Chapter 8

 

Darria opened her eyes. She found herself in the center of the cement circle in Oliver’s graveyard. Her cloak was balled up next to her. Hekate, her dogs, and her mother were gone. Was it a dream ... a nightmare? Was all of it a hallucination triggered by Oliver’s kicking me out of the boneyard? If it had been, then at least she had gotten to hug her mother.

Her joints cracked and popped when she grabbed her cloak and wrapped it around her. As she lifted it, something clattered onto the cement and rolled on the concrete. The glint of metal caught the moonlight. She picked up the needle that had been in her right arm. In her dream, Hekate asked her to remove all the objects from her flesh. Underneath her cloak, she found the safety pin and the feather. She placed those back on her left arm. As they sunk back into her skin, she waited to see if her flesh would darken, as it had been in her dream, but it remained pale with a few brown freckles. Darria worried her bottom lip and glanced at her right arm. The ravens and the morning glories stayed the same. The poppies thrived. Two more had opened, leaving two of the ten closed. A cold chill crept up her back.

She searched around for the key.

If she didn’t have the key, then she couldn’t open the Wunderkammer or the doorways to where she needed to go. It was part of her being an undertaker. Am I even an undertaker anymore? Darria scoured the cement and shook out her cloak a few more times, but nothing fell from the folds. Panic set in.

“Looking for something?”

Hekate stood with one of her black dogs at the corner of the crossroads.

“It was real.”

The goddess flashed her a sly smile. “It was real, and you passed with flying colors.”

“You split me in two.” A mass of twisted emotions wrapped around her, ranging from gratitude to anger to plain horror. Hekate had violated her. Her fury increased. This time, her power didn’t writhe out of control. Instead, it anchored her.

“I pulled you apart because it was the fastest way for you to confront your other half without the months or years of training under Marie’s tutelage. I needed you whole now. You have a job to do. Even if you can’t understand that now or feel hatred toward me, it was for the good of everyone.” She spun the key around on her finger. “You brought your mother through. If you were completely dark and had no heart, she never would’ve been able to appear, and you wouldn’t need this back.” Hekate placed the key into Darria’s palm. It shifted back into the original skeleton key she had come to know, but it had some added weight it hadn’t had before.

“What did you do to this?” Darria asked.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d notice. It’s been a while since it’d been recharged. I made sure it was supercharged, and I added a little bit of something else.”

“What did you add?” Darria studied the key.

“It’ll help you in ways you may need. If you need to find me, unlock a door with it, and it will bring you right to me.”

“Omar always told me it would unlock anything.”

“Correct. Don’t think of it as a literal key; it can also be used metaphorically.”

She nodded. “Can I ask you one more thing before you run away again?”

“One more question, then.”

“You’re the ruler of necromancy; any pointers on how I deal with this? Is there some spell book you can recommend? I know Marie’s here to help me, but I can’t depend on her forever. All the books I’ve read have said that necromancers are evil, and they turn out like ... like my other half.”

Hekate put her hand on Darria’s shoulder and closed her eyes. A weight settled over her soul. It seemed like she was being pulled together or pushed apart. It was hard to know which. She opened her eyes, and the burden moved off Darria’s soul. “You needed a little bit more squeezing together. I wouldn’t do this, except that you are needed for what’s to come.”

“What’s to come?” Darria asked. “From what you’ve told me, you’re hooked into Fate.”

Hekate flashed her a coy smile and faded away. A silver scythe of a moon hung in the darkened sky. Her instincts said it was a reaper’s moon and that the harvesters were out gathering souls. The night seemed alive around her, more so than it ever had before. The implications of what it truly meant made her shiver. Darria glanced around the boneyard. Shining wisps of light hovered over each grave, and some floated along the paths. There were hundreds, maybe even thousands, of souls that Oliver had taken. She had never been able to see them before. Their presences burned against her like bonfires on a cold night. Each one called to her, but the storm that once raged within her had died down. She had no desire to rule these souls or use them for power.

Darria stepped down from the center of the concrete circle and walked among the dead. Their flames drew closer to her. She held out her hand and brushed her fingers over one of the tendrils. Once she connected with the energy, it left a coppery taste in her mouth. The flame morphed into the shape of a small boy. He flashed her a grin with his front teeth missing and held out his hand.

Darria sensed the bond created between them. She granted this soul the ability to take shape. He reached for her, but before she could touch him, someone grabbed her wrist. The cold that shot through her was stronger than anything she had felt before. Darria yanked her hand away and hissed. Hearing the sound spill from her lips surprised her along with the added strength that came with it.

“Careful, necromancer, or I will drop you where you stand. Your soul might have already paid for its journey across my domain, but that doesn’t mean I can’t take you early.” No amount of power could stand up against the being who uttered the warning and stepped out from the rip in the universe sealing behind him.

