I shrugged. “I think you’re handling it well enough.”
His gaze narrowed on me. “Okay, I get it. You’re mad at me, too. I deserve that.”
Damn skippy.
“I owe you an explanation, too—”
“Wait...” Sean said suddenly, his eyes widening with recognition. “I know where I’ve seen your tattoo before!” He rushed out of the room in the next second, leaving us all in stunned silence.
Wyatt went to the hallway and shouted after him, “What are you doing? You know not to go in there! Sean! Not your mother’s room!”
Mother’s room. So, Wyatt was married. I couldn’t imagine any woman who would be okay living in this clutter and dust, but there was someone for everyone, wasn’t there? A lid for every pot? And Wyatt was a special pot of strange.
Then came my next question—where was Sean’s mother? She must have been out for the day if she hadn’t come out during the Halfling attack. That was lucky.
There was a bang, like a drawer closing too hard, and then Sean emerged again, pushing past his father with a small box in hand, maybe the size of a shoebox. It was difficult to see what it was made of—wood? It was too old and dirty to tell, caked in dried mud or sap or something else disgusting.
“Here.” Sean gasped, almost tripping over a pile of boxes as he barreled back into the living room. “Here. This is it.”
“Sean…” Wyatt warned. “What is that?”
Sean thrust the box at me. “See? There. There it is. It’s the same symbol.”
I peered down at the box, and my heart dropped into the pit of my stomach. He was right. On the top of the crusty-looking box was the same design as my tattoo etched into the wood roughly.
“W-What is this?” I asked, my voice trembling. My chest was suddenly so tight, breathing hurt. It was the first time I’d seen anything resembling my tattoo, and here it was, the very thing that could give me some hint to who I was.
A quick glance at Wyatt’s weighted expression revealed two things: he didn’t like that his son had ruffled through his mother’s things, and he had completely forgotten about this box.
“We don’t know exactly.” Sean shot up as he tried to rein in his excitement. “It’s something my mother found during her travels. She was a self-made anthropologist of sorts.”
“That’s a nice way to put it. She would have liked that one,” Wyatt said with a sad smile.
Oh. So she was dead.
Sean’s interest in the afterlife was because he had lost his mother.
“We never could get this thing open.” Sean dug his fingers into the dip along the edge and pulled to show me he wasn’t lying. It didn’t budge. “We don’t want to destroy it, either, because it’s a piece of history, you know? That’s what Ma always said, anyway. Out of everything she’d collected, it was her favorite piece.”
He smiled, but it was a heavy one, full of unexpressed pain and grief. “It’s definitely the same symbol though.”
“Yeah, it is.” I reached out and ran my finger over the dirty cover along the rough edges of the design.
From within the box, there was a loud pop. It startled Sean enough that he let go of the box, but I was quick enough to snatch it as it fell. The moment my palm connected with it, there was a flash of white light, and the lid sprung open, as if whatever was inside couldn’t be contained any longer.
As if it had been meant just for me.
It was my turn to almost drop the box. I fumbled with it for a few seconds, trying to hold on, and as I did, something fell out and flopped onto the floor.
I bent down and picked it up. It was rough and dry between my fingers, but almost as thin as a piece of paper.
Turning it over, I noticed the strange cluster of symbols painted onto one side. Maybe not painted, exactly. The ink appeared to have sunk deeper into the paper. But wait—what were those? Wrinkles? Hairs?
My breath caught. This wasn’t paper. It was skin. Either human or animal skin.
I dropped it again, my stomach coiling in disgust.
Sean was quick to scoop it back up. “What is it?” he asked and flipped it over to the written side.
“Skin,” I choked out, wondering who in the world would use someone’s skin as a writing implement. Even as old as it seemed to me, wouldn’t wood or leaves be efficient enough?
His lip turned up in repulsion, too, but he didn’t half throw the thing like I had. Just examined it further.
“These symbols seemed to be tattooed also. And look, there’s yours at the top.”
