Bitter Magic

  A Demon Trappers® Novel

  Dedication

  To

  my husband

  Harold Buehl

  who was there when it counted

  The old world is dying,

  and the new world struggles to be born:

  Now is the time of monsters.

  ~ Antonio Gramsci

  ONE

  July 2019

  Atlanta, Georgia

  The cemetery was too quiet. There was no rustle of a breeze, no noises from the neighborhood nearby, and even the traffic sounds from the city were muted. It was as if there were no one else in the world but the dead, and Katia Breman.

  Experienced demon trappers didn’t spook easily, and it wasn’t as if Katia was unprotected. A large circle of twinkling candles and Holy Water had been laid onto the ground around her, then charged with a prayer to keep her safe. That same circle guarded the recently deceased Albert Means, who was tucked into his casket, inside a vault, and then under six feet of red Georgia clay.

  To her dismay the dead guy’s widow had dropped by for a visit right after Katia had begun her “shift.” Mrs. Means was a woman in her mid-fifties who talked a lot and listened even less. She’d gone on and on about how nice her husband’s casket looked at the funeral. Not that she missed the man she’d been married to for over thirty years, not that she was grieving his loss. No, it was all about appearances.

  According to the widow, Means’ heart had said, “That’s it, I’m done” during an appointment with his accountant. Which made Katia wonder just what the accountant had told the guy, but she’d been polite and not asked that question. Finally, Mrs. Means had ended her self-obsessed monologue and left Katia in peace.

  Now the cemetery’s eerie stillness made her wish she weren’t here on her own. It’d been almost six weeks since she’d made her solo journey from flat and hot Kansas to steamy and buggy Georgia. And nothing about those six weeks had been normal. Tonight wasn’t any different.

  Sitting vigil to prevent a necromancer from making off with the dead wasn’t Katia’s usual job. Mostly, she trapped Hellspawn or helped the city’s lay exorcist pull demons out of people. Despite what Master Riley Blackthorne claimed, protecting the newly dead wasn’t a skill every trapper needed to know. Still, when you were a journeyman trapper you did stuff that didn’t make sense.

  At least Katia was being paid to be here, which was why Riley had recommended her when the grave watchers’ schedules got shifted around due to illness. The old guy who’d been watching the grave before her had been thrilled to move to an earlier time, escaping the midnight shift, as he called it.

  Ten dollars an hour for a ten-hour shift got her closer to a deposit on an apartment, and there would be no demons involved. Other than the unnerving quiet, this gig was the graveyard equivalent of watching paint dry.

  “It’s a dead-end job, but someone has to do it,” she muttered. And now she was talking to herself.

  If she were honest, Katia didn’t care much for the cemetery, the kind that mandated that all the headstones were flat and slightly below grade so the big mowers could roll right over the top of them. That felt like disrespect to her.

  Her much-beloved grandmother, after whom she was named, had been adamant that the dead should be respected, mostly because if you dissed them they had ways to get even. Katia had never known what her gran had meant by that, and now it was too late to ask. At least her grandmother’s grave had a genuine marble headstone and pretty flowers that bloomed right up to the first Kansas snow.

  As the hours crept along, Katia used her phone to research how necromancers could “buy” the dead right out of their graves. From what she could find on the internet, it was hinted that there’d been money slipped under the table to certain powerful lawmakers, and only then had summoner friendly laws been passed to allow just such transactions. No matter where you lived, politics was all the same.

  Legally the necros were allowed to call the deceased from their grave after the first sundown following the death, providing the family approved of the reanimation. Or the deceased if arrangements had been made before they took their last breath.

  Which made Katia wonder what would happen if the deceased wasn’t buried by that first sundown. Could they still be summoned by a necro? The key thing was that the corpse was “presentable,” which left out such things as car accidents, major burns, and demon attacks. According to Riley, not all the reanimations were legal. Some were outright theft.

  The exhumed were sold or leased as servants of some sort. Most became domestic employees, as if there weren’t enough humans of the breathing kind who needed a job. The dead didn’t have labor unions and so they were usually paid very little.

  Others were reanimated because of their skills in life, like a particularly talented corporate attorney or an artist. One author had been brought back to write two more bestselling books before being returned to his grave. According to the internet, the legal ramifications of that postmortem scribbling were still bouncing around the courts. Lawyers gotta lawyer, as her gran would say.

  The Deaders, they were called, were useful for about six months to a year, depending on the postmortem maintenance skills of the necromancer involved. The whole idea made Katia queasy.

  It was just past four when she was about to stretch out on the sleeping bag Riley had loaned her, when a light approached, dutifully bobbing above a necromancer like a mini spotlight. This had happened four times during her shift, and the first time she’d nearly freaked out. Summoners weren’t that common in her home state, but they seemed to be thick on the ground here in Atlanta. Just like Hellspawn and mosquitoes. To her relief, the widow had been insistent that Dear Albie stay below ground. That’s all Katia needed to know.

