“Because souls are missing.”
I watched him carefully, waiting for the and attached to the end of that sentence. Missing souls were my job, but I got the very clear sense from his cageyness that this wasn’t the run-of-the-mill “old debtor took off running” kind of job. Something was up. If he didn’t have my attention before, he definitely had it now.
“From where?”
“From the vaults of a number of your clients.”
I scoffed. “Is that possible?” As far as I had ever been aware, once Beelzebub or whoever got their claws onto your soul – sometimes with my help – that soul was theirs until further notice. It had never even occurred to me that they could be stolen.
“It is possible,” Ferryman answered, “and it has happened.”
“Is there an illicit trade in souls?”
“There isn’t. The souls literally don’t have value in this life. Once they’ve been reunited with the shade and move on as part of the whole spirit, then they have value. The reason you have a job,” he said, pointing one long finger at me, “is because the physical possession of a soul upon the death of the mortal vessel is extremely important in determining where the spirit winds up.” Ferryman sighed, clearly getting tired of my line of questioning. “I’m here because most of your clients have been robbed. So many are affected, they’ve asked me to be their proxy. Is that satisfactory?”
“Yes,” I answered. It wasn’t; I still had a bunch of questions. But if Ferryman wanted to get on with business, I had little choice but to go along with it. I’m just a working peon, after all. “How many souls?”
“Two hundred seventeen,” he answered sharply.
“Jesus… man, I go after maybe one a week at most!”
Ferryman snorted a laugh. “These aren’t debtors you’re after; they’re souls. You should find them contained in the same kind of soul mirrors that you use for collecting.”
“All right,” I said, gathering my thoughts. This was a little unorthodox. Usually I was chasing a debtor – a person I could track. Stolen goods was out of my comfort zone, which led me to another question: “Why are you coming to a reaper agency? This sounds like it should be handed over to OtherOps.” OtherOps is to the cops what reapers are to monetary debt collectors. A reaper maintains the contractual balance between the Other and humanity. OtherOps deals with anything that can’t be solved by the wording on a piece of paper. Theft certainly fell under that.
Ferryman seemed to consider his response. “The Lords of Hell have requested that OtherOps not be involved. Not yet, anyway. Missing souls are bad for business. They want discretion, which is something OtherOps doesn’t do well.”
Most normal people think of the Other as forces of nature – creatures or entities to be tolerated, worshiped, or sometimes controlled, but generally out of mind unless humans were directly confronted with something they couldn’t explain. People expect OtherOps to protect them from the more dangerous aspects of the Other and to clean up quickly when there’s an incident. Unfortunately, OtherOps is a mostly human organization, which makes it rife with human failings. They let stuff slip through the cracks and leak things to the press all the time, so Ferryman certainly had a point.
I tapped one of my lower canines with a fingernail, trying to think of what else I’d need to know before I got started. “Do we know how the souls went missing?”
“A number of different storage facilities were burgled at the end of last summer. No two of the facilities are owned by the same Lord of Hell, so they didn’t pick up on the pattern or even the thefts until their spring audit.”
“How did they not notice the thefts?” I asked suspiciously.
Ferryman shrugged. “They handle a lot of souls. Would you notice five or six candies missing from a family-sized pack of M&M’s?”
Is he telling the truth? I asked Maggie.
She responded with a snort. Shit, I don’t know. My lie detector works on humans and most of the lesser Others, not the Great Constant himself.
Something about this sounds fishy, I said. I’ve met Lucy and most of her siblings. They don’t let souls fall through the cracks.
I don’t disagree, Maggie responded.
I gave Ferryman a considering look and decided not to call him out. He was paying the bills. If he wasn’t concerned by the circumstance, then I wasn’t either. “Okay, just a couple more questions and I’ll get started. Why me?”
“Because you’re the best in the business,” Ferryman responded, frowning at me as if it should be obvious.
“I’m flattered,” I answered sarcastically. (I was, actually, a little flattered.) “Has Hell conducted its own investigations yet?”
“As far as it can without breaking the Rules,” Ferryman said. “They’ve come up with nothing. The best we can give you is that the souls were all stolen from facilities in the Great Lakes region, so you’ll be working locally.”
I’d actually been looking forward to the idea of getting out of town, but I nodded along. “That’s good. To be clear, the original owners of these souls know nothing about this?”
“They’re not to be bothered,” Ferryman confirmed.
“And none of these stolen souls have popped up anywhere?”
“Not a single one.” Ferryman’s twitchy fingers finally got the better of him, and he lit up another cigarette. He took a drag, then added, “I need you to find these souls quickly and quietly. The Rules prevent the Lords of Hell from dirtying their hands. You, on the other hand, are free to do as needed.”
Now, that was interesting. I’d never actually had carte blanche before. “Is that right? If I actually have to kill people over this, will you keep OtherOps off my back? Because the last thing I need is to do a job for you and then get swarmed by the cops.”
“I’ll make sure they don’t interfere.”
He didn’t answer your question, Maggie pointed out. I repeated the thought aloud.
Ferryman cracked the slightest smile. “All right. I’ll make sure that whatever you have to do in my employ has no consequences.”
“Then I think we can work together.”
“I’m relieved,” Ferryman said with a wan smile. “I already paid Ada a deposit.”
“I’ll get started immediately. If I have to contact you with questions…?”
Ferryman rotated his wrist, producing a card like some cheap street magician. It was black with red lettering that said, in a heavy-metal-style font, the word Death. Awfully subtle, that. There was a phone number beneath it. The card was thick and heavy, and on the back was a mirror.
“Stepping mirror?” I asked.
“The phone number goes to an answering service. The mirror goes directly to my realm in case you need to speak with me personally. If that’s all, I should be going.”
“That’s all,” I confirmed.
The lights flickered, and Ferryman was gone in the space of a blink, leaving behind the strong smell of cigarettes and the fading, uneasy feeling of his presence. I eyed the empty chair for a few moments, repeating the conversation in my head as I tried to think of somewhere to start this investigation.
I may not be able to read him like I can a human, Maggie said to me, but I can tell he’s pissed and hiding it well.
You think that means something? I asked.
I don’t think Death normally cares much for emotion. The fact this has made him genuinely angry means it’s serious.