Ghostland

CHAPTER 8

AISLING was worried by the time they arrived at the occult shop. It’d taken far longer than she’d anticipated and would take them even longer to return home.

The shadows were deep in places and the area felt deserted. The abandoned buildings and rubble remains of war-torn streets were already being reclaimed by wild creatures as well as supernatural ones.

Eyes glowed from dark hollows and disappeared in a blink. The wind brought whispered voices, but whether they belonged to her imagination or some fey beings, she didn’t know and wouldn’t risk discovering.

There were other buildings, their doors shut and barred, their interiors darkened. The occult shop stood alone, apart, an inscribed circle painted in red on the concrete sidewalk surrounding it.

The sigils were traditional, simple, so common Aisling thought perhaps they were done for show, for those humans without inherent magic, rather than with the true intention of keeping spectral beings out.

“Can you cross the circle?” she asked.

Her question was greeted with an amused chuckle. “Yes,” Zurael said, proving it by stepping forward and pushing the door open, holding it for her to pass through.

A woman looked up just as a crystal embedded in the forehead of a primitive statuette behind the counter flared red and stayed that way for a long moment before going dark. “Cool,” she said, tugging at a ring pierced through her eyebrow, then rubbing her palm over a shaved, almond-colored head. “That’s never happened before. I’ll have to tell Javier.”

“He’s not here?” Zurael asked.

“No,” she answered, sparing him a quick glance before asking Aisling, “So what are you? You’re not a witch or a sorceress. We get plenty of them in here and the crystal’s never reacted.”

“A shamaness.”

Aisling didn’t know what to think of the woman’s claim that the crystal had reacted to her presence. She moved closer, studied the crude figurine. It reminded her of the artifacts she’d seen in Geneva’s books on ancient history, of something unearthed long ago and created millennia before then, in what was once called the Holy Lands, though in the end those same lands became the birthplace of The Last War.

“You’re the one who has Henri’s house now?” the woman said, drawing Aisling’s attention away from the primitive statuette.

“Yes.”

“I’m Aubrey, Javier’s assistant and apprentice. Shop’s open for a few minutes more. Since you’re new to Oakland, here are the rules. Cash only. If you want to trade services, you have to wait until Javier’s around to negotiate. Candles and supplies are for sale. The books aren’t unless there’s already a duplicate made up.”

She lifted a hand holding a pen. “If you want a book you can pay to have us copy the entire thing; sometimes we do it by hand, other times we do it on a copy machine. You can also buy copies of a page or more. Price varies depending on the book. You take your chances if you try to memorize the information and leave with it. If we catch you copying it yourself, you get a warning the first time; after that you’re banned.”

The pen tilted to point out a collection of books in a glass case at the end of the counter. “Those come out one at a time and have to be looked at right there. They’re spelled and you don’t want to know what’ll happen if you try to leave with one of them.” Aubrey glanced down at the counter, to a page she was copying by hand. “I need to get a little more of this done, otherwise I’d give you a tour of the books. Ask if you have questions.”

Aisling nodded and began exploring. Zurael did the same.

The shop was larger than it had looked from the front, but laid out in a way so whoever was tending it could keep an eye on any visitor. Candles, pentagram jewelry, fetishes, herbs, wands, caldrons and athames-all were available and with plenty to choose from. But it was the sheer number of books on magic and witchcraft that left Aisling both awed and wary.

An entire wall contained a library of handwritten spell journals, individual Book of Shadows that no living witch would have willingly parted with, much less shared for a price or allowed to be copied by someone she didn’t know or trust. Most were old, probably salvaged from homes where entire families had been lost to plague and war.

Aisling turned away from them, saddened by the loss they represented. She joined Zurael at the glassed bookcase and immediately understood the stiffness of his posture, the menace she read in him when their eyes met. Among the texts there were books filled with demon names and rituals for summoning and commanding them, as well as books on Satanism and performing black magic.

A chill slid up Aisling’s spine at the sight of them. “How can you offer these?” she asked, her voice holding the horror and disbelief she felt.

