Graveyards, Visions, and Other Things That Byte (Dowser 8.5) Read online

  I hunkered down at each of the unmarked niches, allowing a single strand of my necromancy power to uncoil from my fingertips. Reading human remains for gender and age at death was a fairly junior skill when it came to learning necromancy. Usually an early acquired ability. Instinctual, even. And most necromancers quickly learned to actively ignore that mostly passive, automatic side effect of their magic. Picking up specific characteristics — say hair color, eye color, and height — was a more refined skill.

  I eliminated the first niche simply by checking if the unmarked remains had belonged to someone of the magical persuasion. They hadn’t. Very few Adepts were buried in Mountain View — and those who had been were mostly witches, which made sense with Vancouver being coven territory. As far as I’d been able to figure out, all of those Adepts had chosen to be cremated. Because it made sense that people who knew necromancy existed would want to limit how much of their person could be called back to the earthly plane.

  I couldn’t get an immediate impression from the second unmarked niche, so I sent out a second and third strand of my magic, seeking any minute residual, any glimmer. But I got nothing. That was odd.

  I brushed my fingers across the neighboring niche, immediately picking up that it held the remains of a tall, dark-haired woman with brown eyes who’d died at the age of fifty-seven. A quick glance at the inscribed name and the dates confirmed my impression. The niches above and on the other side of the unmarked compartment also easily yielded impressions.

  “Have you found something?” Rochelle asked, quietly anxious.

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so. A blank. It’s probably just empty.”

  I straightened, preparing to tackle the third walled row, when Rochelle started shivering. Beau wrapped his arm around her. And though neither of them was complaining, I suddenly felt stupid for dragging them around with me.

  “Listen, I have your number,” I said, pulling my phone out of my bag to confirm. “I can’t see in the dark or anything, and I have something I have to do for the witches tonight, anyway. So let me try to figure out where your mother’s remains might be, like more specifically than just wandering around, and I’ll come back tomorrow.”

  Rochelle glanced up at Beau. He offered her a slight smile but no guidance. If that was what she wanted.

  “Okay. You’ll text.”

  “If I find her.” I brushed my hand against the interment niches to my right, immediately picking up faint impressions of the remains held within. “No point in dragging you out here again if I can’t.”

  Rochelle nodded, but I could tell she was disappointed.

  “If we positively identify where your mother was interred and I can’t get an impression, then I can always ask my mother to try.”

  “Thank you,” Rochelle said. “And you’ll text when you hear anything from Jade or Kandy? I usually drop off eggs at the bakery Tuesday afternoons, but my hens aren’t laying consistently right now, so I wasn’t planning on bringing any this week.”

  “I’ll text either way.”

  “Can we give you a ride somewhere?” Beau asked politely.

  “Thanks, but I’ll find a car share.” I gestured with my phone. “It’s not a bad time of day to grab one around here.”

  Rochelle abruptly wrapped her fingers around my raised wrist. Her touch was icy, but I suppressed the need to flinch. Showing anything that could be interpreted as fear around powerful Adepts was a bad idea. Whether or not they intended you harm, it made you appear to be prey. And that kicked in instincts. It would likely be protective instincts in Beau and Rochelle, thankfully, but those could still feel suffocating.

  Occasionally, though, acting like prey got you kidnapped by a black witch. Then dragged around Europe for months while she slaughtered Adepts and stole their magic.

  The oracle didn’t speak. She just held me lightly, for long enough that her skin began to warm against mine.

  “Rochelle?” Beau asked gently.

  She nodded, releasing my hand. “Something has happened,” she whispered. “Something happened last night. I’m sure of it. But I … I can’t see what it means or where it leads. I look, but I see … nothing.” She glanced up at Beau. “Maybe seeing nothing is what death looks like for an oracle.”

  Beau touched her upturned face, running his fingers along her cheekbone and jaw. It was a gesture so full of … adoration … love … tenderness … that I had to look away.

  “You had a massive vision last night,” Beau murmured. “Different than anything you’ve experienced before. You’re tired. You could easily be burned out.”

