[Anita Blake Collection] - Strange Candy Read Free Page A

west drive stood two large trees. As my car crunched over gravel, I could see someone dressed in white. A flare of orange was a match, and the reddish pinpoint of a cigarette sprang to life.
    I stopped the car, blocking the drive, but few people on honest business visit cemeteries at night. Carla had beaten me here, very unusual. Most clients want to spend as little time as possible near the grave after dark. I walked over to her before unloading equipment.
    There was a litter of burned-out cigarettes like stubby white bugs about her feet. She must have been here in the dark for hours waiting to raise a zombie. She either was punishing herself or enjoyed the idea. There was no way of knowing which.
    Her dress, shoes, even hose, were white. Earrings of silver flashed in the moonlight as she turned to me. She was leaning against one of thetrees, and its black trunk emphasized her whiteness. She only turned her head as I came up to her.
    Her eyes looked silver-gray in the light. I couldn’t decipher the look on her face. It wasn’t grief.
    â€œIt’s a beautiful night, isn’t it?”
    I agreed that it was. “Carla, are you all right?”
    She stared at me terribly calm. “I’m feeling much better than I did this afternoon.”
    â€œI’m very glad to hear that. Did you remember to bring his clothes and a memento?”
    She motioned to a dark bundle by the tree.
    â€œGood, I’ll unload the car.” She didn’t offer to help, which was not unusual. Most of the time it was fear that prevented it. I realized my Omega was the only car in sight.
    I called softly, but sound carries on summer nights. “How did you get here? I don’t see a car.”
    â€œI hired a cab, it’s waiting at the gate.”
    A cab. I would love to have seen the driver’s face when he dropped her off at the cemetery gates. The three black chickens clucked from their cage in the backseat. They didn’t have to be black, but it was the only color I could get for tonight. I was beginning to think our poultry supplier had a sense of humor.
    Arthur Fiske was only recently dead, so from the box in the trunk I took only a jar of homemade ointment and a machete. The ointment was pale off-white with flecks of greenish light in it. The glowing flecks were graveyard mold. You wouldn’t find it in this cemetery. It only grew in graveyards that had stood for at least a hundred years. The ointment also contained the obligatory spider webs and other noisome things, plus herbs and spices to hide the smell and aid the magic. If it was magic.
    I smeared the tombstone with it and called Carla over. “It’s your turn now, Carla.” She stubbed out her cigarette and came to stand before me.I smeared her face and hands and told her, “You stand just behind the tombstone throughout the raising.”
    She took her place without a word while I placed ointment on myself. The pine scent of rosemary for memory, cinnamon and cloves for preservation, sage for wisdom, and lemon thyme to bind it all together seemed to soak through the skin itself.
    I picked the largest chicken and tucked it under my arm. Carla stood where I had left her, staring down at the grave. There was an art to beheading a chicken with only two hands.
    I stood at the foot of the grave to kill the chicken. Its first artery blood splashed onto the grave. It splattered over the fading chrysanthemums, roses, and carnations. A spire of white gladioli turned dark. I walked a circle sprinkling blood as I went, tracing a circle of steel with a bloody machete. Carla shut her eyes as the blood rained upon her.
    I smeared blood on myself and placed the still-twitching body upon the flower mound. Then I stood once again at the foot of the grave. We were cut off now inside the blood circle, alone with the night, and our thoughts. Carla’s eyes flashed white at me as I began the chant.
    â€œHear me, Arthur Fiske. I call you from the