The little boy squeaked in fear and backed away. The link between them snapped like a rubber band that hit her in the eye. Darria calmed herself. She was afraid of the dark angel who stood before her, but he had helped her before. This time, the mighty power of his office blasted against her, and she could see his wings.

“Hello, Azrael.” Her voice was calmer than she felt. “I wasn’t going to hurt him or use him for any gruesome purpose. I was intrigued.” Somehow, Darria knew that she could have excreted more of her will and made the little boy her servant.

The dark angel, head of all the harvesters, looked upon her with a flat expression. His power washed over her. Darria did not flinch. Silver moonlight cut around him as though he was a silhouette laid on top of the background. He didn’t belong in this universe, and yet, he was a part of it. Azrael stood seven feet tall. His dark hair hung past his shoulders. He wore a black trench coat, and underneath that were black jeans and a red T-shirt. Full lips hid sharper canine teeth. His black eyes glistened like newly shined marbles. When she looked into them, Darria saw universes and stars exploding in them. The silhouette around his back where his coat came together was the outline of his vast wings.

“You’ve changed,” the Angel of Death remarked with a little hint of awe in his voice.

“For better or for worse?” Darria inquired.

He took her face between his cool hands. His fingers slid over her flesh like silk. The scent of jasmine, cloves, and lilies hung heavily about him. It intoxicated her and nearly made her swoon and yearn for Oliver. She expected the slice of her that was the necromancer to spurn the idea, but no revulsion came up. His long nails scraped burning trails along her cheeks. Darria returned his stare and didn’t look away. The death energy that came off him was tough for her to clarify. If Oliver was a power plant she could siphon energy from, Azrael was a massive sun that would fuel her forever. His energy was endless, timeless. Within him, Darria sensed the spark she recognized as his soul.

“Hekate put her mark upon you in more ways than one.”

“What does that mean?”

His lips turned up in a devilish smile that only twisted her heart more into melting. Azrael took her right arm and trailed his index finger over the flowers, tracing the main vine. The ivy wrapped around her arm and showed more blue blossoms covering her arm up to her shoulder. The red poppies stood out more than they had before.

“Do you know what these flowers mean?”

“They’re symbols of death. They have something to do with how much magic or power goes with the office. Marie has them. Sophia had them. Obviously, I’ve done something right because they keep opening.”

Azrael touched one of the closed poppies. The flower quivered and began to open. “Poppies were used in ancient times with priests and shamans to send their souls into the spirit worlds. If they took too much, they could die. It was a gamble; they knew that. Some say the poppies signify resurrection after death. In the beginning, that’s what an undertaker was: a bridge between life, death, and resurrection. Before Hekate and the other gods got involved, tying themselves to their specific religions and the forms they have now, they were powerful beings with different names that humans worshipped. Some called them gods, demigods, or spirits that were thought into being. Put together enough mortals and an effigy of what they think a god looks like along with the mythology to back it, a spirit can latch on to that or come into being. The death gods were luckier than most because death will always exist in one form or another. Across dimensions, worlds, universes, and realms, they are always going to be there the same way death is. Sorry, I digress. Undertakers were originally the shamans, the priests, and the theurgists of the day. They had a bit of psychic power, whether they realized it or not. Supernatural creatures were drawn to them. They could appeal to the gods for them.”

“Wouldn’t the supernatural creatures have their own set of gods when it came to crossing their souls over?” Darria asked, intrigued by his story. Azrael was soft-spoken, but he wove a tale that pulled her in. She had nearly forgotten that he was holding her arm, and it was slowly growing numb and painful from the cold seeping into her veins.

“You would think so, but not in your world. Maybe in mine. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to think about it.”

“You’re not all here, are you?” He seemed more of a cardboard cutout of himself, and yet, he remained physical.

He cocked his head to the side. “Very good on noticing. You wouldn’t have caught that before. I bet you see more of me than you did before. Yes?”

“I can see your wings, but you look kinda flat.”

“To answer your earlier question, no, I’m not all here. I have other things going on. Like all those who work under me, I can split myself into various slices, so I can be in many places at one time. Right now, others need more than you do. I think you got the whole of me before when you were infested with the essence of the banshees.”

“Is Kerstin okay?” Darria had liked the other grim reaper who had kept her company once.

Azrael’s brows bunched together. “She’s having troubles of her own. There’s nothing I can do to help her until she figures it out. It’s a long story.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. I like Kerstin.”

“I do, too. She’s suffered because of the choices she made. Enough about that, though; my time is limited here, and I was telling you about undertakers.”

“Yes, you were.”

“Because the preternatural beings went to the priests and shamans, those death gods who hung around certain tribes took notice. They implored the shamans to be the intermediaries between the spirits of the dead and the death gods. As payment, the supernatural creatures brought poppies. The gods were drawn to particular priests who they felt were the most powerful. These priests soon marked themselves with tattoos of poppies. Hekate told you about the objects, like your key. The gods thought they could control the undertakers, but things don’t always go the way you want them to. The death gods weren’t the only ones who took notice of the souls the humans were helping. The Ruler of the Dead wasn’t happy that he wasn’t being consulted. He had to make sure all the souls got to where they were going.”

