*
Standing in the watch room of the old lighthouse, Tanner scraped his hand over his jaw. He wasn’t by any means squeamish, and he’d seen worse sights than this. But there was nonetheless something very disturbing about seeing a dead body propped up against a wall, his legs crossed, drenched in blood, holding his eyes, tongue, and ears in his hands.
Outside, sea birds squawked, the wind bounced off the walls, and the rotating light at the top of the lighthouse flashed continuously. Inside, there was only silence as he and the two other demons in the room circled and studied the body.
“Fuck,” Tanner finally said.
“Yeah, fuck,” said Knox.
“How long has he been dead?” Tanner asked Levi since, as a reaper, the sentinel had a certain affinity for the deceased.
Crouched beside the corpse, Levi replied, “Just over an hour. It wasn’t the wounds or blood loss that killed him. He died of a heart attack—one that was brought on by preternatural causes.” The reaper looked from Knox to Tanner. “Know anyone who has that ability?”
“No,” said Knox.
Tanner shook his head, staring once more at the body. Harry Tomlinson had been a member of their lair whose specialty lay in espionage, which was why he’d acted as a spy for Knox. He’d telepathically contacted the Prime a few hours ago, asking Knox to meet him at the lighthouse—it was the same location they always met at when Harry had important information to share.
After his business meeting was over, Knox had pyroported himself, Tanner, and Levi to the lighthouse … only to discover Harry dead. Knox’s ability to travel by fire was a secret that only a select few people knew of. Although Tanner acknowledged that it was smart to keep people guessing just how powerful you were, he knew it would drive him crazy to mostly use normal means of transport if he could just pyroport wherever he wanted.
His inner demon, by nature, was no more patient than Tanner. Right then, it didn’t want to hang around the lighthouse. It itched to track down whoever had ravaged Harry this way—hunting was what the hound did best.
“This was done to Harry before his death,” said Tanner. “The scent of his blood is strongly tainted by pain, fear, fury, and helplessness.”
“How many other people were here?” asked Knox.
“Just one. A demon. Their scent … it’s earthy but wrong.”
“What does that mean?”
“Some people have scents that are floral. Others are fruity. Or sweet. Or spicy. Or earthy. The list goes on. This demon smells of autumn leaves and sandalwood, but there’s a single, small note to their scent that’s off. Like … have you ever tasted something you usually enjoy but, for some reason, it just doesn’t taste right? Like someone put a spice in it that didn’t need to be there, or one of the ingredients was stale? This scent isn’t right. Almost seems … unauthentic.”
“Like someone concealed their scent—either through an ability or with magick—by covering it with a fake one, only they didn’t cover it well enough?”
“Yes, exactly.”
Knox’s brow furrowed. “You don’t scent Sloan here?”
“No.”
Sloan Monroe was the newly appointed Prime of a Washington lair. He was also a slick motherfucker who’d repeatedly tried to buy the Underground from Knox. The subterranean version of the Las Vegas strip was every demon’s idea of paradise, and it brought in a shitload of money every year.
Sloan hadn’t been the first to try to buy it from Knox, and he wouldn’t be the last. But he was the only demon who’d tried to recreate it. Sloan had built it in Washington, not far from the lighthouse, and he’d named it the Haunt—how original.
Knox didn’t care about the competition, but he did care that Sloan attempted to coax demons to relocate their businesses from the Underground to the Haunt. That was something they’d learned from Harry, who Knox had planted in Sloan’s lair to keep an eye on things.
It was reasonably common practice for Primes to plant spies in other lairs. Knowledge was power, after all—demons were all about power. In fact, Sloan had planted two spies in Knox’s lair. The dumb assholes believed they were flying under Knox’s radar, and they were blissfully unaware that they were only ever fed false info.
Whenever a Prime discovered a plant, they tended to toss them out of the lair and warn their Prime not to try that shit again. Sometimes they also beat the plant for good measure. They didn’t mutilate and kill them.
Tanner slipped his hands in his pockets. “I wonder how Sloan discovered that Harry was a plant.”
“Can we be sure that that’s why Harry was killed?” asked Levi. “I mean, cutting out his tongue, slicing off his ears, and gouging out his eyes seems something of an overreaction.”
“Yeah, but it fits,” said Tanner. “Seems like a punishment to me. He cut out his tongue for blabbing, removed his ears for eavesdropping, and scooped out his eyes for spying.”