The father, turning to Kyra nodded. “Tell them, tell them to look behind the Montgomery painting, they will know which one. The code is their mother’s birthday.”
It didn’t take long for the siblings to leave, not even a goodbye to their father who watched them go. As soon as Kyra broke the salt he immediately lost his shape, his body flickering as the power that kept him there weakened.
He was free.
Kyra, dropping to her knees carefully moved the soil with her bare hands, covering the salt with delicate and controlled movements.
“Tears?” the father said. She didn’t look up from what she was doing, unable to hear him once more.
Xander couldn’t see, not from his position. “Mr Harrison,” he said quietly. “It’s time for you to go.”
Kyra turned to him, her face wet and eyes red. Her makeup had smeared, the smoky look somehow suiting her.
The father reached forward, but didn’t touch. “My children didn’t shed a single tear when I died, and yet this stranger honours me with hers.” A crooked smile, and a flash of white light.
Kyra said nothing as she finished what she was doing, and Xander offered her no words of comfort. It was a while later, the sky starting to darken when he finally broke the silence.
“Could you have called his body?” he asked when she climbed to her feet, brushing the remaining dirt from her knees. He had heard of black magic that could control the dead in such a way, the thought sickening.
Kyra looked at the cigarette he held between his fingers, the end a bright orange. “They will kill you, you know,” she replied instead.
Xander laughed, the sound offensive against their surroundings. “Answer the question.”
Kyra’s cheeks coloured, and he wasn’t sure if it was because of the way he demanded, or that she didn’t want to answer his question. “Why? So you can judge me? No thanks.”
“Is nothing easy with you?” Xander took a long drag from his cigarette, breathing the smoke out through his nose. “It’s a simple question.”
Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “It works best within twenty-four hours. I refused to do it after that,” she said with a voice like liquid velvet.
“Why?”
“Even with the magic repairing the natural breakdown of the body… it’s not worth the trauma.”
“You’re a Necromancer?” Not really a question, more like a venom coated verification. “I didn’t think Paladins were hired for this type of work.”
“Paladins are agents trained and hired by Supernatural Intelligence. I’m not a Paladin.”
He scowled, the ghosts that staggered behind him forgotten as she held his full attention. “Supernatural Intelligence then. Since when was forcing the dead come under protecting Breed?”
“How am I supposed to know?” she replied with a quiet, but sharp snap. “I was asked to do this, so I did. Supernatural Intelligence have apparently been offering more services than just tracking and detaining Breed with open warrants.”
“It’s disgusting forcing a soul like that,” he bit back, the tendons at his nape rigid.
Kyra flinched, eyes widening as tears still wet her skin. Her mouth opened, her next words drowned out against the loud rumble of the earth. She staggered back, the ground opening up beside her, a line cracking until it slowly split Mr Harrison’s headstone.
Xander reached for her, but the crack opened further and bony claws climbed through.
“Kyra,” he whispered through clenched teeth. “Don’t move.”
He steadied his gaze as the Shadow-Veyn crawled from the earth, flesh covered fur scraped away to reveal a shock of pale skull. A hellhound, it’s snout longer than a wolves and too-thin teeth dripping with venom. He was small, classification B if he went by its lack of sharp bones that were usually an extension of its spine. Dark vapour floated out of the holes of his nostrils, the smoke floating around to the exposed ribs at its side.
From the scent of panic he knew the hound wasn’t concealed in a glamour, the Shadow-Veyn hunting openly and without fear of repercussion.
Fuck.
Red eyes, too small for the hollow sockets rolled freely until they settled on Kyra.
Double fuck.
