The Soul Healer (18 page)

“Do you think Kain will come eat with us?” I asked in hopes of keeping him awake. I didn’t want to be the only one who had to suffer through Nina’s early morning cheerfulness.

“No,” he answered,
his eyes still closed. “He doesn’t live here. His parents are loaded; he has an apartment somewhere… Lucky bastard…”

Lucky bastard indeed. I wondered if he could smuggle me out of here—but with the way he went on about favors, he’d probably make me his slave for life as my way of repaying him. Yeah, never mind…

A few minutes later, Nina slid a plate loaded with scrambled eggs and toast in front of me, and my stomach let out a happy growl. I dug in, thoroughly enjoying my meal. Philip didn’t know what he was missing! And when she handed me a mug of steaming hot coffee? Forget it. I felt like a human being again.

“All we need is some cake, and this would be the perfect meal ever,” I said.

Sitting across from me, Nina laughed. “Do you eat cake all the time?”

“Cake, cookies, cupcakes.” I shrugged. “As long as it’s dessert, I’ll eat it.”

“How are you not fat?” Philip asked, his voice muffled.

Nina gasped. “Phil, you never say that to a girl! Even if you’re gay!”

I had been busy looking for my fork so I could stab him in the shoulder, but I froze at her words, letting out a huge, obnoxious snort. Nina caught my eye and began laughing as well.

Philip lifted his head and stared at us blearily. “Shut up.”

I shoved my mug of coffee in front of him. “Enough with the attitude. Drink.”

He eyed it. “You didn’t poison it, did you?”

“For what, calling me fat? I would never.” I gave him a sickening sweet smile and he shifted uncomfortably.

“I didn’t call you fat!” He sipped the coffee before proceeding to drown the entire thing, much to my outrage. I hadn’t told him he could
finish
it!

“Please tell me there’s more coffee,” I begged Nina. She hooked a thumb over her shoulder, pointing to the instant coffee machine. Reclaiming my mug, I dashed over and grabbed the pot. If Philip wanted more, he’d have to get it himself; I needed at least two cups to get me going this early in the morning. After adding milk and sugar, I leaned aga
inst the counter and asked, “So what are we doing today? More research?”

Philip groaned. “Are you really trying to kill me? Seriously, was that your goal when you woke up? See how much you can torture Phil before he breaks?”

“No, my goal was to go back to sleep, but someone stole my pillow and made me get out bed,” I said.

Nina smiled, clearly immune to my
snarkiness. “Why don’t we do something cool before heading to the library?”

“Yeah, like what?” I asked. I was a little afraid to find out what she considered cool. Dressing up in matching outfits? Dyeing our hair pink?

Her dark eyes glittered. “Want to go check out the autopsy room?”

Chapter Twenty-eight

I had just taken another sip of my coffee and I choked, half-expecting the hot liquid to come shooting out of my nose. I obviously needed to get my ears cleaned because there was no way she had just said—

“The autopsy room?” Philip repeated (guess my hearing was okay). He wrinkled his nose. “Why?”

“What the hell is the autopsy room?” I blurted out. “I mean, besides the obvious. What are you dissecting?”

Please don’t say demons, please don’t say demons.

“Demons!” Nina said, clapping her hands like a little kid
who had just been told she could have a lollipop after dinner. “It’s really awesome! They’ve got the bodies all laid out with their stomachs open so you can see their guts and stuff.”

“How is that awesome?” I asked. Awesome would probably be the last word I would ever use to describe that. Disgusting, yes. Gross, absolutely. The stuff of nightmares, oh yeah. And the smell. I couldn’t even imagine the smell.

But at the same time, I was a little bit intrigued. After Rafe and Evan killed the demons, they bagged them up and…that was it. I never knew what happened next. And suddenly, I wanted to know. I set down my empty coffee mug. “I’m in.”

Philip’s eyes bugged out while Nina pumped a fist in the air and cheered. “Are you serious? You want to see dead demons?”

