Shadow Witch: The Complete Series: Shadow Witch, #2 5e216r

Shadow Witch: The Complete Series

Odette C. Bell

All characters in this publication are fictitious, any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Shadow Witch The Complete Series Copyright © 2020 Odette C Bell All rights reserved. Cover art stock photos licensed from Depositphotos.

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Contents

Shadow Witch Episode One


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Shadow Witch Episode Two


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Shadow Witch Episode Three


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Better off Dead - Sample

www.odettecbell.com

More Fantasy Series by Odette C. Bell



Penelope has dreamed of nothing her whole life, for that way, death lies.

One day, she wakes up normal. She ends the day knowing she’s the daughter of Death. When he disappears, she must fight for his return. But there’s only one man who can help her. A god of ages, a force of destruction, and the harbinger of doom – it’s Hades, Lord of the Underworld. He will agree to assist her, but his price will be high. Her. Penelope is thrust into a world of dark desire, revenge, prophecy, and death. She won’t survive. But she was never meant to.

…

Shadow Witch is a sprawling dark urban fantasy set against the backdrop of the shadowy land of death. It’s sure to please fans of Odette C. Bell’s The Demon’s Witch.

1

I leaned over the corpse, makeup brush in hand. With swift, gentle strokes, I applied the concealer to the slightly graying flesh. The young woman didn’t move – she couldn’t. She’d been dead for four days. “At least you get to sleep for the rest of your life,” I muttered to her as I rammed the makeup brush further into my tub of concealer. I needed a new one, but I couldn’t be bothered grabbing one from the compartment under the steel bench to my side. I applied more, really getting into the cracks around her nose and eyes – the places where her graying flesh had started to decay. I bit my lip. I chuckled. “Me,” I continued the one-sided conversation, “I’ve barely been able to sleep my whole life. I guess that’s what happens when your only friends are corpses just like you.” I scooted back in my chair. I reached the sink and dumped the makeup brush into a little bowl of alcohol I’d already prepared. Looking up, I caught the sound of a procession through the half-open window above the sink. Carlson’s Funeral Home was located right up against the largest graveyard in the city. Pushing up and leaning a hand on the glimmering stainless steel, I inclined my head until I could see the hill of the graveyard. I watched as the gates were opened and a long black Hurst, glinting under the midmorning sunshine, wound its way into the mazelike cemetery. It was one of the oldest pieces of infrastructure in town. It had been there for 250 years. Carlson’s Funeral Home, in some fashion, had been here that entire time, too. I spent too long watching the procession. My eyes darted back and forth as if I was looking for something – something other than the mourners in black carrying white lilies, their somber faces turned to the ground. Something other than the autumn leaves scattering over the long winding pathway that led up to the graveyard. Something other than the granite headstones and concrete angels

with open hands. Sighing, I leaned back and scratched my head. It didn’t matter that I was wearing latex gloves and I’d just been touching a corpse. “Pull yourself together.” I turned. I faced the woman. She was standing. I thought nothing of this. She looked at me. She stared down at her dress. It was white. It appeared to be some kind of debutante gown. I was sure I’d seen one or two like it in one of the dress shops on Eastside. She smiled at me, touched her makeup, then turned. I got up and followed. She walked through the winding back halls of Carlson’s. She reached the open door that led out into the staff car park and wandered through. The whole while, I was behind her. I’d grabbed up the makeup brush again. It was dangling in my hand, dripping alcohol and chunks of concealer onto my black shoes. She walked across the road that led up to the graveyard. I was behind her for every step as a great big wind gust scattered its way through the elms and oaks that lined the road. Autumn leaves were ripped off. They flew around me, catching the ends of my short hair, alighting on my shoulders, and crunching under my feet. As the woman walked, I watched blood drip down from a wound in the back of her head. She’d been killed by slipping over when drunk. She turned to me as we reached the gates. She smiled, her lips cracking ever so slightly around the move. With no circulation left to her skin, her body was no longer capable of the movements of the living. I stopped at the gates. I stared up at the graveyard. It seemed darker. I thought I saw crows descending on it – they were all through it, too. They were landing on the outstretched arms of those angels. They were up on the tall wall that separated the cemetery and the land of the living from everyone else. They were even descending on the cars parked all around me. They made no noise, no

caws, no chattering. They didn’t even scratch their claws up and down or flap their wings. They just watched. The young woman stopped at the gates, one foot in, one foot out. She turned to me, more blood oozing down from the wound in the back of her head. She smiled and flicked a hand forward, beckoning me onward into the graveyard. I took a step toward her, but something held me to the spot. I wasn’t dead. Not yet. And that, that was a fact I’d had to remind myself of every damn day since I’d been born. I, Penelope Hope, had to hold on to the fact I was still breathing. For now.

2

I awoke with a jolt. Though it was generous to say that I woke up. What I had just fallen into was a daydream – a particularly detailed one. I was still in the mortuary room, still applying makeup to the new corpse. She was just in front of me. I was crunched forward on my chair, my arms crumpled on the glistening stainless steel bench, my hair brushing right up against the corpse’s dress. Pushing back, not scared by the fact I’d been sleeping next to a corpse – but angry at myself for falling into another reverie – I rolled my eyes. “Really, Penelope?” I scratched the back of my neck, my latex gloves squeaking over my nails. “Another daydream?” I slapped my cheek. My hand smelled ever so slightly, but it wouldn’t kill me. Standing up, I dumped the applicator by the sink, turned around, found a small mirror, and stared at it. My cheeks were a little sallow. My skin was gray, too, but it sure as heck wasn’t because I was dead. I was just tired. What I’d told that corpse in my reverie was correct. I barely slept. I never dreamed, too. And no, you couldn’t call what I’d just experienced a dream. It was a waking reverie. Now I paused to think about it, I’d been awake the entire time. A part of me had known that I’d been pressed right up against the metal bed. I’d felt the makeup brush in my hand. And I’d known the corpse was right there, right in front of me. I slapped my cheek again. Then I rubbed my eyes. I finally dropped my hands. I was pretty much done here, anyway. I pulled off the gloves and dumped them in the bin underneath the sink. I caught a glimpse of my reflection once more. I almost thought I could see a crow in the room, but I knew that couldn’t possibly be true. Turning around, I glimpsed one flying past

the window. It took my attention for a fleeting second before there was a knock on the door. “You done?” In walked Stanley, the funeral home director. He was in an old tweed jacket with an equally old tweed vest underneath. He always wore the same clothes. They’d been the same clothes his father had worn. This was a family business, after all. I nodded, gesturing at the corpse. “Cindy looks great,” he said. “The family will be thrilled.” He walked over and tilted his head to the side as he obviously tried to see if the injury to the back of her head was visible. “I cleaned off the blood. It’ll be fine. There’ll be no marks on the pillow.” He nodded, clapped his hands together, and gestured with a shrug of his shoulder toward the door. “In which case, why aren’t you ready?” I frowned and scratched my head. “For what?” “It’s 6 o’clock. It’s time for drinks. It’s Friday,” he reminded me. I instantly turned over to the window. I even brought my hand up, ready to gesture to the fact it was midmorning, but I froze. It had been mid-morning in my daydream. Stanley was right – it was 6 o’clock. The first rays of dusk were already setting in. They hung particularly low over the graveyard in the distance. I let my hand drop and tapped it on my leg. “I’ll get ready in a second. I’ll meet you all there.” “You sure?” “Yeah, I could use the walk.” Stanley didn’t say another word. With an affable smile, he left. My lips tugged down into a frown. I stared at the cemetery. I thought I could see a crow or two. Before I could let my imagination get the better of me, I turned swiftly. I washed my hands thoroughly. Then I grabbed my jacket from over the

back of the door and pulled it on. I made it out of the back door to the staff car park. The whole while, I found myself unconsciously retracing the steps of the corpse. Yeah, I could call her Cindy, but there was no point, was there? She had ceased to be Cindy when she’d died. She was now nothing more than a decomposing body. Stanley obviously didn’t think that way. But Stanley had a lot more to do with screaming family . I never saw anyone but the corpses themselves. And I knew they didn’t mind what I referred to them as. Cramming my hands into my pockets, I walked right past my car. It wasn’t that much of a slog to the bar we always went to, anyway. Sheltering under my collar as a quick wind raced in and rustled the leaves of the trees all around me, I tried not to look at the gates of the graveyard. They’d be closed in an hour or two. Then Barney, the security guard, would start doing the rounds. The cemetery hadn’t always had security, but these days there were a lot of break-ins – a lot of vandalism, if you could believe it. When there were thousands of walls in town to tag, why come to a graveyard and mark someone’s final resting place? I knew the answer. For thrills. To a lot of people, death was still a taboo – a lingering curiosity and fear they never got to deal with. Maybe to those young kids, sneaking into the graveyard at night and tagging gravestones proved to everyone else they weren’t scared of death. I knew better. Shivering again, I decided not to follow that thought. I kicked off down one of the paths that cut through an overflow car park for the graveyard. That’s when I saw a car. It was hardly remarkable. Though most of the traffic to the cemetery occurred during the day, occasionally people came after work hours. It was likely the only time they could get during the entire week. That’s why it didn’t close till seven. This car was different. It caught my attention because it was a lot fancier than the rest. It was low, shiny, and black. Inexplicably as I caught sight of the number plate, I realized it just had a symbol. Not that I was an expert, but it looked like omega – the final letter of the Greek alphabet. I frowned at it as I moved on quickly. It didn’t take much longer to reach the bar. By the time I walked in, it was to the sight of everyone from the funeral home flocking around our favorite table. There weren’t that many of us – just 10 in total. From Stanley to some of the other morticians, to the receptionist, to Stella, the old lady who did the flowers – this was still very much a family affair, and

everyone but me was a Carlson. “You’re here,” Stanley said with a booming voice as he reached his arms out and opened them wide. I nodded at everyone and offered a subdued smile. I was usually good at shrugging off my daily reveries. I’d had them my whole life, so it was simple to ignore them. Today, for whatever reason, this one lingered. It hadn’t even been that involved. Compared to the ordinary daydreams I got sucked into like a leaf being swallowed by a whirlpool, having a corpse gesture at me to follow her into a cemetery was child’s play. Ever since I was a child, for as long as I could , I’d been dreaming of this great gleaming castle made of bone. Yeah, I get it – creepy. Maybe that’s why I’d gone into the mortuary business right after high school. I’d always known what I wanted to do – because I’d always only been comfortable doing one thing. I wasn’t good with people. I hated socializing. But the dead… the dead made me comfortable. As for that castle of skulls and bones and rib cages? That inexplicably made me comfortable, too. Whenever I woke up from one of those dreams, I would always get this sense that I belonged somewhere. Which was ironic, because my entire life had proven to me that I belonged nowhere. I’d barely had a single friend during high school. I’d been the odd one out growing up at the orphanage. I’d never even been fostered once. “Come sit by me,” Stella said as she pulled the chair out, a wide smile on her face. I noted there was an empty chair right by the one she was gesturing to. I frowned at it as I sat down. “Who else is coming?” Stanley coughed uncomfortably. Stella grabbed me by the shoulders. “Oh, I’ve invited my nephew. I’ve told you about him, haven’t I?” My stomach sank. Yeah, she had. This wasn’t the first time Stella had tried to set me up. “Don’t look so embarrassed,” she chided. “A pretty girl like you should be out there, enjoying life—”

She continued, but I tuned out. Enjoying life? Who’s to say I wasn’t? I was just more comfortable hanging out with the dead than the living. Stanley quickly cleared his throat and turned the conversation onto something else. Again I tuned out. I dipped back into the conversation occasionally, just to prove to them that I wasn’t ignoring them completely. But most of the time, I let my mind wander. You might think that was a dangerous thing, considering where my mind could take me when it was unsupervised. I only ever daydreamed when I was on my own, thankfully. If I had such sharp waking reveries around other people, I would’ve booked myself into a psychiatric clinic years ago. As it was, not a single person on the face of the planet knew what my imagination could do. That being said, the reveries I had were always geared toward one topic. Death. I never imagined myself as some kind of superhero or anything. I never daydreamed about romantic trysts. It was always the dead – the ghosts of the recently deceased, to be specific. Or it was that castle, empty and waiting for me. I rubbed my face. This quick prickle spiked its way across the back of my neck. I shivered. I pushed up just in time to see over Stella’s shoulder that she’d just gotten a text from her nephew. It read something along the lines of ‘stop trying to set me up with the creepy girl from your work.’ I stifled a laugh. Some might read that as a kick in the guts, but I was relieved. “I’m just heading to the bathroom,” I said quietly as I left the group and wound my way through the bar. You wouldn’t think it, but it was a seriously popular place. We only got the prime table because Carlson’s had been coming here on a Friday night for years – ever since the pub had opened a century ago, in fact. We were as much of an institution as it was, so we were given pride of place. The bar was sprawling. It was in an old sandstone building. It had these beautiful intricate Art Deco tiles over the walls, carved architraves, and a warren of back rooms that were a massive headache for the staff. This place didn’t just serve alcohol but had pretty decent food, too. The staff were always darting around like rabbits. I knew my way to the bathroom. It was a practiced route. There were several ways to get to it, and I always took the longest one. As I shoved my hands harder into my pockets, I strode past the end of the bar. There was a man sitting in one

of the booths. He was on his own. He was sipping at some kind of golden liquor. All these details were completely irrelevant. He had… this energy about him. It was something I’d never felt before. It made me stop on the spot. I couldn’t see his face. It was obscured by the carved side of his booth. I watched his hand as it pushed forward and he settled his drink on the table. He was wearing a ring. It had the Greek symbol omega on it. I hadn’t forgotten that odd car I’d seen earlier. I frowned. A man pushed past me. He jostled my arm. I wasn’t expecting it. Though I usually had nerves of steel, I startled badly. He had a lingering cold touch despite the fact we were both wearing jackets and our skin hadn’t met. The man in the booth pushed up. Either it was to greet the guy, or it was at the startled squeak I’d given. The point was, he stood. I was close enough to the booth that he was right there, near enough to touch. I looked at his face. There was no way I couldn’t. He was categorically the most handsome man I had ever seen. He had regal features. They were practically godly. He reminded me of some carving from old Greece. He had this strong, sharp jawline. He had these glittering yet intense eyes. His hair was slightly curly but closely cropped. He was wearing an expensive suit that befitted the car I’d seen earlier. It was black over a gray shirt and a jet-black tie. He had a pin on. It was a small skull. I got so caught staring at him, absorbing every single detail, it would’ve looked like I was an astronaut who’d come across the first evidence that alien life existed. Nothing would be able to pull me away. At first the guy ignored me. He gestured to his friend to sit, but when I just stood there, staring up at him, he turned. He made eye . It was the kind of eye that begged me to stare into his eyes. My gaze jolted up, and I got trapped in his violet pupils. This stiffness came over him. Maybe he was freaked out by how much I was staring at him, or maybe it was something else. It was almost as if he didn’t expect I’d be able to see him in the first place. I suddenly ed my manners. “Sorry,” I muttered as I quickly pulled

myself away. I felt his eyes on the back of my neck even as I ducked through an open doorway and headed to the bathrooms. They were thankfully close. I managed to latch a sweaty hand on the handle and pull the door shut behind me. Then I fell against it. I was panting – I was actually out of breath and all I’d done was stare at some guy. “No, not just some guy,” I corrected as I massaged my chest with the base of my palm. “I’ve never… seen anyone like that,” I whispered to myself. I stayed there way too long. There were several bathrooms dotted around this warren of a bar. Fortunately no one bothered to knock on the door of this one. It gave me five minutes to just rest there. I eventually told myself I was just tired. I was always tired. I was overreacting to the slightest thing. The guy probably wasn’t even that hot. I splashed water on my face and momentarily looked at my reflection. All I could see were the wrinkles and the dark shadows under my eyes. It didn’t matter how old I actually was, I always looked 10 years older – at least. I went to fix my hair quickly but realized there was no point. I usually didn’t care about my appearance, and now was no different. I finally walked out of the bathroom. My heart skipped a beat – who was I kidding? It skipped about 10 as I made my way back past that booth. Though I really didn’t want to stare, at the same time, I couldn’t help myself. I inclined my head around and tried to catch a glimpse of him – even if it was just of that unusual skull pin – but he wasn’t there. My gut clenched as I realized I’d probably freaked him out. Though you got all sorts in this bar, he looked too wealthy for this t. Maybe he’d even complained to management about me. I kept walking around the side of the circuitous bar. I couldn’t even see our table at the front. My mind was elsewhere. When some drunk guy got to his feet and leered at me that I should him, I didn’t even make eye . I ed his words, but that was it. My head, as always, was up among the clouds. Or perhaps down

among the dirt. The guy wasn’t about to take no for an answer. He got up. He even grabbed my wrist. I’d always had delicate skin that was easy to bruise. I was constantly covered in marks from banging into tables and doors and chairs. So as the drunk guy’s grip locked around me, I couldn’t help but wince as his beefy fingers snagged my arm way too tightly. I jerked back. Stephanie and Tracy – the bar mistresses – weren’t in sight. “Look, can you let me go?” I said. The guy started to tug me toward the bar. As my gut gripped and I realized I’d have to raise my voice and make a scene, I watched someone step in quickly from behind. They locked a hand on the guy’s shoulder. I caught a glimpse of that omega ring. I say a glimpse, because what happened next happened quickly. Suddenly the drunk guy was flat on his ass. His grip was broken on my wrist, so fortunately I wasn’t tugged down with him. As his large form smashed into the floorboards, there was an echoing shake. I looked up to see that handsome man, but he’d already turned around. He pulled on his jacket lapels and walked right through a crowd of patrons who jumped up to help the drunk guy. They hadn’t seen him grab me, apparently, because one woman snapped a quick, “You okay? You just upended. It looked like you were a drink someone knocked over.” I opened my mouth. I was about to correct her. Was she blind? The guy with the omega ring had done that. But when another person muttered, “Did you slip on something?” and started to look for alcohol, I just stood there. The drunk guy rubbed the back of his head. He looked at me. As my muscles clenched and I wondered if he was about to blame this on me, he started to look for alcohol on the floor too.

I realized this was a good chance to leave. I scurried past him. I turned back to him and shifted my attention through the crowd to try to catch a glimpse of that man, but wherever he was, he was long gone. By the time I made it back to the table, I’d lost all appetite for Friday drinks. “You look pale,” Stella said as she leaned over, grabbed my cheek, and tried to rub some warmth into it. “I’m fine,” I muttered even as I collapsed my arms around my middle. “You’ve looked tired all week,” Stanley said in his grandfatherly voice that he was so fond of. “Are you coming down with something?” I opened my mouth to say that I wasn’t, but I quickly thought better of it. I didn’t want to be here anymore. It wasn’t just the incident with the drunk guy. I never liked being seen. Maybe Stella thought I was pretty, and maybe in a certain way I was, but the point was, I hated being looked at. I always felt far more comfortable in the shadows. As the bar was heating up and more people came in, I felt my usual introverted self kick into gear. I nodded. I even went to the effort of pressing the back of my hand against my forehead as if I had a fever. “Actually, I don’t feel great.” I got up and grabbed my jacket from the back of my chair. “I’ll see you guys on Monday. Sorry about this.” “No need to apologize. You rest up,” Stanley said. Stella grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze as I walked past. I paused at the door, staring at them with a smile. They were my family, not that any of them knew it. They were unaware of the fact I was an orphan. Whenever anyone tried to question me about my family life, I always dodged it. I didn’t want them knowing how much I relied on this job and their friendliness. I gave them one last fleeting smile and walked out into the night. The first thing I did was scan the street for that omega car, but I couldn’t see it. I inclined my head in every direction, trying to catch a glimpse of that guy, but wherever he was, he was far away from here. With a sigh, I shoved my hands into my pockets. On the short walk back to the mortuary, I played the incident over and over again in my head. I tried to

where everyone had been sitting. “How the hell had those people not seen what really happened?” I muttered under my breath as I made it back to the funeral home. My keys were in my pocket. I pulled them out and stared at my old hatchback. I let my gaze dart along the hood, then down to the wheels, then across to the shadows beneath the car. I didn’t know why, but shadows had always intrigued me. It was as if what happened in the light simply couldn’t capture my attention. It was in the shadows where true reality existed. Speaking of shadows, the graveyard cast a particularly long one in the encroaching dusk. As crickets began to click and I heard the far-off rumble of engines, I stared at it. I hadn’t stayed all that late in the bar. The cemetery still wasn’t closed. Inclining my head further over my shoulder, I stared up at the gates. My gut clenched. I thought… I thought I could see Cindy there – the corpse from earlier today. It was the same dress. It was the same blood dripping down the back of her head. I closed my eyes, squeezed them tightly shut, then opened them again. She was gone. I breathed a deep sigh of release. I got into my car. I did it too quickly, the move snapped as if I was running from something. And maybe I was. Maybe in moments like this I could it to myself that my so-called waking reveries were a lot more. I could it to myself that ordinary people didn’t have full-on hallucinations like I did every day. As soon as I jammed my keys into the ignition and fixed my teeth hard over my lip, I chased those thoughts away. I couldn’t afford to be crazy. Literally. I couldn’t pay for health insurance, and I had no one to me. So I would simply go back to thinking that what I experienced every day was nothing more than an imagination starved by too little sleep. Satisfying myself that that was the case, I pulled out of the funeral home car park and drove away. I made it all the way around the west side of the cemetery. Just as my mind was starting to calm and my fingers had relaxed their white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel, I came to a sudden screeching stop. I swore I saw a woman dart across the road in front of me. She moved quickly, her footfall desperate. Her

feet were bare. She was in a long white dress. There was blood splattered down the middle. Before I could convince myself that this was just a waking nightmare, I heard her scream split through the air. It was loud enough that it could have woken the dead. Terrified, my breath stuck in my throat, I shoved the car into park, yanked open the door, slipped as I got my seatbelt off, then fell right out onto the cold bitumen. I pushed up. “Are you okay?” I screamed at the woman as I tried to dart after her. I lost sight of where she’d gone. The cemetery hill was just to my side, and it was wooded along that section. Though the gardens within were always perfectly manicured, out in this area they were wild and free – the last true bit of forest left on the outskirts of the city. I went to follow the woman into the forest, but I stopped. I couldn’t hear anything. And as I peered in past the trees and the shadows cast by the evergrowing dusk, I realized I couldn’t see anything, either. My stomach kicked, a terrible question forming in my mind. What if I hadn’t seen anything, after all? I stood there on the spot, teetering, playing with my indecision. Eventually my curiosity and better side won out. I had to go check. That was the only moral thing to do. But I didn’t have my phone on me. I didn’t have a flashlight, either. There was one right underneath the driver’s seat in my car. I rushed back out to my hatch. I wasn’t paying attention. My heart pounded in my ears. Fear and indecision collided together in my skull and made me question if I was making this up or if I was just wasting time when I needed to be out there, saving her. I paid no attention to the road. A mistake. A truck was barreling down toward me. I darted out right in front of it. I had a chance to stare up into its headlights. But that was it. This deep recognition flooded through me. It told me it was finally here. I’d managed to dodge death for so long, but now it had finally caught up to me. I didn’t know if I was scared or just relieved that my pretense of a life would finally end. But death did not come. At the last moment, I felt someone or something grab

my shoulders. I was turned around. I could feel strong arms around me and an even stronger presence blocking me off from something. I caught the scent of white lilies. And I saw a set of eyes – violet, deep, and staring right into my own. I thought I heard the caw of a crow. Even… as incredible as it sounded, I even thought I saw crows darting through the shadow of the man as he turned me around. I heard the fluttering of their wings. Their frenzied flight even caught my short hair and sent it playing around my cheeks. It yanked my jacket and made it whip around my hips. The man turned me to the side and pressed me up against my car just as the truck shot past. It didn’t even bother to blare its horn. It obviously hadn’t seen me at all. For a shaking second, I remained there, locked in that man’s arms, my mind catching up to what could have just happened. I’d… almost died. And I hadn’t cared. Out of the corner of my eye, I swore I saw a shadow jolt then a single crow take flight. Then… nothing. I went to tilt my chin up, to stare into those violet eyes again, but… there was nothing there. I suddenly jolted. I was pinned against my car. I could hear the truck further down. I could even see it as it negotiated a tricky turn and slowed. But I… I wasn’t in the middle of the road. I hadn’t been squashed by it. And I had no idea how I’d gotten here. Because I could not have seen what I had just witnessed. It was impossible. I staggered into the driver’s seat, my door still open. I sat there, shaking. I locked a hand on my chest. “I… did I just hallucinate that entire thing?” I stammered those words out, but there was no one to hear them – no one to make sense of my turgid, turbulent thoughts. I squeezed my eyes closed. When that didn’t help, I opened them. I stared at the wide road around me. There was no indication of that man, and he couldn’t

possibly have gotten away so quickly. I trailed my fingers up my hip. It wanted to believe that it could still feel his touch, but it… “It was all in my head,” I whispered. Locking the base of my palm against my forehead, I dragged it back and forth. “What the hell is wrong with you?” I went to turn the ignition on, but my fingers slipped as I ed why I’d stopped in the middle of the road in the first place. I’d been so determined to go and find that woman earlier. Even though I wasn’t sure if this was a hallucination or not, I’d come to the decision that regardless of whether it was, if there was a chance that it wasn’t, I had an obligation to search for her. I gripped the steering wheel. As I dragged my teeth over my lip, I realized nothing had changed. Rather than leave my car right in the middle of the road this time, I pulled off onto the side. I parked right near the forest. Sweating, shaking all over, I leaned under my seat and grabbed my torch. I pulled it out as I yanked my bag over my shoulder. I ensured my phone was inside. I got out of the car. As soon as I did, a gust of wind took the door and slammed it closed. I unashamedly screamed. In one of the orphanages I’d grown up in, there’d been this sister who’d been obsessed with superstition. Every few minutes, she would grab her cross and chant some prayer to protect herself and the rest of the children. She’d seen bogeymen and ghosts in every corner. The other sisters had tolerated her. Most of the kids thought she was mad. If she were here right now, she would scream and tell me that was a sign to get back in my car and drive away. I stared at the door and swallowed. My keys were still in my hand. I felt their weight as I turned my head and stared past the tree-line. Despite the fact it was still dusk, it was truly dark in there. The shadows were a lot longer, and they appeared to have the power to hide just about anything. As fear gripped me once more, I turned to get back to the car, but at the last moment as my fingers grabbed the door handle, I forced myself to take a step

back. A dose of courage struck me from somewhere. As it rattled up my stomach and straightened my spine, I turned, gripped my bag harder, and pushed off down the hill into the forest. This little copse of trees couldn’t be larger than a hectare. The council periodically went through motions to chop it down, but they never went anywhere. The Friends of the Cemetery Society always fought them tooth-andnail. You wouldn’t think they’d have any power, but obviously they did. Regardless of what developer got on board, this land would never be cleared. This dark forest would hang at the sides of the cemetery until both were destroyed by some other means. “Hello,” I called as I got further into the trees. “Is anyone there? Is anyone in trouble?” I could hear my voice as it echoed around me, but that was it. The forest was strangely quiet. Though I was aware of the wind and I knew that in a forest as old as this, it should be shaking the boughs of the trees, it wasn’t. It was eerily silent. It reminded me of the mortuary rooms at times. In the middle of the day when the hot sun would stream in through that window, it could become as silent as death itself. I walked further into the forest, every step soft. I tried to pick up signs that anyone had run through here. Judging by its proximity to the road, this small winding path I’d found must’ve been where the woman had gone – if she had come here at all. She likely didn’t exist in the first place. My stomach sank. It told me this was nothing more than a wild goose chase. I… I’d had a waking hallucination and nothing more. I palmed my head. It was sweaty. It transferred across my fingers. I dug my nails in and scratched long red and white lines down my face. It did nothing to alleviate my tension. I’d never been to this particular part of the forest – though referring to this copse of trees as a forest was generous. That being said, at least from where I was standing, it did stretch on and on and on. It gave one the impression they were in some massive forest out in the wilds of Romania or some other huge, interconnected, never-ending wildland.

I forgot all about the city, despite the fact I wasn’t that far away from the road. I continued forward. I was compelled. I didn’t want to accept that, but it had to be the only reason I was continuing forward even though everything told me to turn around. I had imagined a man saving me from a truck, for God’s sake. I’d seen his shadow turn into crows. This was not happening. I had never glimpsed a bloodied woman. I had— I turned around a new section of the winding path. Right there, right in front of me was a crumpled woman in a graying white dress with blood splattered over the front. For a long time I just stood there, staring at her. I blinked my eyes closed. I opened them again. I blinked them closed once more. I opened them. Each time, she was still there. Slowly, as if my body wouldn’t work anymore, I took a step forward. When she remained, I took another step forward, then another. I reached her. I got down on my knees. That’s when I saw that her face was gray. She wasn’t just dead – she’d been dead for some time. The blood over the front of her dress had browned. There was an old stain of it underneath her. It had long ago seeped into the dirt. Leaves covered her. Her hair was a tangled mess. There were twigs all over her shoulders and chest. I knew she was dead. I’d seen more dead people arguably than I’d seen live people. She wasn’t moving. I could smell rot setting in. I still got down on my knees. Shaking beside her, I reached out a hand and touched her shoulder. I pushed her ever so slightly. Her body was soft. It was way past rigor mortis. As my fingers alighted on her skin, I thought I felt something. I didn’t know if it transferred from her or if it awoke within me, but it was this rush like no other. It was enough that I jerked back. I screamed – something I should have done the second I saw the corpse. I fell flat on my ass and broke several twigs. The sound reminded me of bones snapping. I dropped my flashlight. It rolled beside me. There was an incline just to the side of this woman. Before it could fall down there and leave me in the dark, save for my phone, it stopped. The torch beam angled alongside the corpse. It lit up her body and cast a shadow onto the tree behind.

The corpse should have taken all of my attention, but I turned around and stared at the shadow being cast across the trunk of a large tree. It moved. Shadows move when light sources move. They do not move on their own. This one… it danced and writhed. It almost… almost looked as if someone was trying to kill it. Riveted to the spot, incapable of moving, I stared at that image. It wanted to reach down and break my soul. I thought I saw a large man grab the woman from behind. I thought I saw him holding a brick. He smashed it against her head. It would’ve been a blow sufficient to kill most people, but somehow the woman survived. She crawled forward. The guy leaped on her. There was a struggle. She was shoved to the side on top of a trunk. It had a jutting branch – a strong stump that hadn’t rotted away. She fell against it. It impaled her right through the side. Though I was only seeing all of this in the shadows, I swear I saw her eyes open with the last glimpse of life then close as it fled her. I was shaking. I simply couldn’t move other than to convulse on the spot as fear blasted through me. The guy pushed down. He pulled something from his pocket. Though I shouldn’t have been able to identify it from a mere shadow, that didn’t matter. It was a pair of nail clippers. He grabbed up the dead woman’s left hand and clipped off her thumbnail. He pushed it into his pocket. He turned to leave, but not before crunching down to his knee and trailing his finger through a slick of her blood. He placed it in his mouth. Then he picked up his brick and left. I… stopped. All of me just froze. From my thoughts to my breath to my heart – nothing could move. This… couldn’t be happening. There couldn’t be a corpse in front of me. I couldn’t have just seen the exact way she was murdered in the shadow cast by her body. Maybe I was dead. Maybe I’d died back there on the road. Maybe I was dreaming. Or maybe… maybe this was real.

3

I remained there by the corpse for way too long. Long enough that dusk became night. I just sat there, incapable of moving as I fought with my mind. I tried opening my eyes and closing them again – anything at all to get this vision to disappear. But no matter what happened, the corpse remained. I begged myself to believe that this was just a vision. It was too sharp. The scent filled my nostrils. Though the reveries I was trapped in during the day were often mostly indistinguishable from reality, they never lasted this long, and they were never this real. “Get up,” I hissed. “Walk away.” As soon as those words were out of my lips, I squeezed my eyes shut. “No, call the police. This is real. There’s actually a corpse in front of you, Penelope.” I opened my eyes again. She was there. I didn’t want to touch her. When I had, I’d felt that unholy jolt. A remnant of it was still in my muscles, chasing its way down my fingers and into my wrists. It was one of the most unpleasant sensations I had ever experienced. It felt like it could wake the dead. I clenched my hands into fists. I drew my arms around myself. I practically shut down. I locked my head against my knees. But my curiosity won out. As I pulled my head back and I stared at the corpse, I let myself see it. I finally let myself believe it was there. “You have to call the cops. Even… even if this is just some psychiatric symptom, you have to call the police. Because there’s a chance it’s real.” Listening to myself, finally accepting that line of reasoning, I shoved a hand into my bag. Shaking all over, I called the emergency number. I was a blubbering mess on the phone, but I managed to relay my position. I sat there until I heard sirens. I sat there until I saw the police. Heck, I sat there until I was pulled away. And it wasn’t until I was taken back to the police station to get my statement that I realized it was real. I’d found a corpse. But there was a

problem. As I replayed the incident in my mind, I’d seen that woman running into the forest. It had been her. The same hair, the same white dress. But she’d… been alive at the time. I hadn’t given my statement yet. I was sitting on a little plastic chair outside of a busy room with a cup of tea in my hands. I stared at it. I closed my eyes again and tried to go over what had happened. I couldn’t write about parking my car in the middle of the road and being saved by a man whose shadow had turned into crows. Nor could I mention seeing that woman running. When it finally came time for me to give my statement, I was cold all over. I had no idea what to say. I expected one of the officers who’d been at the scene to question me, but instead this detective in plain clothes walked up to me, his hands in his pockets. He had a broad chest, an even broader smile, and the kind of easy features that promised you he could be just as handsome as he was practical. He smiled down at me, one side of his lips kinked. “I’m sure you’re shocked – but we need your statement sooner rather than later. Do you mind?” He gestured to the side to an open room. I got up. I was aware of the fact I was clutching my Styrofoam cup way too tightly. My fingers were indenting the sides. His gaze flashed down and appeared to note this. Heck, the way his eyes moved, I was certain he would note every single thing in reality. He had this seriously watchful gaze that reminded me of some bird of prey. Then again, maybe I just had birds on the brain. I shivered as I saw the first seat in the room and sat in it, not twigging to the fact it was his. He smiled slightly. “Your seat’s actually over there. But I don’t mind if you don’t mind.” He hooked a left around the table and sat. He stared at me. “What do you ? What made you go out there, anyway?” he added quickly. I shrugged. I closed in on myself. I now grabbed my cup so tightly, it would’ve taken an army to rip it from my hands.

“Just take your time,” he said patiently. I closed my eyes. “I’m not really sure why I got out of the car. I just did. I’d had a hard day. I like that section of forest. I think I wanted to walk.” I opened one eye to see that he was noting everything. His expression didn’t suggest that he was suspicious. He should be. My voice was wavering badly. I was aware that I was lying to the cops, but how could I possibly tell this guy the truth? I had seen the dead woman running. She had essentially led me to her corpse. “What do you do – Penelope, is it?” I nodded. “Believe it or not, I work in a funeral home.” He smiled, the move contained. It gave away nothing. “So that’s not the first corpse you’ve ever seen, then?” I swallowed. Maybe it was a little too over the top, because I saw his gaze dart toward my throat. I looked down at my drink again. “No, that’s not the first corpse I’ve ever seen. It’s not the first murder victim I’ve ever seen, either,” I added. “I mean, it isn’t the first murder victim that has ever come through the funeral home. Not that she came to Carlson’s,” I corrected quickly, realizing that I was rapidly losing control of myself. “Just take your time,” he repeated. “I’ve just never seen… I’ve never come across a corpse like that, okay?” I let my gaze flash up to him. All I could do was think of everything I’d seen in the corpse’s shadow. It had replayed her death. I… wanted to believe that had just been in my head, but for God’s sake, I’d found that dead woman. I would not have found her – hell, I doubted anyone would have found her for months – had I not seen her running. Something was going on, even if I wanted to deny it with all my heart. I went back to clutching my Styrofoam cup. I was now warping it so badly, soon enough I would crack it and spill the halfsipped tea over my tense white legs.

“I don’t think I introduced myself. The name’s Timothy Waters. I’m a homicide detective. You don’t need to explain why this is different,” he said as he looked at me, the move enduring as he clearly tried to capture my attention. “We all react around death in different ways. I’ve seen hardened officers lose it when coming across a corpse suddenly. It’s out of context. The relevant training doesn’t apply in novel situations. The first thing I’m going to tell you is the first thing I tell them. Let it go. Don’t beat yourself up over how you reacted.” I stared up at him. I waited to see suspicion flaring in his gaze, but it wasn’t there. It should be there, right? He should appreciate that I was lying to him. Anyone with an ounce of psychological training would be able to tell that, from my tone and the fact I simply could not make eye , I was holding back. My lips slipped open. There was a question readying behind them – one I knew he wouldn’t answer but one I had to ask. “Who killed her?” He leaned back, crossed his arms, and smiled. It was polite, but there wasn’t a lot of energy behind it. “We don’t know. The investigation has only just begun.” All I could do was the brick. Then the fact the killer had taken her thumbnail. I opened my mouth to share this detail, but I froze. He leaned forward. “What is it?” “I… sat there for a long time, staring at the corpse,” I itted quietly as I stared down at my drink. “I couldn’t make myself move. I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s gonna happen to me, but I didn’t mean to—” He laughed. “It doesn’t matter. You were scared. And it wasn’t as if calling us sooner would change the fact she was still dead. At first assessment, she’s been there for weeks. I’m sure that’s something you’ve already figured out, considering your line of work.” I looked up at him. I was aware that usually police officers wouldn’t be able to share details of an ongoing investigation, but he was right. I’d seen enough corpses – in all levels of decomposition – to know she was at least several weeks old, if not a month. Carlson’s didn’t just deal with pretty corpses that were a few days old. As I’d already told this officer, we also dealt with murder victims. Some of them were old. Weeks old, months old – sometimes even years. Someone had to see the body. Though you never let the family do it, we still had

to prepare the corpse for burial or cremation. I leaned back. I looked at him. I wanted to add everything I’d seen, but I just couldn’t. He offered me another one of those half-smiles. “You don’t need to beat yourself up – as I already said, you did your best. You found her, and that’s the most important thing.” There was a knock on the door. “Come in,” Timothy said. The door opened. There was a harried looking older woman. She made eye with Timothy. She said nothing. She just pointed to her left thumbnail. My stomach hardened to the point of setting concrete. Timothy’s expression clouded over as if a storm had just swept into the room. He nodded. He looked at me. “I’ll have someone else come and take your statement. Okay?” He pushed up. He reached the door. “Thanks for finding her.” With that, he left. That had not been a coincidence. They must’ve just found out the corpse was missing its left thumbnail. I sat there. Someone else did come in, and I gave my statement. All the while, my mind spilled through the facts. It practically swam in them as if it was trying to drown itself. For the police to react like that to that one detail meant they’d seen it before, right? Which meant one thing? A serial killer. I don’t know why I jumped to that fact so quickly. But I did. As I walked out of the police station, I saw a storm had built up. It was already raining. I paused just underneath the awning. I stared up at the fat raindrops as they sailed down. There was a cold wind out, but I didn’t bother to hide under the protection of my collar. I walked out into the rain. In my handbag was a small umbrella, but I didn’t

bother to grab it out. I let the rain assail me. It was cold. It robbed me of my warmth, but again, it didn’t matter. My mind was obsessed, replaying what I’d seen over and over again. I had discovered the corpse of a serial killer’s victim. I had been led there. And as my stomach clenched and I stared up at the broiling storm clouds above, I realized this wasn’t over. It was just beginning. I gazed at my hands. I traced my fingers, replaying the moment I’d touched that corpse – replaying the moment I’d felt something push from it into me. My eyes closed. I walked away. Before too long, I’d be back.

4

I had to make it to work early the next day. I needed to pick my car up. It wasn’t like I was scheduled to work, but that didn’t really matter. I was cold, terrified, and overflowing with unstoppable thoughts. For the first time, I’d gotten a full night’s sleep, but it had made me more tired than usual. I’d caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. My eyes were hooded with dark shadows. They practically clung to the skin like zombies. Picking up my car was hard. It was still parked where I’d left it. I had to show my ID to the guy watching the police line. He let me take it away only after he called the station to corroborate my story. I pulled up outside the funeral home. I drummed my hands on the steering wheel, closed my eyes, and just sat there for a few minutes. The whole night, I’d tried to rationalize everything. I’d tried to clutch back my sense of sanity, but it was still as broken as a China doll someone had hit with a hammer. I got out of the car. Stella was there. She frowned at me as she walked with a massive vase of flowers toward one of the back rooms. “What are you doing here today, sweetie? You’re not scheduled to work. You were sick last night, anyway.” I opened my mouth to tell her everything, but the words froze on my lips. What the hell was I doing here? I should’ve just taken my car and gone home. Stella frowned at me. “What is it? Did you see what happened around the back of the forest? All those police cars? I heard they found a corpse last night,” Stella spoke quickly. “It’s not a story,” I whispered. She was so busy nattering that she didn’t hear me. She launched into her theories about what had happened, but she quickly paused. “What do you mean?” “I was the one who found the corpse last night,” I itted quietly. Maybe I

shouldn’t have told her this, but it came out anyway. I always found it was better to tell the truth around people like Stella. They were so chatty that if you lied, they’d soon spread that lie over town and it would quickly catch up with you. She paled. She put the vase she was carrying down on the concrete loading dock. She walked over and offered me a big hug. She patted me on the back. “That’s why you look so pale. What happened?” “I’m not really allowed to discuss too many details.” I rubbed my face. No one had told me that specifically, but it was a good way to shut down Stella’s curiosity. I could see it flaring in her eyes even as she patted me once more, her comionate smile flattening out. “How on earth did you find the corpse?” “I just stopped in the forest for a walk. I was feeling kind of bloated. I… found it,” I said with a shrug, not wanting to add another single detail. She rubbed my shoulders with these big circular movements. “You came to work to distract yourself, ha? That’s okay. Can you give me a hand with the flowers?” I smiled at her. For the next half hour, I did exactly as she told me to. We were prepping for Cindy’s funeral. I didn’t know why I was using her name now, but it stuck. Soon enough Stella had spread why I was here, so Stanley didn’t ask any questions about why I was working on a day I wasn’t meant to. He clapped a warm hand on my shoulder. “While you’re here, can you touch up Cindy’s makeup before she goes out to see her family one last time?” I nodded. My gut clenched. As I walked toward the mortuary room, I paused in front of the doors. I pushed in. There Cindy was, already prepared in her coffin. Though I hadn’t realized it before, I’d come to work today to see her, hadn’t I?

As I approached her, another knot forming in my gut, my gaze darted toward her head. I couldn’t see the back of her head. Her hair was artfully arranged. But I had seen the wound in her skull pretty clearly when I’d been cleaning up her hair. I walked softly over to her coffin. I let my hands rest on it. I stared at her. Before I knew what I was doing, I gently leaned forward. I went to grab her head to get another glimpse at her wound – not that I knew why – but that’s when I felt something. This energy jolted through me. It was an exact replay of what had happened last night. As it built in my fingertips and rushed through my body, I gasped and jolted back, but it was already too late. I had a chance to stare down at my fingers before I saw something pick up in the shadows. The early morning sunshine spilled in through the window. It cast a long shadow along one side of the coffin. As I stared in total gut-wrenching horror and surprise, I watched the shadow change. I saw it morph. It expanded then contracted like a heart that was just ing how to beat. I threw myself backward. I slammed into the wall, then slid down it. As my fingers became sweaty and my breath caught in my chest, I watched… I watched the moment Cindy had died. The report we’d been given claimed that she had fallen over while drunk. That’s not what I saw. I saw a large man chasing her shadow. As my gaze locked on him, though I couldn’t take in too many details, considering I couldn’t actually see his face or what he was wearing, I realized he held himself in the exact same way as the guy who’d murdered the woman I’d found yesterday. I watched in total terror as he chased Cindy. I couldn’t see where she was. I wasn’t permitted to note that many details. But I did watch as he reached her. She screamed. Then she fell to the side. He had the brick raised, but he never had to use it. She tumbled, and her head struck some kind of stone. Then she lay still. I sat there, my hands clamped over my mouth, my whole body shaking. I didn’t think I would ever be able to move again.

