Free Affairs of the Dead by A.J. Locke

worth it.”
    “Precisely,” I said, though a little part of me withered when he’d said I wasn’t worth it. “Well, I’d better go pretend to be busy while we all wait for the strip search to start.” I started walking away, but he called out to me.
    “Wait,” he said. I turned around and raised an eyebrow. He didn’t say anything, so I walked back over to him.
    “Are you going to be okay today?” he asked, though his voice was still hard, and he wasn’t looking at me.
    “You give me a verbal beat down one minute, then you care about my well-being the next?” I said. “Thought I wasn’t worth it? If I get caught and carted off, wouldn’t that make the sun shine a little brighter for you?”
    With those parting words, I headed back to my desk. I knew it wasn’t in my best interest to poke at someone who had a grudge against me and knew such a huge truth about me, but Micah hadn’t been lying when he’d called me reckless.
    I didn’t have much time to sit and idle at my desk, because about half an hour later, Andrew came back out to tell us that the dead witches from the government were here. That was everyone’s cue to go up to the twelfth floor, which was where our conference rooms were. Affairs of the Dead employed about fifty necromancers, so we gathered in one of the larger rooms, which was like an auditorium, with staggered rows of seats, an aisle down the middle, and a low stage at the front of the room with a huge projection screen hanging behind it.
    I was mostly calm since I was confident in the steps I’d taken to keep myself from being found out, but I played up the nervous factor for the benefit of everyone else. People were especially chatty when they were anxious, so I soon found myself in a group conversation that cycled the same negative points about this process over and over. I caught Micah’s eye across the room once or twice but resisted smiling and waving at him again. His stony expression never cracked.
    After about twenty minutes, the doors opened and a hush fell across the room when five solemn-faced dead witches entered. They were dressed in dark suits and had that overall “here on official government business” look. People moved to make room for them as though being too close would condemn them, and the dead witches walked to the front of the room where Andrew stood. After talking to him for a few moments, Andrew stepped forward to address us.
    “The witches are going to split up and start the check,” he said. “So everyone please have a seat and be patient. As soon as you’re cleared, you’re free to go.”
    Andrew also had to undergo the check, and a dead witch began working with him. A murmur started up as people settled into seats, and when I glanced behind me, I saw a row of armed police officers blocking the door. They were dressed like they were about to go hunting for terrorists in helmets and bulletproof vests, with rifles in their hands.
    The officers came from a specially sanctioned task force the government had created to support the dead witches who did this kind of work. Any necromancer whose reanimation power was discovered would have better luck jumping out the window than trying to get out that door. Their rifles were full of rune bullets, the same kind we used when we hunted beasties. Not only could rune bullets bring down a beastie, but they were also very effective on a reanimator who tried to evade capture. A bullet was a bullet, after all.
    I found a seat somewhere in the middle of a row and settled down to wait until it was my turn to be scanned. Despite feeling confident that I was safe, I was always a little uneasy about the whole ordeal, so I distracted myself by playing games on my phone. After about forty-five minutes, I looked up and saw one of the dead witches walking toward me so I put my phone away. I recognized the petite woman with her black hair pulled back in a severe bun and face devoid of makeup. She would have been more