Hopeless Necromantic

Book 1: The Catseye Chronicles

by Shiloh Briar

Genres: Dark Fantasy

Synopsis

SHE RAISES HELL. HE RAISES THE DEAD. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?

When new recruit Helspira takes on the doomed mission that no other soldier wants, life - and death - start to get a little complicated.

Helspira must play escort to Sikras - a frustratingly handsome necromancer with the power to raise the dead - as he attempts a mission that he's failed twice before; stopping an undead army at the edges of the kingdom.

No one thinks he will succeed. Not even Sikras. But the more time the two spend together, the more they find they can imagine a brighter future. As secrets come out and the two grow closer - and Sikras's lively skeleton companion Benjamin tries desperately not to be a third wheel - will Sikras' and Helspira's changing feelings for each other be enough to overcome the growing danger?

RAISE A GLASS. RAISE THE DEAD. JUST DON'T RAISE YOUR HOPES.

Release date: September 23, 2025

Publisher: Orbit

Print pages: 352

Sample

Sikras



SURE, EVERYONE claimed they would do anything to bring back a deceased loved one, but that was only because they failed to imagine the ramifications. Unless one had no sense of smell, or an unusual penchant for the stench of decay, undead rarely made satisfying company in the long term. “But, oh,” the people would say, “I never meant for them to return as undead. I meant for them to be alive exactly as they were before.”

Too bad.

No matter how hard anyone wished for, hoped for, prayed for a loved one to come back alive—truly alive—the best a corpse could ever get was a little less dead than they were before.

And that’s where Sikras ‘Catseye’ Nikabod came in.

Necromancy certainly wasn’t the noblest of professions in the kingdom of Nyllmas, nor anywhere in the whole of Siaphara. If Sikras was brutally honest, necromancy didn’t technically qualify as a ‘profession’ so much as an illicit opportunity for magic wielders with questionable moral compasses to make a living by ripping souls from Enos and stuffing them inside corpses much in the way one shoved cubed bread into a hollowed-out game hen.

But it paid the bills. Illegally. People could balk and wail and organize all the protests they wanted, but for every townsperson who cried about ‘dead men’s rights,’ two or three people would be at Sikras’s doorstep, begging him to resurrect grandpa or whoever happened to keel over that weekend.

For that reason, when Sikras smelled the familiar odor of dried blood and rotting flesh outside his mansion’s ornate door, he wasn’t surprised. That meant one of two things: either a strangely independent undead minion waited on his stoop, or he had a new client.

Sikras made no move for the door even when a knock sounded from the other side, instead he studied the gameboard before him, the only pristine object in a cavernous room full of clutter and dust. It wasn’t until he moved an onyx-carved component into the threshold of a gold-lined circle painted on the board that he stood. “I’ve made my move, Benjamin. Your turn.”

“Finally,” called a voice from a distant room. “I almost died of old age.”

“Count yourself lucky, then. Natural causes are a fine way to go.” After dusting his shoulders and tugging at his sleeves to smooth any wrinkles, Sikras approached the door and pulled it open.

A man holding a lifeless body awaited him on the other side. No surprise there. Sikras tilted his head and gave the corpse a cursory analysis.

Adult. Human. Female. Visible, gruesome injuries. Puncture wounds, exposed intestines, the whole kit and caboodle. Dead maybe seven, eight hours tops. Rigor mortis had set in, and it apparently made her rather unwieldy, as the traumatized looking gentleman holding her grunted each time he readjusted the dead weight.

Awkward silence made seconds feel like hours, and if the stranger’s slack-jawed stutters were any indication, it didn’t look as if he would form a proper sentence any time soon. “Allow me to hazard a guess,” Sikras said to break the ice, giving one of the puncture wounds a gentle poke. “A horde of crowned gremlins? They’ve been getting closer to the city lines lately. Devilish things, those.”

The man appeared to settle at the soothing timbre Sikras injected into his voice. “Apologies. I—I’m still in shock from everything that happened. This mansion’s never one I thought I’d visit.”

“It’s not the top tourist destination in Vinepool, I can tell you that much.” Sikras stepped aside. “Bring her in. Benjamin will show you where you can set her.”

“Benjamin? Th—there must be a mistake.” The man’s arm’s quaked as he struggled to hold the body. “I’m here to see the fabled necromancer, the Glowing Cat’s Eye in Death’s Darkness. Who’s Benjamin?”

