Grave Dance(79)

As she spoke, a car drove across the bridge and I jumped as a nearly deafening roar rumbled under the structure. The sound echoed against the supports, the bank, the columns, the water, and back again, like rol ing thunder.

Thunder.

Thundering.

My head snapped up. From underneath a bridge, a bridge didn’t look like a structure that joined two landmasses. It looked like a portal that the river passed through. A gate. The kelpie’s “thundering gate” wasn’t a gate at al . It was a bridge.

Maybe this bridge, if Lusa is onto anything with her missinghomeless angle.

I cracked my shields, slightly, ever so slightly, so just bits of my psyche crossed the planes of reality. The chil of the grave, of the dead, hung in the air, the grave essence reaching for me. Grave essence that emanated from something very close. And fresh.

I opened my shields a little wider. The shadows in my vision rol ed back to reveal the skeletal carcass of the vision rol ed back to reveal the skeletal carcass of the rusted and col apsed Lenore Street Bridge. Beyond the bent and sagging support beams—which I was careful not to touch, as I did not want to be responsible for a bridge col apse—I could see the remains of dilapidated lean-tos and weathered tents huddled on the bank. Grave essence leaked from amid the abandoned tents. Not a lot, just the smal est string that whispered across my skin like a northern wind. But essence meant a body—or at least part of one. And this one was human.

“Your eyes are doing that creepy glowing thing,” Lusa said, staring.

I slammed my shields shut. “Lusa, I suggest you find your cameraman. This place is about to be deemed a crime scene.”





Chapter 19

I hung back at the edge of the crowd as I waited for the site to be declared a crime scene. I’d told Tamara what I found before I cal ed John. The revelation that there was a body—or real y, part of one—on the scene garnered a low groan from her, but she rol ed her shoulders back and went to talk to the officer in charge.

John had been at home when I cal ed him, but by the time I finished tel ing him where I was, what I’d sensed, and what Lusa had uncovered, he’d already been on a second line, waking up a judge for his warrant. He, the warrant, and cadaver dogs were on their way. Now al that was left was to wait.

A scream rang through the darkness and the crowd around me went silent as dozens of heads turned toward the sound. I couldn’t see the screamer, but the voice was masculine, though pained, and distant. One of the skimmers? I squinted even though I knew I had no chance of spotting him—after my brush with the land of the dead under the bridge, the shadows were even darker.

“What happened?” someone beside me asked.

“Not sure,” another said.

“Can we get closer?” asked a third.

That question seemed to reflect the sentiment of the entire crowd. Shoulders brushed against mine and a hot hand pressed into my back as people shoved forward. The crowd surged toward the fence, carrying me along with it as everyone jockeyed for a better view.

Somewhere ahead of me the scream mutated into a ful throated howl of pain, and suddenly I could see. Not from ful throated howl of pain, and suddenly I could see. Not from a spontaneous reversal of years of damage, though until that moment I would have said that possibility was only slightly less likely than spontaneous combustion from magical overload. No, I could see because one of the skimmers ignited, the blaze casting the scene in grim light.

The flame engulfed the man in a single heartbeat, the raw Aetheric energy he’d gathered acting as fuel for the unnatural fire. It il uminated the group of skimmers surrounding the tear, splashing them in color as the fire spit out sparks of green, purple, and red.

I’d heard that drawing too much Aetheric energy could burn up a witch from the inside out, but the few cases of overload I knew of had resulted in madness or the inability to access the Aetheric after overexposure. I’d never heard of anyone actual y combusting.

The skimmer’s scream broke, his voice hoarse from his howls. He flailed, but the other skimmers never looked away from the rift. They didn’t even appear to notice their burning companion.

“Let me through,” a woman wearing an official OMIH tag yel ed as she charged the gate. A second official flanked her. “We can help.”

A contingent of Bel ’s guards blocked the entrance, but the redheaded lawyer threw out his arms, motioning the guards to move.

“Get that gate open. Let them through,” he yel ed at the guards, and then to the OMIH officials he cal ed, “Hurry.”

The two officials and the lawyer ran for the burning skimmer. Forming a semicircle around the man, they pul ed the raw magic brimming under his skin, drawing it out and dispersing it harmlessly into the air. I cracked my shields.