Bad Seed

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

“The f**k I tell you about coming around while there’s customers, Ned?”

Dane didn’t bother waiting to see the professor’s car leave before stomping down the stairs into the large room he affectionately termed “the Lair.” He scowled at the ghost, who hovered, examining a set of silver-coated hunting knives, but the look passed through him. Ned was very dead and very hard to intimidate.

“Figured that one was fine. I saw what he was looking up.”

“Werewolves?” asked Dane, crossing his arms and leaning against the railing. “Probably dipping his toes into some kink and doesn’t want any of his peers to know about it.”

“Oh, he’s not with you?”

“No,” said Dane, hearing the snarl in his voice. “He’s not.”

Ned stroked his chin and put his ankle up on his opposite knee, leaning back like he was sitting in an invisible chair. Damn, that looked comfy.

“Huh,” he said, like he was trying hard to think that was interesting.

“I had to handle it. Again. You could try to pull your weight for a change,” said Dane, hoping the professor would go home and doubt his memory in the morning. He already looked to be into some s**t if he was trying to inconspicuously research werewolves on all the wrong sites; there was a chance he’d forget he’d seen a ghost after Dane kissed him.

“I pull more than my weight.”

“Yeah, funny, Ned. You’re weightless.”

Ned spread his hands and grinned. Dane glared at him. As far as assistants went, Ned was all right. Better than the Order giving him a familiar like they wanted. Dane still got the feeling from them that he was one good f**k-up away from being sent a familiar anyway, since Ned wasn’t technically one of theirs, but rather a ghost who’d more or less come with the land.

“You want me to take care of him if he comes back?” asked Ned. He was serious. Dane still didn’t know the extent of what Ned could do and that made him wary, but he wasn’t about to admit either of those things.

“No. He might not come back.”

“Kiss him that hard?”

“Shut up. I happen to like men. Problem?”

“Not for me,” said Ned. “Didn’t think you were into the intellectuals.”

“I’m not,” said Dane, then, “Wait, what’s that supposed to mean?”

Ned started laughing. Dane moved to the shelves behind the stairs where he kept the booze and pulled out a bottle of rye. He unscrewed the cap and drank once, twice, then motioned to Ned with the bottle.

“The hell are you even here for?”

Ned grew serious and lost his relaxed pose. Dane didn’t like the look of that—it meant s**t was brewing. The Order had sent him here to Bleu Falls, Wisconsin after he’d f****d up pretty badly in Minneapolis, mostly for his own protection. Turned out this out-of-the-way excuse for a city had a cluster of magical nexus points—possibly even a large one, it was hard to say as there was evidence they were f*****g moving—and the Order could always use another Decrypter to keep an eye on a place like that. They’d funded construction and establishment of Crypt Coffee and Dane had hauled his weapons and a couple bags of clothes over for a new start.

Most of what he’d dealt with so far was spirit-related. You got a lot of ghosts right next to a cemetery. Ned was helpful mainly with that, although he often had random information and Dane couldn’t figure out where the hell he’d gotten it. He never cared to say, either.

“Getting another problem grave,” said Ned. Dane took a drink and glared at him to continue. “Out near the three pines. Not a recent one, either—she’s been dead almost as long as me. Eliza Bartley, rest her soul, refuses to keep resting her soul.”

“Specifics? What are we looking at? Possessions, undead, whatever the hell you are but evil…?”

“Who’s to say I’m not evil?” asked Ned, and grinned. His face pulled too wide and stretched into a gruesome look. Dane was unimpressed. He took a final drink and replaced the rye.

“I am. I don’t like you I’ll send you on.”

“I’d say I’d like to see you try, but here doesn’t seem the place.”

“Damn right it isn’t,” said Dane, pulling the hunting knives down and examining them quickly before strapping them on. Ned would be a colossal i***t to make him angry in a room full of weapons. “Well? Am I going to need anything special for our dear deceased Eliza or what?”

“Doubtful. She’s normal. Apart from the ceasing to stay put.”

“Normal,” said Dane, growl to his voice. “You say everything’s f*****g normal.”

“It is to me.”

“Yeah, well, the Order had to pull some strings last time you said that one guy was good and normal, only he’d stopped friggin’ rolling in his grave because he’d possessed those pigeons. That kind mommy reported me—I could’ve gotten arrested.”

Ned drifted back toward the stairs.

“I never said gut them in daylight. And this one is normal. Last I checked, Eliza was coming up. Dirt’s churned around. Standard ghost-using-remains-to-rend-themselves-through-spacetime. She doesn’t want to stay put on the other side.”

“Don’t see what’s there that can be worse than here,” said Dane, following Ned up and through the now-empty coffee shop. Another set of stairs and they were at street-level. Dane yanked the door open. The Order had gotten someone to design the strangest coffee place he’d ever seen. The main level here was like the tip of an iceberg—entrance and a small seating space for those uncomfortable with being underground. You’d never guess a whole large coffee shop was beneath something that was the size of a two-car garage.

