“We might as well try,” I agreed.
Marcus hesitated. “It might help if I meditate first, to get in touch with my past life. Come here, Charlie.”
Marcus made me sit on the ground across from him, and we joined hands. Great. If he started singingKumbaya, I was out of here. I didn’t have time for this shit when there was a fucking murderer on the loose.
“Take a few deep breaths with me,” Marcus instructed.
I gritted my teeth. I’d rather just dig up these graves one by one at this point. I wasn’t in the mental space to do this right now.
“Just humor me, would you?” Marcus asked. “This isn’t easy for me, either.”
Reluctantly, I followed the pace of his breathing.Deep breath in, hold it for three seconds, then breathe out.Around us, I heard the sound of raindrops dripping from the trees, except it wasn’t raining. I suspected Ava was using her powers to help us relax.
God damn it, it was working.
My shoulders dropped, and my jaw eased. When he was ready, Marcus guided his Seer magic up my arms, and it felt like a warm sweater surrounding me. I sent my Earth magic back to him, until our magic swirled together.
My perception of the graves beneath us suddenly became clearer, as if I was encountering Marcus’ visions myself. I could perceive the bones with precision. I knew where every skull lay, and which bones belonged to which body, even if they were scattered yards apart. It was as if I could see underground through an X-ray, though there was no visual information, just an innateknowing. I’d never felt anything quite like it.
Marcus must’ve felt the shift, too, because he gasped. It seemed my magic had made his own stronger. It allowed him to explore the ground beneath us with greater clarity than with his own powers.
Our magic spread wider, until it honed in on a specific grave fifty feet away from us. The intuition that filled my chest became stronger now.
“We found it!” Marcus exclaimed. He scrambled to his feet and yanked on my arm. “Iknowit’s him.”
I quickly followed, and Oberi sniffed the ground at my feet as he hurried beside me. Rishi sprinted alongside Marcus. Twigs snapped behind us as Kallie helped Ava through the trees.
“Here,” Marcus said, stopping in the place our magic had led us to.
I knelt to the ground and splayed my palm across the dirt. I could sense the grave beneath us, but if it wasn’t for Marcus’ magic, I’d never know this was the one we were looking for.
“What are you waiting for?” Marcus demanded. “Let’s dig him up!”
Oberi started digging, and I heard sand and tiny rocks hit Ava’s chair as she came through the trees with Kallie.
I grabbed him by the scruff and pulled him back. “Take a break, Oberi. I’ve got this.”
I commanded the earth to shift beneath us, pulling the bones and anything else Dante might be buried with to the surface. I felt around, and my hands moved over the long-forgotten bones. I searched for a piece of metal, but I found nothing.
“Where’s the key?” I asked.
“It— it’s not here!” Marcus cried, before shaking me. “Check again. Are you sure you pulled upeverything?”
I pressed my hands into the upturned earth and checked again, but I found nothing except worms. “I’m sure.”
“This spot isn’t marked on the map for nothing,” Ava said. “There must be something here.”
Unless the Warden had already found it, like he had with whatever had been in the lake. I didn’t say that out loud, though, because I wasn’t ready to give up hope.
“Let me try something,” Marcus suggested.
We were still connected through simultension, because I felt his necromancy magic swirling around the skeleton. The bones twitched, but nothing else happened.
“What are you trying to do?” I asked.
“I’mtryingto get him to speak,” Marcus said. “I figured if he knew something, he could tell us. But he’s been dead for so long, and his spirit has crossed over. I can’t bring him back to talk to us even if I wanted to.”
“What if we did a séance?” Ava suggested.
