Chapter One
The Lair
Seconds Later
Recognition
Holy bloody Hell’s bells! Oh, to say that Flynn was shocked at what was going down in his kitchen would be an understatement. This was a whole lot to swallow all at once, and he was struggling with it.
How could he not?
The dead had been resurrected and were in his freaking kitchen standing between the wine chiller and the dishwasher.
It was freak-out time.
Only, he wasn’t the only one taking that little journey with him.
Immediately, the second that Flynn told them who they were, his dead parents, Jacques was in panic mode trying to figure this out.
Okay, not Jacques.
Death.
He was losing his shit, and that was saying a lot since Jacques tended to be fairly calm.
Death was in a tizzy.
“Oh, holy shit,” Jacques said, his eyes bleeding red as he tried to sort this out.
In that lair, there was only ONE creature who could bring the dead back.
Oh, and there was no way that he reanimated two humans and brought them back to life without being aware of it.
Bringing back the dead was a complicated thing, and not something that could be done with just a snap.
It was a spell.
An old spell so deeply ingrained into who he was, that yes, he could just think it, and make it happen, but no one else could.
This took magick.
Deep.
Dark.
Magick.
So, for Jacques, that meant one thing. That only left two other people beside him that could make this happen, and they weren’t currently in the room.
Fate.
Or Rinnon.
Fate wouldn’t bring back Flynn’s parents—since that might make him happy.
Oh, this was problematic and in a million different ways too.
The dead, once their soul was removed, never came back the same.
A damn good example of this was when Jolie died and came back the Harbinger.
A creature came back altered, and with a little more, or less, under the hood.
Another example was that Flynn died and came back a vessel for Rinnon.
Something always changed, and with the two ‘humans’ in their lair, that told him this was going to cause one hell of an issue.
Someone used some magick they weren’t supposed to use.
This was the proof.
Now, Death had to get to the bottom of this before it bit them in the ass.
Only, before he could, his mate broke the silence.
Flynn couldn’t help but go there.
He stood back from them, his body pressed to the kitchen counter as if he was expecting something to jump up and bite him.
“Mom and Dad, what the hell? You’ve been dead for a long time. How are you in the kitchen staring at me?” he asked, not sure if he wanted that answer.
Only, it seemed like a good starting point.
In his world, this mess could be just about anything from Death to Fate, with a little Rinnon thrown into the mix.
And it was never good.
EVER.
“Flynn?” his mother asked, looking around. “Where are we?” she inquired, touching her body to make sure she was in one piece.
Beside her, Flynn’s father did the same thing to himself as it was clear they were just as shocked to be standing there.
Oh, boy.
Someone was up to no good.
“Yeah, what’s going on?” John, his father asked. “Where are we at?”
How did one answer that?
Oh, holy shit.
Jolie was ready to protect Flynn, not because she thought they could hurt him, but because he was scared.
There was the scent of fear in the room and all of it was coming from him.
Knowing him as well as she did, Jolie could tell that Flynn was about to lose it.
He was seconds from doing just that.
Truth be told, out of all of them, and maybe it was because he still had a little humanity in him, things like this didn’t sit well with him.
They freaked him out.
When the woman, the woman he called ‘Mom’, moved closer and hugged Flynn, they could all hear his heart racing in his chest.
No.
It was pounding.
Had he been human, he would have had a cardiac episode, that’s how quickly it was thumping.
On top of that, his eyes were huge, and there was more fear.
The woman, who looked like his mother, was way too close to his person, and yet no one was trying to get her off of him.
Why?
Because they were hella confused.
Now, her arms were wrapped around him, but his were up in the air, as he tried to escape her grasp.
“God, Son, I missed you,” Barb Brogan admitted. “I missed hugging you, my boy.”
Flynn just stood there, frozen as he watched it all play out.
When his father did the same thing, it was too much for him to handle.
He was going to be sick.
His fight or flight response kicked in, and for the first time, in a long time, Flynn opted to run.
FAR.
Rinnon! Please! Get me out of here! he begged, knowing he wasn’t going to be okay. I can’t be here with them! PLEASE!
The demon God was confused.
Flynn, what is wrong? Why are you so upset? Shouldn’t you be happy?
He tried to articulate it as best as he could, but his brain was shutting down, and his panic was palpable.
