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Chase shuddered. “Oh wonderful. Just what I want to witness. Another bloody fast-food fest. But if you think it will help, get her into the morgue as soon as possible. We’ve already got two Fae on ice who seem to follow the same pattern we’ve got here. No wounds, no reason why they should be dead. Let’s get moving.”
Sharah nodded. She turned to me. “Will you be the liaison? Corpse Talkers don’t like elves, and Camille shouldn’t really get near them. The chance for a magical implosion is far too great.”
Witches and Corpse Talkers kept a wide berth from one another. Some component of their magical makeup didn’t mesh, and if their energy fields touched, the very real chance existed that we’d be on the receiving end of a very nasty explosion of some sort.
I glanced at Delilah. She’d toughened up quite a bit over the past few months, but she was still too squeamish to play liaison. She’d stand witness, but she probably couldn’t keep it together if she had to be up close and personal with the Corpse Talker. They were creepy enough when viewed from a distance. Something about their aura gave off a major ‘Do not turn your back’ energy.
“Sure thing,” I said, as we headed out into the night. Overhead, a lazy string of clouds rolled past the Moon. It was barely eleven o’clock yet, and the Moon Mother hadn’t set. She’d sink into slumber around two thirty in the morning. The golden orb was growing toward full, and I knew both Delilah and Camille were feeling the siren song of her call. Three nights before the solstice she’d be full and ripe, and her energy would stay strong through Litha. Oh yes, the Summer King was ushering in a wild ride for the Weres and any Fae ruled by the Moon Mother.
“Let’s get this show on the road.” I headed toward Camille’s car. “We’ll meet you at the morgue, Chase. We need to find out where these demons are coming from and put a stop to them before they kill again.”
CHAPTER 9
When we arrived back at the FH-CSI building, Sharah, Mallen, and their trainees had already set up the bodies down in the morgue. The situation felt all wrong. None of the victims showed any signs of injury, there was no blood, no reason they should be dead. But they were.
The survivors were under strict watch in the intensive care unit upstairs, but the medics were having a difficult time figuring out how to help them. Tiggs, an officer, was still clinging to a thin shred of awareness. The other—Yancy—was fading. And nobody knew why. Sharah had called for an experienced healer from Elqaneve, but she wouldn’t be here for a few hours.
As we gathered around the stainless steel tables holding the bodies of the fallen, it occurred to me that I was as dead as the victims. The only difference between them and me was that I’d undergone a little tweak before I died. A simple infusion straight from Dredge’s vein and bingo . . . I existed among the walking dead. By all rights, I should be dust now, a blip in history.
Camille planted herself in the corner, well away from the tables. When the Corpse Talker arrived, we didn’t want any accidents. Smoky stood by her side. Delilah sat in a chair near them, her legs folded in the lotus position, a notebook in her lap to take notes with. Vanzir planted himself next to her.
Chase and I waited near the bodies. His face was stark and weathered.
A few minutes later, Sharah entered the room, leading the Corpse Talker behind her. No one even knew what race of Fae they branched off of, or what they looked like. The Corpse Talkers hid themselves in an underground city in Otherworld, rumored to be deep within the forests of Darkynwyrd.
Only their women ventured out into the world, and only their women became Corpse Talkers. A few had gone mad, their powers shifting in violent and twisted ways. They wandered through OW, feared and avoided. But the majority hired themselves out to those who sought the truth from the dead.
She was cloaked in the garments of her profession. A cowled robe as indigo as the deep ocean covered her completely, and the gloves she wore showed long, slender fingers beneath the cloth. The hood cloaked her face from view, although a slight twinkle of pale gray flickered from within the shadowed hollow.
Her eyes, I thought. We already knew she wouldn’t give us her name, so we didn’t even ask.
She glanced from body to body—seven all told—and her voice echoed out of the folds of her hood. “Where do you wish me to begin?”
Chase shrugged, so I pointed to the nearest body. The man had been a half-breed, perhaps half-Svartan, half-Fae. Whatever the case, he’d been gloriously handsome when he was alive, but now he lay silent on the metal slab. Still beautiful, but not for long.
The Corpse Talker leaned over him. Her cowl shrouded her actions, but we knew what she was doing. As she kissed him deeply, sucking in all that remained of his soul, a faint bluish tinge rose from his body. I could hear her murmuring, coaxing the spirit to enter her body and speak through her. An ancient ritual as old as the Fae themselves, the rites of the speakers for the dead never failed to amaze me.
After a moment, she raised her head. “Ask.”
I sucked on my lip, trying to think of the best questions. If we were lucky, we’d get two or three answers from each body. If not—as few as one. Or none. I decided to start with the most obvious. “What killed you?”
A raspy breath emerged from the Corpse Talker, and then, in a voice as dry as old parchment, she said, “Squid . . . it was horrible.”
Delilah shuddered. “She’s right. They’re terrifying.”
I motioned for her to be quiet. “Let me finish before the soul disappears for good.” I turned back to the Corpse Talker. “Where are your wounds? We can’t find them. How did you die?”
Again, a shudder, then the whistling voice. “Sucked dry—”
Before the soul could finish, the Corpse Talker shuddered, and we lost the connection. I motioned for her to move to the next body. We didn’t have long from first contact. Once the souls were free from the bodies, they began the journey to their ancestors. Then the game was up, and we wouldn’t have a chance to summon them again until the festival of Samhain. Unless, that is, the soul rested uneasy and journeyed to the Netherworld instead of the Land of the Silver Falls.
The Corpse Talker kissed the second body. I glanced over at Chase. From what Camille had told me, the first time he encountered one of the speakers for the dead, he’d almost fainted. This time, he seemed to be keeping it together.
As the transfer of soul essence took place, I became aware that Camille was faintly singing. She was barely mouthing the words, but I could catch the tune. It was a rhyme we’d chanted as children for protection.
Lips to lips, mouth to mouth,
Comes the speaker of the shrouds.
