Better Off Undead Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Acknowledgements

  Introduction

  AFTERLIFE

  A GRAIN OF SALT

  THE POET GNAWREATE AND THE TAXMAN

  THE INFERNAL REVENANT SERVICE

  MUMMY KNOWS BEST

  SPIRIT

  GENIUS LOCI

  AH, YEHZ

  GAMMA RAY VERSUS DEATH

  MUSEUM HAUNTINGS

  FLESH

  MY TEARS HAVE BEEN MY MEAT

  THE PERFECT MAN

  TWO ALL BEEF PATTIES

  THAT SATURDAY

  WALKING FOSSIL

  UNDEAD

  NIGHT SHIFTED

  TWELVE STEPPING IN THE DARK

  GOOBLE, GOBBLE, ONE OF US

  BUMP IN THE NIGHT

  SEPARATION ANXIETY

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Why do I get all the wannabe slayers?

  It’s not like I’m anyone’s idea of ultimate evil. I’m a convenience store cashier, for Chrissake! I don’t need more than a pint of the red stuff a week, and I try to get it in daily doses. Preferably with someone who knows what I am and doesn’t mind a little nibble, although if I don’t have a girlfriend, it’s kind of expensive paying for a fifteen minute simulated quickie each night, just so I can get my few ounces in.

  “Will that be all, ma’am?’’ I might not be much of a vampire, but God help me, I’ll be a polite one.

  "You are so staked, sucker.’’ She even tried to fake the Buffy accent. With her Texan drawl, it didn’t work.

  I smiled at Miss Grrrl Power Wannabe Slayer, a nice smile that didn’t show my fangs. "Pardon, ma’am?’’

  She shoved the dowel a little closer to my liver while I rang up her Doritos. "Enough with the talking, it’s, like, time to die.’’

  I really did not have time for this. I don’t get sick pay, and there’s no way I was going to go to a hospital. The kid was worse than the potheads who did their best to buy out our stock of blunts each night. At least the potheads were harmless.

  —from "Night Shifted’’ by Kate Paulk

  Also Available from DAW Books:

  Blood Bank by Tanya Huff

  Tanya Huff’s Blood books centered around three main characters: Vicki Nelson, a homicide cop turned private detective, her former partner Mike Celluci, and vampire Henry Fitzroy, who is the illegitimate son of Henry VIII. Not only are the three of them caught in a love triangle, but they are, time and again, involved in mysteries with a supernatural slant from demons, werewolves, and mummies. Here are all the short stories featuring Henry, Vicki, and Mike, and as an added bonus for fans of the TV series Blood Bank includes the screenplay for "Stone Cold,’’ the episode Tanya herself wrote for the Blood Ties series along with a special introduction by Tanya, detailing her own experiences with the show.

  Enchantment Place edited by Denise Little

  A new mall is always worth a visit, especially if it’s filled with one-of-a-kind specialty stores. And the shops in Enchantment Place couldn’t be more special. For Enchantment Place lives up to its name, catering to a rather unique clientele, ranging from vampires and were-creatures, to wizards and witches, elves and unicorns. In short, anyone with shopping needs not likely to be met in the chain stores. With stories by Mary Jo Putney, Peter Morwood, Diane Duane, Laura Resnick, Esther Friener, Sarah A. Hoyt and others.

  Witch High edited by Denise Little

  There are high schools attended by students with special talents, like music and art, or science and mathematics. But what if there was a school that catered to those rarest of students—people with the talent to perform actual magic? The fourteen original tales included in Witch High explore the challenges that students of the magical arts may face in a high school of their very own. If you think chemistry is difficult, try studying alchemy. If you ever fell victim to a school bully, how would you deal with a bully gifted with powerful magic? If you ever wished for extra time to study for those exams, could the right spell give you all the time you could possibly need? These are just a few of the magical adventures that will await you when you enter Salem Township Public High School #4, a place where Harry Potter and his friends would feel right at home.