But slowly, slowly, my fingers parted from my mouth. “What?” I hissed. The guy leaned down. He pulled nail clippers out of his pocket. Then he sliced off a section of her left thumbnail. He placed it in his pocket along with the clippers. Then… then the sick bastard did what he’d done last night. He leaned down, trailed his finger through her blood, then placed it in his mouth. I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to hurl. I jerked up. I ran over to the sink. Thankfully I made it. As I turned the water on to full, I retched. There was a quick knock on the door. Stanley walked in. “Kid? You okay? God, you are sick, after all. Finish up here and head home. If you want to,” he added, obviously reminding himself of why I was here in the first place. “Or at least head to the break room. Lie down on the couch. I’ll have Stella come check on you when everything’s done. We’re ready to take Cindy out, anyway.” I pushed up. I pressed my fingers against my mouth. Slowly, I turned. With wide-open eyes, I waited to see more of Cindy’s death. No. Murder. She might’ve hit her head – but she’d only done that because she was being chased. “Kid?” Stanley asked, catching sight of my freaked-out expression. I let my hand drop. I went to nod at Stanley, but I stopped. “Hold on.” I washed my hands. Trying to hide how much I was trembling, I walked over to Cindy. “I think I mucked up some of the makeup on her hand,” I whispered. I had to control my stomach. There was nothing left in it, but that didn’t mean it didn’t want to dry retch. I reached Cindy. As I stared at her, I no longer looked at her as just a corpse. She wasn’t even just a name to me, either. Now she was a story. One I couldn’t keep from replaying in my head – a shadow play that beckoned me on. Carefully, I grabbed up her left hand. I stared down at her thumb. Her nail had been snipped. I almost dropped her hand, but I controlled myself at the last moment. ing I actually had to do something, I rubbed off a little patch of concealer that had fallen onto her wrist. “There we go,” I said quietly. I forced myself to take a step back. My whole body was as hard as a plank. Stanley offered me a kind smile. “Always conscientious, even when you’re sick.

You’re one of our best employees.” He placed a hand on my shoulder affectionately. I didn’t want to point out that I was technically his only employee, considering the rest of them were family. I nodded. Then my mind started ticking over. What… what if what I’d seen had actually happened? No, not what if – I hadn’t been aware that her nail had been chopped off before I’d seen it in that vision. I became rigid as I pressed myself up against the sink. I had to be careful not to shake. If I rocked too much, the old thing might pull away from the wall. Cindy was a murder victim – and a serial killer had attacked her – so didn’t the police need to know? Didn’t they need to check the body? But how the hell could I tell them? More to the point, how the hell could I not tell them? I closed my eyes, and all I could see was that reverie I’d had where Cindy had beckoned me into the cemetery. “Kid?” Stanley asked, his voice wavering with confused concern. My eyes opened quickly. I took a jerked step forward. I looked up at Stanley. He’d been through a lot. He was well in his sixties and had been managing this funeral home since his father had died when he’d only been 35. And in that time, Stanley had seen his fair share of bodies, including murder victims. I didn’t want to burden him with my troubles, but I couldn’t see any way past it. If I wanted to call the cops, I would have to have him on board. “I found a corpse in the forest last night by accident,” I spluttered. He clearly hadn’t expected me to on him, but he was ready for it. He nodded. “Stella told me. It must’ve been quite a shock.” I plastered my sweaty hair over my forehead. I looked down at my feet. I really didn’t want to drag Stanley into this – considering I had no clue what this was…. But I had to do something. I looked up at him determinedly. “Though I’m sure I

shouldn’t share this detail, they suspect she was murdered by a serial killer,” I managed. He became pale with fear. “You serious?” I nodded. “I… saw something while I was at the police station. I think the killer chopped off the thumbnail on the left hand of the victim. And—” I pointed over at Cindy. I couldn’t speak anymore. It was as if I had just spluttered through my allocation of syllables for the week and now I would have to be as silent as a monk. Stanley got this really deep frown. It etched its way across his aged lips. He shuffled over to the coffin. Respectfully, he plucked up Cindy’s right hand. He had no problem with telling which hand I’d indicated – he was just thorough. He moved over to the left side and pulled up her left hand. Sure enough, the thumbnail had been chopped smoothly. He looked at me. I couldn’t tell what the look meant. I had no clue if he thought I was insane or not. He set the hand down. He took a deep breath. “You head into the break room, and I’ll call the police station. We’ve still got an hour or two until Cindy’s family gets here.” I nodded. Then I shook my head. I shoved a hand into my pocket. I was in the same clothes I’d worn yesterday. That detective – Timothy – had given me his card. I pulled it out. “I should probably be the one to call him. He’s gonna question why I know about the thumbnails. I don’t want you getting embroiled in this.” “But I’m the owner of the funeral home. It’s all right, kid—” I didn’t let him finish. I shoved my hand into my pocket and pulled out my phone. Trembling slightly, holding my lip between my teeth, I started dialing Timothy before Stanley could tell me not to. Despite the fact it was the weekend, Timothy answered promptly. I took a breath. “My name is Penelope. I’m the woman from last night—” “What is it?” he asked quickly, obviously sensing the fear in my voice.

I looked steadily at Stanley. “Look, I know it’s not my place, but when we were interrupted yesterday, I saw that lady walk in and point to her left thumbnail. And though I didn’t mention this last night, I saw that the left thumbnail on the corpse had been chopped off.” Timothy was silent for a few seconds. “Did you call to it that?” I shook my head. “This might be a coincidence,” I said in the kind of voice that suggested it very much was not a coincidence, “but I’m preparing a corpse today for burial. The left hand… the thumbnail’s been cut off cleanly. The other nails are all intact.” There was an even longer silence. Stanley was standing beside me, his whole body tense. I knew he only cared about doing the right thing. If Cindy really had been murdered, it wouldn’t bother him that he would have to delay the funeral – or even how distressed her parents would get. He had an enduring sense of justice. “Just wait there. I’m on my way.” With that, Timothy hung up. “What did he say?” Stanley asked quickly. “He’s coming,” I whispered. I shoved my phone back in my pocket. Slowly, I turned, and I stared over at Cindy. Just for a single moment, I thought I saw her shadow. I honestly didn’t know what precipitated my ability to see shadows moving, but this time, it wasn’t a full-on vision. I just saw a flicker around her mouth. It was almost as if she was smiling – thanking me for doing this. I rubbed my face and sighed hard. Stanley clapped a hand on my shoulder again. “You look really tired. You head into the break room, okay? I’ll come get you when this guy arrives. What’s his name?” “Timothy Waters.” A strange smile flickered across Stanley’s lips. I was in no mood to note subtle details, but I couldn’t ignore it. “What? Do you

know him?” “I knew his father,” Stanley said quickly. “Who was he?” Stanley ignored me. He walked out of the room. One of the other morticians was shifting past. He let them know what was happening and asked them to stall things. Then Stanley came back in the room and practically shoved me out of it. He shepherded me until I reached the break room. He even made me a cup of coffee and plopped it down in my hands. I sat there on the couch. I didn’t take a single sip. There was an open window to my side. It was letting streaming sunshine in. Though that was usually one of the nicest things about this room, and I would always curl up on the edge of the couch like a cat, now I stared at the sunshine warily. It wasn’t the light per se that was bothering me, but the long shadows it cast. With a shaking breath, I clutched my cup to my chest, drinking in the warmth. I thought Timothy would take a while. In the back of my head, where the rational Penelope lived, I appreciated Timothy would think I was mad. Or worse. Maybe he’d think I was the serial killer. I hadn’t appreciated that, but enough facts were starting to slip into place that he would become suspicious. I jammed my thumbnail into my mouth. I balked when I realized it was my left hand. Glancing down at it, all I could was what that serial killer had done. The way he’d dragged his fingers through his victims’ blood…. I shivered again. Just what kind of sick bastard would do that? Was it for the thrill? Or was it for something else? I don’t know why I added that last bit, but I couldn’t get away from the possibility. My shoulders hunched, and it felt like the weight of the world had descended onto them.

I had to wait barely another minute before a car quickly pulled up in the staff car park. The break room stared out onto it. As I shot to my feet, I saw Timothy jumping out. He smoothed down his tie. From this angle, I couldn’t see his face – just the rest of his body. My attention was drawn to his Jupiter finger. He had a tan mark on it as if he’d worn a ring there for most of his life but he wasn’t wearing it today for whatever reason. He quickly jumped up the steps and knocked on the back door. I heard Stanley’s vibrating voice. He’d been waiting for Timothy. I dumped my cup of coffee on the chipped linoleum table beside me and ran out. I got halfway down the corridor that intersected with Cindy’s mortuary room, and my gut froze. What if Timothy really did suspect me? Wasn’t there some old adage that murderers always went back to the scene of the crime? I mean, had I adequately explained how I’d found her body in the first place? A cold sweat started to slick across my brow. I teetered on the spot, wondering whether I should just head back to the break room and pretend I was too sick to answer any questions, but once more my curiosity won out. No – it was more than that. Out of the corner of my eye, I swore I saw a flicker. It was a shadow. Fortunately it didn’t burst into life and try to kill anyone, but it centered my attention like nothing else could. With a deep breath, I walked to the mortuary room. I stood there waiting as Stanley led Timothy my way. Timothy had a completely unreadable expression. When he saw me, it cracked a little, and he smiled slightly. “Is she in there?” “How do you know it’s a she?” I don’t know why I asked that. It was such a stupid thing to quiz a detective on. Presumably, Stanley had already shared Cindy’s life details. But the question still slipped out. “Because the serial killer we’re dealing with only ever murders women,” he answered blankly. I felt cold all over at that. I’d made a set of assumptions that there was a serial killer out there. Now they’d

just been confirmed. I stood there awkwardly, not knowing what to do, getting colder by the second until Stanley cleared his throat. Finally I opened the door. I walked in. I stayed as far away from Cindy’s coffin as I could. I simply couldn’t afford to have a vision right now. Timothy did not wait. He walked over and peered down at Cindy. “Do you have any gloves?” Stanley walked over to the dispensary, grabbed a pair, and handed them over. Timothy pulled them on with practiced ease. Then he carefully pulled up Cindy’s left hand. I watched her, not him as he stared at the cut nail. I don’t know why. She was dead. But as my gut kicked, it told me she could give me so much more information than he could. I didn’t know how it was with other homicide detectives, but Timothy certainly had a way with the dead. The way he moved was respectful yet efficient. It was clear that Cindy wasn’t just some corpse to him. He got close to her thumbnail. He ran his hand over it. Even as a frown parted his lips – one that would’ve told anyone that his suspicions were kindling – I continued to stare at Cindy. I simply could not afford to be pulled into a reverie right now, but I also couldn’t yank my gaze away. As Timothy moved into the light, a shadow ed across her face. Her expression changed. I couldn’t tell what it changed to, though, because Stanley suddenly got in the way of the sunshine. I almost went to ask him to move, but I controlled myself. No, no, no – this wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be. I wasn’t seeing ghosts, and all of this… it’d been some kind of coincidence and the result of a mind that had been destroyed over years of sleep deprivation. I rubbed my face. Timothy pulled out his phone. He messaged someone. Then he put the phone

back in his pocket. He looked over at Stanley. “You’re going to have to delay the funeral.” “I see,” Stanley said. He’d obviously been prepared for that news. Unlike with me, he’d been watching Timothy like a hawk, and from the moment the detective had walked in the room, Stanley had become paler. Stanley wasted no time in walking out of the room and making several quick discreet phone calls. Meanwhile, Timothy continued to look at Cindy. He gently picked up her head and stared at the back of her skull. “You did an unfortunately good job,” he said. I wasn’t following the conversation. “Sorry?” My voice kicked up. My fear told me this was the prelude to him dragging me into the police station and charging me for Cindy’s murder. He looked over at me. He took a moment, then his lips flattened into a subdued smile. “I take it you’re the one who did her makeup?” I nodded. “You did an unfortunately good job on her wound. It doesn’t really matter too much. There will be photos from the coroner’s office. Still, we’ll probably have to question you again.” I slowly nodded. Then I shook my head. My breath became trapped in my throat. “So… are you… telling me….” “Cindy was killed by a serial killer?” He shrugged. “I don’t know, but that sure is a neat cut.” He let his fingers slide down the jagged section of her missing nail. My gut clenched even tighter. Stanley walked back into the room. “What exactly do you want me to tell the family?” “Nothing. Hand me the details, and the police will talk to them directly.”

Stanley quickly searched through his phone. He shoved a hand into his pocket and pulled out one of Timothy’s cards. Obviously Timothy had already handed him one. I watched as Timothy’s phone pinged. He went to call the family right then and there. I started to shuffle out of the room, wanting to give him some privacy, but he pulled his mouth away from the receiver. “Stay here for a second. I’ve got some questions for you.” The phone was still ringing. Stanley stood dutifully beside me. Once more Timothy pulled his mouth away from the receiver. “I know this is a bit of an ask, but can you get me a coffee?” “Of course,” Stanley said in his always friendly tone. He shuffled off quickly. I would be more comfortable if he’d stayed in the room. My paranoia was telling me that this was a prelude to Timothy pointing his gun at me and telling me I was the serial killer. I waited for Cindy’s family to answer, but they didn’t. My gaze darted over to Cindy once more. I couldn’t see her shadow anymore. The sun had moved. Anyway, Timothy was obscuring it with his broad body. He tried to call the family again, but when it didn’t work, he wound up calling the station and handing over the details. “Make sure you get through to them quickly – even if you have to drop by their house. It’s unlikely they’re gonna get their daughter back for several days now.” Without a goodbye, he hung up. He turned to me. “I got your manager out of the room to have a frank conversation with you.” My gut pounded so hard, it felt like it was a drum. I locked my sweaty hands behind my back. “Am I in some kind of—” He lifted a broad hand. “Before you say the word trouble, it’s all right. You’re not. That being said, you’ve clearly got sharp observational skills. I thought Mandy was discreet last night.”

I frowned. “Mandy?” “Our on-site pathologist. She’s the woman who came and pointed to her thumbnail. How did you figure out from that that we’ve got a serial killer on our hands?” He didn’t cross his arms, even though something told me he wanted to. This was it. He was finally suspicious of me. And to be fair to him, it was completely justified. My actions had been weird. Though all I wanted to do was close my eyes and sigh, I stopped myself. I controlled my actions so I wouldn’t come across as any more of a criminal. “Like I said,” I looked at my feet, “I spent a long time just… frozen, staring at the corpse last night.” I went to loosen my collar, but I thought better of it. I clenched my hands behind my back. I didn’t want him to see how white and sweaty my knuckles were. They glistened like metal. “You didn’t mention last night that you saw her thumbnail,” he pointed out in a voice that gave nothing away. “I didn’t think it was a detail worth mentioning,” I said that as quietly as I could. In my head, quiet meant he wouldn’t be able to pick up the lie shaking through my tone. I knew full well that thumbnail was important. Or did I? I had received the information from a unique vision – one I kept questioning as my sanity started to slip further and further out of my reach. I couldn’t take it anymore, and I locked my sweaty hand over the back of my head. I turned my fingernails in. “You’re right, though,” I said quietly. “About what?” You could’ve strapped this guy up to a lie detector, and he could’ve claimed the world was flat with a completely straight face. “I do have good observational skills,” I muttered. “Especially around corpses.” I looked up to see that his face stiffened slightly. I opened my hands in a placating position. “It’s because I’ve worked with them my entire life,” I explained quickly. “The first thing you do when you see a new corpse that’s been brought in is check every detail you’re going to have to neaten up. Hands usually take a lot of time. Especially if they’ve been damaged.

They’re finicky. You need a lot of makeup and putty.” He didn’t nod or appear in any way satisfied by my explanation. So I let my gaze drop down to my feet again. I shrugged. “Like I said, last night I didn’t think the nail was an important detail. Until Mandy walked into the room and pointed to her left nail, that was. By that time, there was no point in telling you, because you already knew.” He nodded. His demeanor changed. Gone was the stiff, emotionless inquisitor. Back was the kind man I’d met last night. “Makes sense. I’m going to have to thank you again, I guess.” “Sorry?” My nose scrunched up. He gestured to Cindy. “She would have slipped through if it weren’t for you.” My cheeks twitched. “Are you… you telling me she was killed by that serial killer?” I asked again. He shrugged. He looked back at her. For some reason I got absorbed by the way his gaze darted over her features. As weird as it sounded, I almost wanted to see things from his point of view. What exactly was he staring at with that piercing brown gaze? What did he see that I couldn’t? It took me a second to catch myself. What could he see that I couldn’t? Surely the most relevant fact here was what I could see that no one else could. “You look kinda pale, Penelope. Stanley mentioned you were sick. You should head home.” I opened my mouth to tell him I was fine, but something made me nod. “If that’s okay?” He crossed his arms and leaned against the metal table. “Of course it is. I’ll be in if I need anything. You’ll have to give a full statement later, but it can wait.” He turned and started to consider Cindy again. I walked out of the room. The whole while, I kept staring at her, kept trying to

catch one last glimpse of her shadow. But this time she remained deathly still. Her secrets, it seemed, had been spilled. But they say every corpse has a story to tell, and as my gut kicked once more, I got the distinct impression hers wasn’t done unraveling yet.

5

I made it to my hatch. For a good long while, I just sat in it. My fingers were locked around the steering wheel. My other hand had grabbed the key in the ignition. I waited to turn the car on, but I just couldn’t. My mind was elsewhere. It was back with Cindy. It was back with that other corpse. And it was back with that man. “Why… why the hell would anyone taste the blood of their victim?” I whispered. There was no one to answer me. Hell, I shouldn’t even be vocalizing this question out loud, because it made room for something I wasn’t quite willing to accept yet. I crumpled forward, pressed my palm over my eyes, and rubbed as hard as I could until I saw stars. I didn’t want to be mad. As I’d said earlier, I simply couldn’t afford it. But at the same time, could I afford to ignore my visions? “They’re not visions, Penelope,” I snarled. Scarcely were the words out of my mouth when I heard the caw of a crow. I was so programmed to pick it up that I jolted back. My eyes instantly scanned the sky as I tried to see it, but I couldn’t detect it. I was out of the car before I knew what I was doing. I tilted my head all the way back, following the sound until finally I glimpsed the crow itself. It was flying across the road over toward the cemetery. And that… that would be when I saw that car. The fancy one with the omega number plate. My stomach had already gone on a tour of turgid emotion today, but right now my gut kicked so badly, it could’ve blasted right out of my torso. I had to flatten

a hand on it as my heartbeat quickened and thrummed in my throat. It was one heck of a reaction to have, all at the sight of one man’s car, but it wasn’t the vehicle that made my breath freeze. It was the memory of last night. Long before I knew what I was doing, almost as if I was in a daze, I left my car door open as I walked across the road. I wasn’t paying attention. Another truck could’ve come barreling down on me, and I wouldn’t have noticed or cared enough to get out of its way. Fortunately the road was quiet. I made it up to the little hill that led to the front of the cemetery. There were a few car parks. Today was a Saturday. It was a popular day for funerals and families to come and visit the deceased. For whatever reason, the only car around was that black one. I had no clue why I was walking over to it. I had even less of a clue of what I would do when I got there. Just place my hands on it? Stare in to see if I could catch a glimpse of that man? Or just linger like an idiot? I already had a long list of things for people to be suspicious of. Did I really need to continue to add to it? But I wasn’t thinking straight. Nor could I stop. It felt like somebody had shoved a hook around my throat. It had grabbed hold of all of my muscles. I would never be able to break free from its complete embrace. I was aware of the crunch of my shoes as I continued forward. I felt my hair fluttering in a persistent wind. If I’d paid attention to it, I would’ve realized it was circling around me and little else. The leaves of the massive old oaks that lined the car park were barely rustling. Yet my hair continued to whip over my shoulders as if I was trapped in my own personal storm. I finally reached the car. My stomach had gone on a complete tour of fear by the time I got there. But it wasn’t the kind of fear that could stop me in my tracks. Nor was it the kind of fear that could send me insane. It was simply beckoning me on, grabbing me by the wrist and leading me forward without ever giving me a chance to turn away. I stared at the car. I didn’t know what I expected to see. It was just as fancy as I had previously ascertained. It was, however, not from any known carmaker – at least not to me. It didn’t have a badge, and nor did it have a particularly distinct body type.

I don’t know how long I just stood there staring at it. If anyone had been looking at me, they would’ve had a justified reason to call the police. I was either out of my mind or giving judicious consideration to grand theft auto. It took another caw of a crow to break me out of my reverie. This one was close – close enough that it was just by my left ear. I jerked my head to the side to see that it was sitting in a tree next to the parked car. Crows are bolshie birds. They only ever get off the road when cars are almost on top of them. They have little to be scared of. But this one was right up close beside me. It was certainly near enough to touch. It tilted its head to the side and locked its beady eyes on me. There was something endless about its gaze. It opened its beak, then took flight. I thought it stared over its shoulder at me as it flew further into the cemetery. I kicked off. I went to follow it. I was not some small child nor a puppy. I didn’t follow anything that moved. But I could not stop myself. That same force that had reached inside me and compelled me to walk up to this car was now more powerful than ever. I made it to the cemetery gates. I almost walked through without thinking, but I stopped myself. Despite the fact the graveyard was across the street and I was in the business of the dead, I had never stepped foot inside the cemetery. I’m sure you wouldn’t believe that, but it was true. I didn’t just reject it in my reveries – I rejected it physically. There was something about the cemetery – something about walking past the threshold of the gates – that always got to me. The few times I had been up here before I’d chickened out and left, the cemetery had always evoked one of my strongest reveries – that empty castle made of bone. The one that seemed to be waiting for me – the one that had waited for me my entire life. Back when I’d been a kid and my reveries had made me terrified, I’d always assumed that castle was my grave. It was beckoning me because I was destined to have a short life. Now those same fears rose. The crow turned around when it realized I wasn’t following. No, sorry, I was

imputing intelligence on the crow – or at least some purpose in this interaction. There was none. It was just a curious bird going about its day. I, on the other hand, was an idiot human thinking it was a sign when it wasn’t. It flew right back around and landed on the open gate. It was this massive wrought-iron affair. It looked like it belonged out the front of some castle. Back in the old days, it’d taken three men to move a single side of the gate. Now it had tracks it could be dragged across. As the crow sat on the top of the rusted metal, staring down at me, it continued to tilt its head this way and that. It would give anyone the impression it was staring right at them. I turned. I needed to get the hell back in my car and leave. What if Timothy walked out to see that my car door was open? What if right now he was staring at me through the window above the sink? I didn’t need a genius to answer that question. It would further cement his suspicions of me. And that would only get me into more trouble. If I couldn’t afford to get sick, I sure as heck couldn’t afford to get into trouble. Stanley and everyone at the funeral home were great, but I really doubted they’d stick by me all the way. If there was even a reasonable suspicion that I was behind a murder, they would leave me, like everyone else had in my life. I forced myself to walk away. It was weirdly one of the hardest things to do in my life and yet one of the easiest. The real Penelope – the one who’d been putting up with her reveries – knew that this was the right thing to do. That dreamlike Penelope that had taken control over the past few days screamed at me to stop. To turn around. To walk into the cemetery. For whatever reason, she thought there was something in there I needed to see. What, more dead bodies? Gravestones? Mourners? I’d seen it all before. I saw them every day. There was nothing in there that could hold my attention, and nothing that should. I crammed my hands resolutely into my pockets and made it back to my car. I drove away. I would be back. Because whether I liked it or not, my future lay through those gates. The longer I took to walk through them, the less of a future I would have.

6

I spent the whole day at home. I didn’t do anything useful. I sat at my table or on my couch. I stared at the open window. Occasionally I would walk over, close the blinds, and just gaze at the shadows, willing them to move. They didn’t. I pushed up. It was already past dusk. I had done precisely nothing today. Sorry, nothing but alert the police about a potential serial killer’s victim. Ever since returning home, however, I had simply… existed. “Which is kind of what you’ve done your entire life,” I onished myself as I crammed my thumbnail further into my mouth. I began to stalk back and forth in front of the couch. It was a well-worn path. If you looked at the carpet, you’d note that the pile was a fair bit shorter underneath this section. I turned again, my plush socks slipping further down my ankles. I gazed over at the open curtains. The shadows were almost complete now. I hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights. I was waiting for something to happen. But guess what? Nothing was. “Because nothing is going to happen,” I said in a forceful voice that reverberated around the room. “Because you’re going mad.” I slapped my cheeks as if I was trying to wake myself up. That was pretty ironic considering I didn’t sleep. I continued to stalk back and forth in front of my couch. Every time I turned around and faced the window, I gazed at the shadows, just waiting for them to do something, anything. But they didn’t. I opened my mouth to onish myself once more – to point out that they weren’t going to do anything because they were nothing more than shadows – but I stopped. I stared at my hands suddenly. Closing my eyes, I ed that both times I’d seen moving shadows, it had been after touching a corpse. That thought sent a nasty shiver pushing into my shoulders and racing down my back. It was tight and edgy. It was the kind of move that could have knocked me to my knees if I hadn’t been standing properly. I continued to gaze at my fingers. I brought them right up. There was barely any

light in here now. I lived in a crappy two-bedroom house on the outskirts of town. The rent was enormous, despite the fact this thing was literally falling down around my ears. I looked after what I could – the rest continued to rot around me, just like the corpses I dealt with every day. Even now as I took a step over to the old, chipped window, the floorboards under my feet groaned as if I was asking them to accept the weight of the world. I reached the window. I placed a hand on the warped, calcium-stained glass. I peered through the murky marks. I didn’t know what I was looking for. A corpse? A handy dead person I could go out and touch to see if I could replay their death just to prove that I wasn’t insane? “Give it up,” I snapped at myself through bared teeth as I bashed the base of my palm against the window. The old thing rattled. I went to do it again, but I really couldn’t afford a broken window. Not only did I not have enough money to pay for one, but this wasn’t the best neighborhood. Broken windows were just invitations to break more of your windows. I turned again. I got halfway through pacing in front of the couch before I stopped. I thought I heard the call of a crow. I froze as if someone had pushed a gun against the back of my neck. My breathing became harsh – real quick as if I was trying to puncture my own lungs. I won’t even bother to tell you what happened to my heartbeat. Because I wasn’t even sure it was beating anymore so much as getting ready to explode. Cautiously, moving slower than I ever had before, I turned. That’s when I heard a light peck, peck, peck. A glistening black crow had just landed on the windowsill. If I didn’t know any better, it was the exact crow from this morning. But that… would be impossible. I stood there in startled silence as I watched it lean in. It twisted its head from side-to-side as it locked those beady black eyes on me. When it saw me, it reared back and tapped the window three times. I shivered. Suddenly, I turned, intent on throwing myself into my bedroom, drawing the curtains, and hiding under the frigging bed. I got one step toward the door when I froze. Something within me… something within me stopped me. It was the same thing that had forced me to get out of the car last night. It was the

same thing that had forced me to call the cops when I realized Cindy had been a victim not an accident. I turned. I stared at the crow. Long before I knew what I was doing, I reached the window. I opened it. The last thing I wanted was a mad crow flying through my house. Maybe this guy had been hit by a car or had received a knock on the head. For all I knew, he’d chase me around my lounge room and crap on all my furniture. But I still opened that window. And I still stood there and stared at him. He continued to tilt his head this way and that. Though crows could not smile, I swear as it opened its beak ever so slightly it smiled, nonetheless. Then it suddenly took flight. It happened so quickly that I jolted toward it, my hand half open as if I didn’t want it to leave. I reached the open windowsill, clamped my fingers on the chipped wood, and leaned out. Though it was a strain on my eyes, I just managed to glimpse it. It was flying east. Before I could question where it was heading, it stopped. It found a tree. It landed. It turned its head over its shoulder, and it cawed at me. … It was telling me to follow, wasn’t it? I turned. I went to leave the house but quickly closed the window and locked it. I grabbed my jacket and a scarf. Hooking my bag over my shoulder, I locked up. Then I stood there at the edge of my broken garden path. My gate was just in front of me. It was hanging off its hinges. I doubted it had worked, even when it had been installed. The guy who owned this place wasn’t interested in giving someone adequate shelter – just squeezing every single last cent out of the house and me until we crumbled. … Hold on. What the hell was I doing? Was I about to follow a crow? The crow called again. There was something lonely about the shout – but there was also something insistent. “This isn’t Lassie,” I chided myself under a shaking breath. “The crow isn’t going to lead you to someone who needs your help.”

Scarcely were those words out of my mouth did my heart sink. All I could do was think of Cindy and that other victim. What… what if there were more out there? More corpses that hadn’t been found yet? More bodies this violent serial killer had dumped to rot? I squeezed my eyes closed. I rubbed them hard. I saw stars, but as they darted quickly over my vision, they didn’t stop me from taking a step. I made it outside of my gate. And that was it. As soon as my feet reached the cracked and warped pavement beyond, I’d made my mind up. I had no clue what was happening to me – none at all. But I wouldn’t find out by sitting on the couch. Hooking my bag higher over my shoulder, I reached the crow. This was it. If it just sat there looking at me, I would conclude that it was mad and I was even madder, and I would turn around and go right back home. But it didn’t. Its beak opened ever so slightly again, convincing me it was smiling once more, and it flew off. “Here we go,” I muttered under my breath as my back chilled with darting nerves. The crow flew in short bursts. I was just a human, and there was no way I would be able to keep up with it. It would fly to one tree and stop. I would follow. I lived right on the outskirts of town. I was far further out than the cemetery was. Out here, there were real forests. They didn’t back up on my house, but it was just a short walk to reach them. As the crow flew right to the edge of the woods, I stopped. I was willing to follow it. But not into there. This particular forest had always scared the crap out of me. I clamped my lips together, and I shook my head hard. “Sorry. There’s no way,” I whispered. I went to turn. That would be when the crow landed on my actual shoulder. I was startled enough to jolt, but I didn’t scream. Slowly turning my head, I stared into its eyes. My fear told me this was a prelude to it picking those very eyes out, but it did nothing of the sort. It

continued to look at me. Then it nudged its head forward as if it was telling me to do the same. I just stared at it, my jaw slack, my mouth half open. “I cannot be talking with a crow. Nor can I be following it. None of this can be happening,” I said weakly. The crow gave that slight smile again. It had this knowing edge to it. It took flight. It flew to a tree and stopped. “You’re going to get yourself killed. Do you hear that?” I muttered to myself. “You are going to get yourself frigging killed,” I snarled. But I didn’t stop. I continued to follow the crow. I lost track of time. It became irrelevant. Only my methodical footsteps mattered. While this forest had always scared me, now I couldn’t help but note all the interesting details as I trundled through it. It had a strange collection of old trees. As far as I was aware, this forest had only been planted in the fifties. But you tell that to the massive old oaks and knotted elms and pines. Spruces hung from low gullies, all coiled and twisted like bonsais. There were nooks and crannies in the trunks of almost every tree. I could hear owls hooting softly from within. I turned over my shoulder and tried to convince myself that I knew the path back, but that’s when I realized something very frigging important. I hadn’t even brought a torch. Yeah, I had my phone, but it was in my bag. For the last however long, I’d been walking without any light. As I realized that, I froze. I rubbed my eyes. I opened them again, and it was almost as if I suddenly appreciated I couldn’t see properly. “What the hell?” I whispered. The crow cawed. It was obviously irritated that I wasn’t keeping up anymore. It landed in a nearby tree and twitched its head to the left, clearly telling me to follow. I scrabbled in my bag desperately. What if I left my phone at home? It quickly ceased to be a what-if. As I clutched through my bag, I couldn’t feel it. Terrified, I dumped the contents of my bag onto the ground. They spread around

in the leaf litter and twigs. I searched through the mound, but the phone wasn’t there. What the hell kind of suicidal idiot was I? The crow called again. It jumped from left to right on its branch, obviously getting more and more insistent as it begged me to follow. I ignored it. I reared back onto my haunches. I flopped a hand onto my face. I pressed in hard, grinding the fingers against my eyes until I didn’t just see stars, but it felt as if I would push my eyeballs back through my skull. A few tears started to touch my cheeks. I tried to push them away, but they just marched down relentlessly. “This is it. This is all the evidence you need. You’ve gone mad.” The crow called. It flew up and landed right beside me again. It nudged my hand with its beak. Crows were not social birds. They weren’t pets, for the love of God. This guy nudged my hand as gently as a cat asking for a pat. It briefly stilled my tears. I stared at it. When it realized it had my attention, it tilted its head to the side once more. It clearly wanted me to follow it through the copse of trees just to our left. If I was mad, I might as well keep going, right? What did I have to lose? It was dark, I couldn’t see, and I would have absolutely no way of getting back the way I’d come without breaking my neck. So why not break my neck on the path forward instead? I knew this reasoning was faulty. But I couldn’t stop myself from cramming everything back into my bag. If I’d been paying attention, I would’ve realized that I could see my bag with ease. But that was not a fact I was willing to accept yet. I pushed to my feet. The crow gave out a happy caw than flew forward.

I followed it. I was in more of a daze than I had been before. I was starting to give in to the fact that something was happening to me. If I couldn’t stop it, there was no point in fighting it. It would just make me even more tired than I already was. I was keenly aware of the time. I knew I should be in bed, tossing and turning, trying to sleep even though there was little point. My life up till now had told me that I wasn’t the kind who was meant to rest easily. Every single night was torture. I was just happy I didn’t dream. If I did, God knows what horrendous nightmares my sleep-deprived brain would spit out at me. We continued through the forest until time became irrelevant. It was just when I wondered if I’d died and this was some kind of strange purgatory that we came across something. It was inexplicable. It was not something that belonged in this dense forest. It was a church. As I came into a clearing and spied it, I froze. I had this strong, strange visceral reaction. It was like an explosion going off in my torso. It rose through my chest. It reached my throat and kept going. It blasted up my mouth until it came across my lips. They parted, and I let out a gasp. I took a step forward. The church looked as if it had just been freshly built. It was made out of sandstone. There was a flame torch in an old lamp post just outside of it. I could see flickering candles within. I took another step toward it, then another. I didn’t need the crow to lead me forward anymore. Nothing would’ve been able to hold me back. That same compulsion that had seen me walk toward that omega car had gripped me once more. Nothing – and I mean nothing – would be able to stop me. I finally made it under that flickering flame torch. I stared up to watch moths encircling it, faster and faster. It was as if they knew their lives were about to be extinguished and they wanted to spend the last minutes of their existence doing what made them feel the most alive. I tugged my head down. My short hair rustled in a small but quick wind that chased around me. If I’d been paying attention, I would’ve realized that once more it affected me but nothing else. The rest of this eerie forest stood completely still. If I’d been paying attention, I would’ve also realized that the crow was now

nowhere to be seen. It had landed on a branch just before the clearing. It was watching me but coming no closer. “What… how the hell is this place here?” I whispered. I thought I could hear people within. I didn’t know what they were doing – talking or praying or singing or chanting. It didn’t matter. It was voices. I became keenly aware that I’d become lost in the forest and I needed their help. I raced up the worn sandstone steps to the door. I grabbed up the great big brass knocker, and I brought it down three times. The voices within stopped. The door creaked open. And that’s when the church… it aged on fast forward. The brand-new sandstone steps beneath me changed with it. The paint on the door pulled itself off as if invisible nails had just dragged themselves down it. The door knocker itself came off in my hand. I screamed and jerked back. I landed flat on my ass. It was in time to note that the entire church was changing before my eyes. I watched as ivy grew up the side only to die and leave this brown stain over the sandstone. The sandstone itself quickly went from gorgeous golden pale brown to dingy gray. Slate fell off the roof. It smashed into the cobbles beside me. But it didn’t stay there. It quickly crumbled into dust. I was now shaking so hard, I couldn’t breathe. I grabbed my throat. I tried to pry my lips open. Finally I managed to whisper a word. “What… what’s happening?” My breath came back, and hot on its heels my heart beat as fast as a pounding drum. I scuttled back from the church. I pushed up. I got ready to run. But then I became keenly aware of how dark the rest of the forest was. Though I had managed to make my way here without any light, now I couldn’t see past the illumination of this crumbled down church. For as I flicked my head up and stared at that lamppost, I saw that it was the one thing that hadn’t aged or disappeared. I’d locked my hand over my mouth again. I tried to breathe through my fear, but I couldn’t. It remained as this hot vibrating lump in my chest – feeling like coal I’d swallowed to burn my intestines.

I clenched my hands into fists. I turned on the spot. I stared back at the church, simply because it was the only thing I could see. I didn’t know what to do. I had just seen a church age on fast forward. I…. I thought I heard the crow caw. It was enough that it cut through my fear. It was still out there, then? It hadn’t left me? But it had led me here. Still shaking, I turned. I faced the church. The door was only partially open. I would need to shove it before I could see what was inside. And that would require me getting closer. I shook there, for several more minutes until I made my mind up. That same curiosity kindled within my heart. I couldn’t say that it was a compulsion that saw me walk up those worn, chipped steps. Something external to me wasn’t forcing me to do this. But something within me couldn’t stop me. It was the same thing that had been questioning what I was my entire life. It was the same force that had been trying to wake me up by sending me into my reveries. It was that same power that was trapped, trapped in that castle made of skulls and bones. Trapped there waiting for me to finally accept what I really was. I reached the door. With a shaking hand, I pushed it open. It creaked – creaked so badly it sounded as if every single bone in reality had been gathered together and ground to dust. As soon as I took a step in, this wind came from nowhere. It caught my hair and sent it arcing up over my shoulders. It flapped against my face, whipped my forehead, and framed my startled gaze as I stared at the church. It had an old stained-glass window at the back. It looked brand-new while the rest of the church seemed to be hundreds of years old. There were holes in the rafters. There were broken slate tiles everywhere. There were cracks in the floor.

Puddles covered everything. The forest had encroached long ago despite the fact that outside, this church was in a clearing. Inside, there were tree roots everywhere. They’d pushed up the stone floor long ago. A few of them had even shunted in through holes in the walls. Ivy climbed pews. I only guessed they were pews. They were barely recognizable. The wood had rotted through. Still shaking, but incapable of holding back my curiosity, I walked in. I was keenly aware of every noise I made, from the soft patter of my footfall, to my even softer breath. I no longer questioned what was going on. I walked all the way over to that stained-glass window. I stared up at it. Usually in churches like this stained-glass windows were either plain colored glass, or they depicted something from the Bible. This one… it depicted Death. It looked like the character from one of those old Tarot packs – its skull peeking out of a long robe with bony fingers holding a scythe. The skull was twisted toward me, its empty eyes locked on me. I stared up at it. My hands suddenly became itchy. I had crammed them into my pockets for warmth, but now I pulled them out. I stared at my fingers. I… almost thought I saw something tracing along the skin. Terrified, I tried to scratch at it, to pry it back, but whatever it was, it was inside me not on me. No matter how much I shook my hands, it would not be dislodged. Soon enough, I let my fingers drop. My gaze was drawn back to that stainedglass window once more. I locked my eyes on the hollow stare of Death. Though I had worked with death my entire life, I’d been scared of it. As I’d already said, when I’d been a kid, I’d been sure that my life would be short. Now I wondered if this was it. Maybe I’d hit my head on the walk over here. Perhaps I’d died in a ditch and this was the afterlife. “What… is happening?” I whispered.

At first no one answered. But then I realized that there was an answer, but it wasn’t coming in words. The wind had picked up once more. It rushed in through the holes in the ceiling and the walls. It scattered around me. This time I became aware that it only affected me and nothing else. There were enough loose stones and old leaf litter in here that if a real gale had charged its way in, the entire place would be blown amuck. But everything else remained still while I did not. My hair was lifted up as my clothes fluttered around me. I almost thought I’d be pulled off my feet. I stared at my hands again. This time I swore I saw something under the skin. It wasn’t some terrifying creature or an insect that had managed to wriggle under my flesh. It was… energy. It was this startling black and blue. It was quick, but every time I saw it, I knew my eyes could not be mistaken. This is where the old Penelope would’ve screamed and ran. I’d tried that my whole life, and it had gotten me nowhere. So I just stood there, my mouth open, my jaw slack, my whole body absorbed by the sight. “What happened to me?” I stammered. No matter what I said or what I did, the light continued to pick up within me. As it glowed more brightly, I thought I could see symbols traveling under the surface of my skin. They moved quickly, like minnows in the depths. No matter how hard I stared, nor no matter how hard I scraped with my fingernails, I could not capture them. Outside, I was aware the wind was picking up. It wasn’t just affecting me now. Though it did send my hair scattering and tumbling around my shoulders like a cape, the whole church began to shake. It moaned as if it was about to fall down. “What the hell is happening to me?” I begged again. I couldn’t take it anymore, and I fell down to my knees. As soon as I shifted, the whole church shook as if my mere move had been like a wrecking ball. The rafters above me groaned. It was enough that I was forced to jerk my head back and stare at them with wideopen eyes. I waited for the whole church to fall down around my ears, but it didn’t. It continued to creak. Its tone had changed. It no longer sounded like mere wood and stone. It was almost… it was almost as if I could hear bones. I thought I felt something alight on my shoulder. I jerked my head to the side, the

move so quick, I could’ve snapped my neck. There was nothing behind me. But I still felt something on my skin. Yanking a hand up, I ran it down the base of my neck. But there was nothing there. What if I was having a full-blown psychotic episode? That was the only rational way to explain this. But there was an irrational way. As I stared down at my hands, I saw actual magic picking up across them. There was no other way to describe it. I could call it just light or some strange bioluminescence I didn’t understand the origin of – but magic fit better. The more I rocked back on my knees, gazing at it, the brighter it became, and the more violent the wind became, too. It was now tearing its way around and through the church. It was so strong, I was sure it would knock both the church and me flat. But somehow we both managed to keep standing – or kneeling at least. As the magic continued to gather within me, I stared up at the stained-glass window. My eyes fixated on that image of Death. With his head turned toward me, I thought I could see something building in his hollow gaze. Though the stained-glass piece was good, it wasn’t that detailed. It was still made of nothing more than colored panes. But I still thought I could see energy building up behind those hollows. It stilled me. “I’m… I’m dead, aren’t I?” I whispered. “Not yet,” the wind said. I wasn’t making that up. The wind actually spoke. As it rushed past me, gathering everything in this church that wasn’t tied down, I distinctly heard it speak right by my ear. I freaked out. Screaming, I bolted to my feet. I shot toward the open door. Something told me that the second I ran out of this church would be the second everything would stop. It would go back to normal… or at least the version of normal I’d been living my entire life.

