Death Bound: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Modern Necromancy Book 2)

by Justin Sloan

  “Not yet.” She exited, continuing along the rocks. “I imagine that could have been something, part of an ancient city or something. In fact, I think a lot of these mounds and hills were once part of the city. The forest reclaimed it. I think—”

  She stopped in her tracks, staring back at where they came. Rohan followed her line of sight just as a shape vanished in the trees.

  “An animal, maybe?” Rohan asked.

  “No,” Nora said, holding up her machete. “That was a person. Someone’s watching us.”

  “Come on,” Rohan said, his gut clenching. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

  Nora didn’t respond. Her eyes searched the green shadows.

  Rohan charged ahead. “Let’s keep moving. But in the off chance you’re right, let’s at least keep our eyes open.”

  Chapter 9

  The rainforest swarmed around them as they trudged on, and at one point Rohan didn’t know what was tree, sky, or earth. The hottest hours of the day burned on and on, and they blew through their water supply.

  They zigzagged across the jungle, doing their best to hid their tracks, and were only able to relax when it had been over an hour since thinking they’d spotted someone.

  Nora led them to what she assured him was a clean stream, one she was glad to see because she swore it was the same she’d used last time she was here. Rohan didn’t care for the brackish taste, but it was better than dying of dehydration.

  With Nora’s skills, they found the river where it met the path.

  “Turn around,” she said.

  “What?”

  But then she saw that she was unbuttoning her shorts. She tossed her jacket down on a large rock, then look at him again, pointedly, and repeated herself. “Turn. Around.”

  He did so, and glanced back to see she’d stripped down to her panties and bra and was wading into the river. It wasn’t that he meant to peek, but he was flabbergasted. How could they know if these rivers weren’t full of leaches or some nasty disease?

  “You can strip now too,” she said, once she was submerged up to her shoulders. “Just keep the boxers on…. Or is it briefs?”

  “I—I don’t know,” he said, looking at the murky water.

  “Hey, suit yourself, she said, and swam in a circle, just enjoying herself.

  He was covered in sweat from all this walking, after all. A quick glance around showed him no one was watching, at least that he was aware of, so he said screw it and began to undress.

  “Hmm, boxer-briefs,” she said playfully as he stepped into the water. “I should’ve known.”

  “It’s only practical,” he said, covering himself down there and blushing. “I’m just doing this to get clean. Just, you know, so you don’t get the wrong idea or anything.”

  “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” she said. “You and me both.”

  The water wasn’t as freezing as he’d expected, and felt quite refreshing. A rustling of wind in the trees above mixed with the pleasant flow of the river, and sunlight glistened in a way that brought him back to days spent at a river like this near his home when he was a teenager. Him and the guys, they’d always go back in the woods to explore, and on extremely hot days, take turns swinging from a robe into the water.

  He missed the innocence of those days. Back then you could swim without a care in the world, not worrying about people following you or two evil spirits possessing a girl you went on one date with and using that girl to try and destroy the world.

  Getting old sucked.

  “What’re you thinking about?” she asked, and he turned to see she was only about a foot away, her mostly bare flesh visible through the water.

  “When I was young, how innocent we were back then.”

  “Speak for yourself,” she said with a laugh.

  “You weren’t innocent?”

  “No, I mean yes, but….” She splashed water at him and laughed. “I mean, I’m still young and I’m still innocent.”

  They stood there, both smiling, the peacefulness of the jungle enveloping them.

  “If one of those are true,” he said, more because the silence made him uncomfortable than because he’d meant to say it, “that puts you ahead of me.”

  She wasn’t sure how to take that, and the moment was over. With an uncomfortable nod, she told him to turn around while she got dressed.

  “I haven’t seen it all yet?” he asked.

  “Underwear… clings differently when wet,” she said, then waited for him to turn around before she got out.

  The images that put in his mind made his heart thump as his blood left his head and flowed south, and he was glad she agreed not to watch when he got out either. They didn’t bother drying, because with they heat, they knew they’d be dry before too long.

  They pushed back into the rainforest again and found the place where they had strayed from the path, Nora cutting relentlessly through the thicket with her machete, Rohan doing his best to stay out of her way.

  But they lost daylight. Dusk crept upon them gradually, like a disease, and then before Rohan could savor it, it was gone.

  “Night falls quickly at the equator,” Nora said.

  They stopped in a clearing wide enough for them to sleep in. Nora searched the area and then set her things at the base of a kapok tree, seeking shelter under its gnarled trunk.

  Together, they searched for flint and kindling and made a fire just away from the base of the tree. The flames leapt up and were a welcome heat source as the temperature plummeted. Rohan found himself jumping into a jacket he had packed, and he warmed his hands at the fire like he did when he was in the Urals.

  “We made good progress today,” Nora said. She had wrapped a bandana around her head and a jacket around her waist. She stretched her arms. She was visibly sore and in pain, and her eyes gleamed against the fire

  “How far?” Rohan asked.

  She shrugged. “We should be close.”

  “You said that this afternoon.”

  “We had to make some detours. The rainforest changes. We can’t make straight paths. We have to come upon it diagonally. But I’m fairly certain we are moving in the right direction.”

