Mortality Bites - The COMPLETE Boxed Set (Books 1 - 10): An Urban Fantasy Epic Adventure

by Ramy Vance

  All in the name of good, of course.

  KAT’S ADVENTURES CONTINUES WITH RUN, KAT, RUN - OUT NOW - CLICK HERE!

  Run, Kat, Run

  Stalkers, souls and sacrifice …

  And to think, all Kat wanted was to curl up under her duvet and watch Legally Blonde.

  After killing three dead gods—again—you’d think I’d get a break. Some time off to lick my wounds in a very cat-like fashion. But my stalker has other plans.

  And after discovering who my stalker is—or rather, was—I miss the good old days when my enemies were dead gods and world armies.

  My name is Katrina Darling, and my stalker just had to be one of the most powerful creatures in all of creation, didn’t he?

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  CHAPTER 1

  “T rap the bogeyman, she said. Steal his bell, she said. And what do I do? I listen to her,” I muttered to myself as I laced beads onto a long piece of tread.

  “I listen to my dead wife, who, by the way, speaks to me in my dreams, because, that’s normal. And when she tells me to hang out in a dark, scary park with a Mug Me Here sign on my back because … what? … I’m still pussy-whipped?

  I chuckled at the thought as I laced the last of the ceramic trinkets then walked the thread around three nearby trees to form my own Bermuda’s Triangle of yarn. A cat’s cradle—if the cat were the size of an elephant. “Pussy-whipped from beyond the grave.”

  I carefully placed my Cabbage Patch Kid that I got from my—ehem—collection in the middle of the triangle. Hey, don’t judge me … I love old toys and the Cabbage Patch Kid is a classic. “Open your hearts to a Cabbage Patch Kid … each sold separately,” I hummed as I worked.

  I shook my head. “I need help.”

  Then I pulled out a blue quilt from my baby days, and covered the toy with it. Once my trap was set, I pressed play on a Sony Walkman that I hooked up to a little portable speaker and climbed up a nearby tree.

  The Cabbage Patch cries rang out in the night.

  “Here I am,” I muttered to myself again—or maybe I was complaining to my dead wife just in case she was listening—“a grown man, sitting in a tree, literally waiting for the bogeyman to show up because she told me to do it. I didn’t really listen to her when she was alive, so why start now?”

  I felt a pang of guilt whenever I thought about Bella in such a callous way. She was the love of life, my soulmate—if such a thing exists—and she was gone forever. I loved her and her being dead hadn’t changed that one bit.

  And the fact that I dreamed of her every night proved that, too. Right? I mean, why else would my dreams be filled with her?

  Not because I couldn’t let go. I can let go. I’m well adjusted.

  Seriously.

  But even I couldn’t deny that dangling from a tree, in the dark, broadcasting a toy baby’s toy cries, was case-and-point to the contrary. Still in love, yes. Well adjusted? Hardly.

  Certifiably insane, most likely.

  At least the “bogeyman” part didn’t make me crazy. He’s real—thank the GoneGods.

  And not just him—they’re all real. Legends, fables, mythical creatures—all of ’em, real as you and me. And all currently living amongst us ever since the gods decided to pack up and leave, closing their heavens and hells and forcing their “Other” creations onto Earth—the only remaining plane of existence they left open in this Universe.

  As if Earth didn’t have enough problems with just humans, we now have to add on the divine complications that elves, trolls, oni demons, dragons and all the other Others brought with them—you name it, we got it!

  I listened as my Sony Walkman cried on a loop. The recording was OK given that I got it from a YouTube video and had to really work some cross-generational technical hook-ups, but it worked in the end.

  Not the best baby crying in the world, but good enough. For the mission, at least.

  If only the bogeyman would show up. Where the hell was he? I knew the guy hung out around these parts and my source told me that he frequently cut through the park at night on his way to what he referred to as a gathering. It was night, and this was the park, so why wasn’t he gathering?

