Page 82 of Shadows of the Soul

“When it’s coming from a carcass. The roses are macabrely beautiful.”

I eyeballed her silver strappy sandals. “You’ll need better footwear.”

She snapped her fingers. “We are the same size. I’ll borrow your other pair.” She darted out of the room and returned thirty seconds later carrying my bee print rain boots. She toed off her sandals and slipped them on. Only Rebecca could look elegant in a sundress and rain boots.

I groaned and tipped my head back. “Fine. Neither of you freaks out or intervenes. This won’t be a straightforward task.”

They nodded and followed me out of the kitchen, down the hall, and past the living room full of supernaturals. I grabbed a shovel leaning next to the back door before exiting into the garden. A few clouds dotted the sky as the late afternoon sun bid farewell to the day in streaks of pastel pink and orange. I shivered, still only in my jean shorts and band tee. It’s not like the cleansing of blood magic requires formal wear. Something warm settled on my shoulders. I glanced to my right, finding Rebecca smiling, and she encouraged me to shrug on a pale pink hand knitted cardigan courtesy of Maggie’s latest hobby. It was warm and soft, but a little misshapen and holey.

Harry darted around the corner and waved at me. I’d given him one task. Find me the boy’s bones. I knew without a doubt that they were buried on my ground somewhere. If I removed the catalyst, the magic would unravel. Something this complex and vast would take time, but I had to pull on the string that was holding everything together. The rest would follow.

I stalked after Harry across the thorny rose-filled lawn. We passed the unmarked graves, rounded the largest magnolia tree, and halted near the border of my property. Harry pointed under a bush. The air smelled damp, like decaying compost.

I slammed the shovel in the ground and began digging. Sebastian elbowed me out of the way and took up the task.

“How do you know where to dig?” he asked as the pile of dirt increased next to him.

“Lucky guess,” I mumbled. Rebecca took a step back and Sebastian paled. Oh boy. Ten seconds later, the cloying stench of disease and decay hit me. It brought tears to my eyes and made my nostrils sting.

“There they are,” Sebastian said as he stepped away from the hole he’d created.

I came to the edge and peered down at the hessian drawstring bag covered in dirt. Look at that, they bagged them up for me. Satanists in the south were clearly considerate. Lucky me.

I plucked the bag out of the hole, being careful not to touch its contents.

“Now what?” Sebastian asked.

I frowned. There were several ways to destroy the blood magic, the most effective being to burn the bones and scatter the ashes in a body of water. But that wouldn’t give his soul any peace. In fact, he’d likely be in permanent torment, and that wasn’t acceptable. Not to me. They imbued the bones with the horrific ritual. The power was in the terror from the act. If I relived that act with the spirit, I might be able to take that pain and help him to not be in a permanent state of terror, which was fueling the spell. Of course, with Stephen Proctor in charge, it wouldn’t be that easy. The guy was a master of mental booby-traps.

I undid the string and prepared myself. “What are you doing?” Sebastian asked.

“I need to relive the death, like a retro read, and try to detach the spirit from the blood magic. If I can help find him peace, it will stop fueling the spell.”

His hand shot out and grasped my wrist. “Wait, you want to go head to head in mental warfare with the Satanic priest that blinded you last time?”

“It was a solid plan until you said it out loud,” I replied.

“There’s got to be another way,” Sebastian said.

The boy appeared a few feet in front of me, his mouth open in a silent scream as blood covered his face. “Oh my,” Harry said, hovering a little further away from the tormented spirit. “We must help him.”

I knew I liked Harry for a reason. We were both set on saving the world, one soul at a time. I shook my head at Sebastian. “I can do this. It’s another death memory. I’ve lived through hundreds. Now I know Stephen is lurking around, I’ll be careful.”

I tugged my wrist free of his grip and tipped the bones into my palm. I was dropped into a dark room, my body trembling on the damp, cold stone floor. The porridge in the metal bowl had gone hard and stale. I couldn’t eat, not when I didn’t know what horror awaited me at the end of this. Mother had said I was going on a trip with my uncle to America. The trip had been long. Then my uncle had met with a man in a suit. After some talking in a language I didn’t understand, the man in the suit grabbed my arm and threw me into the trunk of his car. I’d stayed quiet. My uncle would beat me if I created a fuss. I’d struggled to hold my bladder and had paid the price once the man discovered the mess. Now I was waiting, all day, all night, every day waiting in a room with no windows, being kept by a man who had evil lurking in his eyes.

The metal lock on the outside of the door clanged, then it swung open with a deafening screech. I peered at the evil man from underneath my eyelashes. He walked into the room and bent down next to me.

“It’s time for you to prove your worth,” he said in my language.

I shuddered and curled in on myself. Two more men filled the chamber. One grabbed my ankles while the other hooked his hands under my arms. They carted me out of the area, down a dingy hallway, and into another room with the same car I’d come here in. They dropped me in the trunk, then bound my wrists together with a tight rope that burned my flesh. Next they bound my feet. I let out a yelp of terror. I couldn’t help it. The evil man appeared above me and tilted his head. “All these weeks, and now you decide to start whining?” He sighed and whispered some words above me. My throat tightened. I gasped and sought to scream, nothing came out. It was too late. Deep down, I knew that before this day was through, I would no longer be alive.

The evil guy’s gaze roamed over my face, a slow grin tilting his lips. “Cora Roberts, sticking your nose in my business again? You want to know what happened to the boy?”

I tried to scramble out of the memory before he unpicked my mind and got inside. He tutted. “Silly girl, I’m not going to hurt you. But I am going to make you feel every inch of this boy’s pain. After all, you are responsible.”

Time jumped, and I became disoriented as two immense men dragged me into the middle of a stone circle. I struggled, but with bound hands and feet, it was useless. Stephen grinned as he welcomed me into the center of the circle. Gigantic trees surrounded us. Familiar trees. We were on the edge of my property, on the border of my wards. I looked up. The moon was enormous, like I could pluck it from the sky. A super moon.

The men dropped me to my knees, and one of them pried open my mouth while the other grabbed a rope hanging from a sturdy tree branch and fashioned a noose. Stephen approached me and chanted some strange words over a bowl before he scooped out a claylike substance, stuffed it into my mouth, and forced it down my throat.

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