by April Zyon
EVERNIGHT PUBLISHING ®
www.evernightpublishing.com
Copyright© 2016 April Zyon
ISBN: 978-1-77339-121-2
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Editor: Jessica Ruth
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
CURSED
Warriors of Light, 6
April Zyon
Copyright © 2016
Chapter One
The house loomed out of the darkness like a great hulking beast, its windows like black, soulless eyes. The front door was left gaping open, which seemed to serve as a permanent scream. The yellow crime scene tape was strung like pearls around the front porch and drooped into the red hydrangeas like a sick sort of blood. The whole scene seemed to scream that bad things had happened here, in case anyone missed the stench of burnt flesh as well as the eerie silence. The absence of even the sound of insects was enough to speak of the sadness and horror that this home had beheld.
The lights of red, blue, and white still flashed, the shadows broken only by that world-known strobe of a police light. The only sound heard was the crackle of dispatch making a call to one of the officers that milled about the old mansion that had seen something beyond horrific.
Krista Reins lifted the badge, a shiver of apprehension racing up and down her spine. She didn’t want to be here. Every fiber of her being wanted her to turn and run. Nothing would cleanse the site where she stood currently.
“Sheriff Chapman sent for me.” They didn’t need to know who, or rather what, she was. All they needed to know was that their boss had sent for her.
“Of course. You’re the specialist he said to look out for,” the young deputy with the slightly green pallor to his skin said. “He’s in the front room, ma’am, just through the door and to the left.” It was clear he didn’t want to go in there; likely he had seen far too much, she surmised.
“I’ll find him.” Krista smiled at the young man.
Not so young… one of the spirits hanging around said, making eye contact with Krista for the first time. He’s older than you are.
Krista took in the ghost’s print dress and the striking resemblance she bore to the deputy. The woman was a deceased relative, she was sure. She gave the woman a small smile but said nothing, not wanting to attract any more attention. Several ghosts were drifting closer—a woman in a blood-stained, green tank top, a young girl clutching a ragged teddy bear. Deep shadows lingered near every shrub and corner of the property, and Krista could hear the muted sounds of anxious whispering. The dead were restless. Mentally she asked them to be quiet, to allow her to do her job and find what she needed to find in order to put them to rest.
“Do you have booties for me?” she asked quietly, refocusing on the deputy. The woman beside him inched closer, then ran a transparent hand through his hair, and he shivered. Krista kept her expression neutral and when he passed her off the clean pair, she gave her thanks.
Pausing just on the other side of the yellow tape, she slipped the booties on and pulled her long, honey-blonde hair back and tucked it into a cap, then finally pulled on her gloves.
Several spirits—mostly women, all young—had stepped from the shadows closest to the front porch. None spoke. After taking a deep breath, Krista looked to the dead that milled around her as if they had taken numbers and were waiting to talk to her. “In time,” she whispered before entering the home.
“Krista.” The sheriff looked up, then nodded to a man in a suit at his side, a man who scuddled off like a rodent searching for darkness. “Thank you for coming so quickly,” he said, moving toward her.
Krista looked around at the bodies lying there like macabre mannequins set for a play. They were positioned from heel to head, smallest to largest, with exactly one foot between each body—and each corresponding ghost was off to the side. They were gathered in a group, the males holding the females. They weren’t talking until they saw Krista, saw that she could see them. One of the older ones came forward. Krista switched her focus back to the sheriff. “What do you have for me?” She didn’t want the niceties. She wanted to move on and find out who had snuffed out the lives of these young people far before their time.
“Right, okay.” He moved back to his spot. “The nearest we can figure is that they were all here for a game.” He gestured toward the game board that had been found under the coffee table. A Ouija board. From the whispers and the nods from the dead, Krista could tell that he was on the right track thus far. “This place has sat empty for years. Kids coming in here happens more than you’d think. But something like this…” He glanced down at the bodies and sighed.
“There were just the thirteen?”
The sheriff nodded.
“And they were already arranged like this, lined up, when the first officers arrived?”
Again, a nod.
One of the teens, a girl, stepped forward to join the boy, approaching Krista. Her clothes were torn, and blood streaked across her pale skin. Krista turned slightly, facing away from the sheriff, as the girl began to speak. They took our blood, she whispered, her wide-eyed gaze fixed on Krista.
Krista felt her blood run cold. Why would someone harvest blood from these kids? What interest would anyone have for the blood from innocent kids? She glanced to the boy who stood protectively next to the girl, then raised a brow in silent question, but he only shrugged.
“Okay, but here is the issue.” She moved to one of the bodies and bent slightly. “Where is the blood? I see a small amount of it, but not as much as I would imagine there would be.” In truth, there wasn’t a significant lack of blood and spatter among the crime scene. Had the dead not pointed it out, Krista wasn’t certain if the slight discrepancy would have been noticed.
