Page 10 of How to Woo the Undead

“Witch!” Dahlia squawked, swatting at the werewolf with the tea towel that had been draped over her shoulder. “I’m doing this for you, my ungrateful flea motel.”

“That was one time, and that was totally an accident!” Melody roared with laughter as she sprang to her feet. The pair of women were loud, however Hyacinth wasn’t paying attention. Her focus was on finishing up the soup in her bowl.

The specter, Agatha, sat next to her at the table. Hyacinth peeked up at the woman with her hair dancing up and above her head. She loved watching it and almost forgot to blink.Blink, blink.She didn’t want to miss a single flick of magic or twirl of tendril. Agatha studied Hyacinth while the dead woman was fascinated. Like a cat watching lights bob around a tree. She’d completely forgotten she even mentioned feelings until Agatha spoke up.

“The first few days, when everything is new, are hardest. But you’ll come around. It’ll start feeling like you soon. You’ll start thinking of your body as yours, and the things it does as your movements. Trust me.” Agatha winked sweetly before extending her hand. Hyacinth took it and climbed to her feet. It was true. She still felt a disconnect. While the actions in the body were hers, this didn’t feel likehome.Hyacinth couldn’t articulate it with words off her tongue, but she felt like a guest. The wordsjust borrowingkept whispering at the back of her skull.

While Dahlia and Melody chortled over some massive, bubbling cauldron in the kitchen, Hyacinth floated through the house like a stiff breeze. Cold and unfeeling, empty, void of any recognition of size or matter. She didn’t weigh anything but also was stuck to the ground at the same time. Her feet brushedacross the worn carpet runner that split the hallways in half. Its fuzzy fibers tickled between her toes.

Hyacinth stopped to wiggle her appendages, felt them sway around her. The swish of the fabric was nice as the sleeves were back down to enveloping her arms. Flapping them made her smile, the sound as they cut through the air was delightful. Jumping around in a circle, she tornadoed her way after Agatha. The action left her breathlessly giddy. Her lungs begged for mercy, but she couldn’t help it. When she came to a skittering halt next some door in the hallway, her face ached.

This hurts. But good hurts. I like it.Her muscles were not used to the function, and it left her a little dizzy. Putting her arms down, easing the muscles she’d overexerted, Agatha pulled open a heavy, wooden door. Under the grand staircase, it wasn’t hidden but it wasn’t advertised. Nestled.That’s a good word for it, I wonder where I learned it?She let her smile soften to give her face a break. Things got significantly better when she realized her leg muscles also ached after a while. After her knees buckled earlier, she learned to listen to the alarms at the back of her head. When something tugged, she didn’t just keep barreling through it.That’s how I lost my left foot.The pain wasn’t what caught her by surprise, it was the sharp fall to the ground with no warning.

Lord Rosemont stitched her foot back onto her ankle, so it was short-lived. But she learned that day to keep an eye on all her limbs and listen to her body.My body.That’s right, her body.My body!Agatha said it would help if she thought of the vessel as her body.Mine.

“Ready?” Agatha chirped, holding a candelabra aloft.

“I am unsure if ready is a sensation or a feeling, but I am physically capable of walking downstairs, yes,” Hyacinth grinned at her with a singular, strong nod.Not time for screaming, butI can handle stairs.

“Perfect!” Agatha giggled as she proceeded to float down the stairs. Hyacinth stepped up to the ledge and stared down.Down. Right. Just…one leg.She lifted her foot off the ground, reminding her muscles of all the steps required to actually walk down the stairs. One hand to the rail, one to the skirt of her dress like Agatha showed her, and then down. Down. Lift foot. Forward. Down. She talked herself through every step until it was a small chant at the back of her head. The steps creaked in tandem with her mantra. They were heavy wood with deep grooves from where steps rubbed away at it every day. Even the rails were a wiggly worm shape from the use. Hyacinth liked that nothing was level until the very bottom.

When she jumped off the last step like one launched off a swing set, she spread her arms out and let the air whoosh past her. It was a pleasant tingly sensation. Head back, eyes closed, the feel of her hair tickling her shoulders and cheeks, it left her feeling…alive.Alive. I am alive.

Hyacinth opened her mouth, ready to scream.Now! Now it is screaming time.

