“It wasn't a trick!” Seth snapped. Jenny punched him in the mouth.
“Stop,” she hissed. “Stop lying. You've always served the love-charmer.”
“Even if that's true, I don't serve her anymore,” Seth said. “I'm not a prisoner of my past. Unlike zombie boy over there. And now you let him trick you into being his slave—”
“Quiet!” Jenny plunged the knife into his stomach.
“Ow, stop, Jenny!” Seth said. “That's going to take a minute to heal.”
“I know.”
Seth glanced at Alexander, then back at Jenny. “So that's it. You're going to kill me and run off with him.”
“Alexander and I have always been together,” Jenny said. “You belong with Ashleigh. That is how it has always been.”
“Always?” Seth asked. “I may not remember much, but I did see our last few lives together. You weren't with him then. You were with me.”
“I don't think so...” Jenny began, but the intense look in Seth's eyes triggered something inside her. She remembered when Alexander had opened up her past-life memories, there were a couple that he steered her right past without looking. Her most recent lives.
“Jenny, we need to hurry up and kill him,” Alexander said. “We have to dispose of all these bodies.”
“One second. I'm just trying to decide how I want to do it.” Jenny remembered herself in early industrial London, hurrying up a narrow, crowded street with an armload of books whose subjects ranged from scientific medical treatises to kabbalistic magic. She was going to meet Seth in the small, dusty loft where he lived. They were working together, trying to figure out the meaning of their powers. The anticipation of seeing him made her face flush.
Then another life, decades later. Jenny was part of a traveling circus in America in the early twentieth century. She was part of the freak show—people would pay pennies to see “The Most Diseased Woman in the World.” One week, the circus pitched its tents in a field alongside a tent revival, where she met a boy who, according to the preacher that he traveled with, could heal any ailment for a quarter. Once they met, they never parted again.
Now, the last piece of herself fell into place. Her relationship with the healer was no trick. She had chosen to pull away from the dead-raiser...just as the healer had chosen to pull away from the charmer.
“Jenny,” Alexander said.
“This is no good,” Jenny said. “I can cut him up all night, but he heals too fast. If you're really in a hurry, I need to burn him.”
“Jenny!” Seth said. “What's wrong with you?”
“Shut up, healer,” Jenny said. She turned to Manuel and the two gunmen, who were off to her right, near the door. “Someone bring me a pan of hot coals. And tongs.”
Manuel looked to Alexander, who was on Jenny's left. Alexander gave a quick nod, and Manuel gestured for his two gunmen to go. They both hurried out of the room.
“Seth, Seth, Seth...” Jenny traced her scalpel down along his rib cage, drawing a thin line of blood. “You really had me fooled for a while. I thought you loved me.”
“I did love you.”
Jenny snarled. “You're pathetic. I want you to beg me for mercy.”
“Mercy?” Seth asked. “I don't want it. If you really want me dead, Jenny, go ahead and do it. My life isn't worth living if you don't love me.”
She smiled. “Then you've made your choice. And here's what I'm going to do.” Jenny slashed a deep cut along the top of each of his arms, which were extended out to his sides. “First, we make our incisions. Then we fill them with fire to keep the wounds open.”
“I can't believe this is what you are now,” Seth whispered.
“Here they are,” Jenny said. The gunmen returned, one of them carrying, with oven mitts, a cast-iron skillet full of burning charcoal. “Could you guys have taken a little longer? What did you do, stop for a drink on the way?”
“We hurried, la bruja,” one of the men said.
“Quiet.” Jenny took the tongs from the other gunman, the one who wasn't holding the black skillet. She pinched out a few red-hot pieces of charcoal. She scattered these along one of Seth's arms. He screamed, rocking back from her as far as the ropes would allow.
“You fucking bitch!” Seth screamed.
“Hold still,” Jenny whispered. She dropped most of the charcoal onto the coil of rope binding his wrist. Louder, she said: “Can you feel that burning, Seth? That's what my hate for you feels like.”
She sprinkled more hot coals along his other arm, again saving most of them to drop on the rope at his wrist. He thrashed and screamed, trying to get back and away from her. “Now, this next part is going to get messy,” Jenny said.