Corruption

by Jennifer Blackstream

  “Let me out, I’ll watch him,” Peasblossom urged.

  “Be careful,” I warned, rolling my window down. The smell of stale beer and stagnant water poisoned the air in the SUV, and I wrinkled my nose. “Abandoned lots like this attract more than teenagers.”

  Peasblossom hugged my jaw, then hopped to the windowsill and leapt into the air. I kept the window down, but leaned back in my seat to brace for another pothole.

  “I think he caught a scent.” Andy observed.

  I followed his gesture and saw Paul running toward a warehouse on the right. Andy’s jaw tightened in frustration as he drove faster only to risk the SUV’s integrity in a pothole the size of a VW bug. He slowed down, taking the time to ease around the next ten pot holes, and I bit my lip, convinced we’d lost Paul.

  A pair of teenagers rounded the corner of a building up ahead. The boy on the right was so pale, I had a sudden urge to purchase stock in the sunscreen industry. He wore blue jeans that hung far enough down he shuffled more than he walked, and he had enough gold chains around his neck to make quite a racket even at his sedate pace. He looked up and spotted our car, smacking his friend on the arm and nodding at Andy.

  The boy beside him was as black as his friend was pale. He too wore his jeans down around his thighs, but his jewelry was silver instead of gold. He mirrored his companion, both of them pulling their shirts closed and averting their eyes as they waddled past.

  Andy rolled down his window. “Hey. You seen this kid around here?”

  He held out his phone with Patrick’s picture showing on the small screen.

  Neither boy looked up. In fact, they shuffled a little faster.

  “You can answer my question about this kid, or we can talk about what you’re hiding under your shirt. Your call.”

  The pale kid cursed and kicked a beer can so it skittered into the side of the building. Grudgingly, they both approached the SUV, stopping far enough away I expected they planned to run if they got the chance.

  “Hey,” Ghost Boy said, peering at the picture. “It’s the demon king.”

  His friend perked up, staring at the phone and forgetting to hold his shirt closed. My knowledge of guns was too limited to guess what kind it was, but he was carrying.

  “What do you want with that freak?” he asked. He noticed my attention on his weapon and jerked his shirt closed again.

  “You know him?” Andy asked.

  “Yeah. Dude is scary.” He jerked a thumb at a building up ahead on the right. “He hangs out on the top floor of that building. No one else goes in there.”

  “Why not?” I asked.

  Ghost Boy snorted. “Guy worships Satan, man. He’s got an altar with a fuckin’ skull on it. A real skull.”

  “He’s into some fucked up shit,” his friend agreed. “No one messes with that dude.” He frowned. “Well, no one except those priests.”

  “Probably here for an exorcism,” Ghost Boy joked.

  “An exorcism of the building maybe,” his friend added.

  “Priests?” I asked sharply.

  “Yeah,” Ghost Boy answered. “An old priest and a young priest.”

  The two dissolved into laughter at the reference and I sat forward in my seat. “Father Salvatore and Thomas are here.”

  Andy swore and rolled up his window. He drove as fast as he could without losing the car to a pothole, but it was a painstaking process.

  “There!” I said.

  Thomas stood at the entrance to a warehouse. One hand held the dagger from his wrist sheath, and the other stretched in front of him, finger pointing at Paul in his Tasmanian tiger form. I saw his mouth move as he shouted something at the bounty hunter, but I couldn’t make out what he said.

  When the SUV rumbled into sight, Thomas backed toward the door of the warehouse, his jaw setting in a firm line.

  “Thomas,” I said, getting out of the vehicle as soon as it stopped. “What are you doing here?”

  “You can’t go inside,” Thomas insisted. “You need to give him more time.”

  I didn’t try to get past the priest. “Give who more time? Patrick? Or Father Salvatore?”

  “You don’t understand.” A tinge of desperation crept into Thomas’ tone. “Patrick isn’t a bad person. He’s just made bad choices.”

  “Did Patrick shoot the twins, Thomas?” Andy asked, slamming the door to the SUV behind him. “When did you realize it was him?”

