Afterlife (Second Eden #1)

by Aaron Burdett

  Dino passed by the statue of a woman looking to the sky, her mouth parted as if she had a prayer to say but couldn’t find the words for it. He rose and gazed into her face, running his smoky fingers down the line of her jaw.

  He turned from her and spotted the patrol marching along the second-story balcony running the length of the building. Dino zipped through the air and took up residence behind the blackjackets, floating in lockstep with the two quiet men. They turned the corner and came to a door guarded by a spirit.

  She glanced at both men and frowned. Dino pulled closer to them, so close his mist curled around their shoulders. Too close, and they would feel the chill of his phantom form. Too far, and the spirit would sense the third mind among them.

  The spirit pressed her lips into a thin line. She frowned, and Dino tensed.

  Then, she nodded and stepped aside. The two men passed through, Dino exhaling as he glided indoors behind them. He played this game over and over again, leapfrogging from one patrol to another, glomming himself in their shadows to slip by the spirits posted to catch phantoms like him.

  Deeper into the palace he snuck, until he came to West’s doors, two guards posted on either side of the entrance. He waited in the shadows, the mists of his form swirling and curling around him as the clock ticked.

  Outside, a bell tower began to chime, and right on queue, a door opened at the far end of the hall. A servant melted from the doorway’s shadow, carrying a silver tray topped with a bottle of red wine and a single crystal glass.

  Dino smiled and drifted behind her, bobbing in lockstep with her as she arrived at the doors. The blackjackets nodded, the one on the left grabbing the curling bronze handle. The door groaned open.

  The second guard frowned, marching toward the servant. “Wait.”

  The door shut. Dino froze. The soldier’s brows knitted together as he approached the servant. She cleared her throat and pinched her shoulders back. “William, this is heavy. What is it?”

  William planted his feet before her, his frown deepening. He looked over her left shoulder and then over the right. “Something’s off, Ms. Ennis,” he grumbled.

  Dino slipped a hand into his jacket and found the sturdy hilt of his dagger. While no one could see a phantom in their ethereal form unless the phantom wanted it, a competent poltergeist could use their will to force a phantom from hiding if they knew he lurked around.

  William reached for the servant. Dino reached for his weapon. The blackjacket’s hand passed over her shoulder and lingered by her ear. Dino slid the dagger from his coat.

  A glimmer sparkled between the man’s fingers, and his toothy smile spread wide. “You had something in your ear, Ms. Ennis!”

  He popped his hand back where she could see it and showed her the coin he held. She snorted and waved at the doors. “You have too much time on your hands, playing silly magic tricks while the rest of us earn our keep. Now get out of the way before I get disciplined!”

  William pouted, pocketing the coin as he backed away. His partner chuckled and opened the door wide, and both Ms. Ennis and Dino strolled into the room.

  Ms. Ennis scurried over to a massive desk and slid the tray onto it. Without so much as a word whispered, she backed out of the room and closed the doors behind her. Enormous arched windows towered behind the desk, a glass door in the center window open to a balcony overlooking the Grand Braid.

  Potted ferns and blossoming rosebushes dotted the balcony, swaying in the gentle breeze. There, standing among them as he leaned upon the iron railing, was General Ian West.

  His broad, sloping shoulders rose and fell with his heavy breaths. The thick brick of his interlocked hands pressed against the small of his back while he quietly surveyed the city. The general rocked on his heels with a sigh and turned from the balcony, his barrel of a belly stuffed inside a uniform that could barely hold him.

  General West plodded to his desk and took a seat, pulling the glass to him. He poured a drink of rich, burgundy wine and swished it slowly.

  The general took a sip and leaned onto his desk with a long sigh as Dino glided behind him. “It took you long enough,” he said.

  Dino shot back. Curtains fluttered from the force of his leap. His dagger kissed the air.

  Movement swirled in a dark corner, and from a cloud of smoke General Kelly appeared. The general nodded to Ian and took a seat across the desk while Dino gawked, dumbfounded.

