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  She goggled at me. “An exorcist? My goodness, I’ve been terrified living here. There’s all kinds of noises, voices, night and day. Stan here says he can’t hear nothing. Well, he’s a little deaf when it suits him, to be honest. But I can hardly sleep for the voices tormenting me. It’s something from the past. I know it. A woman and a man arguing. And then the woman screaming, and then the man and some children screaming, too.” She laid a hand on her heaving chest, and tears sprang to her eyes.

  I nodded gravely. “I’m sorry to hear that. But I’m happy to tell you it’s something I’ll surely be able to assist you with—”

  “Where do you come from anyway, child?” Stan interjected.

  “I’m an itinerant, like most of the unlucky ones. But I go from place to place, doing what I can to put the sufferings of the past to rest.”

  He folded his arms. He wasn’t a man to be easily won over. “But who sent you here? What in heaven’s name made you think this place was haunted anyway?”

  “I heard it on good authority—”

  He stepped back as if to close the door. Crap. I was losing him.

  “Please, if you’ll just let me—”

  I took a big step over the threshold. And fell to my knees hard. I cried out, part howl, part hiss, and pain reverberated through my body. My spirit animal coiled tight inside me, desperate to make a break for freedom. But my soul shriveled, becoming its worst possible form, some low, creeping thing, like a slow worm or a snail. Once on a beach, long before the fires, I saw a man trying to kill an octopus with a sharp stick. It felt like that. Hurting and squirmy and beaten. Bad things had happened here.

  I was gasping for breath, heart hammering in my chest but, little by little, I pushed myself up onto my knees. When I finally raised my head, Gerta was watching me, enraptured. She was just like all the others. This was what they all wanted—to see some evidence in my pain. And I had seen what had happened in the house, the whole rotten history of it—births, deaths, and everything in between.

  What people didn’t know was that when there had been a recent suffering in a place, it opened a corridor into the past, and I could see way back. They had no idea. Sometimes I thought they didn’t even care. They just wanted to see me suffer. Sometimes they even applauded me when it hurt bad and I writhed on the floor like a snake.

  “What can you see?” Gerta asked in a breathy voice, hugging herself.

  I saw a wife murdering her husband and two young children in a frenzy of rage. I didn’t see it like a movie or anything. It wasn’t like that. It was more of a visual echo. The same thing, over and over, like ripples spreading from a splash in a lake. The longer ago the event happened, the weaker the traces—usually. But this event was very recent, perhaps since the fires. “You have a serious problem,” I told her. “It needs to be cleansed.”

  “Thank goodness!” She clasped her hands in a gesture of supplication. “No one believed me, and I thought I was going crazy.”

  I shook my head. “No, ma’am. You’re just a little more sensitive than the average person. But don’t worry, in half an hour your house will be clear again.”

  “What will you do?”

  “Well, to start with, there are a few things I need: some kind of herbs, preferably sage, and dried is best. Something old from the house that was there when you moved in—a cloth would be perfect. A holy book. Some feathers—big ones if possible. And a dead animal. It really needs to be something furry, like a mouse, a rat, or a squirrel. I could try to work with a spider or a moth, but there’s no guarantees that the exorcism will be successful. Do you think you can manage to find everything for me?”

  Gerta nodded. “I’ll see what I can do. Stan, come and help me.” She stepped back from the door and extended an arm. “Now, won’t you come and wait in here?”

  My ears still rang with the screaming coming from the house, and I’d already backed up to the threshold. “No thanks, ma’am. I’m good out here.” I took another big step backward, bringing myself outside again.

  “Okay then. We’ll be back as soon as we can.” She left the door hanging slightly open, and as soon as she was out of sight, I closed it. The screaming faded, and the burning of my nerve endings eased. I collapsed onto the stoop and waited. Wow. I’d bitten off more than I could chew here. I was already drained and I hadn’t even begun the exorcism.

  They were back in ten minutes with everything I’d asked for, including a dead rat in a Tupperware box and a guide to Kundalini yoga.

