Shattered Souls (10 page)

Jason pulled off his mud-coated shoe and dropped it beside him, his face screwing up in disgust. “You haven’t heard wraiths for years, right? Maybe the magic wasn’t all in that bag, but something
you
did.”

Cait froze.
What?
Something didn’t feel right about what he’d said. He displayed no surprise, no hesitation when she’d talked about the mojo bag and what it did. How long had he known about the frightful voices she used to hear? She stared, but he wouldn’t meet her gaze. Now wasn’t the time for that conversation. “I don’t have the kind of skill needed to make a spell like that work. Wraiths scared the shit out of me when I was a kid. When my mother gave me an out, I took it.”

His face lifted. “Maybe you’re still afraid to hear them. Did she cast the spell? Or did you?”

She and her mother had chanted together. Her breath stilled. A chill rippled down her spine. They’d both put their own desires into the spell as her mother filled the bag with flowers.

“Of course I’m still afraid,” she said more to herself than to answer his question. “A wraith killed Henry. Picked him up like he weighed nothing and dragged him through a fucking mirror.”

“But you had the sense to run when things went south out there,” he said, pointing his chin toward the door still buffeting her back. “You’re not a kid anymore. And you have something of your mother’s talent, don’t you?”

All this time he’d hidden things from her. Someone from that world had talked to him. But who? Celeste and Morin were the only people alive who’d known about her magical past. Betrayal left a bitter taste in her mouth. “What do you know about my mother? About me?”

“Enough. It’s why I took you on. Why I haven’t been on your ass when you drank too much. I knew you had your reasons. That you weren’t ready.”

“Ready for what?” she spat out, narrowing her gaze. “Do I know you at all?”

Jason grinned. “Sure you do. I’m a fuckup. Just like you. Birds of a feather…”

“And do you have
skills
?” she asked snidely.

“None. Other than the fact the kid I killed in that alley wasn’t a kid. Not something I could tell anyone on the force about.” He hung his head for a moment and then glanced her way. “I’ll tell you about it—after you get us the hell out of here.”

His face blurred. She’d thought they were becoming friends, learning to rely on each other, but he’d lied to her. Tears she hadn’t known were gathering threatened to spill. She blinked them away. “I don’t know enough. Years ago I stopped walking in that world.”

“You never really shake it though, do you?” he asked, his expression scarily intent. “It’s part of you. You just have to be ready to embrace it. I sought answers for a long time. I know a little. But there’s nothing special inside me. Not like there is in you.”

“There’s nothing special in me either. I walked away. I drank myself stupid.”

“That’s a crock of shit, and you know it. Everyone knows your instincts are good. Your
gut
isn’t calling the shots.” His hand jerked in the air. “Whatever’s inside you—magic, psychic talent—that’s what’s kept your ass alive and helped you close cases no one else could. Time to own up to what it really is and what you are.”

She snorted. “And what’s that, Jason? All I am is a fuckup. A fuckup whose mother was a witch—a really bad one because she killed herself with her own damn spell.”

He scraped a hand through his hair and glared again. “Well, you’d better figure out what else you might be, and quick, or we’ll be here a long damn time. No one knows we’re out here. You didn’t tell Sam we had another lead, did you?”

Of course she hadn’t. He’d have given her another of those stony stares, like he was trying to figure out if her brain was mush from scotch. Even though she’d proven there was magic in the world, he still didn’t fully trust her.

A powerful swell of wind pushed at the door behind her back, more cold air leaking through the cracks to swirl dust and grit inside the room. Rocks pelted the crypt. In the distance, tree branches cracked and fell with heavy thuds. She dug her feet into the cold slab floor and pushed back against another surge. They were running out of time. Her
gut
told her so.

“I can’t remember any spells that might help. It’s been a shitload of years…”

“Is it the words or is it the thought that makes them work?”

“I always needed the words. And they weren’t mine.” When she’d been practicing, playing at being a witch, she’d recited them like Bible verses, sure she’d drawn power from the author, not from inside herself.

“You have to try,” Jason said, his face pulling into a bulldog scowl.

He was right. They couldn’t stay like this for long. They had acres and acres of consecrated ground around them that hadn’t provided any protection because the wraiths were swept above it, carried by the wind. The crypt was covered, but how long would it take the wraiths to lift the roof?
Think.
“We need to sneak out of here without them seeing us leave. We need a masking spell.”

His mouth tilted at the corners. “Like Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak?”

She rolled her eyes at his joke. “Only I don’t have what I need to cast the right spell—no black snake root, no blue crystals.” All they had was dust…

Her gaze flew to the caretaker. “Can we get into one of the caskets?”

His dark eyes widened. “Why you wanna do that?”

“We need to mask ourselves. Make them think we’re already dead. Can you open a casket?”

“Don’t know what you’re thinkin’. You’re crazy, messin’ with the dead like that.” Still, he lifted his keys with a shaking hand. “I’m gonna go to hell. Straight to hell.”

With the caretaker’s keys, they managed to get into the casket that had been there the longest. Opening the lid, they scrambled back and gagged against the foul odor that escaped.

Cait stood with her back against the door while the two men gathered handfuls of dust and dirt from the floor and sprinkled it over the rotting body inside. She had the men shake the casket until the dirt settled to the bottom, gathering bits of the disintegrating corpse.

Then, holding her breath against the stench, Cait reached inside and scraped together two fistfuls of dust, trying her best not to think about what she touched in the process.

Jason slammed the lid closed and punched the air. “Damn, that was nasty.”

“Don’t be a wuss.” Cait gave him a tight smile. “That’s not the worst. Get on your knees.”