In the doorway, a human skeleton appeared. “Hi.”

“Adalin’s mercy!” The man stumbled backward and fell, trapped under the dead woman’s weight.

“Benjamin.” Sikras regarded him with open arms. “Perfect timing. Did you make your move?”

“Took me two seconds,” Benjamin replied. “You could learn a thing or two from me regarding efficiency.”

Sikras dipped into a humble bow, then glimpsed the horrified stranger splayed on his steps. “It’s true. Benjamin here is a champion at Rack and Ruin. Do you play?”

“A walking skeleton?” A gasping wheeze tightened the man’s words as he shoved the corpse off his torso and scooted backward.

“Walking. Talking.” Sikras raised a finger. “Just don’t ask him to dance. He’ll do it, and it’s not a pretty sight. He’s a damn fine musician though. You’ve never met a man who can work the lute quite like this one, let me tell you.”

The sound of clacking bones rang out when Benjamin placed his hand on his hip. “I can dance. Sort of. We don’t all practice choreography with undead minions like some people.”

“Oh, yes. Undead.” A cloud of dust jostled off Sikras’s sleeves when he clapped his hands together. “On that very subject, gather your corpse and bring her inside. Who do we have here? Wife? Lover? Sister? A corrupt landlord who you wish to resurrect for the sheer joy of watching her die twice?”

“W—wife, sir.” A layer of doubt reflected in the man’s eyes as he stooped to gather the dead. “Am I to believe you’re the necromancer I seek?”

“Judging by your tone, I assume that’s difficult to believe?”

“With respect, sir, you don’t exactly ... That is to say, you don’t look the part of the necromantic prodigy sung of by the kingdom’s bards.”

“First off, Nyllmas’s bards leave a lot to be desired. Second, I haven’t let myself go all that much, have I?” Head cocked, Sikras faced the grand mirror hanging askew on the wall beside him, but a hefty coating of dust robbed it of its primary function. He raked his fingers through the tangled mess of his loosely curled hair, as if that would somehow make him more presentable.

Benjamin tapped his chin in consideration. “I bet it’s the dark circles beneath your eyes. Or the lifeless tone of your skin. Your unnaturally gray hair, perhaps? Wait, no, the atrophied muscles. Oh, or the gaunt face.” He rounded on the client. “It’s his face, isn’t it?”

“All that, yes.” The man nodded, his throat bobbing from a hard swallow. “And you look so ... average. You’re much taller in the portraits painted by local artists.”

Sikras smirked. “I’ve a pair of boots that bolsters me to five foot eleven. Shall I put them on before or after I resurrect your dead wife?”

“N—no boots necessary, sir.”

With his elbow, Benjamin gave Sikras a gentle nudge. “I’m sure he means no offense. Folkloric men are meant to be godlike, glistening things. You know I adore you, but, in your current state, you do look a bit like a corpse that someone left in the sun too long.”

“Your poetry knows no bounds, Benjamin. That’s why you’re the musician, and I’m just the dancer.” Absent of any insult, Sikras regarded his patron and bent into a sardonic bow. “Contrary to appearances, yes, I am the great necromancer you seek, and I will provide you with nothing but the utmost quality whilst rendering my services. Now, slide the trash off our dining table and toss your beloved up there, will you?”

The man lingered, slack-jawed, indecisive. With a surrendering grunt, he stepped past the threshold, followed Sikras and Benjamin into the dining room, and hoisted his wife’s corpse atop piles of loose parchment and empty plates. “You were right about what you’d said earlier,” he muttered, shuffling away once he had positioned her. “T’was a pack of crowned gremlins what killed her when she was out gathering herbs.”

Sikras spun on his heels to capture the man in his stare. “Vile way to go. I’m impressed you weren’t gutted alongside her.”

“I was able to run and hide, sir. Adalin blessed me well.”

“Adalin worshipper, aye?” A shudder rattled Sikras’s shoulders. “She must’ve missed your wife’s prayers for mercy. Lost to the blood-curdling screams, perhaps? Tell me, uh—what’s your name again?”

“Bilsby, sir.”

“Bilsby. For how long has your wife been dead?”

“About eight hours.”

Sikras nodded his approval. “Fresh. Good. It increases the odds that her soul remains in Enos and that Goddess Adalin hasn’t whisked it away to whatever afterlife she created for her venerators. Before we begin, I need you to sign some paperwork. Benjamin?”