“I’ve seen plenty of dead, headless demons,” I told him. “But what happens to them afterwards? How do they end up here?”

“
Oooooh, I can tell you!” Nina linked arms with me, pulling me to the door. “These are demons we’ve fought here, in Manhattan. We bring them back to study, see if there are any traces of magic left on their bodies.”

“You can trace magic?”

“Uh-huh!” The words poured out of her, as if she couldn’t contain her excitement over sharing this stuff with a Silver Moon newbie. “All magic leaves a trace, and we can use that magic to find the sorcerer who summoned the demon. And then—” Nina sliced a finger over her throat and I winced.

“Really? You kill humans, too?” I actually shouldn’t have been that surprised; Rafe had killed Davenport, after all. But Davenport was part-demon, so it wasn’t the same. Or was it?

We reached the elevator and Nina hit the up arrow. Philip, to my surprise, had followed us. He had his cell phone out and was typing out a text to someone. “If you summon a demon, you’re guilty and you die,” Nina said. “There’re no trials or anything. It’s kill on sight.”             

I felt uneasy. “That’s pretty harsh, isn’t it?”

She didn’t look bothered by it. “Demons kill people. When you summon one, you aren’t expecting to invite it for tea, you know? You want it to do bad things. So we need to stop these sorcerers from summoning more, and to also send the message that Silver Moon should be feared.” The elevator arrived, and we got in.

“Is it hard to summon a demon?” I asked as the elevator took us to the fifth floor. Oh, gross. I just realized the autopsy room was on the floor below ours. Okay, I was never going to fall asleep again, thinking about dead
demons
underneath me.

“Extremely,” Philip said, sliding his phone into his pocket. “You have to be highly, highly skilled.”

“Could Evan or Kain—”

“No.” Philip shook his head. “You need to specialize in dark magic, and you need years of practice and experience before you can even attempt the spell. Most sorcerers end up dying, you know. The demon crosses the
sacred circle meant to keep them at bay and eats the sorcerer instead of obeying his commands.”

“Ugh,” I said.

He shrugged. “You have to be a moron to even consider summoning one. It’s not worth it.”

“And yet sorcerers keep trying,” I pointed out. “And there’s a lot of them, right? You wouldn’t need a whole organization to stop them if only a handful of people attempted it.”

“Well, demons can summon other demons,” Philip said.

I blinked. “Excuse me, what?”

“You didn’t know that?” Nina asked as we reached our floor and the doors slid open.

“Uh, no, Rafe neglected to tell me that part,” I said. Nina exited first, and we followed, me and Philip walking side by side. I directed my questions to him. “Is that common? For demons to summon other demons?”

“Oh, yeah.” He looked grim. “They’re first brought here, and then they decide to call their friends over. It’s a giant demon party—where the humans are appetizers.”             

Oh my god, that was the most awful thing I had ever heard. No wonder Rafe had kept that particular little fact to himself
.
I’m going to give him hell for keeping that from me!
“But shouldn’t the world be overrun with demons by now, if that’s the case?”

“It’s just as hard for demons to summon as it is for sorcerers,” Nina explained. “If it wasn’t, then yes, you’d be right. There
would
be more demons than humans.”             

“But because it’s such a hard spell, there’s a little bit of a balance,” Philip said. “But Silver Moon still needs to hunt constantly, to make sure that balance continues to exist. Each time we screw up, miss a demon, that’s a chance for another one
to be brought here.” He paused and turned his face away from me. “That’s why the hunters here hated Rafe. He can’t See demons when they’re glamoured, and every missed opportunity is another step back for Silver Moon.”

Maybe that’s why Rafe hadn’t told me. Because he was embarrassed and ashamed for holding Silver Moon back. I squeezed my hands into fists. “That’s crap and anyone who believes that is going to get a beating from me.”

Philip held his hands up. “Hey, I was on his side, right from the start. Rafe is a damn good hunter, one of the best. Anyone who said otherwise was just jealous.”