Despite the fact the wind was charging in, the door wasn’t smashing back and forth. It was still open only a fraction. Terrified, I grabbed it. But as soon as I went to push through, I stopped. I turned my head and stared back at the stainedglass window. Hadn’t I been searching for answers my whole life? Yes and no. I mostly buried my reveries. I’d kept them hidden where no one could see. I’d never spoken about them. And whenever I’d thought about them too much, I’d pushed those thoughts away. But within, deep down inside me, I’d still searched. I’d still questioned every single day whenever I’d woken up from a fitful, restless sleep what I was and why I was here. What if the only way to find out those answers was in this church? The wind continued to moan as it shot past my ear. It rustled my hair. I wanted to say it was violent, but it wasn’t. It was almost gentle. I found myself dropping my hand. It fell loosely beside me as I turned. I suddenly shook my head, my better reason momentarily getting hold of me. “No. No way. Don’t do this,” I hissed to myself. “Just leave the church. Maybe when you do, you’ll wake up in your bed. Just turn around and leave,” I begged. I squeezed my eyes closed. It did nothing. It didn’t stop the magic racing around my hands. Nor did it suddenly remove the church and transport me to my bed. Everything remained. I turned again. I looked once at the door. Then I backed off from it. I didn’t fall over any of the broken, rotted pews. My feet didn’t snag the stones that littered the cracked floor. I stood tall until I reached the middle of the church. I turned back to the stained-glass window. I stared at it. “Death,” I muttered. I don’t really know why I said that word – possibly because I was staring at a picture of him. The point was, the word bubbled up, and it felt right. As soon as it escaped my lips, something happened. I jerked my head down to see something building in my shadow. The magic from my hands was racing into it. I screamed and jerked back, but the process had already begun. Falling flat on my ass, I stared as my shadow elongated. As my heart trembled,

beating at a million miles an hour, I wondered if the same thing was going to happen to me that had happened to Cindy and that corpse. Perhaps I would see my own murder in my shadow. Maybe it would be a premonition of what was to come, or maybe that very same shadow would rear up and be the one to strangle me. That’s not what happened. I saw… crows. That wasn’t to say that my shadow intermingled with that of several crows’ shadows. It was to say that they literally pulled themselves out of the darkness I cast. At first they were nothing but wisps of black smoke – then it was almost as if someone was inking them into reality. They had this wet, glossy look until finally they morphed into the solid birds I was so used to. They floated up through a hole in the ceiling. “What?” I had a chance to stammer. I felt my eyes rolling into the back of my head. This black circle began to appear underneath me. As I jerked my face over to the stained-glass window, I saw that Death wasn’t there anymore. Instead… instead it depicted me holding a scythe. I went to scream. Something began to lift me up off my feet. My eyes were still rolling into the back of my head. But I never got the chance to complete the move. I heard the call of a crow from outside. This time it wasn’t attempting to get my attention. This time it was desperate. I don’t know why, but that snagged hold of my fear and made it explode in my chest. I’d heard plenty of bird calls my whole life, but this one was different. Its insistence appeared to be perfectly programmed to capture my attention and shake it. I suddenly heard something rushing toward the church. I was halfway up in the air now. I was floating, my hair spread around me. It tumbled up and down. My clothes whipped around my hips. This spell, whatever it was, wasn’t affecting anything else. Just me. None of the leaves or sticks or twigs were sailing around me. Something reached the church. That crow let out one more desperate cry, and the door was blown off its hinges. It exploded inward. I screamed. I jerked my arm up to protect my face, but the wood splinters couldn’t reach me. They tried, but as soon as they neared the magical spell keeping me aloft, they were picked up

by it, their momentum cut. I heard a creak. This was no twig being stepped on. Nor was this a tree moaning in the high wind outside. This was a footstep. It was one like no other. “I’ve finally found you, daughter of Death. And it is time to your father in his forever-grave. You will never get a chance to learn of your power. Because I will not let you.”

7

I could hear, but I could not understand. As that man spoke, his words simply shot right past me like bullets. I was still suspended in the air. As my hair fluttered around me and a few of the splinters from the door circled my face, I peered into the dark doorway. I could see a large shadowy figure. He took a step forward. For some reason, though I hadn’t really noticed it before, there was a little light in this room. It was hard to say where it was coming from. Mostly it was streaming in through the stained-glass window, but that didn’t make any sense. It would only have access to the light outside, and I knew from experience tonight was a deadly dark one. Still, there was light in the room, but that didn’t seem to count as the guy took another step in. Nothing could light him up. It was as if his body attracted shadows like one pole of a magnet to another. “Who… who are you? What is this place? What’s happening?” As soon as I started questioning, I couldn’t stop. They blasted out of me, falling from my lips, shaking from my damn chest as if I was losing a part of myself with every word. The man took another step. It was generous to call him a man, really. He was completely encased in shadow now. He had a form, but I could never catch a glimpse of it long enough to recognize a single feature. I wasn’t even sure if he was broad-shouldered or small. He was just there. I was, however, certain of when he tilted his head back to stare at me. He had no mouth, but something told me that underneath all of those shadows he was smiling, nonetheless. He reached a hand up to me. More shadows swarmed across it. There were so many, it looked like darkness was trying to swallow him whole. I noticed as the air around him eddied. It moved as if it was trying to get away from him. Suddenly reality called out to me. Or whatever the hell this twisted nightmare was, anyway. I tried to jerk back, but I was still floating. There was nowhere for me to go. I couldn’t fight the effects of this spell, or whatever it was. I was trapped, suspended there in front of this man.

His intentions were clear. He reached his hands further out to me, his fingers spreading. They were accompanied by this sound. It was like skin being stretched over something. Skin that was about to snap and rip like plastic wrap. It was disgusting. It made me clamp a hand over my mouth. I heard some pretty gross noises in my line of work, but this… this shook me to the core. I kept that hand clamped over my mouth as he took another step forward. “You want to know who you are? I already told you. The daughter of Death.” Those words – the daughter of Death – couldn’t affect me. That wasn’t to say that I didn’t believe them. It wasn’t even to say that I couldn’t understand them. It was to say that I just couldn’t…. I couldn’t…. I couldn’t be what he said I was. He looked up at my blank expression. He laughed. It was even worse than the sound of his skin stretching. It reminded me of thousands of skulls suddenly opening and their teeth jittering. “I see Death did a good job protecting you from the truth. There is no point now. He’s gone, and soon you will be too.” “Truth?” I wheezed. “Your dear father never wanted you to understand what you were. He hid you away amongst the humans in the hopes you could have a real life,” the guy’s voice pounded down low. “Whatever that means. How can you live without understanding what it is to die?” For the first time I thought I saw a flash of color blast across his form. It was roughly where his eyes were. It was this glimmer of blood red. It didn’t last, and it was just enough to fix my attention on his face. I thought I saw a flash of a smile, but it was probably just my imagination, as his shadows began to swarm and swarm faster around his face. “I… I’m an orphan,” I hissed. I was defensive. It was ridiculous. Here I was trying to prove this guy was wrong when he was encased in shadow, I was trapped in the air, and he was threatening to kill me.

But I had to hold on to this fact. I couldn’t be the daughter of Death. I…. I tried to deny that fact again, but it was like I came up against this wall. And it was the same wall that had been in my head my entire life. It had been controlling me, keeping me down. It had kept me running from my own imagination. But more than anything, it had kept me separated from what I truly was. I caught a glimpse of the magic still encircling my form. It moved faster and faster as if it was trying to free itself. But there was clearly nothing it could do – something was keeping it trapped. “Who… who are you?” I finally managed. “There is no point in telling you. You will not live past this.” “Just tell me who you are,” I hissed. “Your end. The natural end of all. Now.” He stopped right underneath me. He reached his hand up. I could feel his fingers stretching toward mine. I knew that the second he grabbed me would be the second I’d die. Or something would happen. I’d be crushed or contained – trapped eternally. I don’t know where this knowledge came from, but it came hard. It smashed into me like a brick to the back of my head. That image was no mere accident. I thought I felt something behind my head. Though I couldn’t move too much, and I certainly couldn’t land, I could at least twist my head to the side. It was just in time. Something slashed past me. I didn’t even get a chance to see what it was. It disappeared in a blink. I heard the guy snarl, “Just stay still, Penelope. Let it end. There is no way for you to fight me, anyway.” I didn’t ask this guy how he knew my name. As he wasn’t a guy, for the love of God. I had fought reality my entire life, but there was no point in doing it

anymore. I… I had magic. Yeah, maybe there was a small chance that this was some psychiatric delusion. If it was, that would be great. Because it meant this murderous bastard wouldn’t contain me. If it wasn’t – if this was really happening – I had one last chance to fight. I was not a fighter. I was a survivor, but I did so by keeping in the shadows. I did so by ensuring my head was down, my gaze never met anyone else’s, and my mind was kept to myself. To be a fighter, you have to reach out to experiences. You have to stop what you can. But more than anything, you have to be brave enough to try. I felt something behind my head again. I jerked it to the side. I didn’t know why this guy couldn’t fight me front-on, but that struck me as an important fact. He hissed. It was dark. It sounded as if he was trying to pull all the air in the world through his teeth so no one else would ever be able to breathe again. “Just stay where you are, Penelope.” “Who are you?” I screamed now. For the first time, there was actual anger in my words. There was a force that bubbled up from some deep well within me. Maybe it was the same damn well my reveries had been coming from, because it was strong – strong enough that no one would be able to fight it. “Just stay where you are, Penelope,” the creature roared. Stay where I was? It couldn’t be an accident that this guy had come across me in the church. What if he’d been tracking me? And what if he had waited until this floating spell had taken root? I didn’t know what the spell was. But for whatever reason, I didn’t think he was producing it. This had all happened when I’d said the word Death. My eyes opened wide. Then I suddenly squeezed them shut. It was only for a brief second. I got the impression that this guy could only attack when I wasn’t staring at him, but I had to concentrate.

I had never knowingly cast magic in my life. Before about three minutes ago, I hadn’t even known magic existed. But now I pushed away my doubt. And trust me, that was a hard thing to do. For I had been holding on to doubt my entire life. It is what had kept me away from other people. It had stopped me from creating connections with humans. Because it had stopped me from understanding where I fit in. Now I concentrated with all my heart. “Death,” I said. “No,” the guy hissed. I heard something whistling past my ear. But I managed to jerk my head out of the way. The spell that had lifted me up off my feet began to reverse. I started to drift down. Maybe that wasn’t such a good thing, because the guy was still right there, right in front of me. I didn’t know why he couldn’t fight me front-on, but he would find a way to kill me whether I was floating or standing. My feet finally alighted on the ground. The guy screamed. He opened his mouth, and for the first time I could actually see it. There were stumps of narrow, jutting teeth. They reminded me of the sharp glass shards you sometimes get on top of concrete walls to stop tresers. As he shrieked again, black shadows danced around his mouth. Then they shot forward, right at me. I had no option. I jerked to the side. I wasn’t an athletic person. I had never run a mile. Heck, I don’t think I’d ever run a hundred meters. But right now my survival was on the line. I barreled to the side and rolled over some of the old rusted pews. They indented my back and sent pain shooting through my hips, but I still managed to grab a chunk of wood that had completely crumbled. I held it in a tight grasp as I pushed up. The guy screamed again. More shadows shot from his mouth. They pushed toward me. Something told me to hold my ground. For whatever reason, I didn’t think the

shadows could hurt me. The whistling behind me, however, could. I jerked to the side again. I was not graceful. I smashed into the back of a broken pew and had to pull myself over it with a grunt. At least I avoided what was behind me. “You will die – you will die just like your father. Then there will be no one in my way. Now, remain still, daughter of Death,” he screamed. His words were like poison. That wasn’t just me and my overactive imagination – they honestly did something to the air. It vibrated when he spoke. That wasn’t to mention the shadows that continued to shoot out in every direction. They tried to capture me, but as soon as they met my magic, they were rebuffed. Speaking of my magic, it was still there, twisting around and around me. Maybe it was stronger – maybe it was weaker. But the point was, it hadn’t left me yet. Didn’t that mean I had a chance? Allowing myself to believe that with all my damn heart, I backed off toward the door. The guy screamed at me again, more shadows blasting from his mouth. “I have no idea who you are. And I have no idea what you want. But whatever it is, you’re not going to get it.” I threw that chunk of wood at him. I didn’t honestly think it would do anything. Hello, he was some shadowy monstrosity and this was just a chunk of rotted pine. But I wasn’t attempting to hurt him. I wanted to see what would happen. As the wood sailed into him, it was sucked into his form. For just a moment, I saw it resurfacing in his body before it was digested. It made him look as if he was the ocean. “You will die. All those who shepherd the dead will die. Their energy will be mine finally. This ridiculous world will crumble. Now.” He spread a hand toward me again. I could see his fingers this time. For just a moment, the shadows encasing him broke. His fingers were this gelatinous white. It looked as if he was a corpse that had been rotting but had somehow been bleached too. There was no green or gray. There was no pus. It was just this substance that reminded me of

ectoplasm, whatever that was. … That thought came so quickly I almost dismissed it. I’d never seen ectoplasm. But I had… the knowledge of what it was. And that fact now rose up and told me this man, whatever he was, was protected by it. I backed off toward the door again. I always kept him in my sights. At the same time, I ensured I knew what was happening behind me. I’d never had great senses. I always knocked into things. My peripheral awareness was some of the poorest of anyone I knew. If there was a door or a jagged edge of some table, or a chair jutting out, I would inevitably walk straight into it. I didn’t seem to know where my body was in space. That all changed now. Something sliced past my shoulder, but I jerked my head to the side before it could collect my temple. As always, I didn’t get to see what it was. It moved too quickly. It was almost as if it hadn’t existed in the real world. “Come to me,” he commanded, his hand outstretched again. I leaned down, plucked up a stone, and threw it at him. Once more I was treated to the sight of the stone essentially being digested by his body. And once more as it was digested, the shadow that encased him had to break around the point where it absorbed the stone. … Something told me that was important. I didn’t know if it would save me, but at least it was something to clutch hold of. I leaned down again. I grabbed up another stone. But out of the corner of my eye, I saw that there was something underneath it. It was an old reliquary. It was half a broken cross. One of the arms had fallen off, but that didn’t matter. I threw the stone again, just to distract him. Then I leaned down. I grabbed up another stone. This one was far bigger. With my other hand, I hid the cross behind it. I did not know what this thing was. I had no clue if a symbol of God – or at least the Christian version thereof – would damage the monster in any way. I really doubted this guy was some vampire who’d be scared by a religious mark. But I had nothing to go on here. No, I did – my intuition. It was rumbling up from

inside me. It was tearing through my damn soul, trying to tell me what to do in my time of greatest need. It told me to clutch this cross. And it told me to hope like hell this would work. “Your kind are destined to die out. The guards will fall apart. They will break, and in their wake, the true gods will return.” “True gods?” I muttered. I tried to make it as nervous as I could to distract him. And hey, I was naturally freaked out. Though I’d started to fight, at the back of my head, I still understood how terrifying and broken this entire situation was. It couldn’t be happening. But it was. So I tightened my hand around that cross. I kept it pressed up against the stone. My hand clutched the base of the cross. It was the left side that was missing. The right side of the cross was fully intact, as was the top and the bottom half. I didn’t know why, but the missing piece seemed important somehow. “Your father put up no resistance. He could not. But he had his full powers, at least. You have nothing, child. You may be able to get out of here – but you won’t be able to flee me forever.” … I could get out of here? He was itting that? So there really was a chance? I didn’t let his act of intimidation freak me out. Instead, it gave me the greatest hope I’d ever had. I continued to clutch hold of that cross. He took a step toward me. So I jolted forward. I could hear something whizzing past by my ear. I twisted my head as I moved and avoided another attack. I ensured I used every single gram of speed I’d ever had. I used my body like a frigging weapon while all these years I’d just been using it as a shield to protect me from life. I screamed. I threw the stone with the cross behind it at the guy. He just opened his arms and let the stone impact his chest. “There is nothing—” he began.

His eyes bulged. I watched that cross reemerge from his chest only to be digested automatically by his body. “No,” he spluttered. I stood there, panting. Something whistled past my shoulder. This time I jerked a hand up. Without being conscious of what I was doing, I caught the weapon. It shuddered in my hands and quickly disappeared before I could see what it was. But it left this lingering, unmistakable touch. It was like… it was like I’d touched the end. I know that couldn’t make any sense, but there was no other way to describe it. The guy screamed and fell down to his knees. The whole church shook. It was so bad, I was certain it was gonna fall down. But it kept standing, and so did I. For whatever reason, his body couldn’t digest that cross. He kept trying to. It reemerged only to be sucked down, but it just didn’t work. As the cross fought him, his shadows began to thin. I finally saw his eyes. They were two pin-pricks of pure red. I’d never seen anything like it. It was like… it was as if I was staring into the heart of destruction itself. “I will be back. You will never gain your inheritance. You will die, second guard. It may not be today, but it will be tomorrow.” With that, he exploded. He screamed once more, and black shadows spewed out everywhere. They splattered like droplets of blood. A few of them splashed over my face and torso, but my magic naturally reared up to defend me. They sizzled and spat like water thrown into hot oil. Wherever they alighted on the floor, they burned right through like acid. Speaking of burning, the guy’s remains started to melt. He just disappeared in front of me until he created this puddle of black oozing shadows. They quickly disappeared through the cracks in the floor. That just left me standing there.

Standing quickly stopped when I fell down to my knees. With one bang then another, I tilted my head up. I rested my loose hands beside me. I wouldn’t have been able to move them for the world. I stared up at that hole in the roof. Then reality caught up with me. Screaming, I turned and threw myself out of the church. I ran home. If I’d been paying attention, I would’ve realized that it was even darker than it had been before. If I’d been paying attention, I would’ve also realized the crow was still following me. It would not leave me now until I left this world for good.

The end of Shadow Witch Episode One.



Penelope is magical. She can no longer hide from that. Her enemies won’t let her. They are numerous, and they are coming for her powers. There is no one she can trust but the darkness within her. She will have to open up to it, or the world as she knows it will be destroyed before her very eyes.

…

Tune in for the thrilling second instalment of the Shadow Witch mini-series. It is sure to please fans of Odette C. Bell’s Hell’s Angel.

1

I awoke in my bed, panting, sweating all over. The phone beside me was ringing. It took me a long time to appreciate what it was, let alone what it meant. I managed to snatch it up and answer just before it rang off. “Ah, hello?” “There you are, sweetie,” Stella answered. “This is the second time I’ve called you. You sound horrible. I’ll tell Stanley you can’t come in to work today.” “Work?” I pushed up and rubbed my eyes. “It’s Sunday.” There was a pause. “It’s Monday, sweetie. You really must be sick. Get back to bed. I’ll let Stanley know.” “No. Sorry – I’m just a little disconcerted. I must’ve slept in. It’s Monday?” I whispered. “Yeah. But like I said—” “I should come in,” I managed, the words slipping from my lips before I could think them through. “Only if you can. If anything happens, give us a call.” “Okay.” I hung up. I let my phone fall into my lap. I stared at it. Then I slowly stared at my hands. They were fine. There were no scratches. There were no marks. And tellingly, there was no magic. I pulled my covers off me. I gazed at my body. I wasn’t covered in anything but my pajamas. I pulled the covers back over me. I sat there. I flopped back against my wooden bedhead. It didn’t matter that it was hard. All that counted was it could take my weight. I pressed the back of my hand against my head and closed my eyes. “You… you dreamed that, didn’t you? That was just… some kind of reverie,” I

hissed. I instantly dropped my hand and stared at the room as if I was challenging it to prove me wrong. But how could it? There was nothing there. Just my stuff. Just the mildewcovered walls. And just the half-open window to my left. I stared at it as I hooked a hand around my tight trapezius. It looked as if it was midmorning already. “It can’t be Monday.” I grabbed my phone up and checked the date. … It was Monday. But it had been Saturday night when I’d gone to that church. I squeezed my eyes closed quickly. “You didn’t go to any church, Penelope. That was just a dream.” I let those words echo around the room, and I damn well tried to believe them with all my heart. But as soon as they were out, I squeezed my eyes closed. “So where the hell did Sunday go?” I hissed. I checked my phone again. Sure enough, it continued to tell me it was Monday. Letting paranoia claim me for a few seconds, I went on the net and checked several news sites in case there was something wrong with my phone’s clock. There wasn’t. It really was Monday. I had lost more than 24 hours. I dumped my phone. I shoved my thumbnail into my mouth. I reared back when I realized it was my left hand. I stared down at it. I might want to believe that that incident in the church was just a dream, but what about Cindy and the other corpse? “Something’s happening to you, isn’t it?” I collapsed my hands over my face. Though I tried not to anything, the details of the church flooded my

mind. All I could see was that stained-glass window. The moment it had changed from depicting Death to me filled my mind. I almost… I almost thought I felt a tingle of power rushing through my fingers. I yanked them up and stared at them again, but if there was any magic in there, it was invisible. “Listen to yourself,” I snapped angrily as I threw the covers off and got out of bed. I jittered on the spot, shaking my hands out. “You’re completely fine.” I repeated that to myself a handful of times as I got ready for work. It wasn’t until I reached the door that I just froze. I could hear the call of a crow. Achingly slowly, I opened the door. I peered out. I couldn’t see the crow. Just as I went to close the door, I heard it again. I yanked my head to the side. That same crow was sitting in the same tree it had flown to after I’d opened my gate last night – or Saturday night; whenever it had been. My heart trembled. My hands shook. I walked in backward through my door. I closed it, locked it, turned, and slid down it. I forced my hand against my sweaty brow. I started to shake my head repeatedly. “There is no way this is happening to you, Penelope. Daughter of Death? Ha,” I tried, but that exclamation was the weakest I had ever given. I could push the air from my lips, but that was it. “You’re an orphan,” I tried. But those words were equally empty. I kept shaking my head until suddenly I stopped. I opened my eyes. I ed, in perfect detail, when that shadowy man had reached toward me. He’d claimed I was the second guard. He’d said… he would get rid of us all and the old gods would come. I buried my head in my hands. “Don’t think about it. It doesn’t mean anything – because it’s not real.” Scarcely were those words out of my lips when I smiled at my own stupidity.

“Yeah, but those visions were real, weren’t they? You knew Cindy’s left thumbnail was missing. You found that corpse. Something is happening to you.” I spoke with surprising forcefulness. As I pushed those words out, that strength seemed to come from a place within me I’d rarely visited in this long life. It was the same place that had seen me fight Saturday night. I dropped my hands. I stared at them. “If… if there’s magic in my veins, come out,” I whispered. This right here was probably one of the stupidest things I’d ever done, but I had to try. Nothing happened. I took a hissing breath of frustration. “If there’s magic in me,” I said clearly, letting my voice vibrate hard through the empty house, “come out.” I put all my power into that. It was like I was some god commanding their chariot. But again, nothing happened. I went to shove up. I stopped. I looked back down at my hands as I slid into a seated position again. I opened my lips. I took a cautious breath and half winced. “Death,” I whispered. My hair began to flutter. Out of nowhere, magic picked up around me. It was a poor display of what had happened last night – just a shadow of my real power, if you will. But it was there. Freaked out, I jolted into the door. It shook hard. I locked a hand over my mouth, and I balked as I realized the magic began to play over my lips. I dropped my fingers and tried to jerk away, but there was only the closed door behind me. I just rattled against it. “This… this can’t be happening. You’re going mad. Mad,” I spat again as I slapped my cheek. But no matter what I said or what I did, nothing changed. … Because this was happening. I don’t know how long I remained there, standing weakly or slipping down the

wall, striding or rocking back and forth in a seated position. Time didn’t matter. What was happening to me did. I… was magical. “You’re human. You can’t be the daughter of Death. Death is just a concept,” I tried. Every time I said the word death, my magic reacted to it. It eddied around my body, disappearing and reappearing. I suddenly ed how I’d managed to escape that floating spell. At first, I thought that shadowy creature had cast it on me. Now I wasn’t so certain. The spell had initiated when I’d said the word Death. So why wasn’t I floating now? I went to slap myself again and point out that I was mad, but I stopped, my fingers freezing next to my cheek. “Maybe that floating spell only works in the church?” I pushed up. I went to open the door and head to the church, but my fingers froze. What if that shadowy figure was still there? It had been easy enough to get dressed for work when I’d been able to convince myself that last night – or Saturday night – had been a bad dream. Now the shadow’s warning slammed into me. “He said he would come for you. He said he would kill you tomorrow.” I squeezed my eyes closed. Then I opened them. Technically, I’d slept through his tomorrow. That had been Sunday – and I was still alive on Monday. I looked at my hands again. I dragged my lips through my teeth. “What’s happening to me?” There was no one to answer, and that was the point. I was completely alone. I’d been alone my whole life, and it hadn’t mattered, but now I needed someone to run to. Someone to confide in. Someone to make this all make sense.

There was no one. It was just when I was feeling the lowest that I heard a tap on the door. I freaked out, threw myself away from it, and practically rolled on the chipped floorboards. “Who… who’s there?” I heard the caw of a crow. I blinked back my surprise. A crow I could deal with. People right now would send me insane. Inching forward, I reached out without getting off my knees and opened the door. There was the crow from yesterday. It tilted its head to the side and stared at me. I’d been pretending that it had been smiling at me previously. Now I was certain it was. It hopped inside. I watched it. I quickly closed the door when I thought I heard a car backfiring. I couldn’t afford anyone to see me like this. The crow hopped forward a bit more than turned and looked up at me, its glistening black eyes catching the morning light streaming in from the windows to my side. That was the first time I noted that it didn’t have a shadow. I reached a hand forward. I settled it on the crow’s head. It sure felt real. Its feathers were warm and sleek. As my fingers gently fell down its back, all I ed were real sensations. “What… are you?” The crow opened its beak and cawed. I twisted my lips in. “I don’t understand. And I really need to understand right now,” I said, tears practically raining down my cheeks. I made no attempt to dry them. It wasn’t like this crow would care.

The crow inclined his head toward the door. I stared at him. “I don’t know if I can go back to that church,” I wheezed as I clutched hold of my blouse and turned my fingers in hard. The knuckles became white. The crow shook his head. “You don’t want to go back to the church, either? It’s dangerous, isn’t it?” The crow nodded. “Then why did you lead me there in the first place?” The crow could answer yes or no questions. He clearly couldn’t answer complex ones, though. He just looked at me. I pulled my knees up and hugged my arms around them. I began to rock back and forth. “What do I do?” He inclined his head toward the door again. “You want me to go out? Is there something I need to see?” The crow hopped on my knee. I was surprised, but I didn’t jerk back. I did lean back at least, and it gave the room for him to lean down and lightly peck the embroidered emblem of Carlson’s Funeral Home on my shirt. I stared at it. I squeezed my lips together, my nose crumpling. “You want me to go back to work?” My voice vibrated with total fear and confusion. “That’s mad. There’ll be dead bodies at work. What if I see another ghost? I don’t know what’s happening to me,” I glanced at my hands again, “but I can’t let ordinary people be drawn into this.” He leaned down and softly pecked the emblem once more, reinforcing his point. I just shook my head. “I can’t let ordinary people be drawn into this,” I hissed once more.

I went to collapse again and start to cry, but the crow hopped off my knee and flapped onto the door handle. He was too big to land there properly. He touched it once or twice and flapped away. “I can’t,” I hissed. The crow just looked at me. He did not blink once. As he stared at me, I… a little of my fear went away. I started to what I’d done Saturday night. It was too easy to slip into my anxieties – it was too easy to forget that I had fought. Hell, I’d fought with all my damn heart. And I’d defeated that shadowy creature. Or at least I’d seen him off. I looked at my hands again. The crow inclined his head toward the door one last time. I surprised myself when, without further complaint, I stood up. With a breath, I walked over, grabbed my bag, and hooked it over my shoulder. I ran my thumbs over my face and cleaned up my makeup. Then I turned to the crow. Instinctively, I pointed at my shoulder. I don’t know why. The crow flew over and landed on me. It looked at me. I thought it was smiling once more. For the first time in a while, I managed a brief smile, too. Then I opened the door and walked out. There was a slight breeze. It chased through the trees. As I tilted my head up and stared at them, my gaze quickly traced toward the forest. Saturday night I’d questioned how that church had remained in that forest undiscovered for so long. Now I suspected I knew the answer. Perhaps only I could see it. While that should’ve been the kind of thought that would ring anyone’s alarm bells, I just let it slide. I was calmer now that crow was on my shoulder. I made it all the way up to my

car until I realized something. Jerking my eyes wide open, I stared down at my body. I’d been covered in magic before I’d come out here. I’d simply forgotten about it. Now… the magic had disappeared. The crow cawed softly as if he knew what I was thinking. I jerked my head over and stared at him. “Where’s the magic gone?” I hissed though no one was in earshot. He arched his head toward the car. I shook my head. “What the hell will happen if I start practicing magic at Carlson’s?” He nudged his head toward the car. Sighing and realizing I wasn’t going to win this, I pushed over. I expected the crow to travel with me, but he didn’t. He flew up and landed on the hood. I got inside. Then he flew away. It took me a while to gather the gumption to turn the keys in the ignition. Everything I had told me to turn around. Yeah, so a crow was communicating with me. But I was some kind of witch now. I had to stay home, lie low, and figure out what this was. But I still eventually turned the keys, backed the car out of the driveway, and headed to Carlson’s. The crow didn’t completely leave me. Whenever I stopped at traffic lights, I would see him. He would alight on trees – sometimes even on other cars or trucks. Always he would watch me. It was only because he was there that I managed to finally pull up in Carlson’s car park. It was packed, and there were cop cars for some reason. I managed to squeeze into a small space – an advantage of having a tiny, crappy

car. I got out. I saw the crow land on the top of the funeral home roof. I could just see his gleaming wings. I smiled at him. Then I breathed – deep and hard. I walked in through the back door. I saw Stella scurrying around, her face a little pale. “You’re here. You shouldn’t have come. You’re too sick,” she added quickly. “I managed to pull myself together.” “Head to the break room,” she whispered quietly. I frowned. “Why? What’s going on?” “Just head to the break room, sweetie.” “Stella?” I reached a hand out to her, but she’d already scurried off. I didn’t head straight to the break room. I tried to find someone else to talk to. I couldn’t find anyone. I exclusively stuck to the back rooms. I hated going out to where the public was. But now I gathered the gumption to walk out into the main hall. That’s when I saw the police. I also saw reporters. … Did this have something to do with Cindy? “Please,” Stella said as she opened her hands and spread them wide. “We have a funeral already organized for today. Please show some decorum. The family will be here soon.” What the hell was going on? Stella always loved a bit of drama. But now I could see she was breaking under some strain. Someone cleared their throat from behind me. I startled and turned in time to see Timothy. There were several uniformed officers behind him.

I frowned. “What’s going on? I thought you took Cindy’s body on Saturday?” “We did. We’re searching the place.” My nose scrunched up. “For what?” “I guess you haven’t heard.” Timothy stared right at me. “Haven’t heard what?” I had to thank my lucky stars that my voice was even. What with one thing and another, I’d completely forgotten about Timothy and my fear that I’d become suspicious to him. “Your boss, Stanley Carlson, has been arrested in relation to Cindy’s murder. We’re investigating him in relation to the other murders, too.” I stood there. I tried to understand what he’d just said. I replayed it over and over in my head as if there was some hidden clue that would make it all make sense. Slowly my lips parted. “Stanley’s not a serial killer.” Timothy’s gaze hardened slightly. “We have enough evidence pointing to him.” I opened my mouth quickly to tell him one thing. Stanley was the wrong build. But I couldn’t share that detail. My lips froze. Everything caught up with me. I jerked my head back and saw Stella again. She was practically crying. I couldn’t exactly hear the questions of the press surrounding her, but from their tones, they were insistent and hardly nice. “Can you get out of the way please?” Timothy asked. I slowly stepped to the side. “Stanley can’t possibly be a serial killer. He would never kill. He doesn’t have it in him,” I tried. “As the police, we require evidence, not supposition,” Timothy said smoothly. His uniformed officers walked into the reception area and started to break up this mini press conference, or whatever the hell it was. They ushered the journalists

off the premises. I just stood there. I didn’t think I’d ever been colder. I was struggling with the fact that I was a witch. Last night – or the night before – I’d had a fight with some shadowy apparition. Now almost none of that mattered. Stanley had been like a father to me. Now he was being framed for murder? Because he was being framed. I didn’t even have to think that hard about this. Stanley was completely the wrong build. The man I’d seen kill both Cindy and that other woman had been much larger. He’d been strong, too. Despite the fact that Stanley had tried to keep fit in his older years, he wasn’t a young man anymore. It made no damn sense. Before I knew what I was doing, I rushed out. I was not the bolshie kind. I was the kind who stood in the shadows and kept to herself. That didn’t stop me from grabbing Timothy’s wrist. He froze. He slowly turned around and looked at me, a frown marking his lips. Several officers around him looked at me, but they didn’t intervene. It wasn’t like Timothy would need a hand defending himself from me. “What is it, Miss Hope?” “If Stanley was the serial killer, why on earth would he have let me call you? As soon as I told him about that nail yesterday – I mean Saturday,” I corrected myself quickly, “he was the one who suggested calling the police.” “The police rely on evidence, not suppositions,” Timothy repeated in a completely bland voice. He looked pointedly at my hand. I dropped it. I watched Timothy walk away.

“Head to the break room,” an officer said from behind me. I glanced at the guy. “Now,” he repeated in a hard voice. I nodded quietly. I turned and headed through the back rooms. This could not be happening. I’d told myself that if I was framed for murder, Stanley and everyone at Carlson’s would abandon me. But that wasn’t true, was it? As I walked, cold and dejected, back to the break room, I reminded myself of how much Stanley had been there for me my entire life. He’d never asked about my family. He’d never pried into my business. He’d always given me the room to be myself. I reached the break room. I walked inside. No one else was there. I went to sit in the sun, but I chose to sit as far away from it as I could. I stared at it dejectedly. “Stanley’s no killer,” I whispered. Scarcely had the words left my lips when I realized they left a question. If he was no murderer, then why the hell was he being framed? And who was framing him? Why? I’d just found out I was a witch. My father was Death. My powers were growing. And there was a shadowy creature trying to kill me. But I would not let Stanley go down.

2

No one else came to the break room. I soon figured out that was because they were being questioned. When Stella finally appeared, it was to the sight of an officer with her. “You’re next,” the woman nodded at me. I pushed up. Stella looked gray. I don’t think I’d ever seen her looking sadder. “I can’t believe it,” she whispered. I looked at her sharply. “Stanley’s no killer.” Without even looking at me, her lips gently parted. “Then why did he have all those thumbnails?” “Don’t share details of the case,” the officer reprimanded quickly. Then she nodded at me and gestured toward the door. I followed her out. … They found fingernails in Stanley’s possession? I didn’t believe it. For them to act as if it was real evidence, then it had to actually be associated with the victims. Which meant what? The real killer had framed him? Why? “Just this way.” The officer gestured forward. I frowned as we went to a meeting room. The cops had taken it over and turned it into some kind of informal interview room. “Why aren’t we being questioned down at the station?” “You don’t need to know that. You’re here to answer questions, not ask them.”

I sat down. I thought she would be the one to question me, but she wasn’t. She left the room, had a brief conversation with someone, then stepped to the side as Timothy walked in. I stared at him. If I hadn’t called him on Saturday, none of this would be happening, would it? He flattened his tie and sat down. He stared at a document in his hand for a few seconds before looking up at me. “I suppose I have to thank you again,” he said – a line that was becoming all too familiar to me now. “Why?” I asked defensively. “If you hadn’t called Cindy in, we would never have caught the real culprit.” I clenched my hands tightly. “Your boss’s movements fit that of the serial killer perfectly. Not to mention the other evidence we’ve already found here. I want you to tell me everything you can about Stanley. Especially about his movements on these dates.” He pushed a document toward me. I stared at it. I looked up at him. I… I don’t know how, but I knew the dates were wrong. As I glanced down at the most recent one – the one that should correspond to Cindy’s death, I just… I knew it was a day off. I don’t know why. Staring at the other dates, I quickly identified the one that should correspond to the corpse that I’d found in the forest, but that was wrong, too. I seemed to instinctively know when she’d died. There were two things going on here. One was that I should have absolutely no idea when those women died. The other was that I understood that forensic science wasn’t perfect. But I just… I got the impression that someone was fudging the dates on purpose. They weren’t looking for information on what Stanley had done on the days when these women had died. They’d picked a different set of dates for some other reason.

I looked up at Timothy. For the first time I really saw him. He was broadshouldered. He was a very large man. In fact, he was almost the exact size of the shadow I’d seen murdering those women. Before my incident in the church, if I had come across a realization like that, I would have freaked. Now I just sat there. Slowly things started to slip into place. Though I hadn’t been able to catch Cindy’s expression on Saturday when shadows had flitted past her face, I now realized what she’d been trying to do. As soon as Timothy had walked in the room, she’d grimaced. Because he was her killer, wasn’t he? Timothy just looked at me. I was staring at him blankly. He leaned over and tapped the paper. “Do you know what your boss was doing on these dates? I realize some of the earlier ones are gonna be hard to . Just give us what you can.” I was… I was sitting across the table from a serial killer. I’d seen the way he’d murdered those women. I’d seen how brutal he’d been. And I’d… I’d watched him taste their blood. As soon as I ed that detail, I shivered. I almost thought a little magic might escape over my skin – the move was that hard and important. He frowned. “Miss Hope?” “Don’t mind me,” I said quietly. “I’ve been sick all weekend. I wasn’t even meant to come into work. Stella told me to stay home. But I dragged myself here. I guess I’m still not completely well.” He shrugged, obviously not caring about that. He looked down at the paper again. I glanced at it. “Stanley’s very conscientious. He is always at work during work hours.”

“Are you telling me you don’t his whereabouts on any of these days? What about this one?” He leaned over and tapped the date that should’ve corresponded to Cindy’s death. Trying to pretend I was attempting to , I looked away from him. I didn’t have to try particularly hard. Stanley had gone out that day. I recalled it, because it was unusual. What I’d just said was true. Usually during work hours, Stanley was here. He acted like he was the shepherd of this place. Maybe in his head if he left, it would somehow bear badly on Carlson’s. Or maybe he was a lot more poetic than that. Perhaps he thought he was here to protect the dead. And while they were here, he should be here too. I was suddenly reminded of how strong Stanley’s sense of justice was. I could recall the exact way he’d looked at me when I’d pointed out Cindy’s thumbnail had been missing. He had trusted me. And now he was being framed. I tried hard not to let my jaw stiffen. “Look, I’m not really sure,” I lied. “Maybe he was here. He might not have been. I tend to keep my head down. I’m usually in one of the mortuary rooms dealing with corpses.” I shrugged. The way he looked at me made it clear he’d been expecting more. Obviously most of the other employees had told him that Stanley had gone out that day. Now I paused to , he hadn’t even bothered to tell us where he’d gone. So what? That meant he’d killed Cindy? She hadn’t died during the day. She’d died at night. So why did it matter what our boss had done during work hours? More to the point – what exactly was Timothy trying to find out? As I hid a frown, I ed the way Stanley had looked when I’d handed him Timothy’s card. He’d had the strangest smile. He’d pointed out he’d known Timothy’s dad. Was this some kind of revenge on Timothy’s behalf? “Do you anything else?” Timothy leaned forward.

I ed everything. From the build of the killer to the way Timothy had tasted their blood. I had critical evidence but no way to share it – and absolutely no reason to share it with the killer himself. I shook my head. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful.” He sighed. He leaned back and looked at me. “You’ve already been incredibly helpful. Like I said,” he grabbed his tie and neatened it as he stood and opened the door, “if it weren’t for you, we wouldn’t have found the killer.” I nodded. “Am I free to go?” “Stay on the premises. Head to the break room until I’m done here.” I walked straight back to the break room. No one else was there. I didn’t know if they were being questioned and re-questioned or if they’d been sent home but Timothy was holding onto me for some reason. As I sat far away from the sunlight, I couldn’t help but turn my head to face the graveyard. And that’s when I saw that omega car parked there. I bolted up. I pushed over to the window. Locking a sweaty hand on it, I tilted my head down until my short hair sliced over my shoulder. I tried to see if I could catch sight of that man. While his car was there, he wasn’t. I bit my lip hard, my incisor trying to pierce through the flesh. I continued to stand there for several minutes, desperately trying to glimpse him, but it became apparent all too soon that he was nowhere to be seen. I turned around and went to flop against the window, but that’s when I stopped. I brought my hands up and stared at them. I thought I could see just a shadow of power beneath my flesh. I jolted forward. I became cold all over, this darting pressure racing up my spine. “No, not here,” I muttered quickly, the words parting from my lips in forceful bursts. The more nervous I became, the more I could see that shadow of power racing

just underneath my flesh. It looked like someone had thrown a blanket over it. While I couldn’t see the color, I could distinctly see the movement. As it twisted its way back and forth, it was almost like a shark swimming just under the surface of the sea. The very last thing I could do was show my magic. But I also couldn’t afford to act too suspiciously. I went to throw myself out of the room and head home, but I stopped. I became distinctly aware of the fact that there was an officer just on the other side of the door. I hadn’t been aware of it up until several moments ago, but now my senses locked on that fact, and they would never be able to be pulled away. “What is this?” I mouthed, the movements quick. I squeezed my eyes closed. I tried to make these distinct sensations disappear, but what happened was the exact opposite. Now I had no visual data to confuse my mind, I only became all the more aware of the female officer on the other side of the door. Because she was a woman. I could smell everything about her, from the exact laundry detergent she used, to her shampoo, to the scent of latex on her hands from where she’d recently pulled off gloves. The experience was so sharp, I gasped, but I quickly locked my hands over my mouth. “Are you okay in there?” she said. She went to open the door. I deliberately walked over to the table and banged into it. As the door swung open, I rubbed my leg and pulled the table back into place. “Sorry,” I said with a legitimately shaking voice. “I’m a bit of a klutz. I went to grab up the newspaper,” I gestured to it, “but I hit myself.” She didn’t say anything. With a slight shake of her head, she closed the door. Maybe I should’ve taken the opportunity to ask how long I’d be kept here, but it was clear from her stiff-lipped expression that she had no intention of telling me. As soon as the door was firmly shut, I went back to locking a hand over my mouth. I immediately darted my head down and stared in total gut-wrenching terror at my hands. Had she seen anything?

… I doubted it. Magic was still darting underneath my flesh, but she hadn’t screamed. Hell, she hadn’t even glanced down at my fingers. I pulled them up. Unconsciously, I shifted into the light. As I twisted my hands this way and that, the sunlight streamed around my fingers. It made the shadowy magic within all the starker. “This can’t honestly be happening to me,” I mouthed once more. I could keep repeating that – for the rest of my life – but it wouldn’t change the fact that what was occurring was really happening. I squeezed my eyes closed, then opened them again. I turned quickly and stared over at the graveyard. That omega car was there. It was like it was beckoning me. So many things had occurred since that fateful night when I’d found the corpse, that I no longer questioned if that guy had been in my head. Yeah, he’d somehow turned into crows. And yeah, he’d disappeared. But the list of crazy things I’d seen was only growing longer. And to be honest, he was nothing compared to that shadowy creature from last night. “Are you real?” I mouthed as I walked back up to the window, stood in front of it, and tried my hardest to catch a glimpse of him. Maybe he was in his car. It was parked with its rear end facing the cemetery and its front-end directed toward the funeral home. Maybe right now he was staring at me. My gut became all funny as I thought that. I became self-conscious as I stared and stared and stared. It couldn’t last forever. Someone walked in. They didn’t even knock. For whatever reason, despite the fact I’d been aware of the female officer outside, I had no warning about this. I jolted and pulled my hand off the window just as Timothy stopped behind me. “What are you looking at?” He leaned past me. I wondered if he’d be able to see the omega car. Maybe it, just like the magic under my skin, was invisible to everyone else. But as Timothy frowned, I saw his gaze dart right over to the car. His pupils opened ever so slightly, and I realized he could see it, too.

I pressed my lips together and swallowed. “You don’t usually get fancy cars like that around these parts.” “This is the largest cemetery in the city. Many rich people are buried here,” he corrected me. He looked down. I thought I saw his gaze lock on my hands. I froze. What… what if he could see my power? He nodded toward the door. I just stood there staring at him. He cleared his throat. “You’re free to go.” “I am?” I stuttered. Again, his expression was completely unreadable. “Why? Do you think there’s a reason we should be keeping hold of you longer?” I couldn’t tell if he was joking or if this was a pointed question. I shrugged. “Why did you hold me in the first place when it’s clear you sent everyone else home?” “And why do you think it’s clear I sent everyone else home?” He crossed his arms and looked at me. I’d said it before, but it bore repeating – Timothy did not give anything away. You could honestly get every single mode of lie detection, from machines to trained military personnel – and he would be able to defeat them all. I had never seen an expression blanker than his. … Which made the fact of what he was all the more chilling. Didn’t psychopaths have an inability to feel emotion? Wasn’t that what made them more likely to kill? All these thoughts and more flitted through my mind as I stared up at him.

