I woke up w about my priorities. Here oh, my biggest problems were that I only had enough moo live for a year or so, less if I kept buying swords. My sed biggest problem was a cute but nosy neighbor.

  On Amaranth, there could be a war brewing. A small war, not involving thousands of people, but heless people could die. And I art-timer, who could take time off from it, while for Xy and Gren it was life ah.

  I ate some cereal for breakfast, and was remihat I had another problem, small. I o do a grocery run. The fall weather had turned a little cold today, and I was grateful, because it meant that Kathy wasn’t out on her porch when I got the sword and dagger from the van. Then I drove to get groceries, and the hardware store for a peephole and a bunch of eleics, all the while wishing I was baaranth. When I got home, I put the groceries away, and then hurried down to the basement, my backpack loaded with stuff as usual.

  I breathed a sigh of relief as I transformed into Abby.

  I hadn’t felt awkward in my body since I started getting muscles in high school and the cool kids decided there were weaker prey to pi. But as Abel, I increasingly felt big and awkward somehow, even though I was good with my hands. It didn’t help that I had to duck every time I went to the basement because I was a couple of ioo tall for the stairs.

  I ged into a bra, panties, jeans, and a halter top. No one in Amaranth was going to objey bra straps showing. I allowed myself a qui the mirror, leased with what I saw, and then got out my drill to bore a hole for the peephole. I couldn’t see much out the hole, of course, and there was work to do oher side to install the hardware. But I looked through it anyway, and saw only green.

  I undid the bolts and drew my sword carefully from its scabbard on my left hip. I’d have to practice to do it quickly, because it was desigo have the edge face up and I didn’t want to cut myself. Then I unlocked the door and ope.

  No ohere. Good, I suppose, but despite my drawn sword, I was hoping for Xy.

  There was no point in lumbering off through the forest trying to find them, and I had work to do, in any case. I set up the outside part of the peephole hardware, including the fish-eye lens. I’d purchased a particurly wide one. I checked from the other side, and the vieretty good. Someone could still hide, of course, but they’d have to know something of how the lens worked to figure out the safe spots.

  Hopefully, I was about to fix that, too, assuming all the teology worked.

  I debated revving the lirimmer, but I didn’t need Xy ren. I just wao know they were alright. I retty sure that if Xy wao know when I , she could have a squirrel wate. And the work I was about to do involved a bunch of going in and out. I still wasn’t sure I wanted Gren to see everything, especially the gate but also my gloomy outpost on Amaranth.

  There was more work to do outside, but only if I could get the inside part to work. Which meant being Abel again. I stripped a upstairs. Really, I should just work naked, it would be easier.

  I ran some Cat 6 down to the basement a up a wi-fi router ected to the i in my house. Then I tested it with my phone.

  Wele to the twenty-first tury, Amaranth. I wasn’t sure what would be worse, introdug gunpowder ons or social media, but a little local wi-fi wouldn’t bring about the apocalypse.

  I checked the peephole and saw Xy and Gren outside he old guardhouse, so I put clothes ba ao join them.

  “The four fiends are now the timid three!” Gren said, lifting her new bow in salute.

  “Oh?”

  Gren nodded, and beamed. “Far be it from me t about my accurate archery, dangerous from distance.”

  Far be it, indeed. I looked to Xy. “What happened?”

  “They came in a rge group, to log. Thirty of them, way too many for me to deal with. But we kept quiet in the forest, aually, Gren mao line up a shot.”

  “A single shaft,” Gren said. “Doomed the desperate dumbass.”

  “They chased after us,” Xy tinued, “but of course we could move quickly in the forest and it was easy to slow them dowually they went back to the vilge, but not before they had killed many trees, some of which they left on the ground and a few they mao cart off.”

  “They will be afraid to e again,” Gren said.

  Xy shrugged. “Perhaps,” she said.

  Gren spotted the sword. “What is that?”

  I drew the sword. She touched its bde. “Sharp. Do you know how to use it?”

  “Not very well,” I admitted.

  “It’s a good on,” Gren said, “but skill matters more.”

  I shrugged.

  “We need a better solution,” Xy said. “Even if Gren kills one every time they e into the forest, many trees will be felled. And they are cautious now. The evil ones she talks about stayed to the ter of the group. We could kill many trolls, but not the trolls we want, and that would only make it harder to e to peace ter. And if they decide to fight to win, rather than merely to take the trees for lumber, then I worry about the pyromancer.”

  I had never seen her quite so solemn. Fierce, angry, happy — but not so serious. “Was the pyromancer with them this time?”

  Gren shook her head. “Timorous tyrant, he cowered cravenly.”

  “I’m gd he wasn’t there,” Xy said.

  Gren mimed shooting an arrow.

  “The troll you shot, Gren. Did they leave the body?”

  “Yes.”

  Now you’re thinking.

  I didn’t like what I was thinking, but it seemed like a good idea. I stood up. “Shall we?” I asked, looking at Xy.

  “What you do with a dead body?” Xy asked. “Not that I’m surprised that you do something.”

  “Zombie,” I said.

  “You’re a neancer!” Gren said.

  “Yes.” I met her gaze, trying to see how she’d take it.

  Her eyes widened. “Delicious damsel, doer of dark deeds.”

  “I don’t think one zombie is going to make a big difference,” Xy said. “But I suppose — I guess we should.” She made a face. She didn’t like the idea aer than I did.