Aubrey looked up from her work. Pierced eyebrows drew together in puzzlement. “Haven’t you ever been in an occult store before?”

Aisling shook her head. If one existed in the San Joaquin, it was a well-kept secret, even from Geneva, whose sheltering of those with otherworldly gifts was known, though never flaunted.

Aubrey spared a glance at the glassed bookcase. “Javier’s collection is amazing, but it’s nothing compared to the store in San Francisco.” She shrugged. “Selling information isn’t illegal. Nine times out of ten it either doesn’t work for the untrained or it ends up getting them killed. And if it does work, and they get caught doing something they shouldn’t with it, then they’re punished. Believe me, the Church sees to that.”

Aisling couldn’t let the subject drop. “People have disappeared. There have been human sacrifices.”

Aubrey’s hand tightened on her pen. “The police have already been here, several times, asking who looked at the books. We cooperate with them. There’s no guarantee of privacy. Anyone who shops here knows that.” She put her pen down, glanced at the growing dusk and slid off the stool. “I need to close the shop now.”

Zurael said, “Will Javier be here tomorrow?”

“Maybe. He comes and goes.”

Aisling worried about asking further questions and revealing where her true interest in visiting the shop lay, but she couldn’t waste the opportunity. “Do you know anything about men and women who have crosses branded into their skin?”

Aubrey shook her head. “Sounds like they’re religious zealots, maybe members of one of the cults that live outside the city. There’s a place called The Mission at the other end of Oakland, just before The Barrens. Ask there. We don’t get many true believers here.”

“Have you heard of a substance called Ghost?” Aisling asked.

“No. Is it something we should carry here?”

Dread at the possibility made a knot form in Aisling’s stomach. “No, you shouldn’t offer it for sale. Anyone who uses it invites death.”

“You’d be surprised how many customers, especially untalented humans, are turned on by the prospect of dangerous magic.” Aubrey came out from behind the counter and Aisling stopped her with a touch to her wrist.

“What about these symbols?” Aisling used her finger to draw imaginary lines on the countertop.

Aubrey picked up a pen and pulled a sheet from the pad of paper. “Use this.”

Javier’s assistant stiffened when Aisling re-created the branded patterns Elena had traced in tea on the coffee table after the trip to the ghostlands.

“They’re punishment brands for someone caught using magic that’s against the law,” Aubrey said, immediately shifting away from Aisling. “Now I really need to close up and leave.”

“Do you know of anyone who wears these brands?” Aisling asked, but Aubrey was shaking her head no and opening the front door for them to leave before the words were completely out.

“SHE lied about knowing of someone with the brands,” Zurael said after they’d put some distance between themselves and the shop.

“I thought so, too. But we know more than we did.” Aisling slid her hands into the roomy pockets of her work pants to keep from curling one of them around Zurael’s arm as they walked. It worried her that in such a short time his heat and scent had come to represent security. “Tomorrow we can visit The Mission and ask about the man and woman bearing the cross brands. It doesn’t seem likely that religious zealots would frequent places like Sinners or sell something like Ghost.”

Zurael’s hand stroked down her spine and made her shudder with pleasure. “Humans have a long history of seeking enlightenment through mind-altering substances. But I agree, the man we witnessed selling Ghost at Sinners didn’t appear to be doing so with the intention of converting followers or leading them to salvation.”

Even though she didn’t believe in the Church’s vision of heaven and hell, Aisling worried for her soul. She knew too well how choices made in life followed a person in death.

“Is there such a thing as salvation?” she asked, curious what a being who most likely called one of the dark places in the spiritlands his home would say.

Zurael laughed and stopped walking. She stopped with him and both of them turned.

He cupped her face and brushed his thumb across her lips. In the fading light the liquid gold of his eyes held both amusement and desire. “I’m not the one to ask about salvation for the children of mud. Until I met you, I would have seen them all destroyed in the fiery burn of justice and retribution.”

“And now?”

Zurael leaned in, unable to stop himself from pressing a kiss to her forehead. “And now there is at least one I would argue should be spared.”

