Chapter 1

“I need to speak to a ghost.”

Adeline Greenfield paused in the middle of pouring tea into her expensive china cups and looked at me.

“I was under the impression you already could.” Her voice, like her appearance, was unremarkable. With her short gray hair, lined face, and generous curves, she reminded me of the grandmotherly types often seen on TV sitcoms. It was only her blue eyes—or rather, only the power that glowed within them—that gave the game away. Adeline Greenfield was a witch, a very powerful and successful one.

“No. I mean, I can hear them, and sometimes I can see them, but they don’t seem to hear or acknowledge me.” I grimaced. “I thought if I was on the same plane as they are—if I astral-traveled to them—it might help.”

“Possibly.” She set the teapot down and frowned. “But didn’t you help relocate a ghost that was causing all sorts of mischief at the Brindle?”

The Brindle was the witch depository located here in Melbourne, and it held within its walls centuries of knowledge, spells, and other witch-related paraphernalia. “Yes, but it wasn’t really a ghost. It was actually a mischievous soul who was undecided about moving on.”

“Souls are usually incapable of interaction with this world.”

“Yes, but the Brindle is a place of power, and that gave her the ability.”

She nodded sagely. “It is still odd that you cannot speak to them the same way as your mother, because I’m sure she said you had the skill.”

I raised my eyebrows. “You knew Mom?”

She smiled. “Those of us truly capable of hearing the dead are few and far between, so yes, I knew her. We had lunch occasionally.”

That was something I hadn’t known. But then, there was probably a whole lot of stuff I’d never known about my mother—and never would, given she’d been murdered. Grief swirled, briefly touching my voice as I said, “Well, no matter what she may have believed, the dead won’t speak to me.”

“Ghosts can be vexing creatures,” she agreed. “And they often have no desire to acknowledge their death.”

“So how is ignoring me helping them disregard the fact that they’re dead?”

She placed a couple of sugars in each cup, then gently stirred the tea. “We’re talking about the dead here. Their minds are not what they once were, especially those who have been murdered.”

“I didn’t say he’d been murdered.”

“You didn’t have to. Trouble, my dear, darkens your steps, and it’s not such a leap to think that if you want to speak to a ghost, it’s because he died before his time. Otherwise, your reaper would have been able to find out whatever you needed.” She handed me a cup of tea, then glanced over my right shoulder. “I would prefer it, by the way, if you’d just show yourself. It’s impolite to skulk on the edges of the gray fields like that.”

Heat shimmered across my skin as Azriel appeared. Of course, he wasn’t strictly a reaper, as they were soul guides. He was something much more—or, if you believed him, something much less—and that was a Mijai, a dark angel who hunted and killed the things that broke free from hell.

But what he hunted now wasn’t an escapee demon, daemon, or even a spirit—although we certainly had been hunting one of those. We’d gotten it, too, but not before the fucking thing had almost killed me. Which was why I was moving like an old woman right now—everything still hurt. I might be half werewolf, but fast healing was one of the gifts I hadn’t inherited enough of. In fact, I couldn’t shift into wolf shape at all, and the full moon held no sway over me.

Of course, I could heal myself via my Aedh heritage, but shifting in and out of Aedh form required energy, and I didn’t have enough of that, either.

“That’s better,” Adeline said, satisfaction in her voice. “Now, would you like a cup of tea, young man?”

“No, thank you.”

There was a hint of amusement in Azriel’s mellow tones, and it played through my being like the caress of gentle fingers. Longing shivered through me.

Adeline picked up her own cup, a frown once again marring her homely features. “Why do you wear a sword, reaper? There is no threat in this house.”

“No, there is not,” he agreed.

When it became obvious he didn’t intend to say anything else, Adeline turned her expectant gaze to me.

“He wears a sword because he’s helping me hunt down some—” I hesitated. For safety’s sake I couldn’t tell her everything, yet I couldn’t not explain, either. Not if I wanted her help. “—rogue priests who seek the keys to the gates of heaven and hell so they can permanently close them.”

That raised her eyebrows. “Why on earth would anyone want that?”

