Chapter 3

3

T he sun was coming up by the time Vanth got back to his van. The ghouls were still silently staring at the body bag. Vanth checked that the man was still breathing and that the paralyzing potion was still good.

"Only a little while longer, I swear," Vanth told the ghouls. If he went home, he would probably fall straight to sleep, and he couldn't risk it.

Instead, he went to his favorite café and loaded up on breakfast croissants, pastries, and extra coffees. He drank his cup of five espressos mixed together and drove through the fae district and towards the outskirts of the city.

The fae district was an eclectic mix of modern and ancient buildings that matched whatever personality of the family or beings that lived in it. As a result, you could go through impossible landscapes on a regular basis. A forest grew in the center of the business area for a start. Then, there were the intersecting rivers and canals that led to the ocean. As all the tales warned, it was better to stay on the main roads and not wander off while you were in their territory.

People tended to forget there were ancient gateways in it that led to Faerie, Tir Na Nog, the Green, the Otherworld...whatever your preference to call it. The point was, it led you into a place in the ancient lands of the fae where very few laws protected your ass.

The gateways acted like anchor points and had been sanctioned by the First Council. The fae didn't extort them because everyone knew if they tried to bring in armies or monsters, Inferno would fight back. The dragons would scorch the gateways and the district and wouldn't lose a scrap of sleep over it. The fae, higher and lesser, knew better than to piss off the dragons.

Vanth parked outside the gates of what looked to be a large, fancy estate. The guards checked him for weapons and let him in with a welcoming smile.

A woman in scrubs with unicorns on them was waiting for him as he stepped into the foyer to sign in.

"One skinny cappuccino and a cinnamon roll," Vanth said, handing them to her.

"You're a saint even if you look like the devil," the med-mage said, her turquoise eyes shining.

"Clara, I don't know where you get the idea that I'm the devil."

Clara grinned. "Because I actually know you, Vanth. How many ghouls have you got waiting in your van today, huh?"

"Only two, but they are my housekeepers. I need them to keep up with my laundry," Vanth replied. He gestured at Clara, and she handed him a clipboard. "How is she doing today?"

"Restless. She had a bad night. I knew you were due for a visit today. Otherwise, I would have called you," Clara replied, tucking her pen into the pocket of her scrubs. She checked her watch. "She will have finished her shower by now if you want to go in."

"Thank you, Clara. I appreciate you. You know that, right?" Vanth said, giving her his most charming smile.

"Ah, huh. Smile all you like, but you know your nonsense doesn't work on me. I appreciate the breakfast, though."

Vanth shot her a wink. "Heartbreaker."

Clara only waved him on, and Vanth passed through a sharp sting from the wards.

If humans aged and lost who they were to degenerative diseases or mental disorders, they were put in care facilities and watched over with security. The magical creatures and wielders of the world were not as harmless when they went mad. Magic gone wrong led to all sorts of problems, so Inferno had facilities with everything from med-mages to witch doctors to treat and care for them. This place was one of the nicer, more expensive ones, and it was the reason he had fallen into becoming a body cleaner in the first place.

All his grand ideas of discovering and developing new magic went out the window when his mother got sick. Everything had changed then, Vanth most of all. The facility looked like a retirement village with little cabins for the more independent occupants. There were other parts that were more like hotel rooms that nurses could keep a closer check on. His mother, at least for the moment, was in a small cabin with geraniums growing in front of it.

Eiline Vanth was fond of growing flowers at all times of the year, and slowly being consumed by a curse wasn't going to stop her from having bright, impossible blooms around her. She had a strong streak of death magic in her too, but the light and flowers side was what she liked to present to the world. It was her way of assuring people that she wasn't a threat. The same way Vanth did by hiding the true depth of his power.

Don't mind me. I'm just a little necromancer with too many black T-shirts and jeans with the knees ripped out. Nothing to see here. No, of course, my ghouls are tame and have zero desire to want to rip your face off and eat it.

Eiline seemed to sense him coming because the front door banged open, and she rushed into his arms.

" Matháir , what is it?" Vanth asked, hugging her back.

"Bad, bad, bad dreams, Tarael. I just needed to see if you were real," his mother said.

"Of course I'm real. How about I make you some tea, and you can tell me about it. I bought you some breakfast with me."

Eiline pulled back and stared up at him with her indigo-blue eyes still silvery with unshed tears. "Tarael, why does your magic feel so strange? What did you do?"

"Tea first," he said and opened the front door of the cabin for her.

Eiline headed inside. "I miss your father," she said so softly that if he didn't have sensitive fae hearing, he would have missed it. Vanth tried to hide his shock and went to turn the kettle on.

She never talked about his father. She had always made out that it was some brief hook-up one summer solstice party. She didn't know him well enough to miss him. Tarael didn't know his name. He didn't think his mother did either. Her own parents had kicked her out for getting pregnant, and he had never known them either. It had always just been the two of them.