He closed his eyes and inhaled her scent. It filled his lungs and dissolved into his bloodstream, surged downward until desire pulsed through his cock in time with his heartbeat and the whispered sound of her name across his soul.

His fingers traced the delicate bones of her spine, slid over the gentle curve of her buttocks. Had the first son of The Prince felt this way about the human female he’d become obsessed with?

Zurael rubbed his cheek against Aisling’s silky hair as his father’s imagined voice issued a warning through time, drew his thoughts to the moment they stood together in the Hall of History, before the mural of Jetrel. She became his weakness, the bait used to trap him. And overlaid on the Prince’s words were those Malahel had spoken of Aisling. It’s good you already intend to kill her. She is dangerous to us and will be made even more so if she learns what’s written on the tablet.

Fierce protectiveness surged through Zurael when Aisling’s arms wound around his waist and she pressed more tightly to him. He would argue she be spared.

She’d admitted she didn’t know how to bind him and wouldn’t have summoned him if the need weren’t urgent. He’d been a shadow in her mind when they were together in the ghostlands. He could attest to the truth of her innocence when it came to the Djinn. He would offer his belief that powerful forces were at work and had ensnared her in a trap the Djinn benefited from.

His palm glided upward. The heat intensified between them. Worry for her made him ask, “How were you able to draw the brands Elena showed you?” They’d been inked in tea on the coffee table and gone within seconds, so quick they’d left little impression on him.

“I have a memory for things like that. Sometimes it feels as though I’ve seen them before, even though I know I haven’t.”

“Like an ancestral memory. You know nothing of your parents?”

“No.” Aisling’s lips brushed his earlobe and sent lust boiling through him so he ached.

His hands curled into fists at her back with the material from her shirt gathered in them. Her soft moan was echoed by his as the contours of her breasts and the hard points of her nipples became more pronounced.

It would be so easy to urge her into the shadows, to press her against the wall of an abandoned building and take her there. Or to command her to grip a windowsill as he’d commanded her to grip the counter in front of the mirror so he could mount her as he’d done then.

A shudder went through Zurael. Arousal leaked to coat his cock head in molten desire.

“We need to keep walking. It’ll be dark soon,” she said, her breath hot on his skin. It drew his thoughts to her lips. It renewed his fantasies of placing her on her knees before him so he could know the feel of her mouth and tongue on his cock.

He opened his hands, freed her shirt in favor of sliding over delicate, feminine curves to cup her hips. “Do you think I fear the dark or the creatures that roam in the nighttime, Aisling?”

“No.” She pressed a kiss to his collarbone. “But I do. And it would be better if my neighbors didn’t see me out in it and wonder why I’m not a prisoner to it as they are.”

Reluctantly Zurael set her aside. Misgiving, guilt, worry forced the lust to recede into the background. At Sinners he’d accepted Aisling’s need to approach the Ghost dealer. The task of finding its source was hers, set before her by the spirits protecting her in a land the Djinn feared. But in the occult shop he’d struggled against letting her question Aubrey and draw further attention and danger to herself.

It was only a matter of time before Aisling’s questions would ripple outward and turn the hunted into hunters. If they viewed him as no more than her lover, her companion and bodyguard, then they would underestimate how lethal he was. They wouldn’t know until the moment of their own deaths that there had never been a possibility of defeating him or harming her. But looking at her standing before him, fragile and soft, intoxicatingly feminine, he felt a soul-deep fear for her.

Zurael knelt on the ground. He swiped his hand across the loose earth, smoothed it into a dark tablet. A few sure strokes and he’d drawn a symbol representing the name of a lesser angel killed by the Djinn in some ancient battle. It was one he remembered from his childhood and the endless hours he’d spent studying the tomes kept by the House of the Serpent.

He let the symbol remain for a heartbeat then cleared it with the sweep of his hand. “Can you draw it?”

She laughed softly and his chest tightened. The ease in which she knelt and recaptured the name in quick lines across the dirt, the talent she took pride in and performed with confidence, was the very thing that would make her death necessary if she were to see the text written on the tablet he’d been sent to retrieve.

