Chapter 21 #2
“Not quite that simple,” I said. “You can kill their bodies temporarily, but unless you destroy the hearts at the same time, they’ll just keep coming back.”
“And what happens when we destroy the hearts?” Seri asked.
“Not entirely sure. In theory, it should free them to move on. Or at least fully die. But with Arabesque’s magic involved, who knows?”
My mind drifted back to Eluned’s room and the taxidermied kittens playing croquet, their glass eyes gleaming and tiny paws forever frozen mid-swing. Like mother, like daughter.
“The hearts are the key, though,” I continued. “Destroy those while the bodies are down, and they should stay down.”
“At least long enough to burn them,” Koa rumbled.
“What about their habits? Patterns? Weaknesses?” Zane leaned forward, his feet dropping from the table.
“I’ve seen them circling. Like they’re sniffing out something. They don’t obey her like soldiers. They act like they’re hungry.” I paused, trying to find the right words. “But not for food. For purpose? Freedom? They’re bound, but they resist in subtle ways.”
Casimir’s jaw tightened, a muscle twitching beneath his skin. Yeah, he was a cold-blooded killer, but even he had lines he wouldn’t cross.
“Can they be saved?” Seri’s gray eyes widened with an empathy that was far too naive.
“They’ve been warped for so long, I’m not sure what would be left to save. Harrow bitch didn’t just animate these creatures. She bent them. Twisted their spirits, bound them to her in undeath, and warped their memories.”
Koa began tapping at a keyboard, bringing up detailed profiles of each Gravewrought alongside surveillance photos I recognized as ones I’d taken while undercover.
A strange quiet fell over the room as we all stared at the monstrosities displayed on screen.
The White Dread’s ghost-pale form, Splitter’s mechanized horror, Ashmouth’s twisted organic mass.
I remembered watching from a hidden vantage point as the White Dread paced the perimeter of Arabesque’s property, its translucent form shimmering with something that looked like pain.
It would pause occasionally, head tilted as if listening to a voice only it could hear, then throw back its head in a silent scream that made the air around it ripple.
“There’s still a shard of the original inside with the Dread and Ashmouth,” I continued, “but it’s buried deep beneath blood magic, torment, and chains of obedience.
Their pain is both physical and existential, like screaming inside your own mind with no voice.
The Dread, I found it nibbling wilted clover once. Not eating. Just remembering.”
The room had gone completely silent, all eyes fixed on me.
“They’re not mindless,” I said. “The White Dread avoids people as much as it can. I’ve seen Ashmouth clawing at his own ribs like he’s trying to dig something out. She bound them, yeah, but they feel it. Every second.”
Seri looked stricken, her hand reaching for Casimir’s. I didn’t blame her. It was the kind of barbaric cruelty that made even hardened guys like me recoil.
“The White Dread,” Casimir prompted as he patted her hand. “You said it was once something else. What?”
“Unicorn.”
Seri made a wounded sound that had all three dhampirs lunging for her.
“What about the others?” Koa asked as he tucked her face into his stomach.
“Ashmouth was a forest spirit. A leshy. And Splitter was always a construct, some relic of a mage-smith’s forge, but she corrupted it with necromantic enhancements and a demon core. Unstable as hell, too.”
“So three distinct threats, each requiring a different approach.” Casimir was already calculating, I could see it in his eyes. Assessing threat levels, creating scenarios, figuring out how to take each one down.
“If you had to take them on one-on-one,” Seri asked, pulling away from Koa’s hug, “who would you pit against each Gravewrought, Simmy?”
Simmy? I nearly choked trying to keep my face neutral.
Casimir “I will make you rue the day you were born” Cimmerian was her Simmy?
Fucking Simmy? The most feared of the brothers, the one who I once witnessed decapitate six vampires in under ten seconds, reduced to a cutesy nickname that sounded like something you’d call a fucking stuffed bear?
And he let her do it! Hell, from the slight softening around his eyes when she said it, he actually liked it.
It was enough to make a lone wolf question everything he thought he knew about power dynamics.
“Koa versus Splitter,” he said, which let us all know he’d already planned this scenario.
Of course he did. He was Casimir fucking Cimmerian.
“Splitter being the most brutal and viscerally disturbing of the three demands someone equally grounded and relentless. Koa’s stability and physical force meet that challenge. ”
I nodded my agreement. That made perfect sense.