  Then again, my source could be wrong. He was, after all, a drunk fallen angel who lived in my attic. Still, it was quite literally in Penemue’s nature to know things—

  Bells. Chiming in a chaotic rhythm, like a dozen nearby churches ringing their Sunday bells a few hours premature.

  The chiming drew closer and my heart sped as I waited for the bogeyman to appear. I had one chance to get this guy in my trap or suffer the consequences. And according to my source, this particular bogeyman travelled with a shelleycoat … and pissing off a shelleycoat had all kinds of nasty bad-for-your-health consequences.

  Legend has it that shelleycoats dealt with those who crossed their path by getting the offender so lost and confused that they would literally die of starvation as they wandered aimlessly looking for the path back home. Even Hansel and Gretel, those clever bastards.

  Stories of bodies lying dead only a few feet away from a clearing or a road littered the shelleycoat’s past. And I was determined not to add my own to the shelleycoat’s present.

  The chiming grew louder and I heard him say with a heavy Scottish brogue, “What’s this? A wee lad lost in the park?”

  So he was a Scottish bogeyman. Cheers, mate.

  The shelleycoat took three steps closer to my Cabbage Patch Doll. Another step and he’d be in my trap … and then—Wham! Bam! Pow! Holy shelleycoat trap, Batman!

  But the shelleycoat didn’t take that last step. Instead, he looked around. And around.

  Until his eyes fixed on me.

  Hell … Hell-le-lujah.

  ↔

  WHEN I WAS A KID, my PopPop used to tell me all sorts of stories about the bogeyman. The bogeyman, he’d say, would get me if I didn’t sleep, didn’t finish my dinner, didn’t do my chores. Sheesh. Talk about fear-based parenting.

  Still, despite all the stories, I was never really afraid of the bogeyman. I knew that my PopPop, as grandfather-old as he was, would always save me, after all.

  But my PopPop wasn’t here now, dangling from this tree in the dark following my dead wife’s instructions, and I felt old childish fears overrun my soul as I dropped down from the tree to face the bogeyman alone.

  “What do ye want, mortal?” the shelleycoat said.

  On the ground, I got a good glimpse at his coat. It was covered with all sorts of bells, from tiny silver ones all the way up to town-crier brass carillons. He was also considerably shorter than I was and at five foot ten, I’m not particularly tall (or short)—and not even remotely as handsome—with a crooked nose that was a Pinocchio I-didn’t-eat-the-children long.

  Oh, fun.

  “We’re all mortal now,” I said, stepping forward as I tried to push him into my trap.

  I’m pretty strong. I mean, I’m not Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson strong, but I’d probably hold my own against Vin Diesel or Chris Hemsworth. But despite putting everything I had into that shove, I didn’t move the ugly bastard an inch.

  Grinning, he backhand slapped me. I went flying across the ground, by body rolling over dry autumn leaves that crackled as loudly as my bones did. Ouch.

  The shelleycoat took three steps toward me, reaching a bell-jangling arm down as he grabbed my ankle then swung me like a five-iron. I went flying, this time in the direction of my Cabbage Patch Doll/Sony Walkman trap.

  Landing beside the old Walkman, I put it out of its misery, thankfu
l that at least the damn baby’s crying was over.

  Looked like it might be time for my own crying.

  “What do ye want?” the bogeyman asked, taking long strides in my direction.

  Still on my butt, I pushed my feet against the ground as I crab-walked away from him.

  “A bell,” I said.

  “A … bell, you say?” He did a little shimmy that sent all his bells a-ringing and a-ranging. “I got plenty o’ these, but they be mine, not yours, not anyone’s to take. Mine,” he growled with Gollum-esque rage.

  “I know,” I said, shuffling away. “That’s why I did this.”

  I waited until he took another step, then I pulled at the yarn threads I’d lain earlier. A fence-like structure swung up around him. It was no higher than the shelleycoat’s ankles and it was literally made of thread and beads, but it did the trick.