“You’re very sharp, aren’t you, Penelope? Yes, I did send everyone else home,” he answered his own question. “And now it’s time for you to go home.” He inclined his head toward my hatch. I needed to get out of here. The longer I stayed in his presence, the more suspicious I’d become to him. I’d been pretending that the worst thing that would happen would be that I would be framed for the murders. But that wasn’t nearly as bad as what Timothy could do, was it? If he honestly became suspicious of me, I’d wind up being his next victim. I stared down at my feet demurely and nodded. I walked over, grabbed my bag, and headed for the door. “One last thing,” he added. I froze by the door. “I want you to show me the exact path you took when you found the victim in the forest.” My back bristled. I had to try so hard not to show how freaked out I was at that statement. “Sorry?” I inclined my head over my shoulder. I forced myself to stare at him. “The other officers are dealing with things here. If you have nowhere to go, we’ll go there now.” He took a step up to me. I turned around. I wouldn’t let him see my expression. What the hell was I meant to do? If I went with him, what if he attacked me? But how could I not go with him? Wouldn’t the police find that suspicious? It didn’t take me long to realize that suspicion was completely irrelevant. “I think I’d prefer to go home right now—” “This is an official investigation,” he said in a deep voice. I pressed my lips together. I finally turned to face him. He was standing in front of the windows. I stared past them in time to note that that omega car was

driving past. It was heading off in the direction of the forest. I’m sure it was nothing more than a coincidence. It wouldn’t be heading into the forest. It was just driving in that direction, but my back still arched. I don’t know why, but I got the impression that omega guy, out of everyone on this entire damn planet, would be able to tell me what was going on with me. “We’re going now,” Timothy said. He walked past me. His gaze lingered, but I didn’t know what it lingered on. His eyes were quick, and by the time I turned to stare up at him, he’d already shifted past. He had a muttered conversation with the officer in the hallway. Then he grumbled at me to hurry up. My heart pounded in my chest. I was not about to get into a car with a serial killer. At the same time… so what? He wasn’t magical. He wasn’t covered in shadows. I was. Their force was pounding within me. I could feel it growing in time with my hyper-aware senses. Now Timothy was out of the room, once more I was aware of that officer standing next to him. I swore I knew just how fast her heart was beating. From her respiration rate to her temperature to how much sweat was covering her body – all of this information struck me all at once. I… I was changing. I was way beyond questioning whether I was magical now. But because I was magical, that meant I had a chance against Timothy, right? And what… what if he attacked me and I successfully defended myself? Wouldn’t that save Stanley? If I could prove Timothy was a serial killer, then I could get Stanley out right here right now. This was probably the maddest thing I’d ever done. I squeezed my eyes closed and kept them closed until I turned and reached the door. I walked out. I nodded at Timothy. “Let’s go.” I would quickly grow to regret those words. There was no turning back now.

3

I got into Timothy’s car. I tried to ease my muscles into the seat. They were stiff. Who was I kidding? They practically didn’t work. I didn’t know if it was a consequence of my magic or just my fear. Maybe it was my better reason catching up to me and trying to throttle me. I had just willingly got into the car with a goddamn serial killer. Timothy, as always, neatened his tie. It was a bit of an obsession for him. He didn’t seem to be the obsessive kind, but I quickly reminded myself that if he was actually a psychopath, that probably came with the territory. Maybe he just wanted everything in this world to be neat – including the transition from life and death. Perhaps he wanted those who he didn’t agree with swiftly ejected from this earthly plane like someone wiping unwanted stains off the kitchen counter. “You seem tense,” he noted as he turned on the ignition. He placed a hand on the back of my headrest as he tilted his head all the way around to reverse. I glanced at his hand. I’d already noticed this, but I saw it again. He had a tan mark where a ring had been. The ring had been large – the mark was wide. He caught me staring at it. He gazed at me briefly, then dropped his hand, shoved the car into drive, and pulled out onto the road. It was a thankfully short trip from the funeral home over to the section of forest where I found that corpse. I kept referring to her as a corpse. “What’s her name, anyway?” “Whose?” “The woman I found in the forest.”

“Stephanie Rogers.” “… Are you allowed to share these details with me?” He laughed quietly. “You asked.” Yeah, I did, but nothing about this investigation from the beginning had seemed right. That gave me yet more of an indication that Timothy knew I was onto him. Though I tried to encourage my muscles to relax, I got stiffer and stiffer and stiffer. I knew that Timothy was watching me. His gaze would dart toward me every few meters as he drove along the quiet stretch of road. We soon pulled off near the right section of forest. He hadn’t said a word to me in about two minutes. Ostensibly that wasn’t a long time, but it made my back itch. Pounding nerves were now vibrating through my belly. Hot and hard, it felt like I’d swallowed chunks of super-heated metal. “All right, get out of the car,” he said, his voice deep. Slowly, I opened the door. For the first time, I darted my gaze down to my hands. I expected to see the magic writhing under my skin, but it wasn’t there. It had disappeared at some point, and I hadn’t even been aware of it. Fear cascaded up my back, across my jaw, then down my front. What if my magic had left me when I needed it most? “You seem tense,” he noted again. I shuddered through a breath. “Like I told you earlier – I’m just sick. That’s all.” “Is that why you’re so sweaty?” he asked quietly. He smoothed his tie down. Then he locked the car.

I became highly aware of the fact that there was now nowhere to run. Except forward. I stared at the little path that opened out into the forest in front of me. I started scanning the trees. It took me a few seconds to realize what I was looking for. The crow. It was nowhere to be seen. I bit my lip. “You know, I’m not feeling that great—” He walked past me. “So it’s just this way, then?” I caught sight of his gaze. He was staring at me with the same concentrated attention he usually used, but now there was an edge to it. An angry one. Shit. This was it. I was only gambling that I had the power to defeat this guy. If my magic really had left me, then there was no way I could take him on. He was just too big. He was trained and athletic, and the most running I’d ever done was two nights ago when I’d fled that church. I took a step back toward the car. I turned toward it and started hammering on the window. He just grabbed my arm and pulled me back. My gut kicked. Somewhere way back in the furthest reaches of my mind I’d held onto a doubt that maybe Timothy wasn’t the serial killer after all, but as he silently grabbed me and pulled me into the forest, that all ended. I went to scream, but he clamped a hand over my mouth. “Don’t give me any trouble,” he muttered. Fear pounded through me. It was this toxic mix of regret and terror. It smashed into my gut. It shook up through my muscles. It begged me to move. But I couldn’t. I tried to elbow him or pull myself free of his grip, but there was nothing I could frigging do. In a few short seconds, he pulled me through the tree line. Then in a few short seconds after that, I was far enough from the road that I could no longer see it.

He kept his hand clamped over my mouth. I could smell his cologne. I could smell the latex on his skin. But I couldn’t smell him, for some reason. One of the strongest scents I’d noted when I’d detected that officer outside the door of the break room was her. Her unique sweat. Her unique scent. But with Timothy, it was just gone. Did psychopaths not sweat or something? I was rigid all over. I could barely move. It was like my body had already gone into rigor mortis – a prelude to what was about to happen when this bastard killed me. He kept pulling me back and back and back until we reached the point where Stephanie Rogers had died. Only then did he pull his hand off my mouth. He took a step back as I crumpled down to my knees. I screamed. It echoed around me, but it didn’t seem to penetrate through the forest for some reason. “I knew you were the serial killer. Just let me go,” I snapped through clenched teeth. He narrowed his eyes at me. He crossed his arms. “Serial killer? You sure?” “Just let me go,” I hissed. “Let you go?” He laughed. “You’ve already done too much damage. There’s no way I’m letting you go.” A cold, drenching sweat flew over me. It was as if I’d just dumped my head into a rain cloud. Tears began to stream down my cheeks. I pulled my lips in and chewed them hard enough that I almost broke through the flesh. “Don’t look at me like that. I have no intention of killing you, Penelope. I would get in way too much trouble for that.” His comment chilled me to the bones. “Just get it over and done with,” I hissed.

He crossed his arms harder. “Get what over and done with? Like I said, I have no intention of killing you.” “What the hell are you going to do?” “Give you some timely advice before you get killed by someone else,” his voice shook down low. I just stared at him. “So you’re friends with the serial killer—” He tilted his head back and laughed. There was precisely no mirth in the move whatsoever. “You would think, after what happened to you on Saturday night, that the serial killer would be irrelevant. Do you have a short memory?” As soon as he said the words Saturday night, I froze. My body wouldn’t have been able to move, even if you’d strapped it up to wild horses and fired a gun. He looked at me. I could tell he was taking everything in, from my expression, to my glistening brow, to my wide-open, haunted eyes. He rubbed his hand down his face. He closed his eyes briefly and let his fingers drop over the lids. Slowly he opened one, then the other. He looked harried. “You’ve got no idea what’s happening, do you? I can’t believe you showed up to work after finding out what you are.” “What… what I am?” I hissed. He looked right at me. No more touching his face, no more sighing, no more crossing his arms. “You’re the daughter of Death, Penelope Hope.” I froze again. This time it was a complete move. It felt like I would never, ever be able to shift a centimeter again. I’d become a statue – a tree – a mountain. I’d become something so rooted into the earth, it would take a cataclysm of global proportions to even shift me a millimeter, let alone see me running for my life. He took a long time to stare at me. It was clear he was waiting for me to react, but when I didn’t, he sighed again. He palmed his face. He quickly dropped his fingers and stared at me. His expression was hardly nice. “You should have kept your head down,” he growled.

Finally, slowly, I began to move. My lips wobbled. They were still as cold as ice, and pressure was still building in my chest, threatening to explode like dynamite, but at least I hissed, “How… how do you know what I am? Did you follow me to that church?” That realization struck me like a bat to the head. Horror filled my gaze. “Are you that—” “Before you accuse me of another crime, just stop right there. No, I’m not him.” He looked down at his boots. “That shadow?” My voice shook. “Is something ancient. Something that shouldn’t be on Earth. Something that should have been held back by your father.” As he spoke, he didn’t look at me. He played with his finger – the one with the tan mark. He pushed his other fingers up and down as if he was handling an invisible ring. I became cold again as he said the word father. I went to shake my head. He saw. He darted his gaze up to me. He let out a light, short chuckle. “Are you having trouble accepting what you are?” He gestured at me. “Can’t be that hard considering all that magic pumping in your veins.” I glanced down at my hands. I was prepared for this to be a trick. Maybe he was just distracting me so he could slice in and smash me across the head with a brick. But sure enough, my magic was back. It was once more writhing under my skin. It was dancing faster and brighter than it had before. It looked like, with just a little effort, I’d be able to make it rise through my flesh and circle around me like it had that night in the church. I jolted my head up and looked at him again. “You can see it?” He laughed. This time there was a little mirth – though it was hardly a happy move. “Yeah, of course I can see it. Here’s a tip from one guard to another, don’t ever use it in public.” I got stuck on one word. My lips took a long time to open. It took an even longer time for my brain to process what I wanted to say. Finally I stammered, “Guard?”

He got a real sharp look in his eyes. “Yeah, guard. Which is incidentally what you are now your father has gone.” “In the church… that thing – that shadow said I was the second guard.” “Yeah, you are. And that shadow has a name.” “What?” I asked after a long time. Though my curiosity wanted to know, a large part of me just didn’t care. It was trying to convince me that if I didn’t learn what that monster’s name was, it wouldn’t come after me, as promised. Timothy turned away from me. He stared through the trees. I didn’t know if he was distracting himself or just gathering the gumption to say what he did next. “Pyro.” I couldn’t stop freezing. This time was worse. This time it honestly felt as if I had been thrown out into the depths of space. There was no heat left in me, and as a consequence, there was no movement. There was just this unending recognition that that word – and the man behind it – was destruction incarnate. Timothy turned back to me. He took a long time to stare at my expression. He finally nodded, clearly satisfied. “It’s good that you’re ing a little. Pyro,” he said quietly and respectfully as if he thought that monster would appear over his shoulder, “is not someone to mess with.” “He said… once he got all the guards out of the way that the old gods would come.” Timothy’s lips jerked up. They moved hard. I could sense his strength behind it – it was the same strength I’d always been able to sense behind Timothy. But now I could see it. He looked larger-than-life. The way he held himself, the way he talked, and the way he felt were all different. They weren’t… human. I became cold at that recognition, but I no longer shivered. “They call themselves the old gods. They’re nothing more than monsters. They prey on humanity – on anything breathing – on anything alive. They take joy in destruction. And they cannot be allowed to feast on Earth. That’s why the guards exist.”

“And you’re… you’re a guard?” I still didn’t know if I trusted Timothy. He knew who I was, but what did that mean? What if he was this Pyro in disguise? But I spoke nonetheless. Because I couldn’t stay quiet. I’d been ruminating over these facts all morning. This was the first time I’d been able to speak them out loud to anything that wasn’t a crow. “Yeah, I’m a guard. The third one.” “Does that mean we’re related?” It was an innocent enough question. He arched an eyebrow as he looked at me. “No, Penelope,” his voice shook, “we are not related.” “Then… what are you?” “The same thing as you.” “I have no clue what I am,” I itted in a shaking voice. “The daughter of…” I couldn’t finish that. Every time I tried, I came up against that wall in my head. It was thicker and harder than it had been on Saturday night. I’d been able to push through it when I’d accessed my power momentarily, but it seemed as if the wall had rebuilt itself stronger than before. “You can’t even say it, ha? Death really did a good job trying to hide you.” Timothy rubbed his head. “Wait….” Again, I couldn’t formulate the question. “Why did your father,” he said pointedly, “try to hide you? To keep you safe. He didn’t want you to live the same life as him. It is irrelevant what he wants now. He’s gone.” He’d just revealed too much. My head began to ring. I clutched my forehead and let my fingers slide down it. Timothy watched me. “I thought you’d be stronger, you know? And you have to be stronger,” he added in a rumble. “Why… how… did my father die?” I finally vocalized that question. I’d been

hiding from it all day, but it had been inside me, festering like a wound I would not look at. But now as I glanced at it, tears began to touch my cheeks. They came from a deep place – a place of sadness and yearning I’d only vaguely been aware of my entire life. “It’s generous to say he’s dead. What he is, is forever-gone.” Pyro had used that term on Saturday night. I looked up sharply. “Forever-gone?” I stuttered. He rubbed his face. “It’s a complex statement to someone who doesn’t really understand existence. Most people get reborn. They die, and they’re remade into something new as their soul goes on. Not when you’re forever-gone,” he added. Terror gripped me. I hadn’t even known I’d had a father until two days ago, but now it was like I was missing the most important part of my life. “Pyro has essentially banished Death.” “So will people not die anymore?” Timothy laughed. It was frustrated. He planted a hand on his head, then let his fingers slide down until he clutched the bridge of his nose. “I honestly thought you’d be smarter than this.” He spoke through clenched teeth. “Of course people will still die.” “Are they still… reborn?” “Yeah,” his voice dropped. “For now.” My back arched on the way he said for now. “What is Pyro going to do?” “Move through the guards until he kills us all. And when we’re dead—” he shook his head. He didn’t even trail off. He turned from me and stared at the trees. Now would be a good time to run. I didn’t have it in me. My fear was slowly turning into curiosity – curiosity tinged with grief.

I continued to cry, and I made no effort to dry my tears. Timothy soon turned back to me. He glanced at me. It was a penetrating look. I didn’t know whether I should feel scared or not, but it ended quickly. “You have to keep your head down,” he said in a low, warning voice. “What do you mean? You said I’m one of these guards now—” “You have no power. You have to leave it up to my brother and me.” My nose scrunched. “Brother?” Timothy turned away from me. “The last guard.” “Who’s he—” “Never mind. You’ll never meet him.” I don’t know why, but I got the impression that Timothy was lying for whatever reason. I’d been down on my knees, weak and terrified. Now I pushed up – all at the prospect of who the final guard could be. “When I found Stephanie,” I itted, my voice wavering, “I was….” “You were led here,” he said, cutting me to the chase. I’d been holding onto that secret so tightly for the last few days. The fact he already knew it was like having a rug pulled out from underneath my feet. He faced me quickly. “I don’t know exactly how your powers manifest, but the fact that you were led here is clear. As is the fact that you figured out Cindy was a victim.” Everything else started to slip into place. I’d forgotten about Stanley. I’d forgotten about the fact he was being framed. “Stanley’s no murderer,” I spluttered as quickly as I possibly could. “I was honest when I said that he was the one who suggested calling the police. He’s been framed. I saw who killed those two women. He was the wrong build.”

Timothy brought up a hand. “Slow down. You don’t know everything.” “I saw it,” I spluttered. Now I’d started to it this, I couldn’t hold on to the truth anymore. It bubbled up from within me. It wanted to be released before it tore a hole in my chest. “I saw that woman running on Friday night,” I spluttered. “Stephanie Rogers. I heard her screaming. She led me here.” I pointed to the spot where I’d fallen over that night. “I had a torch. I dropped it. And when the light cut across her body, I,” I covered my face with my hands, “I saw her being murdered in her own shadow. It was the same with Cindy. And the guy who murdered them – he’s so much bigger than Stanley.” “You don’t know everything, Penelope.” “Stanley wouldn’t kill anyone—” “Stanley was keeping thumbnails of not just the serial killer victims, but of everyone who went through the funeral home.” That stilled me. For a few seconds. My natural loyalty to Stanley won out. I shook my head wildly. “There’s no way that would be true. He’s been set up. I’m telling you, I saw—” “You saw the victims being murdered. But was it a human who was murdering them?” He looked at me with such a direct gaze, it felt like it was some kind of searchlight that had plastered me up against a wall. “Sorry?” I whispered. “Do you know it was a human who murdered the victims, Penelope? Because it wasn’t.” “It wasn’t… wasn’t a human?” I couldn’t control my tone. It wavered up and down like a flag fluttering in a gale. He continued to stare at me as if he was disappointed by my reaction. But there was at least a soft edge to his expression now. “Have you told me everything you saw?” He slipped right back into the role of the detective. I took a step back from him. I stupidly thought he could be suspicious of me again – that he honestly thought I was the killer here. That would have to ignore

everything he’d said and done, but my old fear still rose. I looked down at my feet. “No,” I itted. “The culprit tasted their blood, didn’t he?” I looked up at him sharply. “How—” I stopped. Timothy was the third guard. I didn’t know what that meant, but I guess it meant he had magic. “You might not appreciate this, but blood, hair, and fingernails can be used to create dark magic. Which is precisely what your boss was doing.” I shook my head one last time. “He was so kind,” I said in a tortured tone. “He let me work there. He never asked questions about my past—” His gaze became hard. “What do you mean?” I rubbed my hands up and down my arms. It became harder and harder. It was cold. It was also dark despite the fact it was early morning. “He let me work there. He never asked any questions,” I whispered. “He didn’t care where I was from.” Timothy clenched his jaw hard. He turned away. I didn’t know what he was thinking. But when he turned back, it was clear he’d made his mind up. “You’re going to head out of town.” “No, I’m not,” I spluttered. “Yeah, you are. You’re already too close to this. Pyro has already identified that you’re around these parts. You will head out of town.” The way he said that was as if he was laying down the law. “Won’t Pyro just come for me wherever I am?” My voice shook so badly, I could barely understand it myself. “No. When you found that gate point, he located you.” “Gate point?” “You really know nothing.” He sighed and grabbed his jaw. He pushed his fingers in until his short nails ran over his equally short stubble.

“Then tell me,” I whispered in a pleading tone. “No. The less you know, the better. You will head out of town. I’ll give you a day to sort out your stuff. You’ve gotta go straight back to the funeral home and quit. You can cite whatever you want – from Stanley’s conviction to mental health to just wanting a fresh break. But you will quit. And you will leave.” I shook my head slowly. “This town is all I know.” “I’ll give you money. I’ll find you a house. You will go there. You’ll do as I say.” I shook my head harder now. “No, who are you to tell me—” His gaze flashed. “I’m the third guard, is who I am. You may not appreciate this, but we guards have a strict hierarchical order. I am above you. So I’m telling you exactly what to do.” I staggered back from him. It wasn’t like I thought he was going to kill me anymore. But in a way, this was worse. I was attached to this town. It felt like my very body was rooted in it. I knew nothing else. I’d never left it, for the love of God. And the thought that I would have to leave it now made me shudder. “I can’t leave—” “You have to. We can’t allow Pyro to find you. He has to go through we guards logically. First it was your father, then it will be you,” he said as his voice dropped with the slightest hint of regret. “And then it will be you and your brother,” I surmised. His jaw stiffened ever so slightly on the term brother. “You understand,” he managed. “So we’re finally on the same page. No more questions. You head back to the funeral home, and you quit.” I shook my head weakly one last time. “No. They did so much for me. Stanley —” “Stanley is a dark magical practitioner. He used the blood of his victims to buy himself a longer life. To reinvigorate himself and to make himself perpetually young.”

“But he’s 60 something?” Timothy laughed. “Stanley is over 250 years old. He has been the head of that funeral home since its beginning.” I shook my head. “That makes no sense. His father died—” “Magic, Penelope. He never had a father, and he’s never had any sons. It’s just a continuation of him. And he gets that magic from his victims and the other poor corpses who go through Carlson’s.” “There is no way—” “You don’t understand this world. Which is why it’s so critical that you have to get out of here. Go back to Carlson’s, quit, and pack up your stuff, and I will pick you up. Actually,” he shook his head, “go back to Carlson’s and quit, and we’ll head back home to your house together. I’m not taking any chances that Pyro will show up.” “You said Pyro only found me because of that gate point. What was that—” He looked at me. I could tell he had no intention whatsoever of answering that question. “Won’t Pyro come and find me, though? He found out what I look like—” “He can’t see.” “What?” “He doesn’t have the same senses as you and I. As long as you don’t use your magic and as long as you never go near a gate point again,” he added, his voice dropping hard, “he will never find you. Now—” he began. I felt compelled to put my hands up. They shook, and all I wanted to do was shake my head with them, but I quickly realized there was going to be no winning against Timothy. “You’re finally understanding what’s happening here, are you? The whole world is on the line,” he said, regret filling his tone.

“Fine. But… answer this.” He looked up at me. “Is my father really gone forever? Is there any way to bring him back?” He turned away from me. He started walking back toward the car. He motioned for me to follow. “Is there any way for me to bring him back?” “Yes.” “How?” My voice shook. I had not known my father. But something inside me did. And that something regretted his ing. “It’s too hard. You’ll never be able to do it. He is forever-gone. If you don’t want the old gods to spill over the Earth and absorb all life, you will keep your head down.” I had no option but to turn my head down now and stare at my shoes as I followed Timothy out of the forest and into the light.

4

We drove back to the funeral home in silence. My head was spinning. I’d learned so much. But what was worse was that I knew I couldn’t learn more. A few times I opened my mouth, but Timothy was staring resolutely ahead as if he couldn’t even see that I was beside him anymore. I longed to know what was going on in his mind, but I was well aware of the fact that he wouldn’t tell me. When we finally parked outside Carlson’s, he turned and looked at me pointedly. “Thank you for your assistance,” he said. I scrunched up my nose. I opened my lips to point out I’d hardly assisted him. He shot me this look. For whatever reason, it told me not to discuss anything now we were back at the funeral home. I got out of the car. He smoothed down his tie again. I stared at it. Was it important to him? Or was this just some kind of nervous habit? … And why the hell did that matter? I was about to leave the only town I’d ever known. For the rest of my life, I’d have to keep my head down. I’d have to— Timothy suddenly froze. He turned his head to the side quickly. It was just in time to see that omega car driving past. It turned back up toward the graveyard and parked there. From the way Timothy stared at it, I could tell it was important. And there was only one thing that could be important to the third guard of the dead, right? “What—” I began. “Get into your car and leave. Change of plans. Head home. Lock the door.” Without another word, he walked off toward the graveyard.

“What?” I called after him. He strode across the road. I could hear some cars coming, but either he didn’t care about them, or he thought nothing would dare run him over. He walked with such strength and poise, he no longer looked human. I stared at him, my mouth agape. But then my gaze traced up to that omega car. I waited for that man to get out of it, but he didn’t. Timothy walked over and got in the front enger seat. I remained there, staring, cold all over. That was until there was a tap on my shoulder. I jolted quickly and turned to see Stella. Her face was a picture of confusion and grief. She quickly crumpled forward and hugged me. She rocked back on the spot. “I can’t believe this is happening. Stanley wouldn’t do anything like that. This is a setup. I’m sure of that.” She broke free from me and stared at my face. “You understand that, don’t you?” I was a little surprised. The last time I’d seen Stella, she’d practically blurted that Stanley was guilty. “Stanley is…” I said. I turned back to stare up at that omega car, but Stella suddenly grabbed my chin. She turned me around and looked at me. There was an endearing quality to her gaze. Stella was usually flighty. She reminded me of a hyper chatting bird. But today she was grounded for whatever reason. “Stanley wouldn’t do something like that. There’s been a setup. Someone is trying to frame him.” My familiar loyalty for Stanley welled in my stomach. “Stella—” “I need your help,” Stella said as she grabbed my hand. I stiffened. “I was told by the police to head straight back home.” “You can after this. We can’t just let Stanley rot in jail. He’s being framed. And I think the police are involved,” Stella said as she shifted closer to me and

whispered in my ear. I became cold again. I was drawn by two competing desires. I… didn’t know if I trusted Timothy. At the back of my head, I was still a little suspicious of him. His build did fit what I’d seen in my visions. But at the same time, what if he was right? What if Stanley – who’d always been a father figure to me – really was some kind of dark practitioner and a serial killer to boot? I was so pulled by those opposites, there was nothing I could do as Stella led me away. She didn’t take me into the funeral home but around the side. “Where are we going?” “Out into the rose garden.” There was a very small rose garden off to the side of Carlson’s. It was for grieving families. They could go and sit amongst the blooms under a large oak tree. It was for them to find some peace on an otherwise fraught day. We reached the seat. Stella forced me down onto it. Her grip was strong – really strong considering I knew she had arthritis. As soon as I was seated, she leaned toward me. “Stanley needs your help.” “What—” “He’s being framed. Things… things are afoot, kid.” Stanley was the only one who ever called me kid. I almost thought I could hear his tone shaking in Stella’s now. I jerked back. “What—” “I know what you are.” Stella began to pat my head. With wide broad strokes, she played with my hair in an affectionate way. She stared into my eyes deeply. “You’re a guard – a guard of the dead.”

I froze. I couldn’t keep doing this. My body was now so pumped full of adrenaline, it felt like I would have to run a marathon to get rid of it. “It’s okay,” she continued to pat me as she cooed quietly. “I’m not gonna tell anyone. But you have to be careful. There are forces that are after you. Dark forces. Stanley’s managed to keep you safe all these years. But now those same forces are moving against him.” “What?” Terror gripped my tone. “He needs your help. You must clear him. But to do that, you must prove who the real culprit is.” “I—” “It’s that detective. Timothy Waters,” Stella hissed. “He’s the one who took Cindy away. He’s also the one who found those nails in Stanley’s office. He planted the evidence. How could Stanley kill those women? He’s a short man, for the love of God. Some of those women were very tall. How would he be able to strike them on the back of the head?” All my old fears and questions came flooding back in. Even though my eyes were still wide open, I managed to replay what I’d seen in those visions. Whoever had attacked those women had been tall. And… dammit, he’d been the same build as Timothy, not Stanley. I became so cold, I was certain I’d been thrown into the heart of a glacier. Stella stroked my cheeks fondly. “You have to help Stanley. You owe it to him. He kept you safe all these years.” “Safe… from what?” “The forces that hunt you. You’re,” she closed her eyes and opened them again, “the daughter of Death, Penelope. Stanley has always known this. He’s always stayed by your side, protecting you until the day something like this would happen. Because it was always going to happen.” “What do you mean?”

“The forces of darkness have been building for decades. That’s why your father brought you here to Earth. He wanted you to help when he knew he would fail.” Tears streamed down my cheeks. I didn’t know who to believe, but it was so much easier to believe Stella. It wasn’t just that I knew her. It was that her story made more sense. She was also not trying to fob me off or hide me away. “Won’t the police hear us?” I whispered quietly. “It’s okay. This rose garden is a safe place.” “It is?” Stella nodded. “It’s a gift from your father, in fact.” “What… what do you mean?” “The energy here is special.” Stella turned her hand to the side and without shifting her head from facing me, she plucked a rose off. She brought the petals forward. I saw that they were glowing. It was this strange, darting energy. As she placed them down in my hands, it grew like a fire. I gasped. Tingles raced across my skin. Stella just locked my hand harder around the rose. “There is absolutely nothing to be scared of. This is who you really are. You’ve been protected for so long, but now you have to rise up. Because there is no one who will be able to save Stanley and your father but you.” “What do you mean save my father? I was told—” I began. Stella’s lips scrunched in. “What do you mean you were told—” “Never mind,” I said quickly. I was breathy. I could hardly push my words out. Though I wanted to believe Stella, confusion was still raging through me. She clutched my face again. She stared deeply into my eyes. “You must help Stanley.”

“How?” “You have a unique skill.” “What?” “You can find out how a person truly died.” My stomach gripped. I didn’t want to show anything, but I would’ve revealed it in my eyes, anyway. She just patted my face even more fondly. “You need to use that skill to get Stanley out of jail.” “But how?” “We need to locate the serial killer’s next victim.” “How the hell are we going to do that?” She leaned forward again. “Not hell.” “What?” “Never mind. You can do it, though.” She plucked my hand up. She went to lead me away. I was still holding the magical rose. I became keenly aware that the funeral home had several windows that looked out onto this garden. “Won’t the police see us?” I hissed. “Never mind. Let’s go.” “But I was told to go straight home—” “Stanley kept you safe his whole life. Now it’s your turn to keep him safe.” Those words got to me. Despite the confusion rising within me, I let her lead me away.

I didn’t know if it would be the defining point in my life, or that which would end it.

5

Stella didn’t take me to the car park. She took me out of the side of the funeral home. We kept walking until we found her car. I was keenly aware of the fact that it was sufficiently far away that there were no police cars around. My back itched. Was I doing the right thing? What if… I didn’t want to accept this, but what if Stella was somehow working for Pyro? But to accept that, I would have to accept that the shadow man was called Pyro in the first place. Who was I more suspicious of fundamentally? Timothy or Stanley? … That was pretty easy, wasn’t it? I’d known Stanley my whole life. I’d only met Timothy recently. I dragged my lip through my teeth. I got into the enger seat of Stella’s car. As she shoved the keys into the ignition and grabbed the wheel, she turned to me. She touched my face again. Stella had never been this handsy before. Sure, she always grabbed my shoulders and gave me a pat or two, but there was something about this. It was almost as if I was some glistening gem she kept shining. “Everything will be over soon. We’ll find the next victim, you’ll identify how they died, and I will get the evidence we need that Stanley isn’t the killer.” Without another word, she turned on the car and pulled out. … I started to replay what she’d said over and over in my head. It seemed

simplistic. I didn’t understand how we would go from finding the next victim to Stanley getting out of jail. But I said nothing. I couldn’t. My thoughts just became this turgid mess that descended on my shoulders like a freaking storm. I was being crushed underneath them. By the time she pulled up in the industrial section along a small laneway that was covered in grime and dirt, all I could do was clench my hands into fists. Stella leaned over and grabbed my wrist. She inclined her head to the side. I finally glanced at where we were. I frowned hard. “Why are we here? How… how do you know where the next serial killer victim is?” As I whispered that, suspicion started to rise in me. She clutched my chin and looked deeply into my eyes. “Stanley is not the only one who’s been keeping you safe. I have my own strength. But to answer your question, I don’t know where the next victim is. I simply know that someone was killed in this area yesterday at midday.” I blinked back. “How?” “Because I’m a witch, dear.” She continued to clutch my hand as she pulled a small amulet out from under her top. It was a star. I saw a glimmer of magic race across it. It was subtle and it disappeared quickly, but it caught my attention. “How did you identify that someone had been killed here—” “I heard their scream ripping through the etheric field.” She dropped my chin. She turned around. She looked cold all over. With a shiver, she finally got out of the car. She walked around to my side, opened the door, and ushered me out. She instantly grabbed my hand. She held it with a motherly touch. She nudged her head forward. “The rest is down to you.” “What do you mean?”

She smiled up at me. “You need to concentrate on the shadows, dear. That is where all secrets lie.” She pulled me forward. I had no clue what I was meant to be doing. I had even less of a clue if I should be here. If Timothy found out…. “Why did you never tell me what I was?” I asked haltingly. “Your father asked us to keep you safe.” “Why?” She looked up at me. “Because you had to be kept safe. He knew something like this would happen.” “Why?” “Because it was always destined to occur. Those who revel in the dark have been pushing against the light for centuries.” “Did you… did you know how I found that corpse the other day?” She looked at me. She nodded. “So why didn’t you say anything then?” “I couldn’t. I had to let you find your truths on your own.” I didn’t know if I should believe that answer or reject it. She continued to lead me forward. When I turned to her, she pointed at the shadows. “That is where all truth lies. Now you must search them. Start now. I thought I heard the etheric scream around here.” I didn’t want to be doing this. At the same time I couldn’t stop myself. For the first time in my life, I felt a genuine sense of purpose. As I walked forward and I stared at the shadows, they no longer scared me. I started… to see things within them. At first they just shifted about slightly – just a subtle movement that made me question whether I was even seeing it. But the more I concentrated, the more it occurred.

“That’s it,” she cooed. She patted my shoulder. “Throw yourself into the shadows. For it is there that you belong.” I receded slightly at that statement. “What do you mean I belong in the shadows?” “You’re a shadow witch.” As she turned and said that, I froze. “Shadow… shadow witch?” “Haven’t you figured that out? Your magic is to be had in that which recedes from the light.” “But what does that mean? I thought I was the daughter of Death. I thought….” “Death shepherds the recently deceased on to a new life. You, on the other hand, stand as an interface between the light and dark.” “What… about the other guards?” She frowned slightly. I didn’t mention Timothy. I didn’t say a thing about what he’d said. This was a test. “How do you know—” “I… had an altercation with… something. It’s when I started to learn I had powers. It told me there were other guards. Four in total. My father’s one of them, isn’t he? And I’m the second one. Who… who are the other two?” She stared forward. “Morpheus and Hades.” My muscles clenched as she said that. It wasn’t Morpheus that got my attention, but Hades. I stopped. She looked at me sharply. “The memories of what you are are trapped within you. You must push to find them. The sooner you embrace them, the sooner you claim your birthright.” Everything she was saying and doing was completely at odds with what Timothy

had said and done. He’d only answered what he’d felt he had to. The rest of it he’d ignored. … Didn’t it make more sense to believe that the person who really wanted to help me was the person who was sharing more information? I wasn’t sure if that was so straightforward, but I didn’t pull my hand out of Stella’s, either. I started to concentrate on the shadows again. They would flit past me. They were moving faster now. It was clear they were no mere occlusions of light. There was something inside them. Some light – though that was paradoxical. Some life – though that made no sense. Stella clearly understood I was concentrating, and she watched me expectantly. She clutched at her pendant. Her grip was hard. As I continued forward, I finally saw something on my left. There was a small gap between two buildings. I stopped. The shadows here were deeper. Unlike everywhere else, they weren’t moving. “What is it? Have you found anything?” Stella hissed. “I… I think something—” I couldn’t even finish my sentence as I pointed toward that gap between the buildings. She clutched my hand quickly and pulled me forward. It was the smallest of gaps. I didn’t think it would be council-approved. There wasn’t a sufficient fire break between this building and the next. It was only wide enough that someone could shimmy down it. Turning sideways, Stella had to finally drop my hand as we parted and made our way forward. The gap soon widened. It became a proper small laneway. There was a dumpster. I became fascinated by it – morbidly so. The whole while, Stella looked at me. I knew her gaze darted back and forth

across my face as she tried to guess what I was thinking. “Can you see anything yet?” she hissed. I didn’t answer. Striding forward, I stopped near the dumpster. I couldn’t take another step toward it. I thought I could smell something. No, I could smell something. I wanted to deny my sharp senses, but they were working on overdrive. Stella reached me. She looked at me. “Is it here?” Her gaze darted toward the dumpster. Maybe I should’ve made something about that – as if she’d known the body was here all along – but the dumpster was the only thing in this laneway, to be fair. I took a deep breath. I closed my eyes. I walked around the dumpster. I opened my eyes. And there was a dead woman. I… couldn’t process it. And one of the reasons I couldn’t process it was, because to me, at least for a moment, she wasn’t dead. I saw her shadow twitch. It jolted. It fell into her body, then it moved out. I saw it in reverse. It started to replay the way she died. My breathing became rapid and choppy. As it slammed around in my chest, I gripped my collar. Stella said nothing. She looked at me, not the corpse. I could feel magic picking up around me. I was aware of it as it leaped high over my wrists and fingers. For the first time, I didn’t shudder back from it. It was hard. As it leaped within my veins, I had this visceral reaction to it. I wanted to run from it, because some part within me could recognize how dangerous it was. “What do you see?” Stella said as she crunched in close.

I stared in horror as I watched the woman being killed in the exact same way I’d seen the other victims go. She was struck on the back of the head by a brick and dragged behind the dumpster. Then her left thumbnail was cut, and the killer – Timothy – tasted her blood. It had to be him. I was more certain than ever that he was the right build. I hissed and jerked back as the vision ended. Though I wasn’t aware of it, I’d been crying the entire time. My face was completely covered with tears. As they washed down my cheeks and trailed over my neck, I shook back and forth on the spot. Stella came in closer. She locked a hand over my shoulder. She drew my head down and pressed it against her chest. Rocking back and forth, she cooed in my ear. “It must seem like a horrible power. But you must see these things in order to do justice to the dead. You’ve already been doing that your whole life, even though you haven’t been aware of it. Carlson’s Funeral Home was training for this. We tried to prepare you in any way we could.” I pulled away from her. I was still snuffling. “Prepare me?” I spluttered. She trailed her fingers down my cheek. “We knew what you were,” she repeated. “We kept you safe. And now—” I pulled away from her even more. “It’s time to save Stanley,” I said, cutting to the chase before she could. I sniffed and wiped my nose. “It was… it was that detective,” my voice dropped all the way down low. I shuddered, too. “Timothy Waters killed this woman.” Dammit, I’d seen Timothy killing the victim with my own eyes – or at least his exact build; his exact shadow. I’d already suspected he was the killer, but I still recoiled – especially when Stella got a certain kind of look in her eyes that I couldn’t place. I jerked my head over to stare at her, but it had already disappeared. She quickly thrust a hand into her pocket. “What are you doing?” I asked, alarm shaking through my voice. “I need to make a phone call,” she said clearly.

“To the police?” Her lips spread thin over her teeth. She went to walk away from me. I grabbed her arm. Yeah, I was a witch. Yeah, my life was falling apart – but I still understood proper procedure. “We’ve just found a corpse,” I said in a long, drawn-out hiss. “We have to call the police.” She patted me fondly on the wrist. “We need to get Stanley out first. Everything else can wait. You need Stanley, trust me.” Trust her? How could I? How could I trust a single thing that was going on here when my head was running circles and my mind felt like it was about to fall out of my psyche? Hell, even my descriptions didn’t make sense. Because nothing did right now. I watched her walk away. Though she only came to a stop several meters to my side, when she spoke, I couldn’t hear her voice. I could feel a little magic. The taste of it darted along my tongue. She ended her phone call quickly. It became abundantly clear that I had no idea what she’d just said and who she’d just called. Timothy’s warning started to reverberate in my mind. I didn’t trust him. I couldn’t. But at the same time… what if I was wrong? What if Stanley really had been collecting fingernails from every single person who’d gone through Carlson’s? And what if he’d been using them to keep himself forever-young? Stella walked up to me. She flattened a hand on my shoulder. She looked endearingly into my eyes. “You did the right thing. But now you need to do one more thing for me.” “… What?” “I need you to touch the corpse again. We have to find out more information.” I receded. “What do you mean more information? How will touching her again change anything?”

“When you touch a corpse… you can access their shadows.” “I know that,” I said, even though I got the impression that, judging by the exact way she was saying that, she meant something more. Her lips crumpled. I wasn’t sure if she was smiling or grimacing at me. “You must learn to truly develop your powers. It will be uncomfortable at first, but you have to do it if you’re going to have a chance against your enemies.” “What do you mean?” I whispered, getting quieter with every single hushed word. “If you touch a corpse for an extended period of time, you can,” she abruptly looked down at her feet and only slowly tugged her eyes back up to me, “connect to their soul for a short moment. It will allow you to communicate with them.” I jerked back from her. It was such an overblown move, I almost tumbled over the corpse. “What?” She reached out to me. I receded further. “You can momentarily connect with their soul, giving them a dose of life once more. It will allow you to verbally communicate with them.” “To communicate with them?” I could say those words, but I couldn’t process them. My head was starting to pound. My heart beat so hard, I was certain I was going to faint. I only just remained standing as I stared into her determined gaze. She managed to pluck up my hand and hold it tightly. She squeezed her fingers in, and I felt a few charges of her magic. They were absolutely unmistakable. I’d only just come into my own magic, but I was starting to get a distinct sense of it. It was completely different to everything else I’d ever experienced in my life. It didn’t have a weight or a charge or a form or a color. It was beyond the ordinary properties of matter. It let me glimpse a realm far, far superior. As she held me, more magic fluttering over her fingers and dancing over her palms, it locked me to the spot.

“Touch the corpse. She will tell you what happened to her.” “Won’t that… be dangerous?” Stella’s lips twitched slightly. I got the impression she was holding something back. But her expression flattened with comion once more. “None of this is meant to be easy,” she cooed. “But you have a responsibility. You are the daughter of Death. You must act as an interface between the light and the dark. Now—” Without another word, she gestured at the corpse. I was keenly aware of the fact that we had to call the police. The longer we spent here messing with this scene, the more trouble we would get in. Wait, those were old thoughts, weren’t they? They belonged to the ordinary Penelope – not the one who had just found out that her life had completely gone to hell. Wincing, I pressed a hand against my eyes. I took a breath. I dropped down to my knees beside her. I didn’t want to stare at the blood surrounding her. I didn’t want to look at how still her body was. But I also did not want to let my gaze dart toward her shadow once. I pushed my fingers out. I froze. “Come on. We don’t have much time,” Stella added in a pressured voice. I looked up at her sharply. “Do you think someone followed us here?” “No. Have you forgotten Stanley needs our help? He’s rotting in jail,” Stella said ionately. He was hardly rotting in jail. He’d been there for a couple of hours at most. But I couldn’t deny her eager sincerity. For whatever reason, she clearly needed to break Stanley out right now. Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. Okay, I should definitely not be doing this. But at the same time, I doubted I should be following what Timothy had told me and running home to hide under my covers.

No – not Timothy. He was Morpheus, wasn’t he? If the final guard was Hades, then the third guard was Morpheus. … I didn’t know that much about Morpheus, but what I did understand about Greek myth made him the God of dreams. Was he even Hades’s brother historically? … Did any of that even matter? Why was I spending my time trying to connect what was happening to me to Greek myth? It wouldn’t help me understand it. “Stop stalling,” Stella said. Though it was clear she was trying to keep her voice kind, a note of irritation infiltrated it. “Stanley has kept you safe—” “My whole life,” I repeated as I finally dropped my hand down. I touched the corpse again. I wanted to jerk my hand back, but I forced it to stay where it was. She was cold. Of course she was. She was dead. The heat had been taken out of her hours ago. “Keep a hand on her. The longer you touch her, the more your soul will connect to hers.” “I don’t know much about this kind of stuff, but that sounds dangerous,” I itted. “You’ll be fine. You’re powerful.” That was not a satisfactory answer to my question. I just clenched my teeth and kept my hand pressed there, nonetheless. I tried to focus, but it was hard. The longer my fingers were pressed against that corpse, the more this… sense built within me. It was cold and darting. It was unlike anything I’d ever experienced. It wasn’t magic. It was… I couldn’t put my finger on it. It was something beneath. That was right… something all the way beneath.