  Copyright © 2008 by Tekno Books and Daniel Hoyt.

  eISBN : 978-0-756-40512-0

  All Rights Reserved

  DAW Book Collectors No. 1456.

  DAW Books is distributed by Penguin Group (USA).

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious.

  All resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.

  The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  First Printing, November 2008

  DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED

  U.S. PAT. AND TM. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

  —MARCA REGISTRADA

  HECHO EN U.S.A.

  PRINTED I NTHE U .S. A.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Introduction and Section Introductions copyright © 2008 by Daniel M. Hoyt

  A Grain of Salt copyright © 2008 by Sarah A. Hoyt

  The Poet Gnawreate and the Taxman copyright © 2008 by Dave Freer

  The Infernal Revenant Service copyright © 2008 by Laura Resnick

  Mummy Knows Best copyright © 2008 by Esther M. Friesner

  Genius Loci copyright © 2008 by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  Ah, Yehz copyright © 2008 by Thranx, Inc.

  Gamma Ray versus Death copyright © 2008 by Carrie Vaughn

  Museum Hauntings copyright © 2008 by Phyllis Irene Radford

  My Tears Have Been My Meat copyright © 2008 by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  The Perfect Man copyright © 2008 by Fran LaPlaca

  Two All Beef Patties copyright © 2008 by Joseph E. Lake, Jr.

  That Saturday copyright © 2008 by Devon Monk

  Walking Fossil copyright © 2008 by Robert A. Hoyt

  Night Shifted copyright © 2008 by Kate Paulk

  Twelve Stepping in the Dark copyright © 2008 by Rebecca Lickiss

  Gooble, Gobble, One of Us copyright © 2008 by Charles Edgar Quinn

  Bump in the Night copyright © 2008 by Amanda S. Green

  Separation Anxiety copyright © 2008 by S.M. Stirling

  INTRODUCTION

  Daniel M. Hoyt

  Undead. The word immediately evokes the image of a vampire, a supernatural being existing beyond human mortality, mercilessly feeding on the blood of the living. The vampire’s ironic reliance on human life in order to cheat death underscores the dichotomy between vampires and humans. Is it any wonder that vampires are often depicted as tortured and tormented?

  But what if they weren’t such emotional wrecks? What if they actually liked being undead? What if being undead were better?

  This idea has been acknowledged in modern entertainment: the vampire photographer, Otto Chriek, in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novel The Truth (2000), as well as the semi-regular Discworld zombie, Reg Shoe; Mel Brooks’ vampire spoof movie, Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995); Joss Whedon’s unapologetic vampire Spike in the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003).

  Although it’s not clear when the term "undead’’ first came about, this modern romantic vision is generally credited to Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897) over a century ago. Over time, the ranks of the undead have expanded from the titular vampire in Stoker’s novel to include entities that were once alive,
but are now neither alive nor dead in the classical sense. Stoker’s Count Dracula was also a shape-shifter—taking the forms of a wolf and even inanimate mist during the course of the novel—so this explosion of undead tropes isn’t surprising, but a natural progression from the Count’s mythos. (Although, ironically, shape-shifters are not traditionally considered undead!)

  Given the broad scope of the modern undead and a burning desire to prove that being undead isn’t necessarily all that bad, I asked eighteen writers—some well-known and even iconic in horror and supernatural fantasy, some fresh faces, and some you’ll be surprised to find in this anthology—to surprise me with stories where it’s better to be undead than alive.

  Naturally, some of those stories are lighthearted, even humorous. But not all of them—just because it’s better doesn’t mean it isn’t creepy. What follows are adventures in four realms of the undead: the highly-anticipated AFTERLIFE, the ghostly world of SPIRITS, the walking dead FLESH of zombies and revenants, and the traditional UNDEAD of vampires and others like them.

  I hope you’ll enjoy the journey.

