Soul Taken (Mercy Thompson #13)(67)

Adam grunted, then said, “Convenient that someone produced both a sickle that could have done the job and a dead body who could not be questioned. I presume you are sure that the body was the one who had been doing the killing?”

Zee nodded. “Yes. And I never found out who left them for Uncle Mike to find. I made assumptions, but I didn’t push it further because I wasn’t interested in how or why, just in acquiring the Soul Taker.”

“You came here to find it,” I said. “You thought that the sickle was the wrong one and destroyed it. And you stayed here. Why?”

He paused and his chair squeaked again as he rocked back. “I had been looking for the Soul Taker for a very long time, and creatures as old as I am eventually run out of things that make life interesting. I decided to settle here and wait.”

“You’ve been waiting for forty years to see if an artifact turned up?” I asked.

“It started that way,” he said. “Forty years is not a long time, Liebchen. I am patient.”

Adam pulled over one of our shop stools and bumped my leg with it. “Sit,” he said. “You make my feet hurt.”

I sat down with a thump.

Adam stepped behind me and put his hands on my shoulders. “We have some unknowns to address,” he told us. “It is possible that forty-odd years ago an artifact was found by chance and some clueless kid—” He paused, and Zee nodded.

“He was no one special. An average human teenager before he was taken,” Zee said.

“But someone killed him and slipped you a ringer,” Adam continued.

I hadn’t realized that Zee had calmed down during our discussion until he got angry again.

“Yes,” Zee said.

“We don’t know who that is,” Adam said. “But I am going to assume, based on the evidence that the Soul Taker is active again, that the person who killed that teenager and gave you a replacement sickle is the one who saw to it that the Soul Taker is out killing people again.”

Zee nodded. “I agree. And possibly that person is responsible for the last time, too. Before that incident, the Soul Taker was last active three centuries ago in Eastern Europe. Someone brought it from there to here.”

“Second unknown person is our current killer,” Adam said. “This killer, we think, is not a mundane person.” He glanced at me.

“Teleported,” I told Zee, making a bouncing gesture with my hand and making pop-pop sounds. “I think it might be Stefan, but something is interfering with my ability to pick up a real scent.” I got that out as if it didn’t matter to me, but Zee gave me a sharp look and Adam’s hands tightened on my shoulders.

“It could be Marsilia,” Zee said. I shouldn’t have been surprised that he knew she could teleport, but I was. “Or any of their bloodline who got that gift.”

“That’s what I said,” Adam agreed. “But I just can’t see either of them giving their minds over to an artifact, no matter how powerful. Vampires have mind magic naturally, and Marsilia and Stefan are old and powerful.”

“Agreed,” Zee said thoughtfully. “There is the possibility that the Soul Taker is being used without taking over its wielder—but then it is even less likely, because the vampires, more than any of us, do not want bad publicity. They do not want any publicity.”

I thought about my dreams. “What about torture?” I asked.

Adam caught what I meant immediately. “You mean the way Stefan showed up with gouged-out eyes.”

“Torture weakens the will,” said Zee, with more confidence than I wanted to see in someone I considered a friend. He nodded slowly. “That might do it, but it would take weeks, if not longer, to break the shields that master vampires can call to protect their minds.”

“Could the artifact give someone the ability to teleport?” I asked. “I mean could we be looking at a normal human given magical powers by the artifact?”

Zee shrugged. “If I had ever held the Soul Taker in my own hands, I could tell you. My own weapons can make an unskilled warrior more skilled. Give them strength, endurance, and other things.” He frowned. “Other fae artificers have done more, cloaks that make one invisible, or change the wearer into a stag or a horse.” He held up a finger, asking us to wait while he thought. Eventually he shook his head. “Giving its wielder more power is not something the stories credit the Soul Taker with. It is possible, but unlikely.” Seeing my face, he said, “It is an uncommon gift, but there are fae who can teleport, as well as a few other beings. Uncle Mike will know.”

“Okay. Please let me know if he comes up with some possibilities,” I said. Then I altered the subject. “Whether it has anything to do with the Soul Taker or not, something is going on with the seethe. Stefan is missing. We are looking for Wulfe, too. And Larry says that all of the vampires in the seethe got into fancy cars and drove away, leaving the seethe empty.”

“Larry thinks that Wulfe is shaking things up,” Adam said. “I don’t disagree with him. If Bonarata weren’t in Italy, I’d look to him—though he has used Wulfe to work his mischief before.” He shook his head. “But I’m not sure that it is connected with the Soul Taker.”

“Except,” Zee said softly, looking at me, “that Mercy tells us that the Soul Taker noticed her and attached itself when she broke through the spell woven by the spider-fae at Stefan’s house.”