Shadows and Stars

by Becca Fanning

  But I wasn’t just any old Reaper. I was Apollyon’s foster child. Like Rumpelstiltskin, except Apollyon won and kept the baby in the end.

  He sighed, resolved to some conclusion I didn’t understand. “No matter what I do, how hard I try… Sin Eaters, I am never to be rid of them. Finish your food. You’re running yourself ragged, Angelica.”

  He was right about that. Each day I pushed a little harder, worked a little longer, fought to keep moving forward out of fear that if I stopped, I’d have to face my situation. Face him. Big A tended to visit when I had downtime, so I’d been making it a point not to have any, which was apparently taking its toll if the Morningstar had resorted to cooking me breakfast in my kitchen.

  “The fi-follet are of interest to me. I want you to bring me the man responsible for raising them.”

  That stopped me mid-bite.

  “I thought they were wayward spirits, brought back for some holy vengeance but decided to do their own thing.” There was a person behind this. Interesting. In my experience, people were far easier to deal with than spirits. “So, if I stop the man, the spirits stop too?”

  “Something like that.” He cocked his head to the side, eyeing me suspiciously. “You’re going to call him as soon as I leave.” He cut me off mid denial. “I watched you, saw you make the decision. You can’t hide from me, Angelica. I know all your tells.”

  “Hester tried to warn me off this one.” When you can’t deny something, misdirect with a change of topic. “She never does that.”

  “The fortune teller cares for you.” Big A wasn’t the only one picking up on someone’s tells. He was torn over this one. “She wouldn’t see you put in harm’s way.”

  “I’m a Reaper. Harm’s way sort of comes with the territory.” I shoved the last bite of sandwich in my mouth, trying to ignore the fact that the eggs had gone cold.

  “Normally, I would agree.” He pushed my coffee mug closer, warming the ceramic and coffee within with the touch of a finger.

  “Normally?” Nothing about being a Reaper was normal, so the turn of phrase gave me a reason to pause. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You may work with Jackson Reed. I will tolerate the Sin Eater this one time.” Big A got up from the table, clearing my plate and setting it in the sink.

  “Wait a second. You just said you forbade it. You were all but threatening me yesterday over talking to him.” I stood up, still clutching my coffee mug. “What gives?”

  Part of me didn’t want to know the answer. If he was breaking his own rules against the Sin Eaters, well, Hester’s warning made a lot more sense.

  “To be able to raise a spirit and change its nature?” A look of awe washed over Big A’s face. “That is a powerful necromancer.” He shook off the momentary trance he’d been put under by the desire to possess such power. There were things out of the Morningstar’s reach, and when he came across them, he collected them. Putting the necro at top priority. “Powerful and dangerous. But, as much as it pains me to say, I need you on this.”

  I’m good at what I do, one of the best, but I’m not expendable. I mattered, at least to Big A. It was part of why I’d managed to last this long. So, it was rare that Apollyon gave me a case he knew could lead to sudden death. There were other Reapers far easier to replace than a foster child. I mean, it wasn’t every day someone bartered their daughter.

  “You mean you need someone you know will bring him back.” And I would.

  I enjoyed being a Reaper, the life I’d built outside Big A’s circles. But there were strings attached. Loyalty, obedience. Break the rules, and I’d be living an alternative lifestyle as a princess of darkness seen and not heard sitting on a dais to the left of Big A’s throne waiting for him to marry me off. The threat of ball gowns and arranged marriages was a surefire way to keep me in line. My independence was an illusion, something Big A tolerated and could take away on a whim, but I clung to it and did my best to follow the rules.

  Jackson had been doing his best to fuck that up recently. Apollyon’s approval to work with the Sin Eater said more about how badly he wanted the necromancer in his possession than assigning me to the case.

  “The night’s still young. The witching hour is hours away.” Big A faded from my kitchen, a reminder to provide regular status reports lingering in the air after he’d gone.

  “Well, shit.” The recently deceased looked up at me from the black-and-white photos in the obituaries. The paper appeared on my table at the same time Big A disappeared from my kitchen—confirmation the blacksmith put me on the right path.