“Oh!...What are you doing down here? Aggie? Where’d you go! Aggie!”

Hyacinth clamped her mouth closed.Not scream time.She grumbled to herself as she twisted toward the great depth of the lab.No one lets me scream. This house is a prison.She tried not to pout, but that was thrice now she wanted to scream and something stopped her.

The lab suddenly went dark minus the candelabra that was left atop a metal worktable. Hyacinth furrowed her brows. It was, mere moments ago, when the basement of the manor was flooded with bright, surgical lighting. Suddenly it was all shadowed and nothing but an amber glow to light her way. Hyacinth tip-toed toward it, a moth following the warmth till her hands touched the workstation. It was cold to the touch.Her muscles immediately retracted from it, but her brain didn’t register why. Not at first. Not until she glanced down and saw the purple and black spiderwebs crawling all over her fingertips.

“Oh, drats, my apologies, I forgot to unattach that from the conductor. Hold still.”

“The conductor?” she murmured at the floating voice from the shadows. While she could feel the vibrations of his movement, she couldn’t see a thing beyond the three feet of amber light. The candles danced in front of her face, their tiny flames doing their best. Hyacinth held up her fingers to the light to see them better. Appendages that didn’t feel like hersjust yetstill wiggled at her command. Her eyes scanned the burned flesh and realized sheknewthat’s what it was.Frostburn.“How did you do that? Does flesh do that when you touch something too cold?”

“Oh, no, not…normally,” the soft inflection was apologetic, but she wasn’t sure why the floating voice was sorry. As she felt something come to stand behind the medical table again, hands were summoned from the shadows. Large, pale ones made of thick hide, something durable.Someonesturdy. The first thing she noticed was the size of them, the second was the stitching. Someone sewed their hands from the wrist to the forearms, but the skin was a slightly different texture.Not the same vessel.It was something internally, she noticed the small things and knew. This voice, the person it belonged to was a collection of parts. In all, four pieces that made up their arm from the elbow down, each section was from someone else.

“You werecreated…are you Austin?” she breathed, peaking up into the shadows. The voice, the made person, was sneaky. Staying out of the candlelight enough that she could only make out a wall of smoke beyond the reach of the amber glow. There were grooves and she could make out tusks, but nothing more defining than that.

“I am…and I was, in the sense you were created, yes.” The voice was more concrete now. A shadowy outline of a person so tall she was forced to lift her chin. Two of the candles blew out with a soft puff of air and she was left with just tiny flames to illuminate a white shirt hung over a torso. Outside of that, she could see hazy shapes that made up a rectangular face, tusks, and broad shoulders. Austin worked on her hands in slow, steady movements she didn’t feel.

“When do you finally feel like a person?” she blurted out as the pressure to speak the words finally grew too much. Something flashed and she had the overwhelming sensation of being stared at once again. All anyone had done since she awoke was stare. Not in a harmful way, nor particularly cruel. But it was as if everyone was watching for her to topple off a high shelf and shatter into a million pieces like a glass vase. “Instead of a collection of parts.”

A soft, wounded laugh bounced around the shadows as he finished wrapping up her fingertips in little bandages. They covered up her nails, which was a shame because she loved those the best. However, they made the annoying pin prickling sensation stop going off. Austin finally spoke with a sigh that made the candle flames dance. “I wish I could tell you.”

“Oh,” she exhaled, glancing down to her hands.

“I can tell you that it takes exactly thirty days from when we get a vessel stitched together, to wake them. I can tell you at exactly 30 days, the heart begins to beat on its own. Then two days after that, your body can start to take its own breath or swallow water if you’re aquatic.”

Hyacinth’s gaze rose steadily up to the shifting shadows once more as he stepped back from the table. She heard the rummaging of hands under it till something low and buzzing finally cut off. Then those large hands returned to the light.They tapped at it hesitantly, as if testing it out, then finally pressed fully against the surface.

“But I can’t tell you when you stop thinking of yourself as a soul within a vessel and begin to see yourself as a person. Sometimes I still feel…”

“Like a thing stuffed in a bear?” the words bubbled up and out of her chest.

“Yessss,” he hissed with understanding.

“I don’t know what bears have to do with it, but I know that’s what itfeelslike.” She grimaced, staring up into the darkness.