Banshee Blues (Bones and Bounties Book 1)

by Bilinda Sheehan

  “You said you would be here, and yet I wake and you are nowhere to be found.”

  “That’s not answering my question. How did they get in? Did you let them in?”

  Her gaze darted to the dead girl in her lap, and when I saw the collar around her neck I understood.

  “You wanted to protect her,” I said.

  “I loved her. She and I…” Samira trailed off and kept her gaze averted. “They said it was shameful to love one another.” She lifted her tear-filled eyes to me. “How can that be?”

  With a shake of my head, I dropped onto the couch. “It’s not… I’m sorry.” I scrubbed my face with my hands. “Did they threaten her? I still don’t get how they got inside.”

  “Ana was a void,” Samira volunteered, and everything clicked into place. Only a void would have been capable of nullifying the wards. Once she was inside, the magic used to protect the apartment would have been rendered useless. The Saga Venatione were able to walk straight in.

  “Tell me exactly what happened,” I said. “It’s important, or I won’t be able to put the wards back up.”

  “There was knocking on the door, so I went to check who it was… They’d hurt her… I had to let her inside, but as soon as I did they came in too.”

  I waited for her to continue, prompting her when she didn’t. “He said they hadn’t delivered the killing blow. What did he mean?”

  “I killed her… They were going to take me away, kill me for spilling their secrets, and she defended me. That one,” Samira said, gesturing to the one on the floor, “he hit her, knocked her to the ground, and started kicking her when she tried to stop them.”

  “You used your magic,” I finished, and Samira nodded.

  “I didn’t have a choice, but my magic is no good against them. They absorb it somehow… It makes them stronger… She tried to take it from him, and it was working. I never knew a void could do that. When I went to help, the blade…” She stared down at the knife on the ground beside her.

  “He used her as a shield,” I said, the events playing out in front of my eyes. The ghosts of the dead moved like puppets as they replayed their final moments. I couldn’t see Samira’s actions, but I watched the blade enter her friend and the look of glee on the Saga’s face as he watched the girl crumple forward into Samira’s lap.

  “How did you know?” she asked, her eyes wide.

  “I mourned her, so I can see her death play out.” I left out the part where her death would haunt me, like a horror movie on a loop. Every time I closed my eyes, I would see her face, feel her pain, her sorrow, and her fear. Her fear for Samira.

  “What are you?”

  “I have many names, but the most common is the banshee. People think there is only one banshee, when in reality there are many of us. Or there used to be…”

  Samira nodded and returned her gaze to the dead girl still in her arms. “What do we do now?” she asked quietly.

  “We call the cops… Well, my version of the cops. But first, I need to reset the wards.”

  Samira’s eyes widened in fear and she shook her head. “If you call them, they will know what happened. They will know what I am.”

  “There is no choice.”

  Samira began to cry. “They’ll kill me, they’ll know I’m a witch and they will kill me…”

  Blowing out a long sigh, I pushed to my feet.

  “Fine, I might know a guy who can help, but don’t even think about opening your mouth. He doesn’t need to know anything that I don’t tell him.”

  Samira nodded, and eventually her tears began drying on her cheeks.

  I quickly scrolled through the list of contacts in my cell phone. There weren’t many, but everyone on the list was there for a reason. Mazik was no different.

  I hit the call button and listened as the ringer echoed and then static cut in.

  “Mazik, you know it’s me,” I said in exasperation. “You’ve got caller ID, so what’s the point in ignoring me?”

  The static continued, and I sighed. “Fine, I’ll owe you a favour…”

  The line clicked as it went dead, and a moment later I turned toward the shattered remains of my entry hall as I heard the sound of footsteps.

  Mazik poked his peroxide-blond head around the edge of the splintered door frame and whistled low, his turquoise eyes meeting mine.

  “What happened here?” he asked, and I smiled when I heard his London accent.

  “Witch hunters,” I said, jerking my thumbs in the direction of the two dead bodies.

  Mazik turned his gaze to the witch hunter slumped against the wall. He crossed the hall, crouched down next to him, and whistled again.

  “How hard did you throw it? It’s gone right bloody through him!”

  “Just more proof that you really shouldn’t piss me off by ignoring my calls.”

  “I’m here, aren’t I? Try not to get your knickers in a twist, love.” His voice dripped sarcasm, and I fought the urge to punch him.

  Every time I laid eyes on Mazik, he left me with the overwhelming urge to commit some sort of violence against him. Usually the kind that would end in him sniveling on his knees and begging for mercy.

  As though he could read my mind, his eyes flickered black for just a second. Then it was gone, and the turquoise glinted brighter than ever.

  “I’d like to see you bloody try it,” he said, his voice low and growling.

  “I didn’t call you over here for a pissing match,” I teased. “And anyway, we both know who would win.”

  “Ha, not bloody likely,” he said, but I could tell the tension had slipped from his shoulders.

  Demons were unpredictable, and Mazik was no exception. I knew that given half an opportunity he would have no problem killing me, but that was also part of what made him such a good gun for hire. With him, there was no conscience, no wondering if he had the balls to kill when necessary. Mazik would kill everyone he got his hands on if he thought he could get away with it and not have an Elite on his ass.

