**BONUS**
Before
It was cold in the small concrete chamber.
A draft whistled through the tunnels, carrying with it the smell of liquid garbage and roast meat. Duck, if he wasn't mistaken. The man drew a deep, cleansing breath. Minutes earlier, the only thing he'd been able to smell was fear. All he'd been able to hear were screams.
Not anymore.
Now, the slight, dirty figure on the table before him was still and silent. Now, if he listened closely, he could hear the sounds of traffic, the buzz of the street car lines embedded in the concrete overhead.
The young man's pleas still grated in his ears. Poor fellow. He'd tried to end it quickly, but there were certain things required for the ritual, things necessarily obtained while blood still pumped through his unwitting assistant's veins. He pressed a hand to the man's pale forehead and reminded himself --not for the first time-- why he was doing this.
He glanced at the other table in the far corner of the chamber. The figure that lay on it was covered with a shroud, but he could picture the face as clearly as if it were his own. In a way, it almost was.
It would all be worth it in the end. For the sake of his soul, it had to be.
He moved quickly. The young man's chest was already laid open, the smooth, white ribs carefully cracked and pried apart. The entire cavity was brimming with blood. Its coppery stench hung heavy in the air, like some rare and forbidden perfume.
The rest of the ingredients waited in stinking repose on the cart beside the table: magical elixirs distilled under the full moon. Marrow. Stones. Various entrails of various profane animals. The ashes of a bird, so long extinct its very existence had passed into the realm of myth.
He'd poured his life's savings into obtaining it all, but after countless failed attempts, his supplies were dwindling. He glanced at the other table again, and his chest tightened.
He couldn't fail again. He wouldn't fail again.
The incantation was so familiar now he could recite it by rote. The ancient words twisted and flowed over his tongue. As he spoke, he began to move. All great spells started with movement; he knew that now. He knew many things now, many more than when he'd begun. Movement was meditation, a journey into oblivion, a way to connect with the divine.
And so he moved. He flailed his arms and stomped his feet and whirled around in a circle, again and again and again. His rational brain started to recede. Foam flecked the corners of his mouth. He slipped further and further into the frenzied zen he'd come to know so well.
He was still reciting the incantation, screaming it now. Just before he lost himself completely, he shrieked out the final, blasphemous word. The energy abruptly sapped from his muscles. He collapsed to the ground. Waited.
Nothing.
He curled his fingers into the cold floor. The sound that rose from his throat was hardly human. Of course, after everything he'd done, he was fairly sure he'd sacrificed his humanity long ago. What was he doing wrong? He had followed the spell to the letter, every time. And every time, he had failed.
He sighed, and hauled himself to his feet. His bones creaked, and he had fresh bruises on his knees. Failure wasn't enough; now he would be reminded of it for days to come. He dusted off his trousers and cinched his tie closer to his throat.
At least he still had options. He reached under the table, retrieved the pocketknife and the blank strip of leather he already had waiting. Then he gritted his teeth, and drew the sharp edge of the blade across his palm. Blood sprang to the surface.
He smoothed the leather flat on the table, dipped one finger into the wound, and started to write.
CHAPTER ONE
She knew better than to try and sleep on nights like this.
Lena Alan sat up with a sigh and swung her legs over the side of her bed. A telltale itch whispered over her skin. She rubbed her arms.
Someone was trying to reach her.
She'd experienced it too many times to try and fight it. Lena eased her feet to the floor, grabbed her robe off the chair on her way out of the bedroom. Light from the retro street lamp outside bathed the living room an odd shade of orange. Across the narrow street, the neighborhood's small park was quieter than usual.
She paused, listened. Come to think of it, everything was quieter than usual. Even once the sun went down and the fog rolled in, San Francisco always hummed with constant, mid-grade energy.
Not tonight. The neighbors' bipolar taco terrier wasn't even barking.
Lena sighed and made for the kitchen. Only one thing could make her feel better about being awake at the crack of insanity. She plucked the kettle off the stove and stood in front of the sink, willing herself into a kind of waking sleep while it filled with water. Finally, she turned back around. Her eye drifted to the glowing digital display on the microwave above the stove.
Two fifty-eight.
Lena groaned.
She flicked on the burner and set the kettle over the flame. Pleasure swelled briefly in her chest. All through her twenties, standing in front of one shitty electric stove after another, she'd promised herself someday she would do better.
