Soul Market - Shadow Justice - Book 2
Soul Market - Shadow Justice - Book 2
D.N. Leo
Contents
Exclusive Invitation
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Part II
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
SHADOW JUSTICE TRILOGY
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Part I
Chapter 1
The theater exploded with a standing ovation. From under the bright spotlight on the stage of the famous Sydney Opera House, she smiled at the audience. They obviously admired her. She wondered whether it was the allure of the limelight that made these people applaud whoever stood on the stage, playing the lead role in a famous play, or whether they truly prized her talent as a performer. She doubted it was the latter.
Other cast members had joined her on the stage to say goodbye to the night’s audience. Although The Woman in the Asylum had been one of the most successful and longest-running shows, no one knew what would happen with the next performance. It was the nature of the trade. The political and cultural landscape on this planet had changed so swiftly in the last decade. Everyone knew they should feel fortunate for what they’d been able to enjoy up to this point.
The curtain finally closed, irrespective of the amount of applause they had received.
She turned to go to her changing room.
“Casey,” a voice called from behind.
“Yes, Richard,” she answered without looking back. Richard was her talent manager and the director of the theater company. He was also the only one who called her by her first name.
He approached her. Under the dim lights of the backstage, he looked quite attractive. He was in his mid-fifties but could have passed for forty. Formidable, tall, and authoritative with a deep voice, Casey thought he’d have made a good performer. But he’d chosen business over art.
“This is our last show here. People would appreciate it if you gave the interview in your costume.”
She smiled. “By people, I take it you mean the press?”
He smiled back. “No, the press isn’t important. Your fans are.”
“Indeed. They pay our bills.” She nodded. “All right.” She gestured up and down her body. “I’ll hang around in this very comfortable outfit for a little longer.” The last scene had been a war scene, and she was attired in armor not designed for comfort. She frowned. “What else, Richard? What’s bothering you?”
He paused then shook his head. “Nothing.” He chuckled. “It’s nothing…it’s silly,” he muttered mostly to himself and turned to walk away.
“You’re worried about it, aren’t you?” she asked at his back.
Richard turned around. “About what?”
She approached him and touched his lapel. “The myth. Next week is the birthday of this theatrical company. And not only a birthday. It’s a centenary.”
“It was before our time, Casey. Plus, as you said, it’s a myth.”
“So did you think making me stay in this stage armor would somehow protect me?”
“Are you insane?”
“It’s not the press. It’s not the fans. I saw you ordering the records of the company and truckloads of books about its history last week. Did you just suddenly have an urge to find out what happens to this company every hundred years?”
Richard whirled around. “That’s ridiculous, Casey.”
“Really?” She raised an eyebrow. “All right. I’ll take this off then.” She tugged at her breastplate.
“Okay, I give up. Yes, you can take that costume off. But can you please be careful?”
“Careful of what? Dying a violent death?”
“It might be a myth, but it’s not a joke. What happened before happened to lead performers.” He narrowed his eyes. “So you knew this, and you still joined the company? You joined before me.”
“I didn’t know anything before this. I saw you digging for info last week, so I sneaked in and read the stuff in your office.”
He nodded. “So you don’t believe it. You think it’s a myth. Every hundred years, there have been accidents. Lead cast members have died tragic deaths. No one noticed because of the large interval between them.”
“Why did you notice?”
“I just had a hunch.”
She laughed. “You should never do serious business on a hunch.”
He shook his head. “It was really a feeling. I don’t know. I’ve just sensed some unusual, dark, and spooky aura around the place in the last few weeks. I’m not superstitious. But it just felt as if the place was haunted.”
She smiled. “Might be you’re reading too much into the current play.”
He nodded. “Maybe. But the play has been performed for a long time. The spooky aura has been here for only a few weeks. Why now?”
She shrugged. “I didn’t know you were that sensitive to the ambiance of the theater.”
“It’s not the ambiance, Casey. It’s the aura…”
She looked up, and from behind him and above, she swore she saw a shadow. A string of rope suddenly broke loose and hung down, and a stage light rail slid out of place slightly. She knew the rope was going to snap, and the steel rail would then drop down behind Richard. If she pushed him out of the way, she would be the one copping the hit. But if she didn’t, it would be his head that sustained the impact.
