Chapter 37
Ghoul
The air over The Collector’s property feels…odd.
Aurelia’s friends, their mates and surrogate-mates, gather with the infirm and traumatised captives.
Those who aren’t dead or ill are setting the place on fire and destroying it.
A mound of guards lies outside the wire gate, their bodies bloodied and marked with hyena witchcraft.
If I hadn’t seen it for myself, I wouldn’t have believed the carnage.
There’s a portion of the riverbank blackened and still smoking.
Aurelia and her mates are gone, but her scent still lingers in the air along with that strange smell.
Some of Aurelia’s friends remain. The powerful tigress Minnie, who sits with the lioness Stacey in her lap.
The girl has a bandage over what looks like a gunshot wound to the upper arm.
She is staring at someone—the sole remaining guard, chained to a chair with Sabrina watching him closely. She, too, has a bandaged forearm.
The hyena matriarch is also sitting on a chair bound in black chains. There are two Dabu pack hyenas watching over her, but they wander forwards to speak with their regina. I take the chance to dive down and whisper in the old woman’s ear. “I’ve never seen you so tied up.”
She scowls at waist level, determined not to crane her neck to look at me. “I knew you’d be the first to arrive. Are you going to stop them?”
“No.”
“Thought as much.”
“They turned the place upside down, didn’t they?” I muse, watching two ex-slaves throw their silver collars into the river with a cheer. Someone has brought out fire crackers and two go off, reverberating into the night as the freed beasts jump and cackle with glee.
“You mean she did,” the old woman says. “Aurelia Boneweaver killed Katerina Crocodylus. Gobbled her up whole.”
“She actually did it, huh,” I deadpan. “She’s become quite the little monster.”
The hyena actually glances at me then, a tiny smirk on her mouth. “You all underestimated her. Mace Naga’s daughter? Bah! Lot of idiots.”
A feeling like fireworks resounds in my own stomach, and all I can do is sniff the air to feel the residue of her bloodthirsty presence.
I take my leave of the ex-queen of hyenas, noting down Hyacinth Dabu, the queen apparent, commanding the area.
My shadows are twitchy as we get back into the air, and I open myself up to the plane of things-better-left-untouched.
More than a few spirits hover in this area. Some will find the light, but others…
A whisper of menace slides around me, a low moan of discomfort.
The Collector’s soul slinks through the air as if looking for a way back to the world of the living.
“I’m glad you’re dead,” I say cheerfully.
“Feeling alright?” Of course, she has no body with which to feel, so the question is just to pour salt.
“You’d better continue on to where you’re called. ”
Katerina’s spirit hovers before me, suspicious till the end. “There are screams in there.”
“Yeah.” I shrug. “They do that sometimes.” All the time actually, but I’m not telling her that.
She carries on, obsessed with her old property for the moment.
She has no body to mourn, so it might take her a while to move on, and Hyacinth Dabu and her mates have made markings all around the property, warding it against malevolent spirits.
I’ve got to give her credit; she knows what she’s doing and moves fast.
Exiting the shadow realm, I survey the twin rivers running on either side of the property. There are still crocs in there. It’s likely Katerina’s rex still resides in there with his other animas. I wonder how much he knows. What he’d seen and who’d done it.
I fly lower, wanting to get a look at the rabid croc, rumoured to be a completely changed beast. No one had seen him in his human form for decades. It’s then that I see the mounds of ash dotting the bank like miniature funeral pyres, and what is left of my old, rotten heart quivers.