Naughty Necromancer (Reaper Collective Book 2)

by Riley Archer

  “Who are you calling devil, Criminella?” Oops. I peeked over my shoulder and watched as Mari stretched into her ethereal skin, ghostly knives and all. “Get rid of that thing, and we are good.”

  I borrowed Maven’s Zippo lighter, sat across from her, and flicked it open. When the flame was nice and high, I held it to the edge of Mari’s contract. The textured page caught flame, blackened, and crumbled.

  I wiped my hands of the ashes. “I have a nickname for you now, Catsassin.”

  “You’re telling me you don’t have a name.”

  “Names are given to control. By choosing many, I choose none.” Mari—or whoever—shrugged. She either made no sense or was a genius, and either way, she was scary as hell.

  “Spoken like a killer.” I cocked my head to the side. “With tiny little claws.”

  “Comfort is dangerous,” Mari said, purring like poison honey. “Who can make a target comfortable? A tiger, or a house cat?”

  Genius. Definitely genius. Before I could pull any more details out of her, Damian finally entered.

  “Honey, you’re home.” I hopped off his desk.

  His initial instinct was to flinch at my presence, but then he noticed Maven squirming on his bed, bound by stretchy, rotten plant matter. His disapproval darkened a shade; he barely registered Mari, which seemed strange. I’d figured her as his dream ghost.

  His hyperalert attention snapped back to me. “What did you do?”

  “Why do you assume this is my fault?” After a pause, I rolled my eyes. “Okay, fine. Watch this.”

  My tainted necromancy magic uncurled Maven’s leafy gag. She coughed up a few curses and I shut her up again. Then, I exposed my almost-butt cheek, the same area where I’d been marked twice. The strange markings, still tingling, shined with a delicate luster—like glowy, magical veins.

  “Thanks to my faerie run-in on the solstice, it seems I’m not limited to dead creatures anymore. Dead grass likes me too.”

  Damian set down the briefcase he’d carried in and knelt to inspect the unnatural symbol. He ran his fingers down it and a shiver shimmied across my skin.

  The image of his body in bed this morning barged into my headspace unannounced.

  It was totally, completely unwelcome.

  Not unpleasant … but … intrusive. Ugh.

  I snapped away from him as if he’d shocked me.

  Our gazes locked. I couldn’t tell if he was offended or full of deep-seated loathing. And I didn’t care which.

  “I’d be happy to give y’all private time!” Maven twanged; she’d somehow freed her mouth. “But hey, bud. Nice to see ya back from the dead.”

  I made a mental note to work on my dead ivy muzzling skills.

  “P.S., she knows you’re not David. Hence her restraints. No need to thank me.”

  Damian straightened and rubbed his neck. Oh, he loathed me. “Do me a favor and don’t do me any favors. Ever. Who’s this?”

  Mari purred and waved with her tail.

  “An unlikely ally.” I pulled the death note out of my back pocket and handed it to Damian. “She’s going to help me figure out who wants to kill everyone I care about. The list is short but accurate. Wanna help?”

  Damian’s expression perked. “Help someone kill you?”

  I decided then and there that when I perfected my rotten nature muzzle, I’d use it on him first.

  18

  The Touchy Caterers

  There were so many timelines of doom ticking away that I felt like a broken cuckoo inside a clock.

  My blackmailer wanted me gone on Christmas Eve, which was tomorrow.

  Maven and David had both been taken hostage, and as far as I knew, Maven didn’t have an evil twin to fulfill her professional duties—whatever they were—so someone was bound to be missing her by now. And if not now, then real soon.

  I wanted to have faith in Mari’s tracking abilities, but when I asked her how she intended to find my target, she growled. And when I told her I wanted the asshole alive, she disappeared altogether.

  I never needed to know this, but I learned cats were just as temperamental in the afterlife.

  For all I knew, she’d hustled me into freeing her and was now on her way to haunt a Petco. And you know what? Good for her. I could figure out who was messing with me without the ectoplasmic furball.

  To prove it, I spent my time in class building a murder board of suspects in my head.

