“I still don’t understand why. You don’t seem to like me much.” Correction: he didn’t seem to like her at all.
“I wouldn’t say I don’t like you. But you can be a thorn in my side sometimes.”
Loren bared her teeth at him. “And you’re a thorn in mine.”
“At least that’s one thing we have in common.”
Loren’s heart pounded faster as they walked deeper into the tomb. The sound of the rain striking the earth above became muffled the farther they walked.
The tunnel eventually branched out into three separate ones. Darien took the middle without hesitation, as if he were shopping in his grocery store of choice. Loren stuck close to his side, the sleeve of her jacket nearly touching his, as they walked into shadows black as pitch. When the slayer’s tattooed knuckles brushed against the back of her hand, they looked at each other as if they’d been electrocuted by the touch.
Loren crossed her arms and made a point to keep her distance from him for the rest of the walk, Darien doing the same beside her.
Not a moment too soon, light glowed around a corner up ahead. They rounded it and found themselves in a room lined with shelves of potion bottles and other magical paraphernalia. A table was in the middle of the room, weapons strewn across the wooden surface, and hanging from the ceiling by wire were string lights.
Benjamin was waiting for them by the table. He smiled at Loren as she and Darien came to a stop several feet away.
The graverobber’s Familiar was perched on his shoulder, the great owl assessing the dog and the lion with wise gold eyes. Loren wondered if the three were talking.
Benjamin was still smiling at Loren. She dropped her gaze to the floor, and only when the graverobber spoke did she look up to find that he was now—finally—looking at Darien. “How long has it been, Cassel? Two, three years?”
“Something like that.” Darien’s tone was casual and amicable.
“Things must’ve changed a lot in that time, for you to come here with a human girl in tow.” Amusement shone in his eyes as they flicked to Loren.
“Actually, she is the reason I’m here.” Benjamin cocked his head. “A number of Darkslayers are tracking her with bone powder that belongs to one of her ancestors. We were hoping you might have insight as to which graves have been dug up recently.” Graves that were dug up without his people having arranged for it. Loren gleaned enough to conclude that if anyone would know a grave had been dug up in the city or the surrounding areas, it was Benjamin.
Benjamin crossed his arms and leaned his hip against the table. “I seem to be missing something here. Why would a Darkslayer want to track a human?”
“Your guess is as good as ours. The fastest way to find answers is by figuring out whose bone powder was taken.”
“Were you given this bone powder as well, my friend?”
Darien gave a smug smile. “Of course.”
Curiosity shone in the graverobber’s eyes. “How much were you offered?”
Loren swore she saw a muscle tic in Darien’s jaw. “Does it matter?”
Benjamin shrugged, though his interest in the amount was clear. Instead of prodding, he diverted to another question. “Why not track the bone powder to the grave?”
“It doesn’t work that way. When I track someone with bone powder, finding them isn’t possible unless they have a visible aura.” Only living people had auras; once a person died, their aura left their body and journeyed through the river to the Lower World.
Loren had asked Darien that same question before she’d gone to bed last night—about the people he’d killed on the Avenue of the Scarlet Star, for she’d hoped the trails they’d left in the city might lead them to Sabrine.
She had been more than a little disappointed by his answer.
Darien continued, “And even if I could, I needed to use all of it to simply find her. There’s none left.”
Benjamin canted his head. “And when you found her, you decided to protect her instead. How very curious.”
A phone pinged, and Loren nearly jumped out of her skin.
Benjamin retrieved his cell from his pocket. “Excuse me for one moment,” he told them with a smile that didn’t touch his eyes.
After reading the text message, the graverobber slipped his phone into his pocket and disappeared into an earthen doorway partially hidden behind a tattered yellow curtain in a corner of the room.
“I don’t know if I have a good feeling about this,” Loren whispered to Darien. But he ignored her. There was tension in his jaw, but whatever he was thinking as he scanned the cluttered shelves, he didn’t reveal it to her.
