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“There is magic in this place,” Azriel said softly.
I gave him a sharp glance. “Good magic or bad magic?”
“Neither. ” He paused. “It sits in between. ”
How the hell could magic sit in between? “What about life? Can you sense the woman?”
He hesitated. “There is someone in the end of that L-shaped—”
I didn’t wait for him to finish. I just ran, as fast as I could. I leapt the remnants of the gates and bolted for the shadowed building, nostrils flaring as I dragged in the scents. Death ran underneath all those I’d noted earlier.
No, no, no!
I crashed shoulder first into the door, sending it and myself falling into the building. I brushed my fingertips against the concrete to steady myself, then ran on, splashing through puddles and leaping over rubbish as I followed the nebulous scent of death through the various rooms—all the while hoping it wasn’t the woman’s death I could smell, but something else.
It was a small hope and, as it turned out, a vain one.
Chapter 2
Dorothy Hendricks lay on a table in the middle of the little room. She was naked, her body so pale and thin that I could count every rib. Though she wore no jewelry, something stuck out from her chest, slightly to the left of her breastbone. It took me a moment to realize it was a knitting-needle-sized piece of wood. She’d been staked.
And yet she looked at peace—her expression was serene, with a smile forever frozen on her lips.
Either she’d welcomed this death or she hadn’t realized exactly what was happening to her. Given what she’d claimed on the astral plane, I had to guess the latter to be true, especially since there was little in the air to suggest anything sexual had been going on.
My gaze went to the four-inch cuts on her wrists. She’d obviously been bled out, but there was no evidence of it on the floor underneath her. Which meant someone had collected her blood—or consumed it. Shivers raced up and down my spine. I really didn’t want to know what someone would do with that much blood, and I really, really didn’t want to meet someone who could consume that much.
“We had time left,” I said, my voice flat despite the anger that surged through me. “But he never intended for us to save her. He was just playing games. ”
“Perhaps, but this death was meant to be. ”
As Azriel spoke, the gossamer shape of Dorothy’s soul rose from her flesh. She looked happy and content, offering her hand without qualm to the white-haired, white-winged reaper who suddenly appeared beside her body. It really didn’t surprise me that she’d chosen the more traditional version of the reaper. Despite her words on the astral plane, there’d been nothing out of the ordinary to be seen in her house. Certainly nothing that suggested she liked her life to be anything other than vanilla.
So why had she become a vampire?
I watched them walk onto the gray fields and disappear, then glanced at Azriel. “Why would a woman like Dorothy be the target of someone so dangerous? She may have been a vampire, but if the information Stane uncovered is to be believed, she was harmless in every other way possible. ”
“Perhaps it was nothing more than a weak astral spirit unwittingly attracting a darker soul. ”
“Perhaps. ” The image of the faceless man ran through my mind, and I shivered again. He’d called me a huntress, but he’d been the one hunting, not me. “But I have a suspicion that his choice of victim was deliberate, not one governed by chance. ”
“Yet he offered you the opportunity to save her. Even if that was never to be, it seems an odd decision for one who takes no chances. ”
“I know. ” My gaze swept Dorothy’s body and came to rest on her calves. Cuts ringed them both, the wounds gaping. I frowned. “Why would he cut her tendons like that?”
“There is a belief in some cultures that cutting the tendons in the legs prevents the soul from rising. ”
And he’d staked her because she was a vampire. “Then why bleed her out? It seems a little overboard. ”
“Perhaps he merely wished to be triple sure of his kill. ”
“Perhaps. ” I scanned the concrete again. Azriel had said earlier that he’d sensed magic, but there was little indication of it. No protective circle, no candles, nothing that in any way suggested there was ever a practitioner here.
“What do you wish to do now?” he asked.
“What I wish to do is go home, eat the biggest steak I can find, have a long soak in the bath, then catch a week’s worth of sleep. ” I grimaced and dug my vid-phone out of my pocket. “What I have to do, however, is ring Uncle Rhoan. ”
His expression, when he answered, was resigned. “So tell me where the body is. ”
A wry smile touched my lips, although—sadly—his presumption was all too correct. Most of my calls to him of late had been about the dead or the about to be dead. Still, I couldn’t help saying, “Hey, I might just be ringing to say hello to my favorite uncle. ”
He snorted softly, amusement crinkling the corners of his gray eyes. “We both know if you just wanted a chat, you’d ring my sister. Who, by the way, is a little peeved that you missed the weekly get-together. ”
Damn, so I had. Mom and Riley had met for coffee and cake every week for as long as I could remember, and it was a tradition Riley and I were determined to continue.