  “Well, you seem to have all of this tied up nicely. What did you call me for?”

  “Clean up?” I gave him my best wide smile, and he rolled his eyes in my direction.

  “When you say ‘clean up,’ are you telling me I can keep the bodies?”

  “These two you can do with as you please. But this one—” I stepped aside to reveal Samira huddled on the floor with Ana’s body—“this one we give a proper send off.”

  “Hell-O, lovely,” Mazik said, striding into the room and making a beeline for Samira. “I do love a woman who knows how to make blood look good.”

  As soon as he drew level with me, I slammed my hand into his chest. My shoulder still ached, but I was beginning to get used to the continuous burn of the iron in my system. Plus, the adrenaline flooding my body made it easier to deal with the pain. Of course, once I crashed the pain would really kick in.

  “She’s not part of the deal,” I said, tilting my head toward Samira. “Leave her alone, Mazik.”

  “One of these days, Darcey, you’ll go too far.” He glanced down at my hand. “You’re just lucky I like you.”

  “And you’re lucky I sometimes call you up for odd jobs.”

  His laughter grated on me, and I gritted my teeth.

  “Is that what we’re calling murder nowadays?”

  “Just do your thing,” I said, waving my hand in the direction of the bodies.

  He didn’t answer me. His eyes darkening as he gazed at the body nearest to him. Ignoring him, I crossed the floor to where Samira still sat.

  “Does she have any family?” I asked.

  “Not anymore. They died before she ended up like me.” Samira stared down at Ana, her face contorting into a mask of horror. “The collar… It won’t come off… Her spirit is trapped…”

  “Well, one of these guys has to have the key, right? We can just unlock it and—”

  Samira shook her head and held up two pieces of a key. “They broke the key. Those whos
e key is broken and who die wearing the collar have their spirits damned, trapped within the jewel. They are slaves for eternity.”

  Her words shocked me. The situation had sounded vile enough before, but to trap someone even after death was a step too far for me.

  “I mourned for her,” I said. “That should have been enough to send her on her way. Their magic shouldn’t override the rite of passage.”

  “She’s still here,” Samira said quietly, and my heart stuttered in my chest. My power might have been depleted, but not to the point that I couldn’t do my one and only true purpose…

  I crouched down next to them and placed my hand over the collar. I could feel Ana’s spirit within, and my heart sank.

  “We need to bury her, and I think I know just the place.” I grabbed the blanket off the edge of the couch and wrapped it gently around Ana’s body. I could only think of one place that might free her. It helped that it was hidden from the human world. If she was ever found, the police would uncover evidence tying her back to me, and that was something I couldn’t allow.

  As I scooped Ana up from Samira’s arms, I noticed just how little she weighed. It seemed the captors weren’t that interested in feeding their captives. Samira hopped to her feet and choked back a gag.

  “Just ignore him,” I said, catching her wide-eyed stare in Mazik’s direction. “He does weird shit like that all the time.”

  He ignored us and continued examining the body, which mostly consisted of him tasting the blood that had spilled from the Saga’s chest wound.

  “I want it all gone before I get back, Mazik, so no stalling,” I said, carrying Ana’s body to the door.

  He grunted in response, and I took that as a good sign. If he’d wanted to cause a fuss, he’d have done it already.

  “Where are you taking her?” Samira asked, following me down the hall.

  “Somewhere special. You’ll like it, I promise.”

  I didn’t say anything else. There didn’t seem to be much point; she was going to find out soon enough.

  Chapter Nine

  It wasn’t hard to find a between place. They existed everywhere, and most humans didn’t pay them any attention.

  After making my way down the alley next to the apartment building, I paused and waited. The air itself seemed to shiver with anticipation, and the feel of it rolling across my skin left me with goose bumps. The smell of blossoms filled the air, and I glanced at Samira over my shoulder.

  “What’s happening?” she asked, staring at the dingy masonry of the apartment building on one side and the lush grass just a couple of steps away.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I took a step forward and felt the earth soften beneath my feet. It wasn’t quite Faerie. Faerie was much grander, but I preferred the Between. According to stories that had been passed down through generations of banshees, the Between had once been our home.

  Nothing lived there now, but we often came to bury what was left of our dead, or sit and commune with the spirits of those who had gone before.

  For most Fae, the Between was simply an inconvenience. Some even had the audacity to call it a Veil, but they could no longer see it for what it was. Fae magic had started to fade from the world a long time ago, and now it was also fading from the Fae themselves.

  “Keep up,” I said. “The Between is not a place where you want to get lost.”

  Samira didn’t answer, but I could hear her footsteps moving closer and I took that as a sign of understanding.

  The air caressed my skin, and as I drank down another lungful I felt the last remnants of my headache drifting away. For me, this place far more than Faerie was home.

  I moved quickly toward the small burial ground ahead. The huge weeping hawthorn that grew in the centre of the circle arched up into the sky, its branches drooping down to brush against the ground. None of the graves were marked—they didn’t need to be. We were all linked in some way, each banshee family related to another, and as such we didn’t need to separately mark our fallen ones.

