“Hey, big guy, how you doing?”
“Release me,” it demanded in a gravelly voice.
Well, at least it can talk.
That’s good and bad, Maggie said. Good because it can answer questions. Bad because it shouldn’t be able to talk until after it’s been destroyed three times.
So your book may or may not be accurate. Great. The iron is holding it down, at least.
“Damn you, release me!” it repeated.
I glanced outside. “Hey, pal, keep it down unless you want a security guard on top of us.”
“I will kill you and anyone who comes.”
“Sure, sure. Until OtherOps calls in a SWAT team. You don’t want to deal with that.” I shone my light on the sarcophagus lid. “Listen, Trevor, I just need you and your brother to answer one question, and then I’ll do exactly what you ask.”
Draugr Trevor went still and glared at me. “I only answer to one mortal.”
“Right, Nick the Necromancer. I just need to know who hired Nick.”
“Hired him for what?”
“To get the jinn from me.”
“I have nothing to say to you.”
I cocked an eyebrow at the creature. It was, truthfully, more than a little terrifying. It and its brother had almost killed me the other day. But watching it lie there and flail its arms, unable to do something as simple as lift a piece of iron off its chest, made me crack a smile. “That iron – does it hurt?”
“It burns,” Trevor hissed.
“I could just put the roof back on your little house here and leave you to cook under that iron for the next few weeks. How would you like that?”
It made a strange sound in the back of its throat. “I know little of value.”
“Tell me what I want to know, and I’ll release you. Cross my heart.”
Its arm trembled, and I wondered what kind of horrible things it was imagining doing to me the moment it could get out of that sarcophagus. “Master…”
“Nick?”
“Yes, Nick. He spoke with her on the tel… tel…”
“Telephone? Who’s her?”
“A woman. We went to her home. It was a large, white house. Perhaps a mansion?”
“What was her name?”
“I did not hear it.”
“So where was the house?”
“It was in a place…” Trevor hesitated for a moment, and then his eyebrows rose. “Ah. The rich man. It is the land where he used to live.”
I leaned on the edge of the sarcophagi and eyed Trevor’s hands. I had no doubt he’d snatch for me, given the opportunity. “You need to be more specific.”
“The tycoon. I don’t remember his name.”
“Rockefeller?”
“Yes!”
“Huh.” Where did he used to live? I asked Maggie.
I’m sure we can find out.
I considered this for a moment, digging through my memories of local history. I snapped my fingers. “Cleveland Heights! Gotta be it. So a white mansion in Cleveland Heights. That’s not super useful, but it’s a start. Is that all you’ve got?” I asked Trevor.
“It’s all I know. Now release me!”
“Here’s the thing,” I said, and brought the wooden stake up over my head and buried it between Trevor’s ribs. The draugr let out a wild moan, its claws tearing my sleeves to ribbons as it grasped at me. Maggie, a little help. The ring flared, and fire shot down through the stake and washed across the draugr’s bones, consuming it in moments. By the time I righted myself, there was nothing left of the corpse but ash. My wooden stake remained undamaged, and I retrieved the cord and iron. Is he gone for good this time?
Should be.
See, the word should does not help me sleep at night.
Would you prefer I lie to you and say, “Yes, I am one hundred percent certain we killed that draugr”?
Yes, I think I would.
I pushed the lid back on the sarcophagus and gathered my equipment before going through the exact same process with Trevor’s undead brother. Ten minutes later, with nothing more to go on than the information Trevor had given us, I climbed the wall out of Lake View Cemetery and headed back to my rental car. I turned on the radio, volume low, and listened to Paul Simon’s “American Tune” while I meditated on the events of the past week. The draugr hadn’t been as helpful as I’d hoped, which meant I still needed to get Nick to talk. There was no telling how long he’d be able to hold out. With the clock ticking on Ferryman’s job, I wasn’t exactly flush with spare time – but with someone out there trying to get Maggie’s ring, I couldn’t just put it off.
I put my chair back and closed my eyes. Wake me up in two hours, please, I said to Maggie.
What’s in two hours?
Presti’s opens. An hour after that, the morning shift arrives at the OtherOps office.
Chapter 11
I was waiting at the door to the Cleveland OtherOps offices when the day shift arrived – nine men and women wearing either sharp black suits or OtherOps polos and black slacks. They were laughing at a joke someone had made as they approached the building, carrying their morning coffees. The laughter broke off when they spotted me, and one of them disengaged from the group and approached.
Justin Hamilton was in his midthirties and had been with OtherOps for over a decade. If he weren’t such a nice guy, I’d probably hate his guts. He was tall, thin, black-haired and svelte, with movie-star cheekbones. He had that kind of easy smile that makes Maggie go ooh every time we see him. We met before he joined OtherOps – back when Ada enrolled me in jujitsu as a teenager so I would be more useful to her.
We’ve been friends ever since, even though I don’t actually get to see him that often. Most OtherOps agents will do anything to fuck with reapers. They resent us because we’re better-paid independent contractors who can get away with murder. We resent them because they have better work hours, government job security, and can get away with murder. Justin and I have never had that issue. I do the occasional favor for the local OtherOps office, and in exchange, his boss gives him quite a lot of leniency when I ask for information that a regular cop would definitely get in trouble for handing out.
We shook hands, and he gave me that damned smile, even though it was eight AM. I was running on less than two hours of sleep, so my response came out as a grimace. “What are you doin’ here so early?” he asked, looking at his watch. “We’re a little too old to have beer for breakfast.”
“Are we?” I joked, following him inside after the rest of the day shift had gone ahead. “We do need to set up that drink. Next Thursday?”
“I’ll make the time if you will.”
“Barring an emergency…”
Justin rolled his eyes. He doesn’t know exactly what my circumstances are with Ada, but he suspects them. One of the reasons we get along so well is because he doesn’t take it personally when I cancel on him at the last moment in favor of work. Other than the seven-hundred-year-old jinn on my finger, Justin is my only actual friend. Which, on its own, is kind of depressing.
“Yeah, yeah,” he said. “Cork and Bottle?”
“Sounds good to me. Hey, did you follow up on that meth house full of dead imps?”
“Follow up on it?” he asked, swiping an ID badge and holding the door open for me. “We brought in a whole team from Columbus to sort through that mess. They were working all night.”
“Any idea what killed the imps?”