“Because they’re not of earth.” They were Aedh, energy beings who lived on the gray fields—the area that divided earth from heaven and hell. Or the light and dark portals, as the reapers tended to say. While the reaper community had flourished, the Aedh had not. They’d all but died out, and only the Raziq—a breakaway group of priests—were left in any great numbers. “And they’ve decided it would be easier to permanently shut the gates to all souls than to keep guarding against the occasional demon breakout.”

She frowned. “But that would mean no soul could move on and be reborn.”

“Yes, but they don’t care about that. They just see the bigger picture.”

“But surely the number of demons who break out of hell is minor when compared to the chaos that closing the gates permanently would cause.”

“As I said, I don’t think the priests care.” Not about the human race in general, and certainly not about babies being born without souls and ending up as little more than inanimate lumps of flesh. “They just want their life of servitude to the gates ended.”

Which is how I’d gotten involved in this whole mess in the first place. The Raziq had developed three keys that would permanently open or close the gates. The only trouble was, my father, who was one of the Raziq responsible for making the keys, had not only stolen the keys but had arranged to have them hidden—so well that even he knew only a general location. And as he could no longer take on flesh form, he now needed me to do his footwork, since only someone of his bloodline could detect the hidden keys.

In fact, everyone needed me—the Raziq, the reapers, the high vampire council. And all of them wanted the keys for very different reasons.

Adeline said, “And this is why you wish to speak so urgently to this ghost? He knows of the keys?”

I hesitated. “No. But he might have some information about a dark sorcerer who could be tied up in all this mess. We questioned our ghost when he was alive, but someone very powerful had blocked sections of his memories. We’re hoping death might have removed those blocks.”

“It’s a rather vague hope.”

“Which is still better than no hope.” I took a sip of tea, then shuddered at the almost bitter taste and put the cup down. Tea had never been a favorite beverage of mine.

“When do you wish to start?” Adeline asked.

“Now, if possible.”

She frowned again. “Your energy levels feel extremely low. It’s generally not considered a wise—”

“Adeline,” I interrupted softly, “I may not get another chance to do this.”

Mainly because I’d been ordered by my father to retrieve a note from Southern Cross Station later this morning, and who the hell knew what would happen after that? But if past retrievals were any indication, then hell was likely to break loose—at least metaphysically speaking, if not physically.

She studied me for several minutes, then said, “If you insist, then I must help you, even if it is against my better judgment.”

“Must?” I raised my eyebrows. “That almost sounds like you’ve been ordered to help me.”

“Oh, I have, and by Kiandra herself, no less.” She eyed me thoughtfully. “You have some very powerful allies, young woman.”

Surprise rippled through me. Kiandra—who was head witch at the Brindle—had helped me on several occasions, but only after I’d approached her. That she was now anticipating my needs suggested she knew a lot more about what was going on than I’d guessed. “Did she say why?”

“She said only that your quest has grave implications for us all, and that it behooves us to provide assistance where possible.”

Which suggested that Kiandra did know about the existence of the keys and our effort to retrieve them. And I guess that wasn’t really surprising—surely you couldn’t become the head of all witches without some working knowledge of the fields and the beings that inhabited them.

“Which is why I need to do this now, Adeline.”

She continued to study me, her expression concerned. “What do you know of astral traveling?”

“Not a lot, though I suspect it won’t be that dissimilar to traveling the gray fields.”

“It’s not. Astral travel is simply your consciousness or spirit traveling through earth’s realm, whereas the gray fields are merely the void through which your soul journeys on its way to heaven or hell. But there are a few rules and dangers you should be aware of before we attempt this.”

Having traveled through the gray fields many times, I knew they were hardly a void, as they were where the reapers lived. But I simply said, “There usually are when it comes to anything otherworldly.”

“Yes.” She hesitated. “Thought is both your magic carpet and your foe on the astral plane. If you want to go somewhere, think of the precise location and you will be projected there. By the same token, if you become afraid, you can create an instant nightmare.”

I nodded. She continued. “Be aware that any thought related to your physical body will bring you back to your body. This includes the fear that your physical body may be hurt in some way.”