Chapter 2
Leon opened his eyes and found himself unable to move any part of his body. But he could feel the blood running through his veins, and his heart was still beating. He was alive—just not quite as lively as he’d like. He had been paralyzed as soon as the gigantic black cat bit him.
He recalled the incident in the woods now. Zach had gone after Mya. He had been talking to Kirra, using his limited amount of English to try to get to know her better. He knew Zach would get Mya back, and then they would go to Eudaiz together. Eudaiz was the universe in which Zach was residing.
That would mean Leon would have to leave Kirra behind. She was human and had nothing to do with any other world other than this current one she lived in. He felt a pang of unusual sensation just thinking about the fact that he might never see her again.
He wasn’t an idiot. He knew he shouldn’t think about her—a human in another world—especially when he knew nothing about her. He made a mental note to ask Mya later about human courting rituals.
He tried to move again but couldn’t. It was strange that
a bite from a cat could have such an effect. Usually, only poisonous snakes or scorpions would have venom poisonous enough to immobilize him. He was the head of the temple guard at the Babylonian court, for the Goddess’s sake. He’d give his body a bit more time to dissolve the poison before trying something else.
He heard footsteps above him and figured he must be lying in a basement of some kind. He tried to turn his head to the side to survey the area and found his neck had loosened up a bit. The footsteps above weren’t random but in rhythm, as if several people were dancing. The faint sounds of a musical instrument found its way to the basement. He squinted into the darkness and saw a line of light as if the floor had a crack which ran into a corner.
He heard laughter and maybe singing. He recognized the language. It was English. Similar to what Mya spoke. He tried to inch his shoulders up and found that his right shoulder moved. He smiled and tried his legs.
A beam of light poured in from a far corner as if someone had pushed the door in for a few seconds and then slammed it closed. A male and female voice murmured something. They laughed. She giggled, and it sounded as if they were kissing. He heard the sound of fabric tearing, and then the woman moaned in pleasure.
“Are you sure it’s going to work? He was supposed to announce it now,” the man said.
“Yes, of course it’ll work. Have I ever failed in any of your plans?”
“No. You’re very resourceful.”
“Is that all?”
“And smart. And beautiful…”
The woman chuckled. “And what do I get for having all of those good qualities?”
“Anything you want. I promised you half of the company. What else do you want?”
Silence.
“Come on, honey, don’t give me that look. I’m married.”
“For money!”
“Yes, but I still need that money. Can you be a bit more patient? Richard will announce his resignation. He’ll go away with that silly actress. And the rest will be history.”
Leon wriggled his body hard to see how much movement he’d regained. He tried to clear his throat to see if he could make a sound. He could feel it—his voice was coming back to him.
Then he felt a puff of hot air blowing into his face. He turned and saw the face of the black cat right next to him. Its eyes glowed green, and its teeth were bared. Its lips rubbed right against his face. And if he wasn’t mistaken, he heard it growl in Babylonian, “Hush, or be dead.”
Leon tried harder to move, inching his body away from the cat. Silent, my backside! he thought. I’d rather be dead than feeling your disgusting breath blowing into my face!
His legs moved an inch or so.
His voice came back.
He shouted for help. But before the sound escaped his throat, the cat sank its teeth into his shoulder. He blacked out again.
Chapter 3
Mya felt a warm sensation wash over her when Zach embraced her from behind. He whispered into her ear. “You’re brooding, my deity. Don’t worry about the jar or the potion. We’ll get it and bring it to the Goddess. We’ll pay off all of your debts. You’ll never ever have to think about Ishtar again.”
She turned and looked at him. There was no natural sunlight in the room because she had closed the door and all the windows in their cabin at the campsite to avoid any unwelcome animal guests. Under the dim light of the table lamp, she could still see Zach’s soft green eyes. They always warmed a shade whenever he looked at her, even before they had been in a relationship. He didn’t even try to hide it. He must know the effect of that look on the female species. She could only hope he didn’t use it on every female he came across.
She played with a strand of his dark brown hair. “How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Not a hundred percent…”
She frowned. “Get more rest then. We can’t go anywhere if you’re not a hundred percent.” She silently cursed the female lynx Elanora. The nasty, sadistic woman had peered into Zach’s mind, read his fatal point, pointed the gun at her to distract Zach, and attacked him where he was most vulnerable.
Well, not right at the point below his shoulder on his back, but close enough. Mya shuddered. If Elanora had meant to kill Zach, he would have been dead.
