Jasper woke with a strangled gasp, startled by a tapping on the mustang’s driver’s side window. He lurched forward, away from Orion’s grin as his companion peered into the car, breath fogging the glass.

He'd been dreaming about a woman, cloaked in black. She’d hovered over him, and within the shadows of her hood, he’d seen the fine bones of her face outlined with tattoos, as though her skin were transparent – as though the bones themselves –

Tap tap tap

“Anyone home?” Orion kept rapping, a sound that rang through Jasper’s ears like gunshot. He saw both images at once: the skeleton-woman superimposed over Orion’s idiotic grin, his large finger leaving prints on the glass. Jasper blinked several times before the woman’s visage faded. Then, registering the marks on his car, he pushed the door open and shoved Orion aside.

“Hands off the car,” he snapped. His throat was dry, and his voice came out in a hoarse rattle. Every joint in his body screamed from the night spent in the car. It was not quite dawn, but in the east, faint ribbons of pink and orange peeked over the coast, and there was a heavy cast of dew on the grass. The festival in the valley below was silent.

It was too early for the festivalgoers to wake, but much too late for the sirens to prowl. They’d have retreated to their hiding places by now. Briefly, it crossed Jasper’s mind that if he could catch them sleeping –

No. Barty wanted them alive. Jasper was already on a short leash because of the gorgon incident and dispatching them this way, albeit much easier, was sure to earn him a more permanent demotion.

Although…looking at his companions, he was beginning to think that wasn’t entirely a bad idea.

Jasper frowned at Orion’s other hand, the one that, thank the Order, hadn’t been tapping on the mustang. “Is that…falafel?”

Orion held it out to him. “Want some?”

Jasper’s brows met in a glare. Perhaps Barty wouldn’t notice if Jasper sought a demotion on purpose. He might miss Zephyra, but it was worth losing her if she took Orion with him.

Zephyra met his expression with a smile that made her eyes sparkle. “I don’t think he does,” she said to Orion, although her gaze never left Jasper’s harried face. “He eats the souls of the damned, remember?”

Orion giggled at the joke, but Jasper's mood only continued to sour. His stomach grumbled and he recalled the stale cereal he’d eaten the day before – his last meal before this assignment.

“I assume that is the reason you were out all night,” Jasper said, eyeing the falafel suspiciously. “Did you at least find the rift?”

Orion nodded. Bits of his meal fell out of his mouth as he replied, “northeast, like you said. A brisk walk into the trees.”

“We came back hours ago,” Zephyra added, “but you were tucked in all cute in the car – so we got something to eat and decided to wait for you.”

Zephyra’s description – cute – rippled over him with the same pleasantness of lemon juice in a papercut, but Jasper turned his gaze back over the valley, to where the festival was dark, still sleeping. Something pulled his attention to the tree line, where the rift waited for them to send the sirens through. But there was something else. It was like an unruly spirit, one that kept tugging on his attention until he found its killer or sealed its coffin or reunited it with a lost token. Usually, however, those spirits appeared to him and asked for help. This was…different. Darker. As though it wanted to be noticed and unnoticed all at once.

He'd felt it in the darkness, last night. Swishing by him like a breeze. There and gone, a whisper against the windows of his mind.

He felt the stares of the other two and looked back at them. “There’s an eighth siren,” he said. Delia’s face flashed across his mind – the way she’d looked at him with those faintly luminous eyes, spotting him even through his cloak of shadows. The way he’d felt when she’d touched him, as though he was about to unravel. The sickness that followed. The uncontrollable urge to run away. “She’s masterminding this whole thing. I met her last night.”

“And you didn’t snag her?” Orion balked, eyes widening. “Jazz – if we take out the leader, the others will just walk into the rift without our help.”

“Right,” Jasper said. “But I didn’t have anywhere to put her, Orion. That was supposed to be your job.”

Orion kept blinking. Thinking was a difficult thing for him – sometimes it took him a while to understand a complete sentence.

