After my first and only failed kill (!!!), I crept back
down to that spot by the creek to finish watching Lily pretty up the hole. My
mind was screwed up from the shock of having walked away from a kill. I’m
beginning to wonder if I’m even me anymore—is that girl really a swamp witch,
and did she transform me into somebody else while I wasn’t looking? After I was
all done watching her and came back to my tent, I took a quick look in a
compact mirror I’d stolen off a previous victim and found that I at least still
looked like me. But that doesn’t
necessarily mean I’m still me…
Anyway,
I watched her prettying up that hole for at least another twenty-five minutes,
and then I heard her begin to murmur under her breath. I strained my ears to
hear what she was saying, and when I couldn’t hear from my distance, I silently
crept closer and closer. Don’t turn
around, I silently pleaded. Please,
don’t turn the hell around. If she caught me spying on her, I would be
branded with the Scarlet J for all eternity—J for “jackass.”
Lily
was praying. She was praying for the dead guy, like this was some kind of
memorial service (I’ve never been to a memorial service once, but I know what
goes on at them from TV). She didn’t know his name, had never seen him alive at
any point in her life (or at least, that’s what she told me), and he meant
nothing to her, yet she was praying for him and setting up a makeshift funeral
as if he had been her brother or husband.
What the fuck was wrong with this girl?!
I strolled over there and caught
her by the shoulder. Her praying ceased, and she looked up at me with those
big-ass eyes that I always found quite creepy. “So you do know this guy,” I
told her. I made myself sound very
displeased that she had lied to me, and I was.
She
shook her head. “No, I don’t.”
“Bullshit,”
I said, giving her a rough shake. “You don’t just pray for people you don’t
know, nor do you cry for them, or make pretty little graves for them…if you
don’t know someone and they’re dead, you leave ‘em alone. That’s what any normal person does, anyhow.” I no longer
cared that she knew I had been spying.
“The
poor guy doesn’t have anybody else to pray for him right now,” Lily said, “so
I’ve got to.”
“Like
that’ll do him any good now.” I released her and began to walk away. Lily
returned to her prayer for the dead guy she didn’t know and never would. I
rolled my eyes, finding this to be one of the most ridiculous things I’d ever
seen anybody do.
That’s
when I heard her say, “Oh, and God? About Blade Queen…”
I had
to clamp my hand over my mouth to keep from screaming. I ran back to the tent
like I had rockets attached to me.
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