  More zombies are better. But these two are more useful alive, as long as you trol them.

  I had the glimmerings of an idea. If we fought in the forest, Xy was strong, but they khat. They’d be fools if they didn’t use fire against her.

  Don’t you see it? Have the troll with the tits kill trolls as they e into the forest, and raise an army. It so simple!

  Simple, but Xy was right about the downside of indiscriminate killing, even if I didn’t have moral s. And right now, our enemies didn’t know I existed. I still wasn’t that good in a fight, especially the kind of guerril warfare that Gren and Xy would be adept at. My range was twenty meters, forty if I teleported forward and then back, and Gren could shoot at least sixty. “The other trolls have bows, I assume?”

  “They wasted many arrows trying to shoot me st night,” Gren said proudly.

  Yeah. Even a bow like Gren’s old one probably had better rahan my spell. No, I had to find a different way to be useful.

  While we made our way to st night’s battleground, I quizzed Gren about the trolls. I mapped out a yout of the vilge and made note of the names of trolls who were less enthused about the ge in the vilge’s power structure.

  The tral binding activity in troll society was the alcohol aided y she’d talked about earlier, whivolved some kind of beer or wine. Gren’s vilge was a beer vilge. Trolls didn’t seem to have developed distiltion, and if anyone else had, the cept was fn to Gren.

  It was also highly structured by gender. Male trolls lived in the vilge proper, women and children lived on farms outside the vilge, where it was less smelly. Women farmed, which was hard physical work, and included growing wheat and hops, and tending livestock, mostly cows, goats, and chis.

  The men hunted, mihe nearby hills, logged when it ossible, and built things. Sihere wasn’t a lot of logging to do, and that meant less building, they did a lot of hunting. “It keeps them busy,” was Gren’s take. Clearly the majority of the meat came from the livestock, but hunting provided some variety.

  They didn’t use s, although the chief had a stash of them for trading purposes, mostly with the elves. The chief decided who did what, and who got what.

  The body of the troll y on the ground underh some brambles, with an arrow stig out of its throat. If this troll was typical, they were indeed pretty ugly. Sy, with a big nose and warty blue skin. It seemed odd that the troll had stood in su rown spot, and I g Xy.

  “I thought I would make it difficult to recover,” she said. “In case we for something.” There was no dan her eyes of pleasure at her cleverness, just a grim set to her mouth. The vines parted, giving me access.

  “Good thinking,” I said.

  I didn’t want to touch the body. Of course I could avoid that with the wand, but then I’d have to touch the wand. And I’d have to remember t it along. Gah. I had a bag of holding, I had no excuse not to have everything with me all the time, but I hadn’t had it on me because if Xy hadn’t showed up I had pnned on one more trip up to my basement.

  This is it! Once you feel the power, you’ll never go back!

  I pulled the arrow out. There was ne of blood, for his heart had stopped beating a while ago. Gren, less squeamish than I, reached out her hand, and I gave the arrow to her. Maybe the zombie would have looked more fearsome with the arrow still inside, I didn’t know, but I didn’t want to waste an arrow.

  Do it! Do it!

  I put my hands on the body. He was so cold, it sent a shiver down my spine. Bodies were meant to be warm. Until they weren’t, I supposed.

  Ah, sweet death.

  “Animate Lesser Undead,” I said aloud, partly to annoy Enash as much as he was annoying me.

  A sort of bck glow formed around my hands and spread over the body of the troll. Then it faded. Nothing much happened.

  You have spent 25 mana and are now at 56/81.

  For first use of Animate Lesser Undead, you earned 1 experience point, and need 870 to bee a sed level Seductress / Neancer.

  For animating the body of an enemy, you earned 10 experience points, and need 860 to bee a sed level Seductress/Neancer.

  Okay, that was something, but I was still just a pretty girl toug a very dead ugly troll. I took my hands away.

  and it to sy your enemies! Not that just one zombie troll will do much. They work best in hordes.

  Ah. It wasn’t doing anything because I hadn’t told it to do anything. “Stand up,” I said.

  The zombie got to its feet, in an awkward, shambling kind of way. Xy and Gren took a step back.

  The zombie wasn’t a lot of good fuerril warfare either. But I had to make use of the tools I had. Neancy, sedu, a bag of holding, and a few modern tools.

  “If this thing walks into the troll vilge, how do you think they’ll react?” I asked Gren.

  “Frightened,” Gren said, who looked a little pale herself.

  “Do you think it will make them less fident in their new leadership?”

  She thought about that, and smiled. “Yes! Evil Abby!”

  “N to be evil, just trying to be smart, and use what we have.”

  “It wasn’t meant to be ive,” Gren told me.

  I like her. She gets it! But yeah, that’s a lovely way to use a single zombie. Fear into the hearts of your enemies! You only give it very simple dires, though. It ’t talk.

  “How do we get there from here?” I asked Gren.

  Xy khe way as well. With their guidance, we walked to the edge of the forest, and from there I told the zombie where to go.

  “When you get there, colpse. If someos close, bite them.” I wasn’t after effective, just weird. If it attacked, that might be frightening, but it would also make sense, and the trolls would quickly defeat it, just as Gren and I had killed the four in the cave. But the unknown and strange was always more frightening than motivations that one could uand.

  The zombie shambled off, and we went bato the forest.

  “I need a few things from my world,” I said. “I’ll be back.”