  The shelleycoat stopped dead in his tracks, looking down at a barrier that a kitten could tear through in two seconds flat. But the shelleycoat was no kitten. He was a bogeyman of legend, a monster of old … and those kinds of creatures had rules. And one of the rules, explained to me long ago by my good-ol’ PopPop, was that no shelleycoat can ever cross over a line made from thread and ceramic—hence the beads.

  These days, jails weren’t just iron bars. Glass to hold dwarves, bird cages for sprites …

  And beaded thread for bogeymen.

  “No,” he growled. “Explain the meaning of this! I have done ye or yours no harm. I nae deserve this.”

  I lifted a placating hand. “And I’ll let you go in a minute, I promise. But I needed to get your attention first.”

  “Fer what?”

  “Like I said—a bell. Specifically, the …”

  I thought back to my dream and searched for the word that Bella had used. I should have been able to recall it without a second thought—after all, Bella wasn’t actually my dead wife; she was a figment of my imagination, a manifestation of my broken mind that was unable to accept that she was really gone. The name of the bell wasn’t something she told me about. It was something I knew about and had forgotten. And for some reason that I can’t quite put together, my subconscious decided I needed this damn bell and sent Bella to deliver the message.

  I hummed for a couple seconds longer as I searched for the bell’s name before finally remembering it.

  “Ismick. The Bell of Ismick.”

  “That bell is mine,” he said. I half-expected his nose to grow longer, but it was true.

  “I know, but given that you’re trapped and I really don’t have anywhere to be, I thought—”

  “Thief!” he shrieked, pointing a green finger at me. As he did, his sleeve-bells chimed their accusations in agreement.

  I mimicked being wounded— “Oh, such harsh accusations! However, will I look at myself in the mirror again.”—before saying, “Don’t worry, ugly, I’m no thief. I offer you an exchange.” I pulled out three obsidian bells from my pocket. “My guy says these were the very bells that were sown to David’s saddle.”

  “David?”

  “As in David and Goliath,” I clarified.

  “They … they be real?” He held out a quivering, bell-chiming hand.

  I threw him one of them. “You tell me.”

  The shelleycoat bogeyman examined the bell like an appraiser might a gem, before nodding. “Very well,” he said, plucking a copper-colored bell from his coat. “This bell for all three.”

  “And how do I know you’re not tricking me? I mean, a bell is a bell to me. Swear you’re giving me the right one.”

  He sighed, grumbling some ancient fae curse under his breath.

  “Swear it,” I repeated, “or I won’t let you go.”

  Swearing, oaths, promises … those were the currency of Others. Once a pledge was given, the creature had to follow through or suffer some wrath from their gods. Of course, with the gods gone, divine wrath was in short supply, but most Others still took their ancient ways seriously. I wasn’t about to remind him of his new GoneGod World rights.

  Luckily, this shelleycoat was no different. He growled before plucking another bell off his coat, this time a silver one with black runes etched into it, and tossed it to me. “I swear that be the bell ye are looking for.”

  “Very well,” I said, tossing him the remaining two bells and cutting the thread barrier, thus setting the bogeyman free.

  ↔

  I PREPARED myself for another attack, but, once free, the shelleycoat made no indication that he held a grudge. Instead he turned his attention entirely to his newfound treasures and hung his new bells on his coat, then started down the park’s path—most likely toward his gathering, whatever that was.

  Strangely touched that the creature wasn’t really that bad a guy after all, no matter how ugly he was, I scooped up my Cabbage Patch Kid and said to it, “I’m gonna have to tell PopPop about this one.”

  Great. Now I was heeding my dead wife’s advice, trading bells with the bogeyman like they were Pokémon, and asking a doll to pass a message to my long-past father.

  I shook my head as I collected the quilt and the Walkman, but quickly turned my thoughts back to the bell at hand.

  I still didn’t know what the damn thing did.

  I followed the jingling bogeyman until we made it out of the park before speaking. I figured the walk would help him with any anger issues he might have over me trapping him.