“Besides,” Jasper added, “she’s up to something. Something more than free food. There’s something weird about this case, and I think she knows what it is.”

“Barty doesn’t want you to use any of your…methods,” Zephyra said.

When Jasper looked at her, he caught the faintest flicker of fear in her usually radiant face.

“I remember,” Jasper replied. “But if she knows something about what’s going on, I’m going to find out.”

“Our mission is to return the sirens to their home,” Orion said. For once he sounded serious. “Nothing else. Barty said – “

“I know what Barty said.” The words came out as a hiss, and Orion and Zephyra took a step away from him. Nothing could explain the anger that boiled under Jasper’s skin, except that something was wrong, and it wouldn’t be right again until he found its source. “We’ll return the sirens tonight. Barty will be none the wiser. Got it?”

They nodded slowly. Zephyra broke the silence that fell between them by asking, “what do you want to do about these sirens, Jasper?”

And so they began to plan.

Orion drew out a map of the festival in the dirt behind the cars, marking the distance between the stage and the rift. Jasper added his own observations from the night before: the tents, the equipment, anything he’d noted while creeping through the dark. Then they discussed their plan. Catching moonbeam sirens was a fairly straightforward task, but Barty’s desire to keep them alive meant they’d have to wait until nightfall to do it. In the daylight they risked turning them into dust.

While Orion and Zephyra discussed their own contributions to the plan, Jasper left them by the cars and descended back into the festival. They were right about one thing: Barty’s tolerance of Jasper’s indiscretions was growing incredibly thin, so whatever he needed to do to get to the root of Delia’s intentions, he’d have to do it well before dark.

---

Jasper only walked the festival for a few minutes before he found her.

Delia’s hair was darker in the daytime, flowing down her back in an inky waterfall that only confirmed his suspicions that she was the eighth siren. Only a magical creature – one from his world – could have hair like that in this humidity.

The other strange thing about her was the pink parasol she carried, covering her from the rising sun. It was out of date and certainly out of style, but she flaunted it, hiding it its shade. It was like a beacon, and because of this obnoxious item Jasper easily followed her as she wandered through the festival tents.

The tents were set up in an organized, grid like fashion, with the main thoroughfare reserved for stalls selling wares. Food, hand-made clothes, brightly colored jewelry and a large assortment of crystals and beads filled the stalls, and Delia stopped at all of them, looking in and smiling. The rich, tangy smell of food filled the air – smells that Jasper didn’t recognize. If he remembered correctly, this was the era of the vegetarian, and the strange substitutions they made with their food sent his head spinning. Orion had most certainly tried all of it.

Jasper was not easily tempted with food. His own appetite was scant on the best of days, and he sated it with his horde of whiskey and stale cereal. Jasper watched as Delia sampled the food in each of the stalls, talking animatedly with the tie-die clad sellers at each one. She gave them all that dazzling, white smile and they melted underneath it. There was no exchange of money that Jasper could see. They handed over her fare, and Jasper’s only guess was that she used her siren song to charm them into handing it to her for free.

He didn’t know if moonbeam sirens needed human flesh to survive, for the simple reason that he’d never been around long enough to ask it. Watching Delia, however, he saw the savor in her eyes as she took a deep whiff of her falafel, took a bite, and savored it.

As though she’d never had anything like it before.

Standing in the middle of the thoroughfare, she closed her eyes. She chewed slowly. Blissfully. She nearly dropped her parasol, as though she’d forgotten it, cradled in her elbow. Jasper’s heart leapt to his throat as a stranger walked by and caught it, and when he prevented it from falling to the ground, she looked at him and smiled.

Delia finished her bite and looked at the man who’d given her the food. She smiled, her eyes radiant like the morning sun. The stall keepers around her cheered.

Jasper’s brows knit together at the strange scene.

