I The dead girl woke and asked for her perfume and we gave it to her and she slept again.
And when she did so I felt glad I had not let anyone rifle through her things as often happened before the funeral. Someone might have been wearing her scent at the ceremony but no one was.
So now she lies on my bed with her bluewhite hand curled around the glowing vial. The one thing she wanted.
Nero sniffs, leans a shoulder gingerly against the doorway, avoiding his newly-implanted wings. "They do that with dinoflagellates, you know. It's nothing special."
"Don't be jealous," I tell him. Of course he cannot help it, he is very young, and anyway we are all of us a little rattled right now, I would say that none of us are really acting like ourselves, not
really.
Someone needs to tell, someone whispers just outside the cracked door of my room, and someone whispers back
Shhh! What is wrong with you? and someone else adds
What the fuck is wrong with you? For now I think the secret is safe. But the owners of our House will find out at some point. Not from me and not from my fellow courtesans, and need has nothing to do with what we do anyway. Does it. Ever. Has it. Ever.
Nero gets up to stand watch in the hallway and that leaves me in here with the dead girl who is not dead.
...