  “Will these work?” Gerta asked, wide eyed. “It’s the most religious book I could find in the house.”

  “I think they’ll be fine,” I said. Out of all of them, the dead animal was the only one that was essential. Although, when I touched the small folded blue blanket that Gerta had collected, a jolt shocked my fingertips and traveled all the way up my arm. It had been here, in the house, when the woman murdered her own children. Grief washed over me, a bitter, sickening tide, and a sob burst out of my throat.

  I clapped my hand over my mouth, gathering myself. Then I spread the blanket on the ground, directly over the threshold of the house, and made an ornamental display of the yoga book, the feathers, and the sage, with the stinking dead rat on top as a centerpiece. When I’d finished, I said some words. If this had been a fake ceremony, as most of them were, I would’ve been more dramatic. I would’ve tossed my hair about, wailed, thrashed my arms to and fro like a southern gospel preacher. But this time, I only spoke the words that came from deep in my soul. I didn’t know what I said. It was as if my ears had been blocked, and something else had taken possession of my voice. When it was time to stop, I stopped, and I gathered up the bundle.

  Then I stepped over the threshold again, and this time the pain was bearable. “Tell me where the voices are loudest,” I said.

  Gerta’s eyes were practically bulging and her face had gone very pale. I wondered what she’d heard me say. “The master bedroom upstairs.” She pointed to the broad staircase with a shaky hand.

  “Stay here,” I told her. As I ascended the creaking wooden stairs, the echoes became stronger, and by the time I reached the landing, my knees were trembling badly and the pain in my body made it difficult to breathe.

  When I entered the bedroom, I felt the echoes tug me in until I became their center and they all rippled off me. It was more than I could stand. My head throbbed, and there was an intense pressure in the back of my nose, followed by a hot, wet trickle that tasted metallic when it hit my lip. This was the spot. I laid the bundle down in the middle of the room and spread the blanket out as much as possible—I had a feeling things were about to get messy. Then I stepped back to the door. Gripping the door frame for balance, I closed my eyes and watched it happen, from beginning to end this time. The husband, stunned, hardly able to comprehend that his wife was holding a steak knife and stabbing him in the chest. And the two children, terrified and huddled in the corner. It was brutal and horrific. I retched and tears leaked from my eyes. My lips murmured more words—of peace, of acknowledgment of the awful things that had happened here, of the need to lay the place to rest.

  Suddenly there was a flash, sizzling through my closed eyelids. My eyes snapped open. The dead rat had exploded and was burned to a crisp, and the air was thick with the scent of burned sage. I let out a long breath. It was over now. I never understood how it all worked, but the dead animal took the energy of the hurt and transformed it somehow. The room was quiet and still as I rushed over and bundled everything up before Stan and Gerta had a chance to see it.

  I left the room and walked back down the stairs. They were waiting for me fearfully in the hallway.

  “The exorcism is complete,” I said. “Your house is now cleansed of all sufferings from the past, and you can live your lives happily here. Now take this”—I handed Gerta the bundle—“and bury it in your back garden without looking inside. This part is very important.”

  She nodded vigorously and clasped the bundle as if afraid that
something might try to escape from it.

  “I can feel the difference!” she exclaimed, looking around in wonder. All that energy has gone. It feels peaceful in here.”

  “It feels pretty much the same to me,” Stan said gruffly. I shot him a look full of daggers, and he froze, chastened. I’ve been told I have a gaze that could turn a man to stone, and I considered it one of my better attributes.

  “I mean, if you’re happy, then I’m happy, dear,” he said hastily, laying an arm around his wife’s shoulders.

  I shrugged. He was a typical human, living his dull life with no awareness or interest in things that existed outside of his limited sphere.

  “Thank you very much for helping us, young lady,” he continued. “Now, as it won’t be long before nightfall, I expect you’ll be heading on your way.” He grasped my upper arm with his free hand, guiding me toward the exit.

  “I’m happy to have been of assistance,” I said, discreetly flicking his hand off me at the same time. “And you’re right, as soon as you pay me for my services, I’ll gladly head back to the town.”