He pointed at the one matching the mark on my chest, and I stared at it in disbelief.
That was weird.
“Let me get a look at it.” Cole continued to struggle against the magical restraints of the demon trap on the armchair.
“You shut up,” Wyatt barked at him.
Cole let out an aggravated sigh. “Come on, Wyatt. You know me. You’ve known me for years.”
“That’s what makes this feel more like a betrayal,” Wyatt snapped.
“Pop,” Sean began, more calmly. “If he wanted to kill us, he’s could have done it many, many times.”
Cole smiled. “He’s right. I could have.”
I rolled my eyes. From the anger still on Wyatt’s face, it was clear Cole wasn’t making his situation any better for himself.
“I don’t like the demon part of me. I want to get rid of it. You know I’ve been trying to find Xaver forever.”
“What is that saying? ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’?” Sean said.
Wyatt’s eyes narrowed—an old man stuck in his ways.
As much as I didn’t trust Cole, I couldn’t deny that I was going to need his help to get Kay’s cure. Especially if that meant confronting Xaver or more Halflings again. My weird magic light fingers had saved us before, but now that I was bleeding and breathing, things were more complicated. Those blessed bullets and guns would come in handy. He wanted my help for some reason, and I needed his.
Guess we were stuck together.
“If it makes you feel better, you can hold your gun,” I suggested to Wyatt. “If he tries anything, I won’t stop you from blowing his head off.”
For the first time, Wyatt’s lips split in a grin. His teeth weren’t the straightest and they were tinged yellow from decades of what looked like a bad smoking habit, but it was nice to see him get some joy out of something. Even if it was the thought of murdering Cole if he turned on him.
Without hesitation, he snatched his shotgun, walked over to the armchair, and scuffed the demon trap markings on the carpet just enough to break the magic. Before Cole could even rise to his feet, Wyatt had his gun cocked and aimed at Cole’s noggin.
I didn’t know why exactly, but I admired this old man’s gritty spirit and toughness. He took no shit. From anyone. And I liked that about him.
Ignoring Wyatt’s gun and threatening glare, Cole strode over to us and reached out for the piece of skin. Hesitantly, Sean handed it over.
“Do you recognize any of these marks?” Cole asked, holding it up for Wyatt to see with ginger hands. His eyes were wide with excitement, as if we had just stumbled across an ancient map leading to El Dorado and its treasure. “I’ve never seen them before.”
Wyatt lowered the barrel a smidge. “Again, they seem similar to the language in the Celilian scrolls, but not enough for me to decipher any of it. At least not now. Maybe if I studied it, I could come up with a general idea.”
“And how long would that take?” asked Cole.
“Two weeks maybe? If I worked all night and day and ran off nothing but that beer you owe me and Red Bulls.”
“Two weeks!”
“Hey, I have all these books to reference.” He swept a hand toward the mess of papers, boxes, and shelves cluttering his living room. “And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not exactly a spring chicken anymore.”
“You have Sean to help.”
“Oh no.” Sean shook his head frantic
ally. “I’m not getting mixed up in this mess. I’ve sworn off the supernatural. It only leads to trouble, and me getting hurt. My ankle still isn’t the same from the last problem you dropped at our front door.”
Cole’s grin widened.
“Besides,” Sean went on, “I’m trying to get Pop out of this stuff. He needs to retire.”
Wyatt snorted at that. “I’ll retire when I’m dead.”
Knowing a good deal about the afterlife and what kind of person Wyatt was, I severely doubted death would be enough to stop him from getting involved in supernatural business.
“Can I see that again?” I asked, taking the piece of skin before Cole could even answer. I pushed down the bile rising in my throat at the weird feeling of dried, mummified skin against my palm. Even though most of the color had faded to gray, there was still a pinkish hue to it in some places. God, I hoped this was from some kind of animal, like a pig, and not from a human. Either way, please let the poor soul to have been dead before having his skin ripped off and written on.