“And a giant ass,” I said.

“That too. What did Kain say yesterday? A douche-dick?” Philip couldn’t even say the words without laughing.

I, on the other hand, remained sober. “Did Kain believe that, too? That Rafe was holding Silver Moon back?”

He sighed heavily. “I told you, the only reason he teased Rafe was because he wanted to fit in. I don’t think—he’s not really the type to believe bullshit like that, you know?”

“But you don’t know for sure what he thought.”

“I…” Philip trailed off helplessly. “I want to believe it’s true.”

But maybe Philip was so blinded by his feelings for Kain, he couldn’t see the actual truth. If Kain really felt that way about Rafe, then there was no way we could be friends. Even if he had helped me out yesterday. Hearing this new bit of information about Rafe filled me with both sadness and anger. I was also hurt that he had felt he couldn’t share it with me. We told each other everything, or at least, I had thought we did… Why hadn’t he said anything? Did he honestly expect me to start judging him? My stomach clenched painfully. Did he really think that little of me?

“Are you okay?” Philip asked in a whisper as he touched me lightly on the arm. “Sorry if I said anything wrong. It must be hard, hearing about what Rafe had to go through when he was here.”

But how was it any different from Philip being teased for being gay? I managed to give him a small smile. “No, it’s fine. I just—I need to see him, Phil. And soon. There’s so much we need to talk about.”

His face was troubled as we joined Nina in front of a huge steel door, but he didn’t say anything. And what could he say? He was sorry that he wanted me to bring his dead best friend back to life? How could I blame him for that? If something happened to Penny or Rafe, and there was a way to bring them back, wouldn’t I do whatever I could to make that come true?

Wouldn’t we all?

“Ready?” Nina asked, oblivious to the tension that hung over us like a storm cloud. Without waiting for an answer, she pushed the heavy door open.

Chapter Twenty-nine

A blast of cold air greeted us, and I wrapped my arms around myself, shivering. Nina fumbled for a moment before locating the light switch and flipping it on. Rows of fluorescent lights flickered on, filling the room with a humming noise.

Nina had no problem skipping inside, but I remained where I was, one hand on the doorframe. The room was long and narrow, with operating tables lined up in two neat rows. The ones closest to me were empty, but farther back I saw two with sheets over them, hiding whatever horror lied beneath.

“Are you sure you want to see this?” Philip asked. He hadn’t gone in either—in fact, from the expression on his face, he looked like he’d rather be anywhere but here. “There are other things you can see, you know. We have a rec room with games and TVs… We could watch a movie?”

I laughed quietly to myself. As if my life was that normal that I could just sit around and watch movies all day. No, if I wasn’t here, finding out what Silver Moon did to dead demons, then I would be in the library, searching for obscure references to Soul Healers.

Hmm, yeah, my choices sucked. And what about the fact that I was
choosing
to see dissected demons? What did that say about me?

I was seriously messed up. Like, big time.

Well, at least I wasn’t dancing around the room like Nina currently was, her thigh-high boots clomping against the floor. I guess I wasn’t as messed up as I could be, right?

Wondering if I was making the worst mistake of my life (would I ever be able to fall asleep again after seeing a chopped up demon?), I stepped into the room. The temperature dropped about a hundred degrees, and I pulled my sleeves over my hands before stuffing them under my armpits. “Argh, I need a jacket,” I complained, my nose already going numb.

“I’d give you my hoodie except I already did,” Philip replied. “Where is it, by the way? You didn’t lose it, did you?”

I waved a hand. “It’s back in my room, somewhere. I think…”

“You
think
?”

“Guys,
hurry up!” Nina called impatiently. She was jumping up and down next to one of the covered demon bodies. “This is so cool. I can’t wait to see it.”

I exchanged a look with Philip. “Um, her enthusiasm over seeing a dead demon is seriously disturbing, right?”