I felt myself starting to disassociate. I was aware of where I was in space, but at the same time I wasn’t. I was stretching. I was— I thought I was aware of the fact that Stella took a step in close behind me. I didn’t know why she was standing right behind my shoulder. I couldn’t pull away from the corpse now. I was too absorbed by what was happening to me. As this energy began to pick up within me, I felt this vibrating power underneath my fingers. My eyes opened, but at the same time they remained closed. I could see the corpse, but at the same time I could see nothing but her. As energy darted from my hands, shadows slipped from my skin and pushed through the corpse’s flesh. I shuddered. My head jerked back. The next thing I knew, a hand clamped over my mouth. It was Stella’s. That pendant she wore was clasped in her fingers. She pressed it against my lips and muttered something. “I’m sorry, kid. I’ve got no other option. Pyro is after me. I can’t fall. Not now. Not after everything I’ve given to this job.” … It was Stanley’s voice. I had a chance to appreciate that. Then I felt this deathly energy rising through me. It was coming from the corpse. I… it was like it was trying to convince me that I was the one who was dead and not her. I froze. No. It was worse than freezing. It was rigor mortis. I could feel my muscles going into their final contractions. I wanted to scream, but there was no way I could try. I wanted to jerk back – to thrust her off – but again, there was nothing I could do. “I’m sorry,” Stella said in Stanley’s voice once more.

More energy bled from me and down into the corpse. My eyes started to roll into the back of my head. I instinctively knew that when they closed, that would be it. I’d be dead. “Almost there, almost there. Just a little more. Give a little more of your shadow light,” Stanley hissed. The way he said shadow light got to me. Despite the fact the rest of my body was shutting down, those words reached in, stilled my heart, then made it pump a thousand times faster. It was as if the words shadow light were a key that was carved to unlock my power. But it was too late. I was already trapped. I thought I felt the corpse shift underneath my fingers. That should be impossible. She was dead. The back of her skull had been cracked open – but I couldn’t deny my senses. Because she shifted again. “That’s it, it’s happening,” Stanley hissed. I could hear his eager joy. It cut through the air as Stella’s breath shifted over my cheek. It was still Stella. Stanley certainly hadn’t escaped prison and captured me. It was her hand – and her pendant. But it was somehow his voice. Those facts… they started to swim together. I began to close down. My eyes rolled all the way into the back of my head now. It felt like my blood was draining out of my body and into the corpse. She shifted again. She jerked so violently, I thought she rose to her knees. I couldn’t see. All I could do was shut further and further down. “That’s it,” Stanley hissed, his words so quick, they could’ve whipped holes through the air. “You’re doing it. Damn, you’re powerful. I’ve waited so long. Come back to me, Diana,” he said. Stella started to shake. I thought I almost heard her crying. As she jolted forward, her face pressed against the back of my head, and I certainly felt something wet.

Who the… who the hell was Diana? And what… what was happening to me? I couldn’t – I couldn’t hold on much longer. I couldn’t open my eyes anymore. I — I keeled over to the side. Without Stella to hold me anymore, there was nothing keeping me up. As soon as I fell on the ground, I thought I felt and heard the back of my skull cracking open. It was as if I was becoming the corpse. I was aware of the fact that Stella rushed forward. There was the squeak of shoes. I almost thought I heard the squeak of old bones laced over the top of it. “Diana,” Stella said in Stanley’s voice, his voice shaking up and down in true fear. “You’re finally back. I finally got you back. After all these long years. You’re finally here,” he cried through his words. Soon enough, I heard another person sobbing. It sounded like a young woman. It had to be the corpse. How… how was she back? And how was I dead? Because I could not move a muscle. My body was completely frozen now. More than that, I could feel the heat leaving me. What had I done? I should’ve trusted Timothy. I should never have left with Stella. But it was far, far too late for regret.

6

I lay there, completely incapable of moving, dying on fast forward. I wondered if this would be my life from now on – if I would remain behind this dumpster forever. Perhaps I would be locked in my dead body, just a mind raging and roving around a broken psyche with no one to help her. As the fear set in, goading me, ripping at me, I heard Stella get down beside me. She didn’t pat my shoulder. She just brought her face close. “Like I said, I’m sorry, kid. It’s better you than me. I needed Diana back. And I guess this was the price I had to pay. You really were like a kid to me, though. Just… I’m sorry,” he added. He went to get up, but he stopped. “It’s probably better this way, anyway. Pyro will have no chance of finding you when you’re half-dead.” I desperately wanted to open my mouth and ask him what the hell half-dead meant, but I could not move. I was completely locked in. I heard him begin to shift away. While he moved fine, Diana’s movements were shuffling. I heard the squeak of shoes as he shifted in close to her. It sounded as if he wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “You’re back, sweetie. I waited 50 long years for this. I hope you weren’t too cold. Were you too cold?” “It was nice when the sun shone on my back,” she whispered. Though I really didn’t want to be drawn in by the details of this, I couldn’t help myself. That corpse… Diana – had been there for 50 years? How the hell did that make any sense? Her body had seemed fresh. There was no one to answer me. And soon, there was no one to help me. Diana and Stella shuffled off, leaving me completely alone. I was trapped in my own body. I couldn’t move. I tried to concentrate on my magic. I tried to make it push through me, but it wouldn’t work. It was blocked

off from me. I was just… alone. I had no idea how long I stayed there. I would have prayed and hoped and begged that someone would come find me, but I knew they wouldn’t. If Diana’s corpse somehow lay beside this dumpster for 50 years and no one had found her, then no one would find me. This bin didn’t look old – and it certainly wasn’t decades-old, to be sure. But it had been hard to find this place. As I ticked my mind back now, the way we’d squeezed between that laneway wasn’t normal. The little gap between those buildings hadn’t made any sense. So what if that meant this place was magical? I wanted to cry – with all my heart. But it didn’t matter how much of my heart I tried to put into the move. Not a single tear trailed down my cheeks. I became obsessed with the wound in the back of my head. I could no longer feel my blood dribbling out of it. It had spread all around me, instead. I was… done. … Slowly but surely, I started to become accustomed to that fact. I screamed and screamed and screamed in my mind, but when that didn’t make any difference, I just… I started to shut down. Maybe Stanley was somehow right, and this was better for me. Pyro wouldn’t be able to find me. That meant Morpheus and Hades would be fine. It wasn’t Morpheus I was concerned about, but Hades…. From the moment I’d heard that word, something had happened within me. This deep memory had tried to rekindle. Even now as I tried to grab hold of it, however, I had no idea where it led. It kept flitting out of my control like a darting bird who refused to be captured. I spent a long time obsessing over it and distracting myself. But reality kept puncturing through. I thought I could hear far-off voices, but no matter how often I begged for them to come find me, they never strayed close. I was aware of cars off through the laneway back the way we’d come. Once again, no matter how much I mentally screamed at them to come my way, no one ever did. … Is this what Diana had been doing for 50 whole years? Through rain and snow and hail and sunshine, had she been lying behind this dumpster, pouring

her heart out, waiting to be saved? I… I was almost happy to have saved her, in a way. No one should have to put up with this unending hell. But reality soon struck me over the head once again when I realized I would remain here forever in her place. It started to rain. It pounded down all around me. I was aware of it as it moved under my body. It yanked at my clothes. It even smeared my blood. It began to pool underneath my face, too. For a few terrified minutes, I wondered if I’d drown. Then I reminded myself the dead could not die again. It was when I was certain that this would be my life – or death – forever, that I heard footsteps. Someone or something leaned down. A man clamped a hand around my shoulder. “You’re not dead yet, Penelope. Believe me. I would know,” someone said in a voice so deep and leading, I thought it would drag me right down through every level of the world. “Get up,” the man said. I felt energy rising through me. It was unstoppable. It was as if a volcano had opened up in my heart and it was getting ready to explode. This energy – this power rose and rose and rose and rose until I felt my muscles start to jolt. “The first thing you need to learn,” the guy said, his voice even lower now, “is that you cannot trust a single soul. Not in this warped world. Everyone will try to use your unique power. You must learn to use it for yourself. You must keep your guard up forever.” The way he said forever made my gut clench. I finally pushed into a seated position. I instantly tried to yank my head around to stare at whoever was behind me, but I couldn’t. The guy still had a hand flat on my shoulder. He had this enduring heat. I’d never felt anything like it. It was the kind of heat that promised you that even if the rest of the universe fell away and all existence tumbled into a cold and endless void, this hand would still be as warm and inviting as an open fireplace. “Who… who are you?” I managed. He chuckled. “You don’t need to know that. Like I said, all you need to do is

keep working on your power.” “What… but—” “Everyone,” he emphasized that with a blast of a breath, “will try to use you. Even I will, if you let me,” he said, his tone becoming strange. I’d been so thankful for his help, but now I froze. “What… who—” He chuckled once more. “I’m not gonna tell you who I am. But I will tell you what you’re going to do. You’re going to leave. You’re going to shake off this death spell. Then you’re going to keep your head down. You’re going to keep working on your power. And you’re never going to let someone use you like Stanley did again.” “Use me like what? What… what happened?” “You’re a shadow witch, Penelope” he said, his voice reverberating with power. There was respect, too. Whatever a shadow witch was, to this guy, at least, it was important. “I know that,” I whispered. He chuckled once more. It was clearly a sarcastic move. Or if not fully sarcastic, then one that emphasized how little I really did know. But it wasn’t unkind. Nothing about him rang my alarm bells. Except for what he’d said. Given a chance, he would manipulate me too…. “Why did you help me if you want to use me?” I hissed. He didn’t chuckle this time. “Because every single one of us in this world is trapped. We are all looking for a way out. You are that way for a lot of us. So keep your magic to yourself. Trust no one. Including my brother,” he added, his voice dipping down. “Timothy?” “Is that what he calls himself among the humans? Yeah, Morpheus,” he added, his voice going even deeper than it ever had before. It felt like it would penetrate the earth and keep going until it reached some underground realm from which

there would be no escape. That was no mistaken metaphor. Morpheus was his brother. That meant… “Hades,” I whispered. He stiffened. He withdrew his hand, but immediately I tried to turn around, so he pushed his hand back against my back and stopped me in place. “I suppose I walked into that. But yeah,” he muttered quietly. “I’m Hades.” “Then you’re the final guard?” I whispered, awe and fear turning into a turgid mess that made my voice sound like an oncoming storm. “Yeah, I’m the final guard,” he said in an unreadable tone that momentarily reminded me of how Timothy could act when he didn’t want to give anything away. “Pyro—” “Attacked you. I’m aware.” “You… were you that crow?” “What crow?” “Never mind,” I whispered. “Why do you… why do you want to use me?” He laughed. Again, there was no mirth in it – just this deep sorrow. “Because every single broken dead soul wants to use you. You offer us the one thing we need.” It took a long time for me to open my lips and ask, “What’s that?” “Another chance at life.” I heard him shift up. He still had a hand locked on my back so I couldn’t turn, but he was standing, suggesting he was about to leave. Which meant I would lose the ability to question him. I tried to turn around with all my might, but there was nothing I could do against his power. “Your brother is a serial killer,” I spat quickly. “I can see how people die in their shadows. He killed the woman here. He’s the exact same build—”

“You can’t really be assured of anything when magic is involved. Like I said, the only thing you can be sure of,” he emphasized the word you, “is that every single broken dead soul will be after you for your power. Trust no one. Including me,” he added once more in a regretful voice. “You saved me – three times now.” “I count two.” “What about that guy in the bar?” “He is one of the ones I’m counting.” “You saved me from that truck.” “I’m not saving you now, Penelope,” Hades said, his voice full of regret. It got to me. My skin chilled. “What… what do you mean you’re not saving me now? You stopped me from being dead – or half-dead—” “But I’m dragging you back into this world for my own self-interest. Your broken boss had a point. In some ways, you’d be safer here behind this magical dumpster. Pyro would never be able to find you. Neither would my brother. The equilibrium would continue. But it would be a hell of a way to spend the rest of your existence.” “Equilibrium?” “I’m not answering any more questions.” “Why not? Because if I’m stupid and I don’t know what’s going on, it’s easy to control me?” There was a long pause followed by a short laugh. “You’re catching on. That’s exactly the kind of attitude you need. You will not trust anyone,” he said, his voice punching down low once more. “If you really intended to manipulate me, then why would you warn me about yourself?”

“Because I’m a complex bastard. And there is no one more broken than me,” he added in a far more regretful, self-loathing tone. “What’s that meant to mean?” “This conversation is over. I’m leaving now. What are you going to do?” he asked before he moved. “Find you,” I hissed. I didn’t know why I said that. No, I did. Out of every single person I had encountered, Hades had been the one to give me real information. He could be manipulating me – he’d already itted he was. But I… something inside me told me to trust him, even though he couldn’t trust himself. “No, you won’t. I won’t let you. I’ve saved you this once – but like I said, this is for my own self-interest. You,” he hissed, his voice vibrating hard as he got ready to lay down the law, “are going to develop your powers. And you’re going to trust no one. Including—” “Including your brother,” I hissed. “Good. You’re learning. Now, the second your crooked boss finds out you’re alive, he’s gonna try to use you again. You’re not gonna let him.” “But where will I work?” It was, on the face of it, an incredibly stupid question. I’d found out I was the daughter of Death. I’d found out my boss was some kind of crooked magician who’d used me and my magic to bring back someone dear to him. He’d sacrificed me. And I… I cared about where I would work? He chuckled. “You don’t need food to live. You can find new shelter, too. You’re the daughter of Death, Penelope,” he reminded me, his voice dropping down lower. “Now, one more word of advice.” “And what’s that?” “Never go near another gate point.” “… You mean… you mean like that church?” “Yeah, I mean like that church. I have no clue how you found it, but you can never go near there again.”

“Why?” “Because Pyro is looking for you. He’ll only be able to find you if you head near one of those gate points.” “Morpheus told me he’d be able to find me if I used strong magic, too.” There was a long pause. Though I wanted to believe this guy – though I really wanted to trust him – I suddenly got the impression that he’d been holding that fact back. “Morpheus is kind of right and kind of wrong.” “Which one is it?” “It depends what kind of magic you use.” “You… you really are manipulating me, aren’t you?” I whispered. I didn’t want to believe it, but it was time to it it. He laughed. It was a pounding, shaking move. “You’re finally getting it. Yeah, I’m manipulating you.” Though he’d risen up to his feet, he got down on his knees again. It was almost as if he wanted to hide behind me at that ission. “Because everyone,” he spat that through clenched teeth, “is going to manipulate you, Penelope. Your father was the only one keeping you safe. Now he’s gone —” “But he can be brought back, can’t he? Stella told me that – or Stanley. Whoever it was. Morpheus told me that, too – but he said I’d never have the power to try. Tell me the truth,” I stated plainly. I had no idea if Hades was going to reply honestly. But I had to ask. There was a long pause. “It’s possible to bring him back. Morpheus is right, though – you’ll never get to try.” “Why not? You told me to develop my powers—” “You’re far too weak. You’re also too late, anyway. Pyro isn’t going to let you

try.” “But as long as I never go near a gate point—” “To get your father back from the forever-gone, you will have to go inside a gate point,” he corrected quickly. “What?” “I know what you’ve been dreaming of your entire life,” he suddenly itted, his voice almost emptying out. That stilled me. Fair enough, I couldn’t turn around because he was controlling my body somehow – but those words froze me to the spot as if moving was a luxury I would never have again. “Though what you experience is technically not dreaming,” he added quickly. “You should never dream.” “Why not?” “Because then you’ll fall into my brother’s hands completely.” I shuddered. “What are you talking about?” “Morpheus is the god of dreams. Dreams are the third realm above the Kingdom of the Underworld.” He used his spare hand to slap his chest. “For someone like you, dreams are a dangerous damn place. So never allow yourself to dream.” “How exactly does one stop themselves from dreaming? It’s an unconscious process.” “Don’t question it. You’ve already been doing it your whole life. Subconsciously, your magic hasn’t let you fall into that realm. Ensure it never does. But where was I? Oh yeah – your reveries have been taking you back to one key place your whole life.” “Where?” I asked in a fluttering, timid voice. I fancied I already knew the answer. As I closed my eyes gently, I caught a glimpse of that skull lined palace. Of the bones. Of the walls and floor – of their echoing, lonely embrace.

“Death’s abode. You and Death are the only two who can go there. Even I can’t go there, and there should be no realm above or below Earth that I cannot venture through.” “You’re telling me… you’re telling me this has something to do with getting my father back?” “You’re quick. And yeah, the Death Castle has something to do with getting your father back. You will have to venture there if you are to reclaim him.” “How?” “There’s no point in telling you. As soon as you set foot inside a gate point, Pyro will come for you. You very much do not have the power to take him on. I might be manipulating you,” he itted, “but do not give yourself to him.” The way he said that… there was so much shaking need. There was so much desire and fear. I wanted to turn around. I wanted to stare into his eyes. Hell, I wanted to reach down into his heart to grab hold of his emotions. I needed to understand them – to see them for what they truly were. It was important somehow. He rose again. “This is as much as I can tell you. Now, what are you gonna do?” He was like some protective parent repeating safety messages to their klutzy kid. I clenched my teeth. “I’m gonna find you.” He laughed. There wasn’t just no mirth in it – there was no hope, either. It sounded completely crushed. “No, you’re not, Penelope.” There was so much loneliness in his tone, I almost wanted to grab hold of his voice and hold it and hug it. “I am. You’re gonna tell me everything. Because… I trust you,” I added. Perhaps it was one of the most naïve things I’d ever said in my life, but I still spat it out. I meant it with all my heart. There was a long silence. It was punctuated only by the sound of my breath. That was when I realized he didn’t breathe. That didn’t necessarily surprise me, considering he was the god of the dead.

“You must develop your powers,” he repeated once more. He finally regained control of his tone. It still shook just a little, though. His grip on my back was not as strong, either. And his warmth fluctuated slightly. “I’m going to find you,” I said. “I trust you – or at least I trust you more than anyone else I’ve met so far.” “You will develop your powers. Trust yourself. Your true intuition is still inside you. Follow it. Get stronger. Because it is only when you’re stronger that you will be able to stop stuff like that,” he gestured to the side, and I caught a glimpse of his skull ring, “from happening.” I glanced down at the blood beside me. I didn’t know if it was my blood or Diana’s. It didn’t really matter. He was right. I had no way to stop that from happening again. I became cold. I sat straighter. I stared over at the wall. I still wanted to turn around, but I no longer tried to. I’d already seen his face before in the bar. I concentrated on it now. On the compact curls, on the violet eyes, on that endless, endless stare. I closed my eyes and held onto his image with all my might. He laughed suddenly. “I can feel you’re working on your magic now. That’s it,” he hissed, his voice quick by my ear, “that’s how you do it. Now keep doing it. Because the world out there is a dangerous place for you, shadow witch.” Again the way he said shadow witch was leading. I heard his respect and awe. I discerned his need, too. I’d never really felt that strongly around guys in the past. I’d dated, but there’d been no emotion behind it for me. Just automaticity. But with Hades, I felt something. It was for the first time in my life, and it was such a strong, gripping emotion that all I wanted to do was hold on to it. “I’m really going to go now. And you’re not going to look for me. It’s a waste of time. You won’t be able to find me. You can’t go where I can go,” he added in a deep voice.

“What about your brother?” Hades stiffened even more. Then I felt him lean back and laugh. It was completely broken. “You will stay away from my brother. He will look for you, though. He’ll try to manipulate you, too. And trust me, he’s the worst. Morpheus knows how to trick you. Never, ever let him pull you into a dream,” he added. My skin chilled at that warning. I felt Hades get ready to walk away. I longed to turn around and grab his hand. I settled for closing my eyes and concentrating on his emotions. I heard him give a quick hiss. “I’d tell you that that’s it – that you’re developing your powers – but I don’t want you to do that right now. And I certainly don’t want you using those powers against me,” he added. He pressed his hand harder against my back, and I was forced to open my eyes. I lost hold of my concentration. “What happens next?” I said as I clenched my jaw hard. “You keep your head down. You find out more. You develop your magic.” “But then what? You said I can’t go after my father. That it will be too risky. So what… I just exist in the status quo for the rest of my life?” There was a really long, pointed silence this time. I didn’t know why, but that statement had gotten to him. “Yeah, this will be your life from now on. Welcome to hell.” With that, he abruptly dropped his grip on my back. I immediately turned, but he wasn’t there. I saw crows jerking up out of a long shadow. They hovered for a second, staring at me. Then they flew away. I tried to throw out a hand to catch one, but they were gone. Then I just… I stood there. It was still raining. It was pounding down around my

cheeks. I’d completely forgotten about it. I shivered, reminding myself I should be cold. Immediately, I stopped. I tuned in to my hands. I stared down at my palms. I gazed at my fingers. I brought them up. Half closing my eyes, I concentrated, and magic leaped over my skin. As soon as it did, I forgot that I was meant to be cold. I went with what I felt, instead, and that was just power. “I… don’t know what to do,” I itted. Hades had laid out my future for me, but it wasn’t a future I wanted to follow. I wouldn’t stick to the shadows, developing my power and hiding from every single person. I would find my father. More than that, I would find Hades again. I wanted to know exactly what was going on here. I wanted to reveal every secret. I needed to shine a light into every dark depth. As soon as I thought that, I found myself standing straighter. My gut kicked. It could be nerves, but immediately I ed Hades’s warning. He’d told me to follow my intuition. What if the darting feeling descending through my torso was just that? It certainly told me that shining a light onto every dark secret in this twisted tale was the most important thing I could do. I continued to stand there in the pounding rain, staring at my hands until finally I dropped them. I walked away.

7

There was nowhere to go. I needed to develop my powers. I had to stay away from Morpheus and Stanley and Stella. But I needed to go back home. I knew it was stupid. It was probably suicidal – but my intuition was blaring at me that I had to return home. I didn’t know why. Maybe I just wanted to crawl under my covers and hide from the reality of what was going on here. But it was… it was a deeper sensation than that. It was this goading need. I tried to ignore it, but there was nothing I could do. I soon found myself heading out of the laneway. I was careful – far more careful than I’d ever been in my entire life. I wasn’t the kind to watch the shadows… or at least, I hadn’t been. I wasn’t the kind who would stare over my shoulder with paranoia blasting through my chest. But now, the shadows were all I looked at. As my gaze darted back and forth, I kept a hand locked on my chest. I didn’t know how to sense magic per se. It happened to me. It wasn’t a conscious process I was in control of. But now I tried my hardest to collect the energy in my chest, hold it there, and use it to detect my surroundings. When I was certain that Stanley hadn’t left anything around here to watch me or scan me, I left. I stuck to the back districts of town. I sure as heck did not hail a taxi. I walked. It helped get my head clear. Sorry – my head would never be clear from now until the day I died – if even that was possible. But it helped direct my will.

All I could do was think about what Hades had said – about every single word. I could replay them all over and over again in my head with perfect clarity. I hadn’t been lying before when I’d said that the intensity of my experience with him had been unlike anything I’d ever felt with anyone else. He was just… realer. That was it. He was more real than every other man I had ever come across. My heart seemed to recognize this more than any other organ. I found myself rubbing my chest multiple times. I continued to stick to the back streets. I had no clue what I would do when I got home. I just knew it was important to get there. I didn’t know if Stanley would be able to figure out that I’d escaped his spell. When he did… he’d attack me, right? Or at the very least, he’d kidnap me. What about Timothy? As I got closer and closer to my home, I started to sneer at myself for the stupidity of this plan. Timothy had told me to return home. What if he was waiting there for me? “This is an idiotic plan,” I began to mutter. I’d already reached the back suburbs near my house. There were a lot more trees out here. I glanced at one as I saw a black bird flitting between the branches. It wasn’t until it caught the light that I stopped. Frozen, I slowly turned my head up. It was the crow. It had just alighted on a branch above me. I stared at it, my eyes wide and expectant. I jolted forward. I opened a hand. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but clearly the crow did, because it didn’t pause. It flew down and landed right in my palm. My skin became cold, but expectant tingles raced across it. “You… you’re the only one who is really on my side, aren’t you?”

The crow tilted his head to the right. He didn’t answer me. He hopped up my arm until he was on my shoulder. I was keenly aware of the fact that there were people around. One or two of them stared at me, surprised at the fact a wild bird was on my shoulder. Though I didn’t want to trust a single thing Morpheus had told me, he had warned me never to use magic in front of people. I started to pat the crow and pretend it was my pet. I finally made it back to my house. I didn’t go in the front way. I felt like that was stupid. Maybe Timothy was waiting there on my porch, magic in hand, ready to capture me. I snuck around the back. I tried to tell myself that if something was wrong, the crow would tell me. It was hardly a dog, but it also clearly had magical senses. It remained on my shoulder steadfastly and didn’t make a peep. I opened the back door as carefully as I could, my key grinding in the old lock. “Here we go,” I whispered to myself as the door swung in. I walked into the back of my house. It was eerily silent. My stomach had been telling me that I had to come back here. Now it was doing loops around my intestines. Fear pounded through me, and I could only barely process it. At the same time, I wanted to run but remain right here in my house until I found out why it was important. I palmed my face and let my fingers drop down my nose. The crow suddenly flew off my shoulder. It flew right into my bedroom. “What are you doing?” I hissed quietly despite the fact there was no one else in the house. Or at least if there was someone, I couldn’t hear them.

I quickly followed after the crow. Fortunately, my house wasn’t massive. I didn’t have multiple rooms to check. There were two bedrooms, the kitchen, and an open living space near the bathroom. I could see most of the room from the corridor that led to my bedroom. There wasn’t a single person in sight. I heard the crow rooting around in something. With a heavy, frustrated sigh, I entered my room to see that he was in my closet. He was pulling my clothes out. It was quite a sight to behold. His glistening black body gleamed in the midmorning sun making it in through the crack in my bedroom curtains. “What are you doing?” I rushed over. I began to heave my clothes back in my closet, but then I stopped. “You’re telling me to pack my stuff and leave, aren’t you?” The crow looked at me. I locked my lips together. I sat down. I stared at my hands briefly. It was really for only a couple of seconds. It was long enough for me to close my eyes and sigh hard. “This is really happening. I can’t run away from this, can I? I can only accept it.” With that realization, I pushed forward. Leaning past the crow, I grabbed an old duffel bag. I started to cram the clothes the crow had selected into it. Then I went around the room. Even though I knew exactly what I would need on the run, the crow took the lead. He landed on my chest of drawers. He was too small to open the drawers, so I did. Then he half flew inside and began pulling things out. They were all odd objects. They simply weren’t the kinds of things you would take if you needed to stay light on your feet.

One was an old half-burned beeswax candle. Another was a box of matches. Another was an old photo of me and some friends. The crow didn’t want the photo, though – just the frame. It was a complex process trying to figure out exactly what the crow needed me to take. Without him being able to talk, he just kinda had to hop up and down on the spot until I suggested the right thing and he nodded vehemently. When I was done, I had a collection of the most random crap you could think of. I had salt, bicarbonate soda, and a little vial of vinegar. But I didn’t have any actual food. I had clothes – but they were all an odd assortment of fabrics. There was nothing warm and functional. It was as if the crow had selected things by color instead of utility. At the back of my head I knew that this could all be mad. I was well past thinking that I was having some kind of psychotic episode. But maybe my trust in the crow was overblown. Perhaps he wasn’t trying to communicate what he wanted me to take – perhaps he was simply jumping around like a loon. I questioned it for a little, but I soon stopped. Like I’d said earlier – I had more trust in this crow than I did for anyone else in this messed up world. When I was done, I stood on my back porch. My duffel bag was in hand. I took a deep, shaking breath. I closed my eyes. I turned back and stared at my house. It wasn’t much, as I’d already said. It was rotting and falling down around my ears – but it had been mine. I reached up fondly and touched one of the chipped chunks of wood by the doorbell. I let my fingers slide down it. I got a few splinters for my troubles, but they didn’t really seem to affect me. Glancing down quickly, I realized that my shadow magic soon pushed them out and repaired the injuries. I arched an eyebrow slowly. “Whoa,” I muttered. Scarcely were the words out of my lips when I heard a car stop right outside of my house. My eyes opened wide. It had to be Timothy.

Sure enough, I heard someone slam the door quickly. There was heavy, pronounced footfall. Then there was a knock on the door. “Penelope,” Timothy demanded, his voice deep and shaking with fear. “Penelope? You there?” I looked at the crow. I waited for him to tell me to run. This was when he should be jumping around desperately from foot to foot, suggesting it was time to hightail it out of here. Instead, he just looked at me as if this was my call. Everything Hades had told me about Morpheus felt right. Dammit. He had to be the serial killer too, didn’t he? But what about what Stanley had done to me? I now fully appreciated the fact that everything Stella had said was a lie. And if it hadn’t all completely been untrue, it had been strategic snippets of the truth meant to control me. Maybe… maybe I was wrong about Timothy. “Penelope,” he said in a shaking voice that certainly did seem to be filled with comion. I bit my lip and stared at the crow again. “What do we do?” I whispered. The crow just tilted his head back and looked at me. “Come on,” I mouthed harder, the move quick, almost violent. “You’ve helped me out until now. You’re my savior. Tell me what to do.” The crow actually shrugged. Dammit. This really was down to me. If Timothy got hold of me, then what? Would he put me into some kind of deep sleep? What if he pushed me into a dream and gained control of me? Hades had been adamant that I had to stay away from him. But what if… what if Hades had been manipulating me at the time? Though I still wanted to trust Hades – on some deep undefinable level – at the same time, I knew he’d been honest. He really was using me.

And what if he was trying to keep me away from his brother for a reason other than to protect me? “Damn it all to hell,” I whispered, not letting my voice vibrate out further than my mouth. “What the heck do I do?” “Penelope? Are you in there? You okay? What happened to you earlier today? You disappeared. I was so worried about you.” … There was certainly something honest about Timothy’s voice. “So this is my decision?” I whispered as I looked down at the crow one last time, giving him one more chance to decide what we would do. He just looked up at me. I made my decision. I pushed away from the back door. Without a word, I started to flit toward the forests at the back of this suburb. I had no clue what I would do next. A large part of me wanted to go find that church. Yeah, Hades had told me not to go anywhere near it. Hell, Morpheus had told me not to go anywhere near it, too. What if they’d both been lying to me, though? “I doubt that,” I whispered quietly. I turned down and looked at the crow. He was hopping beside me – flying occasionally, but otherwise keeping pace. “You took me to that church. Why?” The crow certainly seemed intelligent enough to understand what I was saying. He flew up to a branch in front of me. I stopped as I stared at him. I was now sufficiently far away from my house that I doubted Timothy would be able to find me. There was a small copse of trees right behind my place that led down to an embankment. Beyond that they started to head toward the thick woods where the church was. I was right up against the tree line. Timothy was not in sight. For now, anyway. “Why did you lead me to that church?”

The crow looked at me. I could tell that, judging by his intense gaze, he had so much he wanted to communicate with me but no capacity to do so. “We need to go back to the church—” He shook his head. I sighed. I palmed my face. “It’s the only lead I’ve got. It’s the place I first found my powers. And it… it has that stained-glass window. I….” I went to say that I needed to go back, but the words died on my lips. “Penelope?” I heard Morpheus calling my name. Make no mistake, it was Morpheus. For the words cut through the woods easily. “Crap,” I hissed. I shoved forward. With the duffel bag high over my shoulder, I ran past the tree line. My heart pounded hard in my chest. I still had no clue what was really going on, but there was something about running from someone that was terrifying, nonetheless. I… began to get little flashes of images. I could see the first victim I’d found – Stephanie Rogers. I was practically inside her head as she was fleeing. Then I was inside her head as she was smashed across the back of the skull with that brick. I had to squeeze my eyes closed, even as I ran, to try to control that image. If I didn’t control it, I wondered if I would fall down and become half-dead once more. I had so many damn questions. What exactly was it to be half-dead? And how had my magic seemingly brought Diana back to life? More to the point, where the hell was Diana now? What about Stanley and Stella? I shouldn’t care about these facts. But I did. The more I obsessed over them, the more I couldn’t push them from my mind. Timothy didn’t scream my name again – and neither did Morpheus. I didn’t

know if he was on my tail or if he’d just been heading around the suburb, calling my name. I’d run from him, though. If, however crazily, he was the only good man in this mess, that would break his trust. But I fancied Hades was right. There were no good people involved in this equation. Everyone wanted to use me. It was up to me to save myself.

8

I didn’t know where I was going. I had nowhere to go and no one to help me. Even if I’d had friends or family, it wasn’t like I’d be able to go to them now. I… this would be my life from now on. Slowly but surely that thought was starting to settle. The crow remained by my side. Occasionally he stayed on my shoulder – but more often than not he would flit from tree to tree. I longed to speak to him. Our method of communication could not hope to answer my complex questions. And trust me, they raged in my mind, getting more and more violent with every second. My thoughts kept flicking back to Hades. I’d promised to find him. He promised I’d never be able to. I doubted that. “Because he comes when I’m in trouble, doesn’t he?” I answered quietly, that revelation chancing upon me as I negotiated down a tricky incline. I suddenly slipped. My duffel bag flew off my shoulder, and I tumbled all the way down the gully. I could see an old, jagged tree root in front of me. Just as fear pounded through me, I landed on it. It smashed against the back of my head. Terror escaped through me. It exploded up through my chest. It pounded into my heart. It spread until… in a split second, I realized I wasn’t dead. I pushed up. I felt the back of my head. There was no blood, despite the fact I’d smashed into that jagged tree root with all my force. It should’ve killed me. But I was fine. I massaged my head again. Then I stared at my fingers. I watched my shadow

magic. “Just how many times in my life have you kept me safe?” I whispered at it. Tilting my head up, I stared at the sky. I had no clue where my father was exactly. Though I didn’t know how to conceptualize the realm of forever-gone – I was certain that wherever it was, it wasn’t like I could see it now. That didn’t stop me from staring at the sky, anyway. “Why didn’t you ever tell me what I was, father? Why did you take me to Earth? Why did you give me to Stanley?” My voice fluctuated. “Why didn’t you help me?” They were cruel questions. Everyone kept telling me that my father had just been trying to save me, but I didn’t know who to trust. The crow landed on my shoulder. He looked right at me. I could tell that he was trying to point out that I was wasting time. I sighed and collapsed my head in my hands. I walked up the bank, grabbed my duffel, and continued on. “I can’t leave this town,” I whispered quickly. “There’s too much going on. It doesn’t feel right,” I added. I looked at the crow. He nodded. I’d been trying to ask him what to do for the past several minutes and he’d been completely ignoring me. Now as he nodded, I froze. “Wait, what? You agree? I can’t leave this town? I have a responsibility to it, don’t I? If Stanley,” I clenched my teeth as I thought of his disloyalty, “and Morpheus are out there, then I have to stop them. I need to find out what they’re after.” The crow nodded. Relieved, I patted him. Then my mouth froze just as it began to curl into a smile. … Just what exactly was I suggesting? Going back to Stanley? I didn’t know exactly how powerful he was, but judging by the fact he had managed to switch my body with that of a corpse, I wasn’t dealing with a small fry. As for Morpheus… I couldn’t go there. “I can’t take them on until I find a way to develop my power,” I began, echoing what Hades had told me. The crow shook his head. “What, you don’t agree? Why not? What if I somehow come to the attention of

Pyro again? I only,” I shivered, “got out of his clutches last time because of plain luck. If we fight again, I won’t have a chance.” The crow looked at me. His piercing gaze seemed to have the capacity to cut through any lie. I hissed. I palmed my face. The crow hopped off my shoulder and landed on a rock in front of me. My top was completely shredded from where I’d tumbled down the gully. I pulled my duffel bag off and started to root around inside it. I went to change, but the crow suddenly cawed. He shook his head hard. I frowned and arched an eyebrow at him. “My top is trashed. These are spare clothes. That’s why we packed them, right?” He shook his head. My brow condensed harder over my eyes. “What do you mean that’s not why we packed them? All this stuff,” I opened the duffel bag and gestured again, “is completely random.” It really was random. From the vinegar to the beeswax candle, to the loud printed shirt I suddenly clutched up. The crow hopped onto my bag. He started to muck around inside it. “What are you doing?” He picked up objects and tossed them to the side until he created a pile. Then, laboriously, he hopped around with them. It took me a while to realize he was trying to make a circle. Frowning, I leaned down and helped until we’d created a circle out of all of the objects he’d selected. It took a long time, but I soon realized that the objects represented every color of the rainbow. “What is this?” The crow hopped back up on my shoulder. He nudged the side of my face.

“What?” He hopped down onto my outstretched hand. He lightly pecked my fingers. “Hey, what are you trying to do?” He pecked again, this time harder. “Hey,” I spluttered. It didn’t injure me, though. My magic rose up to protect me. It was obviously my magic that the crow had been trying to indicate, because as soon as it erupted over my skin, the crow cawed, flew right in front of my face, then flew over to the circle. He landed in the middle. He tapped his claws down twice. “You want… you want me to put magic in the circle?” The crow nodded vehemently. I’d practiced magic within my body – or whatever you called it. But I certainly hadn’t cast spells or whatever the heck this was going to be. Nerves tingled through me quickly. They rushed up my back, spread over my chest, and darted over the side of my face. With a quick, sharp breath, I walked past the threshold of the circle. Despite the fact I’d helped create it, I hadn’t felt anything previously. Now as I walked past, tingles erupted through me. They were darting, quick, and seriously powerful. They stilled my attention. I got down on my knees. I looked at the crow. I closed my eyes and spread a hand in the center of the circle. I concentrated on my magic. I tried to let it bleed out of me. And bleed out of me it did. It rushed as if I’d just opened a dam wall. “Whoa,” I spluttered, my voice shaking hard. The crow jumped on my shoulder. When I threatened to jerk my hand back, he just hopped on my wrist and held it down. I’d already been forced to let my magic empty into something today – but this was completely different from what had happened with Diana. As my magic spread and spread and spread, I started to feel more alive. I opened one eye.

Shadows were starting to collect in the middle of the circle. They then bled out to every object that constituted it. Sure enough, it had been the colors of the objects that had been most important. Because as magic fed them, the colors came alive. They darted up in front of my face. It was like the essence of each color was finally being given form. “What… what do I do?” I spluttered in genuine, shaking surprise as I tried to jerk back. The crow kept my hand pressed against the center of the circle. More and more energy flooded out of me until I could finally feel something ri. “What…?” I whispered. A shadow was forming in front of my face. I had never seen anything like it. Even though I now had a little experience with magic, this was… different. Light intercepted the shadow at various places. Wherever it did, the shadow came alive. And I do not mean by that that it started to move. It… it literally became alive. I could feel it breathing. I sensed its heat. And then I was certain I could detect an intelligence picking up within it. I gasped. I jerked back now. The crow let me. I escaped the circle. I fell down on my hands and knees in front of it. Inclining my head up, I stared at it. “What the hell is this?” The shadow collected more and more power. Suddenly my head jerked back. My eyes rolled into the back of my head. My back arched until I thought my entire spine would snap. It just held together. My memories didn’t. Something cycled through them quickly. It was like it was a Rolodex and they were looking for a . Suddenly they snagged hold of it. I was briefly lifted up off my feet as magic completely took hold of my body. It rushed and rushed through my veins until it exploded out. A memory was taken from me. It was the memory of Diana. It spewed into the shadow. It jerked back and forth, back and forth. It looked as if it was at war with something. The crow cawed. I didn’t know what it meant, but my intuition told me to thrust more shadow magic into the spell. I did. Pressing down on my

hands and knees, I practically hugged the circle. I forced my arms out wide. I concentrated with all my damn heart as more energy spilled through me. My teeth began to shudder as my whole body shook. It felt like I would explode, but I gave more and more of myself until finally the struggling stopped. There was this click – this echoing snap – then Diana formed in full. She fell down to her knees in the middle of the circle. Her eyes instantly widened. “What?” she spluttered. She was in new clothes. She wasn’t in that drab dress anymore. She was in jeans and a shirt. I was sure it was her, though. She reared up onto her knees, shifting all the way back as she saw me. She shook her head multiple times. “No. Dad said you were dead. He said you’d taken my place. He said you wouldn’t be able to come back and seek your revenge. No,” she screamed. There was real, palpable fear behind it. The kind of fear that would reach into anyone’s heart – if it was functioning in this screwed-up world – and shake it. Speaking of shaking, I was still jittering on the spot. I was surprised steam wasn’t rising off me. I pressed my hand against the back of my mouth and pushed away the dirt that had collected there. I didn’t rise. I knew I couldn’t stand. I just stared at her. She continued to freak out. I brought up a hand. It was one of the most commanding moves I’d ever made. It was completely at odds with my old personality. It suggested I had power. And I did. I was finally starting to accept that fact. She stilled. Her wide-open eyes shook with so much terror, I was certain it was gonna rip her in half. “I’m sorry,” Diana said. “I couldn’t… I couldn’t put up with another day in halfdeath. It was my father’s plan. But… don’t kill me.” She began to sob. She fell down to her front. She placed her hands over the back of her head as if I was about to smash her skull in. I finally rose. It didn’t matter that I was shaking. I managed to stand. “I’m not

gonna kill you, Diana.” “Then why have you brought me here in a containment circle?” She stared at it. I didn’t show my ignorance by pointing out I had no clue what it was called. I continued to gaze at her. My eyes slipped across her face. They took in every feature. She looked alive. But she wasn’t. Don’t ask me how, but I knew that. It was all in the shadows. For the shadows she cast were far too dense. It was as if they were keeping something trapped. She followed my gaze. She stared at me as I glanced at the longest of her shadows. She froze. “Please. Please don’t send me back there. Please – I can never go back there,” she gasped. “Send you back where? To half-death?” “It isn’t fair. I’m sorry for what my father did to you. He thought it was best for everyone. He thought it would keep you safe from Pyro—” “How much do you know about Pyro?” I questioned quickly. Her eyes opened. Then they closed tightly. “My father said you had no clue what you were. He said you didn’t have your true power yet. If you’ve created this circle—” I wasn’t about to show my ignorance to her. I’d never been one to command conversations before, but now the power rose within me. It was natural – just like my magic. “How much do you know about Pyro?” I insisted. “He is the end of all ends,” she whispered, her voice contorting in total fear. “The end of all ends…” I repeated that, but it was hard as all hell. As those words were forced from my lips, I thought I’d choke on them. I even patted my throat. She stared at me the whole while.

“He’s coming for you, you know that, right?” Her quick words got to me. I tried not to show it, but I still shivered. She pushed forward. It was clear she could not leave the circle. Even as she got a little closer to the outside rim, I could see magic pick up around her. It quickly forced her back. But her eyes remained just as wide and filled with terror. “You know he’s gonna come for you, and he’s gonna break the equilibrium, right? You know he’s gonna start feeding on souls, right? He’ll use that energy to swallow the Earth whole. You have to stay away from him. I’m sorry… I’m sorry for what my father did to you, but in some ways, it was better,” she repeated. “Pyro can never find you if you’re half-dead.” “What are you? You’re not human. If you were ever human,” I added. She looked away from me sharply. “I’m a witch. Just like you.” She laughed suddenly. “Okay, nothing like you. I’m not the daughter of Death. I don’t have someone powerful watching my back. My father….” She spread her lips. It was a truly emotional move. “My father had to scrimp and scrape dark magic for 50 years,” her voice shook, “to find me.” “That’s why he kept those nails, then,” I whispered. She looked away. “He’s not proud of what he did. But he did it for me.” “Who did this to you?” She looked at me. Her brow crumpled. “What are you talking about?” “Who killed you? Who used you as a sacrifice?” “You don’t know?” I was way beyond caring about showing my ignorance now. I just had to find out what was happening. “Who killed you?” “I can’t tell you who killed me – I don’t know. But I can tell you who trapped me there. Hades,” she said softly. I stopped. For the second time today, I shook my head automatically. Loyalty

rose within me. And this time it was far more powerful than when it had been with Stanley. “He wouldn’t do that—” “Wouldn’t do that?” she whispered, her voice tortured. “You know who Hades is, right?” “He’s the fourth guard.” “Yeah, he’s the fourth guard,” she itted in a tortured tone. “And he’s tasked with doing anything – absolutely anything – to keep Pyro back.” “So why would he do this to you?” “Because….” She gazed to the side. “Why?” I insisted. “Because I have a connection to Pyro.” “What?” I receded slightly. “I have a connection to Pyro, okay?” “What are you talking about?” “I’m a sight-seer witch. I can be used to see the future.” “You’re clairvoyant? But—” “I was captured. There was nothing my father could do. I was used to peer into Pyro’s mind – to glimpse his future.” She shuddered. “What does that mean?” She looked at me, her disbelief obvious. “You really know nothing about this world, do you?” “What does it mean?” I insisted in a shaking, powerful voice.