  Travis was notably absent, and so was Ethan. Travis had tried to skewer me, and he’d been expelled for his attitude and absences, but death threats seemed a tad extreme for a sore loser. And if Ethan wasn’t encased in an ice tomb by now, it’d still be hard for him to leave a note at my doorstep if he hadn’t entered the castle, and it appeared he hadn’t.

  Or … maybe Sierra was so excited about the masquerade because she was planning more than just the seating arrangements. Maybe she was planning deaths too.

  Or Headmaster Harmon was the Godfather of the Academy, and I was one night away from saying hello to his little friend.

  It could’ve been all or none of them, and any of them could be the alleged mole—some person connected to Atlas’s operation who likely wanted to kidnap me and put the supernatural revolution back in motion. If it was Maven, then we’d bagged the bitch already, but her eyeballs popped halfway out of their sockets when tainted necromancy magic poured from my fingers. She’d looked horrified. If she had even the slightest inkling that I was a born necromancer, she deserved an Oscar.

  When my murder board of thoughts came to a close, it was an explosive red blob.

  The only thing that would surprise me would be if Santa himself came down and stuffed me into his sleigh tomorrow night.

  As I waltzed to my next class, it became very clear my afterlife was a shitshow. A moderately structured shitshow.

  In Apparitic Defenses, Damian was cool as a cucumber. He said our outdoor tournament was delayed until after the holidays due to the weather forecast—as if reapers melted when caught in a snowstorm.

  I wasn’t buying it. Something was up.

  We got to take our frustrations out on punching bags that punched back instead. I didn’t know the mass could take a swing, so imagine my surprise when the thing swooped into a headless headbutt and left me with what felt like a shiner.

  Darkly amused, sweaty, and still ready for a fight, I lingered after class to milk Damian for info. He let me stare for about five seconds.

  “Yes, Miss Kennicot?” He flipped through the browned pages of an old leather book.

  “Weather forecast, huh?”

  “Uh, yeah.” He furrowed his brows and ran a finger down a page.

  “Lightning?” I asked, and he ignored me. I stepped closer. “Thunder? Blizzard? Ice age?”

  “Sh.”

  That’s when I slapped a palm over his precious pages. The book slammed to the ground with a splat.

  “Oops.” He shot me a look that could skewer. I shrugged. “How was I supposed to know you have such a flimsy grip?”

  So, maybe I blamed him a little bit for getting beaten up by an animated object.

  I glanced down and saw his after-class reading material was handwritten rather than typed, and there was a sketch of a Moss Folk in the corner. It wasn’t an Aiden-level drawing, but there was no mistaking the alien-like figure stretching out of a tree trunk.

  “You’re a pain in the—ow.” Damian’s head crashed into mine on the way down, both of us reaching for the book.

  I scooped it up and pivoted out of reach. “Doing research on me, huh?”

  Damian checked for eavesdroppers, shut the door, and tried and failed to get the book out of my hands. He crossed his arms. “For you, twiggy. I’ll let you know if you need to be planted. Anyway, go back to your room.”

  “You aren’t my dad. You can’t tell me to go to my room. What’s all the fuss about the weather?”

  “I didn’t make it to the staff meeting. I now have two prisoners to feed, thanks t
o you.” Damian reached for the book again, and this time I didn’t resist. “But it can’t be good if we’ve all but been put on lockdown. Just lay low while I figure it out.”

  I wasn’t obeying Damian. I was checking on my room, for, you know, inventory purposes.

  I swung the door open and completely froze. “What. The. Duck.”

  “You remembered!” Ash flung her arms around me. Her blond hair had a lavender sheen, and she smelled like sweet noir.

  I glimpsed Jose behind the attack of affection.

  He propped a fist on his hip as he inspected a floor-length magenta dress with his free hand. “I can’t believe the Academy is throwing its first masquerade and you didn’t invite us.”

  “Uh, sorry, but who did?” I patted Ash’s back, thinking maybe she needed some reciprocation before she’d let go.

  “Your fairy godmother, of course.” She released me with a smirk.

  I dropped my chin. “Does my godmother have black hair and aggression problems?”