This happened several times as Jasper tailed her through the festival. He kept to the shadows, using the tents to keep himself hidden from anyone who might be watching – siren, or something else. Delia was contented with interacting with the festivalgoers, staying underneath her parasol, trying food and smiling and winking and laughing with anyone who caught her eye.

He noticed that she kept a tighter grip on her parasol after that first scare.

They made it to the outskirts of the festival, where the largest tent stood, dark against the sunrise. It was decorated in tie-die and neon paint, standing out among all the other tents, drawing curious onlookers. Delia considered the entrance for only a few moments before making her decision and ducking inside.

Jasper followed. The entrance was adorned with hanging beads and fabric streamers that swayed gently in the breeze. Though he felt extremely out of place, not a single person seemed to notice him as he stepped in.

No one, of course, except Delia.

It was as though she’d been expecting him.

The spacious interior of the tent was dimly lit with lanterns casting a soft glow. The walls were lined with vibrant tapestries sporting abstract designs that reminded Jasper of a particularly violent episode of vertigo he’d once had, after capturing a vampire hypnotist in Washington. Delia, sitting on a wide, plush cushion, waved to him, smiling that large smile when he came forward.

He wanted to turn around. He wanted to leave this strangely mesmerizing place before it, before she, took advantage of his senses. This was, however, the opportunity he’d needed – right here, as though he’d planned it. So he overrode the grip of panic around his throat and moved through the press of people to get to her.

He navigated the plush-covered floors, the smell of incense burning his sinuses. The cushions were arranged around a pit, inside which stood musicians at the ready behind gongs and what he guessed were singing bowls. When he made it to her, Jasper sank down beside Delia. One of the musicians was already playing, gently circling the rim of one bowl with a mallet, filling the tent with a deep, resonant hum. The rich, warm sound vibrated through him as he sank deeper into the cushion.

It was peaceful. Soothing. Almost inviting.

Jasper hated it.

Everything in this room was designed to dull the senses, to entrap the victims in a state where they’d be helpless against the sirens. Perhaps this was where the feasting truly happened – perhaps the sirens were here, glamoured so that no one could see them, waiting until the incense and the music lulled everyone into a state of complete and utter delirium.

Beside him, Delia shifted, watching him through hooded lids. “Didn’t expect you here,” she said.

There was that charming, half-smile again, and Jasper armed himself against it. This room was darker, more shadows to call to his aid. There was also no sunlight, and a siren would be well-equipped to ward him off.

“I am one for trying new things,” Jasper replied.

She nodded approvingly, her hair falling into her face. As she brushed it back behind her ear, she said, “you disappeared rather quickly last night. Something I said?”

“No.” Jasper’s response came a little too quickly, and that earned him a look. “I didn’t care for the band that was playing. I’m not sure I’ve heard their style before, but I didn’t like it.”

“The Moonbeams,” Delia supplied. “No one expected them to show up, but when they appeared, everyone just loved them. People would cry if they stopped.”

Jasper gave her a sidelong glance. She returned it with a flirtatious look that made him squirm.

“The solstice ended over a week ago,” Jasper noted, looking around at the others still gathering at the singing bowls. What exactly was supposed to be happening here?

“Why stop a good thing?” Delia shifted to sit cross-legged, placing her hands on her knees in a yogic posture of serenity. Jasper squirmed away from her to avoid an accidental touch. He had no desire to repeat what had happened the night before.

“They’re playing again tonight,” Delia added. Her voice had taken on a soft, faraway tonality, and the room began to hush as more musicians entered the pit. “You should come. Give the Moonbeams a second chance.”

Jasper tried to mirror her posture, although the cushion felt small with her on it, and his back ached from the night sleeping in the car. Why would she presume to know anything about what he might or might not enjoy? Glancing at her again, her eyes had closed – and he searched for signs of the masterful moonbeam siren he’d seen before.

Apart from her spectacular looks, however, she appeared to be nothing more than a beautiful, human woman, somewhere in her twenties. Normally he could sense a glamour – one that would conceal a siren – but she seemed…ordinary.