  “I didn’t know,” Thomas snapped. He lifted his chin. “I still don’t. So what if it was his gun, that doesn’t mean anything. Patrick could have sold it, or lost it, or given it away. He’s never killed anyone, there’s no reason to think it was him.”

  “You don’t sound like you believe that,” Andy said grimly.

  “Father Salvatore is inside, isn’t he?” I asked, creeping a few steps closer. I held my magic at the ready, but didn’t call it yet. I didn’t want to hurt Thomas if I didn’t have to.

  “Father Salvatore is talking to Patrick.” Tension squeezed his shoulders until his spine practically vibrated. “He’ll get him to explain what happened—if anything happened.”

  “That’s not his job.” Andy took a step closer. “He’s a priest, not a cop.”

  “It is his job!” Thomas snarled. “Our concern isn’t justice, it’s salvation. Corban and Christophe are dead, and that’s terrible, and I wish I could change it. But I can’t, and throwing away another life won’t make it better.”

  “So he’s trying to get a confession,” I said slowly, “but not so Patrick can be arrested.”

  “Father Salvatore wants to save Patrick’s soul. That’s what matters.”

  Andy opened his mouth, but I raised a hand to silence him. “That is what’s important, you’re right. But there are questions to consider.”

  “Such as?” Thomas asked, creeping farther from the door.

  “How did Patrick find out about the exorcism?” I asked.

  Thomas stared at me, and I could see him groping for an answer. His brow furrowed. “I don’t… I—”

  Something I couldn’t see struck Thomas, sending him hurtling backward into the wall of the warehouse. His head struck the brick with a sickening thud, and his eyes closed, his body slumping to the ground in a pile of discarded beer bottles, crumpled cellophane bags, and cigarette butts.

  I whirled to find Lorelei standing behind the open door of the SUV, one hand held out at Thomas. She swung the door closed and sauntered forward with a satisfied smirk on her face.

  “Thank you for the distraction, Mother Renard,” she said. “Now if you don’t mind, I’d like to see this human who dared to interfere in my affairs.”

  I cursed and bolted for Thomas, wincing when a piece of broken bottle did its best to penetrate the thin sole of my boot. “Andy, go with her, make sure she doesn’t kill anyone. I’ll take care of Thomas.”

  I waited to see if Andy did as I asked him. Blood covered Thomas’ face, and he wasn’t moving. Striking the outside of the warehouse had opened a gash in his scalp, and when he slumped forward, all that blood rushed into his eyes and down his face like a macabre waterfall. The blood touched his mouth and he groaned and shifted, licking his lips as he tried to speak. He gagged at the taste of his own blood and rolled onto his side, heaving.

  Blue energy pooled in my palm as I fell into a crouch beside him, careful not to kneel in the broken glass. “Sana,” I whispered, laying my hands on his forehead and over his chest. I flexed my will, forced the magic to skate over his entire body, pressed it down until it sank into muscle and bone.

  Thomas moaned. “What happened?” he croaked. He winced and spit blood onto the ground.

  “You were—”

  A gunshot cracked somewhere above us. Thomas shot into a sitting position, hissing as broken glass bit into him, but ignoring the pain. “Patrick!”

  My heart leapt into my throat, and I shot to my feet. I ran for the door to the warehouse, not objecting when Thomas came with me. The warehouse’s ins
ides were criss-crossed with shadows and beams of sunlight, alternatively highlighting and hiding the piles of refuse within. A flash of pink light caught my peripheral vision and I turned.

  “This way!” Peasblossom shouted.

  I followed her up a winding staircase to the left, dodging bits of debris and more broken bottles. The smell of rotting garbage and body odor threatened to push me down the stairs and out the door, but I fought to keep moving up, deeper into the decaying building. The next floor was open and gutted, with no walls or furniture to hide the scenario playing out in the far corner.

  A young man stood before a filthy mattress shoved into the corner of the room. He wore all black, from his jeans to his too-tight T-shirt. His artificially black hair was held back with the sheer amount of oil coming from his scalp, so there was nothing to take away from his wide kohl-lined green eyes, or the panic tightening his features. The lost, panicked expression looked strange on a face pierced at least a dozen times. Based on the scent of incense lingering underneath the smell of unwashed teen, I guessed this was Patrick.