  Hitting my second wind, I emptied the contents of my mug and the coffee pot. A fresh pot brewing, I dug through the contents of my junk drawer until I came up with a black marker. Mug refilled, I sat down to peruse pictures and paragraphs describing the dead, hoping to come across a clue. One of those poor souls was the best chance I had at catching the necromancer.

  In other words, my chances weren’t very good.

  SIX

  THE POUNDING on my door timed perfectly with the pounding in my head as I sat up and pulled off a piece of newspaper stuck to my cheek. I’d fallen asleep somewhere around one o’clock in the morning, eyes burning from staring at the screen on my tablet as I Googled and scoured social media for information on the people listed in the obits. Given the average age was mid-eighties, there wasn’t much to go on. Wiping a small spot of drool from my chin, and hoping there wasn’t newsprint transferred to my face like a lump of silly putty, I got up to answer the door.

  “So, you’re Morningstar’s daughter.” Jackson’s eyes widened as he took in my appearance. “That explains why you look like hell.”

  “Are all Sin Eaters sweet talkers like you?” I hadn’t set the chain lock on the door, so there wasn’t much I could do while still half asleep to stop Jackson from coming in. “Make yourself at home,” I grumbled, heading back to the kitchen to start another pot of coffee.

  “Thanks, don’t mind if I do.” Jackson dropped down onto the sofa, propping his biker boots up on my makeshift coffee table. “Had an interesting chat with your…”

  “Coffee before conversation.” With a finger pressed to my lips, I emphasized my need for silence until I’d been thoroughly caffeinated.

  The coffee was at least two hours old, the burner had automatically shut off, but was warm enough to drink. Normally I’d start a fresh pot, but with Jackson Reed already seated on my couch, I needed an immediate shot of caffeine. I pulled a clean mug down from the cabinet above Mr. Coffee for Jackson and refilled my own mug, before joining the Sin Eater sitting on my sofa.

  Leaning against the wall separating my kitchen and the open dining-living area, I eyed Jackson over the rim of my mug. His eyes roamed the room, taking in every detail of my apartment, from the bookshelves overflowing with second-hand paperbacks to the shipping pallet converted into a table, like they’d help him uncover some secret about me. He wouldn’t gain much insight into who I was from my décor apart from the fact that I kept things clean and simple.

  If I wanted complicated and lavish, I’d have stayed with Apollyon.

  “Coffee’s in the pot.” I took a sip of mine before nodding toward the kitchen. If Jackson wanted a cup, he could damn well make it himself. I had no intentions of starting our partnership off by playing happy hostess. “Milk’s in the fridge.”

  “Thanks.” Jackson pushed himself up off the couch and headed toward the kitchen to fix himself a cup of coffee with a smirk on his face and a playful look in his eyes. “Point taken.”

  “So Big A sent you, huh?” My foster father had been quite the social butterfly. Following Jackson back into the kitchen, I filled my vacated spot at the table and straightened up my pile of notes.

  “Big A?” Jackson looked puzzled, unfamiliar with the nickname I’d given the Morningstar. “You mean Apollyon?” He shook his head, smiling, and took a sip of his coffee. The smile quickly turned into a grimace as he forced the coffee down. Hours on the burner
hadn’t done my preferred strong brew any favors. “He must love that.” Realizing the grin over the rim of my mug was the only reply he’d get, he tried the direct approach. “While we’re on the subject of Apollyon, is he really your father?”

  “Foster father.” Setting the obituaries in front of the empty chair across from me, I motioned for Jackson to join me. “Smithie told me to start with the obituaries and Big A seemed to agree. I’ve scoured two days’ worth of recently deceased and only came up with two possible corpses our necromancer could go for. Take a look.”

  “Real smooth subject change there.” Spinning the chair around, Jackson straddled the seat, set his coffee on the table and rested his arms on top of the back of the chair. “You’re not getting off that easy. We’ve been traveling in the same circles for months. How come I’m only just hearing about this? That’s a pretty big secret to keep.”

