Chapter One Snippet

Present Day

The old lady next to me in the window seat died somewhere over the Atlantic. I know because she told me.

“Symon Bryson.”

The husky voice surprised me. I hadn’t spoken to anyone either at Dublin airport or on the flight. I first looked to my right the see the well-built, mustached man sleeping next to me. By the number of empty little bottles of vodka on his tray table, I guessed that his sleep wasn’t due to exhaustion.

“Symon Bryson. Look at me.”

I turned slowly to look at the old lady. She was staring at me through milky-white eyes, smiling.

“Who are you?” I asked cautiously.

Most people would freak out if a corpse suddenly reanimated and wanted to have a nice chat with them. Not me.

I’d seen worse.

“Who I am matters not,” croaked the old woman.

“Yoda?” I said. No one in the supernatural world of Heaven and Hell—the Shadow-world—gets pop culture references. It’s a sad commentary on the priorities of the Shadow-world.

“I have a warning for you. Fortunately this body died so I could use it to speak with you.”

“Oh goodie,” I said, sighing. “Lay it on me then.”

“Your return to Boston at this time is not happenstance.”

“Look, dead lady,” I snarled, pulling a scrap of paper from my pocket. “I’m going to see the Monsignor, find out what this telegram he sent is all about, and get the Hell back to Dublin as soon as humanly possible. Who the Hell sends a telegram in this day and age anyway?”

“You must not give in to your powers, Symon,” the creepy dead lady said. “You are the strongest Practitioner of this age. But you are undisciplined and dangerous.”

“I don’t plan on using any magic,” I said.

“You never plan it, Symon. That is your biggest problem. Let me show you what you could be.”

With that, she put a cold, dead hand on my arm and the vision began…

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