“Close your eyes,” he said, an ache forming in his chest when Aisling complied with a smile, trusted him so easily when he might bring only death to her.

This time he wrote several sentences using script and symbols many of the Djinn no longer studied or remembered. It was an account from a history text, a record of angel sightings in long-dead and forgotten cities.

“You can look now,” he said, watching her closely, giving her only enough time to scan each line once before he cleared it away. “Can you copy it?”

Her eyes met his. Pleasure had given way to somber expression, to private, guarded thoughts he longed to coax from her as much as he feared what they might reveal.

She leaned forward. Her hand moved with the same sure confidence she exhibited when re-creating only a solitary symbol. There was only a brief hesitation on the name of an angel whose purpose the Djinn had never been able to determine, before she moved on to complete the task, her perfect accuracy deepening his fear for her.

He had to ensure she never saw the tablet he sought. Even the pleading of a Serpent prince wouldn’t spare her from a Djinn assassin if she did.

Zurael erased her work and stood. He offered his hand because he couldn’t stop himself from wanting the feel of her skin against his. A shudder went through him when she placed her hand in his in a simple display of trust. Pain over possibly betraying her lanced his heart even as his cock responded by growing harder and fuller.

They resumed walking. Silence reigned between them, though around them the increasing dusk brought the sounds of insects and frogs, of swaying weeds and the rub of leaf against leaf-the thinly veiled hush before the predators stirred and woke, arrived to claim the night.

“In Stockton the Church or a religious council is always involved when magic practitioners are on trial,” Aisling said as they drew close to her home. “It happens rarely, since few admit openly to being gifted, but if the brands Elena saw are punishment brands as Aubrey said, then Father Ursu might be able to identify the man who sold Ghost if he was judged here. If nothing else, he’d know what offenses they represent.”

Zurael’s hand tightened on hers in protest. He didn’t trust the Church not to set Aisling to a task in the spiritlands if she went to them. Father Ursu may have claimed Henri’s death weighed heavily on him, but that hadn’t stopped him from going with armed men to take Aisling from her home and family.

“It would be dangerous for me to be with you if you go to see him,” Zurael said.

In a non-corporeal form, as he’d been when he followed her from the house, he was nearly impossible to kill or detect. But he was also at his weakest, when a spell trap set for any number of other beings would also ensnare him. He would expect such traps at the church, just as he’d expect one of those rare humans who could read heavily masked auras to be present. They’d think him demon instead of Djinn, but the damage would be done and the risk for Aisling increased unnecessarily.

“You asked Raisa about the library. Let’s look for information there first. If you ask Father Ursu about the brands or the man who wears them, he’ll wonder what your interest is, perhaps have the authorities intervene and collect the man for questioning.”

“You’re right,” Aisling said, and he could hear the worry in her voice. “We might never get a chance to talk to him if the police or Church get to him first.”

They rounded the corner and her house came into sight. He felt her tension build with each step. Several times she called for the ferret, Aziel, but there was no flash of black or chirped greeting.

Zurael pulled her keys from his pocket as they neared the front door. He laughed at her consternation when she realized she’d been in such a hurry to escape his presence earlier that she’d left without them.

She took them from him, glanced around again, though the yard was overgrown and held a number of places for her pet to hide. “Maybe he’ll show up once I start cooking dinner,” she said, worrying her bottom lip. “I can leave a window open for a little while longer.”

Zurael’s thoughts went to the few things she had in her cabinets. In the Kingdom of the Djinn, few knew hunger. Even the sila, those of lesser birth who had no ability to change shape or become non-corporeal, didn’t lack for food or shelter unless they were cast out into the elements by their houses or clans and not accepted into another.

His life had been one of luxury, of fine food and respectful servants, of incredible freedom borne along with the heavy weight of responsibility that came with being The Prince’s son. Until he’d been summoned, he’d never known true fear, had never experienced so deeply the emotions that buffeted him when he was in Aisling’s presence.

“Let me provide tonight’s meal,” he said, and as soon as the words were out, he saw the opportunity they provided for him to return to the occult shop.

