Freaky Reapers (A Mystic Caravan Mystery Book 8)

by Amanda M. Lee

  “Dinner first,” Cormack insisted. “Then we’ll come up with a plan.”

  “Definitely dinner,” Braden enthused. “What did you get me for the ice cream bar?”

  “Coconut-covered sprinkles. They’re multiple colors.”

  Braden nodded. “Good choice.”

  19

  Nineteen

  The group heading back to the cemetery was massive.

  Maya volunteered to stay behind with Lily. Apparently she wasn’t keen to go on an adventure, but she offered to patch up anybody who was hurt after the fact. I thought that was weird until I was informed she was a nurse. Aisling demanded to be included, so Griffin insisted he had to be part of the team, and by the time we were finished we had a six-vehicle caravan traveling to the cemetery.

  We parked at the fairgrounds to exchange information with our people. Now that the action had shifted, there was no keeping Nellie out of the fray. He scampered off to get his ax before I could inform him that we wanted to keep the hunting party manageable. It was too late. Apparently everybody was going.

  If Cormack was bothered by the army we’d brought with us from across the road when we met at the cemetery gate he didn’t show it. He apparently had a the-more-the-merrier mentality, which explained why he had so many kids.

  “Seth, I want you and Dolph to take up position on either side of the cemetery,” I instructed as I tied my hair back in a bun. “Keep on the lookout for Agent Stone particularly. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if he’s hanging around ... and if he sees all of us heading into the cemetery he’ll be curious. Text me so we can at least pretend we’re doing something normal.”

  Aisling slid me a sidelong look. “What normal thing could we possibly be doing in a cemetery after dark?”

  “Having a séance,” I answered without hesitation. “Perhaps your father, being a rich man, decided he wanted me to contact the spirit of his dead wife and jumped at the chance to hire us.”

  “Wait ... can you really conduct séances?” Braden looked intrigued.

  “Yes, but they’re not like those you’ve seen in television and movies. Why?”

  Izzy put her hand on Braden’s shoulder and leaned in to whisper to him. Some of the tension left his body, which I took as a good sign.

  “We’ll talk about a séance later,” Cormack instructed. “For now, we need to get moving. I think we should break into teams.”

  That made the most sense, except for one thing. “Do you really want to trust some of your kids — like Redmond — to run around with someone like Nellie?” I gestured toward my cross-dressing friend. His eyes were lit with excitement because he hadn’t beheaded anything in days. He became almost manic when he had to go without action.

  Cormack heaved out a sigh. “Good point. I guess we’re going as a group.”

  “It will be easier to explain if we get caught by Logan,” I offered. “Then we can use the séance excuse.”

  “Fair enough.” Cormack put his hand to Aisling’s back and prodded her in front of him. It was a protective move, one designed to make sure that his lone female child wouldn’t fall by the wayside and into trouble. I had no idea if that was normal behavior for him — if he favored her over his brothers or simply watched her more closely because she was a new mother — but I found it interesting.

  As for Aisling’s brothers and Izzy, they seemed thrilled to meet new people and didn’t find Nellie’s ax off-putting in the least.

  “That’s a nice one,” Redmond commented as he matched paces with our bearded lady. “How many notches do you have on it?”

  “If you can count your kills, you’re doing it wrong.”

  “Does that mean a lot or only a few? I’m not sure if you’re trying to be smug or psychological.”

  “I have more kills than you have years behind you.”

  “How old do you think I am?”

  “Don’t make me behead you,” Nellie shot back.

  Kade and I fell into step behind Aisling, Griffin and Cormack. They took the lead because they seemed to know the cemetery well.

  “I take it you guys are here often,” I said to their backs. It seemed silly not to talk. “Do you collect souls here?”

  “Souls should be collected as close to the time of passing as possible,” Cormack countered. “It’s not always feasible, but we do our best. You shouldn’t have to absorb a soul at the cemetery. It should be done long before then.”