Clever ruse, he thought, just as a gong sounded in the pit below.

Jasper had never attended something like this in his memory – what little he had of it was too fragmented to make any sense – but in his time with the Order he’d seen many strange things. Some of them included such instruments as gongs and singing bowls. With the monotone humming and the harmonies of the bowls filling the tent, it was no wonder to him how these hippies had managed to open a rift to the other world. They had everything they needed, including the stupidity to not understand what any of these strange rituals meant. His theory of the mastermind began to shift. Delia wouldn’t need too much manipulation to open a rift here; only impeccably good timing.

Glancing at her again, he knew that she did.

That left him with another unsavory thought: could she have possibly been on this side before they’d summoned the sirens, just to ensure everything was in its proper place?

Despite himself, the reverberation of the bowls through the ground made its way up into his bones. Something ugly and dark, something that had been clinging to him since the night before, began to slither away. A deep relaxation followed. His train of thought stagnated, as though the vibration in the room could clear away the cobwebs in his mind left by poor sleep and the flask still weighing down his right pocket. All of the attendees began to breathe in unison, Jasper’s own lungs responding to the silent command.

In. Out. Deep. Slow.

Jasper.

His eyes flew open. Someone had called his name - his true name, not the lie he’d shelled out earlier – but it wasn’t Delia. In fact, no one else had been disturbed by the sound.

And then he saw the woman. His shoulders loosened as he spotted her, standing directly opposite him on the other side of the tent. No one noticed that she was softly crying, or that there were seven holes in her chest, or that she was dripping a pool of dark blood onto the floor. He watched the red river as it crawled slowly to the center of the tent, sliding into the pit with syrupy grace. The musicians who stepped in it took no notice.

When Jasper looked up again, the woman had the same, imploring eyes of the child he’d seen the night before. The same longing. The same question.

The same fear.

Jasper’s hand twitched for the flask. He longed for a drink. For shadows. For the safety of the mustang. For anything that would banish this spirit, boring holes into his head with her watery eyes. But Delia was beside him. He couldn’t leave her now, not when the answers he needed were so close.

Later. He hoped the spirit could hear him as he shot the silent reply as far as it would go. I’m busy.

The woman’s lip trembled, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. She started shaking her head, slowly, left to right. Jasper frowned. He’d never seen that gesture from a spirit before.

“You okay, mister?”

Jasper’s attention snapped back to the female beside him, and he looked at her, sight and sound crowding back in. His whole body was taught, slick with sweat, beads of perspiration gathering at his hairline. Delia watched him with those luminous eyes.

As though she was…concerned.

“You look like you’re about to wig out,” she whispered. “Healing gongs aren’t for everyone. You want to go outside?”

Healing gongs? Jasper’s frown deepened, and he looked back into the pit. No blood pooling onto the floor. No woman staring at him from the other side of the tent. Just forty or so hippies, high on the Order knew what, hallucinating to the rhythm of the strange instruments.

“Actually,” Jasper said, keeping his voice low, “I was thinking about the Moonbeams.”

Delia’s dark brows flicked up. “You were?”

“I think I judged them rather harshly.”

“Do you want to meet them?”

Jasper swiveled to look at her, but her face was serious. A half-smile tugged at the corner of her mouth.

“It might change your mind,” she added, when he didn’t respond.

It was too good to ask for, certainly too good to believe. She was willing to take him right into their den. Right to where they were hiding, waiting for their next meal. Maybe they meant that to be him – certainly they got hungry in the daytime – but she didn’t know what he could do.

“I think I would,” Jasper said. “Would you be so kind as to introduce me?”

Delia’s face broke into a full smile and she said, “I know exactly where to find them. Let’s talk after the session, yeah?”