It would be the immovable object against the nightmare made flesh.
Koa had a stillness about him, a solid presence that seemed unshakable.
I’d seen him during training sessions with his brothers.
He didn’t dodge or weave much. He took the hit, absorbed it, then struck back with twice the force.
Against something like Splitter, with its multiple limbs and unpredictable attack patterns, you needed someone who could weather the storm and strike at the exact right moment.
“Zane versus Ashmouth,” Cas went on as though discussing chess moves rather than life-or-death combat. “Ashmouth feels chaotic, almost viral. The kind of horror that adapts mid-fight, breaks the rules, and keeps mutating. Zane thrives in chaos. He’s feral, fast, improvisational. Roach-coded.”
Made sense, too. Zane would figure out a way to survive and win against a creature that refused to die the same way twice, because that’s who he was at his core. Adaptable to the point of absurdity.
“Roach-coded?” Seri wrinkled her nose and looked insulted on Zane’s behalf.
“He meant it as a compliment,” I chuckled. “Z could survive anything, just like a roach. He always crawls out.”
“Damn right I do.” Boy’s smirk was smug as hell.
“Plus, it’s just karma to give Z the most unpredictable enemy,” Koa added, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Let him out-crazy the thing.”
“And why do you want the White Dread, Simmy?”
“I can answer that, little witch,” I interjected before Cas could speak. “Because the Dread is cold, calculated, and commands fear and silence. Cas is all quiet horror in return. He’s the scalpel. He matches dread with discipline.”
In my mind, I could almost see it. Cas versus the Dread wouldn’t be loud or brutal; it would be almost still.
A chess game played with steel. Two beings moving with lethal grace, each step calculated, each attack measured.
The White Dread might be a nightmare, but Casimir was something a little more terrifying: A man who had weaponized control itself.
“So we have our targets,” Koa said. “But first we need to find a way into her compound, locate the hearts, and coordinate simultaneous attacks.”
“And figure out how to protect Seri while we do it,” Zane added, his usual flippancy gone. “Because Harrow bitch will be gunning for her, not us.”
“Won’t be easy,” I warned.
“Nothing worth doing ever is,” Seri said with a little shrug.
#
We moved on to talk about the photographs I’d sent before Arabesque tried to turn me into charcoal.
Ko brought up the first photo on the big screen that took up most of a wall, the image slightly blurry from where my hands had been shaking, but the text was still legible.
If you read Ancient Egyptian.
“Kemetic,” Casimir informed us all. “Queen Kaori has agreed to translate it for us. Strangely enough, King Julian Hemming also contacted her to ask if she’d be so kind.”
All eyes went to me, and I shrugged.
“What? You knew I was spying for him, too. Sent the pics to both of my employers.”
“Regardless, she’s made this a priority,” Cas went on, “so hopefully we’ll know what this is soon. For now, we have to consider that the Harrow bitch set this up to trap you for a reason, Foster.”
“This next page has an intriguing element.” Koa’s fingers flew over the keyboard and the second photo appeared.
Once more, my eyes went right to the little handwritten note taped in the bottom right corner.
“Couldn’t be clearer,” Zane muttered, no sarcasm for once. “She’s either gonna aim something at the werewolf king or do something to her own rogue army.”
“Question is, what?” I rumbled. “And which is the target?”
“Making guesses now is fruitless without knowing what these two pages say.” Cas crossed his arms, squinting at the picture language as if willing it to betray its secrets to him.
“Once we have a translation, we can make better inferences. Until then, we know she’s up to something and she either wanted an excuse to kill Foster or was testing to see how loyal he was before she implemented something. ”
As the brothers continued spitballing, Seri stayed silent, chewing her bottom lip, and I watched as Brumous nudged her hand. The dire’s mental voice brushed against mine, not directed at me, just spilling over in his anxiety.
Protect Seri. Bad Hurt Witch not get Seri. MY Seri.
The little wolf had imprinted on her hard.
She was Brums’ personal Moon Goddess, and he worshipped her like a zealot.
It was a little freaky in a way, such single-minded devotion.
Then again, who was I to judge? We all picked our brand of crazy and ran with it.
She’d saved him multiple times over and never gave up on him, loved him despite his scars and his scrambled brain and his mangled speech.