Death's Cathedral: Shadow King Series Book 2

Chapter 17: Where the Road Takes You

The brownstone building looked like every single other building on the street in which it was nestled. It was stately and quiet, and the sort of place Jacinta thought she might live in if she worked as a receptionist for some businessman in New York. She was glad she didn’t live there and didn’t have that job.

The paperwork she’d found had been well constructed to be misleading. Guthrie had been good at making a loop of dead ends. But not perfect. Every trail had a beginning, and Guthrie had one as well. The company that imported the selenium had to be registered. There was a fee associated with registering a business name, and an address needed to be provided. Guthrie’s name was on that application, and the address of the brownstone was listed alongside it. It was the oldest piece of identifying paperwork she could find—everything began there. She was parked outside the dead man’s house.

Despite the relief she felt at locating the address and the sense that she might have come to the end of this chain of weirdness involving the mystery metal, she sat in her car, eyes on the building with tension building inside of her. She had shot Guthrie herself and knew he was dead. But the lights were on in the brownstone. Someone was moving inside, their shadow cast on the curtains as they went about their business.

Did the man have a family? Did they know what he did? Do they know he’s dead? she thought.

She left the car and walked up the path to the door. There was no bell, but she knocked firmly, then took a step back and waited.

The sound of the door lock clicking open preceded the door pulling open. A short woman with gray hair pulled back in a bun stood in the doorway, eyeing Jacinta with some suspicion behind wire-rimmed glasses.

“Can I help you?” the woman asked.

Jacinta flashed her badge quickly. “Detective Perez, ma’am. Sorry to bother you. I’m looking for a man named Guthrie. Is this his address?”

The woman beamed, smiling brightly.

“Oh yes, that’s my son,” she said. A beat later, her smile slipped. “Is something the matter?”

“No, ma’am,” Jacinta lied.

“I’m afraid he’s not home, if you’re looking to ask him some questions,” his mother said.

“No ma’am, I—”

“But he’ll be home any time now, if you want to wait.”

The statement caught Jacinta off guard. “You expect him home soon?”

“Oh yes, he just ran out for a moment to get something for dinner.”

“He had been here earlier today?”

“Of course,” his mother replied. “You’re welcome to wait, inside or out is up to you.”

The woman seemed to have no idea that anything at all might be wrong.

“Thank you, I’m happy to wait,” Jacinta said, entering the house.

The woman stepped back into a hallway, giving her room to enter and then closed the door after her.

The hall led into a stairway up to the second floor, as well as a hallway that looked to end in a kitchen. There was a doorway to their immediate right, and the woman stood by it, gesturing for Jacinta to enter.

“Have a seat. Can I fix you a tea?” Guthrie’s mother asked.

Jacinta shook her head as she entered an over-decorated living room. She took a seat on an old, uncomfortable sofa, and the woman opted for a wingback chair that didn’t match.

“Is this about my son’s work?” the old woman asked. Jacinta nodded, taking in the room. There were dozens of framed photos on the walls and on shelves all over the room. Some looked to be positively ancient, while others looked much newer. She didn’t see the woman in any of them—or Guthrie, for that matter.

“Yes, actually. His shipping business,” Jacinta answered.

“He’s always on the phone or traveling. All hours of the day. I tell him to rest, but he never does,” Guthrie’s mother explained.

“Has he been doing it long?”

The old woman nodded. “Oh yes. It’s quite exciting, I have to say. He’s always bringing the most amazing things home from faraway lands.”

“I can imagine.” Jacinta smiled.

“Oh no, dear. No one can imagine,” the woman stated in a hushed tone.

Jacinta raised an eyebrow. “How do you mean?”

“Something beyond imagination,” the older woman said. The light in the room shifted, like a plane banking away from the sun. The light scanned across the room, and shadows replaced them. The clock on the wall had changed. It had been early afternoon when Jacinta arrived. Now it was evening. The sun was setting.

“What’s happening?” she asked, getting to her feet.

“You’re about to see.” The woman gave her an eerie smile. “It’s something that could change your whole world.”

The room grew colder. Jacinta’s hand went to her weapon.

“Ma’am, when do you expect your son to be home?” she asked, her eyes darting to the door and the hallway beyond.

“He’s been home for some time,” the woman replied.

The gun slipped from its holster with that quiet rustling of steel on leather. The shadows in the room grew longer.

“I’m going to need to speak to him,” Jacinta said, her gun trained on the woman as she backed towards the doorway. The shadows crept over the wingback chair, and she realized suddenly that it was empty and the woman was gone.

A voice answered her, unlike any she had ever heard before. It spoke inside her mind, and the words—if they were even words—shook the inside of her head.

Jacinta fell to her knees as the sound reverberated in her skull. It thrummed and buzzed and overwhelmed her senses. From the shadows where the woman had been sitting, something new emerged. A figure like the silhouette of a man, but was darkness upon darkness.