Vanth had been the new name that Eiline had chosen for her new life to honor the death magic they both wielded. Vanth was an Etruscan goddess of death, a psychopomp, and Eiline had always honored her. If Tarael had another family in Inferno, he had never met them, and they sure as shit had never bothered to help his single mother out.

Flustered, Vanth made a pot of tea and set out a pretty china cup for her and a mug with dancing skeletons on it for him. He set the pastries out on a plate between them. Eiline looked calmer, but that didn't fool Vanth. Like himself, still waters ran deep, and he knew when his mother was deeply troubled.

"How about you eat something and then you can tell me what has got you so upset, Ma?" he asked her gently.

Eiline shredded a strawberry Danish with her fingers. "You tell me about what you've been up to first."

Vanth stuck out his hand. "Scissors, paper, rock?"

His mother obliged him, but her paper defeated his rock. Vanth sighed. He knew better than to play against her. She had visions of the future, and he often suspected that she knew more about what he was thinking than he did.

"I got called out to this fucked up job this morning, and things just got weirder..." he began and ended up telling her everything.

The one good thing about his mother's curse giving her a form of short-term magical dementia was that he could tell her just about anything, and she would never hold it against him. In a few days, she wouldn't remember it to judge him. He had always told her everything anyway.

She had been his first mentor on how to deal with the ghosts and the power coursing through his veins. She was the only one who was like him, which was why she might be the only one who would understand him when he described the ghouls' obsessive cleaning and the weirdly familiar magic stored in Andres's morgue.

"Show me the sigils that appeared on the body," she said and gestured for his phone.

Vanth handed it over. "They were hidden until I touched it with my magic. It was like they responded to my call, but Andres couldn't get them to do it at all."

Eiline's skin lost its remaining color as she studied the photos. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head, and Vanth caught her before she could face-plant the tiles. He cradled her head on his lap as the visions overtook her. He had learned long ago that there was nothing he could do but let her ride them out.

"The guardians are dead," his mother gasped in an otherworldly voice. The temperature in the kitchen dropped, and mist rose from Eiline's skin. "The Veil is unprotected, and they are trying to tear through it. The blood of the guardians sacrificed to help them accomplish what they tried seventy-seven years ago. Only wards made by love hold them back…" Eiline shook violently, and her eyes snapped open. "Tarael, Tarael, they are coming for you."

"No one is coming for me, Mama. If they do, I'll make them regret it," Vanth tried to calm her.

She wasn't listening. She scrambled to her feet and ran to her bedroom.

Vanth hated himself for doing it, but he hit the call button to alert Clara that his mother was having an episode.

He followed her, scared she would try and hurt herself before the nurses could get there to help her. Eiline tipped her small box of jewelry out on the bed before chanting softly under her breath. Magic made Vanth's ears pop, and the bottom of the box fell out. Eiline pulled out a silver chain with a pendant hanging from it. It pulsed with a protection magic that knocked the breath out of Vanth's lungs.

"You must wear this for me. Don't take it off, mo chroí . It will protect you as much as it's able," Eiline said, and Vanth moved his braid so that she could clip it around his neck. The pendant was of two small onyx scythes set in a silver circle. "Promise me you won't take it off, baby."

"I won't, Mama. I promise. What… What is it?" he asked, the magic pulsing against his skin before settling.

"Tell no one. Show no one," she insisted and tucked it under his shirt. "Only trust the guardians."

Before Vanth could ask who the guardians were, the front door burst open, and Eiline's face went blank, like she had pulled into some part of herself no one could reach. All the hair on the back of Vanth's neck stood on end. He hugged his mother to him.

"I promise, Mama. I love you," he repeated, hoping some part of her would understand.

"Everything okay, Vanth?" Clara asked, coming into the room.

Eiline's fingers gripped the back of his shirt before letting him go.

"It is now. Mom just…had a moment," he said.

Eiline stared at a corner in the room, showing no sign that she knew either of them were there.

"I'll come visit again soon," Vanth said and kissed his mother's cheek.

"We'll take good care of her until then," Clara assured him. "I'll just get you a cup of water, Eiline, and you can have a lie-down."

In the kitchen, Vanth took out his wallet and grabbed a handful of euros. "She likes to paint after an episode. Can you buy her some more supplies? And maybe a new soft blanket of some kind. She likes soft things when she's…"

Clara took the money and squeezed his hand. "I know, Vanth. She's going to be okay. You know this is just how it goes some days."

"I know. I just want her to have whatever she needs," he said, his voice cracking. He cleared it roughly. "I've got to go. Can you message me an update later?"

"I will. Get some sleep. You look like hell," Clara said, teasing him lightly.

Vanth laughed even though it hurt. "Yeah, it's been a long night."

Vanth said his goodbyes and hurried down the small roads leading back to the gates. The guards let him through, and it wasn't until he was back in his van that he let out a shuddery, gasping sob. He swallowed down all his anger and helplessness and the wounded child in him who only wanted his mother.

The body in the back groaned, and Vanth pulled himself together and drove home, more confused by the night's events than ever.