My throat burned as more stomach acid clawed to the surface.
I had to suck it up. There was something going on with this box, something about me. Not only did it have the same marking on it as my tattoo, but Sean had said it had been sealed up for decades and then it had popped open just for me? That was more than just a coincidence.
Scanning over the strange branded symbols, a twinge of recognition hummed through me. But this was my first time seeing these scribbles. Wasn’t it? The more I stared at the symbols, the more my temples pounded. I tried to search my memory for any recollection of the box and came up empty, except for the painful pinching behind my eyes.
The longer I stared, the greater the pain got. Digging deeper and deeper into the pit where my memories once were stored was excruciating, but just as I was about to give up, the shapes readjusted and moved to form words—words I understood.
I could read it.
“It’s a list,” I thought aloud, amazed that I had even known that much information. “It’s a list!”
Cole’s face lit up with excitement. “A list of what?”
I kept staring at the symbols. The words sprang up from my darkened memory, like little balls of floating lights, guiding the way into my past. Giddy at the find, I almost squealed with joy. “Something about the four elements being needed…to save a damned soul? Does that make sense to anyone?”
“Holy shit.” Cole balked. “Could this be it?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Sean said, his voice calm and collective.
I glanced between the men. “What? Did I miss something?”
“Cole thinks this is the cure he’s been looking for.”
“You’re shitting me.” Finally, Wyatt lowered his gun. The faster he spoke, the more his southern accent came out. “You’re telling me the demon cure was sittin’ in my wife’s bedroom all these years? Just sittin’ there, underneath her socks and T-shirts? In this house? It’s not supposed to exist.”
“It would explain why so many things have been trying to get into this trailer,” said Sean. “It could be something they’ve wanted.”
“Not because of the other thousands of spells and enchanted talismans I have stored away in here?” Wyatt replied.
“That, too. It certainly doesn’t help your case any,” Cole said.
“And this is why I want you to retire.” Sean threw his father a hard look. “Normal families don’t go through this kind of shit. Other families worry about who’s bringing what to Thanksgiving dinner, not when’s the next time an all-powerful demon will be blasting through their door.”
Wyatt waved the comment away. “Those families are boring as sin. The people in them don’t even want to be part of them.”
“But boring is safe.”
Boy, was Sean wrong. I could tell him that from experience. I mean, look at what I was involved in now. My boring afterlife led me here, and none of this was safe. It could be fate or just bad luck, but this kind of stuff sought you out if you were asking for it.
“So what does the list say? What do we need?” Cole was so close to me now, his warm breath tickled the side of my neck and shoulder. His shaking fingers hovered over the skin in my hands, as if he were about to snatch it any second and run off with it.
“Uh…” Scanning the list again, my focus readjusted, and the symbols changed to actual words I knew. “The Holiest ground. Breath of life. Hell’s fire. And damned blood. Whatever that means.”
“The elements,” Sean said. “The ingredients are based on the four elements. Earth, wind, water, and fire.”
“Water? Did I miss something there?” Cole asked.
“The blood,” I replied with an eye roll.
“My blood?”
“Or Kay’s. I guess.”
“Well, that’s easy enough. At least we have one item on the list right off the bat.”
Something told me it couldn’t be that easy.
I passed the piece of skin back to Sean. “The Holiest ground…like a church or graveyard?”
“That would make sense,” he answered. “I can’t believe you can read this. I’ve never seen this language before.”
Wyatt stroked his white beard in thought. “Yeah, not this exact language.”
“I have no idea how I can.” I was just one big ball of mystery, wasn’t I?
There were other things scribbled in the corners of the list, but before I got a good look at them, Cole snatched it from Sean’s grip.
“So Holiest ground…” Cole repeated. “I know plenty of cemeteries and churches. There has to be fifty in this town alone. We can just scoop up some dirt—”
“But it says ‘The Holiest of grounds,’” I cut in. “How do we know one of those are the Holiest of grounds?”
