Managing Death Read Online Free PDF Page B

given instructions.’
    Neti sniffs at that, and I wonder if I haven’t fucked up again and offended her. ‘You’ll have them back before three, thank you.’
    ‘You could always come with me.’ It doesn’t hurt to offer an olive branch.
    Neti grins wryly. ‘Oh, to walk the streets of Brisbane again. To terrorise and shop. Hm, what sort of parasol is in fashion these days?’
    I start to frame an answer and she laughs. ‘Mr de Selby, these rooms and my gardens are enough. But I appreciate the offer. Besides, what you need to do is aprivate thing, and best shared only with your Ankou. That is, if you trust him.’
    ‘Of course. Absolutely.’
    Neti swings a set of eyes towards the grandfather clock that takes up a large chunk of wall space between two doors. ‘You’re best away. You don’t have much time.’
    I wipe my lips with a linen napkin on which little black spiders have been stitched, far too realistically. I stroke one for a moment, and I swear its legs flutter. I drop it, pick up the knives and leave Neti to her parlour. I feel every single one of her eyes watching me as I walk back down the hallway.
    ‘She’s not kidding,’ Wal says, his eyes fixed on the Knives of Negotiation. ‘You be damn careful with those.’
    ‘I will,’ I say, but he’s already a tattoo on my biceps again. And it’s just me and the knives.
    I walk through the offices, the naked blades in either hand. I’ve got nowhere to put them and they’re certainly not the sort of thing you slip in your pockets. My staff keep their distance. Maybe it’s the slightly manic expression on my face. No, it’s definitely the knives. It gives the concept of staff cutbacks a certain, well, edge. I feel every eye on me and I try not to look menacing, but with the Knives of Negotiation it’s impossible not to. The knives, too, seem curious. They’re mumbling and somehow staring at everyone and everything. I can feel that rapt attention running through my wrists. They want to jerk this way and that. I don’t let them.Though part of me wants to. Part of me knows how easy it would be to re-create my dreams of blood and cuts.
    Once ensconced in my office, I take a deep breath and call Tim.
    Tim regards the knife in his hand with a look that tells me he’s wishing he was back working in the public service. ‘So, how do we do this?’
    We’re standing in the middle of my office. My back’s to my throne, but I can feel it there, the bloody thing a constant presence.
    ‘I know you haven’t done a lot of pomping, but the cut has to be shallow and long. Just like you would if you were stalling a Stirrer.’
    Tim hasn’t stalled anything since we faced off against Morrigan’s Stirrer allies in these very offices a couple of months ago. I’ve kept him away from all of that. He’s much better at administration, at getting people to do what needs to be done. Lissa’s the opposite. She leads by example; people follow her because she gets down and does it, too. I’ve fallen down on the leadership front, but that’s going to change now.
    Tim’s knife hand shakes.
    ‘I wouldn’t ask you to do this,’ I say, ‘if I didn’t need you, and believe me there are much more confronting ceremonies than this one in a Pomp’s repertoire.’ I remember the binding ceremony I’d once performed with Lissa’s ghost. That had involved arcane symbolsand a few good dollops of semen. ‘From what Mr D says, the knives will guide us.’
    For a moment I feel sorry that I’ve pulled Tim into all this. But then he grins at me, and it’s just like old times.
    ‘Fuck it, let’s do this now.’
    I find myself grinning back. ‘Pub afterwards?’
    ‘Absolutely.’
    As one we slice our hands. My cut burns, a flaring burst that wrenches its way up my arm. These are the Knives of Negotiation, after all, they are edged in a multitude of ways and all of them are cutting. The blade bites deeper than I intended. Blood flows thick and fast. Tim reaches out