Shadows of Old Ghosts

by Stephanie Zayatz

  “Never been in a morgue,” Jirel mentioned offhandedly as the two of them walked up to the county medical examiner’s office at Denver Health. Hazel’s case had been transferred immediately from Larimer county at the request of her father—being a high up at the Alliance carried a lot of weight even in the human offices.

  Aviira glanced at him. She suspected the comment was more to break the uneasy silence than anything. “No?”

  He shook his head. “You?”

  “Had a serial case a couple of years ago,” she said. “Came up here a few times to dig over some autopsies and look for patterns. Plus I had to come down and identify my mom a few years ago.”

  He did a double take, surprised at the casual tone in her voice. “You had to do what?”

  She cleared her throat and held the door open for him. “She od’ed and nobody else could be reached. Someone found my records and tracked me down so she could be identified, even though she hadn’t had custody of me for almost twenty years.”

  “You sound so…unaffected by that.”

  Aviira shrugged. “She was my mother but she wasn’t my mom, you know what I mean? I didn’t know her. When I saw what the drugs had done to her I was actually thankful that the state had taken Liisha and me, because one way or another we would have ended up dead or drug addicts, so. Actually when I came to do it I was a little disappointed that it was her and not my dad.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “No idea,” she said. “Which is just fine with me. Don’t need a piece of shit like that in my life.”

  “You aren’t curious if he’s—alive? Okay?”

  She shook her head. “I’m sure he’s alive. If he’d died someone would have contacted me same as my mom. So I’m sure he’s still wasting good air somewhere.”

  “Maybe he’s come around.”

  “I doubt it. People like him don’t change. You have to be a special kind of fucked up to push a six-year-old down a flight of stairs and abandon a newborn. So. He’s welcome to have his life and live it however he chooses so long as it doesn’t come near mine.”

  Jirel couldn’t think of what to say, but luckily he didn’t have to say anything, since they’d arrived at the front desk of the coroner’s office. He stepped up to the front information desk and held his badge up to the glass and said they were there to see the medical examiner. After a brief wait, the ME came to the door to let them through and led them down the hall to the morgue.

  “I’m sorry to bother you,” he said as they walked. “I know you must be busy with your investigation, but something came up during the autopsy that I thought you should see. I thought…maybe you would be able to identify something for me.”

  Aviira and Jirel looked at each other. That was not a promising situation. The ME held open an examination room door for them and shut it behind them.

  Hazel’s body was lying on the exam table under a blue sheet. Despite herself, Aviira had to work past a shiver. There was something inherently distressing about a morgue—maybe it was the feeling that everything in it lacked life; the environment was too sterile and cold to support anything other than an occasional warm body passing through. Everything about the room was gray and lifeless, most notably the body on the table.

  She had not felt such a sensation of unease when she had come to identify her own mother.

  The medical examiner was unfazed, naturally. “I concluded that the cause of death was stabbing with a sharp object, a butcher’s knife or something similar. Punctured the lungs and throat and I’m assuming it was a quick way to die.”

  “It was,” Aviira said quietly. The medical examiner gave her a look that said he wasn’t aware that they had been present at the time of death.

  He cleared his throat. “Well. I’m sure that fact does not surprise you, then. What stood out to me, however, was this. You may want to step closer, if you could.”

  He peeled back the sheet to just above Hazel’s breasts, enough to expose the slashes on her chest and neck. Jirel and Aviira stepped closer to the table to get a better look. The gashes were filled with what looked like thick, black tar.

  Aviira’s eyes narrowed. “What is that?”

  The medical examiner shook his head. “I was hoping you could tell me that, detective.”

  Jirel ran a hand over his mouth and slowly shook his head. The examiner watched both of their faces carefully.

  “I noticed it when I began to clean the body for the autopsy, and thought maybe it was something organic from the crime scene, dirt left behind from the murder weapon, something easily explainable. But even once the wounds had been cleaned, it continued to rise up and sit atop them…like oil above water. My thought is poison, possibly, though given the state of the wounds it seems to be superfluous.” He paused and looked at the body, shaking his head. “I have done my fair share of examinations on the bodies of Ancients and I have never known anything about their biology to be different. I thought perhaps this would mean something to you.”

  “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” Aviira said. She looked at Jirel. “You?”

  “No.”

  “I know your ability to answer questions is no doubt limited, but I have to ask…is there anything that would allow context to the nature of her death? Anything that you have encountered in your investigation that could explain this?”

  Aviira and Jirel looked at each other, both at a loss for words.

  “Did you see this at the crime scene?”

  “No,” Aviira said. “I mean…we were there within moments of it happening. I covered the body with a sheet. If this…stuff…came up post mortem it’s possible nobody noticed till she got to the morgue.”

  “Did this make it into the official autopsy report?” Jirel asked.

  The medical examiner shook his head. “I have it in a contingent file, but I wanted to contact someone from the Society before I made any conclusions.”

  “Keep that confidential, if you would.” Jirel cleared his throat. “We may have someone from our supernatural offices contact you, and you’ll need to give them access to your files. It’s possible they have encountered something like this before. I understand if that sounds unconventional but we may have something strange on our hands here.”