  “And you absorb every soul?” I was naturally curious. “If that’s true, how do you explain ghosts?”

  “We try to absorb every soul,” he explained. “Despite our best efforts, I would say that at least five percent of them are either missed or flee.”

  “That’s not a terrible percentage,” Kade pointed out. “Most people would kill for a ninety-five-percent success rate.”

  “Yes, but the five percent of souls left behind usually fall victim to a horrible existence.”

  “Ghosts,” I surmised.

  Cormack nodded once. “In some instances. Most souls become manic or crazed when left without a body for too long. They draw attention to themselves, which allows us to track them after the fact. Very few are quiet ... and they’re the ones to be more concerned about. That usually means they’re more aware of their surroundings and can turn vicious.”

  I’d never really given it that much thought. “You said that only some of them become ghosts. What about the others?”

  “They are absorbed by wraiths.” Cormack’s voice went grim. “When that happens, the soul is lost forever. It’s destroyed to fuel the wraith ... although wraiths only live a half-life, so the souls aren’t even put to good use. It’s sad, really.”

  It sounded sad. “What about the souls that you’ve lost recently?” I was curious about the process and decided to take the opportunity to ask the question that had been plaguing me since things started going sideways. “I mean ... you guys have said the banshees are stealing your souls. What do you think they’re doing with them?”

  “I don’t know.” Cormack’s gaze was grave when he stopped and turned to me. “My guess would be ingesting them. I can’t think of another purpose. I’m not all that familiar with banshees. They’re soulless beings, correct?”

  He seemed to be asking for a history lesson, so I decided to give it to him. “Banshees were created in times of great mourning. They’re Irish in origin.”

  “Hey, so are we,” Redmond chirped from behind me.

  “The keening is their main identifier. It stems from Scottish and Irish traditions.” I explained. “Those who mourned hardest and couldn’t get over their grief turned into banshees.”

  “And they’re always women?” Griffin asked.

  “Yes, but I don’t have an explanation for that. I would think there had to be cases of men mourning hard enough for lost loves or children that they would turn. But the phenomenon seems to happen only to women.”

  Aisling glanced at her father. “Yeah. I’ve known people who grieved hard and never had that happen. So, it’s a woman thing. That doesn’t explain what’s happening on the streets right now.”

  “It definitely doesn’t,” I agreed. Cormack was leading us to the old section of the cemetery, to the place where the mausoleums and tombs were built. I wasn’t surprised. I figured that’s where the banshees had to be hiding. “There’s another type of banshee, though.”

  I explained to them about human suffering and the phenomenon that occurred during World War II. When I was finished, Aisling looked disgusted and Cormack was intrigued.

  “Ugh. Weren’t those poor people put through enough?” Aisling complained, annoyance obvious. “I mean ... really.”

  It was a valid question. Cormack had another one.

  “Do you think that’s what’s happening here?”

  I expected him to ask. That didn’t mean I was sure how to answer. “I don’t know,” I said finally, organizing my thoughts. “The thing is, the girls have been missing for only a few weeks. Human suff
ering of this magnitude usually takes longer than that. We’re talking about a soul-cracking force. That takes a lot of effort. It doesn’t simply happen willy-nilly.”

  “We know a little something about soul fractures,” Cormack started, clearly choosing his words carefully. He risked a glance at Aisling and immediately slipped his arm around her shoulders when he saw the way she was looking at him. Her expression was not exactly accusatory. It wasn’t loving either.

  “I would agree that fracturing a soul, breaking bits off, takes longer than a few weeks,” he continued. “I don’t have an exact timetable — nobody does, because suffering doesn’t follow guidelines — but I get what you’re saying.

  “If these girls have been transformed into banshees — whether the traditional sort or something new — then something truly terrible had to happen to them,” he continued. “The thing is, even when a soul has been fractured, goodness remains. Sometimes it remains in only one half of the soul. That doesn’t mean that all is lost.”

  He was speaking from a place of specific knowledge.

