"I guess so."
Kissa gave a little tug.
He winced. "I'm okay." His voice was a little higher than it should have been. a little scared.
I held out my hand to him. "Come here."
"Not yet," Janos said.
I'd tried. "What do you want?"
"First drop your guns."
"If we don't?" I thought I knew the answer, but I wanted him to say it.
"Kissa will kill the boy, and you will have done all this for nothing,"
"Help me," Stirling said. "She's mad. She attacked Ms. Harrison with zombies. When we tried to defend ourselves, she nearly killed us."
That was probably what he'd say in court, too. And a jury would believe him. They'd want to believe him. I would be the big, bad zombie queen, and he would be the innocent victim.
Janos laughed, his paper-thin skin threatening to split, but never quite doing it. "Oh, no, Mr. Stirling, I watched from the darkness. I saw you murder the other man."
Fear flashed across his face. "I don't know what you mean. We hired him in good faith. He turned on us."
"My master opened your mind to Bloody Bones. She freed him to whisper in your dreams about land, money, and power. All that you desire."
"Serephina sent Ivy to kill me, or rather for me to kill her. So she'd be sure to have Bloody Bones free," I said.
"Yes," he said. "Serephina told her she had to rid herself of the disgrace of losing to you."
"By killing me."
"Yes."
"What if she'd succeeded?"
"My master had faith in you, Anita. You are death come among us. A breath of mortality."
"Why'd she want the thing freed?" I seemed to be asking that a lot tonight.
"She wishes to taste immortal blood."
"This is all sort of elaborate for a little extra kick in your food."
He gave another rictus grin. "You are what you eat, Anita. Think upon it."
I did, and my eyes widened. "She thinks by drinking immortal blood, she'll be truly immortal?"
"Very good, Anita."
"It won't work," I said.
"We shall see," he said.
"What do you get out it?" I asked.
He cocked his skeletal head to one side, like a decaying bird. "She is my master, and she shares her bounty."