  “By traveling in the same circles, you mean you moved into the city and started following me around?” Shoving the rest of my notes across the table, I got up to reheat my coffee in the microwave. “Who says I’m keeping secrets, anyway?” I slammed the microwave door closed, jamming a finger on the button for thirty seconds. “You say it’s a secret like you have some right to intimate knowledge about my life.”

  “Your father seems to think I do.”

  Jackson’s matter of fact statement caught me off guard. The microwave beeped like a countdown for my head exploding as embarrassment and anger warred for dominance over my emotions. I decided on anger, it was more familiar and easier to project, but my cheeks had already warmed with a light flush.

  “He’s not my father, and it’s not up for discussion.” I thought my tone and expression brooked no argument.

  The Sin Eater thought differently.

  “Under different circumstances, I may have let you off the hook, but after the warning Apollyon gave me…” Jackson shook his head. “He seems to think something is going on between us and I think somebody owes me an explanation.”

  “Yeah? Well, you’re both wrong.” Stubborn was my strong suit. It came in handy when I was running down my latest target or when dealing with equally stubborn men like Jackson Reed.

  On more than one occasion Jackson’s tried to take me out after turning up at one of my collections. He wasn’t short on looks or charm, the ladies no doubt lining up for a chance to go out with him, but I’d managed to ignore those qualities and say no every time.

  Until recently.

  He kept turning up and, despite my refusals, I hadn’t put a stop to it. I caved and took his card, agreeing we’d help each other out stopping the fi-follet before I had Big A’s okay. Any one of those could have given the wrong impression, but I knew what Jackson was. A Sin Eater. In other words, forbidden, and I wasn’t going to end up donning ball gowns for the rest of my life for anyone. No matter how charming or good looking he was.

  “Like I was saying, I came up with two real possibilities. Maybe a third, but only if these other two don’t pan out.” Draining the last of my coffee, I set the empty mug on the counter, crossing my arms over my chest and silently pleading for him to drop the subject of Apollyon so we could focus on more important things, like stopping the necromancer.

  Jackson was like a dog with a bone. He wouldn’t let it go. “You need my help, and I need to know what I’m getting into.”

  “Why does this even matter?” Frustrated, my arms went up in the air before my hands found my hips. “I couldn’t give two shits about your backstory. It’s irrelevant to what we’re working on.”

  “It matters because you matter to him. The question is, how much?” Jackson met my glare, daring me to argue when we both knew I couldn’t. “And why is he willing to risk all of that for a couple of fi-follet?”

  Interesting. Jackson still thought we were dealing with real fi-follet and not souls converted by the necromancer. Filing that little tidbit for later, I watched him shove the newspaper along with my notes back to my side of the table. We were running out of time before the faux fi-follet needed to feed again and I was running out of patience. Another kid would be dead before Jackson decided to give up.

  “Fine!” My voice rose with my temper, almost to a scream. “My mother, not that she deserves the title, wowed a few crowds at the local karaoke and started to believe her own hype. She was going to be the next singing sensation, except she wasn’t that good. Not without a few shots followed by beer chasers to loosen her up and deafen the crowd to her off-pitch singing.” I closed my eyes, bracing myself to say out loud what I’d buried inside almost all my life.

  Tears welled up, not of sadness—I hadn’t cried those in a long, long time—but of anger. Forcing them back, so Jackson didn’t get the wrong impression, seeing weakness where there was only fury, I continued with the sob story that was my life.

  “So, Apollyon swooped in like Rumple-fucking-stiltskin and offered Sara a deal she couldn’t refuse. I used to let myself believe she regretted it. But the truth is, being pregnant isn’t so great for your singing career, and she never wanted me in the first place.” I shrugged my shoulders, trying to keep up the act that I didn’t care. “So, everyone got what they wanted. Sara got to be a star, sort of. B-list at best until she drank it all away and met her end at the bottom of a bottle. And Big A got me.” I waved off the question before he could ask it. “I stopped trying to figure that one out a while ago. Why he did it never mattered as much as the fact that she actually did.”

