Grave Ransom Read online

  What is he—

  The wooden figure suddenly flushed with color, the rough edges smoothing to soft flesh, and the now little man, who couldn’t have been more than a foot tall, snatched up the ball and tossed it. PC turned, bounding after it.

  “You’re the garden gnome,” I said, stating the obvious in my surprise.

  The gnome turned. He looked like any lawn ornament of a gnome, right down to his friendly, rosy cheeks and a pointed hat almost as tall as he was. “And you’re the mistress of the castle.”

  “I—” Well, yeah. I guess I was. “I’m Alex.”

  “They weren’t wrong,” he said, nodding in the direction Roy and Icelynne had gone.

  “About the castle bending to my will? I’m not so sure— Wait. You can see ghosts?”

  The little gnome shrugged. “Only when I’m wooden. But yes, you are the mistress of the castle. There was no spring here before. I must say, I’m enjoying it. So many things grow in spring.”

  “I didn’t . . .” I started, but trailed off. He’d said all of that as a statement with very little wiggle room. While it was possible it was only his belief that I’d willed the castle to be caught in spring while fall hurtled toward winter just outside the door to this folded space, it might actually be true. And the other fae at the castle would probably know a lot more about it than I would. Fae were extremely long-lived. Compared to most of the other people at this castle, I was very young. The fact that I’d grown up believing I was mortal didn’t help. So I considered the weather here, and how I was always relieved to get out of the chilly November air and step into the folded space holding the castle. I was cold too often from the grave as it was; I didn’t like cold weather on top of it.

  “So if the grounds bend to my will . . . does that mean I can move the door leaving the folded space closer to the castle?” It would be a relief to not have to make that hike every time we needed to get to and from the other side.

  The little gnome shook his head. “The castle and estate are yours. The folded space itself and the door are not.”

  “Oh.” Well, darn. That would have been awesome. “But you can make a winter garden?”

  “Yes, most definitely.” The gnome perked back up. “You have to really want one. But yes, if you do, I can make something that will please the frost sprite’s specter. Which garden would you like to freeze?”

  I had no idea. I looked around. “Not this one. This one is perfect like it is.”

  The gnome bowed, both hands moving to his large hat to hold it on his head. “You honor me.”

  In my pocket, my phone began singing about how girls just want to have fun. Holly’s new ringtone.

  “You’re the artist behind these gardens. I’ll leave it to your discretion to decide which would look best frozen,” I said to the gnome as I dug my phone out of my pocket. “I need to take this. Hello, Holly.”

  The gnome bowed again, and if I hadn’t been on the phone, I would have asked him to stop. Then, without another word, he turned and vanished into the hedge of roses. In my hand, the phone squawked, Holly’s voice coming out broken and full of static. I glanced at the display. One bar.

  “You’re breaking up. I didn’t get any of that,” I told her, standing as if that would improve the signal.

  “What? I can’t understand you.” She sounded like she was yelling into the phone, but while her voice was still a little garbled, at least I could make out her words.

  “Better?” I asked, patting my hand on my thigh to get PC’s attention as I headed for the entrance of the garden.

  “Yeah. I take it you aren’t somewhere you can turn on a TV?”

  “Not if I’d need to do it in the next ten minutes.”

  Holly was silent for a moment and I glanced at the display again to make sure the call hadn’t been dropped. The reception at the castle was horrid. No towers. Finally she spoke. “The broadcast is over now. I’ll find a clip online and send you a link. You were on the news, and, Alex, it was bad.”

  • • •

  True to her word, my phone buzzed with a link a few moments after I hung up with Holly. I didn’t open it immediately but gathered PC and headed back into the castle. If it was bad, I wanted a little more privacy than the gardens offered. My growling stomach also demanded more food before bad news.

  I passed through the kitchens on the way to my room. It was still too early for dinner, so the kitchen boasted fruit hanging in baskets and steaming baked goods that appeared to have just come out of the oven. In another hour, when the dining table filled with the night’s meal, the kitchen wouldn’t have so much as a crumb in it, forcing anyone who wanted food to present themselves for dinner.

  I thought about what the gnome had said about the castle reacting to my will as I snagged a muffin the size of a small plate. Had I enforced the family dinner situation somehow? I certainly hadn’t meant to, and sometimes it was annoying, but in truth, I did rather enjoy it. Maybe I had? If the castle was shaping itself for me, even here, at least half in the mortal realm, I would definitely have to pay better attention to my own thoughts and desires.

  Back in my room, I set to work devouring the muffin as I clicked the link Holly had sent. It loaded slowly, the intermittent signal sluggish. I was about to give up and head back to Caleb’s house when the video finally filled my phone screen. A pretty woman in her early thirties smiled out of the screen, addressing the camera directly as she finished a sentence pertaining to a report she must have been giving before the clip began. I vaguely recognized her as a reporter for one of the local stations, but the only news I watched with any regularity was Witch Watch. A small tag near the bottom of the screen identified her as Xandra Lundahl.

