Iron Kissed (Mercy Thompson #3)(25)

O'Donnell didn't see me standing in front of him so he wasn't the first, most useful kind of ghost.

All I could do was watch as he walked to the shelves that held the rocks and touched something on the top shelf. It clicked against the fake wood shelf. He stood there for a moment, his fingers petting whatever he touched, his whole body focused on that small item.

For a moment I was disappointed. If he was just repeating something he'd done every day, I wouldn't learn anything from him.

Then he jerked upright, responding, I thought, to a sound I could not hear and he walked briskly to the front door. I heard the door open with his motions, but the door, more real than the apparition, stayed closed.

This was not a habitual ghost. I settled in, prepared to watch O'Donnell die.

He knew the person at the door. He seemed impatient with him, but after a moment of talk, he took a step back in invitation. I couldn't see the person who came in - he wasn't dead - or hear anything except the creaks and groans of the floorboards as they remembered what had happened here.

Following O'Donnell's attention, I watched the path of the murderer as he walked rapidly to a place in front of the bookcase. O'Donnell's body language became increasingly hostile. I saw his chest move forcefully and he made a cutting gesture with one hand before storming over to confront his visitor.

Something grabbed him around the neck and shoulder. I could almost make out the shape of the murderer's hand against the paleness of O'Donnell's form. It looked human to me. But before I could get a good look, whoever it was proved that they were not human at all.

It was so fast. One moment O'Donnell was whole and the next his body was on the floor, jerking and dancing, and his head was rolling across the floor in a lopsided, spinning gyre that ended not a foot from where I stood. For the first time, I saw O'Donnell's face clearly. His eyes were becoming unfocused, but his mouth moved, forming a word he no longer had breath to say. Anger, not fear, dominated his expression, as if he hadn't had time to realize what had happened.

I'm not a terrific lip reader, but I could tell what he'd tried to say.

Mine.

I stayed where I was and shook for minutes after O'Donnell's specter faded. It wasn't the first death I'd witnessed - murder is one of those things that tend to produce ghosts. I'd even cut someone's head off before - that being one of the few ways you can make sure that a vampire will stay dead. But it hadn't been as violent as this, if only because I'm not strong enough to rip someone's head off.

Eventually, I remembered that I had things to do before someone realized there was a coyote running free in a crime scene. I put my nose down on the carpet to see what it could tell me.

Distinguishing any scents at all here proved difficult with O'Donnell's blood soaking into couch cushions, walls, and carpet. I caught a hint of Uncle Mike's scent in one corner of the room, but it faded quickly, and though I searched the corner for a while, I never caught it again. The Cologne Man had been in the living room, along with O'Donnell, Zee, and Tony. I hadn't realized Tony had been one of the arresting officers. Someone had been sick just inside the front door, but it had been wiped up and left only a trace.

Other than that, it was like trying to pick up a trail in the Columbia Center Mall. There had simply been too many people in here. If I was trying to pick out a scent, I could do that - but trying to distinguish all the scents...it just wasn't going to work.

Giving up, I went back to the corner where I'd scented Uncle Mike just to see if I could pick him up again - or figure out how he managed to leave only the barest trace for me to find.

I don't know how long it was there before I finally looked up and saw the raven.

Chapter 5

It watched me from the hall doorway, as if it had simply found the open back door and flown in. But ravens are not night birds despite their color and reputation. If there had been nothing else, that alone would have told me that there was something off about this bird.

But that wasn't the only thing. Or even the first.

As soon as I caught the glitter of the moon's light in the shine of its feathers, I smelled it - as if it hadn't been there until then.

Ravens smell of the carrion they eat overlaying a musty sharp scent they share with crows and magpies. This one smelled of rain, forest, and good black garden soil in the spring. Then there was its size.

The Tri-Cities has some awfully big ravens, but nothing like this bird. It was taller than the coyote I was; easily as big as a golden eagle.

And every hair on my body stood up to attention as a wave of magic swept through the room.

It took a sudden hop forward, which moved its head into the faint light that trickled through the windows. There was a spot of white on its head, like a drop of snow. But what caught most of my attention were its eyes: bloodred, like a white rabbit's, they glittered eerily as it stared right at me...and through me, as if it were blind.

For the first time in my life I was afraid to drop my eyes. Werewolves put great value on eye contact - and I'd blithely used that all my life. I have no trouble dropping my eyes, acknowledging anyone's superiority and then doing whatever I please. Among the werewolves, once dominance was acknowledged, the dominant werewolf could, by custom, do no more than cuff me out of his way...while I then ignored him or plotted how to get back at him as I chose.

But this wasn't a werewolf, and I was consumed with the conviction that if I moved at all, it would destroy me - though it was not making any sign of aggression.