Kalayna Price - Grave Dance: An Alex Craft Novel

Table of Contents

Praise for Grave Witch

Fascinating magic, a delicious heartthrob, and a fresh, inventive world.

Chloe Neill, author of Hard Bitten

A rare treat, intriguing and original. Dont miss this one.

#1 New York Times bestselling author Patricia Briggs

A zippy pace and entrancing descriptions of grave-sight, which juxtaposes a decaying spirit world on top of ours, will keep readers happily turning pages.

Publishers Weekly

The Alex Craft Novels

Grave Witch

Grave Dance

ROC
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First published by Roc, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

First printing, July 2011

ISBN : 978-1-101-51651-5

Copyright Kalayna Price, 2011

All rights reserved

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To Kist,
who keeps me fed and watered, and who
is always quick with the emotional duct tape
when everything is falling apart

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

To Jessica Wade, who believes in Alex and my story and who worked with me to make sure that story was told. There are not thanks enough for everything youve done for me through the process of getting this book out on shelves. And to the entire team at Roc, who makes this series possible.

To my fabulous agent, Lucienne Diver, for believing in my voice and getting the books out to the world.

To the Tri Mu: Christy, Nikki, Sarah, Vert, and Vikki, and to George for your encouragement and honest critiques.

To all the speakers and instructors at the Writers Police Academy. I took great liberties with what you taught me, but you gave me a solid base from which to spring.

To my friends and family, who encourage and support me, and to the artists, authors, and musicians who inspire me.

And to the readers. This story is for you, and I hope you enjoy Alexs continuing adventure.

Thank you all. You all mean more to me than I can say.

Chapter 1

W hen I first straddled the chasm between the land of the dead and the world of the living, I accidentally raised the shade of our recently deceased Pekinese. The former champion dog floating around our backyard resulted in my father shipping me off to a wyrd boarding school. Seventeen years later, I still reached across that chasm, but now I got paid to do it.

That isnt a body, John, I said, staring at the open black bag. Its a foot. A pale, bloated, waterlogged foot.

John Matthews, personal friend and one of the best homicide detectives in Nekros City, nodded. Its a left foot, to be precise, and I have two more back at the morgue. What can you tell me?

I frowned and nudged the toe of my boot at a clump of grass sprouting between chunks of loose gravel. My business cards read: ALEX CRAFT, LEAD PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR AND GRAVE WITCH FOR TONGUES FOR THE DEAD. I was actually the owner and only employee of the firm, but that was beside the point. I raised shades and gave the living a chance to question the deadfor a fee. My work tended to take me to a lot of graveyards, the occasional funeral home, and to the Nekros City morgue. The parking pit for the Sionan Floodplain Nature Preserve was most definitely not my typical working environment. Nor was a single severed appendage my typical job.

Sorry, John, but I need more than a foot to raise a shade.

And I need some better news. His shoulders slumped as if hed deflated. Weve been scouring this swamp for two days and were turning up more questions than answers. Weve got no IDs for the vics, no obvious causes of death, and no primary crime scenes. You sure you cant give me anything? As he spoke, he shoved the flap on the body bag farther open with the butt of his pen.

The foot lay in a sea of black plastic. The sickly scent of rot filled the humid afternoon air, coating the inside of my nose, my throat. The bloodless skin had sloughed off the exposed ankle, the strips of yellowish flesh shriveling. My stomach twisted and I looked away. Id leave the physical inspection to the medical examinermy affinity for the dead was less for the tangible and more for the spectral. Memories hid in every cell of the body. Memories that my grave magic could unlock and give shape as a shade. Of course, that depended on having enough of the bodyand thus cellsat my disposal for my magic to fill in the gaps. I didnt need to cast a magic circle and begin a ritual to know I couldnt pull a shade from the foot. I could sense that fact, the same way I could sense that the foot had belonged to a male, probably in his late sixties. I could also sense the nasty tangle of spells all but dripping from the decaying appendage.

The foot is saturated with magic. Some pretty dark stuff from the feel of it, I said, taking a step back from the gurney and the sticky residual magic emanating from the foot. Im guessing you already have a team deciphering the spells?

Yeah, but so far the antiblack magic unit hasnt reached any conclusions. It would really help if we could question the victim.

But that wasnt going to happen with such a small percentage of the body. You said you had a matching foot back at the morgue? Maybe if we assemble all the parts, there will be enough to