  “Understood,” he said with a small nod. He replaced the sheet over the body.

  “How old was she?” Aviira asked suddenly.

  “Twenty-three.”

  The idea made her feel a little sick. She was barely older than Liisha, and it didn’t help that they looked strikingly similar.

  “We’ll get out of your way, doctor,” Jirel said. He touched Aviira’s elbow. “Thank you for your time. We’ll be in touch.”

  They were silent as they walked out of the morgue. Even once they stepped outside, the smell of formaldehyde was difficult to shake.

  ***

  Tito put up a “be right back” sign on his front counter and led Aviira and Jirel through his vault and up into his apartment, where even Aviira had never been.

  “You two look rough,” he said as he held the door open for them. “When’s the last time you slept?”

  “You know you look bad when a guy who never sleeps is asking when you last slept,” Aviira murmured to Jirel. “It’s not the sleeping that’s a problem. It’s the batshit crazy nightmares that keep interrupting it.”

  Tito gave her a serious look that she had never seen on his face before. “Sounds like you got wrapped up in some dangerous shit.”

  “That about covers it.”

  He walked into the kitchen and leaned against the counter, crossed his arms as he looked at the both of them. They were both taking the place in like they had expected something different. His eyebrows went up. “What?”

  “Just not what I expected,” Aviira said.

  “Exactly what were you expecting?”

  She shrugged. “Not sure. Candelabras and bats, maybe. Not…nice backsplash and a Keurig.”

  “Oh, well. Sorry to disappo
int. I keep my coffin in the back room.”

  “I thought so. You got files for us or what?”

  He reached onto the counter behind him and tossed a sealed folder at her. “After you told me about the cop earlier I looked it up. The media’s blowing everything out of proportion and now everyone is apparently terrified of some crazy flu.”

  “Better that than terrified of what really happened to him,” Jirel said as he stepped up next to Aviira at the kitchen island. She was spreading the files over the countertop. A gruesome picture of a twisted corpse with skin the color of rotten meat slid out of the pile. Her nose wrinkled involuntarily as the scent memory of the undead thing came back to her. She sniffed and pushed the picture to one side; under it was several more photos of more Creepers all laid out on the ground beside one another.

  Tito watched them read the files for a minute, absentmindedly rolling his tongue along the edge of one of his incisors. “From what I gather, the detective was looking into some weird cult activity and the rabbit hole eventually led him here. The files are all over the place. I have a feeling someone removed a few things.”

  “Yeah, like the names of any potential suspects,” Aviira said. “Or identities on these Creepers.”

  “There’s one name in there, but I already put it in the computer and it didn’t come up with anything.”

  Jirel frowned. “Fake name obviously.”

  “Where did he find these bodies?” Aviira asked as she paged through the files.

  “Some abandoned hospital down in, uh, what was it…just west of Castle Rock. I think it was used as a tuberculosis clinic before it was shut down in the fifties.”

  Jirel could feel the shiver that rolled down Aviira’s shoulders just standing beside her. He glanced at her, but her face was still calm.

  “Park Vista?”

  Tito nodded and lifted himself onto the edge of the counter. “That’s it. I always thought it was weird that there was a hospital way out there, not like anybody lived out there back in the day. No wonder it was shut down.”

  Aviira flipped a page and found the write-up in the files about the location. Jirel sensed that something wasn’t right.

  “Park Vista wasn’t a hospital,” she said quietly.

  He paused in the middle of inspecting his fingernails. “What do you mean? Course it was.”

  She looked up at Tito and shook her head. “Park Vista was a mental institution. They put it way out there because it was easy to hide it. People called it a TB clinic because it was a convenient excuse when they shipped off their crazy relatives.”

  “How the fuck do you know that?”

  Aviira shook her head a little and looked back at the papers. She could feel Jirel’s eyes on her, and felt a weird sense of comfort in knowing that he understood why the connection was a little odd. “Just a weird interest of mine,” she said quietly.

  Tito shrugged. “Well. Not really relevant what it was. Point is someone was using it to stash these Creepers, and he found out about it. Probably how he ended up dead.”

  “Same as Patrick Devaney,” Jirel said, leaning his forearms on the countertop. He shook his head a little. “We thought they had gone after him because he was a human and was obviously too scared to go after a Society detective, but obviously that’s not the case.”

  “Assuming it’s the same person,” Aviira said. She pulled one of the photos toward her. The body in it was not quite as gruesome as the others; it didn’t look as dead as the others. There were still some recognizable features in the face, still some color in the limbs, but the sense of undead was still pervasive. “This guy isn’t quite the same as the others. Maybe the person who did this learned it from our witch.”

  “Or the other way around. What’s the date on all this?”

  She flipped back to the beginning of the files. “’02. Almost fifteen years ago.”

  Jirel considered that for a moment and ran his hands over his face, groaned. She heard him say something under his breath that didn’t sound like it was in English. “God, I’m exhausted.”

  She nodded. “Mm. I’m sure some of this makes sense somewhere but I just can’t put it together right now. I could probably read through all of this and not remember it.”