  His features instantly rearranged themselves into a deep scowl. “Now then, young lady. I’ve been very patient here with your hocus-pocus. Turning up on my doorstep unannounced, insisting we waste our time gathering all this nonsense. But we’re done here. And I’ll say good night to you.”

  I folded my arms, jutted my chin out, and fixed him with the stare. “I’ve successfully exorcised the echoes from your house. And it’s cost me, more than I can tell you. My services would be cheap at twice the price.”

  Stan cleared his throat and puffed out his chest. “I’ll have no more of this nonsense. If you don’t leave the premises right now, I’ll have you arrested.”

  “And by the time law enforcement has turned up to arrest me, I will have unleashed the echoes again and your wife will get no peace at all.” I kept my arms folded, toe tapping on the floor, and continued to regard him levelly. “And then nobody else in the whole land will be able to exorcise them for you.”

  “Stan, please!” Gerta wailed. “I’ve been so scared! I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was the end of me. Pay the young lady, for heavens sake!”

  Stan let out a sigh worthy of a jaded horse and rummaged in his pockets. “Okay. I’ll give you five.”

  I laugh loudly and slapped my thighs. “Ha, good one! The fee for my services is thirty.”

  Stan scowled. “I’ll give you ten, and not a penny more.”

  “Twenty, or I guarantee you won’t get a minute’s piece for the rest of your life.”

  Stan dragged his hand out of his pocket and revealed a large number of bronze and silver coins. He counted them out with ill humor.

  “Thank you,” I said pertly and snapped my hand closed around the money before shoving it into the pockets of my coat. “Nice doing business with you. Now, if you know anyone else who might need my—”

  “Get out of here!” Stan roared. “And don’t let me find you still here in the town tomorrow.”

  I waved goodbye to Gerta and fled for the door. I knew when to take a hint.

  Several minutes later, I reached the bottom of the hill and started to follow the road back to the lodging house. The coins jangling in my pocket cheered me up considerably, but something kept prodding at my nerves. It was now dusk, and the peripheries of my vision were shadowy and flickering. Seeing a movement to my left, I spun around, hand instinctively going to the knife tucked into my belt. But there was nothing there, only a bush, its leaves trembling in the wind. Funny. I’d had the sense that something was watching me all the way down the hill, keeping pace with me, but somehow out of sight. The dim silhouette of Hillview Lodge came into view and I sped up. But the feeling didn’t go away—an anxious prickling between my shoulder blades that warned me I wasn’t really safe anywhere.

  Chapter 2

  My dream of sleeping in my very own private room was thwarted, of course. By the time I rushed into the darkening lodging house, eager to book a room and take a look at it before it became impossible to see anything, they were all taken, and the only beds available were in the common bunk room. I used the last of the light to go inspect it. It was on the lower bunk of two, with the head of the iron frame flush against the wall, and one more bunk to my right and two to my left. I’ve had much worse. It definitely beat being on the top level of a triple-decker bunk, marooned in the middle of the room, where everyone crashed into you while trying to find their own bed.

  On the way back to the canteen, I counted my paces to the door: seven. Then it was a right turn and twenty-three paces to a set of double doors that led directly into the canteen. I used the bathroom for the last time that night. There was no way I was going to run that gauntlet in the pitch dark later. I put in a brand-new order of food from the lodge owner. It was now too dark for her to recognize me. Either that or she didn’t give a crap either way. Since I was feeling flush with my earnings, I also ordered a small glass of wine. I usually avoided alcohol since it blunted my senses, but the exorcism had taken a lot out of me, and I needed to settle my nerves.

  I ate my meal and drank the wine sitting at a right angle to the door to capitalize on the dim light spilling in as I watched people coming and going. No one who’d previously spent their lives in the city was prepared for real darkness. In civilization, there’s always a light source, no matter how faint or unreliable. But when there’s no power, no fire, darkness is absolute, and its effect is less enveloping than suffocating.