  All the adrenaline rushing through Dino dissipated. So this was how the Spider set up the assassination. She had her ally on the Council meet General West in secret, an ally who so happened to also be a phantom. General West ensured Oscar could slip into the palace. Unbeknownst to him, another phantom came with him.

  “I’d offer you a glass, but I only have one,” General West said.

  “I don’t drink, but thank you for the offer,” General Kelly responded.

  Tension hung thick in the air. Oscar’s tight features, his stiff posture, the way he glared at the General all pointed to an uncomfortably strained relationship between the two men.

  It wasn’t exactly a secret that the Council didn’t act as one. The generals often played political games for the archduke’s favor, usually at the expense of one another. Curious, Dino glided away from them both and took up residence in a corner as the conversation unfolded.

  “We’re close to finding the girl,” Oscar said. “I believe she’s somewhere in Angel Park.”

  General West’s eyes widened. “Angel Park? Bold move, to put her in such an inner district. A smart one, though. We’ve been wasting our time dusting fools in sewers while she’s been sipping coffee in a café in the palace’s shadow.”

  Dino grinned.

  Oscar sighed and placed his hands on his knees. “It seems so. I’ve captured a few of the Errand’s fools, and they say they’ve seen her. Not only that, but they say the rumors are true, that this girl can use many curses. I’ve doubled my phantoms in Angel Park. They’re posted on every street corner with orders to capture her, but she seems quite good at moving unseen. We’ll never find her without Chakma’s spirits, and you know how I feel about her. She’ll take the girl and find a way to use her against us. I’m sure of it!”

  “She’ll run straight to the archduke. I have a spy in her ranks, and he has informed me she believes the girl is also in the inner districts. Kamlai already believes we are hiding the girl. If she finds her, the general will take her straight to the archduke and say we did everything to stop her. She wants to obliterate the Council and become the only general in the archduke’s service. Desperately.”

  “Kamlai is an idiot who doesn’t know what we know,” Oscar said. He fidgeted, leaning back and interlocked his fingers. “Say what you want about the Spider, but she’s a useful source of information. What were you able to discover about the Mother of Curses? This buried bride or whatnot?”

  General West reached into his desk and pulled out an old, leather-bound book. He untied the string fastened around it, spreading the yellowed pages to the light. “I found some information, but I’m not sure how trustworthy the source is. Vera’s writings had a certain … flair common to those Deep-touched.”

  A shock shot through Dino’s system. Vera kept a diary?

  “So it does exist.” Oscar eyed the book with wide, glimmering eyes. “How’d you find it?”

  “A few years ago when my poltergeists were clearing a collapse in Peddler’s Pit. It was the first in a long line of clues that revealed the archduke’s true intentions and why he obsessed so greatly over the Deep’s relics.”

  Dino frowned, drifting closer to the desk. He peered over the general’s shoulder and tried reading the pages, but the words were too small and messy for his eyes.

  “What does it say?” Oscar asked.

  “It speaks of a necklace worn by the Mother of Curses, a gift given to her by her husband. It says that this necklace would call the dark serpent, and through mortal blood the buried bride would reawaken.” He cleared his th
roat and leaned onto the desk. “Vera seemed to think the bride will rejoin her husband, and together, they would raise a Second Eden.”

  “But it sounds so preposterous, Ian!”

  “It does, but do you deny it has a ring of truth? This Second Eden could be the end of not just Afterlife, but the mortal world, too. The diary speaks of the great burning, of some kind of sacrifice of souls. There can be no Second Eden unless it is built upon the ashes of the first. It may sound crazy, my friend, but I believe the archduke and his bride mean to erase all that’s come since they left Eden and start again with children who do not know their sins.”

  Oscar paled. He swallowed and scooted to the edge of his seat. “You truly believe this is what the archduke plans? Destroy two worlds to make another?”

  “Afterlife was never his true goal. He needed a base of power to build his army and search for the relics that would raise his bride. The necklace marked her vessel. The relic in the box transferred her soul into the girl’s body, and with each day it grows stronger. If what Vera wrote is true, the serpent will devour this girl from the inside, and on that day, Eve will be reborn.”