  Tito looked between them both. “You want something to put you out?”

  “Like what, a hammer?”

  He gave her a look. “Like a narcotic, smartass.” He looked at Jirel with a helpless shake of his head. “Mad props to you for putting up with this shit every day. No wonder you’re exhausted.”

  Aviira frowned and shook her head. “I’m good.”

  “I’m serious. I take it all the time to sleep. It’ll put you out twelve hours solid, no dreams, which seems to be your problem.”

  “I wasn’t aware that you sleep.”

  “I don’t. That’s what the pills are for.” He shrugged. “Sometimes you’ve seen as much late night television as you can possibly handle before you start losing it.”

  “Yeah, but if it’s enough to put a vampire to sleep, what’s it going to do to us?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Just because I’m undead doesn’t mean I don’t still take medication. You’ll be fine, I promise. But you keep on looking like you do right now and you’ll be in the ground before you finish this case.”

  She stared at him for a while and then glanced at Jirel. The idea made her nervous, but he shrugged wearily.

  “Can’t be any worse than another night of this shit,” he said quietly.

  Tito had already glided out of the room without their noticing.

  “This is some fucked up shit,” she said, gesturing at the papers. “I don’t really believe in coincidences but this is just getting…”

  “Coincidental?”

  She looked at him. “Why yes, thank you, Captain Obvious.”

  “We’re going to have to go down there and check it out. Might as well get a decent night’s sleep before we descend into this rabbit hole.”

  Aviira brought in a deep breath and sighed it out. Tito appeared at her right side silently and she jumped again.

  “Jesus fuck,” she whispered as she took a step so close to Jirel that she bumped into him. He put a hand on the small of her back to keep her from falling over. Even after she steadied herself, he left it there and pretended he didn’t notice what he’d done. She pretended that she didn’t like it.

  “See?” Tito said as he extended his palm, upon which were two pills. “Consider this a chill pill. Nice to have friends in high places, isn’t it?”

  It wasn’t until later, as she was being dragged into a thick, hazy sleep, that those words fluttered to the top of her mind, and she couldn’t figure out why it suddenly reminded her of Patrick Devaney. Something that she knew she should have known from the very start occurred to her, but by morning, she had forgotten what it was.

  July 22nd – Wednesday

  ***

  Loretta Dannels looked surprised to see the two of them when she opened the door to the sprawling house the next morning. The air conditioning seeped out of the open door and wilted against the dry July heat on the other side. She looked different than she had the morning they had dropped in on her—more rested, younger. Aviira remembered thinking the first time she’d seen her that Loretta looked like the kind of trophy wife who needed a few extra hobbies, but for some reason, she didn’t get that impression now. She was dressed in a button up blouse and a pencil skirt with thoughtful pumps—an outfit that read more administrative professional than homemaker.

  “Good morning, detectives,” Loretta said uneasily. “What can I do for you?”

  An easy smile slipped onto Jirel’s face and he turned up the charm, which was just as well because Aviira still felt as if she was half asleep. She was fairly sure she’d need another cup of coffee before long if she was going to get anything done. They had spent the previous afternoon in a vain attempt to make some sense of the files Tito had given them before realizing it was pointless since they
were both too tired to see straight let alone work out the details of their case. Not much later than seven, they’d locked themselves into their apartments and took the pills Tito had handed over with a fair amount of trepidation, promising to the other that they’d call in the morning as soon as they woke up.

  Aviira had felt nothing at first, nothing but strong disappointment—she’d been looking forward to the prospect of a night of actual sleep—before it kicked in about twenty minutes later and she was glad she’d already been in bed, because she was out in moments and knew nothing for the entire night.

  “We had some questions for you and wondered if we could take a few minutes of your time,” Jirel said.

  Loretta’s eyes flickered between the two of them for a moment, and then a hesitant smile came to her face. “Come in, please.” As they followed her down the hall, she asked, “Can I get you something to drink?”

  “No, thank you,” Jirel said after a quick glance at Aviira, who shook her head discreetly. “We won’t be here long.”

  Aviira had a feeling that if she took anything Loretta offered, it had a good possibility of being laced with a hallucinogenic. The smell of stargazer lilies was just as strong as it had been the last time they’d visited. If anything, it at least woke her.

  Instead of bringing them into the kitchen, Loretta showed them into a formal sitting room and offered them a seat in front of the white brick fireplace. There was a vase with an arrangement of huge pink lilies on the mantel. Aviira took the seat, but Jirel stood next to the loveseat, hands in his pockets.

  Good cop, bad cop, Aviira thought.

  Loretta sat on one of the upholstered seats across a glass coffee table from them. Aviira did not miss the way she aimed her legs toward Jirel as she crossed them. He either did not notice, or was playing cool. Aviira felt strangely irritated by it.

  “Were you able to speak to Aiden?” she asked.

  “We saw him over the weekend,” Jirel replied.

  A thin eyebrow went up. “And?”

  Jirel ran a hand across his cheek and glanced uneasily at Aviira, cleared his throat like he wasn’t sure how to phrase it.