  “So tomorrow, then?” Rohan asked.

  Nora studied the starlit treetops. The stars were barely visible through the canopy. “If we wake early, then yes.”

  “Good,” Rohan said, eating a granola bar. “The more time we take, the more likely Altemus is going to take over the world.”

  “Tell me about him,” Nora said. “Altemus.”

  Rohan laughed, and then he sighed. “It’s funny. You’re the first person I’ve ever met who would actually believe me. Most people would call the insane asylum and try to commit me if I told them about my misadventures with him.”

  “Try me.”

  “My fiancé had a mental illness. He was her psychiatric doctor. When she died, I thought it was her disease, but it turns out she was a botched sacrifice to open the gates to the afterlife. I didn’t know it at the time. Altemus convinced me that he could bring her back from the dead, and well, I believe him. After racing across Russia and the Middle East, and fighting my way through the deadly afterlife, I’m here.”

  Nora listened as he told her more about his earlier journey---Corinne, how he learned to control the dead, Anne Altemus, and all the other crazy things he saw. Nora listened all the while without judgment, nodding and shaking her head as if on cue.

  “You’re almost as messed up as I am,” she said. “Fate must have brought us together.”

  Rohan laughed as the fire crackled.

  “The other woman in my house---was she?”

  “First date,” Rohan said.

  Nora looked taken aback, and then she burst into laughter. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I wish. I took her out for Moroccan, we hit it off, almost went to third base...and BAM! Turns out she’s freaking possessed.”

  “Good for you for trying.”

  “Dating?
Yeah, I guess.”

  “Your fiancé, Senna---I met her. I can understand why you grieved. She loves you.”

  “I know.”

  Rohan remembered that Senna had saved Nora from the afterlife. “Hopefully it wasn’t too gruesome down there.”

  “It’s everything I expected,” she said. “You know, I have nightmares about all of this. The souls. The undead. What’s waiting for me when I die.”

  “Don’t we both.”

  “I suppose. It’s getting late. We’ll rise early tomorrow and put all of this behind us soon enough.”

  A gaze lingered between them and Rohan told her good night. He crawled into a sleeping bag by the fire and had a hard time falling asleep, startling at every sound in the shadows just outside the clearing.

  But Nora was soon asleep, and he eventually drifted off thinking about everything that had happened in the last day.

  ***

  They woke at dawn and put out the remains of the smoldering fire. It was surprisingly cool, and even though they’d slept in jackets, they were now sweating.

  They packed up. Nora consulted her GPS and confirmed a path.

  “I’m holding you to your promise yesterday,” Rohan said, grinning.

  “Promise?”

  “That we’ll reach out destination today.”

  Nora smirked. “And if I break it?”

  Rohan was about to say something witty when he heard a rope twinging. He grabbed Nora just as an arrow whistled past her and stuck in the trunk of the kapok tree.

  Suddenly a group of men and women came out from the shadows in all directions with guns pointed at them. They were all sufficiently bronzed from constant exposure to the sun and did not look happy to see them.

  “Crap,” Rohan said.

  Nora circled around and said in Spanish, “What do you want?”

  One of the men said something in rapid-fire Spanish and his face hardened. He and Nora traded in a heated exchange. Rohan didn’t like his posture, which was on edge and ready to attack.

  “Let me guess,” Rohan said. “He wanted to give us a warm welcome and he insists that we follow him to his home for tea.”

  “Not quite,” Nora said. “He says he remembers me and asked me to return what I stole.”

  “That’s not the answer I was expecting.”

  “I told him to go screw himself.”

  “Fantastic.”

  “He said they’re not going to let us pillage their culture.”

  “You can stop translating now. This is getting depressing.”

  Rohan and Nora stood with their hands raised, staring at the semi-automatic rifles aimed at them. Slowly, Rohan lowered his hands, realizing they were goners anyway.

  “We don’t want trouble,” he said, secretly searching for any sign of spirits nearby he could call on, even long-dead corpses.

  He sensed something, but he couldn’t tell if it was near or far, and it was something he had never contacted before. It was as if a wall blocked him from communicating further.

  (??? Does this break what we’ve established? Should he be able to “sense” things?

  (JS - Can’t he always as his powers grow? Such as at the arrival to the temple with Corinne in book one, doesn’t he kind of sense stuff there? And later on?)

  The men with their guns started to shout and then one stepped forward, lifting his rifle to shoot.

  Something hit the man in the temple and he dropped. He crashed to the ground and his gun fired into the canopy, sending a flock of parrots wheeling into the sky.

  The others looked around, confused, frightened, and two people began shooting into the jungle.

  Another rock connected, dropping one of the shooters, and then a man appeared from the trees, hitting the second shooter with a knee to the face and dropping him with a crunch before turning to the others. He had long black hair and wore all beige. His back was to them and Rohan couldn’t make out his face—only a beige blur as the man flipped around the area, knocking out men left and right.

  As more shots rang out and bodies dropped, Nora pulled Rohan with her.

  “We don’t want to be here if he loses,” she said.

  Rohan ran along with her, but said, “I hope I don’t regret not knowing who he is or why he’s here.”