While I did have a good excuse—I’d still been in the process of recovering from the fights with both my sword and the Rakshasa, the spirit who’d answered the call of ghosts desperate for revenge at one of the blood whore clubs run by the high vampire council—I couldn’t exactly tell Riley that because she didn’t know about my connection with the vampire council. If she ever did find out about it, she’d hit the roof, not to mention shove me somewhere safe while she confronted Hunter and her cronies. And as strong as Riley, Quinn, and Rhoan were, I had a suspicion it would take more than the three of them to outmaneuver Hunter.
“You need to ring her,” Rhoan continued. “She’s worried. We’re both worried. ”
“Then you need to not tell her so much about what’s happening. ”
He snorted again. “Yeah, like that’s going to work. You know she can smell trouble a mile away. ” He paused. “Okay, I have your location and will be there in twenty. Don’t disturb any evidence. ”
“I won’t. See you soon. ”
I shoved the phone back into my pocket, my gaze on Dorothy’s body. Why on earth would anyone go to so much trouble to destroy someone who was, it seemed, totally harmless? It made no sense, and part of me—a small, insane part—wanted to unravel the puzzle.
“Let your uncle find whoever is responsible for this,” Azriel said. “It is not something we should get involved in. ”
“No, it isn’t. ” I couldn’t help but look again at the woman’s face, though, and there was an unpleasant suspicion in my heart that this was far from over. “We’ve enough on our plate as it is. ”
Including, I thought, with a glance at my watch, a date with a locker at Southern Cross Station in just over an hour.
I rubbed my arms, then scanned the immediate area. Rhoan might have warned me not to disturb any evidence, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t look. Besides, I needed to do something while I waited for him.
Water and trash lay everywhere, and the air was ripe with rotting rubbish and mold. The vaguest aroma of blood laced the thicker, more unpleasant scents in the room, but there was little else. If the stranger—or anyone else, for that matter—had been here, he had no distinct smell. Which went with his lack of a face, I guess.
“Someone was here,” Azriel commented. “The air still resonates with energy. ”
I glanced at him. His blue eyes held echoes of the anger that burned within me. “Can you track it?”
He shook his head. “They used magic to leave. ”
“And yet there’s no trace of magic on the ground. ”
“Magic can take many forms. The charm around your neck, for example. ”
“But this charm is minor magic compared to something that could transport a person. ” My gaze went back to Dorothy and I studied the wounds on her wrists again. “How can there be no evidence of bleeding when she’s been bled out?”
“I do not know. ”
I squatted next to the table. The concrete was thick with layers of grime and god knows what else, but the area underneath her hanging wrist bore a faint ring-shaped mark. The blood hadn’t been consumed—it had been collected.
Why would anyone want to do that? I glanced up at Azriel, but he merely shrugged. “I am not an expert on humans and all their eccentricities. ”
“So the person behind this was human?”
“I would have sensed either a spirit or a demon. ”
That the no-face stranger might be human somehow made him seem all the more creepy. I shivered, then rose and walked around the rest of the table. Other than a matching ring in the grime on the opposite side of the floor, there was little to see.
I retreated to a wall and sat down on the floor. God, if I didn’t get some food and rest soon, I was going to end up back in bed and sick as hell.
Azriel strolled around to my side of the table. “Shuffle forward. ”
I raised an eyebrow, but did as ordered. He sat down behind me, then placed his fingers against my temples and began to gently massage them. Heat radiated from the epicenter of his touch, and the pain began to recede.
“Azriel,” I said, somewhat reluctantly, “I thought we agreed you shouldn’t be healing me. You’re the better fighter, so it’s more important that you keep your strength rather than sharing it with me—”
“If you can’t think and move, then me being the better fighter is irrelevant. ” He paused, but his fingers continued to work their magic. “Besides, I can no longer fully heal you. I merely revive. ”
“That’s splitting hairs and you know it. ” Not that I wanted him to stop. It felt far too good—both his touch and the sense of reassurance it provided.