Busy admiring a stone amphitheater sunk into the earth, I wandered off the path. A small gathering sat on the curved seats that functioned as steps to reach the floor, and each took turns reading from a book of poetry they passed around and around.
Distracted by their laughter, I almost missed the long shadow prowling across the quad in my direction.
Not everyone is out to get you. Not every shadow is nefarious.
Just to be on the safe side, I let Cletus usher me back on track with a gnarled hand on my shoulder.
Ignoring the twitching skin beneath my tattoo, I hit the coffee shop, where a flirty barista who knew how to earn a tip filled my order. Still smiling at her outrageousness and the stack of phone numbers jotted on receipts peeking from her skirt pocket, I experienced a pang on my way past the campus bookstore.
“Really, Cletus? You couldn’t have told me that was there?” I glared into the whirling darkness where his face ought to be. “I could have picked up a shirt or a keychain, a souvenir. Now it’s too late to browse.”
A low moan I interpreted as an apology had me sighing. I could always come back tomorrow.
“Cheese and crackers,” a high voice squeaked. “What is that thing doing loose?”
Glancing over my shoulder, I spotted a young man wearing the designer equivalent of my usual duds. Jeans, shirt, sneakers. His blond hair curled around his face in a mass of artful twists. His pink cheeks made him downright cherubic, and I wondered if many people asked to pinch them.
Clearly mothering a six-year-old ghost was having an effect on me.
“He’s tame,” I teased. “Don’t worry. He won’t bother you as long as you don’t bother us.”
“How can you be sure?” Squinting, the necromancer studied me. “You’re not bonded. Who does he belong to?”
I blamed his curiosity on his panic and figured telling him would calm him. “Linus Lawson.”
“Professor Lawson’s back?” His eyes lit up like stars in a moonless sky before crashing to the earth in meteoric indignation. “He loaned you his wraith?”
The ease with which I chatted openly with this guy about Linus and his wraith drove home how foolish I had been to ignore the early-warning signs with Amelie. There was just too much history there, too much unhappiness. It had been easier to avoid the cracks in the fa?ade of friendship than face what was happening. But there was nothing for it now, and this guy wasn’t going anywhere until I answered his question, judging by the look on his face.
“Yes, he did.” I lifted the tray of coffees. “Nice bumping into you and all, but I need to get back.”
“I’ll come with.” He grabbed for the tray and frowned when I didn’t hand it over, but I didn’t want to explain about the empty cup when he tried passing out the drinks. “Where are you headed?”
“To Professor Reardon’s office.”
“Have you had him yet?” The guy groaned as he fell in step with me. “He’s a GPA torpedo.”
“I’m not a student here.” I saw no reason to lie. “Though I did fall asleep listening to him bat theories around with Linus. I fell off my stool and busted my butt, the whole nine yards.”
“You came here with Professor Lawson?” Any rounder and his eyes might pop from overinflation. “As in, you’re with him?”
“Well, thanks for chaperoning me.” Ignoring his question, I picked up my pace to a near sprint until the squat building came into view. “I’ve got it from here.”
“Let me get the door.” He rushed ahead and held it open. Darting in on my heels, he jogged past me on his way to Reardon’s room. With an apologetic look flung over his shoulder, he hammered on the wood. “Your hands are full.”
“Thanks.” This kid had a serious case of hero worship. He was giving me flashbacks of me at my most obnoxious, when I would have done anything to catch Boaz’s eye. “You’ve done your good deed for the day.” I smiled tightly. “You can get back to what you were doing before Cletus and I derailed you.”
“Cletus?” The guy divided his attention between me and the door. He was worse than a dog pawing to get out when he had to pee. His focus snapped into place when Linus appeared on the threshold. “Professor Lawson.”
Arching a brow, he glanced between the two of us. “Do I know—?”
Linus didn’t finish asking before the guy swung out his arm, metal glinting, and sliced a thin line through the shirt over his chest. Stunned by the sudden violence, Reardon froze. Or perhaps it was the scent of fresh blood that immobilized him.
Determined not to freeze too, I pried out the tall black coffee, flipped off the lid, and flung it at the back of the guy’s head. He screamed, twisting to look at me, but didn’t lift a hand to stop me as I splashed my mocha latte in his face.
Arm swinging in protective arcs, he kept Linus back while he dried his eyes on his sleeve, but his face was a mottled red, and his vision was shot. He cranked his head back toward the doorway, squinting to relocate his target, in time to intercept Linus’s fist across his jaw. He took the hit and crumpled to his knees.
Tossing the tray and empty cup aside, I used Taz’s favorite move and kicked him so hard in the ribs, I felt the reverberation through my aching tailbone. He slumped onto the floor, hand fisting the knife, fingers twitching on the handle.
I took a healthy step back, not out of fear, but to escape the seething fury in Linus’s limpid, black eyes.
Strolling forward, he stepped on the guy’s wrist, applying pressure until his fingers flexed open, and the knife clattered onto the tiles. He kicked it away before squatting near his head, forearms resting on his thighs. Black wisps pooled around his ankles, the hem of a cloak that climbed up his shoulders in a creeping fog that had the man babbling for mercy.
The wasteland of eternity shadowed his eyes. There was no mercy to be found there.
With the attacker subdued, Reardon turned his back on us and focused on deep-breathing exercises that did nothing to bolster my confidence in his ability to not eat me.
“Who sent you?” Linus demanded, his voice as hollow as a tomb and just as resonant. “Who escorted you onto school grounds?”
Trembling, looking anywhere but at Linus, at that living fabric, the guy kept his mouth shut.
“Are you willing to die for your secrets?” His tone hardened. “Who. Sent. You?”
“Linus,” I whispered, unsure what I was asking, if I was asking anything at all.
“The punishment for treason against your potentate is death.” He cradled the man’s skull in his elegant hands, the ones capable of producing such beautiful art. “Speak now, or your sentence will be carried out where you lie.”
Tears pricked the corners of his eyes, but he locked his jaw.
“Justice is served,” Linus murmured. “May the Goddess grant you peace.”
The crack of vertebrae splintering was deafening, and my ears kept ringing long after Linus lowered the man’s head gently back onto the floor.
This violent side of him I had, on an intellectual level, known existed. A new mask. One I had yet to see how well it fit. He was the champion of a city, the Society’s own law made flesh. Enforcing those rules would come at a cost. What I hadn’t expected was the cold light that gilded him the moment he decided the man’s fate or the indifference that smoothed his features as the spark went out of his eyes.
While Linus arranged for a cleanup crew, a service I shuddered to realize must be on most necromancers’ and vampires’ speed dials, I sank to the floor in the farthest corner of the room. Knees tucked against my chest, I had the phone in my hand before making a conscious decision to call Boaz.
“Hey, Squirt.”
“Hey back,” I rasped. “You got a minute?”
“Sure,” he said, distracted. “What’s up?”
“I’m having a bad day,” I confessed. “Two bad days, actually.”
“You okay?” A hint of his usual warmth surfaced. “Where are you?”
“It doesn’t matter.” I rested my chin on my knees. “Where are you?”
“My location is classified.”
“Yeah.” I exhaled, long and slow. “Yeah.”
“Talk to me, Grier.”
The brutal mask of executioner Linus had slipped on moments earlier shook me, and I couldn’t pinpoint why, but that coldness had seeped into me. “Have you ever killed anyone?”
“Yes.”
“A lot of someones?”