  “You’re talking about your wife.”

  Cormack jerked his eyes to Aisling, perhaps sensing she was the one to tell me. “I ... you know about that?”

  “A little. Not much. I know the basics, and that’s okay. The thing is, I’ve seen two of these banshees die so far. There were no souls hanging around that I saw.”

  “She’s right,” Redmond interjected as he hurried to catch up with his father and sister. “The one I killed ... there was no soul left behind. Not only that, when I killed it, there was only dust left. That usually indicates the absence of a soul.”

  He said it in such a matter-of-fact manner I had to take a moment to consider it. Once I thought about it, I decided he was right. Soulless beings often faded to dust when killed. That was beyond interesting ... and something to think about down the road.

  “You want to know if we can save them, don’t you?” I asked Cormack pointedly. He didn’t respond, just held my gaze. “I don’t know if we can. My gut says no. The two we’ve seen go down were easily defeated and gone within seconds. Nothing remained behind to save.”

  “They’re thinking as a unit,” Kade pointed out. He kept my hand firmly in his as we closed in on the part of the cemetery we were headed for. “They reminded me of the human dolls we faced out on the West Coast.”

  I tilted my head, considering.

  “Human dolls?” Aisling looked horrified at the thought. “Is that a real thing?”

  Kade launched into the tale of the crazy witch who subverted human girls so she could feed off them, giving me time to decide if I thought it was an avenue worth pursuing. When he was finished, Aisling was even more screechy than usual.

  “Ugh. I hate dolls,” she complained. “I don’t know how you managed to deal with that. I mean ... gross.”

  “They were still humans underneath,” I murmured, rubbing my chin. “They still had souls.”

  “What are you thinking?” Cormack asked. “I can practically hear the gears working.”

  “Maybe they’re rusty,” Redmond suggested, earning a firm cuff from his father.

  “There are spells to track souls,” I said. “They’re mentioned in books, but I’ve never used them. I have used a modified version of the spell to track other forms of monsters. We might be able to try to find the souls ... although that might be a wasted effort. I need to give it some thought.”

  “It’s not a wasted effort if we can help the souls move on,” Aisling persisted. “It’s not the outcome we wanted — which is to save these girls — but it’s better than nothing.”

  “I need to conduct some research,” I said. “I have some books to check. I’ll do it first thing tomorrow morning.”

  “Good. I ... .” Whatever Cormack was going to say died on his lips as a peculiar scratching reverberated through the area. It sounded like a brick wall was moving, perhaps opening, and it put us all on alert. “Spread out,” he hissed. “Find the source of that noise.”

  No one needed to be told twice. We were two separate groups who hadn’t worked together before, yet we moved as a seamless unit. Everyone knew what they were doing. Even Nellie was quiet as he hunted with his ax.

  “Which direction?” Kade whispered, his hand in front of me as if he was trying to keep me from running headlong into danger. “Which way should we go?”

  I didn’t have an answer. “I ... .” The hair on the back of my neck suddenly stood on end and I swiveled quickly. It was an odd time of day. It wasn’t quite dark and yet the sun was offering no illumination. I had to squint to make out anything thanks to the growing haze, and it took me almost a full ten seconds to find the source of the feeling.

  The girl had dark hair. I couldn’t determine her age, but she was so small I figured she couldn’t be older than sixteen. Her eyes looked sunken and there was no glow to her skin. She was a pallid creature, but she was alive. Her head moved, her eyes bounced from face to face, and her hands were extended and ready for battle.

  “Where did she come from?” Redmond asked, moving to my side as he prepared to take her down.

  “I’m not sure,” Kade replied. “She just appeared.”

  “It can’t be far. We should kill her and go looking for the others.” He made a move to do just that, but I shot out my hand and grabbed his arm.

  “Not yet,” I hissed.

  His eyes widened. “Why not? I thought we agreed we couldn’t help them. They’re soulless.”

  I mostly believed that, but a niggling doubt remained. “Just let me try to talk to her,” I insisted.