“Full darkness will be here in-”

He stopped her by the touch of a fingertip to her lips and felt his heart fill with tender warmth when a fleeting look of worry moved through her eyes before she gave a slight nod, accepting he would be safe out in the night, where she wouldn’t be.

“I’ll travel fast and be back soon,” he said, finding himself suddenly reluctant to leave her.

She nodded and turned back toward the barred, metal door, slid the key into the lock and opened it enough to unlock the wooden door behind it.

He couldn’t resist the temptation to touch her one last time, to trace her spine and feel her shiver as desire flared inside her as surely as it did inside him. When he returned he’d have her again. He’d know the silky heat of her wet core, the ecstasy of being buried so deep inside her their heartbeats blended and pulsed in sync with one another.

“I’ll have to close the windows before you get back,” Aisling said, letting the exterior barred door close as she gave Zurael the house keys.

Somehow he managed to part from Aisling, to seek the shadows and will his physical shape to fade. He became a swirling, eddying wind that twisted, picking up random twigs and leaves as he retraced their steps to the occult shop. He knew even as he did it there might be no chance to examine the primitive statue and perhaps destroy it.

Javier’s assistant had assumed the crystal in the figurine’s forehead reacted to Aisling because she was first through the door. But he’d seen images of similar statuettes in the history books of the Djinn, and all of them were dangerous tools in the hands of someone capable of summoning and binding those who could shed their physical form.

What had taken quite a bit of time to do as a man took only a few minutes without the hindrance of flesh. With a thought, unseeable particles condensed, re-formed and clothed him in the manner he’d chosen when he left the Kingdom of the Djinn.

From deep in the shadows another presence emerged. The aura was heavily masked but recognizable to Zurael. He turned and said, “What brings you here, Irial?”

“My father sent me,” Irial said, stepping closer, the green of his eyes a sharp contrast to the stylized raven marking his cheek.

Where Iyar en Batrael was the pitch-black of night, the eldest prince of the House of the Raven was the golden-brown of the forest floor in evening light. Teeth flashed white, but the amusement didn’t quite reach the green of his eyes as he said, “I think my father worries the little shamaness will distract you from your task and perhaps be your downfall. From what I’ve witnessed, even from a safe distance, he has cause for concern. Beyond that, I’m simply a messenger boy, sent to gather what you’ve learned so he can feed the information to Malahel en Raum in silken threads for whatever web the two of them are weaving.”

There was no reason for Zurael to withhold most of what he’d learned, though he carefully parsed through it, avoided mentioning Aisling’s ability to quickly memorize script and symbols. And underlying his recounting was a subtle message: He didn’t view her as an enemy of the Djinn. He would see her spared.

Irial’s face was grim by the time Zurael stopped speaking. He glanced at the occult shop. “I can feel the traps from here. They’re powerful. I’m not sure it would be safe for you to enter the shop again, even in a corporeal form.”

Frustration spiraled through Zurael, but he wasn’t foolish enough to ignore Irial’s assessment. Irial was gifted with the ability to recognize the presence of entrapment spells before they could be triggered.

“We can get closer,” Irial said, “I want to see the figurine.”

AISLING remained on the door stoop long moments after Zurael disappeared. She’d been so anxious to return to the house, to escape the impending darkness. But now the thought of going inside alone held no appeal.

“Aziel,” she called, knowing it was useless but unable to stop herself from doing it.

Goose bumps rose on her arms as she left the stoop. She was determined not to give in to the fear and uneasiness that being completely by herself engendered.

Resolutely she forced herself to go around the corner of the house, as Aziel had done when he’d escaped earlier in the day. But there was no sign of him in the tangled weeds and rubble.

She frowned as she imagined the work it would require to reclaim the yard. Perhaps Henri’s size had kept him from tackling the physical work necessary to garden, or perhaps, as the gloom of his house indicated and both Raisa and Father Ursu had alluded to, he suffered from depression and had no energy for managing a yard.

“Aziel,” she called again before returning to the stoop and glancing to the spot where Zurael had disappeared into the shadows. Need for him coiled in her belly and snaked up her spine to her breasts. Each time she resolved to keep her distance emotionally, to deny the desire for him, her resistance melted against the lust that flared between them.