Benjamin pried open a drawer and removed a prewritten parchment. After struggling to find room for it on the cluttered table, he grabbed the deceased’s arm. “Pardon me, miss,” he said, then scooted her limb out of the way.

“Quill and ink pot are over there,” Sikras mumbled, pointing. “I’d tell you to read the parchment, but we both know you won’t.”

The statement seemed to ruffle Bilsby, evidenced by his puffing chest and reddening cheeks. “I don’t need to read it. It doesn’t matter what it says. I’d give—”

“Anything to have her back. Yes, where have I heard that before? As noble as it is original, I assure you.” Nonchalance padded Sikras’s words as he tapped the parchment. “This contract states I did, or at least attempted to, review the risks associated with the resurrection of a dead loved one, including but not limited to nausea, vomiting, lightheadedness, intense regret, mental and emotional turmoil, cursing me, cursing the gods, and any damage to your person or personal belongings should you drop to your knees, wail, rend your garments, et cetera, so on and so forth. In addition, please note that signing this parchment relinquishes me from any liability regarding your satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the services rendered.”

“Gimme the damn quill,” Bilsby snapped, hastily jotting his signature.

Sikras crossed his arms. “Don’t forget to initial. I’ll need payment up front, please and thank you.”

Bristling, Bilsby reached into his vest pocket. With a trembling hand, he set the leather satchel of coins atop the table. “You keep an awful lot of paperwork for someone who does this outside the law.”

“The paperwork isn’t for the courts. It’s so when you inevitably return later to complain about my services, I can shove proof of your blatant disregard for my cautions in your face.”

“Any cautions you’d utter are irrelevant,” Bilsby huffed. “I just want my wife back.”

“Of course you do. And while I can bring her back, the divine thread that weaves her memories, her personality, her mannerisms to her body, will only last for as long as—”

“Just return her to me!” The force of his tone failed to match the stout, quivering patron who had cowered on the doorstep moments prior. “I wouldn’t have hauled her all the way here against the laws of Nyllmas, dodging the Red Sentinel, marinating in her blood, if I wasn’t damn well sure I wanted her back. I paid your price, I signed your paper, now do whatever it is you people do.”

“My people? Necromancers are hardly a—you know what? Never mind.” Stifling all outward signs of emotion, Sikras pocketed the money and blew on the ink to dry it before handing it to Ben. “File these with the others for me, would you?”

Benjamin’s eyeless sockets gawked at the papers for only a moment before he tossed them on the floor with the other disorganized contracts that Sikras had collected over the years. “All filed.”

“Perfect, thank you. All right, then.” Sikras cracked his knuckles and rotated his shoulders. “Stand back. Time for the fun part.”

Arthritis, or carpal tunnel, or some other irritating affliction unbefitting a man in his midthirties made perfecting the necessary hand gestures required for the spell the most annoying part of a resurrection. Nevertheless, Sikras powered through, twisting wrists and fingers in a flurry of memorized movements.

The atmosphere shifted, suffused with otherworldly energy that pulsed with forbidden power. Rising tendrils of smoke curled in the room as Sikras initiated the spell’s verbal component: “An’stisei tus necrouz.”

It appeared. Like a streamer tethered to the woman’s gutted chest was her life thread, her essence, the raw energy that animated a body. A bead of sweat tickled the side of Sikras’s forehead as it snaked its way to his jaw.

Good, got the essence. Halfway there. All that remained was the soul.

Sikras mentally reached out, and while his physical body remained in his dining room, his mind snapped into Enos.

A soundless wonderland of various flora sprawled before his vision. Trillions of soft, glowing plants stretched into an impossibly far horizon. He recognized the plants for what they were—the afterlife’s representation of human essence, each plant somehow tangible and intangible, the Grim Reaper’s veritable garden of human life. Little balls of light floated above the various flowers and vines, like luminous particles of dust caught in a stream of sunlight. Souls. Souls that lingered in Enos, waiting for their chosen deity to collect them and bring them to that deity’s individual plane to live out eternity in whatever afterlife their god or goddess fashioned.

Sikras reached out, feeling, searching, until he sensed the missing half belonging to the woman sprawled on his dining table. Her soul parted from the others, drawn to him like a magnet, and though he had no olfactory senses in Enos, the sensation of rosewater and cotton struck him.