  At that moment, I realized I could have been talking about Damian or Erik, and I also realized that my circle of associates was small and weird. Although, the two intruders in front of me might take the cake.

  “And a nice ass?” Jose flung the dress on the bed. “Yeah, same guy.”

  Ah, so the tall one without the horns. Visible horns, anyway.

  “Not that I’m not excited to see you guys,” I pointed at the bed. “But why have you broken in with a pile of lavish dresses?”

  There was a box filled with frilly masks taking over my pillow, too.

  “Because you can’t have a masquerade without the gear, duh. It’s not like the students can go to the mall after class. But don’t you worry.” Ash winked. “We saved the best for you.”

  My stomach turned. Not because I had a reasonable fear of them dressing me, but because the last couple of times I got all dolled up ended pretty badly. Kidnapped, massacre, etcetera.

  I shook my head. “No tha—”

  Four persistent, sparkly arms pulled me in, and I gave up; I was in no position to fight off a centipede of purple nails.

  My skin was pinched and prodded as extravagant gowns were pressed against me and tossed aside in a flurry. Amid the fabric madness, Ash asked for an update.

  I briefed them on the trial and recent events at Academy Hellhole—including my trip to the faerie realm, induction into the Illusionists, murderous pen pal, the crazy kitten, and Damian’s hostages.

  I expected gasps and an onslaught of questions I couldn’t answer.

  Clearly, I had forgotten who I was talking to because they just nodded as if the whacky details weren’t the least bit abnormal. They were more concerned with the dresses.

  “This one?” Ash asked Jose with one eyebrow raised.

  He pursed his lips and then nodded. “Definitely.”

  Ash spun a deep blue gown bejeweled with what looked like tiny diamonds in front of my face; each twirl twinkled like a starry night sky. I couldn’t help but poke it. The irresistibly smooth fabric wrapped around the neck but opened up in the cleavage area.

  “About this uber cursed faerie tattoo, Ellis …” Jose pawed my side. “Let me see.”

  I dodged his grip a second and third time. “Wanna tell me how you got here, about your secret partnership with Tanaka, or why you guys were eerily not mentioned at all at the trial before the strip search commences?”

  Jose pondered at the ceiling. After a pause, he reached for me again. “No, not really.”

  I swatted his hand. “Too bad.”

  “We’ve been waiting to come Alcatraz your ass.” Ash perched on the sliver of available space on the bed with her feet kicked out. “When the Academy reached out to a party planning company with ties to the supernatural, we were golden. They’re catering the event. Decorations, outfits, food, whatever.”

  “You guys are working for a party planning company?”

  “Oh God no. We just … replaced some of them.”

  I cocked my head. “Replaced?”

  Ash and Jose shot less than guilty glances to each other. Ash hopped up. “They’ll be fine. And c’mon. The questions you really want answered are deeper than that.”

  I imagined two terrified teenagers tied up in a closet and shook my head. Ash was right, though.

  I took a breath. “How’s the investigation going?”

  Her features sobered. “We’ve been unearthing Atlas’s misdeeds, making it hard for RC to pin his disappearance on Tanaka.”

  Jose sighed. “That evil man had his gorgeous fingers in a lot of sticky pots. You should know.”

  I winced. “I know that I kind of want to hit you with a pot.”

  Jose wiggled his eyebrows, but then the cheerful lines in his face fell flat. “He’ll be okay. He has to be.”

  “We’re all doing what we can. Let’s lighten up a bit, yeah?” Ash was immediately up and playing with my hair.

  “Sure. After you tell me how you escaped the court system.”

  “Umm,” Ash started. “Let’s just say Jose and I could say things in court that RC wouldn’t want spoken in a forum. Our position within RC makes them inclined to omit us from legal proceedings.”

  My curiosity burned so hotly it was palpable. “What pos—”

  “Ah, ah, we have other things to focus on Ellis. So, focus!”

  I knew I was pouting. This wasn’t over. “Fine. Tell me some good news.”

  I could feel Ash brighten from behind me. “An undocumented shapeshifter owed Erik a favor, so Atlas has had some tasteful appearances here and there.”