Aisling shivered. Her nipples tightened and her clit stiffened against panties wet with arousal as she remembered the light scrape of his talons against her neck after they’d left Tamara, the heated promise in his eyes and hard intent of his body after they’d left the occult shop.

Another shiver passed through her, this time with thoughts of the script and symbols he’d drawn in the dirt. So many of them were vaguely familiar-perhaps ancestral memories as he’d claimed. But if they were…

A cold knot formed in Aisling’s stomach and banked the fires of need. If they were the memories of her ancestors, did that make her part-demon? What other symbols and script would Zurael know so readily and use to test her with?

She wiped suddenly damp palms against her pants. Her heart beat so loudly it drowned out the call of insects in the deepening menace of dusk.

Shall we appease your curiosity about the being who would claim you as his own?

You asked who I served on your first visit. Would you like to see the place he calls home?

I’ll let you in on a secret. He’d like for you to join him here. Your mother got away from him, or so they say. But that’s a story for another day.

I’d hoped we could spend some time together. Not that I’d risk eternal torment and damnation by actually fucking you. But even a dead man can fantasize.

The taunts Elena’s brother had spoken in the spiritlands whispered through her mind, haunted her with a different meaning than the one she’d attributed to them before. She’d thought John spoke of lust, but what if he spoke of her father?

Aisling curled her hand around the hidden pouch containing her fetishes, pictured again the mix of script and sigils Zurael had drawn in the dirt, the one among them she knew by heart. It was a name Aziel had given her long ago, her most powerful protector though he’d refused to answer her questions or speak of the being the sigil represented.

He’d cautioned her against using the name unless she feared for her soul. He’d warned the cost of summoning her ally and drawing him to her was beyond any she could imagine paying.

Aisling shook off her thoughts and went inside. She moved from window to window, noting as she secured them that the bars she’d set ensuring they couldn’t be raised higher from the outside remained in place.

The shaman’s workroom drew her. The sight of the stones and unfinished forms waiting on the workbench, the fetishes guarding the room, didn’t offer her respite from the unanswered questions and haunting fears circling inside her, not only about her unknown parents and her own identity, but about Zurael and Aziel. If they were both demon, then were they her father’s enemies or his allies?

She glanced at the bed of dirt in the center of the room but knew she didn’t have the courage to seek John out in the ghostlands and ask him to show her the place his master called home. And beyond that, she feared what the knowledge would cost her, what it would mean to her.

With a sigh Aisling forced the swirling chaos of her thoughts to still. She picked up the box of matches on Henri’s workbench and lit several lamps rather than use electricity. Then she turned her attention to examining the large fetishes Henri had positioned around the room to guard him when he journeyed in astral form.

She lifted an owl carved from a heavy greenish-brown stone she didn’t recognize. Henri’s work was less detailed than her own, lacking the tiny lines that made some of her larger pieces seem real, as though they could actually house the spirits of the animals they represented.

For an instant she flashed back to the primitive figurine at the occult shop. She hoped the library would have history books covering ancient times so she’d get a chance to learn more about the statuette, but she didn’t count on it. During the years of plague and lawlessness so many books had been destroyed-burned to provide heat and light, and in some cases because those who came across them found the ideas and thoughts they contained offensive. Any truly valuable books surviving had long since disappeared into private collections

In Stockton there was only a small library because the city government saw no reason to spend money on books when the rich and powerful had their own and the poor who struggled in the city or on the land had little time to read or even to learn how. And even if they had, most were wary, worried their choice of reading material would be noted and judged by the Church and those they supported to power. Aisling wondered if it would be different in Oakland, or if word of her visit to the library with Zurael would find its way to Father Ursu as it seemed the trip to Sinners had.

A presence in the doorway made her glance up. Adrenaline poured into her bloodstream at the sight of the stranger standing there, blocking her escape. Her hand instinctively tightened on the owl fetish.