Soul in hand, he blinked out of Enos and into his body, his dining room. The rhythmic beat of his heart quickened, his breath growing shallow, as black mist erupted from his palms and enveloped the corpse in an undulating shroud of darkness. The light of the woman’s soul competed against it, glowing bright enough to cast shadows on the walls.

A sudden chill siphoned all heat from the room, which was a very handy side effect of resurrections during the summer months. Sikras had often raised the dead in the insufferable seasonal heatwaves for no other reason than to cool the living quarters. Today, however, with winter on the horizon, it sent an unpleasant shiver through his arms. Fortunately, the ritual was near completion.

The fabric of the planes between living and dead quivered as the two broken pieces—the thread of essence attached to the corpse and the soul plucked from Enos—wove together.

The body on the table convulsed, a spasm of life jolting through her limbs.

Sikras matched her tremor when the snap of magical backlash crackled through his body. The price of spellcasting. Blood and bone, it burned like a thousand little needles sinking into his skin. Winded, he wiped the sweat from his brow and leaned forward to inspect the movements within the once lifeless vessel. A flicker of light, dim and fragile, lit the woman’s eyes when they shot open.

The room fell into an unsettling hush, save for the labored breathing coming from both Sikras and the resurrected woman. She sat upright, slow and deliberate, intestines still exposed, skin still pale from blood loss. She looked every bit the same as she had when Bilsby had dragged her to Sikras’s doorstep, albeit more animated.

“Bilsby?” The woman’s shaking hands patted her body, her face, as if touching herself would assuage her confusion. “Wh—where am I? What happened?”

“She’s ... She’s ...” Bilsby stumbled backward, a look of horror twisting his expression. “She’s not right. Put her guts back in, sew her up, something! Gods, man, she still looks like she’s dead!”

“Come now, that’s no way to speak to your wife.” Sikras swatted Bilsby with the back of his wrist and found the woman’s gaze. “Does he always talk to you like this?”

“You said you’d bring her back!” Bilsby stuttered, spittle flying from his lips.

“And I did. I’m a necromancer, sir, not a tailor. If you want her sewn up, I recommend Carpin Capers Clothing. Granted, it has been four years since I stepped foot in the city, but last I heard, Jiselle was a master of her craft.”

“I—I can’t do this. What good is she in this state? I can’t be married to a, a monster. That’s not my wife; that’s an abomination!” An accusatory, quaking finger trembled in Sikras’s face. “Fuck you, you soulless demon!”

The picture of calm, Sikras wiped away a fragment of spittle that had flown from Bilsby’s lips and onto Sikras’s face. “Benjamin, please show Mr. Bilsby the door. He’s dropping some very subtle hints that he’d like to leave.”

“To your right, sir.” An unflappable aura of professionalism emanated from the skeleton as he pointed toward the exit. “We thank you for your business and hope you’ll come again.”

Wounded deer scuttled toward safety with more grace than poor Mr. Bilsby. His boots slipped on strewn papers, nearly toppling him, as he dashed for the door. Soon, the only thing left of him was the haggard voice that echoed in the mist outside, “Death to all of you, you rotten bastards!”

“Don’t forget to recommend us to friends and family,” Sikras called out, then faced the slack-jawed woman before him. “He seems nice.”

“He’s an arse!” she spat out, chest heaving with each unnatural breath. “Why did he—how am I—?”

“You must have questions. I used to have a pamphlet somewhere, but I’m afraid it’s lost to the chaos. Here, let’s have a seat where there’s less cutlery.” Sikras slid his hand into hers and eased her off the table, frowning when one of her organs fell from the hole in her stomach. “Oh, dear. You don’t need that, do you? Benjamin can dust it off if you’d like.”

“No trouble at all, milady.” Without delay, Benjamin scooped up the organ and picked off pieces of debris.

Puffy-eyed and on the brink of tears, she shook her head. “Something tells me that’s the least of my problems.”

“Come, now. Just because you’re sort of dead, and in a complete stranger’s home, and your husband ran away screaming after calling you a monster? Trust me, sweetheart, I’ve seen worse.” Supporting her fragile frame, Sikras guided her to a dusty, padded seat. “Bilsby’s reaction isn’t terribly uncommon. The fantasy of having a loved one resurrected is often kinder than the reality.”