  He was incredulous, but took a step back. “Fine. Talk to the banshee. See where that gets you.”

  His tone grated, but I ignored him and focused on the girl. “Hello.” I held my hands out to my sides in a peaceable manner so she wouldn’t fear me. “Can you hear me?”

  The girl blinked several times rapidly and glanced between faces. Finally, after what felt like a really long time, she focused on me.

  “You can hear me?” I forced a smile that probably came across as creepy rather than soothing. But she was a monster. Perhaps creepy was comforting ... although I sincerely doubted it. “I would like to help you,” I offered. “I know you don’t trust me and you’re probably confused, but I would definitely like to help you.”

  The girl cocked her head to the side, reminding me of a dog I once saw. The vacant expression in her eyes told me the dog had understood more than this girl.

  “Do you understand me?” I pressed. “Can you communicate with me?”

  The girl hissed but didn’t speak. Of course, I didn’t really expect her to.

  “Listen, we want to help.” Tentatively I took a step in her direction. She shrank back, but I was determined to get close enough to touch her. If I could make that happen, I was certain I would be able to see whatever was happening inside her mind. If it was nothing, so be it. If it was something, I might be able to find a way to help her.

  “I only want to touch you,” I reassured, adopting the calmest voice I could muster. “I won’t hurt you. I have no intention of hurting you. I just want to ... .” My fingers lightly brushed against her hair and a lightning-quick flash filled with screaming and brick walls filled my head. “Oh, geez!”

  I slowed my pace, which was a mistake. The banshee decided at that moment that I was a threat and she needed to take me out. She extended her fingernails into brutal claws and moved to leap on me. I was just deciding how to react — with deadly force or something softer — when Nellie appeared behind the woman.

  I knew what he was going to do. I’d spent enough time with him to see exactly how this was going to end. I opened my mouth to scream at him to stop, but it was already too late.

  He brought the ax down on the back of the girl’s neck with an exuberant precision that took my breath away. The girl froze for a split second, her eyes filling with something I couldn’t quite identify, and then dissolved into dust and poofe
d out of existence.

  The hand I was reaching for crumbled to nothing, and I was left standing alone next to the mausoleum. What had once been a young girl I was certain had hopes and dreams, was no more.

  “Are you okay?” Kade rushed to my side.

  I was too angry to answer. Thankfully I didn’t have to because that’s when a shadow I hadn’t noticed before started moving. This one was lower, set close to the ground, and it appeared to belong to an animal.

  We weren’t out of this yet.

  “There!” I extended a warning finger and everyone turned in anticipation. I held my breath as the beast padded forward.

  When the creature stepped forward enough for me to make out its features, I was horrified. It looked like some sort of mutant dog ... or as if it was the outcome of what would happen if a dog and owl mated.

  “Holy ... !”

  Kade shoved me behind him and took the position closest to the creature. “I don’t know what you are, but if you touch her I’ll kill you.”

  Instead of bearing teeth or growling, the animal started laughing ... like a human.

  “Oh, I love it when you people say stuff like that,” he chuckled. “I mean ... it’s so funny. Aren’t death threats funny? I love them.” His expression shifted quickly. “Oh, wait, I don’t. You’re all douches and I don’t want to know any of you. Are you happy? I mean ... geez. What is wrong with you people?”

  I was starting to wonder that myself.

  20

  Twenty

  “What the hell is that?”

  Luke practically jumped into my arms he was so eager to get away from the creature. For a guy who could shift into a killer wolf, he had a lot in common with Shaggy from Scooby-Doo.

  “I don’t know, but I want to mount that head on my trailer wall,” Nellie announced, gripping his ax tighter. “Come here little ... owl-dog thing.” He looked uncertain as he eyed the creature. “Hey, is that your tail or ... nope.” He averted his eyes quickly. “Wow. I think we know why there aren’t many of these things in existence. They’ll kill anything they try to procreate with.”