With both men kneeling before her, she let dust sift from her hands onto Jason’s and the caretaker’s heads, and then onto her own. As she let it fall, she drew inside herself, finding that calm place where she’d learned to go when she was younger.

And like the flame that had burned the mojo bag in a searing flash, the spell erupted as well from a fragment of her memory.

“Elementals, hear me.

With this dust, I cover any trace of life within us;

I cloak our heartbeats, our breaths, our thoughts.

I draw darkness to shield us from view.

I summon silence to still our voices.

With this veil, protect us,

Turn all evil from our path.

As I command, so mote it be.”

Maybe she wasn’t a poet, but something felt right about the words. She straightened, emoting more confidence than she really felt. “When we go out, I want you to do something else.”

Jason grimaced as the ashes slid over his face. “Something worse than breathing corpse dust up my nose?”

“Spit over your left shoulder.”

He gave a bark of laughter. “I think I can manage that.” His eyebrows rose slightly, betraying a tinge of fear, the first he’d let slip through his carefree mask, haunting his eyes. “Sure this is going to work?”

“Of course not.” Squinting, she grinned. “I’m just going with my gut.”

The three of them stood huddled beside the door: Cait first, Jason, then the caretaker holding onto Jason’s shirt.

“Say your prayers now,” she shouted over the racket banging against the door. “When we go outside, we move slowly. No speaking. We’ll head straight to the cemetery gates.”

The two men nodded. The caretaker crossed himself and closed his eyes for a moment while his lips moved. When he opened them again, she gave the two men a nod and reached for the door handle.

The wind whipped it from her grasp, slamming it against the wall of nested coffins. Frigid air swept inside, picking up whorls of dust and spiderwebs.

Cait ducked her head, praying the wind tearing at her hair wouldn’t remove every speck of corpse dust, because the distance to the gates was long. She stepped out the door, past a barrier of cold that set her teeth clacking. As soon as she pushed through the barrier, only the gloomy sky above hinted at the tempest behind them.

She paused, angled to her left, and spit over her shoulder. Turning, she glared at the two men behind her until they did the same. A childhood trick to ward away evil, but she was ready to try anything to keep them safe.

They crept slowly through the rolling hills of graves and crypts, past statuary with blinking, hollow eyes and fluttering wings.

Jason’s hand tightened at the back of her shirt, and she almost smiled. She knew how mind-defying all this was.

She worried most about the caretaker, whose dark eyes grew wider and wider as they passed creatures crouching on pedestals, noses tipping into the air as though seeking their human scent.

For her part, she felt no fear. Just an edgy awareness. The spell was working. The preternatural creatures surrounding them sensed their presence but couldn’t find them. Like pepper tossed on a field to foil a dog’s nose as he set it down to search, they’d tricked the spirits. She’d woven a spell that actually worked.

Wouldn’t Morin be proud? The thought had her drawing a deep, sharp breath. The casting had come so naturally. Even though years had passed since she’d apprenticed with him, her first instinct was to run to the mage and brag about her success.

Only they weren’t safe yet.

The gates loomed before them, sunlight gleaming brightly just beyond the barrier.

Cait risked a glance over her shoulder. The two men paused and did the same. Behind them the dark-as-dusk graveyard teemed with activity. Figures leaped from pedestals. Lambs grew longer, with snouts pressed to the dirt to search. Angels with fierce, leering smiles swooped down the tarmac paths. All searching for their prey.

The caretaker moaned, swaying on his feet.

“Catch him,” Cait called to Jason. Between the two of them, they dragged his sagging body toward the gates, silence thrown to the wind.

They hustled with the dead weight between them, stumbling quickly toward the gate and the sunshine baking the pavement on the other side.

“Almost there,” she muttered.

Jason pulled the caretaker over his shoulder and shoved her toward the gate. “Run, dammit!”

Behind her, the wind whipped into a frenzied sideways arctic blast. She spat over her shoulder again, but the act didn’t stem the violent gusts. Perhaps that bit of childhood magic held no power because she no longer felt sure or strong.

Her breaths shuddered out; her limbs grew slow and clumsy. At last, she reached the barrier of sunlight shining through the gates. One last step, and they were through.

She shivered and dared another glance. The cemetery was once more peaceful and limned in sunlight, statues again on their pedestals.

“Seems back asswards,” Jason said, his breaths jagged. “Didn’t Buffy seek hallowed ground?”

“Spirits live there. Good and bad. Only a spark is needed to stir them up—like someone reading an inscription on a tomb,” she said, giving his shoulder a shove.

Jason went down on one knee and set his burden on the ground. Together they knelt beside the caretaker, Cait chafing his wrists. She didn’t know what else to do, and the action soothed her own skittering heartbeat.

Glancing at Jason, she laughed. Sooty dust grayed his hair, which stood up in spikes around his head. “That real enough for you?”

Jason’s expression turned grim. “We have to talk.”

“We do. But later.”

“You gonna tell Sam about this?”

“I suppose I have to. It’d be nice to have you there, because…”

“Yeah, Sam’s not the kind to go for this woo-woo stuff.”

The caretaker moaned. His eyelids slowly blinked open. He stared beyond them to the clear blue sky. “I need to find me another job.”

At Caitlyn’s request, she and Jason headed straight to Celeste’s shop. Jason needed no directions, so one question was answered.

Dressed in another of her colorful caftans, Celeste eyed them both. Her lips pulled up in distaste. “You bot’ smell of deat’. Did you find your answers in da graves?”

Cait didn’t bother asking what she knew. Celeste’s sight was always creepily accurate. “Just more questions. We’ll have to see how a missing girl is related to the family buried in Edgemont.”