  Jackson’s mouth opened and closed like a fish, as he struggled to formulate a response and came up with nothing.

  “Now that your curiosity has been thoroughly satisfied, do you think we could actually get some fucking work done?” My use of profanity had a tendency to increase when I got angry.

  The Sin Eater nodded, reaching for the information I’d managed to compile before passing out at my kitchen table.

  “As I was saying, there are two graves worth checking out.” Grabbing the bag of coffee beans off the counter, I poured enough in the grinder to brew a full pot to fill my thermos. If I was going to make it through the witching hour and a stakeout, I was going to need coffee.

  A lot of it.

  SEVEN

  CATHEDRAL CEMETERY’S sprawling hills and its lichen-covered marble headstones stretched out before us. We left my car parked at the back of the property, hopping the fence to gain access. Weaving our way through statue after statue of angels, erected to watch over the dead until it was time for their souls to be ushered home, we finally reached the newest section of the graveyard and a plot with freshly turned earth.

  Henry Jones, buried not twenty-four hours before we came to stand at the foot of his grave, lived a devout but lonely life. A thorough search through the soul database, like Google but for the dead, told us he isolated himself from what little family he had, choosing to escape the modern world for a more rigid religious lifestyle. It was just a hunch, one I kept to myself in case I was wrong, but I had a feeling the more devoted the soul, the stronger the corruption, and in turn the stronger the fake fi-follet became.

  My attention to Henry Jones’s grave was momentarily derailed by the memory of my first visit to Cathedral. A small, sad little girl looking for answers instead of sinners and lost souls. Three to the left and about eight rows back, a flat, rectangular stone slab marked the spot of Sara Wright. There was only one line etched below her name, a shooting star. No mention of beloved wife or mother. Why would there be? She’d been neither of those things in life.

  That was the day I decided to become a Reaper.

  “Hey, what are doing?” Jackson moved to the position we’d agreed upon, behind the largest angel statue on the southern side of the cemetery, to wait for the necromancer to show up. “Get over here before our guy shows up and sees you.”

  Snapping my focus back to the job at hand, I shoved all my skeletons back in their closet and joined Jackson behind the statue. Crouched behind the stone angel, our shoulders pressed together, I coul
dn’t help but wonder how I’d wound up partnered with a Sin Eater. And not just any Sin Eater. The same one I’d been trying to avoid for months.

  Life, it seemed, was not without a sense of irony.

  “Why did you pick this guy again?” After thirty minutes huddled together at the feet of divinity, Jackson’s interest in our stakeout began to falter. Repositioned with his back against the base of the statue, legs outstretched in front of him, he’d nodded off more than once. “Maybe we should pack it up, scope out the other gravesite.”

  “I realize you’re not used to this, what with all the swooping in at the last minute after I’ve done all the work, but this”—I swirled a finger in the air around us, gesturing to our position—“waiting is a big part of what Reapers do.” Rolling my eyes, I jabbed him in the shoulder with my elbow. “Less napping, more watching.”

  “All right, all right.” Jackson rubbed his eyes, trying to wake himself up. “In all seriousness though, why Jones and not the other one?”

  “I flipped a coin.” Digging into my satchel purse, I pulled out the thermos that sat shotgun on all my runs and managed to collect as many dings as I did sinners and handed it to Jackson. “Here.”

  “A coin toss? We’re sitting here and not at another cemetery because you played heads or tails? Great.” The Sin Eater continued to mumble complaints about my methods and the numbness in his ass cheeks as he unscrewed the cap from the thermos and guzzled down half its contents. “Black coffee. Let me guess, like your soul?”

  “My soul?” I mocked offense, placing a hand over my heart. “I’m not the one eating sins for breakfast lunch and dinner.”

  Before Jackson could muster up a witty comeback, I shushed him. Something or someone was moving in the cemetery. Prior experience told me it could have been any one of the critters who roamed the streets at night, from feral cats to possum or wharf rats, but the sound of the footfall suggested two legs and not four. And from the way the hair on the back of my neck stood up, I was willing to bet it wasn’t one of the homeless looking for quiet refuge among the dead.