  AFTERLIFE

  Many people believe in an afterlife, but few think of it as being peopled by the undead—yet that’s exactly what it has to be. If there is an afterlife, be it heaven or hell or something else, it’s peopled by the former living, acting much the same as if they were still alive. In other words—undead. Four writers embraced this concept to provide glimpses of afterlives worth believing in.

  Sarah A. Hoyt takes us on a wild ride through part of the eighteen Chinese hells, complete with supernatural contracts. When Dave Freer mixes up a poet, a witch, a dentist and a taxman, it can only end up in a bar. Our communal frustration with the IRS resonates with Laura Resnick’s tale of sin, judgment, and penance. And only Esther M. Friesner can make mummies seem this attractive.

  A GRAIN OF SALT

  Sarah A. Hoyt

  My name is Hui and my surname is Fang. I was born in the year of the Fire Pig, at the time of the Quin Shi Huangdi Emperor, on the banks of the Yellow River, in a village of no significance.

  I was my father’s only surviving son. But since my father was only a secretary of the rank 6-A to the local court and since by great misfortune on the year of my birth the Emperor fined all his functionaries throughout China twenty silver in cash for pestering his Majesty with unneeded petitions, there was no money for my schooling.

  Still my father taught me at home the principles of Lao Tze and the Classic of the Mountains and the Sea and many other excellent works, which he bought by forsaking a portion of our weekly rice.

  Thus I grew up hungry but learned. I could write a perfect hand and improvise on the spot an erudite poem to a lotus leaf and there was every hope that when I stood the examination I might get a post with the provincial ministry.

  To great misfortune, just before my twentieth birthday I was waylaid on a deserted road on a night when the moon suddenly vanished and all became pitch black.

  At my death I was given the name Heng.

  We have found this auspicious site, which is suitable for the grave of Fang Hui Heng. We use 99,999 strings of cash as well as five-colored-silk as offerings of good faith to buy this plot of land.

  To the east and the west, it measures five steps; to the south and the north, it measures ten steps. To the east is the green dragon’s land with the element of wood and the season of spring; to the west the white tiger’s land, whose element is metal, whose season is autumn; to the south is the red phoenix, whose element is fire and the season of summer; to the north is the Great Tortoise, whose element is water, whose season is winter, and in whose power lies immortality.

  The imperial guard shall patrol the four borders. The deputy of the grave mound and the earl of the tomb shall seal it off by pacing its borders; the generals shall make twisting paths through the fields so that for one thousand autumns and ten thousand summers no spirit will find its way back from the dead. If any dare contravene, they shall be imprisoned by the Two-Thousand-Bushel-Captain-of-the-Underworld.

  We have prepared meat and wine and fruits and the sacrificial food. These things are a contract of our sincerity.

  Once the land is paid for, the order will be given for the workmen to build the tomb. After the deceased is buried, that will guarantee good fortune and peace for ten thousand thousand years.

  Someone finished reading the document, and I came awake with a start. At first I saw nothing. Blinking brought me a vision of a smoky, dark cavern, where many people clustered and something made a sound like metal rubbing on metal. The sound was barely audible, drowned out as it was in the screaming, shrieking, and begging of a thousand tongues.

  Closer at hand, I had other problems. For one, I was shackled, my hands and feet held by boards pierced with holes, then tied to each other by strong ropes, so that I could only walk in the smallest of steps and could not move my hands at all.

  Worse than that, on either side of me were two men. At least I assumed they were men. They looked like clouds formed entirely of ice and curling snow.

  In front of me stood a functionary in silk robes, holding a document and glaring down. "How do you plead?’’ he said.

  I realized suddenly, in dismay, that he had the head of a tiger and multiple necklaces of jade. His eyes looked like deep-set fires, burning at me.

  "How do you plead, you miserable debt-skipper?’’

  I remembered the contract read at me. A tomb contract. I supposed my father had ruined himself in providing well for me in the underworld. But none of this explained why I was shackled and guarded. Or why I was being called a debt skipper by a creature with the head of a tiger.