Krista’s blue eyes narrowed as she took everything in. Then she looked from the sheriff to the other men. “No one saw anything?”
“The neighborhood is still being canvased. But so far, we’ve got nothing. No witnesses. No suspects. No motive.”
Suddenly, the dead were all talking at once and it was confusing her. These kids had gotten together to call something to them, to call a power to them that they didn’t understand, couldn’t understand. She eyed the ghosts again, trying to see beyond the ruined bodies and torn clothes. The four boys all looked as if they were the type to be into things like online role-playing Wizarding games, and the nine girls were all young, no older than sixteen or seventeen, she guessed, and seemed to be misfits. That was the only word she could find for the poor girls. She was positive that if she were to look into their lives, she’d find that they came from broken homes or had issues that needed therapy.
We’re all virgins, one girl said, her voice rising above the others. We all belonged to the same chastity club at school. The men who came here tonight, who did this to us, they were looking for virgins.
It was that last bit that had Krista biting back curses that would have had everyone looking at her. Instead she took a deep breath and forced a tense smile. “We have some serious mess on our hands, Sheriff. I think it’s time to call in the FBI, because this is over what we can handle here.” She saw the anger that flashed in his eyes, but continued. “You don’t have the manpower and you know it. We need to call them in.”
“Fine,” he growled
. “I just want this shit over and done with. This many dead kids ain’t good for nobody.”
Especially when said kids were from the wealthiest families around. Yep, it sucked to be him, she was sure. “At least with the feds takin’ over it will take some of the heat off of you.”
“You’re right, good thinking. Now you need to get out of here if you don’t want them to see you.”
“Great point.” She never liked to be seen at all. She preferred to work from the sidelines and let the detectives take the credit. It was easier for her that way. It was one of the reasons she’d managed to keep her ability under the radar all these years. There were always rumors here and there, about why she had such an uncanny knack for correctly reading crimes scenes, for noticing things that other cops didn’t. But very few people knew what she could do. The sheriff knew, but they had a longstanding agreement: She gave him information, and he didn’t ask how she’d come by it. “Call me if you need me?” she asked, then turned to leave.
Then there was a whisper from one of the boys. He was shorter than the others, maybe five feet tall, and had shaggy blond hair. His eyes were pure black. The whispered words he gave to Krista sent shivers down her spine. There will be more, he promised, more death. More virgins will be dying, but not the kind like them. His gaze cut to the side, to the dead girls, before he turned his intense stare back to Krista. The vestals will be falling quickly.
Chapter Two
Mercury was pacing around his office with a datapad in hand when Demaratus stopped by. Waving the other man inside, he kicked the door shut before moving to pace again. “This is not good,” he said.
Demaratus eased himself into a chair with a tilt of his head. “At least Holly has figured it out, what Helen was doing, and is working to undo it even now.”
He could see the worry in Demaratus’s eyes. Mercury knew that the men he guided wondered about him, about his history, and his story more so than not. But he was an intensely private person, always had been, and always would be. While he’d shared a bit with those that had been with him the longest of his past, and of his time before the first he’d brought back from the grave, he definitely hadn’t shared it all. Barely a scratch on the surface of the sun in comparison.
It was hard at times holding it all in, but he’d been betrayed too many times over the years by those he’d considered brethren to ever let out more than was required to assist them in their jobs. For centuries Mercury had yearned for someone all his own like Holly was for Demaratus now. Someone he could open up to fully, speak freely with, and someone who could help shoulder the terrible burdens he carried on a daily basis.
While he never spoke of his desire to have someone like six of the guardians now did, it didn’t mean the craving went away. He dreamed of the possibility nearly every night. Only recently had she begun to take shape. Mercury should have known something in the universe had changed. But to go so many millennia without made one blind to such small changes. The news Holly had just dropped on him, though, brought everything into crystal clarity.
Thinking back on his dreams, he realized it was only in the last four years that the woman of his dreams had truly shown a shape. Before it had always been a vague sense of something, or rather someone, meant to be his. Twenty or so years ago the dreams had begun to solidify, but truly the past few years were the important ones. She was of age, and adult as it were, in the world out there. What made him nearly sick was the thought of her alone, unaware of the dangers, and unaware that help was coming.
“Stop pacing,” Demaratus said, bringing him back to the present.
The hand he’d been rubbing his brow with fell to his side, and he stopped moving.
“I really hate it when you go all still like that,” D muttered. “Will you sit down and focus for a moment. You have to send someone out for this woman. I’m guessing you’ve already figured out who it’s to be.”