Not that she'd settled on this place for the gas stove. The instant she realized the restaurant space downstairs came with its own apartment, that had been it. Never mind the leaky roof, the shitty insulation, the sometimes overly-raucous drunks who made the park their headquarters most days. The instant she'd turned the key in the lock, she'd known she was home.
Lena smiled to herself and opened the cupboard next to the stove. A wall of small, cheerful boxes greeted her. Suddenly, being awake didn't seem so bad. She scanned the familiar names. What was a good sipping blend for the witching hour? Lapsang Suchong? Too exotic. English Breakfast Tea? Too early. Irish Breakfast Tea? Too late.
The kettle started to whistle, and she settled on Lady Grey. Even the box was soothing: a rich, royal blue. Lena popped it open, retrieved her favorite cup from the ledge over the sink and deposited a small, fragrant bag into the bowl. She wandered back to the stove.
The familiar motions felt almost meditative: turn off the flame, lift the kettle, fill the cup to the brim. The herbal, citrus-y scent of black tea and bergamot flooded the kitchen. Lena sighed, not with resignation this time. Gingerly, she carried the cup out to the living room, settled into her favorite chair, curled her legs up underneath her.
And waited.
The energy in the room built gradually. Lena checked the clock on the sideboard near the door and furrowed her brow. A mature spirit wouldn't take this long to materialize. Either something was holding it back, or she was dealing with a juvenile.
She sighed and readied her shields. The recently dead were always difficult. So many emotions: anger, fear, bitterness, regret. She'd learned long ago to be careful, to keep at a safe distance, like someone preparing to witness a nuclear test.
It was an apt metaphor, the more she thought about it. If spirits were pure, concentrated energy, then a volatile spirit was the equivalent of a bomb blast.
The energy spiked abruptly.
Before she could fully prepare herself, a ball of white light exploded into the center of the room. Lena leaped to her feet, swore as tea sloshed onto her white camisole. In the building next door, the Johnsons' taco terrier started to howl.
The light careened around like an out-of-control pinball, bouncing off the walls and rattling the light fixture on the ceiling. It zinged by her head, sending a crackle of electricity down her spine. She set her cup on the small table beside the chair.
"Look, I realize this is all probably really confusing, but would you please calm down before you destroy my home?"
The light stopped, flickered, as if considering her request. Slowly, it floated back to the center of the room.
Lena brushed off a few lingering droplets of Lady Grey. "Thank you." She took a deep breath and strengthened her shields. "Okay, then. You're here. I'm here. Let's talk."
The light brightened a fraction, then dimmed again.
Lena crossed her arms. "You really are new at this, aren't you? Here's how it works. I'm your friendly neighborhood medium. I can hear you and I can talk to you, but not if you're going to keep up the whole 'one-with-the-universe' thing. So concentrate really hard, and give me something I can work with."
The light brightened, then as abruptly as it had arrived, flicked out.
Lena scowled at the empty space in her living room. "Oh sure, thanks, I had fun too." She'd stayed awake, spilled a cup of perfectly good tea, and for what? A spirit with the noncorporeal equivalent of erectile dysfunction. Mostly she was fine being permanently on-call in the Veil. On nights like this, however, it sucked.
She forced a deep breath, then another, and turned to retrieve her tea cup from the table. When she straightened again, she was nose-to-nose with a wild-eyed young man.
The cup slipped. At the last minute, she regained her grip. "Jesus Christ. Didn't your mother ever tell you it's rude to sneak up on a girl like that?"
The man took a step back, eyes sweeping the room. "Please. You gotta help me. I think I'm... I think I'm dead."
Lena sighed and set the cup back down. "Yeah. Hate to break it to you, but you've got that about right." She paused. Why did this spirit seem so familiar? She narrowed her eyes. A second later, it came to her. Her eyes shot wide. "Oh my god- Jimmy? What the- what happened?"
The man had been dancing from one foot to the other. He froze, peered closer at her face. "Lena? For real? I felt something pulling me here, but I didn't realize you were a- is this some kind of trick?"
Lena winced. She hadn't known Jimmy long --he'd only started working odd jobs at the shop about a month earlier-- but already she'd come to like him. "Sorry. No trick."
The agitated look returned to his face. "Then I really am dead. Fuck, I was hoping all that shit was a dream. He cracked my fucking chest open, and I... I felt it. Hell, I watched."
Lena's stomach soured. "I'm sorry."
