Something In The Water: Cast In Shadow, #2

Something In The Water

Phaedra Weldon

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Published by Caldwell Press

Cover Design © 2017 by Lou

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Copyright © 2017 by Phaedra Weldon

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Chapter 1

SUMMARY

My black market blood dealer, Emmet Carson, is dead. So are three other people, all found in Lake Lanier. No one had to hire me to unravel this mystery. This was personal.

Or it was, before the Head of the Talmadge Family, Jedediah, requested my presence once again. This time a magic cup is missing, stolen out of the New York safe house, a place that holds Night Walker artifacts. It was stolen by another Ghoul, and Jedediah wants me to find it. After all, she and I were in the same club of previously owned humans.

Throw in a Vampiric Countess, a sleeping Ancient and a myth even I didn't believe existed, not to mention, there is something in the water...

Chapter 2

One

I have no idea who she is, I said for the hundredth time and crossed my arms over my chest. We're in a morgue…I wouldn't be surprised if she's some ghost wandering around.

But she wasn't. That much I knew. I just didn't know how to explain it to my colleagues.

Detectives Julie Wallace and Luke Meehan stood in the new M.E.'S office with me, looking at the Polaroids I'd just taken of Emmet Carson's body. Yes. Polaroids. The kind you have to peel the back off of. Why old style?

Cause that's just how I roll.

My name's Renwick Grainger. I'm a Photographer, among other things. I tentatively take pictures for a little known part of the local police department called SIS, Special Investigations Service. And when I say little known, I really mean, little known. As in I think about five of us know it exists. Me, Julie, Luke, the captain who runs the show and my best friend, Aberdeen Windersham.

No joke. And you might have thought my name was odd.

Now, to catch everyone up: I'm a Ghoul, this means I was created by a Vampire, or a Night Walker as they prefer to be called, in 1964. It was at that moment I stopped aging. So I look like I'm in my twenties even though I'm really not. I am also a Chevalier, which was a type of particularly trained Ghoul—picture Special Forces for Night Walkers—who served and catered to the vampire community at large. I protected my Maker with my life when I was alive as I was compelled by her blood to do everything she ever told me to do.

And I mean…everything.

My Maker is long dead, and with no Childers still living, I am a free Ghoul. No master. This fascinates and irritates the Night Walkers to no end because by their own law, of which I know very little about, Ghouls are no longer permitted. Especially Chevaliers. There's a story there. I just wish someone would tell me what it was.

My existence and this law places several stresses on me to survive. One of those stresses is to continue living as a Ghoul.

One of the perks, as I mentioned, was I no longer aged. But as a Ghoul I'm not permanently immortal. I can be killed if I bleed out. I can be decapitated just like any other blood sucker. And I can break things although I do heal pretty fast. The thing that makes this possible is the Night Walker blood inside of me. If I had to get down to technicalities, I'm dead. But not dead. I have to drink a Night Walker's blood every 30 days to keep myself alive. If I miss even one month then all the years of my life will catch up to me in an instant. So imagine me abruptly becoming a man in his mid- seventies. The body can't handle that kind of trauma. Death is the usual outcome for Ghouls who miss a feeding. And I've been told it's a very painful death.

Imagine how ugly that death would be in a hundred years?

Insta-dust.

Julie, Luke and the Captain know I'm different, and that I'm somehow tied to Night Walkers. They don't know I'm a Ghoul. I'm not even sure that term is known these days. But the fewer who do know the more comfortable I feel.

Now, my BF Aberdeen isn't human either. He was human at one point, like myself, but not anymore. He's a Gargoyle. And before anyone thinks they know what a Gargoyle is, let me correct you now.

You don't.

Yes; Gargoyles are made of stone.

Yes; Gargoyles protect buildings most notably churches.

No; Gargoyles are not captured demons made to serve God. They were humans, blessed and cursed to serve God on Earth. Aberdeen had been a Priest. A Cardinal…I think. I really need to clarify that with him one day. His Order was one formed to eradicate the scourge of Vampires and demons in the world. Until one day the leader of the order betrayed them, especially Aberdeen, and cursed him as a Gargoyle. He'd become stone then, a figure atop one of the most famous churches in the world unable to move.

Until I came along and freed him. He's been my companion ever since. Companion, not lover. I'm into girls. Not guys.

No shipping please.

Time to get back to the present.

The man I was taking pictures of was the former Coroner. A man not quite human, though I'd never been able to figure out what he was. And he was my supplier of black market Night Walker blood. Remember my addiction, so to speak? It wasn't like the stuff was in the local convenience store. I had to get it somewhere. And Emmet was it. Till a few weeks ago when he went missing. I'd ordered from him before he went MIA, and I found the order and took it at a moment of need. IE — bad shape.