“It means I’ve seen Pyro’s face.” I froze. That fact shouldn’t mean anything to me, but somehow, it meant the world. “And that’s important?” I guessed. She spluttered. It was completely defeated. It sounded as if she’d just swallowed a popping balloon. “Yeah, that’s important,” she itted in the most tortured voice I’d ever heard. “It means people can go find him and stop him.” She looked at me again. Her eyes narrowed. “You’re dangerous. You’re a danger to yourself and everyone else. You don’t even know the basics. You’re easy prey for Pyro. And when you’re gone, everyone is gone.” “Why? I’m only the second guard. There are two more above me.” “Yeah, but you’re the most important one,” she said, her lips opening in an emotional sneer. “You’re the weak link.” I didn’t like being called the weak link. But I couldn’t deny what she was saying, either. I closed my eyes and pressed my hand against them. I let it drop. “Who kidnapped you? Who made you peer into Pyro’s past?” “I don’t know.” “That’s not good enough. I need answers—” “No, shadow witch,” her voice bottomed all the way out low. She looked at me. I would not have been able to turn away for the entire world. “You need to get out of here while you still can.” “I’m already on the run—” “You’re naïve. The longer you keep strong magic like this operating, the easier it will be for Pyro to find you.” I recoiled at that. I looked over at the crow. For the first time, I noticed that he was starting to get decidedly nervous. He was hopping from foot to foot. I balked. I went to go kick the circle, realizing that if I got rid of the shape, it might break

the spell, but I stopped. I looked right at her. “I need to know more—” “You should’ve stayed half-dead,” she hissed. She suddenly jerked her gaze over my shoulder. So much fear broke through her expression, I appreciated there was something behind me. I had no option but to turn. That’s when I heard this sizzling. It was like meat cooking on a grill. Diana screamed. The crow fluttered away. He cawed, his pitch shaking in total terror. I fell to my knees. Acting on instinct, I reached over and broke the circle. Immediately Diana disappeared. It cut her scream short. I jerked back as I started to see something form in front of me. It was a hand. I could see its gelatinous white surface first, but all too soon, it was covered in shadow. It was Pyro. And I’d stupidly called him to my side.

9

I had no clue what to do. I had only gotten out of that church last time because of plain dumb luck. But Pyro was here for a second time, and I would not be fortunate again. I tried to roll to the side, but Pyro was too quick. He formed in full. The shadows arrived before his face did. I now knew that was important. He was clearly trying to hide his identity from me. I didn’t know why. But it had to be critical. I attempted to jerk away from him, but he quickly leaned in and grabbed me by the throat. He pulled me up. He didn’t crush my windpipe. He just stared at me. He brought me close to his forever-encased face. He hissed. He didn’t breathe, so much as let air escape through him as if he was burning it so the earth would become uninhabitable forevermore. “You brought yourself to me. Finally. There will be no more escape—” I grabbed hold of his hand and tried to yank it off, but there was nothing I could do. Every warning I had heard today caught up with me. I should’ve run – should’ve kept my head down. I should never have practiced strong magic. But I had. There was no going back now. He gripped my throat harder. I finally felt him start to squeeze. This is where I should scream, but I didn’t. I concentrated on my magic. It wasn’t instinctual. In fact, it was one of the hardest things in the world to by my fear and grab hold of my power instead. I just managed it. He tried to squeeze again, but more shadow escaped over my form.

It reacted to the shadows chasing over his hand and almost pushed them back. It was the only hope I had that I might be able to get away from him, and I clutched hold of it with all my damn might. He hissed. “There will be no more running, second guard—” I squeezed my eyes closed. I concentrated – with all my damn mind and then some. I threw my psyche into my magic. It was not instinctual. It wasn’t even easy. It felt like there was some kind of maze in my mind – one I had to navigate on fast forward as I tried to connect and reconnect with my power. Pyro kept breaking that connection, but I just held on. He hissed at me. “You have nowhere near the power required to fight me.” I ignored his words. I thrust further down into my soul. I gathered all the energy I could. I didn’t use it. I didn’t know how. But I grabbed hold of it. It was enough that he couldn’t end this. Not yet. “You can try to fight me.” He suddenly threw me to the side. I landed right at his feet. I began to back off from him as he walked forward. Unconsciously, I was pushing myself back into the containment circle. “But you will never win. Shadow witch, second guard, there is no one who can save you – because there is no one who would dare try. You are as cursed as you are blessed. You can bring the dead back to life, but at a cost. Your magic is formidable. But you are not willing to pay the full price of using it. So I will take that burden from you. Once and for all.” He took another step. I scurried backward. I was now inside the containment circle. He smiled. The shadows encasing his mouth thinned for a single second, and I caught sight of his lips, that white gelatinous flesh stretching like plastic wrap. He flicked his hand to the side. The containment circle closed in.

I was trapped. And he was right. There was no one to help me now.

The end of Shadow Witch Episode Two.



Penelope is trapped. Pyro won’t let her go unless she calls on her deepest powers. She’s thrust further into the mystery of the murders, and yet further into the mysteries of herself. There is a shadow between her and the truth in her heart. It is time to shine a light on it.

…

Tune in for the thrilling final instalment of the Shadow Witch mini-series. It is sure to please fans of Odette C. Bell’s Hell’s Angel.

1

I gasped as I rocked back in the middle of the circle. There was nothing I could do to escape it. I locked a hand over my mouth just as pulses of magic ran up from the middle of the circle and shot into me. They tied around me like a rope. Soon I was pulled down to my face and was pressed into the crackling dirt. Pyro stood there at the edge of the circle, his massive form looming large. I watched him extend his hands and open the fingers wide. The shadows encasing his form always caught up to his move, covering his flesh so I could barely see a glimpse. While I had witnessed his fingers and pulpy gelatinous white skin previously, I still didn’t catch a single glance of his face. For the shadows were thickest there. I had to go back to what I’d already discerned earlier. Clearly there was something important about seeing his face – something he was trying to hide from me. But then again, who cared about important right now? I was trapped. A fact that became abundantly apparent as he ground his fingers in. As magic blasted over them, the containment circle became smaller. All of the objects that had been creating it started to jitter on the ground until they jumped toward me. The circle hadn’t been big to begin with. Now it was pressed up against me. I was still down on my face. I locked my hands into the dirt. Every shaking exhalation made it play around my cheeks. As I sucked it into my nose, I was sure not to choke. Even when Pyro got down on his knees and pressed his shadowy face close, I still didn’t choke. “You do not benefit from being stupid,” he hissed. “You are all the easier to control.” This was where I had to say something bolshie. I had to rise to my own defense. What was the point? He was right. I was so far out of my depth, I hadn’t even been aware of the fact he’d been backing me up into my own trap. I had no idea how these containment circles worked. I didn’t know what kind of power they had, but as I reached out a hand experimentally and pushed it toward

the crackling shields, the answer became all too apparent. My hand was blasted back as if I’d just touched a thousand volts. I rocked on the spot as steam escaped off me. My teeth chattered for a few seconds until I finally managed to gain control of them. As I pressed my lips together and sneered through them, I rose to my own defense. “I don’t care what you have planned, Pyro,” I spat with all my vehement worth. “I may not be able to stop you,” I conceded as my face fell forward and my hair fanned in front of my eyes. “But Hades will.” Only my lips moved. And even then, it was just a slight twitch. They pushed against my bedraggled fringe, making it jerk wildly. It took Pyro a few seconds to respond. He laughed. There was a real edge to it. It was one that dug deep. It threatened to pull out the last of my resolve and strangle it right in front of me. He was still down on his knees. His whole body creaked, even when he wasn’t moving. He sounded as if he was a forest, an old one, one filled with ancient trees just waiting to fall over and collapse under the strain of life. But Pyro sure as hell didn’t collapse. He remained where he was until he stretched his fingers out. He pushed them into the shield. At first I wondered if he was just going to caress it, as if he was truly thankful for it capturing me. Then he spread his hand. More energy pumped from him into the shield. It became twice as bright. I might be a newbie when it came to magic, but any fool would be able to tell that the exact color meant it was twice as lethal, too. I tried to contain my shock. I tried not to let my eyes widen too much, but they did. He sneered. For a fraction of a second, I saw his lips. I couldn’t actually see what they were made out of, though, and I couldn’t infer the rest of his face from that short glimpse. “I should have come for you sooner. It would’ve been all too easy to find you if you were this naïve. Didn’t anyone tell you not to practice strong magic? Didn’t anyone tell you I would be able to sniff out your unique power from a realm away?” “You’re not going to win,” I said in all confidence. Heck, it was the most confidence I’d shown all week. I could have tried to fool myself into thinking that I didn’t know where it came from, but I did. It came from Hades. Maybe our

interactions thus far had all been bittersweet, but they had promised me one thing. Hades would not stop. He would continue to defend these realms. He would do what it took. And if that meant defeating Pyro when I was gone, so be it. I pushed up. It was a dangerous affair. The containment field was all around me, almost right up against me. I had to maneuver very carefully not to let a single part of my flesh touch it. If I so much as grazed the shield, I jolted badly and fell back down. But I finally managed to kneel. I stared at him. I knew my expression was the strongest it had ever been. There was real defiance burning in my eyes – the kind that could blast through any resistance. He laughed. It was this sonorous affair. It almost… almost sounded familiar. “There is no point in staring at me with those eyes, shadow witch,” his voice dipped down, both in greed and anger, “for there is nowhere to go. It is time to end you as your father was ended.” The conversation was now over. He pushed to his feet. If I’d thought his whole body had sounded like some forest previously, now it sounded like planets on the move. There was so much import in the way he shifted around, turned from me, and opened his arms that it was clear he was no longer joking. This was it. It was over. I’d only known I was a witch for several damn days. It hadn’t even been a week. And now… I’d be forever-gone. Thomas was right. I didn’t have the requisite knowledge to understand what forever-gone meant, but it would be worse than death, whatever it was. I closed my eyes. I got ready to accept the inevitable. I thought it would calm me – at least a measure. But it didn’t. As I tried to submit, something rose up from within me. At first it was barely there, but with every ing second as Pyro began to chant, it grew and grew. It felt like fire, but it wasn’t here to destroy me. It was here to light up even the furthest reaches of my body and soul. As it rose and rose within me, I pushed to my feet. I managed to do it without coming in with the shield once. Though Pyro was clearly ignoring me and concentrating on his magic, he did pause at least once when my shoes crunched hard on the forest floor. “No matter what you do, you won’t win, Pyro. Hades will stop you.”

“You can’t even conceive of what you are, let alone what he is,” Pyro said, his voice dipping down strangely. His words were enough that my nose scrunched up, but I ignored his warning quickly. “Hades will defeat you,” I spat again, more anger and righteousness vibrating through my voice. I don’t think I’d ever said something with such confidence before. I was thrusting away all my doubts as I ed how easy it had been for Hades to come save me from half-death. I didn’t entirely understand what that state entailed yet, but I understood deep down to save someone from it you had to be powerful. Hades would be able to use that power against Pyro. “Hades will defeat you,” I screamed now. I clenched my hands into fists, pushed my head forward, and practically fell face-first into the shield. I didn’t care. All I had to do was be certain of Hades. Pyro had been chanting. His loud words had been practically cracking through this forest. Now he stopped. At first I didn’t know why, but I swore I felt something. It was just this… I don’t know. It was almost like a question mark on reality. It was forming all around me. It took me a few seconds to realize that it was forming within me, too. My power was doing something as my certainty rose. Pyro opened his hands wider. He began to chant quicker. There was no mistaking his urgency. … It was almost… it was almost as if he thought I was about to break free. As soon as I snagged hold of that thought and recognized what it meant, I squeezed my eyes closed. What had I been doing to worry him? The only thing I’d done was talk about Hades. So that’s what I threw my heart and mind into. “Hades will defeat you,” I roared. I didn’t just force my voice into it – dammit, I forced my entire heart into screaming that until it felt like it would blast out of my chest just to make a point. Pyro’s chants became louder. He forced his hands up higher. Magic was starting to spin all around him. Wherever it struck trees or grass or anything alive, it

burned right through as if nothing would dare get in its way. “Hades will defeat you,” I screamed one last time. The containment field suddenly flickered then pushed in. It squeezed all around my skin now. As there was nowhere to go to get away from it, it began to burn me. It jolted me back and forth against it. I couldn’t concentrate. I could barely stay awake, but I still just managed to crack my lips open. “Hades will defeat you,” I whispered one last time. I waited to black out, but sweet unconsciousness did not come. For as I said that, something rose from within me. True shadow-light magic played around my form. It was what the air had been vibrating with earlier. And as it rose off me in its purest form, it did something to the air above me. Pyro snarled. He stopped chanting. He jerked around. He opened a hand and thrust it toward the force field, but it was too late. Something had formed just above me. It was a split in space. I had just enough energy to tilt my head back and stare at it. I watched as it opened. Then the next thing I knew, a hand spread toward me. There was a ring with a skull on it. It was Hades. Once more, he was back to save me when it mattered most.

2

I couldn’t reach a hand out to Hades, but the fact he was finally here made my heart leap. And as that happened, my magic only became stronger. More shadow-light ripped out of me and played into that break in space, making it wider. Pyro screamed. He now had both his hands thrust into the force field. So much energy played around them, I thought they’d be burned. I even saw a few glimpses of his actual fingers. I don’t mean the strange gelatinous white skin I thought he had – I swore I saw real fingers underneath. I almost thought I saw a place where a ring should be, too. Hades grew and grew. At first he was just a hand, but he became more until I could see his arm, the cuff of his suit, even his bicep. Having him form above me was giving me hope, but I was still being squeezed within this force field. It was starting to take its toll on me. My eyes were beginning to roll into the back of my head. I couldn’t hold myself up. If I fell against the force field, it would only steal more of my power. Just as I almost fainted, Hades grabbed my hand. With a crack, he ripped me right out of the containment field. I fell against him, my chest flattening against his, my face pres alongside his cheek and my hands locking over his arms. I wanted that sweet moment to last. There was something so unique about Hades. It wasn’t just his warmth and power. It was… him. It was him on a level I couldn’t understand. Heck, I wondered if it was him on a level he couldn’t understand, either. Hades didn’t push me away. He locked one hand on my back. I heard his neck creaking as he turned and stared at Pyro. “This is the end of the line,” he growled. Though I didn’t want to push away from the protective embrace of Hades, I still managed to incline my head up. I stared over at Pyro.

In my head, Hades had the power to defeat Pyro, but I couldn’t forget what everyone kept telling me. Pyro was the end. As soon as I was defeated, he would smash through both Morpheus and Hades with ease. Pyro should know this. But he wasn’t holding himself with confidence. He shrunk back. Strange things were happening to the shadows collecting around his body. They raced up and down. They looked like nervous rats who were searching for a place to bolt to. Hades kept a hand locked on my back. He spread the other – with the skull ring – toward Pyro. “All creatures die eventually. Do not take it personally.” I felt Hades concentrate. This blast of energy suddenly surged from his ring. It was unlike anything I had ever experienced – unlike anything I had ever imagined. It was like a concentrated shot of death. No, it was more than that. It was like Hades had somehow tapped into the power of everyone’s final end and weaponized it. I thought it would strike Pyro and rip him to shreds, but it didn’t. Pyro managed to lift a hand. He shoved it forward. Magic blasted over it. The shadows encasing him couldn’t keep up. For the first time, I actually saw the hand – and what I glimpsed made me gasp. He was human. Male, even. He had a ring – one almost exactly the same as Hades. As Hades’s power slammed into it, it was rebuffed. Hades’s eyes opened. I felt him jolt with pure shock. He almost dropped me. I could stand on my own now. Turning from him, I stared at Pyro. That ring remained visible until the shadows leaped up his wrist and swallowed it whole once more. “There’s nothing you can do against me, Lord of Death.” Hades staggered back. When I thought he’d fall, I grabbed him up by the arm. “No. You have to fight. Maybe if we combine our power—” He shook his head. His eyes were wide. His cheeks were pale. Heck, he looked on the edge of death himself.

“Hades,” I screamed as he finally fell down to his knees. I fell with him. I locked a hand on his shoulder. But then when Pyro took a menacing step toward us, I squared off in front of him. I had been useless against Pyro. No – worse than useless. I’d been nothing more than a sitting duck. But I’d been the one to bring Hades here. I would not be responsible for his demise. I kneeled in front of Hades with my arms held out wide. I didn’t know the first thing about practicing powerful shadow magic. When I’d called Hades here, it had been by accident. Now I concentrated. I closed my eyes. My eyebrows descended hard over them. My lips furrowed into the deepest frown I would ever give. I concentrated with all my might, and a little shadow-light began to play over my form, but it wasn’t enough. Pyro jerked forward, and he reached for me. I could just see a glimpse of his hand again. I caught sight of that skull ring. Before he could grab me, Hades pushed in from behind. He locked a strong arm around my middle and yanked me back. I was so surprised by it, I let out a gasp. That’s not all Hades did, though. He thrust a hand into the grass beneath him. Magic began to play through it. It didn’t just twist past every blade – it sank into the dirt and disrupted it. It vibrated until the earth parted like a pair of curtains that had been thrust back. “What?” I stammered. “Just trust me,” he said. As the dirt gave way, we tumbled down through it together. Hades’s arm was around me. My arms were still thrust out wide to protect him. But we soon dropped away from Pyro. I heard him scream. He tried to bolt toward me, but Hades was too quick. The portal he had opened closed before Pyro’s hand could reach through it. I caught another glimpse of that skull ring. I thought that we would land in the underworld. That’s where Hades was king of, after all. We didn’t. We reappeared back in another section of the forest. I couldn’t tell if we were close or far away from where Pyro was. For a few seconds, I remained exactly where I was, down on my knees, my arms

out wide, Hades around me. He was the first one to move. He pushed back. I heard him give a tense, shaking breath that made it sound as if it would be the last he would ever dare take. I then reminded myself that he didn’t breathe. I turned quickly. I stared at him. He still looked as cold as outer space. I finally let my arms drop. I almost brought a hand up to touch his face, but he wouldn’t let me. He grabbed my hand, held it for a few seconds, then pushed it down. He shoved up to his feet. He went to walk away without another word. “What… what are you doing?” I whispered. “I saved you. That is all that matters. Never,” he hissed, “practice magic like that again. It will call him to you.” “Where are you going? Why are you leaving me?” I hissed. There was a lot of need in my voice. It wasn’t just the fact that he’d saved me. Heck, I wasn’t even sure it was the fact that he had all of the information I wanted. I just… I wanted him beside me now more than ever. I pathetically reached a hand further out to him. I didn’t think it would do much. But just as he reached the side of a tree and opened a dark portal within it, he stopped. His back bristled. I took a shaking breath. I pushed up to my feet. “You came to save me. You keep telling me that—” “You need to stay away from me, Penelope. Now more than ever,” he said in such a tortured voice, I couldn’t even begin to fathom how broken it was. “What… what are you talking about? If it weren’t for you—” “Don’t bother to finish that sentence. You don’t know what you’re talking

about.” He walked into the portal. “Hades,” I screamed before he disappeared completely. He paused, his back bristling again, his strong shoulder muscles pushing against his fancy suit. “Run. I would tell you to develop your shadow-light magic, but it’s too risky. The more you practice, the more he will come to you. Just run, Penelope. As far away from here as you possibly can.” “Morpheus told me to do that—” Hades let out this dark laugh. “You should’ve trusted Morpheus more than you trust me.” “What are you talking about?” I asked in the quietest voice, it was almost as if I didn’t want to hear myself saying those words. “You just need to leave. Never face me again. That way death lies,” he said, his tone becoming so ominous, I swore several leaves withered up and died beside him. My gut might’ve kicked – my back might’ve slicked with sweat – but I still took the slightest step toward him, my hands spread wide. I didn’t know why I was doing this. Yeah, Hades had saved me. But he kept warning me away from him. I couldn’t forget what Diana had said, either. It had been Hades that had trapped her there. Surely he wasn’t a good man. So why did my heart keep reaching out to him? I took another step. He didn’t leave. So I took another step. When he still didn’t leave, I took a breath. I settled it in my chest. I reached him. I let my fingers drop on his shoulder. He stiffened. I swore he became a statue. “Hades. I don’t know why, but I trust you—” He let out a dark chuckle. “Don’t do things unless you know exactly why you’re doing them,” he onished. “And never, ever trust me.”

“Why not? You saved me,” I said again, obsessing over that fact. It was hardly obsessing though, was it? Because it was true. If Hades hadn’t come, I would’ve died, and the whole damn universe would be worse off. Why couldn’t he see that? “I’m not who you think I am, Penelope. And I’m not the man I once was. Now, leave. Run. You’ll have a chance if you don’t invoke strong magic.” “You told me I needed to practice in order to—” “You won’t be able to defeat Pyro anymore. I was wrong. You just have to run.” He went to leave. I just locked my fingers around his shoulder harder. I really pushed him into the spot. I even used a few charges of magic, though I wasn’t conscious of them at first. But as they darted through me and down into his arm, he finally stilled properly. He turned. He looked up at me from under his crumpled dark brows. “Penelope —” I don’t know what possessed me – I really don’t. But in that moment something dug deep into my heart. It spread through my limbs. It lifted my hands. Before I knew what I was doing, I was settling my fingers on the side of his face. Yeah, so Hades was the realist guy I’d ever encountered. Yeah, so when I was with him, unlike when I was with other men, I actually felt something. But I had no right to touch his face now. Especially after everything he told me. But I couldn’t stop my fingers. They had a mind of their own as they caressed his cold but slightly warm skin. And the more they caressed it, the more it heated up. He watched me. He had this unknowable look in his eyes. I couldn’t tell if he enjoyed this or hated it. I couldn’t even tell if he was thinking or if my move had transported him into some far off place. As I got a little closer, my heart now completely controlling my moves, he suddenly reached up and grabbed my wrist. He didn’t hold it tightly, but it was a firm, controlled move. “You can’t do this. You don’t know who I am. You have

to run.” He could keep repeating that, and I’d just ignore him. My heart— He dropped my hand. He looked at me. “No more magic. And no more me.” With that, he stepped backward into the portal. It took me a second to realize what he’d done, then I jerked forward to follow, but by then it was too late. “Hades?” I screamed as I tried to bash a fist on the portal, but it closed too quickly. A few charges of magic spread across my skin, but that was it. It was over. He’d left. For several desperate seconds, I tried to re-create the spell until terror gripped me and reminded me of what had just happened. “No more strong magic,” I whispered in a voice that was so tortured, it sounded as if someone had wrapped barbed wire around every syllable. I soon grabbed my throat. Then, after a few seconds, I allowed my trembling fingers to travel up to my lips. I shook even more. “What the… what the hell is happening to you? Why would you touch his face? What’s going on?” I could ask that all I wanted, but there was no one to answer. The question wasn’t directed at anyone else, anyway. I was interrogating something deep within me. The same thing that acted on autopilot whenever I was around Hades. “What the hell is going on with you?” I went to collapse my hands over my face, but I suddenly stopped. I thought I heard the caw of a crow. I don’t know why, but I was certain that it was my crow. Which meant that this forest was the same forest where I’d encountered Pyro. Hades hadn’t bothered to tell me if he was nearby. As I jerked my head to the side, I tried to assess the trees around me. I recognized the various species. It was the same general mix as the forest behind my house. For all I knew, Pyro could just be a kilometer or so away. To someone like him, that would be no distance at all.

I quickly yanked my hand down from my mouth. I tried to control my breathing. One breath in, one breath out. One breath in, one breath out. I squeezed my eyes closed when that didn’t calm my nerves any. I winked one eye open to see that the crow had now flown up into a tree beside me. He just stared at me. I didn’t know what he was trying to communicate. But I could guess based on the exact way he gazed at me that he was trying to point out that had been a close call. I spluttered. “Yeah. I only barely got away.” I rubbed at my arms hard. I even turned my nails in and dragged them over the skin. I shook my head. It took all of about three more seconds until my fingers drifted back up to my lips. As I pressed them there, I closed my eyes tightly. I finally let my hand drop. I looked at the crow. “You know what’s going on here?” He just looked back at me. I squeezed my lips in tighter. Though the only thing I wanted to do was find Hades again, I realized he wouldn’t let me. So I stared at the crow. “Where do we go next?” The crow gestured with his head to the side. I didn’t know if he was telling me to head in a specific direction or just to move on, no matter the cost. As I squeezed my eyes closed, I decided moving was infinitely better than staying still. Still, with every step I took, nerves catapulted through me. For all I knew, I could be walking to Pyro, not away from him. The crow remained steadfastly by my side. This wasn’t the first time we’d ventured together, but this time, my nerves got the better of me. They goaded me. It was like I was standing in the path of a bull.

As they ripped through me, I was certain I’d be torn to shreds. But I managed to just hold on. All the while I continued to press my fingers into my lips. It was as if I was trying to replay something that hadn’t happened. Because, for the love of God – and a specific god at that – I had not kissed Hades. Even though in the moment, I’d wanted to with all my damn heart and body. “What’s wrong with you?” I slapped my cheeks. “You just met him.” No matter how hard I slapped myself and no matter how much I onished myself, nothing mattered. Nothing changed. We soon reached the edge of the forest. I could see a little clearway, then a road. It didn’t take me long to appreciate I was on the opposite side of the forest from my suburb. That was a good thing. It was quite a thick forest. It was large, too. Hopefully Thomas wouldn’t have assumed that I’d be able to travel it so quickly. It was a dangerous assumption. Barely had I ventured out onto the road did I hear spinning tires and a revving engine. I whipped my head over my shoulder to see Thomas’s car blink into sight. The next thing I knew, it screeched to a stop beside me. I jerked back, fear catapulting through my heart. The crow flew off before I could call out to it. Thomas got out of the car. He was drenched in shadow. I didn’t mean by that that he was Pyro and he was hiding his body. It was just an energetic thing. I don’t think I’d ever encountered someone with such anger. “Penelope, there you are. I’ve been looking for you everywhere—” I backed off. I turned. I went to run. It was a mistake. There wasn’t a damn thing I could do against him. He didn’t even have to jump around the car to capture me. All he did was whisper, and suddenly I stopped. I began to wobble on the spot as if I was just about to fall asleep. Flattening his tie and looking over his shoulder in case we had any witnesses, he

reached me. He locked a hand on my arm. He looked into my eyes. … He… really was Morpheus, wasn’t he? Because with little more than a whisper, he’d made me half asleep. As I stared into his eyes, I realized it would take a little more than another whisper to make me dream. That… I couldn’t allow that to happen, could I? Hades’s warning rang loudly in my ears. But there was nothing I could damn well do about it. Thomas opened the enger door and pushed me inside. I was completely compliant. It was like I was sleepwalking to the tune of his dream. He flattened his tie again, stared around him, then got in the driver’s side. He pulled out from the curb and began to drive fast down the street. He stopped on a side road I personally knew no one went down. Then he turned to me, straining against his seatbelt. “What the hell happened? Why did you run from me?” I couldn’t answer. All I could do was rock back and forth on the spot. My shoulders softly kept banging into the seat behind me as my head lolled from side to side. “Penelope.” He clicked his fingers in front of me. I saw just a faint charge of black magic sinking between them. I suddenly woke completely. I went to scream. He growled at me and whispered something under his breath. I became docile again. Not enough that I couldn’t speak – but enough that I wouldn’t make any loud noises and I certainly wouldn’t open the door and run. “Penelope—” “You’re trying to use me. You’re trying to force me into a dream. You’re—” “Who told you all this?” “Your brother.”

Though I could only just see him out of a crack of my eyes as they continued to flutter closed, it was enough to watch him stiffen. First it was his cheek muscles, then his jaw, then his brow. It was as if his face had become a mask of anger. “My brother? You met… you met Hades?” “Yeah, I met Hades,” I managed. “And he warned me about you. So did Stella.” “Stella?” “She… Stanley was speaking through her. He—” He jolted forward. He locked a hand on my shoulder. He stared into my eyes. I wasn’t certain if he was using magic now or just plain psychology to see if I was lying. “You met Stanley? He escaped.” “What? I… didn’t meet him. He… was speaking through Stella. She’s a witch.” “No, she damn well isn’t. You met Stanley. You need to tell me where he was and what happened.” “I,” I began, my voice forceful as I got ready to tell him that there was no way I was going to help him. He just whispered. The world around me became less real. I started to care about fewer and fewer things. Somewhere at the back of my head I could the fight I’d just been in with Pyro and what happened with Hades. It was irrelevant, though. It was like all of that had been a dream and this oncoming dream was the only thing that was real. “Penelope,” he said in a controlling tone. It wasn’t overt, but it was laced with this magic the likes of which would be impossible to control and fight against. “I’m not lying. Stanley spoke through Stella. He used me to save someone.” “Who?” “His daughter.” I watched as true terror gripped him. His cheeks practically wobbled as if a shockwave had ed over his face. He jerked back, grabbed his chin, and dug

his fingers in hard as if he intended to wrench the bones from his jaw. “She’s the one who saw Pyro’s face, isn’t she?” “You… know. It was you who—” “Stop it, Penelope. I had nothing to do with this. I’m the one trying to stop it. If you want to know who trapped Diana, you need to keep looking.” I almost opened my mouth to volunteer what Diana had shared with me. It had been Hades who’d trapped her. But at the last moment, I controlled my tongue. He looked at me. It was clear from the exact way his gaze darted across my face that he didn’t know what to do with me. He took a breath. “Time to go to sleep, Penelope. It’s the safest thing. You won’t be able to practice magic. No one will be able to find you—” “You’re going to half-kill me, aren’t you?” I whispered. His nose scrunched. “Half-kill you? What are you talking about?” “That’s what Stanley did. He used my magic to switch my life with his daughter. Hades saved me.” I didn’t know what Thomas was thinking. Though he’d been emotional previously, now he shut down. He became that automaton I was so used to. It seemed that not a single feeling would be able to blast through his impenetrable defenses. “Hades saved you from half-death? He should have kept you there. At least you would have been safe from Pyro.” With that, he reached over. He planted the palm of his hand against my forehead. My eyes started to flutter into the back of my skull. These charges of magic descended from his grip into my skin, then through my flesh, then through my head, then through my whole psyche. I felt myself tipping backward. I could start to see the world around me form with shadows, not with solid matter. It was leading me away. Each of those shadows gathered together until they created a path. All I had to do was take a step on it. I could let it lead me out of here. I could let it lead me out of all of this

pain and sorrow. I could…. Somewhere at the back of my head something screamed. It was that same force that had been stopping me from dreaming my entire life. It rose within me, as mighty as a single spark. It tried to tell me to hold on. “Just dream, Penelope. It’s better than half-death. Pyro will never be able to find you. The equilibrium will be maintained. Hope and order will reign.” With that, I slept. There was nothing I could do to stop myself. It was over.

3

I thought it was over. It had to be. The shadows around me gathered speed. They collected over my body. It felt like they were trying to drown me. But just at the last moment that spark rose. It lifted within me. It was like a set of wings. As it unfurled in my heart and chest, the shadows encasing me no longer scared me. It was like they were giving me an option. I had been told by many people not to allow myself to fall into Morpheus’s grip. If I dreamed, there would be no going back. But it was almost impossible to withstand his magic. It was gathering speed all around me. At first I thought it was the shadows that were the magic, until I realized they weren’t. How could they be? They were the basis of my power. They were the only thing trying to protect me now. As they swarmed over my form, I finally gave them the energy they needed so much. I concentrated with the last of my mind and pushed all of my power into them. It wasn’t much. But it didn’t need to be. It just had to keep me afloat. For it did feel as if I was drowning under images. They began to stalk me from every angle. All they wanted to do was make me walk forward. I needed to believe in them – I needed to travel with them, then Morpheus’s spell would be complete. But I held on. It wasn’t to anything tangible, but it was to the most intangible thing in existence. For what is a shadow? It does not and cannot exist on its own. It only exists as a consequence of something else. These thoughts and more assailed me.

But I held on, dammit. I freaking held on. I knew unconsciously that the only thing I had to do was last longer than Morpheus. He would assume I was under his spell. I just had to hold on until he removed his hand from my forehead. It felt like an eternity. Like thousands of damn years. It couldn’t have been more than several seconds. But the toll it had on my body was unimaginable. I finally felt him move away. I heard him take a hiss. It was satisfied and relieved. “Finally. You won’t be able to do any more damage.” He shifted back. As he removed his hand from my forehead, in my mind, my shadows surged. I didn’t understand my magic, and I sure as hell didn’t understand his, but in that moment I realized we had to be somewhat similar. For what are dreams but the shadows of one’s mind playing at night? Morpheus started to drive. I had no idea where he was going. I remained there, semi-aware but incapable of moving. I was locked in my head. If I hadn’t already experienced this today, I would have freaked out. But I knew what to expect. I also knew I had to control my magic. I… had resisted Morpheus. But if he found out, he would only redouble his efforts to control me. There was only so much I could do to withstand his magic. If he really used his full force, I would be controlled. He continued to drive until finally he stopped. I had no idea how long it took. My capacity to understand the flow of time was completely reduced. A second felt like a year. Half an hour blinked past as quickly as a single microsecond. But the point was, finally he stopped. And finally he got out of the car. It took a long time for me to muster the energy to be able to wink one eye open. It was like I was fighting against the universe.

While I’d stopped myself from dreaming, Morpheus had obviously dulled my mind somehow. I had to recruit every aspect of shadow magic I could. Even then, it was an agonizing process. I had no idea where we were and no idea when he would come back, but I knew I didn’t have the luxury of time. The only thing that finally allowed me to wink one eye open was a memory of Hades. It was the way he’d stared at me. The regret. The sorrow. If there was one mystery I needed to understand more than anything, it was him. As I held onto that, I stared around me. I was on a street. Fortunately, I wasn’t in or near the police station. Heck, the street wasn’t even that pact. There were a few pedestrians, but they quickly walked off. I fought with myself. I used every ounce of strength I had. I pushed it into my hands until finally I managed to flex them. Then I pushed it into my legs. Laboriously, as if I was fighting a thousand battles in only a minute and a half, I managed to undo my seatbelt and open the door. I was so careful to ensure that Thomas wasn’t anywhere in sight. I spilled out onto the pavement. My movements were still completely jerky. It was as if I had been in a coma. I slowly closed the door. I shoved up onto my feet. I went to run, but I couldn’t push away from the car yet. My knees wouldn’t play nice. Sweat beaded down my brow. My fringe clung to my face. Desperately, I turned over my shoulder, knowing Thomas could come back at any moment. I didn’t even know where he was. He could be in one of the buildings close by staring at me right now and getting ready to cast another spell. I had to get away.

So I ran. It was uncoordinated. It would’ve looked as if my feet had been replaced by bouncy balls. But I managed it. I reached a small laneway. I pushed down it. When I couldn’t see Thomas, I lurched my way to the end. I reached another small street. I stared out at it. When no one else was in sight, I pushed through. It took me a long time to be able to regain the use of my limbs. Thomas’s magic was pernicious. And it was pervasive. It had spread to every single part of my body. I felt like I was being forced to remind myself every second that I was not asleep. I couldn’t keep this up forever, but at the same time, I knew I couldn’t stop. Who knew when Thomas would get back to his car? And the first thing he would do was come out and look for me. I was obvious. Other people would see me loping along. If he paused to ask anyone, they’d be able to tell him in which direction I’d run. More and more sweat was beating across my brow and trailing down my temples. I was shaking so bad, I was certain that I was going to fall back down to my knees in a jittering mess – but I just held on. I didn’t have a plan. I just had to get somewhere – get safe. And… think. I didn’t know what thinking would do. Because all my thoughts wanted to do was turn to Hades. And obsessing over him wouldn’t help. Reminding myself that I’d almost kissed him wouldn’t help, either. It would just make me feel worse and even less in control. It was when I was running desperately that I came across a figure I did not expect. I saw Stella. She didn’t see me. She had her back to me. She was walking along with a couple of shopping bags in hand. I immediately freaked out. I couldn’t afford to fight with Stanley right now— Before I could turn, Stella spotted me. She instantly waved cheerily. “There you are.” She walked straight over to me.

I briefly considered running, but that would be when a cop car pulled up close by. They weren’t staring at me, but if I fled, they would. I freaked out. Stella frowned as she reached me. She placed her shopping bags down and patted my cheek. “You’re cold all over. You poor dear. You’re still sick, aren’t you? And probably shocked,” she added in her own terrified voice. She palmed her mouth. “I can’t believe this is happening. Stanley…” she just trailed off. I waited for her to turn into Stanley. I waited for her to call me kid – to tell me I needed to be half-killed so Pyro wouldn’t find me. She did nothing. She acted as if our previous interaction hadn’t happened. “Do you need a lift home?” she asked kindly. “No,” I spluttered so quickly, it was like the words were shots. She looked at me, startled. Then her face compressed with a kind frown. “I know it’s hard to accept. But… there’s a lot of evidence. I think I’ve seen it previously, too. It’s real, Penelope,” she whispered. “Stanley’s been keeping corpses’ nails.” My mind suddenly ticked back to something Morpheus said. Stella wasn’t a witch. I stared at her chest. She frowned and looked down. “What is it?” “Where’s your pentacle necklace?” Her frown grew deeper. “Pentacle necklace? What are you talking about?” “I saw you earlier today. You were wearing a pentacle.” She shook her head. She grabbed her pendant and pulled it out, but it was just a chunk of amber. The concern she’d been showing for me redoubled. She leaned in and pressed a hand against my head. “You’re burning up,” she spat. “I really have to take you

home—” “I’m okay.” I took a step back from her. I began to reevaluate this. Stanley was not controlling her. “Stanley—” I began. “You’ve heard, haven’t you?” she whispered. “He escaped.” I froze. “I can’t believe it. It proves everything I already suspected.” “Where—” I began. I was about to ask her where she’d been earlier today. I wanted to know if she’d been aware of it or if, in her head, she had no clue what she’d done with me. Her gaze flashed up. She took a step closer. “You know, he once told me he has this old family property up in the hills. One no one else knows about. It belonged to his father.” “What?” I spluttered. “It’s on Dovetail Road – or something like that. It’s one of those large old Edwardian houses. I saw a photo of it once in his office. I want to tell the police,” she said, her nose scrunching, “but every time I try…” she trailed off. It was clear that she was confused but also clear that she had no idea why she was confused. She started to scratch her brow. She looked at me, looked at her shopping, then back at me. “What was I saying?” I didn’t have to crunch in close and place a hand on her cheek in order to feel the magic suddenly zipping up around her. Without an invitation, I suddenly grabbed her amulet. “What are you—” I ripped it off in one smooth move with a few charges of magic to ensure that the

chain snapped without taking her neck with it. I could feel Stanley’s control sizzling through the pendant. “What…” Stella started to look sleepy. “The bastard’s been controlling you through this, ha?” I snarled. I went to chuck it away, but I thought better of it. I shoved it into my pocket. I’d always liked Stella. I stepped in close. “Are you okay now, Stella?” She scratched her chin. “I can’t really why I’m here or what I’m doing.” I glanced down at her bags. “You’re heading home. We were just talking about Stanley, the bastard,” I added. She looked at me sharply. She nodded. “I’m glad you’re finally accepting reality.” I laughed. “Yeah, so am I.” I settled a hand on her shoulder and patted it fondly. “You’ll be safe from now on, Stella.” She frowned at me. “Safe?” “All of us will be. Our horrible boss is gonna go down forever,” I said, my voice vibrating low on the word down. She nodded. “Don’t worry, someone will find him soon,” I added. I kept a hand in my pocket. I locked my fingers harder around the pendant. I had been told by Hades to keep my head down, not to practice any magic, to just run. I didn’t know if that was the right thing to do. I couldn’t tell what had happened with Pyro. I had no clue why Hades’s instructions to me had changed after he’d fought him. But there was one thing I

could be sure of. As I grabbed that pendant and watched Stella walk off, still confused, I realized someone had to put a stop to wizards like Stanley. To Morpheus, too. And to Pyro. And Hades wouldn’t be able to do it on his own. Nothing would change – the status quo would continue – unless I did something. Far off, I thought I heard the caw of a crow. I tilted my head up to stare at it. Then I turned. I had something to do – an old friend to visit one last time.

4

There was every chance that this was the wrong plan. It was suicidal. Stanley was more powerful than me. He had made me half-dead previously. I’d only got out because of Hades. Now I was sure Hades wouldn’t come to my aid again, no matter how much I begged him. I’d seen that terrified look in his eyes. It was as if he couldn’t trust himself around me anymore. If I wanted anything to change – if I wanted to save myself – I would have to rise to my own damn defense. I couldn’t afford to walk all the way to Dovetail Road. I already knew where it was. It was right on the outskirts of town. In order to get there, I needed a car. Though I would never usually steal, I had no option. It wasn’t like I could head home. Thomas would be there waiting for me. I found a car in a side street. I placed a hand on it, ready to take it, but immediately I caught a glimpse of something. It was of a grieving family. Don’t ask me how, but I just… I knew this car belonged to a widow who’d just lost her husband. I clenched my teeth. I moved on. I kept touching cars. I got a short life story of the owners of each one. I would not steal from somebody who was already in a bad way. It didn’t take me much longer, however, to find the car of a bona fide criminal. The guy was white-collar. He was into trafficking – the human kind. As soon as I locked my hand on the handle of the car, a jolt of pure anger and disgust blasted through me. It rose up my throat as if I was about to chuck. I tightened my fingers around the handle. I yanked it open. I sat and sighed. It was one of those fancy new cars that needed a key to be in proximity of the

driving stack before it started. “Let’s see if I can do this,” I muttered to myself. I stretched a hand forward. I locked it on the dash. I let my eyes flutter into the back of my head, and I damn well concentrated. As zips of power blasted through me, they sank into the dash. At first they did nothing, but finally I could start to feel power rising from it. A few short seconds later, there was the sweet sound of a revving engine. My lips curled into a smile. I grabbed the steering wheel. “I can’t believe that worked,” I hissed. I’d just used magic. I turned my head over my shoulder quickly. I checked the mirrors and the street around me. I waited for Pyro to walk out of a crack in reality. He didn’t. I clenched my teeth and forced a breath through them. “Here we go. No backing down,” I spat, even though my hands started to shake. Because this was the worst possible plan. I had to go back to the fact that I didn’t know how to use my magic but Stanley knew perfectly well how to use his. Worse than that, presumably his daughter would be there with him. … It was his daughter I really needed to speak to. She’d seen Pyro’s face. I don’t know why, but his face was the most important detail. If I knew it, everything else would slip into place. I drove in silence. I didn’t speak to myself or sing to myself or mutter my thoughts out loud. I let them swirl inside my mind in a turgid, toxic mix of fear, anger, and desperation. By the time I finally made it to Dovetail Road, I wanted to turn back. My whole body was alight with nerves. As they shifted through me, snaking up my muscles, twirling around my spine, and shuddering into my jaw, they begged me to retreat. But I was way past running away. Stella was right. It didn’t take long to find Stanley’s house. A lot of the other places on this remote road were small shack-like things. But there was one

massive Edwardian house right on the top of the hill. The woods were right up against it, wild and embracing. They hugged the side of the white weatherboards. The roof was painted this dark blue. It peeked over the top of several spruces, looking like the spire of some dark church. That was no paranoid image. I could feel energy coming off the place from here. I didn’t drive all the way up to the house. I wasn’t that stupid. I parked the car on the edge of the road. Then I got out. I continuously wiped my sweaty hands on my pants. I closed my eyes. I walked up the driveway. I didn’t know how Stanley’s powers worked. I wondered if he could already sense me coming. I could not back down now. I finally reached the house. By the time I did, it was as if I’d gone on a tour of horror. This place had seen its fair share of death. It had created it, too. To think… to think that I’d genuinely liked Stanley. He’d been my surrogate father. He’d kept me sane. He’d kept me on track. “No,” I whispered, my voice little more than a breath, “he kept me controlled.” As I settled that reality in my heart, I finally reached the side of the house. I didn’t walk right up to the front. I wasn’t that stupid. I came at it from the left. Old houses like this had multiple entries and exits, and sure enough, I spied a porch with a small door that looked as if it led into a scullery kitchen. I didn’t yank the handle open and stride inside. I settled my fingers on it. There was magic there, vibrating pulses of it. It spun around the handle. I knew that the second I tried to open it would be the second they’d spring into place – right through my palm. “Nasty,” I muttered quietly under my breath. I needed to get a handle on my shadow magic, but to do that, I had to practice. And to practice, I had to forget that Pyro was out there, waiting to sniff down my power at any moment.

