"Because she was there. The dead don't have any strength compared to the living. If she wants me silent, if she's paying attention to me, then believe me, Tin, I can't speak."

"I'm alive, Lizzy. I wanted you to speak."

"Yes, you had the strength to call me, but, Tin, if you're strong, she's—well, she's beyond strong. When she noticed me, she saw the opportunity. She used me, kept me close by, so she could raid my memory the way she raided yours. Use me as part of that Madeleine thing she made. She's a master at manipulating the dead. I thought it was mortuary reunion week at breakfast here this morning. All last night she was rummaging through the graveyard, calling those poor saps back from wherever they were and forcing them to attend her little banquet."

"Why? Who is she? Is she Madeleine?"

"I told you, she made Madeleine. Out of nothing. Out of your desires. Whatever you thought was beautiful and charming, that's what Madeleine became. The way she found the perfect taste and smell and texture for every food you ate today. She also drew on me, of course, forced me into the illusion. I was like clay to her, I couldn't do anything but what she wanted as long as she watched me."

"So I guess she's not watching now."

"You failed her. She left raging. And for the time being, she forgot me. For the first time since you called me back, we're alone together."

Quentin remembered how it was when he first took Madeleine home to meet Mom and Dad. How Madeleine never left them alone.

"Yes," said Lizzy. "Like that. Because she's mortal, she has power over me. She could paste little bits of me into Madeleine. My memories of you. Little habits of mine that you would respond to without realizing it."

"And I believed it all."

"Of course you did. Everyone did. When you went out in public with Madeleine, she pulled me in and used me as the core of her, so the illusion could fool hundreds of people all at once."

"That must have been hard for you."

"Only because I hated what she was doing to you. As for me, I had no urgent appointments. The dead never do. It's not that we're apathetic, we still care about things as much as ever. We're... patient."

"And yet you're here."

"Because you have a deadline. Because there are worse things than death."

"Losing Madeleine?"

"Opening that box."

"Why? What's in it?"

"I don't know what it is, Tin. I only know that it's very strong and the others are all terrified of it."

"The others?"

"The other dead ones. The dead ones at breakfast. The only one who doesn't fear it is the one who's been using us. She hungers for it. That's why she's so angry now. Why she isn't paying attention to us. We aren't useful to her at the moment."

"So she is human. She can only do one thing at a time."

"She's stronger than you and definitely stronger than me, but she can't do everything. I don't think she was able to keep her true self from leaking into Madeleine. Especially today. Today she was so busy keeping her dead puppets under control that she wasn't as careful about making Madeleine act like Miss Perfect all the time. Especially when she had the servants in the room. There weren't any real people behind those servants, dead or alive. She was just making you see them. That's a lot harder than building an illusion around a real soul. Making those servants about wore her out. And while she was maintaining them, some of the others got to sneak in a few things they wanted to say to you."

"Lizzy, I don't understand this."

"And you think I do? It's not like they give us a manual: How to Be Dead. The answers to everything don't become clear the minute you die. I mean, now I know there's definitely a life after death, but we don't look like humans to each other. You see me like this because when you recognize that I'm Lizzy, your mind adds the rest."

The moment she said it, he realized that she was looking a lot less definite. Wavering.

"Don't lose me now," Lizzy cried. "I have to tell you how this works, so you aren't completely helpless against her!"

He reached for her, but there was nothing there. She faded more. "I don't know how to hold on to you!"

"Don't look at me! Look away, listen to my voice until you have me in your head again. The way it was when I read to you out of my favorite books."

"That was real, then," he whispered.

"Listen to me. I don't think she's done with you. She needed you for some reason, and she didn't get what she wants, so she still needs you, and I don't know how to fight her but at least I can tell you what I've figured out about how things work. That's something. It's all I can do."

He nodded, not looking at her. "I'm listening."

"Most mortals can't see us dead people, but she can. So can you, sometimes. She can also cut loose of her body without dying and go out and do stuff. You can't do that."

"Is she here now? Is she listening to us? Would you even know?"

"I would know, and she isn't, not right now. I can't even feel her rage, that's how far off she is. Maybe she went back to her own body, wherever that is. The point is that when she's loose and wandering, she's like us dead people. Only she's stronger because her body's alive. So let me tell you what I've figured out about souls, so you'll know what she is when she's loose. We don't even have a location, unless somebody mortal calls us the way you called me. When I'm not here with you, I'm nowhere in particular. We're still free to make choices, but without a body there aren't a lot of choices to make. We can't change anything in the physical world, and we're kind of weak in some ways. We can get tired—I'm about wiped out now. And we're still bound to our old lives, for a while at least, until the old ties dissolve away. The people she called to breakfast, they're tied to this house, to the family that holds this place. She's part of it, and she can use it to bring them and tame them. That's the list. All I Know About Death, by Lizzy the Dead Girl."

"Lizzy, who is she?"

"I don't know, Tin, that's what I'm trying to tell you. If I knew, do you think I'd keep it a secret from you? I only know that she's so strong she must be mortal. She's a living person. And she's so powerful that she's able to create illusions that you and everybody else can actually see and touch and—and all the other things you did with her."

Quentin thought of all that he had done with Madeleine. "Lizzy, you said that sometimes you were part of Madeleine...." He blushed.

"She only used me like that in crowds, Tin. And don't worry about what I saw. We don't have bodies here, we don't care about that stuff."

"Lizzy, I loved her."

"You loved a dream that had been made real by a person so cruel that—I hate her, Tin. She's vile. But Madeleine wasn't vile. Madeleine was wonderful."

"If this—person—if she's vile, how could she create something as... someone like Mad?" And he was filled all over again with longing for his wife, who he now knew was gone forever, even though he needed her as much as always.

"She didn't invent Madeleine. You did. She took Madeleine out of your head. You gave her the script and she acted it out for you. What you loved was your dream of love."

"Why was she doing this to us?"

"All I know is it has something to do with what's inside that box. Obviously she can't open it herself, or she wouldn't need you."

"But if she wanted me to open it, why were Grandmother and Uncle Paul stopping me? At least, she seemed to think Grandmother was stopping me, and he blocked me the last time I tried to open it—"

"Well, see, the Grandmother and Paul, she didn't call them. They just came. The old lady is a wanderer, like her. Not dead. Uncle Paul—I'm not sure what he is."