He shook his head. "That's not why I'm here. Look, my mamío, she was always telling us about souls and good and evil and what happens when you die, and all that shit. I always thought she was just a crazy old bat who'd had too much plum brandy back in the old country, but she was right. About all of it. Something's wrong. I don't know how I can tell, but I can. It's like... confused. Everything's all confused, and something bad's going down, and I-"
Lena held up both hands. "Hold up. You lost me. What's a mamío? What was she right about? What's wrong?"
Jimmy blew out a frustrated breath. "My grandmother. She's... I'm... shit. I'm not really supposed to tell you any of this, you being a raklí and all, but... you've heard of the Roma?"
Lena nodded slowly. "Yes."
Jimmy jerked his head in the affirmative. "Right, well, I'm Rom. Or I was. My mamío's a fortune teller. The real deal. At least, she's good at palms and tea leaves and shit. The rest of it- damn. I should've fucking listened to her." He raked a hand through his hair, pulled it back and shot it a puzzled look.
Lena cleared her throat. "You don't have a physical body anymore. Everything probably feels... different."
Jimmy wheezed out a half-hearted laugh. "Yeah. Different." He shook himself, and looked back up at her. "Anyway, Mamío was always going on about the 'cosmic harmony, and all that. According to her, the universe needs a balance of both good and evil."
Lena furrowed her brow. "You don't sound convinced."
Jimmy shrugged. "I always was a pretty shitty Rom. The kris -that's our, I dunno, internal court system, I guess- kicked me out of the community about a year ago. Been on my own ever since."
If that bothered him, he gave no sign of it. Lena swallowed the sympathetic murmur that sprang to her lips. "Okay, so what about this balance?"
Jimmy started to pace. "Well, apparently, when something throws it off, things get all kinds of crazy. So crazy, people say the ancestors will give you signs to warn you about it."
His ethereal form shimmered as he drew a deep breath. "I wasn't supposed to, but I stayed in touch with my family. Lately, Mamío's been saying her sister keeps waking her up in the middle of the night, telling her something's wrong. Only her sister died during the Porajmos, back in the forties."
Lena's head pounded. Three in the morning was too early to be dealing with ghosts, fortune tellers, and the Romani Holocaust. She pressed the pads of her fingers to her eyes. "Okay. I agree, that sounds bad."
Jimmy shook his head. "If I'd just listened... but I thought she was crazy. I mean, I never told her, but she knew. She's like that." He stared off into the fake ficus in the corner. "I should have listened."
Lena snapped her fingers in front of his face. "Hey. Earth to Jimmy. I don't host pity parties here. Maybe your grandma was on to something, maybe not. Regardless, I think we have a bigger problem."
He gave her a blank look.
She rolled her eyes. "Somebody killed you, you lug."
Jimmy grimaced. "Right."
"Any idea who it was?"
He thought for a moment. "No. Never saw their face. Don't even remember what happened, really. Not until, well, you know." He winced down at his chest.
Lena fought back a shudder. "Yeah, I'd probably try to forget that, too. But think for a second. If you can tell me where your body is, maybe we can figure out who killed you. At the very least, I can get it back to your family. They'll probably want to give you a proper send-off, right?"
"Yeah." His eyes started to shimmer. "Yeah, they probably will." He paused, and his gaze sharpened. "Hey, you can give them a message for me, right?"
"Sure." Lena pulled her robe tighter. "I could do that."
"Just, I dunno, tell my folks I love them. And tell my brothers to quit giving our dále such a hard time. And maybe you could tell my mamío-" He stopped. A confused look flitted across his features.
Lena waited. "Yes?"
Jimmy's lips parted. "What the..."
Lena took a step forward. "Jimmy?"
But he wasn't looking at her anymore. He stared off into the Veil, mesmerized by something she couldn't see. Then his eyes went wide. Horror infused his face. He dropped into a crouch and covered his head with his hands. "No! Go away! I don't want- just leave me alone!"
Lena strengthened her shields. At the same time, she reached out. Energy was all over the room: Jimmy's, hers, even energy from the last couple who had lived there. She could feel it when she focused, crackling all around her like a broken net of superheated thread.
She gathered each individual strand, willed the energy to flow into her. Her hands started to tingle. "Jimmy? Just stay close to me. I can protect-"
Jimmy's eyes rolled back in his head. He let out a shriek that chilled her to her core, and disappeared.
###
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