He was only slightly bigger than she, small against other men, which had perhaps led to the violence he’d been found guilty of. The tattoos of a lawbreaker marked his face, one on each cheek, both proclaiming the nature of his crimes-a serious assault against a lover and another against a family member. A third conviction and he might well be executed, but Aisling doubted he’d ever be found if he escaped from her house.

Zurael. She cried his name, but she wouldn’t wait for him to rush to her rescue.

The man stepped into the room. His eyes traveled over her and made her skin crawl.

A length of cord unwound when he opened a hand. He grabbed its end and pulled the cord tight, snapping it with a violence meant to add to her terror.

She didn’t dare look away from him, though she frantically sifted through her memories of what was on the workbench behind her. There were mallets and chisels, but none of them would give her the reach or the weight of the fetish in her hand.

“Who sent you?” Aisling asked, managing to push the words out, sure his presence in her home wasn’t accidental.

“You’ll know when you’re dead,” he said, snapping the cord again before slowly wrapping it around his hand, covering his knuckles with it and kissing them like a prizefighter might do his bare flesh.

He grinned and licked his lips when Aisling grasped the owl with both hands. “I like it better when it’s not easy.”

Every muscle in Aisling’s body tensed as he took a step toward her. Her breath moved in and out of her lungs in fast pants.

There was no point in screaming. Even if her neighbors heard her, they wouldn’t brave the night to come to her aid.

Death. Delay. They were the only two options.

Aisling didn’t let the open doorway tempt her into making a wild dash into another room. But she cursed her ignorance and her ready acceptance of Zurael’s protection for not having paid enough attention to the details that could make a difference between life and death. She had no idea if there were locks on the internal doors, if they were strong enough to last until Zurael’s return.

At home she knew every hiding place, every defensible space, each room that offered a safe refuge and a chance for survival from not only supernaturals should they attack, but from bands of outcast, lawless humans. Living in the country-on land with an abundance of food, water and shelter-was dangerous, though other than those times when the landowners came with their militiamen, or the police came on some pretext, she’d never felt threatened.

She kept her attention on her assailant’s eyes-counted on his intentions arriving there first and giving her enough warning. How many times had the eldest of Geneva’s fostered children drilled and driven that point home to the youngest as they were growing up? How many bruises had blossomed on her skin in the course of learning how to defend herself?

There was only a second to act and she did it-swung the large fetish like a club without stopping to question or second-guess her instinct.

Her attacker howled with pain as the carved stone struck his forearm. Fury contorted his face, chased away the sick amusement she’d seen when he taunted and toyed with her.

Pain screamed through Aisling as he landed a blow to her chest. Agony spread in her stomach when the steel toe of his boot struck her, driving her backward against the workbench.

Rational thought left her and she fought, swinging the fetish as primal sounds and whimpers blended, escaped along with the sound of her breathing.

The will to kill, the necessity of it, rode her. It fed on terror-fueled surges of adrenaline and gave her strength without hesitation.

She managed to drive him back a step, and rather than cower she advanced, swung again, and the sickening crack of a broken bone sent savage satisfaction through her.

He lunged and she sidestepped, used the fetish like a baseball bat and sent him into the edge of the workbench. He struck headfirst and fell to the floor. Didn’t rise.

Aisling tightened her grip on the fetish. Her stomach roiled with the choices in front of her: kill him as he lay unmoving or get close enough to tie his wrists and ankles.

Small tremors warned of larger ones to come. It took her a few seconds to realize the whimpering sounds of an injured animal were hers.

She dared to glance away from her assailant long enough to scan the workbench. There were some strands of wire within arm’s reach. She picked them up, and the tremors grew stronger at the thought of putting the fetish down so she could secure her attacker.

Aisling watched him carefully as she slowly knelt. She willed herself to strike first, to club him if he moved at all.

She couldn’t kill him in cold blood. But she wouldn’t let him subdue her.

He remained completely still, so still she paused to see if his chest rose and fell. When she couldn’t be sure, she dropped the wire in order to check his pulse.

A wrenching shudder gripped him just as she placed her fingers on his throat. His eyes opened, revealing shock and horror in the instant before his spirit entered the ghostlands, leaving a hollow body staring at the ceiling.