  “Is there any way to stop it?”

  “Not that I can tell. If there is, the Deep holds the answer. The necklace, the box, it all came from there. The city’s expansion must not slow down, now more than ever. If we’re to stop the archduke, we must extend our reach as far as possible into the dust and find the key to destroying him. Two relics have been uncovered so far, but two is not a good number. Three is the number of the way of things.”

  Dino gawked at the two generals. The archduke wanted not only to destroy Afterlife, but the mortal world? And Amber was in danger. Not just from the outside, but from within. The curse was consuming her, and Dino had to warn her.

  General Kelly leaned back, folding his arms over his chest. “I never believed it to be true. To think, the archduke may truly be Adam resurrected. I’m a rational man, Ian. When I heard him ramble on about his rule and reign, I just assumed he was some Deep-touched soul who happened upon a particularly powerful relic. But to think he might be Adam? His power may be far greater than we thought.”

  “Which means we must tread even more carefully than before. We should continue our current act at the Council as necessary. Together, our blackjackets will expand the city’s borders and search for anything that might give us a weapon to use against him. I think Fabiana may be receptive to our message, but I would never trust Hans or ambitious Kamlai. Those two will stay loyal to the archduke even if he leads them to annihilation.”

  “Then what are our next steps?” Oscar asked.

  “Faye’s resistance is weakening throughout all the districts. We must capture the girl and keep her hidden from the archduke and his disgusting hound. Have the Spider help us. We have the funds to pay her off and make her ours.”

  Oscar smirked. “True. The Spider can hold her fangs if she sees gold glittering in your hand. And once we have this mortal girl? What then?”

  “We go to the Deep. The answers lie there. The archduke cannot raise Second Eden without the mortal, so keeping her hidden and alive will buy us time.”

  “A solid plan. You’ve always been the most rational general on the Council.” General Kelly rose to his feet, his body thinning into trails of thin mist. “I’ll not disturb you any longer. Good evening, Ian.”

  “Good evening, Oscar, and stay safe.”

  As General Kelly faded away, he bowed, his glittering gaze flicking to the corner where Dino hid. “You as well, old friend.”

  What haze remained of Oscar Kelly whisked through the open balcony door and vanished into Afterlife. Dino clenched his dagger. His body floated from the corner, drifting inch by inch toward the general’s chair.

  The man sighed and poured himself another glass of wine. He stared into the burgundy and took a deep breath, then tipped the delicate crystal to his lips.

  Dino’s knife glinted silver as it solidified. The razor edge raked across General West’s neck, a spray of dust arcing from the wound. The man managed little more than a pitiful, garbled groan as the glass shattered on the floor, his hands clutching at the wound pouring dust over his knees.

  “I’m sorry,” Dino said, backing away. “For what it’s worth, anyway.”

  Ian latched onto Dino’s wrist. The floor trembled as crashed to his knees. He gasped, his lips forming words that couldn’t come. General West’s eyes darkened. Cracks spread along his face. He shuddered, and his body burst to ash and collapsed into a heap at Dino’s feet.

  Dino looked at the blade of his weapon. He blew the dust from it and saw the reflection staring back. Something seemed so wrong about what he’d just done. Ian West was a general on the Iron Council, a man who committed one crime after another, suppressed freedom, murdered countless souls, and yet, dusting the man felt so wrong at such a core level he was suddenly disgusted with himself over it.

  A knock sounded on the general’s door. “Sir? Are you okay?”

  Dino pocketed his blade and swiped Vera’s journal. He bolted to the balcony and leapt over the railing, his body swirling into a writhing mass of murk as he took ethereal form.

  He found a nice, tall clock tower and perched atop the pointed roof. He sat cross-legged, flipping through the pages of nonsensical ramblings of someone who had succumbed to the Deep’s call.

  Words caught his eye. He slapped his hand down on the page and leaned closer to it. Alarm bells blared all around him as lights blazed at General West’s palace. For now, he ignored them and squinted instead at the diary, reading the words Vera scribbled on the page.