  “In other news,” Xandra said, still smiling directly at the camera, “the police are asking for help locating a person of interest in an ongoing investigation. Viewer discretion is advised as the footage you are about to see could be considered graphic.”

  The reporter vanished and a grainy black-and-white image appeared on the screen. It took me a moment to recognize the museum from the Magic Quarter, but as soon as I did, the muffin I’d eaten turned leaden in my guts. The angle was focused on the entryway, and as the museum’s door opened, I wasn’t surprised to see my own figure appear. I’d barely stepped inside when a middle-aged man barreled into me and we both froze, caught in the security spell. Lines appeared in the image, as if it had been recorded in analog and was being fast-forwarded. An effect added by the studio to indicate time, no doubt. People moved faster than life around the edges of the screen. I hadn’t even noticed them at the time, and they were moving too fast to follow closely in this rendition. Then the lines disappeared and normal speed took over again. A crowd was gathered around the two frozen figures. A witch removed the spell, and the man in the video collapsed, clearly dead.

  A buffering symbol popped up in the center of my phone screen and I cursed. The video Holly had sent me was only half finished. I paced as I waited for the phone to finish buffering, and fidgeted with the hem of my sweater until I noticed several strings fraying at the hemline. I didn’t have the budget for new sweaters right now, so I forced myself still, willing the phone to load faster.

  Finally the clip began playing again. A new image loaded on the screen. This time I recognized the location immediately. The bank. It was one of the security videos the police had shown me. This clip was shorter. Just a few seconds of the three robbers in the bank before all three simultaneously collapsed. Then Xandra was back on the screen.

  “Police have confirmed that they do not yet know the cause of death for these four people, but as you can see, this woman was present at both of these events.” Small, superimposed boxes appeared on either side of the reporter, framing her red curls with two close-up images of me. The one from the museum in the Quarter was terrible quality, and the one in the bank caught me with glowing eyes and hair wh
ipping around my face, but they were still very identifiably me.

  Which proved to be a moot point a moment later as Xandra continued her report.

  “The pictured woman is believed to be local grave witch Alex Craft.” As she spoke, the two black-and-white security close-ups vanished, and the full-color headshot from my driver’s license appeared. “Police ask anyone who has information about the whereabouts of Alex Craft to contact the number on the screen.”

  The camera panned out, revealing that Xandra sat at a table with several other reporters. The man to her left shuffled the papers in front of him and said, “This isn’t the first time Alex Craft has ended up news in Nekros. Do the police suspect her of being involved in the deaths?”

  Xandra turned, not completely toward the other reporter, but enough that it was clear she was addressing him while still smiling into the camera. “Well, Chad, currently the police are only saying that NCPD and the MCIB wish to question Ms. Craft about the events that occurred. No one has currently been named as a suspect in the deaths.”

  The man nodded. “One has to question if magic was involved in the deaths. And if so, how? Has a new type of magic emerged? Something deadlier than we’ve seen before? And on that subject, the Humans First Party has made headlines again—”

  The clip ended. The screen of my phone went blank as the video shrank.

  I stared at the phone, too shocked to process what I’d just seen. Holly had warned me it was bad. I could have never guessed it would be this. Why would John have released those clips and statement? Not only had he questioned me about it already, but the shades’ testimonies had cleared me. Plus he knew exactly where to find me. If he’d been looking for me, he would have called. Or shown up at my house or work. I wasn’t hiding from the authorities. Hell, I’d been with Briar most of the day.

  Briar.

  Anger bled through my shock. The only thing that plastering those videos and my name over the media did was destroy my reputation. Oh, and let whoever had actually killed those people know who I was. That report wasn’t John’s style, but Briar? I wouldn’t put it past Briar to try to stir up a reaction from the real killer by letting him know who had been breaking his toys. She’d just painted a target on my head.

  Fuck.

  I closed out of the browser app on my phone and pulled up the recent call list. The number Briar had called me from yesterday morning was second down on my incoming calls, and I tapped it. The first time the call failed. The second time, it rang three times before she picked up.

  “What the hell is your problem?” I all but yelled into the phone.

  “Craft, I take it you saw the afternoon news?”

  “You just made me a target.” Now I was yelling. She’d also damaged my credibility and probably my business. I didn’t add that yet. Right now I was more worried that the guy who ripped out souls so that other ghosts could navigate the bodies now knew who I was.

  I could almost hear Briar’s shrug through the phone as she said, “We had no leads. The clearing where we found those monstrosities is being watched, but since the necromancer responsible didn’t show up immediately after we tripped his wards, it is unlikely he plans to show at all. But you’ve been breaking his puppets. The easiest way to flush someone out is to give them someone to blame.”

  The phone chirped, alerting me to another call coming in. I didn’t recognize the number, so I sent it to voice mail before saying, “So you thought you’d just throw me to the wolves. Zombie wolves in this case. Are you insane?”

  “What are you worried about, Craft? I’m on the case with you, so I’ll likely be around if they come after you during the day, and you’re sleeping with an FIB agent who looks more than capable of watching your back. Like I said earlier today, it’s a lot easier to hunt someone who comes to you.”