  She relaxed as the summoner drew closer because this one she knew. She’d met Alex Greene during her first unforgettable day in Georgia’s capitol, a day that nearly ended with her checking into Hell, forever. She’d also met his uncle, Mortimer Alexander, a very senior summoner. She liked them both even though she detested what they did for a living. Still, Alex was younger than her and him being here on his own was odd. She’d not thought he was far enough in his training to perform a reanimation without his uncle’s help.

  Alex stopped just outside the circle, studied the protective ward, then frowned his displeasure. The ward wasn’t going anywhere unless she broke the circle because Riley had taught her how to set it properly. It immediately spat bright flames at him when he stepped too close. Alex retreated, his frown growing.

  After a long pause he said, “I’m a summoner,” pointing at the black robe he wore.

  Well, duh. Of course, Alex was a summoner. They’d spent time together at his uncle’s house, and then met up again at a local trapper’s convention. Had he forgotten her already?

  Besides his cluelessness, the black robe bothered her. Earlier in the week she’d listened in as Riley had patiently explained necromancer rankings to her current crop of apprentice demon trappers. Most newbie summoners rated a pale gray robe because their magic was very weak, and that’s what Alex wore the last time she’d seen him.

  His uncle, on the other hand, had earned a black robe because Mort’s magical prowess was seriously badass. From what she’d heard that required years of study. Either Alex was yanking her chain or . . .

  “What’s your name?” he asked, his eyes on Means’ grave, not her.

  Working with Hellspawn had taught Katia that names had power, so she offered her mom’s instead of her own.

  “Susan,” she said.

  “Susan, I want to make you an offer.”

  Black robe, doesn’t know me, hasn’t introduced himself like the others. She’d bet a glamour spell was involved, a strong one if she couldn’t sense it. But why impersonate Mort’s nephew?

  One of the scars on her left forearm began to itch furiously, and the intense discomfort made her look away for a moment. When she returned her attention to her visitor, he now sported a faint hazy outline, the spell he was using to alter his identity.

  Nice try. “The widow doesn’t want Mr. Means reanimated. So, thanks, but no thanks. Now if you’ll head off, I can get some sleep.”

  “If I reanimate the corpse, you could have the rest of the night off. I’ll even double what they paid you.”

  And now he tries to bribe me. “The dead guy’s name is Albert Means. He has a wife and two daughters,” Katia replied, because the missus had been extremely specific about all that. “Even in death this man deserves respect.”

  The fake Alex’s frown deepened further. “You are going to be a problem.”

  She huffed. “From what I’ve been told, that’s my purpose in life.”

  The summoner pushed against the barrier again, causing it to glow brighter. “You will break this circle, or I will.”

  The voice had taken on a level of menace now, as well as ramped-up in power.

  So not Alex.

  “Here’s a counteroffer: You leave now, and I won’t report you to the Summoner Advocate. I’m sure he’d love to know you’re all glamoured up as his nephew.”

  The necro’s eyes grew darker. “That was a mistake, Susan.”

  Katia felt the spell begin to grow around him. It started out small, then built, and built even more as it pulled on his power. His eyes were closed, his hands raised, the robe flowing aro
und him. And then the spell exploded, flowing outward across the cemetery like a windstorm.

  Flat gravestones erupted from the earth and rushed toward the circle like incoming missiles. It took all her courage not to move, not to panic and run. She’d been inside a Holy Water circle while in Hell, and it’d kept her and Simon Adler safe. This one would hold. It had to.

  A gravestone hit the ward, then another, and it felt as if the ground shook with each strike. With each assault the circle flared bright white and repelled the magic attacking it.

  “Let me in!” the necromancer shouted. “Let me in!”

  The words burrowed into her mind, demanding she walk through the protective sphere, causing it to fail. Once it was gone, so was Means. “Come to me now! I command it, Susan!”

  The vicious mental assault drove Katia to her knees, causing her to rock back and forth as the pressure only built within her skull.

  “No,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “No.”

  She thought of the exorcist, and what it had taken for her and Simon to survive in the pit. What it had been like to stand in front of Lucifer’s throne. How terrified she’d been, how sure she’d never see her family again.

  This is only a necro.

  Katia forced herself to rise, her head pounding and heart hammering. She scowled at the magical threat, ignoring the chaos of utter destruction raging around them.

  She gulped a breath of damp air, stubbornness overriding every other emotion. Crossing her shaking arms over her chest, she glared at him.

  “Aren’t you done yet, dickwad?”

  The necromancer howled, and for a moment it sounded unearthly, almost inhuman. Then with an air-sucking pop, he vanished.

  She waited in case this was a feint on his part, but he did not reappear. Finally, Katia began counting slowly to thirty, then to fifty. When she reopened her eyes, she found the cemetery unchanged—no uprooted trees, no gravestones littered across the ground. That incredible display of magic certainly hadn’t been Alex the Newbie Necro.

  “Yeah, it’s a dead-end job,” she muttered, then shook her head, her heart still beating too fast.

  One thing for sure, the hundred bucks she’d get for tonight’s vigilance wasn’t nearly enough.