---

The healing gong session lasted until mid-morning, after which Delia led Jasper backstage, where the festival performers prepared for the midday concert. Smaller, local bands would take the stage until the sun was high in the sky, and though the Moonbeams wouldn’t be out until dark, Jasper took it as a good time to scout the area and decide how, exactly, to get them back to the rift

He watched Delia unfold her parasol as they stepped out of the tent and into the California sun.

“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Don’t like direct sunlight?”

“I read somewhere that long-term exposure to the sun can give you cancer,” Delia answered dryly. “I’m not interested in cancer.  In any case,” she continued, leading him away from the large tent and towards the amphitheater, “it’s not fun walking around out here with a debilitating sunburn.”

He noted her fair complexion and doubted she’d ever had a sunburn in her life. “You must not be from California, then.”

“Chicago,” she answered, nodding. “Took a train out west when things got a little spazzy, if you get me.”

Chicago to California. Most of the things they hunted didn’t know their geography – they were spat out into this world with little orientation to it. Jasper had learned that most of the time, they wreaked the havoc they did out of sheer confusion and fear – not out of malice. Sirens were different, though. Smarter. And this one…she’d been here long enough to study a decent map of the United States. That worried him.

“What about you, Drew?”

He realized, with a start, that she was still talking to him, watching him through lowered lashes. Jasper spat out the second lie of that mission and said, “San Francisco.”

“You don’t look like a native.”

“Begging your pardon, but I don’t think you’ve been here long enough to tell.”

No – Orion was the one who could fit in with these sunburnt Californians, all flowing hair and smiles, bronzed skin and surfboards. The people of Lumenvale were like that, all of them; which explained why Orion liked California so much.

There was little use in telling Delia the truth, however. Even if she found out he was lying, in the next few hours he’d be gone, and she’d be standing trial in front of the Order.

“You look like you came from somewhere else.” Delia gave him that look – the one she’d had when she’d spotted him through the shadows, as though she could see through the magic that cloaked him from the seeing eye.

“Oh?” His brow hiked up. “And where’s that?”

Jasper tripped, choking on his own saliva, when she said, “Whitechapel. 1888. Did you meet Jack the Ripper while you were there?”

She misread his startled expression and laughed, her merry voice igniting his fraying nerves.

“What makes you say that?” he coughed.

“Well…all of you,” she continued, still giggling. She gestured to his midnight-black outfit, which hadn’t seemed entirely out of place to Jasper until he’d seen the way the others were dressed. Notably, the presence of the waistcoat, which, when examined closely, sported fine embroidery of silver and black thread.

Perhaps he should have taken Zephyra up on her offer.

He quickly changed the subject, asking, “do you – you know.” Jasper mimed the strumming of a guitar, and Delia shook her head. Her dark hair shimmered down her back.

“Oh, no,” she said. “I’m not musically gifted in the least. I sound like a rusty gate, and my radio breaks every time I try to sing along.”

“So why come to a music festival?” he asked.

Delia avoided his question by pointing out the stage. It was a large, raised platform made from reinforced steel and wooden beams, approximately sixty feet by forty feet. A sturdy canopy of waterproof canvas, supported by steel trusses, protected both performers and the equipment from the elements. The backdrop of the stage sported more tie-die and psychedelic art, likely made under the influence (art, according to Jasper, was a loose interpretation of what he saw). As they approached, Jasper noted the entrances and exits to the stage; where the large, reinforced power cables ran and disappeared under the platform; where a person might hide to disrupt a performance.

The plan was already taking shape in his mind.

They circled around back, and he spotted a generator station, equipped with four massive diesel generators, connecting the stage to power. They were off at the moment but would be powered up soon to accommodate the bands taking the stage.

“How do they get the diesel up here?” Jasper asked Delia, who was still leading him around back. “Surely by now the generators would have used up all the fuel.”

The festival had been running several days longer than expected, after all.

“I dunno.” Delia shrugged. “Perhaps they’ve been getting fuel in between sessions.”

Or maybe they planned for this. Jasper kept that observation to himself.