  Once onto the main road, I matched stride with him and said, “Sorry about what I did to you back there. But you understand why I did it, right? I mean, you know the legend?”

  He nodded. “A shelleycoat will never give up one of his bells without being trapped.”

  “Yeah, like a leprechaun. You gotta trap them if you want the pot of gold.”

  “I be no leprechaun,” he said, his bells ringing in fury as he turned to face me.

  I lifted my hands up in surrender. “I never said you were. I’m just saying that I had to trap you to get the bell … otherwise, you know …”

  He nodded in understanding. “I would have turned ye around so that no map in this world or any other would have helped ye find home.”

  “And I like home,” I said. “That’s where my toys are.”

  If he thought I was funny he made no indication of it. Instead he doubled his pace as he walked to his gathering.

  “So,” I said, trotting to catch up, “what does the bell do?”

  “Ye don’t know?” he asked with an admonishing shake of his head.

  “No. All I know is that someone I trust said I needed it. But I don’t know why.”

  “And I suppose that ye will not leave my side until I tell ye.”

  “My wife always said she’d inscribe the word ‘tenacious’ on my tombstone.”

  He chuckled at this. “Yer wife is a wise woman.”

  “Was,” I corrected him.

  At this he turned, his face softening. The look wasn’t pity, but more of understanding. So, you’ve lost too, the look said.

  “Read the inscription on the bell, then ring it three times next to each ear, then hang it above the threshold of your abode,” he said before continuing on his way.

  Others, with their cryptic answers, I thought. I chased after him, not wanting to let this go.

  “Abode?” I said. “Who says ‘abode’ anymore? It didn’t even rhyme! And, you didn’t answer my question … What does it do?”

  The bogyman sighed. “ ‘Do’? Humans always want things to do things, when sometimes things are just things.”

  “Ahhh, I get it. It doesn’t do anything. Well that makes sense.”

  The shelleycoat shook his head in frustration—or maybe his way of saying no, or both. Probably both. The book on Other body language hadn’t had enough time to be written.

  “Human, the bell does something. Hang it above your abode—um, I mean, home’s threshold and see.” He stopped at a main door entrance to what was obviously someone’s home and rang the doorbell.

&
nbsp; “I really would love to know what it does before I hang it any—”

  My words stopped dead in their tracks and I stared at the figure who opened the door.

  He—I only call him a he because he lacked any of the curves normally associated with a she—was tall, easily seven feet … and without a face. No eyes or mouth or nose or ears.

  Just a taught-skinned surface … like the face of a drum. A creepy, animated, drum on a humanoid body.

  Having no eyes, however, didn’t stop him from looking in our direction. I shivered, making the bell in my hand tinkle.

  “Slenderman?” I muttered. “I thought he was an urban legend.”

  “Aren’t we all?” the shelleycoat said with a wry smile. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a poker game to attend to.” And with that, the bogeyman went inside.

  So that was the gathering he was going to—poker with other bogeymen. Sounds like a hoot.

  Fan-friggin’-tastic, I thought as I held the little bell in my hands. Now why do I need this, Bella?

  She didn’t reply. After all, Bella was dead.

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  7 - RUN, KAT, RUN

  PART I

  A BEGINNING OF SORTS:

  Humans are idiots.

  He should know—he was born a human. And if things continue the way they are, he will die a human.

  But he dismisses the thoughts. That will not be his fate—to die human. He will return himself to his former glory.

  More so … he will find the gods and they will return him to his former glory.

  And that is when he will cease to be a disgusting, worthless human.

  And so he sits in the Okinawan airport, scratching at his frail skin that flakes under the weight of his nails, fixated on one thing: a remedy for his current humanity.

  The key resides in the hands of one like him … a former creature of power, rendered human by their departure.

  Katrina Darling.

  She possesses the final piece of the puzzle he needs to finally leave this plane of existence and follow the gods to their new home.