They set off into the graveyard behind the lot. It should have been eerie in the night, but Dane had gotten over his jumpiness at this s**t long ago.

“You got quiet. You leave yourself?”

“I never passed on,” said Ned, then, probably so he wouldn’t have to talk about it, “You know it’s unusual to do so and then return, right?”

“That’s what I heard. Can’t tell the difference. Sometime’s you’re just dormant, right?”

Ned led him to the left. They were approaching the river now, loud and rushing in the night. If Dane had been someone else, he might think this graveyard was peaceful. He knew better. When he died, burn him away until he was nothing. That was the best way to stay dead, really dead.

“I can tell the difference,” said Ned, words a whisper. Then he raised his voice. “There. Those three pines.”

Dane followed and saw the problem grave immediately. Eliza Bartley, deceased, had a plot far too lumpy for the fact that it had been around a good ninety years. Her stone was freshly tilted, and the ground was uneven, like something had been rolling around just beneath the sod, trying to come through.

Well, something had.

“Where is she?” Dane pulled out his knife and shot a glare at Ned, who kept a good eight feet back. He’d never specifically said, but Dane knew ghosts could hurt each other and he figured Ned wasn’t the particularly violent kind. And as much as he acted like an asshole, Dane wouldn’t have been surprised to learn Ned hadn’t even killed a spider while alive. What little he knew about the ghost was sad, really—Ned was transgender long before that was a term, had lived and died and been put in the ground not as himself. He seemed to enjoy being able to shape his form and exist as a ghost.

Not appealing to Dane. Cremate him and send him on his way, thank you f*****g much. Still, whatever help Ned wanted to give, he wasn’t going to turn down.

“I expected her to be out by now,” said Ned. “I guess she’s taking her time.”

Dane groaned, returned his knife to his side.

“Should’ve brought the gun.” You couldn’t really use the bullets on a ghost unless they were still in the ground. Too easy to accidentally kill an innocent. Not that the Order wouldn’t get him out of a situation like that, but Dane had pissed them off enough for now, and as a rule they didn’t like to be inconvenienced.

“I’ll keep an eye on her.”

“Take care of yourself,” said Dane. When he glanced at Ned, the ghost’s expression was closed off, neither joking nor concerned, just blank. Almost eerily blank. “Don’t engage. Sometimes they can be nasty pieces of work.”

“I’ve been around a while, thanks.”

Dane thought he should feel insulted at that, but really he was just tired and irritated. It was late, his report to the Order was overdue, and they were going to start riding his ass for it. Worst of all, he was thinking about that damned professor again, whatever his name was. He didn’t want to deal with Eliza’s bout of ethereal indigestion. He turned away from the grave.

“Anything else going on I should know about?”

“Such as?”

“I don’t f*****g know, Ned, you tell me.”

“Some other grave rumblings. Nothing you need to worry about. Some people in to look at a plot—I’d bet on them burying someone soon, but I seem to have no currency.”

“Right. Anything not in the graveyard I should know about?”

“Cemetery. A graveyard is a—”

“I know,” said Dane, and Ned fell silent. They were nearly back to the coffee shop and he was not looking forward to finishing cleaning out the machines. Or checking the time. He needed another drink. “Look, that thing you do, where sometimes you tip me off to something else in Bleu Falls. That vampire passing close by a while back, that flushed fish that got magically charged and turned vicious, s**t like that.”

“I’m not aware of anything at the moment. I’ll contact you if anything changes.”

Ned vanished abruptly and Dane figured he’d pissed the ghost off. Not that it mattered. He wanted some alone time anyway. Despite Crypt Coffee being a good business, Dane was more comfortable the fewer people he had to interact with. He entered the mausoleum entrance and descended to finish cleaning up for the day, glad at least the theme of it meant he didn’t have to be constantly smiling. And he could get away with pushing some boundaries now and then—everyone expected the owner to be creepy.

As he went through the annoying process of rinsing out the cappuccino machine, he wondered why that professor had even come in in the first place. Crypt Coffee didn’t look like his scene. Not that Dane completely minded—he wasn’t bad looking, even if he was a little older than Dane normally went for. He’d looked cute the few times Dane had glanced up at him working, brow scrunched low over blue eyes as he peered through his glasses at some internet bullshit about werewolves.

If only he knew Dane could give him actual information on them. He’d get flustered and his white, stay-inside-lecturing-all-day face would flush. Dane had seen what had happened to the professor’s pupils when he’d kissed him, could guess why he rushed out of the place. Too bad he doubted the man would return.

The Order wasn’t very keen on its members having relationships anyway, even flings or hookups. It put people at risk, and led to everything from very messy situations to catastrophic fuckups. There were enough members of the general public to lasso into this life.

It sucked, though. Dane had a hard enough time finding someone, and too many of the people through his place were teens. He’d sign up for one of those apps, only he had to constantly change his phone, and again the Order cautioned against it after several members had been tracked down and murdered that way.

It was too late to think about this anyway. Dane slammed the last things shut, turned off the lights, and got in his car. Almost three in the morning. Enough time for a drink and then bed.