Relief came and Aisling sat on the floor. Tears emerged to run freely down her cheeks in a release of fear at first, and then in acknowledgment of the agony radiating from her stomach and chest where her assailant had struck her.

For long moments she gave in to emotion and pain, buried her face against her knees and hugged them to her, until the need for answers pressed her into action.

Unlike the men who’d been Ghosting at Sinners, she felt no guilt over this man’s death. He’d meant to kill her.

The tattoos on his face told of his crimes-assault against a family member and against a lover, both offenses inflicting damage severe enough for him to be charged. She guessed his victims had been women, glanced to the cord still wrapped around his knuckles and doubted he’d been warned of Zurael’s presence.

Had her attacker slipped into the house when she’d gone around back to call for Aziel? Or had he entered earlier in the day to lie in wait?

Aisling forced her arms away from her knees and knelt next to him. She braced herself to touch him, to search his pockets for answers. She tried to close her mind, but it was impossible to hide from her gift. The absence of a soul made the body nothing more than an already-decaying husk of flesh.

There was folded paper money in his front pocket. She set it aside, wondered if it was what he’d been paid to kill her.

Her pulse leapt when she found keys in a second pocket. She wouldn’t be sure until she tested them, but they looked like duplicates of the ones she’d given Zurael so he could get back into the house when he returned with dinner.

Physical pain screamed through Aisling when she rolled her assailant over. It continued to pass in waves that made her want to curl into a ball.

There were no answers to be found in the back pockets, and she knew she didn’t have the strength necessary to undress him in case there were hidden pockets sewn into his clothing or identifying marks on him. She wondered if they’d find a cross branded into his flesh but knew looking for it would have to wait until Zurael returned.

Aisling rose to her feet, swayed and nearly collapsed. Her hand curled around the healing amulet she’d gotten in payment from Tamara. If it was as powerful as the witch claimed… If she could just make it to the kitchen and boil some water…

But what if there’s a next time? She’d only just started looking for whoever was creating Ghost.

The tears she’d fought successfully returned with indecision. She had no way of knowing how much of the amulet’s healing properties would be leached away if she steeped it in tea, even for only a few minutes, and used it now.

Aisling closed her eyes. She forced herself to combat the waves of pain and nausea with steady breathing and sheer determination. If she wasn’t better in a little while, she promised herself, she’d use the amulet. And the promise helped.

Breath by breath her strength returned. She took a step, then another. Found the second easier than the first.

Her destination was the couch, where she could curl up and wait for Zurael. But as she passed the bed of dirt in the center of the room, she remembered asking, Who sent you? and heard her assailant reply, You’ll know when you’re dead.

Aisling shivered as, unbidden and unwanted, an idea came to her. If she followed him into the ghostlands, she might gain the answer to her question. If she got to him before his soul was claimed, he might gladly exchange the name he held for what protection she could offer-even if it was only temporary.

Nervousness made the nausea intensify. She worried that she might have internal injuries making her bleed into her stomach. Shortness of breath and the rapid beating of her heart made the pain in her chest seem sharper, more piercing. But the idea of following her attacker was unshakable.

Slowly she sat on the red dirt. As she enclosed herself in a protective circle, she thought of the names she could call upon for help, and discarded them in favor of a more powerful spirit guide. The price she paid would be higher, but she’d never traveled to the spiritlands when she was in pain or weak. She didn’t know whether her astral form would be more vulnerable because of her physical injuries. When the circle was closed, she pulled the pouch containing the fetishes from underneath her shirt and spilled them across her palm just long enough to select a falcon, its wings and legs outstretched.

Aisling placed the falcon upright on the dirt and retrieved the small ceremonial athame from its hidden sheath sewn into the back of her pants. With a quick slicing motion she made a shallow cut across her lifeline.

Her blood welled, beaded. When there was enough of it pooled in her palm, she cleared her mind of everything but a single word, a single name. She held her hand over the falcon so her blood fed it, and called the one she needed as the spirit winds swept in, cold and fierce, to claim her.