He kissed her on the lips and then gently eased away. “Let’s go.”
“No, I’ll go find Leon. You stay here until you’re a hundred percent again.”
He chuckled. “Why would you want me to deteriorate?”
“What are you talking about, Zach?”
“I’m at a hundred and fifty percent capacity.” He grinned.
She punched his chest. “Then let’s go.” She scrambled up, but he pulled her back down into his arms.
“Calm down, my deity. You can’t do anything good in the state you’re in now.”
“What state?” she said, on the verge of switching on her deity vision to check on Leon. She had refrained from doing so because Zach wasn’t in any condition to be left alone, and if she found out Leon needed help, there would be nothing she could do. “Where’s Kirra?” She spat out the question for no particular reason. It was just there, in the middle of her thought process for some reason. Well, it wasn’t much of a process, but at least it was something.
“Your mind is clogging up again, Mya. It happens whenever you panic.”
She pushed at him. “Don’t talk like you know me so well. Not long ago, you were still calling me Professor Portman.”
“And which part of that title isn’t correct?”
“The part—”
He interrupted her speech by kissing her until she melted in his arms.
“There. You’re calm now,” he said. “I know you’re worried about Leon. But he’s fine.” He glanced at his wrist unit. “And I know you want to switch on your deity mode so you can check on him. But I don’t want you to do that—I don’t like the look on your face when you’re in deity mode. It weirds me out.” He tapped his finger on the screen of his wrist unit. “The unit suggests that Leon’s vitals are healthy. Meaning he’s alive and well. Not only that, I know his location.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why didn’t you say so?”
“You didn’t ask. Plus, I was busy kissing you.” He grinned again.
“How can you be so sure he’s fine? How can your unit tell? Is it psychic?”
Zach chuckled. “One psychic in this room is enough. I gave him some of my eudqi and appointed him as my successor, remember? So I got a sample of his blood and entered his data into the system. They track him, of course.”
She scrambled out of the bed. “You track him because eudqi is such an important energy source to Eudaiz. If anything happens to Leon, you don’t want your adversaries to sample the substance. You’d have to kill him—or so you’ve said.”
Zach stood up. “Yes, there’s that. But I do care for Leon. He’s my successor, Mya.”
“Really? So if you find Leon, and his blood or the eudqi has been taken, would you kill him?”
“If it’s already been taken, what good would it do to kill him? If I did have to kill him, it would be before the eudqi was taken. But that’s beside the point. There are many ways to take this. Why do you have to take it the wrong way?”
Mya waved her arms in the air. “I don’t know.” She whirled around. Something wasn’t right. Something was ticking her off. Calm down, she told herself.
Zach grabbed at her shoulders. “Mya, listen to me. You’re agitated and snappish. What’s happening?”
“I don’t know. This…only happens when…” She looked at him. “Oh no… It happens when someone I’m supposed to save is on my list, but I couldn’t get to my vision to check…”
Zach blew out a breath. “Okay, then check. I really do hate to see you with those blank eyes, but I would rather see that than you whirling around not knowing what to do.”
“What if it’s Leon? What if it’s Leon that I have to save, but it’s too late because I’m here!”
&nb
sp; “I told you he’s fine. Alive. If he’s now on your list to save, that’s great because we’re going to go and get him anyway. You, he, and I will go back to Eudaiz. Everything will be fine.” He approached and held her shoulders. “Now let’s check so that you can be sure and calm down.” He smiled at her.
She nodded and was just about to switch on her deity vision.
“Knock knock!” Kirra’s voice interrupted from outside the room.
Mya stopped and looked up at Zach. He gazed into her eyes. He knew her rather well now, and she didn’t need to explain.
“It’s Kirra. She triggered your anxiety, didn’t she?” Zach asked.
“I’m afraid so.” She hadn’t had a chance to check her vision, but as soon as the name came into her mind, her agitation eased. That was a sign that she had gotten to the right subject, the one who needed her attention. All she had to do now was to switch on the vision to find out the cause of death.
“Trouble,” Mya muttered.
“If she’s on the list of people you must save, then we will save her. How is this any different from the thousands of other lives you have saved over the years?”
“There are two lists. I’m supposed to save those on one of the lists, but I’m not allowed to save the people on the destined-to-die list. That’s part of the fine print in the Goddess’s agreement.”