  With her he will raise his Second Eden, and through the sacrifice of souls, death shall come to living lands. Oh, the serpent of my heart, she has bitten me. I heard her call and thought it you, but it was false. It was a siren song, a pretty poison, and now I have become the herald of oblivion. What have I done?

  The sacrifice of souls approaches. Second Eden will rise, a garden that blooms from a bed of endless dust, the graves of immortals, the destruction of all souls.

  “Well doesn’t this just suck.” Dino slapped the book closed and sighed. He leaned against the flagpole and listened to the angry screech of sirens ripping through the night.

  Dino stared into the sky. Wilhelmina played a good game. Dropping that hint to Amber about the Black Palace would send her sprinting for it. And Dino knew the only tiny, miniscule chance she had to survive that labyrinth of shadows and dust would be with a map and a friend.

  He reached into his jacket and pulled out the half of the key Faye had given him so long ago. Once united with its other half, it would unlock the box that contained the very map they now so desperately needed. If only Faye didn’t keep the other half of that key tucked snuggly between her breasts.

  Even if he did find Faye, she would probably already know about the assassination, and she probably would correctly surmise that her wayward assassin Dino Cardona did the deed. Maybe she would have shown mercy had he come when she summoned him. Maybe she would have been kind if he hadn’t fled the Errand. Now, her short fuse would ignite, and there would be pain.

  If he and Amber were to survive this mess, he would have to bring Faye to him, and on his terms. Luckily, Dino knew exactly how to do that.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  No Safe Quarter

  Amber spent hours in Dino’s hidden crawl space in La Couronne, that thin hall of lights ending in the glass gateway to the mortal world. She sat before the tall, polished mirror and stared at the creepy reflection watching her with her own eyes.

  Approach it, and it would take her home. Home.

  “Is it my home?” she wondered.

  So many days had passed since she left Portsmouth. Maybe by now her mother had probably returned from Borneo with pictures of a colorful frog that she hoped would bring some meaning to her life. Perhaps Chris finally wondered why he couldn’t reach his sister and called someone for help. If Bone Man hadn’t killed Ms. Fl
annery, no doubt the old woman would have raised some kind of alarm by now. If not her, surely Jason.

  She smiled thinking of her best friend. “If you could only see this place, Jason! You’d freak. Totally freak.”

  Amber tipped her head back and sighed, staring at the dark ceiling. At times, she doubted Afterlife even existed and this was all some terrible dream. She half-expected the city to come crashing down like some gothic Wizard of Oz concocted by a delusional girl desperately seeking attention.

  The mirror coaxed her toward it. It would pull her through if she came any closer to the glass. And why shouldn’t she? Wilhelmina hadn’t lied when she told Amber the archduke dusted Toby in some mad experiment to create his own relic. Toby was the only thing that anchored Amber to this city. Without him, the reasons to stay dwindled to nothing.

  She stared at her reflection. Her black corset dress kept her shoulders bare, but a lace shawl to match covered them and kept them warm. The violet threads of her skirt cascaded in shimmering folds over her knees and pooled at her ankles. She pressed her hands into the bloom of her skirt, and the fabric rustled as it flattened.

  When she first arrived in Afterlife, the clothes looked magical, vintage yet spiced with a modern flair. They didn’t even feel real. They were costumes, and she was a little girl playing dress up. Now, she couldn’t imagine herself in anything else.

  Amber lifted her gaze to the mirror. “I have to go to the palace, don’t I?” she asked it.

  The mirror didn’t reply. She stood, smoothing her dress and tugging at her corset. “I’m not leaving you, Toby. Not yet. Even if dust is all you are, I have to know for sure.”

  Using her curse, she floated the drape over the mirror and turned her back to it. She would return to her family soon enough, but not before she knew exactly what happened to her brother first.

  Amber marched down the hall, her poltergeist curse clicking the lights off as she passed. She reached the crack in the wall and spun into a thin trail of mist, slipping into the hotel’s stairwell beyond.