“Of course I have.” Mercury had known the moment Holly had given a name to the potential vestal virgin. Just as he knew exactly who to send for every single one of the others. It was part and parcel of the bonus package the goddess had given to him. It didn’t always make a hell of a lot of sense, but he went with it every time. Not once in all his years had he ever been wrong, even in the very early days long before technology had been a consideration.
“Are you planning on keeping it a secret, or sharing with the rest of the class?”
Not many realized that Demaratus was actually a sarcastic, snarky little shit on the best of days. But Mercury had known it from the first time the man had opened his mouth upon awakening from his death. Like it was only yesterday he could recall the man’s words. “If this is Heaven, I damn well want a refund,” was the loose translation in modern lingo, but it had been pretty fitting to the situation.
Mercury leaned back in his chair and let out a breath. He was too wound up. He knew better than to let his emotions run rampant. The consequences were not ones he ever wanted to have to live with again.
A knock on the door had him giving Demaratus a look. “It’s open,” he called.
“Mercury, you rang?” Eric Thorvaldsson asked as he sauntered into the office. He shot a grin toward Demaratus as he settled down in the other guest chair. “D, didn’t realize you were going to be here.”
“Impromptu stop by to see what thoughts the big guy had on the latest information Holly managed to dig up.”
“Oh? And what information has your little mate dug up?” Eric asked curiously.
“Holly’s gotten Helen’s program up and running with a few tweaks to start looking for the VV’s again,” Mercury said. “She’s found a potential in New Orleans. I need you to head there tonight. Robert is in the area, so I’ll have him meet you at the hotel.” Digging out a file from his desk, he passed it over. “That’s all that Holly sent me on Krista Reins. Your ticket and the hotel information are in there as well.”
Taking the folder, Eric settled back in the chair to read through the information, tucking the airline ticket under his chin as he did so.
“She’s a consultant for the locals,” Mercury said. “You’ll need to tread carefully with her. She’s not like any of the others to date.”
“She likely knows how to actually shoot a gun,” D muttered.
Mercury threw him a glance. He knew the other man had been working to try to train Holly in at least a few methods of self-defense. Demaratus had occasionally bemoaned about the woman being such a girly-girl. No one could argue that Holly was definitely a woman. Mercury had a feeling she’d yet to find the one thing that worked with what she already knew. She’d find it in time, and the upside was watching Demaratus grind his teeth.
“More than likely,” he said to both men. “I’ll pass along whatever other information Holly comes up with as she gets it. I told her to focus on Ms. Reins for the moment, that she was our immediate priority. You have a couple hours before your flight to get your gear together. I’ll have the chopper readied to take you to the airport.”
Tucking the ticket back into the folder, Eric got to his feet. “Roger that, boss man. Later, D,” he said to Demaratus. “And thank Holly for the impressive amount of information on the woman.”
Demaratus gave him a mock salute and waited until the door shut behind the man before turning his eyes back on Mercury. “So, do you want to talk to me about what Holly revealed to you?”
He knew that Demaratus was only trying to help. But when it came to the subject of Mercury’s potential mate, that was a closed, sealed, and permanently buried item. “No,” he said quietly. He did want to talk about it. He wanted to rage. He wanted to scream, and he wanted to hurt someone. But he knew he couldn’t do any of that.
“All right.” Demaratus got to his feet with a nod. “You know where to find me if you change your mind.”
Giving a vague wave of his hand, Mercury stared at the closed door long after Demaratus had left his office. Pressing his fingers to his eyes, he let out a shuddering breath.
So close, so very close.
The sound of an object vibrating on his desk had him snapping a hand out to still it. Shit, he needed to get down to the gym and beat the shit out of something inanimate, and quickly. He was starting to lose control of the emotions he’d kept under wraps for so long. If he did that… No, he couldn’t think that way. Not now, not ever. Pushing to his feet, he headed for the door. A few hours of mindless activity would calm the worst of them down. It had worked before, and it had to now.
Chapter Three
Krista had just finished filing her report when the bell rang over the door of the police station. She looked up, then up some more. Holy fucking hell, the men standing before her were massive. “Uhm, hello?” She peered around the men and frowned. There were dead that lingered near both men, but the dead weren’t from this century—or any other she had ever seen before. The ghosts seemed to follow these men because they had done so in life as well. These men looked like soldiers.
She tilted her head to the side. She looked at one of the ghosts in particular. He was a warrior, one who looked like he was from ancient times. Perhaps ancient Greece. His skin was pale, but even in the paleness it still looked slightly tanned all the same.
Your life is about to change, Krista, he told her. There is a man who is about to come into your life, and he is going to change everything…
She was shaking her head when the man began to tell her the most insane story, insisting that Billy the Kid was hunting her down and these men were there to protect her. He talked about an ancient goddess, and an evil that knew no bounds. About medallions, and ancient warriors who’d been brought back to life and tasked with holding back the coming storm.