  Rochelle nodded. Then, turning to me, she smiled tightly. “Thank you for your time and efforts, necromancer.”

  “I will not fail you, oracle,” I said — and in all seriousness. A trace of weight settled briefly on my shoulders, almost like the touch of a ghost. Then it ebbed away. It was magic, maybe, but not compatible with my own. Or perhaps my necklace had absorbed whatever energy had passed between Rochelle and me automatically. Repelling magic was what Jade had designed it to do, after all. That and stopping the ghost of my brother from stealing my life force.

  But that was another story, another lifetime. For Rusty, at least.

  “I know you won’t.” Rochelle’s smile softened, becoming more sincere. Then she wrapped her arm through Beau’s and allowed him to lead her away, keeping carefully to the paved pathway.

  The oracle did look tired. Drained, even. But I didn’t want to believe that her inability to clearly see whatever was going on with Jade and the elves — or whatever had gone on after we’d left the club — meant that she was peering into the abyss of her own death. Put simply, too many people would stand in the way of whatever might come for Rochelle. I doubted whether anything could get past Beau or Pearl for a start. And even if it did, it most certainly wouldn’t get past Jade.

  Thinking about Jade made me slip my hand inside my sweater collar, weaving my fingers through the scarf so I could curl them around my necklace. My friend Burgundy was a witch, and even though she couldn’t see the necklace’s energy, she could feel its power. She told me that both the chain and the coins Jade had connected to it with her alchemy teemed with magic.

  I certainly didn’t worship the dowser. I didn’t put her up on any pedestal, didn’t think she was infallible. But still … I trusted her to always be there when she was needed.

  I just kind of wished she didn’t think I needed her quite so often.

  I watched Rochelle and Beau walk away, crossing toward West Forty-First Avenue where they had presumably parked. Then I closed my eyes and sent my senses reaching out through the cemetery, careful not to disturb anything that slumbered in its depths. I tracked the magic of the oracle and the werecat, losing the feel of it — the aliveness of it — the moment they passed through the fenced boundary.

  Their being alive was foreign to this place. It was what made any Adept who stepped onto land that had been claimed for the dead stand out. Except for vampires. If Kett or Jasmine had ever crossed through the cemetery, I hadn’t been on the grounds at the time. But when Benjamin Garrick walked through Mountain View, he felt like he belonged. Just as I felt like I belonged.

  I wove my way back through the rows of the pale stone columbarium, pausing to touch the one that had felt empty to me. Without the worry of boring Rochelle and Beau, I took the time to really listen for the whispers it should have contained. Again, I easily picked up glimmers from either side, but I could sense nothing from within. It crossed my mind that maybe some family member had insisted on keeping the remains, even though the interment niche had been purchased and the name marker had been adhered.

  But that would have been odd. Wouldn’t it?

  I brushed my fingers across the letters etched in the stone panel by my shoulder.

  … daughter, beloved …

  It was getting dark enough that I couldn’t quite read the smaller lettering. I could have used the flashlight on my phone, but I just shook m
y head instead. I had more important things to do than stand around as the chill of the evening set in, manifesting mysteries where none existed.

  I walked toward the main road, checking the car2go app for a nearby vehicle. The only reason I had the money to pay the credit card attached to the car service was because of the task I had to do just after sunset every night. Bus service wasn’t the most reliable means of transportation in Vancouver, and Pearl Godfrey hated waiting around whenever I was late for our weekly appointments.

  Pearl had capitalized on the opportunity to put me on the Convocation’s payroll after the elves had broken out of the guardian prison hidden in the shoreline of Kits Beach. Though honestly, I enjoyed zooming around in the Smart cars that I could rent by the minute, and not freezing my ass off waiting for buses. So I had cheerfully accepted the task, and the stipend that came with it.

  I parked the car in a permit-only spot on Arbutus Street, which was one of the perks of using the car-sharing service. Then I walked through the grassy park that stretched toward the Maritime Museum. A glance toward the Talbots’ house — a newly painted, four-level Craftsman — confirmed that at least Tony had returned from Whistler. The basement windows of his high-tech sorcerer lair glowed with the light of his multiple computer monitors.

