Night was falling. Rayshade counted the stars as they appeared, his mind wandering elsewhere. He sat on the porch steps, waiting for them to return. The forest grew darker a short distance away. He eyed the edge where the assortment of trees held out their branches invitingly.

“They’ve been gone too long,” he said quietly. “Best not to keep our hopes up, though.”

Springtail’s ears twitched. The dog lay on the grass, his head rested on his paws, at the bottom of the steps. If it weren’t for his cold ultramarine ghost ectoplasm, Rayshade figured he would have been a handsome dog. Golden fur alight in the sunset. A friendly nature, but not high maintenance.

Too bad. Rayshade preferred cats.

A few more stars popped up when three shadowy figures separated from the trees. Slyspore and Greyleaf were chatting animatedly. Since when did they have so many things to talk about?

Soldier followed the Slyspore closely, like a pet. A grossly loyal one.

“Had a fun time, did we?” Rayshade glided towards his body. The zombie cast him a stinky eye but didn’t reply. Not even an irritated growl.

“Well, I had a splendid time, if you want to know,” Rayshade went on. “Being home alone and everything. With the dog.”

Springtail at that moment was sniffing Greyleaf’s idle hands at his side. The faery shivered and shoved his hands back into his pocket, not the slightest clue of the dog’s ghost trailing behind him.

The zombie did not reply. He followed the faeries into the house, leaving Rayshade out on the lawn.

“Can you believe that?” Rayshade said. “I’m getting the cold shoulder. From my own body!”

Springtail looked like he couldn’t care less. In fact, the dog had fallen asleep.

Rayshade muttered incoherent angry expressions under his breath, then glided inside the House, having nowhere else to go.

The Slyspore was already cooking again, smiling and being amiable overall, like a proper host. Dinner was, of course, more mushrooms. Rayshade had a particular dislike for fungivores. The one intruding his house right now was at the top of the list.

“Grog,” Soldier spat at him, once the two faeries were seated and ready to eat.

“You’re dismissing me?” Rayshade couldn’t decide whether he was more surprised than offended. He carried his eyes over the scene; a dinner table set in candle-light, illuminating an odd pair of faeries who couldn’t be more contrasting to each other. They leaned towards each other, carried conversation from one witty quip to another.

It was almost … romantic.

“This is not happening,” Rayshade spat back. “Not in my house!” He swiped his hands across the table, sliding away all of Slyspore’s dinner efforts. Ceramic plates fell and cracked on the floor, glass cups tumbled over, rolling to a stop before the spilled contents of a cooking pot.

For moments, nobody spoke. The two faeries stared at the mess, flabbergasted.

Then Greyleaf said: “Do you have ghosts here?”

Rayshade laughed at that. He stuck his thumb at the assassin and said to Soldier: “This one is clever, at least. Still. It doesn’t mean he should stay.” And to conclude, Rayshade turned the cooking pot upside down.

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“That’s not normal, is it?” Greyleaf insisted, much too composed for Rayshade’s liking. “Ace?”

The fungus faery was having a more appropriate reaction. Speechless. Terrified. Just what Rayshade ordered.

“Ghosts,” Ace finally said.

“Ghost,” Rayshade corrected her. “Just one.”

“Grag!” Soldier chipped in. “Grag!”

“So it wasn’t you who destroyed the garden, was it, Half-Smile?”

Soldier was looking directly at Rayshade with as much as intensity his decaying eyeballs could summon.

“Half-Smile? What are you – is there a ghost here right now?”

Soldier never took his eyes off Rayshade.

“Do it,” Rayshade challenged. “I dare you. Tell the Necromancer about me. See how quickly she’ll get rid of us.”

In the patronizing silence while Soldier thought of his next move, something buzzed. A cellphone.

“I hate to miss out on an exorcism,” Greyleaf stood, hand in his pocket, “but I need to be somewhere else right now. Work things.”

“You hear that, Soldier?” Rayshade said. “The assassin said work things. You know what that means, right? Work. In the night.”

Soldier didn’t respond.

Rayshade pressed him further. “You know that means he’s going to kill someone again, right? Make them end up like us –”

Soldier interrupted with a shriek, lunging at Rayshade with an ugly, battered, and bruised arm. Some of his bones cracked with the effort.

“Honestly, Ace, I wish I could help,” Greyleaf was already rushing out the door.

The Slyspore was much too preoccupied with her zombie and the mess in the kitchen to see the other faerie’s features distort with worry. But Rayshade noticed. It was enough to perk his curiosity. He followed Greyleaf out into the cold night air, easily escaping out of the zombie’s grasps.

Silence enveloped them, quiet like a graveyard. This wasn’t such an exaggerated description, with the ever present forest cemetery casting long shadows over them. Even Greyleaf walked down the pebble path with a light gait, his boots never betraying his footsteps. Rayshade glided along quickly, keeping up his rushed pace.

“To the arcade again, are we?” Rayshade mused aloud. “Off to murder another video game playing fellow?”

Correct. He stopped shortly before the arcade’s main entrance, hidden beneath the deep shadow of a tree. Rayshade waited next to him.

“Tell me,” said Rayshade, conversationally, “how much do we get paid for this, hmm? Is it enough?”

Greyleaf, of course, couldn’t hear him. Or see him. He did shiver and shove his fingers deeper into his pockets, but that was it.

Rayshade carried on anyway. “Do you enjoy it then, hmm? Do you –”

Greyleaf shapeshifted. One second a man was standing there and the next second a woman. Everything else remained the same about her appearance; the twigs and leaves in her hair, the dress made of dull grey leaves, the black laced boots.

“Oh I see now,” said Rayshade. “It’s a game, isn’t it? The rebellious kind. It’s like a protest to you. The more you kill, the more ruthlessly, the larger the rebellion. Is that correct?”

Greyleaf plucked a dagger out of her dress. She held it in her palm, turning the blade over. The hilt was made of twisting wood, spiralling around the metal and sprouting even more grey leaves. Of course it did, Rayshade thought.

Her eyes shone with misty light. She walked into the arcade.

Rayshade waited a moment in the resulting silence. He turned back to see the House, insect-like, a painting with black ink over a black canvas. There was nobody around. Unless you counted the ghosts lighting up the forest with ultramarine ambience.

“I suppose I have to be the sole witness to everything.” He followed her inside.

She knew exactly where he would be; this wasn’t her first time, of course. Rayshade stood at the door while she did it. The boy didn’t have time to yell. He didn’t even hear her approach. With one gesture, the dagger plunged into his flesh. A death blow.

“Marvelous,” said Rayshade while she wiped the dagger on her dress. “Shane, is it? You’d be glad to know there’s a Necromancer next door. And she loves to fix things. She’s an optimistic little bugger.” He leaned over the body, as if sharing a conspiracy. “When do you think your murderer is gonna notice the mushroom over there?”

Almost as if she heard him, Greyleaf turned, her eyes landing on the patch of dried blood a few paces away from the newly dead body. The mushroom resembling Shane’s hair color and overall similarity, stood there innocently. Greyleaf frowned at it for a long time – longer than she could afford to, Rayshade guessed.

“I know, right?” Rayshade said. “A mushroom? At the scene of the crime? Almost as if … I don’t know, a fungus faery was here?”

He waited for the moment of eureka to dawn on the assassin’s face. But only question marks remained, her frown deepening. What was so difficult to understand? What was she thinking?

She plucked a leaf from her dress, and instead of letting it stagger to the floor, she placed it over Shane’s back herself. He lay face down, his chest and arm covered in his own blood once again.