They are dead. They shouldn’t be here. I need a moment. I need a break. I can’t do this. Please. God. Please! Help me.
By the tone in his voice, Rinnon knew this was bad, and he wasn’t messing around.
Set me free.
Flynn didn’t stop him from coming out, and that was saying a whole lot.
It was rare he willingly let The Big Scary out for no reason.
If he wasn’t happy to see his dead parents, the least he could do was save the man.
His heart was going way too fast, and that told Rinnon this could go bad. Flynn had fought monsters and never felt like this.
He was worried.
Because he was no longer in control, Flynn’s body morphed, and the man went deep inside himself. He went so deep that even Rinnon couldn’t feel him anymore.
Yep.
That was a bad thing.
Someone was freaked out over all of this, and it was Rinnon’s duty to protect his vessel when he needed it.
Oh, and he definitely needed it.
As his wings ruffled, and he stood there, he pushed the woman and man away from him with a wave of his hand.
They slid backward on the floor, until they were far enough away from him that Flynn wouldn’t panic any further.
“Please stay there. My vessel doesn’t want you hanging all over him. You’re upsetting him,” he said, and then looked at Jolie and Jacques.
It was time to protect the man who had died and suffered for him.
“Death, watch our woman. Flynn wishes to be somewhere safe. I am leaving now.”
And then without another word, and just like that, Rinnon disappeared.
He.
Was.
Gone.
All they heard were the fluttering of his wings before he had left the space.
Since this was his lair, made and controlled by him, there was no way to find him in it. He could change the layout, put up literal walls, and hide.
Yowza.
This was getting worse by the minute.
From where they stood, Flynn’s parents, or who they believed were his parents, looked around in shock at what had just happened.
Their son had…disappeared.
Yeah, that was one hell of a magic trick if you weren’t accustomed to popping in and out of places. The once humans didn’t understand what had happened.
“What happened to my son?” his mother asked, looking around for him. “And who are you?”
Yeah, they weren’t answering that right now.
Jolie and Jacques stayed across the room where they were safe. They weren’t afraid of the humans, but they didn’t want to trust what they were seeing.
This could be a trick.
This could be Fate fucking with them to do maximum damage.
They all knew she did that a lot.
Is it really them? Jolie asked, sniffing the air. They seemed to smell like Flynn, but not quite like them. There was something missing.
I’m not quite sure yet, Mon Amour.
Only, Death knew how to tell.
He snapped his fingers, and suddenly, The Book of the Damned appeared before them.
It landed with a thump to the counter, startling the two humans who didn’t know what was going on.
Moving closer, Death waved his hand over it, and the book opened. Immediately, with some silent command known only by Death, the pages started flipping at a blinding speed.
Jolie kept an eye on the two people as her other mate tried to sort this out.
Yes, she’d wished her husband’s parents could see him, and be proud, but there was no way she could have done this.
Right?
Had she somehow brought them back?
Had she wished them into existence?
As Death used the book, a gold chain appeared, binding him to it. When one of the middle pages stopped, he stared at the writing.
It was right there.
“Oh, boy,” he muttered, causing Jolie to move closer to her mate.
While Jolie could see the book, there was nothing written on the fleshy pages. They were completely blank.
Well, they were blank to her.
Running his long, elegant fingers over something he saw, Jacques found his answer that he was looking for, and it was problematic.
Glancing over at Jolie, he told her.
“I went back to the year and date that our mate’s mother passed.”
“And?” she asked, ignoring the two people not far away who were watching them.
Jacques gave her the bad news.
“Flynn’s mother has been removed from my book,” he said. “She didn’t die on that date. Death one-point-oh never reaped her.”
Jolie’s eyes went huge.
That couldn’t be good.
Could it be?
If she didn’t die, that meant she was legit his mother, standing in their lair.
“What does that mean?” she asked. “Put it in terms I’ll understand, Death, because Flynn is freaked the fuck out, and I’m with him on this.”
Well, there was only one thing it could possibly mean. Apparently, according to the timeline, Flynn’s mother didn’t die of cancer.
Somehow, it had been undone, and that meant only one of two ways.
He brought her back, or she was necromanced. Those were the only two choices in this. There could be nothing more.
Deep in his mind, he was trying to reach Flynn to offer him comfort, but he was running up against a wall.
A Rinnon wall.