  That basement was my second stop, after my first errand had been run. I could have just texted my request to Tony — helping me track down Jane Hawthorne’s place of interment — but it was proper to ask for magically inclined favors face-to-face. Not that the tech sorcerer himself cared about Adept protocol. I, however, did. Another side effect of hanging out with those who were more powerful than me.

  When it came to using magic of any kind, ignorance wasn’t a defense. Certain boundaries were not to be crossed, so it was best that those boundaries were always clearly defined. Because when an Adept ignored those clearly marked lines, they could too easily forfeit all their other rights — including life and liberty. If Sienna hadn’t killed him, Rusty would have been sentenced to death for the murders he’d participated in. The pack would have demanded his life. And the witches would have granted it.

  I jogged down the steps to a section of Kits Beach that had been designated as an off-leash dog park. Benjamin Garrick was already perched on a surf-and-sun-bleached log by the time I reached the sandy lower path. Though it was almost fully dark, a couple of people were still on the beach, tossing sticks into the rolling surf for a terrier and what looked like a shepherd cross. The water had to be freezing, but the canines didn’t appear to mind as they gleefully crashed through the low waves to retrieve their prizes.

  Benjamin was always on time, though he didn’t appear to wear a watch and routinely misplaced his phone. I had a feeling that his reliability had something to do with the way vampires felt when the sun set. But I couldn’t go so far as to suggest that the sun dipping below the horizon woke him, or anything like that. I had never outright asked Benjamin if he was dead during the day, as some vampire myths claimed.

  One entire section of my mother’s library was devoted to vampire lore. But it was mostly garbage generated to perpetuate the already-ingrained fear and loathing that existed between necromancers and vampires. As much of it as I’d bothered to read, at least.

  Benjamin glanced up from his notebook as I meandered across the sand toward him. Then he looked back down to finish writing whatever he was currently working on. Pale skinned with an olive undertone, he appeared to be around my age, almost twenty. And he was. He just wouldn’t age another day ever again — unless, of course, that was just another myth. I hadn’t known Benjamin when he was human. He’d been living with his mother, Teresa Garrick, in Vancouver for almost as long as he’d been a vampire, about fourteen months. But Benjamin had only been allowed to wander as he willed for the last three months or so.

  Teresa also happened to be a necromancer of some power, and my mother’s new best friend. The Garrick family had once been known as rogue vampire hunters. But that reputation had been snuffed out when the family had all been slaughtered by vampires over twenty years ago. All but one. Teresa.

  And now there was a vampire in the Garrick line.

  Benjamin closed his black leather notebook, tucking it in his inner jacket pocket. He was wearing distressed black jeans with a dark sweater underneath a leather bomber jacket — a jacket I’d found for him at the thrift store the last time I went looking for cashmere sweaters. If I found any that weren’t felted, I unraveled them, reclaiming the yarn, which I then overdyed with Kool-Aid and reknit.

  Benjamin had to constantly be reminded that it was cold in Vancouver this time of year — at least to everyone else. Hence, my giving him the jacket. I had sewn in the inner pocket for his notebook and pen, though he also carried a satchel with him everywhere.

  He waited until I was about two steps away to speak. “Kandy hasn’t returned my texts from last night.”

  “Did something happen last night? I mean, with you?”

  Benjamin pondered my awkward question. I was hesitant to mention that a bunch of us had been out partying when the elves had shown up, in order to spare his feelings. Which was stupid. He didn’t care about cupcakes or dancing.

  “Nothing specific,” he said. “I just always send a report of the evening, and Kandy replies with a K. Or at least an emoticon. Usually a pile of poo.”

  Watching the dog owners at the shoreline as they attempted to lure their pets out of the water, I cast my voice low. “Something happened with the elves last night.”

  “A fight?”