“Loved one? Ha. More like his financial security.” Her bottom lip trembled as tears welled. “I just ... I can’t believe it. I remember the fear, the pain, the gremlins. And Bilsby, he just ran. Left me to die.”

“Yes, he seems to be quite good at running.”

She regarded Sikras with wide, glistening eyes. Confusion—and probably early signs of decomposition—choked her words. “I saw Death. I crossed the threshold into Enos. I was at peace, waiting for Goddess Adalin to take me to her paradise. And then, I heard your voice.”

“Death was there, was she?” Sikras cringed as he eased into a nearby chair. “I’ll be hearing from her soon, I’m sure. She hates it when I mess with her garden.”

“I like Death,” Benjamin said, shrugging. “I think she’s nice. And that body. Yes, sir.”

Sikras arched a brow. “How would you know? You can’t even see her. Or hear her.”

“Well, no, but she’s always asking about me. I think the Grim Reaper has a little crush on ole Benjamin Reese.”

“And why wouldn’t she?” Regarding the woman, Sikras smirked. “Just look at Benjamin’s face. Flawless, isn’t it?”

Oblivious to their banter, it seemed the only motion she could manage was to shake her head. “So, that’s it? Married to that miserable, wretched man for twenty years, barely enjoying a day of life, and now I don’t even get to enjoy death?”

Sikras recognized the devastation in every tortured decibel of her breaking voice; he had heard it countless times. Placing his hand atop hers, he offered what he hoped was a gentle smile. “What’s your name?”

She sniffled. “Canida, sir.”

“Canida. Let me be the first to welcome you back, however briefly it may be.” He gave her hand an affectionate, platonic squeeze. “As I tried to explain to your husband before he so valiantly ran off, you’ll only be yourself for as long as your brain is, shall we say, viable? Once the decay sets in and the integrity of your synapses fades, I’m sorry to say, you’ll just be a thoughtless, walking corpse.”

The weight of the confession, however tender in its delivery, sparked sadness that showed in her sagging posture. “I see.”

“Not the news you were hoping for, I’m sure. Your husband may not be here to enjoy your final hours, but Benjamin and I make terrific company when we’re the only option. Can I get you a drink? Wine? Mead? Whiskey? I can’t promise you’ll feel the effects of inebriation, given your body’s condition, but I hear it’s cathartic just to go through the motions.”

Silence followed, the eerie quiet of a woman coming to terms with her death, her reanimation, her husband’s betrayal, and her impending second death. Her posture straightened as she drew a cavernous breath and released it in a slow exhale. “A drink sounds lovely.”

“On it.” Benjamin dipped into a side room, and, before long, he reappeared with a frosted green bottle and a single glass. “For you, milady.”

A weak smile graced Canida’s dry, cracked lips. “Such a gentleman. Thank you.”

“Anything for our honored guest,” Benjamin said.

Disregarding the glass, Canida seized the bottle and chugged it, liquor sailing down her throat in one swift gulp. When the amber liquid leaked through the hole in her stomach lining and soaked into the chair’s padding, she gasped. “Oh, dear. I’m sorry. I—”

Sikras dismissed her apology with a nonchalant wave. “Trust me, that’s not the worst thing that chair has seen in its lifetime.”

A short but genuine laugh lifted some of her dismay, and she jiggled the bottle. “Join me in a drink?”

“No thank you. I don’t drink.”

“In these shit times? Mercy, how do you cope?”

“Gallows humor and a mountain of denial have worked out pretty well so far.”

“More for me, then.” Canida took another drink and let her head collapse into the chair’s tall back. She stared at the ornamental ceiling, lips pursed. “He was a shit husband, you know.”

Sikras chuckled. “He didn’t make a good first impression, but, to his credit, he did haul your corpse all the way here. Surely he had some redeeming qualities.”

“Oh, yes,” Canida mumbled. “And he was more than willing to share them with the local florist, the baker, and Adalin only knows who else. That’s why this whole thing is so damned confusing. Why beg a bloody necromancer to bring me back when he barely acted like he wanted me in the first place? I’ll bet you that organ I dropped that he only wanted me alive because my parents send us silver every month to offset the burdens of living.”

Pretending not to feel the weight of Bilsby’s gold weighing down his pocket, Sikras shrugged. “Money is a wicked motivator, isn’t it?”

“I suppose.” Canida sighed. “Doesn’t matter much now, does it? It’s a wild thing how fast life goes. I lived a fair one though. If I had any regrets at all, it’d be that I never got even for that bastard’s infidelity.”

