by Becca Andre
James tugged his black T-shirt in place over his jeans and gave her a puzzled look. “I thought necros could hear ghosts.”
“For a price.”
His brows rose in question.
“We must let them possess us.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Then what do you do?”
“I’m a bit of a ghost myself.” He shrugged and walked away.
The drive out of Athens was a quiet one. Her few comments on the scenery or the weather had been met with silence. Not liking the quiet, she popped in her favorite CD and turned up the volume. The manic drum beat and screaming guitar thumped through the speakers, and she tapped a finger against the steering wheel.
James glanced over. “You like metal?”
“Yes.” She had seen a couple of his T-shirts and wondered at his surprise. His taste appeared even heavier than hers. “Expecting something different?”
“I figured you would torment me with bad pop.”
“Dear God, no. I’m a necromancer, not a sadist.”
A soft snort answered her, but when she glanced over, he was studying the dark landscape outside his window. He didn’t comment further, but the silence that followed was more comfortable.
Two hours into the trip, she pulled over for gas. James climbed out of her Ford Focus and stretched to his full height.
“Next time we take my car,” he muttered, rubbing one shoulder.
“You’re sore?” Not possible. The dead had no bodily concerns. From her experience, they weren’t aware enough to know they had a body.
He rolled his shoulder and gave her a frown. “You going to stop and eat or should I get something.” He hooked a thumb toward the store.
“You eat?” She almost dropped the gas cap.
“It’s eat or starve.”
“Starving implies that you could die.”
“In my case, I go dog and slobber all over your upholstery.”
She snorted and turned to lift the gas nozzle. “Then you had better get a snack. Grams’s place is still an hour away. By the time we get there, it’ll be too late to expect more than a sandwich.”
“No offense, but if a necro is cooking, I’m not eating.”
She thunked the nozzle into the tank. “Why would I be offended?” She squeezed the lever and the gas began flowing.
James grunted and turned toward the store. He took a couple of strides and stopped. “You want anything?” he called.
“I’ll be in.”
He nodded and headed inside.
She watched him go, still not sure what to make of him. Metaphysically, he was a complete mystery, but more perplexing was his attitude. He should hate her, maybe try to hurt her, but he hadn’t tried anything. Once he had moved past his anger, he had been… civil.
She finished pumping the gas and walked inside. James waited at the counter with an assortment of chips, sweets, and a bottle of Mountain Dew.
“I thought you were getting a snack.” She placed a Diet Coke on the counter.
“What do you think this is?” he asked.
The clerk, a pretty-faced pregnant girl, gave them a grin and began bagging his purchases.
“No snack?” James asked, eyeing Elysia’s bottle of Diet Coke.
“Not hungry.” She handed the girl a couple of dollars, aware that the five in her pocket was the last of her cash. She had missed work tonight and now had to finance an unexpected road trip. It looked like a lot of Ramen Noodles next week.
James took the sack and thanked the girl, then they headed for the exit.
Elysia laid her hand on the door handle at the same moment the entry door on the other side of the counter chimed.
“Nobody move!” a male voice shouted.
James gripped her wrist.
Two men stood inside the entrance, both in ski masks and each carrying a handgun. The first raised his gun and fired toward the back of the store. Elysia dropped into a crouch before she realized that he wasn’t shooting in her direction. It took three shots until an explosion of plastic marked the end of the video camera. The man stopped at the counter and pointed his gun at the cashier.
“Empty the drawer.” He tossed a cloth tote bag on the counter.
James toed off his boots, his attention never leaving the two men.
“What are you doing?” Elysia whispered.
The second man noticed them and hurried toward their side of the counter. “You two, on the floor.”
James didn’t comment. Instead he undid his pants and shoved them down.
“Listen you twisted fuck. On the floor or I pop you one. Or better yet, your girl.” He swung the gun toward her.
James growled, and the gunman’s eyes returned to him.
“What the hell?”
“Exactly.” James tossed his shirt aside and sprang at the guy.
The gun fired. This close, it made Elysia’s ears ring. Darkness enveloped James, and an enormous black dog landed where he should have.
The gunman screamed—very high and very loud—and began to fire repeatedly.
James the hellhound jumped, covering the distance between himself and the gunman in one leap. Elysia expected the pair to collide and crash to the ground, but James didn’t slam against him. He disappeared into him.
Elysia stood up. “What—”
The gunman collapsed on the floor without a sound. James was nowhere in sight, but her senses told her there was still a dead man in the room: the man on the floor.
“Hades’s blood,” she whispered.
Another gun went off, and she realized that the other gunman was just as freaked out. The cashier screamed and Elysia reached out instinctively. Joyous relief filled her as she unfettered her soul. It flowed into the empty body on the floor and brought life. Euphoria rolled through her veins, and she almost forgot her purpose.
