No. The showier the better. I plan similar theatrics of my own.

“Can’t wait to see them.” I found a long copper ladle and stirred the bubbling pot. “Think we’re going to live through this?”

She just shrugged and busied herself with her sputtering, burbling machine.

Darla joined me at the pot, holding a napkin at arm’s length and wrinkling her nose. She shook the cloth out in the pot, eyed the stain left behind by something malodorous, and dumped the napkin in as well.

I stirred, turning my face away from the sudden rotting-meat stench.

“Tell me that did not come from the kitchen,” I said.

She was about to reply when the dead man came walking down the grand stairs.

I’d wrapped him in a blanket. I’d checked him for a pulse. I’d never forget that bloody eyeless face. I knew it was him, up and moving, though no spark of life remained.

People saw and screamed. A few rushed to help. Even in the dim light, you could easily see that his eyes had been gouged out. The way he walked, wobbly-legged, arms held out before him, made him appear gravely injured.

Before I could do more than draw my gun, the first of his would-be rescuers reached him. The dead man fell toward them, arms stretched wide, and caught two in a tight embrace. They all three went down, rolling and flapping, finally landing in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.

By then I’d managed to shove my way nearly there. I was close enough to hear the two men the corpse had grabbed start screaming, close enough to see them stumble to their feet, clawing at their own eyes, charging headlong into the crowd.

The dead man rose, laid his hands on the chest of the man nearest him.

That man too began screaming.

Then the screaming man took up a fork and put out his own eyes.

I threw someone aside and took careful aim and put all six rounds square in the dead man’s chest.

I might as well have tossed roses. He opened his mouth and made a wet burbling noise and came stomping toward me.

My gunfire had at least scattered the crowd. I backed away at a quick walk, waving my arms and keeping the blind corpse moving toward me. I figured I had a good twenty feet of floor before my back found the wall.

I hadn’t figured on an overturned chair. I tripped over the damned thing, dropped my fresh slugs, nearly let the corpse lay a cold white hand on me before I managed to scramble up and scamper away.

Darla appeared, guns blazing. Her shots had no more effect than mine.

I drew Toadsticker. Before I could swing him, a dozen halfdead sailed down the stairs, and twice that poured out of the shadows behind us.

They fell on the dead man like furious crows, silver blades flashing. I saw him grab, saw him take hold a few times, but the halfdead just shrugged him off and kept hacking.

Their blows had far less effect than they should have. Swords broke. Crossbow bolts barely penetrated the dead man’s loose skin-until the Regent’s creature entered the fray.

She didn’t charge in. She didn’t even rush. She strolled up to the dead man, plucked a pair of halfdead out of his grasp and cast them away. When the walking corpse laid his hands upon her, she simply took hold of his wrists and held them still.

The ring of halfdead closed in, blades flashing. Where a moment ago their swords had been useless, now they bit deep. Thick black blood flew.

It didn’t take long. Darla turned away. I loaded my gun and put it in my pocket and joined the ring of halfdead at the corpse.

The pieces still twitched and struggled. The mouth worked, teeth clacking, white tongue testing the air like some blind damp worm. The hands still tried to crawl and clench into fists, though each was pinned to the deck with a fine silver blade.

Small groups of halfdead managed to push the gamblers who’d been touched against the floor. All but one writhed and bellowed. Blood pooled under the still man, black in the dim light.

“Boy,” said Mama Hog, who came stamping up behind me, her infamous meat cleaver in one hand and a red-tipped fire poker in the other. “Boy, that wand-waver needs you, right now.”

I didn’t have to ask. A dozen halfdead nodded and broke ranks, flanking me and Mama without a word or a sound.

Stitches was standing near the stage, her metal-vaned staff glowing in her hands. Darla was beside her, guns drawn.

Do not come near. Sorcery is at work here.

I approached to stand by Darla. Mama stomped up as well, keeping the hot end of her poker in constant motion.

“What the hell?”

Things looked almost normal, at first. Couples were dancing, some in the decadent modern style made recently popular by a finder and his wife, some in the formal bows and turns of an Old Kingdom dance.

The casino was largely empty. The appearance of the walking dead has a tendency to clear a room. But these people danced, and danced, and from the looks of horror on their faces, and the way their jaws worked-trying to scream-it was obvious they were being compelled to dance.

“Dammit, tell the musicians to stop,” I said.

“They can’t,” said Darla. “None of them can.”

A woman twirled past, her arms raised, her feet moving in perfect time to the waltz. She should have been smiling.

She was trying to cry out.

A man rushed up to her, shouting and pleading. He stood in her way and she knocked him aside. He tried to grab her, to pick her up and carry her away, but even with her feet off the floor, she continued to spin and twirl, dragging him with her.

He kept shouting, calling her name. In desperation, he reached up and took her hands.

As soon as they joined hands, he stopped shouting. His feet began to move in time with hers. He tried to speak but couldn’t open his mouth.

His eyes lost focus.

They twirled silently away, and were gone.

“It’s a geas,” said Mama. She spat. “Damn, these here people is liable to dance ’til they’re dancin’ on nubs.”

A woman brushed past us and joined the dancers in a jerky, tortured path across the floor, her hand held up to a partner who wasn’t there.

More are being called. I cannot stop it.

I took Darla’s hand, motioned to Stitches. “Would something like this need a hexed object?”

Damned if I know.

I spied something on an empty table just beyond the range of the dancers and took a couple of steps to get a better look.

A small ornate chest, all brass and dark wood, sat on the table. Atop it, two tiny dancers spun in an endless circle.

“Stitches. Do you see that?”

Before Stitches could reply, Mama trundled past me. She brought her poker down on the music box with a wild yell.

The mechanical dancers danced on, unbroken.

Mama howled and swung her poker sideways. It struck the music box with a clang and bounced out of Mama’s hand, leaving the box intact and in place.

Mama hacked away with her cleaver, which raised sparks and left deep gouges in the table but couldn’t land a solid blow on the music box. Mama cussed and adopted a two-handed stance that probably would have decapitated Trolls but merely left her huffing and puffing as she circled the music box, swinging.

Stitches marched up beside Mama and brought her staff down hard on the clockwork dancers. There was a crack of thunder and Mama stepped back, still wheezing and puffing.

The tiny dancers danced on, unharmed.

This artifact must be summer-born. Stitches backed away from it. I advise keeping your distance.

“Markhat.” I turned, recognizing the voice and having no idea how the Regent had come to stand beside me. “The huldra. Give it to her.”

His creature oozed up, smiling at me, her right hand outstretched. It should have been covered in blood. There wasn’t a drop to be seen.

I hauled the false huldra out of my pocket and handed it to her.