But I was committed to this plan, however stupid it might be. I waited there, God knows how long. Minutes drifted past. I tried desperately to grab hold of my shadow magic. It kept flitting away, however. It was almost as if every time I tried to concentrate, it was like I was shining a light on it – and shadows can’t exist where you shine lights. It wasn’t until I made that association that I realized just how mysterious my force was. It was almost as if I had to let it use me. I had to concentrate on it, but not directly. I had to let my body do all the controlling while my mind just forged a path forward. Finally I felt a click underneath my hands. The handle vibrated. I opened my eyes to watch dust drift out of it. The nasty spring spell disintegrated. It wafted away on a quick wind that was chased into the woods. I opened the door. I was keenly aware of the slight creak it made – despite the fact it was no worse than a branch under a wind. I walked into the kitchen. I expected to see Stanley there. I waited for him to cast some devilish spell on me and to get this fight started, but he wasn’t there. I inched through the kitchen. My hands were itchy. My whole damn body was as stiff as a plank. But I continued to move, every step controlled. I made it out of the kitchen. If I’d thought the outside of the house was bad, then the kitchen was much, much worse. There was this dense, dark energy in here. I could tell that for years, if not decades and centuries – dark magic had been practiced here. The kind that involved bodies, blood, hair, and nails. I even saw a jar of nails on a hallway stand. I took one look at it, and I wanted to hurl. Pressing a hand against my lips, I just managed to control myself. I continued on.

I couldn’t risk coming across Stanley suddenly. I needed to prepare myself to fight him. Considering it had taken me five full minutes to break in, I was now keenly aware of how unlikely it would be that I would be able to face him and win in a fight. You’d think that would be when I would turn around and flee, but I continued forward. I almost thought I heard a crow cawing off into the woods. It made my lips twitch slightly. “Always there to push me on when I threaten to fall behind,” I whispered under my breath. I saw a massive wide staircase that led up to the two top levels of the house. I went to take it. I placed a hand on the banister. I carefully pushed my foot onto the first step, and thankfully it didn’t creak. That’s when I heard a breath. It wasn’t behind me or anything. It wasn’t anywhere in the hallway. It was somewhere further through the first floor. But that wasn’t the point. It had an effect on me. Because the breath was wrong. I could tell that whoever was breathing wasn’t doing so to live. They were doing so to fit in. “Diana,” I mouthed. I retreated from the stairs. I walked toward the breath. All my senses were locked on it. I’d already got the impression when I’d seen Diana in the containment circle that she wasn’t normal – that she wasn’t human. As I approached her, that knowledge only spread. It made my limbs stiffen. It made me curl my hands into fists. I honestly didn’t understand where I fit into the four guards. My father shepherded the dead. Morpheus was the god of dreams. And Hades was the Lord of the Underworld. I was a shadow witch. But what did I do for the dead? Bring them back to life? Pyro had already itted that I could do that. He’d said I wouldn’t want to pay the price, though. I very much doubted that that was my job, anyway. So what did I do? These thoughts filled me as I finally reached an open door. It led to some kind of

lounge room. I peered through it and saw Diana on a couch. She was reading an old tome. It was open in her lap. The pages were ancient, but I got the impression that they were nowhere near as old as she was. As I watched from the doorway, I ensured that Stanley wasn’t anywhere near. I finally took a step in. Diana stopped, her fingers freezing on the page as she went to flip it. She turned toward me. I watched as fear blasted over her expression. I shoved forward. I didn’t let my mind control what my body needed to do. And that ensured shadows spread out around me. They encircled her. They moved in quickly and without remorse. Just as she tried to scream, the shadows stopped that scream from spreading. Terrified and awed by what I’d just done, I stared at my hands before dropping them and glancing at her. She’d jumped to her feet when she’d seen me, but now she fell back against the couch. Her face was awash with terror. She shook her head. Pressing the back of her fingers against her mouth, she shook her head once more, over and over again. “No. Please. Don’t kill me. It’s not fair. Hades—” “I’m not here to kill you,” I growled. I took a step inside my shadow as I did. I didn’t know what it was doing to ensure that sound wasn’t spreading, but I needed that right now. Diana did not launch toward me and try to attack me. She remained on the couch, terrified as if she was staring at an apparition. I’d seen that gaze before. Other people clearly knew I was powerful. So the energy was within me. I just had to find it. Dammit, I just had to find it.

I curled my hands into fists, then tighter fists. No matter how much my nails dragged across my skin, it did not cut. She stared from my hands up to my face. She shook her head. “Please don’t take me back down to Hades. It’s not fair.” “Like I told you, I have no intention—” “But that’s your job.” My nose scrunched. “Sorry?” “That’s your job. You deal with spirits. Ghosts. With… specters.” As she said that, she lifted her hands. It wasn’t just her breath that was off. I finally saw that her flesh didn’t fit, either. That wasn’t to say that it wasn’t functional as it covered her form. It was to say that… it didn’t look right. Though I guess it looked real, it was almost like a suggestion and nothing more. I frowned harder. My lips dropped open. She continued to shake her head. She pressed forward, locked her elbows against her knees, and collapsed her head in her palms. “I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t exist. But it isn’t fair,” she spluttered one last time. “I deal with… spirits?” I couldn’t move past that point. I knew the importance of pretending I was in control of this conversation. But screw that. I had just been questioning what I was. Now I had an answer. And it wasn’t a lie. As I stared at my hands again, it felt right. I’d been dreaming of ghosts my whole life – or at least had been having reveries of them. It was ghosts that had first shown me that I had power. If I hadn’t seen Stephanie Rogers running across the road, I would never have been drawn into my shadow magic. She looked at me sharply. “You have no clue what you are. But—”

I took another step toward her. “I have no intention of killing you, Diana. I just want information.” She pressed her lips together. She looked down at her hands. “You’ll kill me, anyway. That’s your job. You extinguish the last of the light from the shadows.” My gut catapulted now. It felt as if I had swallowed a cannonball. It took an agonizingly long time for my lips to part. “What?” I whispered. “That’s why you can practice shadow-light magic. You exist to pull the last of the light from the shadows. That’s what we spirits are. We’re like a spark – a spark that shouldn’t be there. One that should fall back down to Hell to be recycled.” She collapsed forward again. She really locked her hands over her face. She rocked back and forth, back and forth. “I… pull the last of the light from the shadows?” As I said that, my voice was empty. There was no power, because there was no strength anywhere in me. It was emptying out. … She was right. My father existed to take the living to the underworld. I… I existed to shepherd ghosts to the underworld. We were a pair. I stood there for I don’t know how long. I wasn’t cold. I wasn’t hot. I wasn’t terrified, but I wasn’t happy, either. I was just stuck between all of those states. They raged through me, shaking harder and harder as if I’d swallowed a storm. Diana finally dropped her hands. She stared at me. “Just make it quick, okay?” “I told you—” “And I told you, regardless of what you want to do, you will end up taking me to the underworld.” “How?” I whispered quietly.

“Because of your power. When you stare at someone’s shadow, you draw the last of their light from them unconsciously.” That riveted me to the spot. I’d been complaining that I had no way to control my shadow-light, but learning that regardless of how much control I developed I would never be able to stop myself from attacking ghosts… it undermined me. I felt shaky all over. Diana just watched me. Her cheeks looked so cold that I was certain she was nothing more than a walking corpse. “I’m sorry for what my father did. But—” she began. I took another step toward her. “It isn’t your father that I’m after. I need to know everything about Pyro. I need to know what he looks like,” I whispered. She immediately jerked her head away. Tears filled her eyes. “If I… if I hadn’t been used to glimpse him, I’d still be alive.” She grabbed her arms. She really pushed her fingers in. She dragged them back and forth until it looked as if she was about to rake the flesh from her bones. While that didn’t happen, I did see a few charges of magic escape. They had this shadowy quality. But within them… within them I could see sparks. Something happened to those sparks as I stared at them. They became fewer. Diana jolted. She stared at me. She shook her head. “See what I mean? You deal with spirits without even knowing it. That’s what my father used you for,” she said, her laugh disted and broken. “While he…” it took her a long time to gather the confidence to say what she had to say next, “while he gathered all of the things he required for my spell,” she said, almost incapable of saying the word spell without her whole body shaking, “you were used to placate the dead.” “What… what do you mean?” “If you take parts from a corpse to be used in dark magic, it almost invariably turns them into ghosts. Vengeful ones. People don’t want to be tied down to this realm when they die. They want to move on without any baggage. But dark

magic has its consequences.” As she spoke, I could tell that she hated what her father had done but at the same time had to rationalize it. “So he… he used me to deal with ghosts without me even knowing it?” She nodded. She wouldn’t look at me now. She wouldn’t look anywhere. Her face was awash with total confusion. She suddenly jolted her head up, though. “It had to be done. It is torture,” she said, her voice shaking in total fear yet total certainty, “to be half-dead for eternity. Hades would have just left me there—” “Hades isn’t like that,” I tried. She stared at me, her gaze blazing. “And how would you know?” “Because I know him, all right? And he isn’t like that.” She laughed. It was completely hollow. “How would you know him? He hasn’t allowed you to see him all these years, even though you’re the only one who can see him.” “What?” She laughed. “Even his brother can only see him in his dreams.” I shook my head. “That makes no sense. I’ve seen Thomas – Morpheus – going to Hades’s car multiple times. He always reacts when Hades is near. And I saw someone else talk with Hades at a bar once.” “You likely saw an apparition talk to Hades. As for Morpheus, he’s aware of his brother’s presence, but he can’t see him unless he’s dreaming. Presumably as soon as he went into the car to talk to Hades, he would have forced himself to go to sleep.” “That makes no sense. Why wouldn’t anyone else be able to see Hades?” “Because Hades is a spirit. The most powerful of all. He is also the most hidden of all. He has to be. But you can see everything that’s hidden. Your magic

intersects with his.” “You’re telling me… no one else in existence can see him? What about my father?” My voice shook as soon as I mentioned his name. She shook her head. “Death and Hades had nothing to do with each other. Only you can see Hades – no one else.” I opened my mouth again to say that made no sense, but I stopped. I replayed in my mind every single time Hades had seen me. It had been different. The way he looked at me… there’d been something needy behind it. And now I knew why. I was the only person in existence beyond spirits who could see him. That was cruel beyond imagination. “I don’t know what you’re thinking about him,” she said in a sudden growl, “but I would stop. He does not deserve your pity.” “How could you say that? To be cursed for eternity—” “I was cursed for eternity by him.” She slapped her chest and pointed a stiff finger in the direction of the floor. “He kept me there, through rain, through sunshine, through hail.” I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just stared at her. Then I glanced at my hands once. I closed my eyes and reminded myself of my mission. “You need to tell me what Pyro looks like.” She laughed. “I wish I could tell you.” “Then do it.” “Hades stole that information. I’ve been trying to get it back. I thought it would come back with time, but it’s not.” She pressed her sweaty fingers into her brow. She dragged them hard down her temples. “It’s stuck. Behind his wall. Even though I got out of his clutches, he’s still here.” She crossed her arms. She flopped back on the couch. She was not sullen. It was as if she was protecting herself in the only way she had left. I continued to stare at her. I wanted to come to his defense, but I… I couldn’t

deny her ion. I wanted to pretend that Hades wouldn’t do that, but I… had no clue whatsoever. Hades was certain that he was a bad man. This was probably why. I couldn’t remain here. The longer I stayed, the more danger I’d be in. Sure enough, I heard a creak from behind me. I turned just in time to see Stanley walking in. He had a platter with sandwiches and a drink on it. All of them were covered in this weird black energy. It was likely because Diana wasn’t alive and couldn’t really eat. But enough of the sandwiches. As soon as Stanley saw me, he dropped the tray. He opened his hands wide. This pentacle pendant lifted up from his chest. No, who was I kidding? It burned through his clothes. He roared. Thrusting his hands forward, the pentacle burned a circle in the air. It shot toward me. It smashed into the shadow magic I’d been using to contain Diana. It blasted it to smithereens. I was thrown to the side. I didn’t stay down. I pushed up. Stanley roared again. He burned another one of those pentacles into the air and sent it hurtling toward me. I rolled. The pentacle smashed into the TV, destroying it completely. “No. Don’t fight her. You’ll make it worse,” Diana tried. But her father would listen to no reason. He roared again. I heard the terror and deep need. It was clear he would do anything – anything at all for his daughter. I pushed up. I had to fight. It was my turn to open my hands. I tried to call on my shadow magic, but I’d forgotten my most fundamental lesson. It would not follow my mind. It could

only be cast in the shadow of my attention. I stood there for way too long, a wide-open target. He took full advantage of it. He sent another one of those burning pentacles slashing toward me. I couldn’t get out of the way. It smashed into my chest. It knocked the breath from me. I was thrown back into the wall. I blasted into a bookcase. I broke it, and little knickknacks and tomes hailed around me. They banged hard into my head, but nothing could knock me out. “You should’ve stayed half-dead,” Stanley roared. “No, Dad, please. You’ll make it worse. She’s already… she’s already taken most of my light,” Diana said. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched her fall back onto the couch and grab her arms. She looked almost insubstantial now. I’d… I’d done that without even being aware of it. “You monster,” Stanley roared at me. Screaming once more, he let another massive blast of energy smash into me. I had no option but to take it on the chest. It was way worse than before. It pulled me up and smashed me into the ceiling then locked me against the floor. I spluttered underneath it. Choking and struggling, I tried to shove it back, but I couldn’t. “You shouldn’t have come here. You should’ve stayed half-dead,” he roared once more. “No, Dad, please. You’ll just make it worse for yourself. You are already going to Hell,” she hissed. “I’ll be dead when I’m dead. Don’t think about the underworld. Not yet. I will do everything,” Stanley said as he took a determined step up to me, his footfall ringing, “to keep you alive. I have wasted 50 years of my life for this.” “You shouldn’t have done it if it was a waste,” Diana said, her voice a tortured

mess. I watched Stanley’s cheeks twitch. “Not a waste, then. I misspoke, my dear. It was never a waste. I focused,” he took a step toward me, “with everything I had,” he took another step toward me, “in order to get you back. I am not going to lose you now.” He reached me. There were these two burning mandalas blasting over his wrists and up his arms. I’d never seen power like it. It shook me to the spot. It told me that as soon as those mandalas catapulted into my skin, it would be lights out forever. “You should’ve stayed half-dead,” he growled once more. I closed my eyes. I wasn’t about to give up. I just… I could feel Stanley’s pain. I didn’t agree with what he’d done. I couldn’t condone how many spirits he’d stolen from. But I… I let myself become awash with his darkest side. It was only then that my power began to rise. As I tuned in to his shadow, it did something to his energy. He spluttered. I opened my eyes in time to see that the pentacles in front of his hands were starting to shake. “What are you doing to me? You don’t have this power. You’ll never have this power. You don’t know how to use your own magic,” he spluttered. But no matter how much he repeated that, it wasn’t true. I could go into other people’s shadows. It wasn’t just my own. It wasn’t just the shadows of the dead, either. I could shine a light on the darkness within everyone. Now I knew what I had to do, I pushed to my feet. I didn’t take up a defensive position. I just stared at him. I let my gaze dart backward and forward, backward and forward like a metronome keeping tune to his sorry song. “I understand what

you did. I don’t condone it,” my voice dropped down low in a growl. “I would never condone it. But I understand it. You thought you didn’t have a choice. You did.” “I did this for my daughter,” he roared. His blast of anger gave him more energy. Those pentacles erupted back over his hands once more. He sent them forth with an angry shout. I shoved my own hands up. I concentrated on his shadows. As I lifted my fingers, I caught his pentacles. It was hard. As they vibrated, they threatened to break free of my control and destroy him, but I still managed to hold them for now. His eyes opened in complete fear. “You can’t do this,” he spat. “You don’t know how to use your powers.” “No. I didn’t know how to use my powers. But I’m learning. I have a position. A roll. A duty,” I added, my voice pitching all the way down low. It felt like it could tumble down through reality and reach the deepest realm of all. I took a step toward Stanley. He was still covered in magic. He was still raging. But I faced him. That’s what you were meant to do with shadows, after all. Diana was still on the couch. She was breathless as she watched this. She was becoming less real by the second. Unconsciously, I had liberated her light just by staring at her, just by listening to her. “You were never going to bring your daughter back. Not completely. Because she wasn’t just half-dead, was she? Someone put her into that state after she had been killed,” I whispered. “What…?” Stanley stammered. It all started to slip into place. When I had been pushed into the half-dead realm, my body just stopped. I’d become cold. I hadn’t been able to move. My thoughts had been my only friends. But with Diana it was different. My mind shifted back to the actual scene I’d glimpsed when I’d come across her. Her head had been bashed in. There’d been dried blood beneath her.

“You really were a victim of the serial killer, weren’t you? He’s somehow been operating for decades.” I turned to her. Stanley was still there, blazing with magic, desperate to kill me, but I still yanked my gaze off him. Diana just sat there, cold and alone. She was almost completely insubstantial now. “No. That doesn’t make sense. I was only half-dead—” Diana shook back. “I don’t know what half-dead is,” I itted. “But I know what my intuition is trying to tell me. You are fully dead, Diana. If you were half-dead, just by staring at you, I wouldn’t have liberated the last of your light.” “No,” Stanley roared. He went to attack me again, but I just opened a hand. Even without looking at him, I could feel his shadow. I could commune with it. Importantly, I could give it a way out of his poisoned, trapped mind. I spread a hand toward him. He tried to attack, but he just stopped. It was as if his spirit had given up inside his own chest. Diana stared on, awed by my power. I could just see the faint outline of her eyes. Everything else was starting to disappear. “You were killed, Diana. You were never going to be able to come back for any extended period of time. I don’t know why Hades trapped you in the half-dead realm. I don’t really know what’s going on here, but… it’s time for you to move on.” As I said those words, they vibrated up from this deep place within me. It told me I’d said those words before – that I was made to speak them. This was my role. My whole life, I’d been searching for a reason for my reveries. I’d been looking for a clue to who I was. And this was it. I reached a hand toward her. I curled a loving smile over my lips. “It’s time for you to move on. But first, please show me Pyro’s face.”

She shook her head. “I told you, I don’t know. I can’t see it. Hades kept it locked away from me.” Stanley was no longer roaring and throwing himself at me. He’d fallen to his knees. He rocked back and forth, a sobbing mess. I didn’t completely ignore him. I knew Stanley’s power. He would attack again. But for now, I focused on his daughter. I took another step toward her, my hand held out wide, my palm inviting. I didn’t really know what would happen when I touched her, but I knew it would be the end for her. I would liberate the last of her light, and she would be able to disappear back into the underworld to be reborn again. “I don’t know who Pyro is. I just know that he’s being summoned through someone’s soul.” I stopped. I’d never heard that. I didn’t even know what it meant. “Summoned through someone’s soul?” I repeated, my voice empty. She sat there. Or at least, she was propped there. Hell, that wasn’t even right. She was just there – a dull image flickering against the background of the world. “In order for Pyro to manifest in this world, he is being brought here through someone’s soul.” “Who’s helping him?” “Himself. He found a hole in a powerful practitioner. And he’s using that hole to bring himself here.” “How can I find out who that is?” She was almost completely gone now. Stanley jolted to his feet. He suddenly slammed into my side. He tried to wrap a pentacle around my face. By the exact vibrating pressure of it, it was clear that he was attempting to kill me.

I thrust him back. We grappled on the floor until my shadow magic once more regained full control of him. I rose. Diana was gone. I saw the last few of her sparks disappear. She smiled at her father and whispered a quiet, “Thank you.” Then it was over. Stanley was still trying to grapple with me. When he saw that his daughter had disappeared, he stopped. It was as if someone had pressed pause on his entire life. He looked completely empty as he stared at the equally completely empty couch. I waited for him to attack. He wouldn’t. He never would again. His heart had been ripped out of his chest. He had no force now. I rose. “Diana?” he whispered. “Diana,” he tried again. I stood above him. Unashamedly, a few tears touched my cheeks. “Diana, baby. It’s okay. Come back. No one is gonna try to kill you again. Diana,” he sobbed. I stared at him. I glanced back at the couch. Diana was gone. She wasn’t coming back. It was over. I took a step away from Stanley. He grabbed my leg. He stared up at me with fear and anger filling his eyes. They were touched with tears, but that did nothing to reduce the intensity of his blazing gaze. “You did this. You—” I reached down, and I placed a hand on his shoulder. I looked at him. There was no anger in my gaze. There was barely any power. It was just recognition. “This

was always going to happen, Stanley. She was dead. She was a ghost. She was only connected to that body because of how she died – she had a grudge.” “No, Hades locked her there. He made her half-dead,” he spat. I shook my head. There was no strength in the move. “I don’t know what Hades did to her, but he didn’t make her half-dead. Perhaps he hid her, but she was a ghost all along. But now the last of her light is gone. Let her go,” I whispered seriously. “Let her go be reborn. And she is right.” I stared at him with the first comion I’d shown since he’d turned out to be a monster. “The more you hold on to her, the more you do to try to bring her back, the worse life you’ll have. And the worst death,” I added. I still didn’t completely understand how the realms of the underworld worked, but I knew that wherever Stanley went after he died, it would not be a nice place. It would take him a long time to crawl his way out of it. He kept hold of my leg. Though at first it was hard, all too soon he became weak. He began to sob. He fell against my foot. He rocked back and forth. “It’s not fair.” “If it’s not fair, then help me find the serial killer.” I’d been certain that he was the serial killer, but now I wasn’t so sure. I knew that Diana had been killed by the serial killer now. That knowledge was stuck deep inside my bones. But her father would not have killed her. And he would not have gone to this effort to bring her back if he’d known that she was really dead. “I don’t know who that bastard is, but I’ll find him. It has to be Hades. I will find him, and I will destroy him—” I got down on my haunches. I stared at him. “Listen to me, Stanley.” I placed a hand on his shoulder. I didn’t recoil, even though I got a flash of all the dark things he’d done in his life. “Stop letting your shadow take hold of you. You need to repent in the little time you have left. Your daughter is gone. If you ever want to see her again in another life, don’t go further down the path of shadow.” I spoke from total experience. The knowledge was within me, yet at the same time I couldn’t grasp it.

He stared at me. He shook his head. He thrust to his feet. “Stanley,” I tried. He ran from the room. I let him go. I had no clue what he would do. Presumably he would try to bring his daughter back again, but he’d fail. Maybe he finally realized that as he reached the staircase. He collapsed against it. He began to sob. They were these great big heaving gasps. It sounded as if they would rip right through his chest and keep going until his body was pulverized under his grief. I walked up beside him. I stopped. “You can’t bring her back. Let her go. The more you clutch onto her, the harder it will be for her to be reborn. She’s gone.” “This isn’t fair.” My lips crumpled together. “Death rarely is. Rebirth is, however. Now stop, Stanley. Help me find the serial killer,” I added. He looked at me. He shook his head. “I’ve got no clue.” “Thomas—” He laughed. “Morpheus is capable of a lot, but is not capable of that.” “Then who could it be? It’s someone magical,” I said with utter confidence. “And someone powerful.” “I can’t help you, shadow witch. I have no clue. And I… must expunge my sins.” He rose. He stared at me. I watched his shadow. I could see it darting in his eyes. There was still anger there. There was still the brutal man who’d kept all of those ghosts down by using my power against them. But I could see and feel in his heart that he was finally accepting reality.

He walked away from me without another word. He would no longer be a risk to anyone else. I turned. I reached the door just as he reached the top of the staircase. “If you want this to end – if you want to have a chance against Pyro – you’re going to have to return home.” “To my house?” He laughed. “Stop being stupid, kid. No one can afford for you to be stupid anymore,” he added with a growl. “You have to go home.” As he said that, the words vibrated through the air. I froze. I turned back to him. “You mean the Death Castle, don’t you?” “Yes, I do.” “If I go near a gate point, Pyro will try to fight me.” “I’m a truly powerful wizard, kid. And you fought me as if I was nothing more than a newborn. You’ve finally got hold of your power. You need to use it. If you want this to end,” he emphasized again as he growled hard, “you must go back home.” “I’ll be safe there—” He laughed again. It was dark. “I doubt that. There’s nowhere Pyro won’t be able to go now. He’s getting more powerful. And if,” he choked up, “if Diana was right, and he’s being summoned through someone’s soul – especially if that person has a lot of magic – then he’ll be able to get to Death Castle, too. Prepare yourself for a fight. The final one.” I shook my head. “No way – I’m not ready—” “It doesn’t matter if you don’t think you’re ready yet, kid. You have to be. Pyro is coming,” he said with as much importance as he could muster. And that was a

fair bit considering he was a dark wizard. The room blackened at his words. Everything started to pull in, too. I knew he wasn’t attacking me, though. He couldn’t with that defeated look in his eyes. I took another shuddering breath. I locked it in my chest as I flattened a hand on my throat. I went to shake my head, but he just looked at me sharply. “The whole world is depending on you now.” “But I only just discovered how to use my magic—” He laughed again, the snort ribald and echoing through the hallway. “And yet you managed to defeat me with ease.” He gestured back to the lounge room. “You’ve got no more time. Pyro’s coming. Head to Death Castle.” “What will I even do when I get there?” He looked at me. For a moment, his grief drifted away from him. The glare he shot me was strong. “It’s in your blood.” He laughed. It was not kind. But at the same time, it was defeated. “I should know that better than anyone else considering I used you for years to mop up after my dark spells. Do you know how many aggrieved ghosts you’ve dealt with?” I shook my head. He went to answer, but at the last moment, what he’d done obviously caught up with him. He let his gaze dart down to the floor. He sniffed. “You’re ready. You have to be. Because there’s no more time.” With that, he turned and went to walk up the stairs. “Wait. I need more information. I need a chance.” “You’ve got one. Don’t let it go. Head back to the church. Fight Pyro off. Save the world. What more of a plan do you need?” I couldn’t say anything to make him stay. I stood there until he was out of sight. I turned and looked at the front door. So this was it? After less than a week of knowing I was the daughter of Death, it was time for me to go and avenge the very force that had killed him? It was time

for me to save the damn world? I closed my eyes, ground my palm against them, then moved. I didn’t have any other choice. And somewhere within me, I knew this was right. I’d been born for this. It was time to show the world – and all the other realms within it – exactly what I could do.

5

I walked down to my car. I was in a daze. I would challenge anyone who’d just heard what I had not to be. My head felt like I’d swallowed a balloon, and there was this ringing picking up between my ears. I was in so much of a daze that by the time I reached my car, I didn’t appreciate I could hear another engine revving up from behind. I locked a hand on the handle and turned in time to see a memorable vehicle. It was one I’d been trapped in only hours before. “Thomas,” I snapped, my lips moving so quickly, they could’ve torn right off my face. I shoved in close. I yanked open the door. He saw me. He was still right at the end of the road, but my senses were so acute that they zeroed in on his surprised face. The surprise quickly turned to anger, and that anger quickly turned to rage. His car shot toward me. I lurched into the driver’s seat. I patted the dash once with a shaking, terrified move. The car growled into life. I pulled it out onto the road. Thomas was right behind me – only 20 meters or so away. “Come on,” I spat at the car, my voice reverberating through the spacious vehicle. I shoved my foot harder on the accelerator. The car shot forward with evermore grunt. You’d think, considering how fancy this vehicle was, that it would easily be able

to outrun anything Thomas had. But while he had nothing but a midrange sedan, he had a lot of magic on board. Just when I thought I’d be able to get a good head-start, his car miraculously closed the distance between us. Now he was right beside me. He pointed at the wheel and mouthed for me to pull over. Like hell. I’d unlocked this car with magic. It was time to drive with it, too. I hated the fact that I had to continually learn my magic on the run, but at least it meant I didn’t second-guess the process. I half closed my eyes. This was a winding, otherwise perilous road, but that didn’t matter. I focused with all my frigging heart. My instincts drove the car while I pumped magic into it. With several more revs, I finally got ahead of Thomas. I saw him swear in the rear vision mirror as he fell behind. We shot forward faster. Every time I pumped my car full of magic, he did the same. Soon enough, we would run out of these handy back roads. I did not want to take this magical car chase onto an actual populated road. Though I didn’t want to believe a single thing Morpheus had ever said to me, one warning was easy enough to trust. No matter what happened, I shouldn’t let humans learn about my magic. But that would become hard. Don’t ask me how, but I got the impression that somewhere close by there was another car. My intuition simply spread out and warned me of it like a slap to the face. Morpheus put on another burst of speed. I swear he moved several meters in under a nanosecond. He was right beside me again. We came around a corner. And there, just in front of him, was a massive semi. I expected there to be a head-on collision. There wasn’t. Morpheus’s car simply lurched behind me. The truck didn’t even blare its horn.

We were running out of road. This road ed onto a highway just ahead of us. I could see the cars zooming along it. Dammit, dammit, dammit. I had to— Before I could think of anything, Morpheus’s car rammed mine. I only just managed to keep control of it. As we spun to the side, both of us skidded down into the ditch and into the trees. I was certain my car was going to flip. It didn’t. As I held onto the wheel, I pumped so much of my magic into it, it was like I was using my body to stabilize the car. As I slammed my foot down on the brake, the car slammed onto the forest floor. I had a chance to remain there, my breath trapped in my chest, terror pulsing through me, and my eyes wide open before magic started to sink around my car. It was black, it moved quickly, and it felt so much like Morpheus, it was like it was a dream. “Resist it,” I snapped at myself. I went to shove my foot on the accelerator until I realized there was a tree right in front of me. So I shoved the car into reverse. There was something behind me now. It took me a moment to resolve what it was. It was some kind of… God, it was some kind of massive troll. It became stark while everything around me became dreamlike and amorphous. “It’s a dream,” I said between clenched teeth, “it’s nothing more than a—” Before I could push those words out of my lips, the troll smashed its massive fist down on the back of my car, and the top crumpled inward. I screamed. Just before the car could flatten with me inside, I jerked a hand up. I concentrated on shadow magic. I let it spill out of me. As it pushed into the car, it reinforced it. Even as the troll went to try to smash it up again, I stopped it in its tracks. Morpheus had gotten out of his car. The problem was, I didn’t know where he’d

gone. I could see his car just to the left, and the door was wide open. I had to get out of my car and run, but the troll continued to smash its massive fist down into it. I let out a scream. It couldn’t end like this. I really doubted Morpheus would kill me, considering that was precisely what Pyro wanted to do to end the world, but he would capture me and pull me into another dream. And this time he would be well aware of the fact that I had the magic to resist him. He would use everything he had, and I would not be able to stop him. The troll smashed its fist down once more. There was an echoing crack. It managed to undermine the top of the car even though I was pumping it full of magic. “Enough of this.” I didn’t barrel out of the car. Instead, I readjusted the rearview mirror until I could see the troll. It was one massive, epic creature. If I had seen it a week ago, I would’ve fainted. Now I just concentrated on it with all my might. More than anything, I stared at its shadow. I plunged my mind into it. I let all my thoughts center on that shadow until I could start to see light darting within it. The troll went to smash up the roof again but couldn’t. When its fist came down, it had no strength in it. I heard it give this shaking, terrified shout. “That’s it,” I growled. I continued to pay attention to its shadow. I had to do it in the same way I usually practiced shadow magic. That was to say I couldn’t focus on it completely. I had to kind of direct my mind while hoping that my shadow magic would come along on its own. Though at first it had been mind-bending, the more I used that skill, the easier it was becoming. I heard another crack. The troll attempted to smash my car one last time, but this

time it just fell against it weakly. The car shook slightly as its massive form punched down into it. Then it just slid off. “Finally,” I spat. But that was the exact moment that the enger door opened and Thomas thrust in. “Finally,” he spat himself as he reached over and grabbed my forehead. I went to elbow him, but immediately I felt this lulling sensation descend through me. I went from being at the full height of my awareness to starting to drift off. I tried to fight against his power, but he was far too powerful. I was the second guard, and he was the third. He kept his hand practically soldered against my brow. His grip was enough that even if a massive earthquake had ed underneath us, he would’ve kept hold. “I shouldn’t have taken my eyes off you. I hadn’t expected you’d be able to access your true powers,” Morpheus said as he glimpsed the troll in the rear vision mirror. While maintaining his grip on my head, he gestured dismissively with his other hand. The troll disappeared. “What… what was that?” I managed. He darted his gaze over to me quickly. Judging by the sharp quality of it he was surprised that I’d just managed to speak. I felt him redouble his magic, but at least he did answer. “A semi-apparition. And before you ask what that is, let’s say that it is a creature that once existed but became trapped in dreams. Quite useful, really.” “You can… trap people in your dreams for later?” “I can do a lot of things. But everything I do,” his voice descended with a shake, “is for the good of all the realms. And for the good of all the realms,” he added in an even harder voice, “you must be brought under control before you hand yourself over to Pyro.”

I wanted to spit at him that I wasn’t handing myself over to Pyro. I was doing the only thing I could. I was fighting. It’d taken me my whole life to get to this point, and I wouldn’t back down now. But I couldn’t even open my lips. His magic was so strong, it felt as if someone had injected my entire body with concrete. I would never be able to shift a centimeter again, let alone ionately scream at him. “Come on,” he said, frustration pounding through his voice. “Sleep. And this time, do it forever.” I started to see ghosts. They lined up in front of me. And all of them, one by one, reached their hands out to me. I began to recognize some of their faces. They were corpses I’d dealt with at Carlson’s funeral home. They must’ve… they must’ve been the same ghosts I’d pacified inadvertently for Stanley. They reached out toward me. When I didn’t grab their hands, they grabbed me instead. They started to pull me relentlessly toward this black void in front of my face. It was Morpheus’s forever-dream. And once it consumed me… I…. I thought I caught a glimpse of my past. Not the past at the funeral home, not even the past at the orphanage home. Something far further back. I thought I caught a glimpse of a palace. The castle. My true home. I ed running through the halls, happier than I’d ever been in my life. I ed staring from the turrets out into a blackness only I could see shapes within. I even ed walking through the throne room. All of it filled me up. These were happy memories – the happiest of my life. And I could fall into them now – forever. I thought I heard Morpheus mutter that he was finally doing it. I ignored him. As I strode through the throne room in my half-dream, I realized there was someone sitting on the throne. I ran toward it. But I couldn’t reach it. Because I wouldn’t let myself. At the last moment, something rose within me. It was defiance wrapped up in total power. I had come to this world for a specific task and I would not be turned away from

it by Morpheus. He was powerful, but so was I. I could stare into the darkness where others could not. As Morpheus pumped more power into me, I saw shadows all around me – these hidden dark patches in my dreams. The things that I was meant to ignore as I ran heart-first at the figure in the throne room. Even in my dreams, it was shadows that held meaning for me. For as I stared at them, I was momentarily realigned with my body. I thought I felt Morpheus twitch. He ignored it. I did not. I thrust my mind further into the shadows of my dream. I sought them out. I did not let them fester. I deliberately found them and shone a light on them until the entire dream started to shift. It began to shake as if someone had set off a bomb within it. Morpheus gasped. I felt him trying to rock back. I continued to stare at the shadows, liberating every single spark of light I could until finally his hand fell from my head. It was dramatic. He jerked back in his seat. My eyes shot open in time to see that this strange energy was picking up around him. It was his magic. This time it was attacking him and not me. He stared at me, his eyes so wide open, I thought they were trying to swallow the whole world. “What… how? How did you turn the dream against me? You don’t even use dream magic. You—” I stared at him. For a long time, I’d thought Morpheus was my true enemy. He’d been the one trying to capture me. He’d been the one I was certain was the serial killer. Now I wasn’t so sure. His magic continued to coil around him like a snake. He didn’t fall into a dream, though. He simply flopped to the side. Only one of his eyes was open.

He would be no threat to me anymore. “How?” he whispered. “I’ve been learning,” I answered plainly. It was the truest statement I could say. While the last week had set me on a roller coaster ride of fear and torture, after every single fight, I had learned. For that was my only way out of this horror. “I’m going to fight Pyro,” I snapped defiantly. “No one is going to get in my way.” “You won’t… have a chance against him,” he whispered. “And why is that? I defeated you. I turned your magic against you. For everywhere something exists, there is a shadow. And I use those shadows to give me power.” “It won’t matter. Pyro is far more powerful than you can imagine.” “I defeated him once.” “I don’t know how you got away from the church, but I doubt it was just you.” “What do you mean?” “Something else must’ve been helping you.” I cast my mind back. “I found a cross.” “Sorry?” “I found a cross in the church. One of the arms was missing. The others were fine. I concealed it and threw it at Pyro. He absorbed it into his body. He couldn’t digest it or something. It started ripping him apart. It gave me the time I needed to flee.” Several hours ago, I wouldn’t have shared this with Morpheus. I wouldn’t have shared anything with him apart from a fist to the face.

Now, though I knew this was probably mad, I was starting to trust him. Or at least, I was starting to understand him. He wasn’t really my enemy. He was just trying in a misguided way to stop all of this. “The cross,” he said. He laughed. There was this odd edge to it. It made me frown. “You know what I’m talking about?” “We four guards are represented by a cross. The broken arm is your father.” My stomach pitched. I hadn’t forgotten about him – even though all of this was happening, he was still at the back of my head. “You said before there was some way to save him. How?” “It’s suicide. You’d have to go back to Death Castle.” “I’m gonna go there to defeat Pyro, anyway. If there’s some chance I can bring my father back, just tell me how to do it. I am far more powerful than even you can imagine.” Maybe that was just arrogance speaking, or maybe it was the understanding that I really was far more powerful than people kept assuming. And the person who thought I was weakest by far was myself. “To bring your father back, you have to find his shadow and pump it full of power from the other guards.” “How do I do that? How do I find his shadow? I thought he was forever-gone?” “That’s the point. Even if he still does have a shadow in this realm, it could be absolutely anywhere in the entire universe. There’s no way for you to find it.” “And why would being back in Death Castle help?” “Death Castle connects you to all those who have died. Theoretically you should be able to glimpse his shadow there. But Death Castle is massive. And his shadow will be no bigger than a mote of dust. It’s an impossible task. You could search for your whole life and never find it. But you won’t have your whole

life,” he added. Despite his condition, his voice dipped down in a growl. “Pyro will be there looking for me,” I whispered. “You know he’s being summoned?” “Summoned?” “I learned it from Diana… before I sent her back to where she belongs.” “What do you mean?” “She was a ghost. Her father thought she was half-dead, but that wasn’t true. Someone… Hades,” I itted, “trapped her in the half-dead state for some reason even though she was a ghost.” He didn’t answer. I didn’t know if that was because he was processing this revelation or because he had nothing to say as his weakness caught up with him. I took a breath and closed my eyes. “The only thing I know is there will be some way to defeat Pyro.” “You said he was being summoned,” Morpheus prompted. “Yeah. Diana said he was being summoned through someone’s powerful soul. I don’t know what that means.” There was another silence. “Whoever it is, they likely won’t be aware of it. It could even be you or me.” I stared at him. My first reaction was to assume that he was simply saying this to undermine me in the hopes that he could turn the tables again, but as I cast my gaze over his expression, I realized he wasn’t lying at all. “What?” I croaked. “Anyone could be summoning Pyro. They wouldn’t be aware of it. He would be coming through them when they were asleep. They’d have no clue – unless they were truly powerful. Even then, there’d be nothing they’d be able to do about it. Pyro would be absorbing their magic like a frigging parasite.”

I curled my hands into fists. A kick of fear blasted through me. What if it was me? I hadn’t known about my powers for most of my life. Stanley had already itted that he’d been able to control my magic without me being aware of it. Pyro could’ve been feasting on me for years without me knowing. “You must proceed with caution,” Morpheus whispered. He was continually having to fight against his own power. As it chased and coiled around him, his head would loll back only for it to roll forward as he reminded himself he had to stay awake. “So you’re itting I have to do this now?” “If Morpheus is summoning himself through someone, then we have even less of a chance than we first thought. Keeping you asleep won’t do anything. He will come. It’s only a matter of time.” I shuddered back at that, even though I had known it on some level. “What do I do? Stanley told me to head back to the church.” “That’s one way to get to Death Castle. There’s an easier way.” “What do you mean?” “The cemetery.” Despite everything that had happened to me, I sat straighter at the mere mention of it. As I’d already said, I’d never once stepped foot in that place. It always scared me on some level I’d never be able to understand. “It’s a massive gate point,” he revealed. “It is? I hate the place,” I whispered, my voice shaking. I was probably revealing way too much to Morpheus that he could use against me, but I couldn’t stop myself. He chuckled weakly. “I’m sure on some kind of unconscious level you recognized that you couldn’t step foot in it. But now you have to. You have to use its gate point… and try.”