  † ~ ‡ ~ †

  After pacing around inside the circle to burn off her anger and the residual shakes, Katia finally dropped down on the sleeping bag. Why hadn’t the summoner been able to force her to break the circle? Was it because of something she’d done?

  “No, I was damned lucky.” There’d been no other reason. Somehow she’d kept Means safe and saved herself from one helluva butt chewing from his missus. “Go me.”

  Once the threat departed the night sounds had returned, including a dog barking somewhere in the distance. An owl hooted in response, as if they were having a conversation. Katia finally laid down, putting her hands behind her head, trying to relax. The moon peered down through the trees, casting a pale light on the gravestones. It was still warm, a typical July night in the Deep South. The occasional whine of a mosquito came from outside the circle.

  Katia must have dozed off because she woke to a car door closing in the parking lot further up the hill. The sun was up, and a quick check of her phone said it was nearing eight and the end of her shift.

  How she could have slept after that nocturnal horror, she had no idea. It had to have been the stress, nothing more.

  The figure trudging toward her was Katia’s boss. Master Riley Blackthorne was six years younger than her. She had shoulder-length auburn-brown hair and eyes that spoke of deep personal loss. Katia could not imagine what it was like to be orphaned, married, and already a master trapper at eighteen. Or what it had taken to survive all that had happened to her.

  But was this really her master? It would be hard to tell because Riley was also a summoner, so magic was in her blood. Whoever this was, came within thirty feet of the circle, then abruptly halted. She took a deep inhalation, then executed a slow three-hundred-and-sixty-degree turn.

  When she was facing Katia again, she said, “Wow, now that’s some power. What happened last night?”

  Katia rose. Her scars weren’t itching, her version of a “something’s not right” warning system. Still, she was on edge.

  “Prove to me you’re Master Blackthorne.”

  If she’d expected Riley to be upset at that demand, she’d have been disappointed.

  “Smart move, because I can guess why you’re asking.” Riley took a deep breath. “You are Katia Breman, previously of Lawrence, Kansas. You were sent to Atlanta because they thought you were a problem child for their Guild.”

  “Lots of people know where I came from and why,” Katia said, hedging.

  Riley cocked her head. “Last night must have been a bitch or you wouldn’t be so skittish.” She nodded to herself now. “Okay. Because you are a special soul, you spent quality time in Hell with my favorite lay exorcist, saved the lives of three boys, and lived to tell us about it. How’s that?”

  There was no hazy outline, nothing that made Katia’s hackles rise. This was the real deal.

  “Thank God, it’s you,” she said, then sighed in relief.

  Riley took a quick look at the grave. “Mr. Means is still in place, I see.”

  “Yes. It got damned ugly there for a while.”

  Her master shook her head as if trying to clear it, then created her own circle of protection out of nowhere, without all the bother of using Holy Water. It blazed up around her as she parked herself on the grass. After another deep breath she said, “Ah, that’s better.”

  “What are you feeling?” Katia asked.

  “Residual magic, the really strong kind. What did you feel?”

  “Something weird. It made my scars itch. At least, the big one on my arm. That’s usually the one that warns me something bad is going down.”

  Riley eyed her. “You sense a lot more than most folks.”

  “My grandmother was like that. Drove my parents nuts. They’re firmly in the ‘weird stuff doesn’t exist’ camp.”

  “Even after your brother was almost killed by a demon?”

  Katia shrugged. “Yeah. They’re still denying all that but failing badly.”

  “Well, considering what you were up against last night, I’m thinking your itchy early warning system is a good thing. Anyone else, and we’d have to call this guy’s widow with unbelievably sad news.”

  Another car door slammed, most likely Katia’s replacement. They both watched as the woman unloaded items from her trunk, then closed it with a pronounced thump.

  “Is she for real?” Katia asked.

  Riley nodded. “There’s no glamour.” She looked back. “How much of last night do you want to share with her?”

  “A warning, but not too many details. I think some of it’s going to cause problems when it gets out.”

  That earned her a thoughtful pause. “Then you tell her what you think she needs to know, and you can tell me about the rest in the car.”

  Katia kept another sigh of relief to herself. Her previous job in Lawrence had been a bitch after her first master had died unexpectedly. Master Griffin had been fair and great to work with, but her second master made her job impossible. Plus, the ass had been pocketing most of her wages, claiming it was the National Guild that was slowing up her payments.

  Due to those lies, she’d had to sleep on friends’ couches or in one of the trappers’ “bolt holes” because she didn’t have enough money for rent. Or much food. Because of issues with her family, and her own stubborn pride, Katia had been on her own. Then she’d been sent to Atlanta and everything had changed. Really changed.

  Because of all that, Katia was still waiting for Master Blackthorne to go bad on her. Not likely, but trust didn’t come easy, even when your new master was legendary in the trapper world and wielded magic like most people took a deep breath.

  “Good morning! I’m Gloria,” the new arrival called out. She was older, probably in her early seventies with short silver hair. She toted a small hamper, a folded beach umbrella, and a turquoise lawn chair. “Looks like the weather is going to be hot again today. Lower nineties. No surprise there.”