That was nearly three weeks ago. And now his body had turned up in Lake Lanier, one of the now four bodies dredged out of the water in a month. The media was having a field day with this story. The police believed they had caught the actual strangler a week earlier, a man named Mitchell Graybeard. I'd half expected him to look like Gandalf when he showed up on the news with a name like that. But he was young, maybe my age when I was made. And he was a land owner in the area. Owned several of the houses on the shore near where all the bodies were found.

Sheila Elliston, the former day-time M.E., had judged time of death after Graybeard was arrested. This had caused a firestorm with the media. Luke and Julie called me in minutes after they knew the findings, before it was announced. I was more worried that Sheila would find out the guy was not human, and if she went public with her findings she'd end up a target of every unconventional conventional out there who wanted to keep their existence a secret.

But so far, nothing had flagged.

I took pictures for them since the suspect wasn't the suspect anymore and I had yielded results in the past.

That's when the girl kept showing up in my Polaroids. I took these when I spoke to the victim, hoping the spirit would give me a clue to what happened to them. And Polaroids worked best at this.

Except when I peeled them all apart and She Who Is Not Known showed up. In all of them. Which was a rarity.

It was also a rarity that I let others see these initial pictures. I liked doing this by myself because sometimes what they show me…isn't for the living. But given we all knew Emmet, letting Julie and Luke see them didn't seem to be a problem.

Until the girl.

She was exotic looking. Dark hair. Tanned skin. Dark eyes. It was hard to see the details in her face because the images sort of blurred. They usually didn't do that. And we couldn't really see what she was wearing. It was more of an impression of her.

Regardless of who or why she was there, my experience said the ghostly images were either that of the dead person, or the one that killed them. Since they didn't look anything like Emmet—we all assumed this was the killer.

The door opened and Aberdeen stepped in. Julie smiled at him, Luke nodded and I gave him a look of HELP ME!

He was dressed in his usual Professor Clothing, as I called them. Khaki pants, loafers (Italian, of course), shirt, suit jacket with patches on the elbows and a soft blue scarf. He really looked the part when he dressed like this, and the fact his cover (and his real job) was that he was a Professor of Ancient Studies or something at a local college, helped immensely. They knew I was strange but none of them knew what Aberdeen was.

Other than a dead ringer for Jeremy Irons.

Hey Aberdeen, Luke said as he stepped back so the taller, thinner man could take a look at the pictures spread out on the desk. You see her?

Indeed I do. He looked at me. Who is she?

I threw up my hands. Why does everyone think I know who that is?

You took the picture.

I glared at him as I put my hands on my hips.

Eh, just calm down, Ren, Julie said as she leaned over the photos. I've seen some of your Polaroids and they're usually not this vague.

No… Aberdeen said. They're not. It's almost as if she doesn't exist from the waist down.

Like a ghost? Luke piped up.

No. The Gargoyle moved around the desk as he tilted his head this way and that. Is she supposed to be his killer?

We don't know, I said.

That's odd. Wait, he stepped back and put his hand on my shoulder. You don't think this was Emmet's secret, do you? What made him a little off? He was really a woman and this is the true look of his spirit?

I rolled my eyes and pushed his hand away. Get serious, please. Emmet wasn't a woman. I'm not seeing Emmet's spirit at all. Just hers. And I just don't sense that she's his killer either.

Then why would she be in the pictures? Julie asked.

I scratched at my beard. No idea. Unless it's a message? Funny thing is—she never answered any of my questions either.

When I take these pictures, I go through a litany of questions. The same ones every time and then snap a picture after each question and make a note what the question was. Things like, who killed you? Did you see them? Can you tell me anything? The spirits don't really answer but sometimes they point or make gestures.

Not this spirit. She was standing right beside Emmet's body the whole time just…staring down at him. And given he'd been in the lake for a while, Emmet's earthly remains weren't in good shape.

Aberdeen crossed his arms over his chest. Is there a report on Mr. Carson?

Yeah, Luke said as he offered a folder to Aberdeen. His death matches the same evidence left behind with the other three bodies.

Such as?

Julie answered. Drowning. She smirked. But they all have this, and she moved one of my shots closer, the one that had a good profile of Emmet's face and shoulders. With her pinkie, she gestured around the neck. All of them have this strange looking banding around their necks. Sheila thought it was some kind of restraint.

Not some kind of garrote? Aberdeen said.

No. Luke sighed. It's marked more like something stiff. Like a collar. See how there are defining lines with about two inches apart?

I bent down and looked at the photo and absently put my own hand to my neck. I recognized the markings immediately because I'd had them for a while early on in my Chevalier training. It is a collar. Like an old slave collar. I pointed out the marks. Those marks, the ones above and below, are where the edges of the metal cut into the flesh.

You seem pretty sure, Julie said and I felt her eyes on me.

I am. I straightened and held out my hand for the report in Aberdeen's hand. I scanned the report, and noticed something very…odd. Gross, and odd. It says… I looked at Aberdeen. You see this?

"Yes I