Instead of saying anything else, Death found Flynn’s father’s name in the book.
Or tried to find it.
Only, that, too, was problematic.
Death couldn’t, simply because it was gone too.
Both names had been wiped from a past where they’d died, leaving Flynn alone.
To him, the reaper, that meant only one thing.
They.
Were.
Back.
When he lifted his head, his red swirling eyes seemed to be even more intense, and Jolie knew the reason for it.
Why?
He was pissed off.
“This is bad,” he warned. This caused a shit ton of problems in the universe. One couldn’t just reanimate the dead for shits and giggles.
It was against the rules, as far as he was aware. Then again, Death and Fate didn’t play by the rules a whole lot—thus how they’d gotten into this situation.
“How did you get here?” he asked, his voice booming through the room as that anger filled him.
Both humans took a step back able to detect that this man was NOT the one to mess with when he wanted answers.
Finally, Flynn’s mother answered him.
“I don’t know,” Barb admitted. “I don’t know where I am. I can’t remember much of anything,” she answered.
Then, she was curious.
“Who are you?” she asked again. “Do you know my son?”
Because the room was filled with tension, Flynn’s father put himself in front of his wife to protect her from what he believed to be a threat.
This was a whole lot of creepy, and to freak them out…that was saying a lot.
The most eerie thing about all of this was that Flynn looked just like his father.
If he could age, this was what he would have looked like at some point.
Flynn’s father was just as handsome as he was.
As he moved to protect his wife, something Flynn would do too, they moved back a step.
Cautiously.
Oh, not because they could hurt them, but because they weren’t sure this wasn’t Fate gunning for them.
“I don’t remember either. Please don’t hurt us. Where is our son?” John asked, looking around as he protected his wife.
Shit.
Could this be Fate messing with them?
This would be right up her alley to distract Rinnon’s vessel and damage Flynn.
If they were innocent of this, Jacques didn’t want to hurt them. If they were, indeed, Flynn’s parents, he would be upset if something happened to them again.
They all knew how hard their deaths affected him in his past.
It put him on the path he was on.
Now, they might be back.
“Jacques, I wanted them back for Flynn. He was hurting and I wished they could see him.”
He blinked, and that nictitating membrane covered his eye, and then disappeared. It was very snake-like, but Jolie had other things to worry about.
Like the two, no-longer-dead people in their kitchen.
Because he needed answers, Death moved toward his mate, needing to find out if what she said was behind this.
He wasn’t sure how this happened, and that had to be the first step in handling this mess.
Oh, because that’s absolutely what this was.
ONE.
HOT.
MESS.
Reaching for Jolie’s mind, he moved around freely in her head, and that’s when he found it.
Yep.
She’d summoned them back.
Jesus.
There was a spell, and it was a spell that only he was privy to. It was from Death’s repertoire and something very private that had been passed down from the mother of all mothers.
Lilith.
There was only one creature, other than him, that could have access to that spell.
Their mate.
Oh, holy Hell’s bells, this was a problem.
Rinnon! he called, reaching for him. Answer me! We have an issue!
It didn’t take long for the demon God to answer him, and he sounded testy.
Oh, well, Death was too.
This was breaking the rules, and he was in charge of this mess now. Had this been Fate, he could bust her chops, but this was from their camp.
Thus, his clusterfuck.
I’m a little busy here. Flynn won’t come out. I can’t get him to come to the surface. Can this wait?
No.
No, it couldn’t.
When you were doing the spell to block us from Fate, what did you see in my mind? he asked, curiously.
This was why he didn’t let his family play willy-nilly in his head.
This.
Right.
Here.
That had to be when it happened.
It had been the last time Rinnon had been freely allowed into his thoughts and he’d been distracted by some truly amazing sex.
It was good, wasn’t it?
It’s not the time to be proud. Just answer the question, Rinnon. We have a potential mess here.
Because he heard the urgency, he considered it.
Not much. You were thinking about Flynn’s dick most of the time, but there was the spell to cloak us from her. Well, that and something about a sword.
Death closed his eyes.
And sighed.
What wouldn’t he do to have Rinnon’s memories back in his head and away from getting them in some dangerous shit?
Seriously.
Rinnon had read his mind.
Yeah, he was thinking about The Necromancer’s Sword because it was out there, and they needed it found to put it back into the box before Fate got it.