  The tiger’s tongue lolled out in an expression or distaste or perhaps of madness. "Answer me.’’

  "I . . . milord,’’ my voice emerged creaking and trembling like a metal spring too long held immobile.

  "Kowtow to the Lord Ping Deng Wang, ruler of the Ninth Court of Feng Du,’’ the dark cloud creature next to me bellowed. It reached out and grabbed me by the neck, pushing me forward, into what could be a kowtow—or just as well a full-bodied sprawl, held only by the boards that served as shackles.

  Being that close to the ground, I could tell it was neither stone nor dirt nor paving, but a sort of black ice. And being that close to it, I might as well pretend I intended it as a kowtow. I looked up. Feng Du. I was in Feng Du—the hell of eighteen levels where souls suffered punishment for their sins in life. How had it happened? Surely my parents had done everything to ensure I would suffer no such fate. And I had not sinned in my life. Indeed, I had had too little time to live, much less to sin.

  And the tiger-headed gentleman facing me was none other than Ping Deng Wang, the Lord of the Iron Web, who held you fast while the lords of the underworld reviewed your sins and decided on the appropriate eternal punishment.

  I abased myself, hitting my head on the floor three times. "Oh, Lord Ping Deng Wang, sublime Lord of the Iron Web,’’ I said. "This miserable one does not know what his crime is. He died before he was twenty summers and is not aware of having committed any of the nine unforgivable sins.’’

  "Silence!’’ The guard to the right of me—was he a Two Thousand Bushel Captain? Such were usually the officers of the courts of the underworld—put his foot on my neck. "Do not lie to the Lord.’’

  "You and your wife, Yen, have not ever paid the bill for your land and therefore you are liable to punishment as debtors.’’

  I should have been terrified. I was terrified. Nonpayment of debt was a serious offense. More serious, though, was the mention of a wife, Yen. I’d died at twenty, unmarried. How had I acquired a wife?

  I did not dare ask the tiger, who turned to one of the officers near me and said something. He did not address his words to me, and I could not hear him through the shrieking of the damned and the rubbing of metal on metal.

  The two guards grabbed me and lifted me, then threw me. I flew through the air, through darkness and col
d. The cavern could not be that large, but it felt as though I flew through thousands of years of darkness, till I hit something. The something was a web made of iron strings. I clung to it, unable to move, like an insect in a spider’s silk.

  At the same time, with a twang of metallic strings, she landed beside me.

  She was small and lithe, with a body like a graceful spring stream, skin the color of the whitest lotus, and eyes and hair as black as a summer night. Around her waist was a girdle of bright green jade beads.

  "Who are you?’’ I said.

  "I am Yen,’’ she said. "I am your wife.’’

  "I have no wife,’’ I said, pitching my voice so she could hear it over the mayhem around us.

  She was the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen, and at any other time, I’d think myself the most fortunate of men to have acquired her as a wife. But right then my heart was speeding at the thought of the torments ahead. Would they send me to the forest of iron, where every leaf of every tree is a blade? Would I be commanded to climb the trees and cut myself to ribbons over and over again? Or would I fall under the purveyance of the Fifth Hell, which was ruled over by Yen Lo Wang, where they gouged out your heart and boiled you in oil?

  It was hard to concentrate on Yen’s lovely features and disconcerting to realize she did not look in the least troubled by our location or our fate. "You had no wife when you died,’’ she said. "But your parents were approached by people who said their daughter had died without marrying. For a very small price, they allowed your parents to celebrate a wedding between your body and my bones, that you might have company in the underworld.’’

  I thought about it. It was not unusual. Not unusual at all. In fact, some villages had a matchmaker for the dead as well as one for the living. It gave the parents someone to call their kin, and it provided the dead with that companionship they would otherwise have lacked in their afterlife journeys.