  “I cannot bury her within the circle, but this is close enough that the burial will still count.” I rested Ana’s body on the ground at my feet.

  “I don’t understand,” Samira said.

  “Just watch,” I answered, feeling the ground tremble beneath us.

  Samira gasped as the first tendril burst from the ground and wrapped around Ana’s body. It was quickly followed by others until she was completely covered in a fine lace of interwoven tendrils that hid her from view.

  The place where the tendrils had come from split, and the ground swallowed the root coffin into the rich, dark earth. Power spiked, making it harder for me to breathe, and tears stung the back of my eyes as the grass rolled like the fur of a wild animal rippling beneath the touch of a hand.

  Magic pulsed, and the hawthorn groaned, its branches sprouting thousands of tiny white and pink blossoms, their scent coating the air in sweetness. From the corner of my eye, I could see the look of wonder of Samira’s face as she stared up at the sight. And it was a sight to behold. Mother Earth herself had accepted Ana into her embrace.

  A shiver raced down my spine, and I felt the moment Ana was freed from her bond by the spirits of those who had come before her.

  The blossoms began to fall, drifting down through the air, and for a moment it appeared as though the tree itself was weeping.

  “Why are you doing this?” Samira asked, turning to me with a curious glance.

  Her question surprised me, and I didn’t have an immediate answer. I hadn’t known Ana, and I barely knew Samira, and yet part of me had felt the importance of bringing Ana here. I had wanted to free her. I couldn’t save her from those who had hurt her, but I hadn’t wanted them to keep her even after death. I couldn’t take back the things I had done in my past, but I could still try and make amends for them now.

  The Between had called to me, and not just because I knew Ana’s body would never be found by the humans.

  It was because I’d seen the hurt and terror in Samira’s face. I’d witnessed Ana’s fear, and her passionate desire to protect Samira from those who would harm her. They were slaves, and it seemed only right to release their spirits…

  “Because no one should be forced into anything against their will,” I said quietly as I stared down at my bloodied hands.

  “You are,” she said.

  “My situation is different. Mine is the equivalent of a prison sentence without the prison… It’s in place of the death sentence I was supposed to receive.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Nothing I want to talk about,” I said quickly, an image of His face flashing before my eyes.

  “You know we’ve all done things we’re not proud of,” Samira said.

  Lifting my face to meet her gaze once more, I smiled. “I never said I wasn’t proud of it.” I left out the part where I was utterly ashamed of the actions that had led up to the end, and about getting caught. But what I had actually done to get myself caught… that, I would never regret. It had been my only choice, and it had been worth every second of agony I’d since endured.

  She looked utterly confused, and my grin widened.

  “Come on, we should get back,” I said. “The wards need to be replaced.”

  Instead of responding, Samira watched me with a new wariness. Whatever I had said to her had clearly frightened her, and that wasn’t any harm, those close to me tended to get hurt. Perhaps she would be better off afraid of me.

  With a shrug, I headed toward the way out of the Between, happy in the knowledge that, at least for now, she was still following me.

  Chapter Ten

  The bloodstains on the floor and the shattered door frame were the only indications of what had gone down in the apartment. Mazik had been as good as his word, and both bodies were gone when we returned. What he did with the bodies was something I hoped I would never have to find out.

  “I’m sorry about the door,” Samira said as she stepped through t
he wood splinters.

  “It’s not your fault, it’s not like you…” I stopped speaking as soon as I caught her expression. “Oh, it was you.” I smiled.

  At least she wasn’t entirely helpless, and that was always a good thing.

  “I wasn’t aiming for the door.”

  “Well, I’m sure next time you’ll nail him,” I said with a wide grin as I bent down to pick up one particularly large carved piece of wood.

  It was mostly intact, and I let out a long sigh of relief. The thought of having to get my hands on another protection symbol of this level didn’t fill me with joy. As long as Samira’s magic hadn’t rendered this one void, we would be fine.

  “If that’s your ward, you’re going to need a new one,” Samira said quietly as she began to pick up the cushions that had been knocked to the floor during the fight.

  “Why?” I stared down at the piece of wood in my hand.

  “Ana was a void, remember? What little magic the ward used to have is now long gone.”

  “Ah, crap.” I dropped the wood on the floor and kicked it hard enough to send it skittering across the floorboards.

  It had cost me a hell of a lot to get my hands on that one—it had mostly cost my dignity, but that wasn’t something I ever gave up lightly.

  “Any chance you know how to create another ward?” I asked, but a shake of Samira’s head dashed all my hopes.

  “So what can you tell me about the guys who sold you?” I asked. “Because from what I’ve seen, none of this is adding up.”

  Samira shot me a curious glance. “I do not understand.”

  “The ones who were here today are known as Saga Venatione, or at least they used to be,” I said, remembering the dark, vine-like tattoos that stretched across their very bald heads.

  “They still are, but they were foot soldiers.” Samira’s words caused my breath to catch in the back of my throat.

  “What do you mean, ‘foot soldiers?’ I didn’t think the witch hunters had any sort of tier system.”

  “There is much you do not know about witches.” A small smile lit Samira’s face, but it was still tinged with terrible sadness—the kind of sadness I knew only too well.