  The gun he held kept Father Salvatore, Lorelei, and Andy in a semi-circle around him. The two men held their hands up, palms out, to show they were unarmed. Lorelei had her hands braced on her hips. I caught sight of movement in the opposite corner and realized Paul was still in animal form, staying well out of harm’s way. An old dilapidated desk and office chair were falling to pieces in the center of the back wall, and the skinwalker was careful to stay behind it, using it for cover.

  “What’s going on?” I asked, careful to keep my voice calm. “Patrick?”

  “Who are you?” Patrick demanded. He thrust the gun forward. “Why are you here?”

  “Patrick,” Father Salvatore said calmly. “It’s all right. No one wants to hurt you. Remember what we were talking about?”

  Patrick looked straight past him, zeroing in on the demon. “My queen,” he gasped. “Why did you bring them?”

  “I am here because I am seeking the one who murdered Corban and Christophe. The miserable cretin who killed my chance at freedom, my chance at glory!”

  All the blood drained from Patrick’s face. “But… But they wanted to cast you out. They were going to send you away.”

  “It’s all right, Patrick,” Andy said. “Put the gun down. Let’s talk about this.”

  Patrick tightened his grip on the gun and aimed it at Andy, without ever taking his gaze from Lorelei. “My queen, I don’t understand. They wanted to send you back to Hell. I was only proving to you I’m worthy.”

  “Worthy? You are not worthy to lick the ground I walk on,” Lorelei snarled. “You have destroyed my chance to escape this prison, to return to my home and be worshipped as I deserve to be!”

  Patrick’s face paled, revealing dark grey eye shadow in addition to the eyeliner. “No. No, that’s not right.” His brow furrowed. “None of this is right. You love me. You want to stay with me.”

  “Love you?” Lorelei said incredulously. “I loathe you.”

  “But… But I killed for you. I saved myself for you, I exist only for you.”

  “Then die.”

  The world suddenly moved too slow and too fast. I had all the time in the world to see the boy raise the gun.

  And no time to stop him from firing it.

  The gunshot echoed in my ears longer than it should have. I stared, frozen, as Patrick slumped to the ground, his eyes open and sightless.

  “No!” Thomas ran forward and dove to his knees, reaching for Patrick even though it was too late. Blood spread from his friend’s head in a growing pool as Thomas’ hands fluttered around him in helpless frustration. “No, no, no, no…”

  “Can you heal him?” Andy asked, his voice tight.

  “She can’t help him now, lawman.”

  I whirled to see Paul coming out from his hiding place behind the desk. He was in human form, fully clothed and fully armed. For what good it did us now.

  “The boy’s beyond this world now,” Paul finished.

  Andy didn’t acknowledge the skinwalker, didn’t look away from me. I shook my head, even as my fingertips tingled with the urge to cast a healing spell. Paul was right. “No. No, he’s dead. He’s…” I swallowed hard. “He’s human. If he’d shot himself somewhere else, if he were bleeding out, then maybe…”

  Paul stepped around Father Salvatore, who stood rooted to the spot he’d occupied when I’d first come in. The priest stared at Patrick, his rosary in his grasp and beads sliding through his fingers, as the skinwalker paced around the room perusing the dead teenager’s home.

  He paused at the windowsill and picked up a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag. “If it makes you feel any better, he didn’t have time to suffer. Death like that happens fast.” He unscrewed the cap and sniffed the bottle’s contents, then made a face. “Barbaric.”

  I could feel Andy’s next question, and I answered it before he could decide whether to ask it. “I can’t perform resurrections. And I’m not a necromancer, so I can’t talk to the dead.”

  “Do you know any necromancers?” Andy asked.

  Paul snorted and put the bottle down, turning his attention to the filthy windowsill. “You don’t want to meet a necromancer, Agent Bradford. Dodgy fellows. Raisin’ the dead, talkin’ to the dead. Messes with their heads, mark my words. Bunch of nutters.”

  Father Salvatore approached Thomas and knelt beside him. Tears streamed down the paladin’s face as he smoothed Patrick’s clothes, touched his friend’s cheek. I tuned him out, letting them have as private a moment as I could.