  Great. Just great. I sank down in a chair and buried my head in my arms. Unfortunately, that didn’t solve the problem.

  “You could have at least asked,” I muttered.

  “But you wouldn’t have said yes. This was easier. If you feel like you need extra protection, I can see if the NCPD can spare some extra bodies to watch your place, but for now I have to go. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She disconnected.

  Chapter 16

  I stared at the phone in my hands. Briar had just painted a bull’s-eye on my back, but it was already done. What could I do now? Turn myself over to the police? They weren’t actually looking for me, so that wasn’t going to help. Unless I wanted to hide in my castle, I was just going to have to find the necromancer before he found me.

  My phone buzzed and began playing “When you’re a stranger.” Another caller not saved to my contact list. I hadn’t even had time yet to listen to the voice mail I’d received while on the phone with Briar. From experience, I knew I was probably about to get very popular. That happens when you make the news in a less than good way.

  I didn’t want to answer, but I did. Might as well get it over with.

  “Alex Craft, it looks like you’ve stepped in it again,” a vaguely familiar female voice said from the other side of the line.

  I frowned. “Who is calling?”

  “I’m hurt,” the woman said, the words so overdramatic that I imagined her pressing a hand to her chest as if I’d actually wounded her by not recognizing her voice. “This is Lusa Duncan from Witch Watch. I just saw that hatchet job they did on you over at Channel Six. Why, they didn’t even mention that those people you killed were robbing the bank at gunpoint. Promise me an exclusive at Witch Watch and I guarantee the coverage will be much less defamatory.”

  While she was speaking, the phone chirped letting me know that yet another call from a number I didn’t recognize was coming in. And so it begins.

  “Listen, Lusa. For starters, I didn’t kill any of those people. And for another, I’m working with the authorities on this ongoing case, so I’m not free to offer exclusives or discuss it.”

  “Interesting . . . so the story was what, a ploy? I’m guessing the retraction will be interesting. Maybe I’m glad you didn’t come to me.”

  And I’d said too much already. How had I forgotten that anything beyond “no comment” was too much when it came to reporters? It was time to end this call.

  “I have to go. There is another call coming in.”

  “Wait, I—” Lusa started, but I said my good-bye over her and switched calls, prepared to tell whichever reporter was on this line that I had no comment on the current situation.

  Except it wasn’t a reporter.

  “You were supposed to find him. Not kill him,” a distraught voice yelled through the line as soon as I answered.

  Taylor. I probably should have anticipated my client seeing that broadcast. I was going to kill Briar.

  “Taylor, calm down. I promise that I didn’t kill Remy, and that wasn’t actually him robbing the bank.”

  “Shut up. I never should have gone to you. I’m calling the police right now and telling them everything.”

  Great. Well, the police were probably about to get a lot of calls about me. I wondered if Briar had passed this plan by them before releasing a story full of half-truths and misdirections.

  “Feel free to call them. I’m working with the authorities on this case.” Which was more or less true. I was working under Briar, at least.

  “Shut up, shut up, shut up. You’re a liar and a murderer,” Taylor said, her voice getting louder with every word until the final one broke into a sob.

  The line went dead a moment later. She’d hung up.

  Well, that definitely could have gone better.

  I had to wonder what the police were telling people when they called. This was definitely not going to be good for business.

  I shoved my phone in my pocket, and it immediately started ringing again, Jim Morrison’s slightly creepy lyrics alerting m
e that it was yet another unknown number without even looking. I didn’t answer. I was done with calls for a little while. I considered turning the phone off, or at least putting it on silent, but changed my mind. If someone I did want to talk to called, I wanted to be able to hear their ringtone. After all, it wasn’t like most people could track me down at the castle if they needed me.

  As if the universe wanted to immediately refute that thought, a loud knock sounded on my door.

  I jumped, my hand flying to the dagger in my boot. Which was a rather ridiculous reaction. For one thing, if someone meant me harm, they wouldn’t knock first. For another, the castle didn’t get visitors, which meant it had to be someone who lived here. Despite that, my heart thudded in my ears as I cracked open the door.

  Falin stood in the hall, his hand lifted as if poised to knock again. Small lines pinched at the edges of his eyes, betraying either agitation or worry, I couldn’t tell, but I was guessing I was about to find out.

  “Hi,” I said, hoping my smile didn’t look quite as feeble as it felt.

  He didn’t return the smile. “What is going on?”

  I opened the door wider, revealing the empty room behind me. “What do you mean?” I asked with as much innocence as I could summon.

  Falin was not fooled. He stepped into the room, scanning the interior, but the action seemed more habit. Most of his attention remained fixed on me.

  “What were you thinking, volunteering for this farce? Do you understand how much trouble you’ve just created yourself?”

  I grimaced. “I take it you’ve seen the news?”

  His look was answer enough. He’d seen it.

  “Well, in my defense, I didn’t exactly volunteer. It was Briar’s bright idea and I didn’t find out until after the segment aired.”