  That was pretty good. A warm feeling flirted with my heartbeat, and then it dawned on me that my most badass, dangerous connection was a twelve-year-old with a candy obsession.

  “By the way,” Ash swept my hair above my ears. “He’s upset you didn’t send him a birthday card.”

  All right. My most badass associate was a thirteen-year-old, then. Whose birthday I didn’t know, but who I definitely owed a comic, my life, or something he might find equally valuable.

  “When’s his birthday?”

  “I have no idea.” Ash curled my baby hairs around her finger.

  Jose scrutinized me; at the same time, he and Ash both said, “Down.”

  My hair fell past my shoulders, and Jose continued, “Did you say something about a kitten ghost?”

  “I have arrived on time, da?” a voice echoed in the corner.

  Mari’s kitten form, with a stack of papers in her mouth, stretched into a humanoid shape. She transferred the papers from her teeth to her hand, her tail and ears stretching and staying put.

  “Me-freaking-ow,” Ash said, her eyeballs halfway out of their sockets.

  Jose vibrated with glee as he took in all that was Mari, knives and all. He offered her his hand.

  “I’m Jose. Feel free to cut me any time you like.”

  Mari purred and flicked her tail. She sauntered right past a partially bowed Jose to hand me the crinkled documents.

  I flipped through them while Ash and Jose gawked.

  “Am I supposed to grade these or what?” The papers were a mixture of essays and student information sheets.

  When I glanced up, Ash and Jose were peering into Mari’s ectoplasm like kids in an aquarium. Mari seemed lightly amused and was tolerating them, but like a cat, she seemed ready to strike without warning.

  I knew from experience that Ash and Jose could handle themselves, but Mari was armed and already dead.

  “Step away from the ghost,” I advised before clearing my throat. “Mari?”

  “Check handwriting, Crim,” she said, assessing the almost nonexistent space between her and her admirers.

  I continued glancing through the pages. Eventually, I recognized the chicken-scratch of my blackmailer.

  The top of the page had Travis Butler spelled out at the top.

  Gotcha, sucker.

  I was impressed. I had expected Mari to bring samples of flesh, not writing. “T
hank you.”

  “Don’t look so surprised. I don’t sniff like dog.”

  Mari disappeared, and Ash and Jose’s foreheads met with a smack.

  19

  The Cracked Egg

  If I thought Ash and Jose were borderline insufferable in Atlas’s swanky apartment, I didn’t know what to call them now.

  After being pinched and prodded for an hour, I showed them how to get to Damian’s room. Since he was the one who’d arranged for their arrival, I’d expected to simply drop them off like a responsible babysitter.

  It didn’t work out.

  “Ouch!” I complained when an elbow jammed into my ribs. Or it could’ve been a knee, or some other bony projection. This bed was too small to share, and I was trying not to think about what was touching where.

  “Oops,” Jose said without a trace of remorse. “But you know it felt at least a little good.”

  “Shift change!” Ash said as if their constant rotation was protecting me.

  The only thing they were shielding me from was rest of any sort, and I was one bruise away from going full Elektra on them. Although Mr. Sparky was strapped to a wall, totally out of reach.

  They’d probably beat me into a puddle of transferred glitter if I tried anything, but it was close to being worth it.

  I groaned into the stale mattress. The pillow had long been stolen away. “Don’t you guys enjoy the lap of luxury?”

  “Depends on whose lap,” Jose answered as he switched spots with Ash.

  “Damian’s lap, damnit. You saw his suite.” Right before he said hi and kicked us out. “Why must you torture me?”

  Ash settled into the bed. “As much as I want to hear what you know about Damian’s lap, we’re here for a reason. You said it yourself. Some well-placed Atlas crony could’ve got you put here, meaning they likely know where you sleep. Some whacko named Travis left a death threat at your doorstep, so he knows where you sleep. And your new club full of ne’er-do-wells left an invite here, so they know where you sleep. I mean, who knows how many knives are hidden in your mattress!” She cuddled close, buzzing with energy and still smelling like designer perfume. “Just admit it. You need us.”