He was trying to be proactive to find an antiquity that wasn’t on Fate’s radar.
And it bit them in the ass.
From beside him, when she heard the exasperation, Jolie looked over.
“What?” she asked. “Is it bad news? Did I do this?” she asked.
He said one thing.
“Rinnon.”
Jolie didn’t know what he did, but to make Death sound that irritated, it had to be a doozy.
Rinnon was basically the only way to test Death’s patience, and the demon God did it daily.
What are you talking about? she asked, keeping an eye on the two humans who were touching each other and talking not far away.
He was in my head, trying to find a way to protect us. His memories are patchy. Mine aren’t. He found something I was thinking about and manifested it.
Rinnon protested.
Sue me. I’m trying to keep my woman and unborn child alive. I wanted us cloaked so we can’t be spied on anymore! That was my only intent! I wasn’t being sneaky!
No one blamed him.
Not for that.
Had they believed he was being ‘sneaky’ that would be a completely different thing.
Jacques continued.
He found a spell that would give a person the ability to necromance. It’s only temporary, but it’s tied to a sword. Whoever has the sword can raise the dead.
Jolie stared at him.
Oh, that sounded bad.
REALLY bad.
Aiobeheann wanted to raise the dead, and they had to keep her locked away in Death’s realm to keep her from making an army of zombies.
Is this sword one of the things that was in Pandora’s Box, and that we have to put back? she asked.
Jacques nodded.
Yes. It’s another of Rinnon’s trinkets, but I didn’t see it coming into play until much later. If Rinnon accidentally did this, clearly, Fate has changed the timeline. We can’t let just anyone raise the dead. I can necromance only because it’s part of my job. I kill and I can raise the dead. You cannot.
Well, this proved to be a problem.
Because she clearly had.
The proof was standing before them.
And those really are Flynn’s parents? Jolie asked, glancing over at the couple hugging each other.
He was honest.
That really is them, but when you raise the dead, they don’t have a soul. They are missing what made them human, so they can be…off.
She was confused.
Few things didn’t have a soul. Mostly, it was all of the monsters.
So vampyres? Or?
Rinnon handled this since he was eavesdropping on the whole conversation.
In a way, yes. They aren’t human anymore, but that will still be them as Flynn knew them. It’s clear that they don’t have their memories. That might be what didn’t come back with them. That could be what is ‘off’, as Death has mentioned. They could be a clean slate.
AND THEIR SOULS! Death added, in case he’d forgotten that very important part. That was also what was going to be missing.
Well, and that. Don’t be touchy. I was trying to keep us safe, he offered again.
Jolie was curious.
Well, then, what are they if they’re ‘kinda’ like vampyres?
They both answered at once.
They might be zombies.
At the mention of that one word, Jolie’s eyes went huge, and that gave her all kinds of visuals that she didn’t like. Zombies were NOT a good thing.
How could they be?
Didn’t they eat people?
Maybe she’d seen too many scary movies, or TV shows, but that never bode well for anyone who was walking the streets with them.
Jacques and Jolie stared at each other.
Yeah, it’s that damn bad, he admitted. We don’t know if they’ll go bad, or if they’ll have a long shelf life.
They aren’t cans of soup, Jacques. We can’t turn them over and look for that expiry date. It’ll bite us in the ass before we figure it out.
Oh, he was aware.
This was absolutely going to bite them in the ass. How did they know?
It always did.
This was their fate.
Seeing this, Death was going to have to clean this mess up, too, at some point because it was going to fall into his lap.
He’d bet on it.
Someone tried to reassure them, and he was really bad at it too.
It could be worse, Rinnon offered.
Could it be?
Really?
Did he actually believe that?
Death wasn’t so sure.
Rinnon, Jolie can’t go around raising the dead for the next week. That’s how long your spell is active. You know that the spell is sketchy as hell. Without the sword, she is a loose cannon. We need to find it now, so she doesn’t reanimate anyone else.
Jolie stared at her mate.
Did he just say what she thought he said?
Seriously?
Pardon me, Death? I’m a loose cannon? Do you want to choose this hill to die on? Today?
Jacques held out his hand.
Mon Amour, there can only be one necromancer, and the last one was…
Lilith, Rinnon offered. It’s her sword. Like I had Destruction, and the other horsemen had Wrath and their swords, she had hers. She made it small to carry with her always.