I'm about to show them up again, because this target is one everyone is after. The Reformed Legacy Human Netherborn Association—the RLHNA that has become the new international government powerhouse—put one hell of a bounty on this guy's head with a long rap sheet that I didn't bother reading. All I know is, he's a healer-turned-necromancer who's been wanted since before the Upheaval.
Honestly, I'm doing all this more for a distraction than for profit. Better to get off my ass and make some money than to sit around waiting for another eight months.
Fuck. It better not take another eight months for me to get my hound back.
I observe as the well-dressed couple drives away. This mansion and much of the surrounding rural community look like they were left mostly untouched during the Upheaval, or,if they weren't, they've done a hell of a job patching them up. Thanks to the Legacy Curse being broken, all incubi receiving a Limbo mark, the Nether being contained, legacies and humans finding common ground, the changes in government, and the settling of the Netherborn humans…
The world has fixed itself.
I'm out for four months and wake up to no curse, no Upheaval, and no shadow fiends seeping into the mortal world. Even growing equality for legacies, for fuck's sake.
And all it took was me getting an extended time-out from a bullet to the brain.
Go fucking figure.
As soon as the wealthy couple's car is out of sight, I recheck my surroundings and move silently toward the bottom of the hill, creeping through more trees. I'll have to book it once I lose this cover and vault over the perimeter fence. I'm sure there are dozens of protective wards placed on that fence–but thanks to Arati's blessing, I can usually slip through shit like that without tripping anything.
I brace myself, about to launch into action, but I pause when I hear the low croak of a raven to my left. Turning my head slowly, I spot the glossy black fowl perched in the branches of a nearby oak tree, watching me.
Damn that demigoddess.
"Fuck off," I whisper at the evil chicken.
It squawks again, tipping its head to get a better look at me from its other eye. Something about the way it examines me seems out of bounds for normal animal behavior.
"Fly back to your creepy-ass master. I'm working," I tell it, giving it my own bird for good measure before turning back to the job. I hear it flutter away a second later.
I want to wrap this up quickly and silently so I can go back to staring at the charred dirt in my friend Jada's backyard likethe sad sack I've become ever since I woke up without my furry friend.
The dimness around me lightens briefly as my eyes glow green, another acrid pull of the sorcerer's magic drawing my attention. There's no one stationed outside the mansion. Not even security cameras, from what I can tell. This guy really must think he pulled one over on the RLHNA by leaving a false trail in Minnesota.
Pretty sure that threw the other bounty hunters off, too.
Amateurs.
Taking off, I bolt across the open lawn. When I reach the fence, I leap as high as I can, grasping the arched points of the fence and slinging myself over in one silent move. Dropping to a low crouch with a sharp exhale, I stay alert for any sign of danger until I reach a set of dark cellar doors. One test pull tells me they're only locked—but there's no chains, no additional magic protection. Nada.
"Cocky fucking idiot," I mutter before casting an unlock charm.
Creeping soundlessly down the cellar stairs, I reach the bottom and will my eyes to adjust to the darkness. When they do, I frown, trying to understand what I'm seeing.
Seven large shipping crates, roughly the size of coffins, line the edges of the room. A large cauldron sits in the center of the room, surrounded by bone-white magic symbols. I peek into the cauldron and make a face at the dark sludge congealed inside, nearly black from however long it's been sitting.
Blood. Alotof it.
I pull out my phone, taking a few silent pictures of the cauldron and the runes all over the ground for documentation to send to the RLHNA, along with my target. Most of the symbols are unique to necromantic rituals, but others are bloodmagic markings. Whatever dark shit this necromancer has been selling, he's clearly got someone else using blood magic for him.
I saw a setup like this a couple of years ago while hunting a legacy crime lord in Spain. If my suspicions are correct…
Checking to make sure no one has come down from the mansion into the cellar, I gently pry the lid away from one of the shipping crates.
Bingo. Decrepit vampire.
If a vampire doesn't feed often enough, they get weak and decrepit. If they go more than a couple of weeks without blood, they start to ossify—getting progressively weaker, corpse-like, and gaunt until they can't move at all. Any special abilities they might have, like hypnosis, stop working. A couple more weeks of that, and they're goners.
The fact that there are seven of them in here confirms my suspicions.
"Thralls," I mutter, taking another picture.