“She’s right. It can’t just be any cemetery dirt,” Sean added.
“Well, what makes a cemetery ‘Holy’?”
“A few things,” Wyatt chimed in. “Being blessed by a man of the church, prayer, Holy Water… All religions have their things, but the principle is always the same.”
“You’d think the Holiest ground would be one of the oldest, too, right? The one blessed the most or the longest,” I said.
“That’s true. The age certainly wouldn’t hurt.”
“Old-ass cemetery. Okay, still easy.” Cole ran his shaky fingers through his hair. “Two out of four.”
“I’m not sure that’ll be it.” Sean glanced back down at the writing.
The more I thought about it, the more I knew Sean was right. It couldn’t be that easy. This was supposed to be the cure to a demon’s cursed blood. If it were that easy, Halflings wouldn’t be such a problem, now would they?
Think, Jade. You live in the afterlife and work for the Angel of Death. You should know something about this.
Maybe my tablet had something to help me out here? As I reached for my tablet in my back pocket, I paused, remembering the piece of chalk in the front of my jeans—the piece of chalk that allowed me to hop between the living and non-living world. I pulled it out, an idea forming. Wouldn’t the Holiest of times or places be when the dead and the living collide? When one could cross into the other freely? Like when the veil was at its thinnest?
“The solstice.” The words burst from my lips as the realization hit. “Maybe the blessed earth needs to be collected during the solstice, when all worlds are aligned and demons, spirits, whatever can cross over?”
Cole’s eyes widened. “She’s right. That would be considered the Holiest of nights.”
Sean and Wyatt exchanged looks and then nodded.
“It is when all supernaturals are at their magical peak, too. It makes sense,” Wyatt said.
Cole sighed, seeming annoyed. “So old cemetery, on the solstice…”
“We’ve got a few days till then,” I said.
“What are the oldest towns in this state?” Cole whipped out his cell phone and began tapping on the screen. “Fairport�
��s harbor was used during the Revolutionary War to bring in supplies and for trade even before that. It has to have one of the oldest cemeteries in the country there.”
I wasn’t surprised. Fairport was full of history. It was one of the reasons why I loved it so much.
“Looks like we’re off to Fairport, then,” Cole said. “And while we’re there, do you think you guys can figure out what the other two ingredients are? That way we can track them down as soon as possible and test this thing.”
Wyatt gave Cole a hard look, likely not impressed by his pushiness.
“Please,” I made sure to add, and tacked on a sweet smile for good measure. “My friend needs this to save her life. I know she doesn’t have much time, and honestly, I don’t know if she will last the full three months. I need to get this to her as soon as possible.”
Not to mention this was the first real clue I had to my life. I needed to know how I was connected to this demon cure and what the symbol on my chest actually meant.
Wyatt’s cold gaze flickered between me and Cole. After a long moment, he said, “Obviously my wife was interested in this for a reason…and I am curious about it.” He snorted, seeming to convince himself. “Fine. I’ll do it. But on two conditions.”
“A-Anything,” Cole sputtered, grinning.
Wyatt locked eyes with him and jabbed his finger at Cole, like a father scolding his disobedient child. “No more secrets, for one.”
Cole held up his hands. “Done.”
“And that beer.” Wyatt’s voice became even more serious. “The expensive kind I told you about, remember? Lots of it.”
Cole’s head fell back as his laughter exploded. “You got it, you arrogant bastard.”
“I feel like I should apologize or something for not warning you more,” Cole said as he swung the beat-up Jeep onto the main highway back toward Fairport.
After being in the middle of the Halfling fight, the clunker was vibrating and whining suspiciously the faster he accelerated. I gripped the door handle, thankful I was able to touch things in the living world now instead of being tossed around like before. Even though I hadn’t eaten an actual meal in over a year, I could feel something roiling in my stomach, threatening to come back up.
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