Twice Dead Read Online Free PDF

yet, where had I been?
    My elbows wobbled as I pushed off the ground, my palms sinking into the thick grass. I looked around. Small cement buildings surrounded me on all sides. No, not buildings.
    Sarcophaguses. Mausoleums.
    I’m in a graveyard?
    “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” I whispered.
    “You weren’t in Kansas to start with,” Gil said from somewhere behind me. “But we’re not in Haven either.”
    I jumped. My vision spun with the sudden movement, and I squeezed my eyes shut. Can a vampire hurl? I sure felt like I might.
    “Are you hurt?” Gil asked, her rain boots thudding as she moved closer. The lightest touch of magic tinged the air, and I cringed, my eyes flying open.
    Gil knelt a couple feet from me, but she wasn’t reaching out to help me stand. No, instead she jotted something in her damned scroll. Most likely something about me .
    “Can you describe how you feel?” she asked, looking up from the tightly penned lines.
    I forced my lips to curl into something akin to a smile.
    “Like I’d commit mageicide if I could only stand up.”
    Gil dropped her quill, her gulp audible.
    She’d only recently started to trust me, and I needed to stay on her good side if I wanted to avoid the judge and his execution warrant. I was still on the magical equivalent of parole. I took a deep breath and let it out again, resisting the urge to yell as I asked, “So, should my first question be ‘How did I get here,’ or ‘Where here is?’”
    Gil licked her bottom lip. “Well, as far as where , this is King James Cemetery. The how is a little… uh, complicated?”
    Understatement. Definitely an understatement. I waited, my teeth gritted. Gil fidgeted.
    “I might have tucked you outside of time and space while I traveled here. But it appears not to have had any adverse effects.” She fished her quill out of the grass and tapped it on her scroll. “I hypothesized that a short detour into the void between worlds would have no ill effects on a vampire. I wouldn’t chunk anything fully alive in there, of course.”
    “You hypothesized? As in you guessed and then you threw me in a… a void ?” I shoved to my feet. My face was hot, and the pinch against my lips told me my fangs were showing. I couldn’t help it. I was well and truly pissed.
    Gil stumbled back and her scroll vanished. “I did consider the possible outcomes thoroughly before trying it,” she said, wringing her hands together.
    When I only raised an eyebrow, she took another step back and her gaze darted away, skittering over stone monuments without finding a place to land. She tugged at an imagined wrinkle in her coat. “Well, that aside, my research points to this cemetery as the resting place of… someone I think can help us determine if you tagged any other rogues. I’ve narrowed it down to one sarcophagus, but I need help.”
    “Help with what?”
    “A little research.” She turned, her eyes still not meeting mine. “The lid is heavy. I can’t lift it.”
    Great. I was here as muscle and we were what? Grave robbing? I pressed the palms of my hands against my eyes. A headless body, the rogue’s haunting memories, the void, and now grave-robbing? Could this night get worse?
    Wait, I forgot. When I returned to Nathanial’s, I still had to appear before the vamp council. I sighed and dropped my hands.
    Might as well get this over with.
    “Which one?” I swept out a hand to indicate the rows of monuments that stretched around us for as far as the eye could see.
    Gil indicated a small mausoleum with what appeared to be a sphinx watching over the rusty gate covered opening. The gate squealed as it swung on ancient hinges, and flecks of red rust stuck to my fingers. Inside, Gil pointed to the second sarcophagus. I gave the lid a shove, but the large cement slab barely budged.
    Moving to a better angle, I braced my knees and shoved harder. If a human had been watching, they probably would have laughed at the idea of