“Rise,” she breathed, and the dead gunman came to his feet in a smooth coordinated motion. The body responded perfectly with no lingering resistance to her foreign presence. It was as if his soul had left his body so smoothly it had left no bit of himself behind to fight her.
“No,” she whispered, as the full impact of what James had done hit her. But she would think about that later. Now she willed the new body to raise the gun.
“Herb, what are you doing?” the first gunman demanded.
She fired and he staggered, but he didn’t go down. Instead, he fired back. The impact shook her new body, but there was no pain.
She leveled the gun to fire again when darkness rippled behind her target. She glimpsed a taloned hand slashing from behind, then the second gunman collapsed without a sound.
In the space where he had stood, the slash of darkness remained. A glint of red eyes was followed by green. An instant later, her green-eyed hellhound crouched over the new body.
“James?” It was a rhetorical question. She could feel the bond in him, but it was still unsettling.
Another flicker of darkness, and James the man now crouched over the gunman.
“You going to keep that?” He jerked his chin toward the gunman she still held.
Heat rose in her cheeks and she pulled back her hold. The pain of her soul’s return made her gasp, and the body fell to the floor.
“You ripped out his soul,” she said. Knowing he could was one thing, but seeing him do it was something else entirely.
“Yes.” He held her gaze with his still glowing eyes.
A groan sounded from behind the counter. The clerk.
“No,” James whispered, then vaulted the counter.
Still a bit disoriented from the animation, Elysia wasn’t as graceful. She stumbled around the end of the counter. James knelt beside the girl who lay unmoving on the floor. He
pressed his fingers against the other side of her head, and they came away bloody.
Elysia grabbed a roll of paper towels from beneath the counter and knelt beside him. “Was she shot?”
“Yes.”
Elysia ripped off a handful of towels and passed them to him. It quickly became apparent that he would need more. There was so much blood.
“Her soul is leaving,” he whispered.
Elysia bit her lower lip. She had to take his word for it. She wouldn’t feel the difference until the woman was actually dead.
“But the baby’s still here,” he said.
“Oh.” That would change as soon as the mother died.
“Please, don’t go,” James muttered.
Elysia realized that he spoke to the girl’s spirit. Could she hear him? A cell phone rested beside the open register, and Elysia picked it up to dial 911.
“She won’t listen,” James whispered. He took the dying girl’s hand in his.
The operator picked up, and Elysia gave her a quick description of what had happened—with a few embellishments to hide the necromancy.
“Help’s on the way,” she told him, returning the phone to the counter.
“She’s going. I can’t stop her.” He raised glowing eyes to hers. “Can you do something?”
Yes, animate her body after she goes. But she didn’t say that. Voicing her frustration wouldn’t help.
“If we can keep her here until they take the baby, maybe…” He pressed a bloodied hand to the girl’s swollen stomach. “Do you think she’s far enough along?”
“I haven’t a clue,” Elysia admitted.
“The soul is so strong. So here.” He closed his eyes, his brow wrinkled in anxiety.
Elysia drew a breath, and he opened his eyes as if knowing what she would say.
“There is something,” she said.
“Yes?”
“I can bind her soul… to her body.”
“You mean, make her a lich.”
“Yes. She’ll still die, but more slowly. It’ll give the ambulance a chance to arrive. Perhaps the baby can be saved.”
James blanched, clearly not liking the idea.
She didn’t blame him. Binding this woman’s soul to her rotting corpse was not a kind thing to do. Maybe it was cowardly, but Elysia remained silent, and let him decide. She wasn’t sure what she wanted the answer to be. Her dark side was thrilled at the prospect, but the rest of her wanted to vomit.
“Do it,” he said.
She nodded and looked down at the girl, swallowing her revulsion. Was she really going to make this young woman a lich?
“What do you need me to do?” James asked.
Elysia forced herself to focus. If she was going to do this, she had to do it right. “See if you can find something sharp. I’ll have to use my blood. Then you’ll need to get dressed and cart me out of here.”
“What does it do to you?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never done this. It should only drain me—unless I screw up. Then I die.”
He glanced between the girl and her. Worried for his own existence? If Elysia died, so did he. For some reason, she didn’t think that was his concern.
“I won’t screw up,” she said, holding his gaze with her own.
He smiled. “You remind me of someone.”
She scooted closer and took the girl’s face in her hands. “Who?”
He shook his head. “Not now. How long will this take? If the ambulance comes…”
“Seconds.”
“I always had the impression that lich making was a big deal.”
“It is. I’m not a normal necro.”
“Meaning?”
“Later.” She leaned in closer to the girl. “Do me a favor? Keep what I’m about to do to yourself?”
“Who would I tell?”
“My grandmother.”
“You could command my silence.”
“I could.”
He grunted. “Shall we see if death can save a life?”