  “Something tells me he’ll have a way of tracking us down.”

  Chapter 10

  They ran as fast they could, not looking back. Behind them, gunfire and screams filled the rainforest. Rohan couldn’t get the face of the mysterious man out of his face—rather, the lack of it.

  Who was he? Where did he come from?

  But if there was anything he’d learned in his travels, it was to not ask questions and take advantage of an opportunity to run.

  Nora’s stamina was almost unlimited. He followed her but had a hard time keeping up.

  They ran and ran, until the sun was high in the sky. Then they rested for a few minutes and ran more.

  At every turn, Rohan expected armed men to jump out of the brush and shoot.

  But none did.

  They heard no more gunfire.

  No more footsteps in the forest behind them.

  After a few miles, they were truly alone.

  They ran with Nora’s GPS as their guide, and the run got them closer to the destination. They spent hours circling back on their trail and looping in strange directions in order to throw off potential pursuers. They ate lunch as they walked.

  By the time they stopped, they had only traveled a few miles—most of the day was spent in diversions.

  They stopped and hid in a clump trees, panting.

  Moonlight filtered through the tree canopy above and sprinkled the ground in a soft silver light. It reminded Rohan of the light spirits gave off, and for a moment he thought one would float out of the bushes and start talking to him.

  He sensed a presence, the same presence he had sensed earlier.

  But this time it was stronger. He felt as if he could just reach out and touch it. Just a few yards away. He imagined sending thoughts toward it, waited and listened for a response, but nothing.

  He didn’t know why, but he stood and started walking.

  Nora, who was setting up a fire, looked up. “Where are you going?”

  He didn’t answer her. He parted several ferns and charged forward.

  “Rohan, we need to stay together,” Nora said sternly.

  “What if I told you I sensed something?”

  “An attacker?” she asked, glancing around.

  “No,” Rohan said, parting more plants. A large circular stone rested in the shadows.

  They studied the stone. It was flanked by several tall pillars that looked manmade, and as if they were ready to crumble.

  Rohan strained and pushed the circular stone. It was heavy, but the soft earth under it gave him leverage. Nora joined him, and after several seconds of intense pushing, they rolled the stone aside. The stone rolled down a hill and crashed against a tree.

  In its place, a starlit colonnade lay ahead, swathed in a faint silvery mist. The stones were unevenly placed, and some lay in the path.

  “This is it,” she replied. “This has got to be it.”

  They continued on, each step leading them further down the path. The ground sloped downward, almost impossibly downhill, but they kept a moderate pace until they arrived at the vine-covered mouth of a cavern. On the walls above the opening was a circular pendant with curved lines through it that reminded Rohan of the crop circles he’d seen in magazines as a kid. The trail of silver mist wafted into the cave and grew wider and thicker the closer they got to the entrance.

  The presence of spirits was strong. Rohan couldn’t mistake it. Though he’d only controlled spirits a few times, he knew the feeling anywhere.

  Tingling danced across his skin and he imagined controlling spirits with his mind, willing them to fight for him.

  “Do you feel it?” Rohan asked.

  “Yes,” Nora said. “There are spi
rits here.”

  “Nice to know we’re on the same page,” Rohan said.

  They entered the cool cavern and the temperature dropped. Nora lit a lighter and they moved in the dim light. Frantic scurrying sounded from the walls, and Rohan tried not to imagine what kinds of animals were moving in the darkness.

  Then, as if out of nowhere, he noticed patterns in the light, like spider webs that danced in the darkness.

  Suddenly pinpoints of light were all around them, pulsing quietly. At the center of each web was a mound of earth.

  “Interesting,” Rohan said, walking over to a web. He reached into the center of the light and brushed the dirt aside, revealing more light.

  It was a pillar, and the light was glowing like veins inside the rock, in the same pattern that Rohan noticed above the cave.

  “This is definitely Incan,” Nora said, running her hands along the newly revealed lines. She touched more of the webs and soon the dark chamber was aglow with curvy lines of light. “Impressive,” she said. “But what is it?”

  Rohan circled a pillar, contemplating. Kneeling down, he noticed tree small blue dots carved on it. As he examined them closer, he noticed they were concentric circles.

  “What does that pillar over there have?” he asked.

  Nora bent over and checked her pillar. “This one has only two circles.”

  They searched the room and found another pillar with three concentric circles on it.

  Rohan put his hands over the center circle, and Nora did the same on her pillar.

  The ground quaked. The ground collapsed, and the pillar next to Rohan fell away into a deeper slope. It rolled down into darkness and then made a crash that reminded Rohan of a bowling ball striking pins. Then he heard deeper rumblings from below, as if a path were being cleared in the shaking.

  As the quaking subsided, an earth-covered staircase appeared in the earth, leading downward.

  “Your lighter have a lot of fuel left?” Rohan asked.

  “I don’t know if we’ll need it,” Nora said, pointing. The dark path begin to light up with more blue light—the quiet light of spirits.

  As they walked down the path, Nora examined the walls. There were drawings of men and animals on the wall, and a phrase spray painted in Spanish that Rohan couldn’t decipher.