  I shrugged. “Not sure. Jade banished Drake and me back to Pearl’s, and sent Rochelle, Jasmine, and Beau away as well before anything really happened. Other than a bunch of elves crashing Jade’s bachelorette party. Pearl’s acting like everything is under control, but Rochelle is … restless. And now you haven’t heard from Kandy.”

  Benjamin’s notebook practically appeared in his hand. I knew he must have reached for it and pulled it out of his pocket, but he sometimes moved so quickly that I couldn’t track it. It was unconsciously done, I thought. He didn’t have Kett’s strength or mobility. Not yet, at least.

  “Drake?” Benjamin asked. His pen was poised over a blank page.

  “Sometimes I feel like I’m just a walking encyclopedia to you,” I said. And a blush instantly flamed across my face as the inappropriate complaint tumbled out of my mouth. It was inappropriate because wanting to be perceived as more than just a source of information to Benjamin wasn’t applicable … or relevant to our relationship as it was currently established — for numerous reasons.

  The most important of those reasons was the fact that this was a working relationship. We had been commissioned by Kandy, who oversaw and enforced things like security in Vancouver, to keep watch on the elves’ former prison. But unbeknownst to Benjamin, I was also supposed to be keeping an eye on him. To help ease him into a life among the Adepts that called Vancouver home.

  So the chronicle and his questions were perfectly in context, perfectly appropriate. And indicating in any way that I wanted things to be different or deeper between us was just … stupid. Moronic.

  Again, for many, many reasons.

  Benjamin eyed me questioningly, then started to close his notebook.

  I sighed, feigning an exacerbated tone to cover my own embarrassment. “Drake. No last name that I know of. Fledgling guardian —”

  “A dragon?”

  I nodded.

  Benjamin started taking notes. His handwriting was cramped but readable.

  “He’s a friend of Jade’s … and of Warner’s, I suppose. Trains with them, I think.”

  “Weapons? Affiliations? You called him a fledgling?”

  “Actually, I’m not sure who his birth parents are, but he’s the far seer’s apprentice. I’ve seen him wield a long, wide, golden sword.”

  “A broadsword? When?”

  “In London. When Jade, Kandy, Kett, and Drake rescued me from Sienna. Drake tried to hack through
the magically sealed sorcerer pentagram I was being held in. With his sword. Unsuccessfully.”

  Benjamin’s hand stilled. Then he looked up at me, locking me in place with his dark eyes. As if I were suddenly the center of his universe. A smile slowly spread across his face, and suddenly he was … more. Just …

  I couldn’t explain it. He was just more.

  “Are you going to finally tell me the tale of the black witch, Mory?”

  My heart began beating wildly in my chest. I would have sworn I could feel my blood thrumming in the veins of my throat. I listed toward Benjamin, feeling him calling to me.

  He frowned.

  I tore my gaze away, looking resolutely out at the dark, churning sea.

  Benjamin had no idea he could ensnare me so easily. Without even trying. Another blush flushed my cheeks.

  “No,” I finally said. I wasn’t interested in discussing being kidnapped by Sienna. I wasn’t interested in being seen as less than capable. I was me now, not me then. I was the person I wanted him to know.

  Again, that was stupid. But it was also the truth.

  Benjamin nodded, returning his attention to his notebook. “And … Jasmine?”

  Jasmine?

  Oh, God. Why didn’t he know who Jasmine was?

  Benjamin glanced up at me, then down at his notebook. The tip of his fountain pen was poised over a blank page he’d titled Jasmine. “Is she a secret?”

  “No.” I hesitated. “I don’t think so. I mean, Jade, everyone, thinks it’s okay for you to be writing the chronicle, right?”

  Benjamin twisted his lips wryly. “The notebooks are stored in Jade’s bakery safe after I fill them. So I have to ask permission to retrieve one if I need it. And I’m still collecting information, transcribing interviews, so I haven’t actually written anything so far —”

  “Jasmine is Kett’s … child.”

  Benjamin gave me a quizzical look. “Why does that upset you?”

  “Because … because you didn’t know who she is.”