Chapter
4
James handed Elysia a box cutter and watched as she snapped it open. This blade looked much sharper than that knife she had used in her kitchen. Maybe he shouldn’t let her do this. She took a deep breath that shook when she released it. He opened his mouth to speak, but couldn’t get the words out before she ran the box cutter across her forearm. The scent of Elysia’s blood colored the air, the iron-rich aroma calling to him. James pushed to his feet and hurried away.
He returned to his clothes, alarmed by his reaction, his longing to once again drink the ambrosia that flowed in her veins. God, what was wrong with him? He pulled on his clothes and considered escaping to the fresher air outside.
He looked toward the counter, using the hound’s sight to see the souls on the other side. He squinted in the brightness that was Elysia. He had never seen a soul that glowed so brightly. Not even Addie’s.
He felt it the moment Elysia bound the girl’s soul. It stopped fluttering about her body and sank inside. He didn’t want to think too deeply about what Elysia was doing, but he couldn’t ignore it. The girl was being bound to her dying body. But maybe the baby could be saved.
A thump sounded from the other side of the counter and Elysia groaned.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
When she didn’t answer, he rushed around the counter. She lay slumped against the wall, holding a wad of tissues to her forearm.
“Hey.” He moved closer.
“It’s done,” Elysia whispered. Her eyes were half closed, but he still glimpsed white irises where golden-brown had been.
“I see.” He squatted beside her and then regretted the move when the strong scent of her blood washed over him. His mouth immediately began to water. It was a bizarre reaction he had never had before, but then, he had never been exposed to necromantic blood. The vibrancy and vitality he could smell. Even the color seemed brighter, more full of life.
“How badly did you nick yourself?” Not wanting to, but knowing he must, he caught her wrist and rotated it toward him.
“It didn’t heal like it did with you,” she said, the words a little slurred.
He pulled away her other hand and found an inch long cut, still sluggishly bleeding. “Heal?”
“Does your saliva have healing properties?” Her head drooped and her tawny blonde hair fell forward, obscuring her face.
Unease crawled along his spine as he remembered his brothers’ ability to heal him. “I’ve never made it a habit to lick open wounds.” It was hard to tell with the new blood, but he saw no evidence of the cut from earlier this evening.
“That would be gross,” she mumbled.
An ambulance siren wailed in the distance. He lifted his head, listening. It was still miles away, but they needed to leave or answer some uncomfortable questions.
He glanced at the clerk and found both souls still firmly attached. The clean towels Elysia had placed under her head were not as blood saturated as earlier.
James scooped Elysia up and headed for the door. He paused long enough to retrieve his bag of snacks and hurried to her tiny car. He placed her, still muttering about something, in the passenger seat and cracked his head climbing into the driver’s side. He put the seat back as far as it would go, but still felt cramped. Grumbling, he punched the accelerator and left the ill-fated convenience store behind.
He continued down the road in the direction she had been headed. How long would Elysia be out of it? Could he make it to Cincinnati? And then what? She had only to give him a command and force him to kill everyone he cared about. He didn’t think she would, but it wasn’t a chance he could take.
“James?” Even though she slurred the letters together, he still
felt the tug on the sliver of soul she had buried within him. It seemed to do that every time she said his name.
“Yes?”
“I’m thirsty.”
“Just a minute.” He glanced at the sack on the back seat and then at her slouched form. “Let me pull over.”
He drove until he spotted a rutted lane that led to an ancient barn a hundred yards off the road. The little Ford bounced and thumped over the dips and ruts. After one particularly deep rut, Elysia sat up with a gasp and gripped the dashboard.
“Did we wreck?” she asked.
“No, it’s a bumpy country road.” He brought the car to a stop and reached into the back seat to retrieve his bag of goodies. He pulled out her Diet Coke, cracked it open, and handed it to her. “You got it?” he asked when she fumbled the bottle.
“Mmm,” she answered, tipping up the bottle. A drop escaped and rolled down to her chin. She took the bottle away and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. He glimpsed her forearm in the glow of the dashboard.
“Are you still bleeding?” he asked. He had adjusted to the scent of her blood—after driving with his window down for several miles. Even so, the smell made him edgy.
She rotated her wrist to reveal her forearm. A drop of blood had rolled to the crease of her elbow. “Yeah,” she said. “Is that bad?”
He grunted. Though it was down to a trickle, it should have stopped by now.
“Grams once told me about her cousin. She tried to make a lich, and she bled to death.”
James cocked his head. “Did she hit an artery or something?”
“Nope. She wasn’t strong enough.” Elysia continued to stare at her arm. “I am, but two bindings in one day is a bit much.” She snorted. “Never thought I’d hear myself say that.”
James watched a second droplet move toward her wrist. He took her Diet Coke out of her hand and twisted the cap into place before dropping it on the floorboard.
“I was drinking that,” she complained.
He cupped the back of her forearm, and before he could reconsider, leaned over and ran his tongue along the cut.