“Oh?” Sikras arched a brow. “A little revenge would make you feel better, would it?”

Bottle in hand, Canida leaned forward, elbows on her legs. “I’ve been a patient, understanding woman my entire life. Adalin knows he didn’t deserve it. Does it make me a bad person to crave pettiness just this once?”

Sikras shook his head. “Not at all. Just to be sure, is this one of those statements you really mean or one of those things you say aloud just for the satisfaction of saying it?”

“Honey, if it meant getting back at Bilsby, I’d let the entire Red Sentinel have their way with me. And after? I’d sleep like a kitten curled up by a fire.” A flash of mischievousness sparked through the heaviness in her eyes. “What do you say? You raise the dead, but how about you raise my hopes and help out a dying woman?”

Ignoring Benjamin’s childish snickering, Sikras forced a polite grin. “As far as ...?”

Canida laughed. “I don’t have to spell it out for you, do I? Is sex still taboo if I’m only kind of dead?”

Holding his grin, Sikras cleared his throat and placed a hand on his chest. “I’m flattered, Canida, and while I do love a rebellious act of vengeance, my heart belongs to another.”

“A man who takes his vows seriously? Where were you two decades ago when I married Bilsby?”

“Well, I’d have been about fifteen or sixteen, so probably falling in love for the first time. That’s right about when I met my wife.”

“Adorable.” The bottle clanked as Canida set it atop a nearby table. “That’s all right. It’s my own fault. I should’ve gotten back at Bilsby when I was alive. Where is this special lady of yours? I’d love to meet her.”

The silence lasted the length of a heartbeat before Sikras smiled. “Absent.”

“Well, she’s a lucky woman.”

“She’s had better luck,” Sikras murmured.

“Sorry? I didn’t quite catch that.”

Banishing his self-pity to the back of his mind, where it could fester with the rest of his mental problems, Sikras sprung to his feet. “I said perhaps Benjamin can aid you in your final quest. He’s always been something of a ladies’ man.”

“The skeleton?” Canida turned a baffled gaze toward Ben. “No offense, but you haven’t a single organ to your name let alone the one I’m looking for.”

“Oh-ho, Madam Canida, trust me”—Benjamin struck a valiant pose, chest out, hands on his hips—“I know a thing or two about—”

Sikras’s raised hand abruptly ended the sentence. “Benjamin, you know I love your bone jokes as much as the next person, but Miss Canida is running on borrowed time.”

“Fair enough.” Benjamin offered Canida an arm, an open invitation. “You’ll forget you ever had a husband when I’m through with you, and not just because your brain is slowly deteriorating.”

Canida stared at the offering, her expression a mixture of doubt and hesitation, until she sprung from her chair. “You know what? Fuck it.”

“That’s the plan.” Benjamin patted her hand when she weaved her arm into what remained of his. “Right this way. With luck, Sikras will have actually made his move in Rack and Ruin before we’re finished.”

As the pair vanished into a secluded bedroom down the hallway, Sikras shuffled toward the exit. Much as he wished to finish their Rack and Ruin game, dropping eaves on Canida and Benjamin’s extracurricular activities rated very low on his list of desires. Perhaps a brisk walk around the grounds would do him some good. If nothing else, it’d help to clear the lingering thoughts of his wife.

Winded from the resurrection, he nabbed the tall, ethereal scythe leaning against the wall, and gave it a tender stroke. “Hello, lovely.” Despite the weapon’s appearance and craftsmanship that would suggest otherwise, it was nearly weightless. With his fingers, Sikras twirled it effortlessly and planted the blunt end of the staff onto the floor. As was the circumstances with most casters, he couldn’t wield a weapon to save his life, but Death’s scythe made a damn fine walking stick when he was still reeling from the effects of magical backlash.

Just as he reached for the door handle to make his exit, a knock sounded on the other side.

“Oh, look,” he muttered, “Mr. Bilsby has returned already to call me a thieving hustler, and it only took him five, ten minutes? Must be a new—”

The door’s hinges squealed as he opened it.

“—record.” Sikras blinked, gawking at the strange woman before him.

Two clashing eyes stared back, one humanoid in appearance, the other a brilliant red iris set inside a black sclera. She boasted a silent, otherworldly charm along with her soft complexion. . .