“And that wasn’t you?”

Azrael shook his head. “No. It was well before my time. My history is a bit jaded and not up for discussion.”

“Sorry. What happened?”

He licked his lips, and his eyes burned deep crimson. He grimaced, and his canines flashed in the moonlight. “Forgive me. The rest will have to wait. I have to go.” A rip in the universe appeared, and Darria distinctively saw the curved blade of a large scythe make the cut. The cold of the expanse behind him called to her for a quiet place for her to retreat.

“Wait. What about Oliver? He said you revoked my access to the cemetery and to him.”

Azrael’s wings enclosed him. He stepped backward into the rift, but they separated, and his eyes narrowed. His eyes were no longer the wisdom-filled ones with galaxies exploding in them. Instead, they were full of a hunger and a longing she could not understand. His lips twisted up into a snarl.

“I told Oliver no such thing. All I told you was never to take over one of my harvesters again, or there would be dire consequences.”

She tried to ask him another question, but he floated back into the darkened chasm. She had a few more tidbits of information and applied it to what she had learned from Hekate. Undertakers were far older than what she had imagined. Darria didn’t know how far back her memories went, probably thousands of years over hundreds of undertakers, to whenever the death gods had assigned themselves to a line of undertakers. Of course, that didn’t figure into how the hunters worked and how the grim reapers came along. I bet that had something to do with the Ruler of Death, and he wasn’t happy about the death gods using the souls of the undertakers who were helping the supernatural creatures cross over and that his reapers were not doing their jobs. Supernatural creatures were no longer seeking out undertakers. The agreement with the undertakers and the hunters dated back a long time. The hunters provided the money or the goods the undertakers needed. The undertakers would take the souls and provide a respite for the hunters and give them shelter. Omar had said something about undertakers in the past being killed. Omar had served in a temple as an undertaker, but she couldn’t access those memories. She had tried to recall them but hadn’t been able to. It made her wonder.

Darria shook her head. Before all this had happened, she was headed over to Rory’s to see if he could tell her what the piece of paper was that they had found in Gerry’s pocket. It had to mean something. Her personal life was in shambles. Oliver was the last of her worries. It coiled her heart into knots to think that he didn’t want her anymore. He had lied to her and figured she would never find out. Her emotions locked in her throat and tears threatened, but she pushed them out of her mind. Darria had to work with him as an undertaker. Staring up into the night, she noticed that the moon looked different. A half-moon instead of a crescent hung in the night. Darria wrapped her cloak around her shoulders and chose one of the paths back to her neighborhood. Spirit flames skated closer to her and lit her way to the front of the cemetery. Her stomach growled as she got closer to the front.

Being removed from reality had caught up to her. The air around her grew heavier, signaling that she had returned to her own realm. When she got to the front, the souls remained near their stones. The name above the cemetery gate in the scrolled iron didn’t waver any more, and she could finally read it.

Requiem aeternam intra iacet. Eternal rest lies within.

Darria chuckled at the message. All along, she had assumed it was going to be some kind of name for the place like Resurrection Cemetery or Our Lady of the Sanguine Heart. Her stomach growled again, and she felt the other needs her body had. Darria touched the front gate and pushed it. This time, it opened for her. She slid through the opening and heard it click shut behind her. When she glanced back, the padlock remained on the gate. When she tried to get it open again, it wouldn’t budge. Darria touched the cold iron and found it solid. Power hummed within, but this was Oliver’s working, blocking her from the boneyard. Tears gathered in her eyes. She didn’t think she would be so distraught that her world had ended because she couldn’t get back into the place that was part of him.

It must’ve been how he felt when I pushed him out of the house and didn’t give him any explanation. The key could open the padlock if she really wanted it to, but she wasn’t going to break into the graveyard.

What if? She brushed her hand over one of the open blossoms and plucked it from her arm. The red blossom grew until it was eight inches around and the stem was a foot long. The image of the bloom remained in her arm, but it was slightly faded as though needed a touch-up. She carefully pushed the flower through the bars and focused on the nearest spirit.

“Tell Oliver who this is from, and make sure that no one else picks it up. Do you understand?” Her tone was harsh. She pushed a little bit of her power into the spirit, creating a tenuous link between her and it. It didn’t gain form, but it was obvious that she controlled it.

“Yes,” it whispered, guarding the flower.

“Darria. Please, Mistress of the Evil Darkness, come back to me. I’ll be a good hand. I’ll please you in any way you wish. My magic fingers will massage you in ways you’ve never imagined. Answer me.” His desperation enveloped her.

Darria reached along their thread and reassured him, “Don’t worry. I’m coming home.”