  Someone at the opposite end of the room was trying to create enough light to see their way into the bathroom. They had some kind of oil lamp and a lighter—a rare commodity these days—and they kept sparking the lighter against the wick of the lamp, creating an ember that glowed for a couple of seconds before dying out. I shook my head. By now, everyone still alive in this forsaken land had tried every possible technique for creating fire, but to no avail.

  The food was okay. The chef had mixed some herbs into the buckwheat, which made it taste less like bland mush than usual, and the wine was actually kind of good. If I had a safe place to live and a passive income, I’d probably spend all my time drinking wine and sleeping so I didn’t have to think anymore.

  People were starting to herd into the back rooms, so I finished up the last of the buckwheat, drained my glass, and followed them. The last thing I needed now was to discover that somebody had taken my bunk and was either unconscious or too crazy-violent to be kicked out.

  I retraced my steps—back through the double doors, twenty-three paces then a left turn, and the door should be right there. I fumbled it open then took seven paces across the room and, edging sideways crab-style, felt for my bunk on the right. The bed was still untouched, thank goodness. I slipped off my boots, stuffed my bag under the bed, pulled aside the sheets and blankets, and climbed in. The bed was cold and unwelcoming, the mattress was thin and lumpy, and the blankets were bound to be filthy, but I settled in, too tired to care.

  How long since I’d slept in a comfortable bed? Staring up at the darkness, I ran through the chain of similar days that stretched back into the past. Years maybe. It sure felt like a lifetime ago.

  There was only one bed I’d ever really been comfortable in, and that was in my childhood bedroom. I had slept there from when I was too tiny to have any memories at all until—well, until it was all over. My weary muscles cried out for the dreamy soft mattress and down-filled pillows, as if they too retained a memory of them. Every night I had fallen asleep there, soft and trusting, imagining things would always be the same. Until I was twelve and Mom got sick. Really sick. Then my asshole of a father abandoned her, and us. Grandma moved in and helped me take care of my three siblings as Mom got weaker and weaker every day. She was weeks from death when the wildfires tore through the world, turning half of it to ashes. Mom was too ill to flee, and grandma wouldn’t leave her. I ran with my three siblings, but I was still young, and they weren’t shifters like me, and in the end
I couldn’t save them. I lost everyone.

  The only thing I had left was my mom’s final words to me—the guy who walked out on her wasn’t my biological father. I was the result of the most passionate, joyous experience Mom had had in her life. Although the light was already fading from her eyes, I could see the happiness he’d brought her when she whispered the truth in a cracked voice, begging my forgiveness for having kept it from me for so long. But they’d been separated, and she had no idea how to find him. I guessed he was a deadbeat, just like my stepdad, to have left my mom like that. And that’s why I trusted men about as far as I could throw them.

  My face was tingling and my eyes stung. I bit down on my tongue until the threat of tears receded, and I cursed myself. Survival meant not thinking about these things or they’d drive me mad, break me, or worse—leave me vulnerable to others who wanted to break me. I needed to think about today, tomorrow, and the next day, and that’s how I’d stay sane in this screwed-up world.

  The room was full now, or almost full. Straining my ears, I picked out the sleepy sounds of both men and women—the snores, groans and nightmares of my damaged peers. There was a woman in the bed above me, and fragments of her past pain filtered down to me like moving air currents. I pushed them away, forced my brain not to interpret them, not to turn them into a narrative that would torment me all night long. I tried to think of snow falling and nothing else, one peaceful snowflake after another and, soon, I drifted off, too.

  Sometime later, I was awake again abruptly. The room was still pitch black, and I had the sense I hadn’t been asleep very long. There were sounds in the room that were separate from the noise of my slumbering companions. Adrenaline prickling in my chest, I pulled myself up on my elbows and listened hard. There were footsteps, more than one set, advancing then receding. Three people, I was pretty sure, all men. And they were clearly looking for something. My heart started to pound. Robbers. It wasn’t the first time someone had tried to loot a room at night, but a room in such perfect darkness, without even any moonlight coming through the window?