He couldn’t even say that I had to try to save the world. I pressed the back of my hand against my mouth. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I nodded once. The move was stiff. I wanted to believe it was in control, but I wasn’t so certain. Because the rest of me certainly wasn’t in control. I was shaking internally. While my limbs were fine, it was as if someone had grabbed hold of my soul and shoved it into a blender. I flattened a hand on my chest again and let my eyes close. “You’re going to help me?” I must’ve come far to ask Morpheus for help. “I’ll take you to the cemetery. But that’s all I can do for you. I can’t set foot inside it.” “Why not?” “Because I’ll be dead meat. The more we let Pyro attack we guards, the weaker you’ll be.” “What do you mean?” “If you used a representation of the guards to defeat Pyro last time, you’ll have to draw on our collective power again. Especially if you want to break your father out.” “But you won’t come into the cemetery with me? I have to do this on my own?” “You were already gonna do it on your own. There are places you can go and things that you can see that no one else can. You’re the only guard who nothing is kept hidden from – if you search far enough and long enough.” I held onto that fact. Hell, I practically grabbed it and embraced it against my chest as if it was a newborn. I closed my eyes. Then I reached over. It was my turn to place a hand on Thomas’s brow. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I let my magic direct my every move

until finally the energy chasing around him stopped. He let out a deep breath. He closed his eyes momentarily, then opened them. I could see magic within. He did not use it against me. He stared at me as if he was looking at me for the first time. “I underestimated you. When your father placed you on earth, I thought he did so to give you a different life. I didn’t realize he was teaching you all the lessons you needed to rise.” “All the lessons I need to rise?” I asked quietly, my voice weak. He laughed, his lips kinking to the side. “You don’t need an explanation. Now, do you want to drive? You need to center your mind and start meditating. The cemetery will probably lead to a maze.” “Maze?” I got out of the driver’s seat to let him take it. He got in, flattened his tie, and waited for me to sit down before he started the car with a stroke of the steering wheel. “Yeah, maze. Pyro’s going to do everything he can to stop you. He’s gonna confuse the gate point with magic. It will lead to both a physical and psychological maze. You’ll have to find a way to break out of it at all costs and as fast as you can.” “Psychological maze?” He chuckled darkly. “Take it from me – they are the most powerful of all. He will trap you in a maze of your old memories and fears. And the more trapped you get, the more you’re going to forget your purpose. You have to fight that. With everything you have. Start fighting now, in fact.” He nodded at me. I voluntarily closed my eyes. Like I said, this could’ve been a trap, but I didn’t think it was anymore. Sure enough, all Morpheus did was start driving. He didn’t push me into another dream. In fact, we drove in silence for a little until he cleared his throat. “What happened to Stanley?” “He repented.” Morpheus chuckled. “What do you mean?” “His daughter died right in front of him. Or at least, she traveled the last distance to the underworld. She told him there was no point in trying to kill more people

to get to her. She’s gone. He’s not gonna re-offend. He’ll use the last few years of his life to do as much good as he can so that when he goes to Hell, and not if,” I emphasized, “he’ll have a chance.” I was surprised when Morpheus didn’t question me. But I had some questions for him. “Who’s the serial killer? If it’s not you,” I finally accepted that fact, “and it’s not Stanley, who exactly does that leave? Are there other dark practitioners in town I’m not aware of?” “It would be Pyro,” he stated in a subdued voice. “And whoever Pyro is controlling.” My stomach kicked. “Are you telling me he would’ve made someone unconsciously go around killing people?” “Yeah, I am. And I must warn you, it could be any one of us. If Pyro really is summoning himself, whoever he is within will have no idea.” I opened my eyes and looked at my hands again. Could it be me? I wanted to pretend that it couldn’t, considering Diana had been killed by the serial killer years before I’d even been born. But I was starting to more of my life from Death Castle. I was not as young as I thought. “Don’t freak out, though,” Morpheus said quickly. “Out of everyone, Pyro is the least likely to possess you.” “Why not?” “Because you can stare into your shadows. And it is precisely within a person’s shadow that you can remove possessions, ghosts, spirits, or phantasma.” I opened my eyes wider. I stared at the shadow my hands cast against the door beside me. He laughed slightly. “You wouldn’t be able to see Pyro unless you stared right into the depths of yourself. And that would take time and… shall we say angst?” “Angst?” “To access the true realms of the soul, you have to use your strongest emotions

as a path.” “How do you know so much about this?” He arched an eyebrow. “Because I am a god of the dead. As are you. Knowledge is within you. You have to dig deep.” I went to close my eyes again, but I stopped. “Why don’t you wear your ring? You have one, don’t you?” He looked down at me. Then he shifted his gaze over to his hand. He twisted his fingers slightly, and a skull ring appeared. It was exactly the same as Hades’s. “You have one too, you know. As does your father.” I stared at my hand. “I do? Where is it?” “You’ll be able to access it in time.” “When I was fighting Pyro… I saw that he had a skull ring,” I managed through a tight breath. Morpheus came to a skidding stop. We were on a highway. There was a massive truck behind us. But we didn’t cause an accident. Traffic simply flowed around us as if we were an obstruction in a raging river. He slowly turned to me. His cheeks were cold. “Then that confirms everything I already suspected. It’s one of us. Pyro is coming through one of us.” “Which one?” “It could even be your father.” As he dropped that bombshell, my stomach pitched. “But he’s forever-gone—” “His mind might be forever-gone, but Pyro could still be using his body. Your father has a lot of power. He’d be a good target.” I started to shake my head. All too soon I realized there was nothing to shake my head at. I didn’t have a clue what was going on here. With every second, the terrain changed under my feet until it felt as if I was standing on nothing but air.

Thomas started the car again. We drove in silence for a bit. We were nearing the cemetery. I tried to rehearse what would happen when we were inside, but I couldn’t. Who knew? Because who knew who Pyro was coming through? We finally reached the street that led to the cemetery. I didn’t dare turn my head to the side to stare at it. But I could feel it. It trembled in my heart. It sat in my soul. And it waited for me to see it, to venture within. I made the mistake of closing my eyes. I caught sight of several reveries from my life. Heck, I caught a glimpse of the reverie that had started all of this – Cindy leading me in through the gates of the graveyard. “We’re here. I’m not gonna drive all the way up to the gates. You have to walk there yourself.” He stopped on the side of the road. I slowly undid my seatbelt. I turned and stared at him. For his part, it looked as if he would never look away. “I don’t know what to tell you. Good luck won’t cut it. You need to dig deep and reach through all your fear to access your real power. If any one of us has a chance to do this, it’s you.” All I was aware of was the sound of my seatbelt as it un-clicked and wound back up. I pressed my fingers into the handle beside me. I continued to look at him. He continued to stare at me. “How did you even find that church in the first place?” he suddenly asked. “A crow led me to it.” I turned around. Something told me that very same crow would be watching me now. Sure enough, I could see him over by the cemetery gates. I pointed him out. We were far away, but I knew Thomas would have absolutely no problem with distance considering his godly powers were technically more powerful than mine. He frowned. “I don’t know what you’re gesturing at, but there’s no crow over there.” “He’s right there.” I gestured at it with an imioned swipe of my hand.

He looked at me. “Only you can see it.” “What?” “Maybe it’s a spirit. Maybe it’s something else. Be careful of it, though. If it led you to that church, it might not be on your side.” I opened my mouth to defend the crow, but then I realized there was no point. If no one else could see it, then… then what? Why had it hung around me? Why had it helped me? Why had it sometimes led me into danger and other times led me to help? I frowned at it. In fact, it was the crow’s presence that finally allowed me to get out of the car. Morpheus tilted his head back and stared at me. “Save the realms.” I nodded at him. I didn’t say another word. In silence, I walked toward the graveyard. I was ready. I might not have the strength or the force of will or the understanding the other guards did – but I was here. And that was all that mattered.

6

As I approached the cemetery, fear rose within me. It was like it was some kind of picture book of my old life. Every time I’d stared at the gates and shivered – every time I’d driven past and felt as if cold hands slipped across my shoulders. All that came back. It wasn’t tempered by the fact I was now magical – that I now had the power to deal with the things that once made me afraid. The fear was raw. It surrounded me as I finally reached the gates. I stared at them. I fancied they somehow stared back. The crow was still there. He sat atop the left side of the gate. He stared at me then tilted his glossy black head back and cawed. The sound echoed across the graveyard. Hell, by the power of it, I swore it echoed across the city and then the rest of the world. I pressed my lips together. I nodded at it. I had no clue if it was my friend or foe, but I went with what my body wanted to do. It nodded at me too. Then it took flight. It flew further into the cemetery. “Here we go,” I muttered under my breath. I walked forward. I reached the threshold of the cemetery. Something stopped me. My old self rose. The old self that had crumbled over the past week and been remade anew. She reached up from the past and grabbed my shoulders, locking me in place. And she screamed in my ear that once I walked through there, there would be no turning back.

I knew that. And it was the point. I shoved forward. As soon as I walked in over the threshold of the cemetery nothing happened. At least, nothing overt. The ground didn’t start to shake, the heavens didn’t open up, and ghosts didn’t rise up from their graves to sweep around me. But inside me, I felt something twitch. I took another step, then another. That thing within me continued to twitch more and more. I stared at the gravestones and crypts further off in the distance. It started to rain. I hadn’t been aware of the fact there were clouds in the sky earlier, but now as I tilted my head up, they flooded in from everywhere. As every fat, relentless drop hailed down, it felt like judgment. I took another step forward. I arrived at a row of gravestones. I began to walk down it. Thomas had said there would be a maze. Everything looked logical. I made it down the end of that row then saw another path to take. I took it. I took ten more paths like that, and it took a long damn time for me to realize that I was walking without knowing where I was going. I stopped, turned, and saw the gates. I headed toward them. But I couldn’t reach them. No matter how close they seemed, I could not get closer to them. My gut kicked as I realized I was already well and truly stuck within the maze. “Dammit,” I hissed under my breath. I rubbed my face and tried to figure out what to do. Thomas had also said that I would walk into a psychological maze and that would be far worse. But I seemed fine. I even slapped my cheeks and let my fingers trail down my chin as if I was somehow checking the integrity of my mind. There was nothing wrong.

I continued to walk. I didn’t know how much time went by, but it took another 10 rows until I stopped. I wasn’t getting anywhere. I was just walking in circles. For a second, that fear flared within me until it dulled once more. I took another step then another. But once more, I walked without there being anywhere to walk to. I stopped on the top of the hill. I stared down at the rest of the graveyard. My fear tried to rise within me as it desperately attempted to tell me that something was wrong, but the rest of my mind pushed it down. Wasn’t the point of life to move forward, anyway? And yes, while some people genuinely got to progress, not everyone did. The majority of life, in fact, is simply putting one foot in front of another because that’s what humans are meant to do. Real progress is often confused for forward momentum. I knew all this. But it didn’t stop me from continuing to walk. At the back of my head I ed something Morpheus had told me. I couldn’t afford to waste time. I didn’t know why. As I took another step, I stopped in front of an angel. Her outstretched hands were filled with rain. It dribbled down her cracked wrists. I watched as it trailed its way down to a puddle before me. I leaned forward and wiped the dirt off the name on the plinth. “Penelope Hope,” I whispered in a completely empty voice. I went to walk away. I saw another angel. I stopped. I cleaned the dirt off this name, too. “Penelope Hope,” I whispered again. This time I read the date. The death date was today. I got a few more steps. I stopped. I stared back at the angel. I looked at the name. Was that… was that name important to me? I rubbed my face. I shook my head and went to leave, but I stopped. Didn’t… didn’t someone important tell me not to waste time today? I dismissed that thought.

I continued to walk. Unbeknownst to me, with every step I took, I lost more of my mind. I left my memories behind me, distributed through the graveyard like corpses. I started to feel more and more empty. I was just like a husk. Only one that could walk. I stopped again. This time there was a massive stone angel in front of me. If I’d had an ounce of reason, I would’ve appreciated that it was far too large for the cemetery. It looked more like some kind of political statue you’d get in a square in front of some kind of parliament house. I stared up at it. The thing was encased in shadow. As it ran around its form, I thought I could catch a glimpse of what was beneath if only I stared hard enough. I wanted to know what was underneath. But the longer I stood there, the emptier I became. It was like I was nothing more than a flower fluttering around on a wind it could not control. The statue moved its hand. I stared at it. I didn’t scream. I didn’t bolt back. I barely thought it was interesting. It moved its other hand. It started to pull itself off that plinth. “Second guard of the dead,” it said in this endless, powerful voice, “your end is finally here. You gave yourself to me. Within, you recognized there is nothing you can do. So submit.” As it pulled itself off the plinth, the statue became smaller and smaller until it was roughly the size of a man. It reached a hand out, getting ready to clamp it around my head. I just stood there. There was nothing I could be scared of, because it wasn’t as if I ed what being scared entailed. The statue’s fingers sunk into my forehead. This flickering memory rose within me. It told me this wasn’t the first time someone had done that to me today. But… it was irrelevant, wasn’t it?

I just stood there. I had nothing in me but this present moment. I had nothing to warn me, nothing to protect me. I started to feel something crack up inside me as the statue tightened his grip. Energy pounded from him into me. I stared at him. I started to shake. I fell down to my knees. My whole body quaked, but I simply smiled vacantly. I did not move to save myself. “After you, there will be no resistance.” “Resistance,” I repeated that word in a voice that sounded as empty as deep space. “The last of your shadow magic will flow into me. You will be the key that unlocks everything. The secrets of his soul will finally be revealed. He will not be able to resist me further.” “He will not be able to resist you further,” I repeated vacantly once more. But vacant ended as one word became stuck on my lips. “Shadow… shadow magic.” Those words grabbed hold of something deep within me. a spark. This tiny bundle of hope. I winced. It was like I was finally ing that I should be in pain, and trust me, I was in absolute blinding agony. As the statue kept his hand clamped over my forehead and more magic sailed into me, I was being broken up on the deepest level. “Shadow,” I repeated, my voice breaking. “There is no point in trying to fight me now. You have no mind. You have no memories. You are nothing more than a husk.” I ignored what he said. That one word seemed to be the most important thing in my entire life. So I held onto it. I started repeating it over and over in my head. I used it like a chain. It corralled my mind, holding it in place. “Shadow,” I repeated once more. This time I only just moved my lips. There was nothing else I could do. My whole body was quaking under the force of the destruction

ripping through it. “It’s over, second guard.” “Over.” Over…? Over? No. It would never be over. I… I had not come this far to give up now. That determined thought flew through my mind. It was the fastest most powerful thing in my head right now, so I held onto it. It started to pull me up out of the darkness that had surrounded me. “There is no point in fighting me, shadow witch,” Pyro snarled. … Because his name was Pyro. Pyro was attacking me. He’d almost killed me. I…. I opened my eyes. I tried to jerk back, but Pyro simply grabbed my head harder. As true fear bolted through me and my memories rose up to fill my otherwise empty mind, I stared at his shadow. I don’t mean the shadows encasing his form. I stared at the tiny shadow right behind him. It was no bigger than a matchstick. I pumped all my attention and the last of my magic into it until he shook. It was only the slightest movement, but it didn’t have to be something massive. Jerking up, I elbowed him and broke his grip on my head. I thrust to the side. I rolled and started to run. Pyro screamed.

As I fled, I encountered lines upon lines of gravestones that were exactly the same. There was nothing at all to differentiate them. Though I didn’t exactly understand what had happened previously, I could guess that mindlessly walking through this maze had destroyed my memories. Obviously there was something about it that sapped one’s will and psyche. But I couldn’t exactly stay where I was. I thought I heard the call of a crow. It was off near a crypt. As I ran desperately, tears trailed down my cheeks. I had almost lost, and the fight hadn’t even really begun. Everything was dependent on this, dammit. I reached the crypt. I threw myself around it. I pressed my back up against it. I waited. And I waited. I could hear Pyro. He called for me. He screamed. He smashed up stone angels in anger. But he did not find me. Still shaking, I pressed my hands over my eyes. I did not dare allow myself to sob too loudly. He would hear. Something fluttered above me. I inclined my neck up to see the crow. It sat on top of the crypt. I could only see one side of its glistening body. It had led me here. If the crow really was working for Pyro somehow, then Pyro would find me. But he didn’t. He continued to search. He smashed up the cemetery. But no matter how hard he looked, he could not find me. I remained there with my back pressed up against the wall. I shook badly. I cried so much, it was a surprise my body didn’t turn into the Sahara. But nothing changed. Pyro continued to look for me. I was safe…. But I wasn’t safe. All I was was paused.

As I went to inch out of hiding, I froze. I reminded myself of how easily he’d attacked me. I had no chance against him. If I continued to run through this maze, he’d simply sap my memory once more. So I shrunk back into hiding. The crow looked at me. It didn’t caw. It didn’t really try to communicate apart from with its gaze. And that gaze was penetrating. I swore he begged me to let my mind turn in – to let it delve into the depths of my soul to find the secrets hidden within. But I did not have the time. Pyro was close. I shrunk further back behind the crypt. He didn’t find me. He shifted past. He destroyed everything in his wake. I didn’t know how many tears I’d cried now. To be honest, it was irrelevant – there were always more to replace them. I had come in here with such strength. Now it had completely disappeared. Would I just… stay here for the rest of my life? Obviously there was something about this crypt that Pyro was confused by. Maybe it wouldn’t last forever, but maybe it would. And maybe from now until the end of time, I would have to hide behind here, a hand over my mouth as I kept away from him. That thought had a chance to settle. But Pyro was close by again. Once more he did not find me. And once more I just held myself back. … But I couldn’t do this forever. It wasn’t just the fact that everyone and everything was riding on me. It wasn’t even that I needed to break my father free. It was that… I wasn’t built to hide in the shadows. I was built to seek them out and liberate them. I dropped my hands. I stared at my shadow. I ed what Morpheus had said. In order for me to

find out if Pyro was summoning himself through my soul, I had to stare at my shadow. I was the only one of the guards who could do it. But to do that, I needed a catalyst – an emotional path stronger than any other. I gazed at my shadow. It was only slight. It was dark behind this crypt. Most of it was shadow. It was hard to differentiate which bit belonged to me and which belonged to the rest of the graveyard. I continued to concentrate until I realized that was the point. Why differentiate shadows at all? They are simply occluded light. The larger the light source, the more shadows blend together to become the same unit. As I stopped looking for my shadow and just stared into the shadows themselves, I started to feel energy within me. It wasn’t this enormous surge – this massive spark. It was subtle – far more subtle than anything I’d ever encountered before. As I pushed a breath deep into my chest, I got down on my knees. I touched the shadow. A little magic spread from my fingers into it, but that was it. I was holding myself back. I always had. Though I’d accepted what I was, I hadn’t really. I’d always thought of myself as a fundamentally scared individual. All sorts of things had freaked me out in the past. Yet I had grown out of them over the last week. But had I really grown that much? Even now I held back. While I touched the shadow, I didn’t plunge my mind into it. Because I would be alone when I did. It would just be me and whatever spirit I found within. No one else in existence would be able to see what I could see. For the shadows were a fundamentally lonely place. A tear trailed down my cheek. It was just one. I was done crying in fitful hysteria at the fact Pyro was hunting me. I was aware of the fact the crow was still above me. Either it was watching over me, or it was just waiting for me to rise to my own defense.

I didn’t turn my head up and stare at it. I touched the shadow. I allowed myself to recognize the fear that was still pounding through me. I didn’t open my lips and tell myself I could do this. It was dark. But the more I stared at it, the more I saw just a single spark from within. It wasn’t big, but it didn’t have to be. Shadows weren’t repositories for light. If anything, all they ever contained was a spark or two. They weren’t meant to be as bright as the sun. But they didn’t need to be. They were that which could not be seen but needed to be. I’d spent my whole life running from the shadows in my mind. They’d scared me. I hadn’t once appreciated the fact that they had wanted to be seen. They needed to be, in fact. There wasn’t anyone who could glimpse their depths and recognize the light within but me. I let out a breath. It came from deep within me. As it rose up my chest and shook out of my lips, it brought with it this unusual power that had been sitting within me my whole life. This energy I’d never been able to recognize. I opened my eyes again. I stared at the shadows. They were starting to gather underneath me. Where I hadn’t been able to differentiate my shadow from that of the rest of the graveyard previously, now I could. It seemed as if all of the shadows from the graveyard were flocking toward me to enter into the shadow of my body. I stared at them, and I smiled. I searched for Pyro. I told myself that even if he was there, I would not freak out. I would not turn away. I would see what was really there. He wasn’t. There wasn’t anything in my shadow but my shadow. I smiled. I rose. I could hear Pyro again. He swept close to this crypt once more. I could not stay here forever. I had to fight him. I couldn’t do that in this graveyard, though. I needed to head home.

Scarcely had that thought traveled through my head did the crow hop around to the other side of the roof. I frowned at the guy. Though I’d been locked in hiding for God knows how long, now I confidently walked around the side of the crypt. Pyro didn’t suddenly find me and strangle me. But I did face an open crypt door. It led down to a set of stairs. As crazy as it sounded, I thought I could see a stained-glass window at the end of the stairs. One that depicted me. … Somehow this crypt was the gate point. The crow had led me here. I wasted no more time. I rushed down the stairs. The end was here, and it was time to embrace it.

7

As soon as I reached the base of those stairs, I faced off against a stained-glass window. I saw it for what it was. Me holding a scythe. The scythe was made out of shadows. Not glass – an active, writhing shadow. I heard something from the top of the stairs. There was a strangled caw. Then footfall. Pyro was already here. I wanted to tell myself I had no idea how to activate the gate point, but I did. I’d already activated the church one. As I stood in front of that stained-glass window, I closed my eyes. “Death,” I announced in a voice that could cut through reality. Pyro roared. He reached me. He wrapped an arm around my neck, but at the same time, I started to float. “It doesn’t matter where you choose to fight me, I can follow you anywhere now,” he growled. I managed to open my arms, even as he continued to wrap his arms around my throat. I let shadow magic play within me. It blasted out over my skin. This time the gate point opened quicker. As I floated up, I felt reality begin to change around me. It pinched in – then it expanded suddenly. If I’d had my eyes open, I would’ve seen the graveyard shoot away as this other dark image raced up from beneath. Pyro continued to try to fight me, but reality… reality wasn’t real in whatever space this was. He could grapple me, but neither of us was more than a mere image. That was until something shot into place underneath our feet. We were both knocked back.

I opened my eyes to see that Death Castle was resolving around us. It was massive. It perfectly matched the dreams I’d been having of it my entire life. We were on a huge wall that ran around the perimeter of the building. It was made of leg bones. Long and short, they were compacted together. There would’ve been a time when such an image would have disgusted me. Now I just thrust to my feet. Pyro took a moment to adjust. I almost… I almost thought I saw his face. The shadows around it dimmed slightly. But then they raged back into place even thicker than they’d been before. He screamed. Spittle didn’t fly from his lips, but black energy did. It spewed out of him and shot toward me. I rolled to the side. While shadow magic was indeed powerful, it wasn’t quick. I didn’t have time to stare at the shadows of his attack to undermine them. But I did have time to run. Turning, I thrust over that wall. My feet slapped into the bones beneath me, and they let out this eerie echoing. “This is the end. For everything comes to an end,” Pyro roared as he followed me. Energy smashed into the wall beside me. I flung myself forward and dodged it. Another blast sailed in from the left. I managed to yank my head to the side just in time, but it singed my hair. “There is no point in running toward one’s demise. Stand still and take it.” There was no damn way I was going to stand still, and there was even less of a chance that I was going to take this without a fight. I suddenly pitched into a roll. As I jerked to my feet, I changed direction. I stared at him. I tried to ascertain where his shadow was. I couldn’t see it. I didn’t know if it was because it was so dark around this wall, or if he was doing something to it.

That slight moment of distraction cost me, though. Another surge of energy blasted out from nowhere and sunk into the wall just beneath my feet. It made the bones buckle. I jerked to the side. The next thing I knew, the whole wall began to shake as Pyro sent this massive charge of magic into it. The section of railing right in front of me crumpled. I tumbled down into the yard around the castle. I called it a yard. It was hardly filled with fruit trees and lush grass. I smashed down onto this barren dirt. Here and there, skeletons rose from the surface. They were like trees. They weren’t humans. Most of them were extinct animals. I saw dinosaurs, mammoths, even something that looked like a precursor to humans. I fell hard, but that didn’t stop me from jerking up. I ran toward the castle. Pyro was right behind me. “Look around you, child. All of these things have died. They once existed. And at the height of their lives, they could not imagine their demise. But demises will come to all. Because everything must end. Nothing can go on forever. Everything must be recycled.” “I know that,” I spat. And I really did. It was a knowledge that had been within me, even if I hadn’t been consciously aware of it my whole life. I had always gravitated toward the dead, and their state of being had never bothered me. Somewhere within, I’d understood it was only a momentary phase – a stepping stone onto something else. But the end Pyro was speaking about was fundamentally different. The death we guards protected was a renewal of life. It was a constant remaking of energy. What Pyro spoke of, however, was a complete nihilistic extermination of existence. It was an End with a capital E. It was something that I was here to stop. Pyro screamed. He sent another charge of magic smashing my way, but I managed to dodge it. Once more I turned and tried to catch a glimpse of his shadow, but I simply could not. “If you hope to be able to defeat me, think again. There is nothing you can do. You cannot end the end, now, can you?”

I didn’t have a reply to that. I finally reached the castle gates. I lurched toward them. Unconsciously, I connected to them, and they began to open. As I shoved my way in, a blast of nostalgic memory catapulted into my heart. It shot up into my throat. This was… this was my home. I closed my eyes, and I could almost sense the memories that I’d lost – running through here, my father by my side. I tried to twist my head up and access the image of him in my memory, but it flitted away. Pyro wasn’t about to let me do it, anyway. He sent out another angry blast of magic. This one caught me. I was thrown forward. I rolled, but I was decidedly slower as I got to my feet. Blood was now dripping down my back. I clutched my shoulder. I continued on. I had no clue where I was going. I ran through a long corridor until I reached a massive door. “You lead me unconsciously to the throne room because you understand that I am the king of all death. You four are nothing but my foot soldiers. You were there to recycle humanity and all living objects on Earth until I arose. But I am here once more. Now get out of my way. Use your life to feed my ascension.” I desperately reached the doors. I locked my hands against them and shoved. They opened. There I saw the throne room. It was massive. It was black, and yet it wasn’t. It was filled with shadow. Shadow that, if you stared at it long enough, you could see life within. Previously I hadn’t understood how Morpheus had been a guard of the dead, but now I did. For as I gazed at that blackness I understood that it was the same darkness every human felt when they closed their eyes every night. This was the thick blackness of unconsciousness. But it wasn’t a lack more than a veil. Beyond it, within it, surrounding it, were dreams. Thousands, millions, billions – every unconscious reverie of every creature that had ever existed. Pyro laughed. It was disted and broken. It came from the mind of a man – or creature – that had never been able to see a future for itself. And if one cannot see a future for themselves why bother to see one for other people?

“Come back here,” he roared. “Your end is here.” Out of the corner of my eye I saw light start to spill through the room. Pyro opened his hands. Flame built up in them. It leaped high. I finally caught a glimpse of the throne. It was massive. It was carved out of bone. There was a scythe right beside it. It was floating in the air. “Even if you grab that up, you will not be able to fight me with it.” I ignored him. Using a last blast of speed, I reached the throne. I skidded down to my knees in front of it, and I clutched the scythe. My fingers squeezed around it. I could feel its power. I could feel its promise, too. It was renewal encapsulated in the final moment of death. But as I tried to draw it up, I couldn’t move it. It would not shift. And in attempting to hold it, I lost my final second. Pyro appeared behind me. He reached over my shoulder. He clutched the scythe. It sang in his grip. I jerked my eyes up. In terror, I stared at him. “No, you’re not my father, are you? Are you using his body? You—” The scythe was doing something to the shadows around Pyro’s form. It was chasing them back. No – it was funneling them into it, using them as power. As they disappeared, they revealed the man beneath. “No,” Pyro said just as his lips became visible. “I’m not your father. I am Hades.”

8

The word Hades reverberated through the room. It dug into my mind like a parasite. I saw him. The same hair, the same smile, the same endless power. He gripped the scythe harder. As soon as his fingers squeezed around it, I was brought back to the present. I jerked back against the throne, my head banging hard against the skull armrest. “How… how did you possess Hades?” “He tried to end me,” Pyro said, his lips snapping hard. It was Hades’s face, all right, but it wasn’t his countenance. The kindness was gone. It was replaced by destructive power and nothing else. “What do you mean?” I demanded. “The fool tried to recycle me. He tried to take me,” he slapped his chest, “and end me.” My brow scrunched. I was only just starting to understand. “You mean you died?” “How can the end ever die? I must exist. You can die,” he growled. “But the ultimate end cannot. Hades did not appreciate this. He thought humanity would benefit from removing nihilism from its heart. But how can I be removed? I am ubiquitous.” He stretched his arms out wide. The scythe sang in his grip. It pulsed with power. I stared at it. I looked up at him. “You made Hades do all those terrible things? How? I

would’ve thought he was the only one who wouldn’t be able to be possessed.” “He made himself vulnerable when he came after me. So I came after him. It’s only fitting that he used his body to summon me. He may be the Lord of the Underworld, but I am the Lord of Destruction.” I shook my head. “Hades,” I whispered. “You must still be in there somewhere. Please,” my voice shook even harder, “please listen to my voice.” “You may call to him, but there is nothing you can do. He has disappeared. I have banished him just as I have banished your father.” I shook my head. “You’re lying. I your words. You need me,” my voice shook, “to stare into Hades’s shadow. To reveal every last secret. He’s still holding on, isn’t he?” Just as when I’d defeated Pyro in the forest by believing in Hades with all my heart, I did so once more. This time was different. This wasn’t naivety speaking. I was finally understanding. “Hades cannot come to you, foolish child. As I told you, I am in complete control of him.” “But he’s not dead. You haven’t banished him. He’s still within you. And I will reach him.” I thrust out a hand. Pyro was right above me. He had my father’s scythe. It was completely encased in powerful magic. And yet I held my hand out to it, nonetheless. I did not pounce to my feet. I did not square off in front of Pyro and call my shadow magic. I simply chose to believe in what I could not yet see. Pyro laughed. He swiped at me. The scythe slashed me across the middle. My blood splattered out everywhere. I rocked back as total terror ripped through me.

I couldn’t withstand too many more of those attacks. He brought the scythe up again. So I brought my hand up once more. I reached it out. My fingers trembled. “Hades. I know you’re still in there. You can get out. Please. Please return.” “He will never return again. Do not worry. Soon your mind will him in the forever-gone.” Pyro slashed at me again. More blood splattered out. I became so weak, I could barely keep my eyes open. But I still… somehow I still managed to keep my hand reached out. “Hades,” I whispered, “please return.” Pyro lifted the scythe. This was it. One more attack and I would be gone forever. I should drop my hand. But I couldn’t. I stared at it. Time seemed to slow down. I glanced over at Pyro. It was Hades. He was right there in front of me, but he just couldn’t… he couldn’t see me. I could see him. I was the only person in existence who could. I hadn’t thought more of that fact earlier, but now it consumed me in my final moment. When I was gone, Hades would have no one. I opened my eyes. I searched for the only thing that mattered to me other than Hades. I stared through the darkness to find the shadow within Pyro. But there was none. That’s when the scythe’s shadow caught my attention. The scythe slashed me across the middle. This was it. My final blow. Pyro’s eyes opened wide. Electric greed pulsed through him. His lips jerked back and forth in total unchecked desire. I felt my life start to leave me. I could tell that this was no normal death. My mind was beginning to stretch. I… in my very last moment, when nothing else would work, I grabbed the scythe. It was still pulsing with shadows. As it bubbled and shook, it tore through the last of me. But I still held on.

“It’s over. Release your power—” he began. I did not release my power. I continued to grip the scythe. Then I… pulled it within me. I was done hiding from the shadows. I was done running from my past. I was done ignoring who I was. “You fool,” Pyro began. As I pulled the scythe further within myself, it wasn’t the blade that mattered but the sheer darkness within. For Death’s scythe was a composite of human darkness. It was the shadows of the psyche of the soul. I pulled it deeper inside me. I shouldn’t have had the power, but I did. For as I accepted the shadow and the blade, something began to rise within me. Pyro continued to laugh until his lips froze. “Why aren’t you dead?” The scythe was half inside my middle now. I pushed it in further. It began to disappear as those shadows were absorbed by my light. I looked up at him. I rose to my feet. He jerked back. Total fear owned him. “How—” “All things have shadows. I exist to liberate them, not of their darkness, but of their fear of it. I take spirits,” I said as I took a step toward him, “from this earthly plane to the next. All those things that are cursed to hide in the shadows will be given another chance. That is my duty.” I stopped in front of him. He jerked forward. The hilt of the scythe was still sticking out of my stomach. He grabbed it and tried to shove it in harder. His lips pulled open in a terrifying sneer. I let him push it all the way in.

It disappeared inside me. It didn’t reappear out the other side. He shook his head. “No—” I placed a hand on his shoulder. I looked into his eyes. “There are shadows all around us and within us. They are not our tormentors but our constant companions. They may be a database of our fears, but they are also a repository for our potential growth. You threatened that,” I said, my voice shaking down low. I still had my hand on his shoulder. Pyro tried to jerk back. He couldn’t. I didn’t just grip him with my hand. He might not have a shadow outside his body, but I could finally see it within. As I stared in through Hades’s wide-open eyes, I saw the fear that was at the heart of Pyro. He could not connect to a single thing. He existed for the sole purpose of destroying all other things forever. But nothing can be destroyed forever. Existence will and must continue in some form. Pyro was a myth. I finally understood what he’d said earlier. Hades had tried to get rid of him because he was no longer relevant. I smiled. “You’re not a human. You’re not an animal. You’re a spirit just like me, just like Hades, just like my father and Morpheus. And it is up to me,” my voice vibrated once more, “to see you off from this realm one last time.” Pyro shook his head. I reached forward. I clamped a hand on his cheek. I stared right into the shadows playing in his mind. “Do not fear. This won’t be the complete end. You will be reborn again. This form is no longer relevant. Another one must rise.” “No. You cannot get rid of the final end—” “All things must rise from something and go back to it. All potentials must exist alongside one another. But you are not potential. You are its exact opposite. You

are a myth – a concept used to bind one to their fear and to never allow them to outgrow it. You are no longer needed.” I continued to stare into his eyes. I watched his shadows. They did things to my mind. They took me to places I would’ve never wanted to go. Now I saw them. And I let them liberate themselves. Pyro shook back. He was almost completely gone now. “You can’t get rid of an ending.” “You simply replace it with a beginning. It is time for you to be reborn, Pyro. Do not fight it. Accept it for what it is. And rise once more.” As soon as those words were out of my lips, it happened. Pyro… he drifted away. It was similar to what happened with Diana. As I liberated the last of the light in his shadow, his form had nothing else to hold on to. His spirit disappeared. It shifted down through the cracks in the floor. I stood there, staring into Hades’s eyes. He began to flow back into his mind. He had a unique light, because he had a unique role. I watched it re-enter him, an enduring smile on my lips. He gasped. His head jerked back. I just held onto his face tighter. He shook once more. Then he stopped. He finally saw what – who – was in front of him. “Penelope?” He touched my face timidly. I nodded. A tear or two trailed down my cheeks. “You need to get out of here. Pyro is summoning himself through me. I’ve tried to stop him, but I can’t. Everything I tried – every witch I ed to help me – failed. He’s too strong—”

“Pyro has been dealt with.” “You can’t deal with Pyro. I tried but—” “He’s gone.” He stopped arguing. He stared around the room. Then he patted himself down. His hands fell into his lap. He stared at me. “How?” “I stopped running from myself.” He nodded. I didn’t know if he understood what I was saying, or if he suddenly became taken by the look in my eyes. It would be endless. Because I was endless. “So it’s over?” he asked. “Nothing is ever truly over.” “It only begins again.” He touched my face. “We knew each other once, didn’t we?” I asked. “We’ve known each other for eternity. You’re the only one who can see me.” “And I fancy you’re the only one who can truly see me, too.” Our gazes roved across one another’s faces. I didn’t long to see what he saw in me. I knew. Just as I now understood what I saw in him. The realist things out there aren’t blessed to shine under the strongest light. It is often only those things that are hidden right in the depths of darkness that matter the most. That which cannot be glimpsed by everyone, that which remains hidden your whole life until a moment of illumination – until you finally see what’s always been beneath. We kissed.

As his lips moved over mine, I stared into his eyes, never missing a moment, never missing a shadow, never missing a spark. I’d been waiting for this for my whole life. And Hades had been waiting for me, too. When we finally moved away, he kept a hand nestled on my face. “We must bring Death back. But first, we must find him.” “I—” I stopped. I thought I heard the caw of a crow. It flew into the room. It landed on the throne. Hades followed my gaze, though it was clear he couldn’t see what I could. “What are you staring at?” “Only I and death Can enter this realm,” I whispered. “I came here under Pyro’s power,” Hades began to explain. “I’m not talking to you.” I stared at the crow as it tilted its head to the side. “Are you what remains of my father’s spirit?” “Penelope?” Hades said, his voice quickening. The crow just looked at me. I really stared at it. Not its glistening wings. Not its shiny beak. Not its sharp eyes. I stared at what it meant to me. The crow had always pushed me on, never letting me fall behind. He’d forced me to stare into my shadow. So now I looked into his. Morpheus had told me that in order to bring my father back, I would have to find his shadow. It could be anywhere. But it had always been right in front of me. “Penelope?” Hades pushed. “How can I bring my father back?” “Liberate the light from his shadow. Morpheus and I will do the rest.”

I stared at the crow. I looked into his eyes, into his shadow, into his heart. I saw my father smiling back. As I liberated the light in his shadow, he started to form before Hades. I knew that, because Hades jerked back. Then he got down on his knees. He grabbed his skull ring. He began to chant. As the chanting grew louder, I thought I could hear Morpheus’s power laced over the top of it. I continued to stare at my father as they did the rest. In a cascade of sparks and shadow, he finally appeared. He sat on his throne, his scythe forming in his hand. He stared at me. I stared back at him. It was over. I had returned that which cannot be returned. I’d seen that which should not be seen. And in my travels through the darkness, I’d found a light within myself like no other. I reached out to Hades and held his hand.

The end of Shadow Witch. I hope you enjoyed this series. If you liked it, you’d love Better off Dead. This four-book action-packed urban fantasy is available today. Read on for an excerpt from the first book.

Better off Dead - Sample

Death comes to all – or at least, that’s the promise. Eve’s got a problem – a big one. She can’t die. She’s cursed to be resurrected, no matter what happens. You’d think that’d be a blessing. You’d be dead wrong. One of the most powerful – and handsome – generals of Hell has promised to kill her once and for all. He’s left her alone for a decade, but now he’s back. When Eve is dragged into a shady mission, she doesn’t realize he’s at its heart. It’s going to take her a lot longer – and a lot of blood and tears – to realize he’s always been in her heart, anyway. … Better off Dead is an action-packed urban fantasy sure to please fans of Odette C. Bell’s Angel: Private Eye.

I gunned the engine, driving right at the violent gang blocking the street. I could take them – I could take anything, including death. Gritting my teeth, I let magic bleed out of me and blast into my motorbike. It gave it the last bolt of power it needed. I mounted a car in front of me, shot over the top, and lunged into the air. Around me, shots blazed. This big, beefy guy in a leather jacket that looked as if it had been made from a whole cow yanked something out of his pocket. I had a chance to see a blast of light and magic exploding everywhere, then he threw it at me. I hauled the bike to the side, skidding around the object. It whipped past my long ponytail. I could smell the scent of nails, sulfur, and wax. A hex.

Sure enough, as it smashed into the street beside me, it gouged a meter-wide chunk of bitumen out and sent it spinning into the air like flaming kisses from the devil himself. My blood boiled from the aftereffects of the hex. Fortunately, my blood didn’t actually boil. My heart wasn’t burned to a crisp, and my skin wasn’t seared off me. But within me, my energy recognized the magic of Hell. Spinning the tires, I shoved the bike to the left. There was another car. Fortunately, it was a low sedan. Expensive. Luxury even, if my short glimpse was anything to go by. Well, it was about to get a bonus set of tire tracks up the hood. Sneering again, I rammed the bike up and got plenty of airtime, my ponytail slicing over my shoulder like a whip. The gang continued to attack, firing every spell they had in their inventories, but it wasn’t enough. I landed again, my tires skidding. Fumes wafted everywhere. This great toxic cloud now blocked us off from the shops lining the street. Nobody was outside staring at us. There weren’t any intrepid kids on their phones catching this crazy footage for the Internet. If there had been anyone on the street when I’d arrived, they’d run for cover long ago. Nobody got involved when a Hell gang was out to make someone pay. Well, no one got involved except for me. The massive guy chucked his head back and yelled at me. Considering his sheer aggression and size, he had to be the leader. Jerking back, he locked his hands on his knees, and he bellowed, spittle flying around his lips. The cry pierced through the air. I wasn’t making that up – nor was I going for dramatic overemphasis. This guy had to be a voice magician. Because with one simple, rumbling cry, he carved a doorway out of the air with nothing more than his frigging words. Shit. Reinforcements were on their way now. As the door was carved right out of the very fabric of space-time, I saw a bony white hand stretch through. The skin glistened. It was wet and hung off the corpse like melted plastic wrap.

Feeders. I hated feeders. Their singular purpose was in their name. They fed off anything and everything in sight. That could be lampposts, chunks of the street, little old ladies, or entire school buses. If they got big – because as they grew their appetite matched their size – you ran.

The rest of the Better off Dead series is currently available.

www.odettecbell.com

Do you want to read more great fiction? For plenty of free series starters, serializations, and information on current and titles, visit www.odettecbell.com today. To sign up for the Odette C. Bell new-release newsletter, head to www.odettecbell.com/-forms/-2 For a full list of series, head here: www.odettecbell.com/books Thank you for reading!

More Fantasy Series by Odette C. Bell

All of these series are complete.

A Lying Witch – she likes to lie; he’s the curse sent to make her pay for her sins. Angel: Private Eye – she’s an angel; he’s a vampire. Together, they must solve every crime that comes their way without falling for each other. Anna’s Hope – she’s the unluckiest witch in the city; he’s the vamp who has everything. Together, they must save Marchtown and fall in love in the process. Better off Dead – she’s cursed never to die; he’s the demon waiting for the chance to rip that curse from her soul and save her in the process. Broken Witch – she’s a witch with two personalities; he’s her partner, and he needs her power to fix this city once and for all. Forget Me – she can make anyone forget; he’s the one person who needs to her before it’s too late. Forgotten Destiny – she’s a new witch with no clue; he’s the most powerful vamp in the city, and he knows exactly what she can do – for the city, and for him. Gladys the Guard – she’s an ancient fighter; he’s a soldier with the cutest smile around. Together, they must save a simple coastal village from Hell. God Given – she’s a goddess with the power of all; he needs her before it’s too late. Gods no More – she was thrown out of heaven by him, and now she’s here for revenge.

Grail’s Dawn – she’s a grail, a witch capable of pulling strength from another; he’s the man she’s been dreaming of all her life. When she’s thrown into his school, she must fight through the lies and intrigue or die trying. Hell’s Angel – she’s the most powerful angel predator in the city. She rips through broken souls to survive. He’s the by-the-book detective she works with. When the army comes for her, he’ll be all that stands in their way. His Only Hope – she’s a goddess on the run; he’s the god she’s running from. When they’re both reborn, they fall for one another again, until he re and the end returns for all. Legal Rites – she’s a wise-cracking sassy witch detective; he’s an ancestral vamp with a secret. Together, they have to save the city from an ancient curse. Magic Born – she’s on the run from the most powerful wizard family in the country; he’s one of them, but he has no clue who she is. For now. She’ll use him, and he’ll use her in turn. My Immortal Soul – she uses her soul to fight; he’s a demon who could never forget her. Together, they have to stop the city from spiraling into Hell. Modern Goddess – these goddesses must find their consorts to save the day. One More Bite – she’s a rare creature who must feed on vamps to survive; he’s willing to give her his blood for a price. On the Cards – she’s the most powerful magical card player in the city; he’s a cop with a secret and a use for her. She’s no pushover. She’ll finish his job, reveal his secret, and do it all in a day. Prince of Roses – she’s a fay fighter; he’s the only vamp in the city brave enough to offer her protection. Shadow Witch – in the dark realm of death, her truth lies. The Billionaire’s Witch – she’s the most powerful witch in the city, and he’s the most powerful man. When he inherits her, she’ll fight for him – but only to find out the truth.

The Demon’s Witch – she’s a powerful witch out for revenge on a school that tormented her. Her demon master will help her. Until she falls in love with him. The Enchanted Writes – when a diner waitress finds out she’s a witch hunter, all hell breaks loose. When she finds out she’s destined to marry her mortal enemy, things only get worse. The Frozen Witch – in her veins lies the cold power of the darkest realm. He will lie to her to use it. But he will need her help soon enough. The Last Queen – she’s the most powerful piece in a real-life game of chess. Every king wants her, but does she want them? The Witch and the Commander – when a prim witch and a handsome navy commander are thrown back in time, they’ll only have each other. Today’s Exorcist – today’s exorcist is tomorrow’s dead meat. A sassy exorcist and a straightlaced detective who is out of his depth must fight to defeat a serial killer before it’s too late. Trial by Light – a mysterious woman with the gift to see the future and one man who can save her. Witch’s Bell – a sassy witch with a rambunctious bookstore, a mysterious detective, and a city to save.

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