  “I know a necromancer, yes.” I looked at Paul. “And she’s a lovely person. She works with the families of people who died unexpectedly, helping them find wills, clarify settlements, and such. Good, honest work. But she couldn’t do any good here. Resurrecting a murder victim is too dangerous.”

  “How dangerous?” Andy asked, his gaze drawn to Patrick. “If there are precautions to minimize the risk, the rewards might be great enough to try. We need to find out who told him about the exorcism.”

  “Bad idea,” Paul said, stepping back from the window. “First thing a murder victim does after rising from the grave is seek revenge on their killer. Worse than a dog with a bone. And let me tell you, killing someone that’s already dead is no walk in the park.”

  “He’s right,” I admitted. “If you raise a murder victim, they won’t do anything or say anything until they’ve gotten revenge. So unless you’re willing to let them have their pound of flesh, you won’t get anything useful.”

  “He killed himself,” Andy argued.

  I glared at Lorelei. The demon was the only one who didn’t seem affected by Patrick’s death. In fact, she seemed to feel better than she had earlier. There was a spring in her step as she walked across the room to a window that had been completely smashed out and braced her hands on the windowsill. She leaned out to draw a deep breath of fresh air.

  My temper flickered, but I forced it down. “Yes, and he shot himself in the head. Even if I called my friend to raise him, I doubt he’d be able to speak, let alone answer questions. Raising someone from the dead doesn’t heal them, it only animates them.”

  “All right.” Andy sighed. “Well, we can’t leave him here like this, and there will be a lot of questions if we call it in.”

  “This is not a crime scene.” Lorelei withdrew from the window and threw herself into the old desk chair with broken leather and stuffing sticking out like wild mushrooms. “He committed suicide. We all saw him.”

  My temper roared forth like a hellhound frothing at the mouth. I closed my hands into fists.

  Andy spoke before I could. “Why don’t you call the woman who drove the ambulance. You said she’s a crime scene tech, and she can take care of bodies?”

  I swallowed the venom I wanted to spit at Lorelei, the words that begged to be let loose. “Yeah, okay, I’ll call her.”

  Andy nodded. “Good. Then we’ll look for something to tell us why P
atrick wanted the twins dead.”

  I gritted my teeth. “We already know why he wanted them dead. It was her. He did it for her.”

  Lorelei rolled her eyes. “And as I’m sure you heard me say, it was against my wishes. He may have done it for me, but he did it without my knowledge or support, and definitely without my gratitude.” She snorted. “If I’d known what he was planning, I’d have killed him myself.”

  I opened my mouth, and she shot me a glare. “But I didn’t, and I didn’t kill him. That,” she pointed to the body, “is not my fault.”

  Again Andy spoke first. “Then you have nothing to worry about.”

  Lorelei raised her attention to Andy, and for the first time, anger glittered in her eyes. “I am tired of being treated like the villain. I’m the one who was robbed of the chance to be free, to return home after a millennium of being trapped with this insipid woman. I am the one who was shot. And yet despite all of that, you treat me as if it’s my fault.” She straightened in her chair. “So in case you’ve suffered brain damage since the last time I told you, I will remind you again. I wanted this exorcism. I did not know Patrick planned to stop it. And I did not come here intending to kill him.”

  “You did it on purpose,” I hissed. Anger rose like a whoosh of heat from an open fireplace, burning away some of the pain. I welcomed the heat, the anger. Anything was better than wallowing in frustration and loss for not having been fast enough to save him.

  “Easy, Shade,” Peasblossom whispered, stroking my ear. “She’s a demon. Making her mad right now would be a bad idea.”

  “You did it on purpose.” I jabbed a shaking finger at Patrick. “He worshipped you. Literally. He worshipped you, and you yelled at him, told him he was worthless. He was obviously fragile, in a vulnerable state. You used that to push him over the edge.”

  “You’re suggesting that I should have used my nice voice when talking to a killer?” Lorelei curled her lip in disgust. “He is pathetic. Was pathetic. And do not lecture me.” She jabbed a finger at me. “You are not the one who’s endured foolish mortals and their pathetic, misguided shows of devotion for centuries. Cretins trying to curry my favor by committing senseless acts of violence.”