Mikey grabbed him by his face guard, pulled him close and growled in his face. “That’s right. Touch her again and you’ll wish you never died.”

“Yesh shir,” said Moose.

“Now,” said Milos, “I suggest we get off this dock before we sink right through it.” He gestured for Allie to take the lead, which she did—and although she never let go of Mikey’s hand, she couldn’t help but appreciate Milos’s suave manner. Most of the boys she had met in Everlost were wild to the point of being feral. Allie never considered herself a lady, but for once it was nice to be treated like one.

CHAPTER 9
Good Stewards

While Moose and Squirrel might have been the poster children illustrating Mary’s point about “wild skinjackers,” they were marginally civilized under Milos’s guidance.

“They are not so bad,” Milos told Mikey and Allie. “Or should I say, I have seen much worse.”

The rain had given way to broken clouds, and they continued to follow the road around the lake. Mikey was sullen, and didn’t talk much, and Moose and Squirrel, always lingering a dozen paces behind, snickered over their own private jokes. Milos, however was full of conversation for the newcomers. Allie supposed that, having had no one but Moose and Squirrel to talk to, he was starved for intelligent conversation. Milos told them that they had traveled as a group for several years. The “Deadlies” they called themselves. There were four— Milos, Moose, Squirrel, and a girl they called Jackin’ Jill. Jill, however, was gone, and Milos didn’t say any more about it. Allie found it all interesting, but Mikey kept making exasperated sounds, as if listening to Milos was like torture.

“Mikey, you’re being rude,” Allie told him after a particularly loud groan.

“Sorry,” said Mikey, although it sounded more like a curse than an apology.

Milos continued the tale of his afterlife, unoffended. As Allie suspected, Milos had come from Russia. “Russian-born, but American-dead,” as he put it. His family had moved to America from St. Petersburg. Milos had been hanging out with friends on the roof of his apartment building, and had fallen off.

“It was a stupid way to go,” Milos said.