When they made it behind the stage, there was another gathering of tents, presumably for the performers. A handful of musicians loitered about, strumming their instruments, tuning, and getting ready for mic checks. He didn’t see any trace of the sires. Except, of course, another woman, standing near the platform, sheltering underneath the shade of the canvas overhang.

She stared at Jasper. There were no wounds, no gore, no blood – but Jasper knew. The victims had this sort of look about them, all hazy edges; and they all had that same gleam in the eye. Hoping that someone might see them. Someone might tell them what had happened, or why they were still there.

“I think I need a minute in the shade,” Jasper said, realizing this spirit might be able to help, but he needed Delia to be gone in order to talk to it.

“I think the moonbeams are up there,” Delia said, gesturing to the gathering of tents.

“Would you mind looking for me?” Jasper asked. “I’m just gonna stand here a minute.”

He stepped into the shadows, out of the direct sunlight. Delia frowned at him, but said, “okay. Be right back.”

She saunter off, and the moment she turned her back, Jasper turned to the woman standing next to him. The woman no one could see – no one in this entire camp, maybe in this entire world – but him.

Jasper hated this part. He hated the moment they made eye contact; realizing they were seen, realizing that someone on the other side could still hear them. 

"Hi," he said, as quietly as he could manage. He wanted to avoid the musicians seeing him speak to the air.

The woman-spirit's eyes widened when she realized he was speaking to her.

"I presume you were eaten." Jasper forced the words out as quickly as he could, because soon, the spirit would become nonsensical, crazed that he would even speak to her. "I need to know - where are the ones who ate you? And the one that was just here - "

The woman began shaking her head, violently. Jasper frowned.

"I don't know what that means. Can't you speak?"

The woman kept shaking her head. She reached out for him, translucent hands flickering in the daylight. This would be so much easier at night, when the spirits were more solid, but Jasper didn't have that kind of time.

He stepped away from her, avoiding that silvery touch. "Okay, just nod, yes and no. I don't have time, I'm sorry. I'm looking for the sirens. The seven women on stage last night. Do you know where they went?"

The woman kept shaking her head. Her eyes welled with tears as she opened her mouth, nothing but raspy air coming out. Perhaps she'd forgotten how to speak - that sometimes happened, especially if they'd lost their vocal chords in whatever incident had ended their lives. 

Jasper tried again. "Okay - nod. Are the sirens here?"

"I couldn't find them!" Delia's musical voice jingled through the air, breaking Jasper's concentration. He turned to see her coming back. "Sorry - I really thought they were here. Maybe later tonight? It's not too hard to sneak back here when the music gets going. You could wait."

Jasper didn't tell her that he'd already planned to do just that. He shoved his hands into his pockets looked at the ground, hanging his head. In his periphery, the woman was still shaking hers when he said, "no worries. Guess I'll have to wait around like everyone else."

---

Jasper sat in the mustang, tipping back the flask while he watched the sunset. The festival had gone quiet, now that they were in a break between the afternoon and evening blocks. It had taken him time, but he'd shaken off Delia - now committed to a deep-breathing-yoga-session - and made his way back to the ridge, where he decided to sit and wait for Orion and Zephyra.

If they'd done their jobs (highly debatable) then they'd scoped out exactly what they needed to lure the sirens away that night and take them back to the rift. Zephyra would get them into the woods; Orion would seal them inside. All Jasper needed to do was get them in and out without being seen.

He couldn't put his finger on why, but something about that day left his stomach uneasy. Maybe it was the fact that his stomach was empty; he hadn't found a decent thing to eat that entire day, and wasn't ready to try whatever a veggie burger was, no matter how much Orion promoted it. More than anything, he wanted to leave. Something about this valley worried him. Something about the sirens. Something about Delia.

This was his seventy-third assignment from the Order. And yet something about this one set his teeth on edge.

He tipped the flask again, and it emptied into his mouth.

All out. Jasper hadn't planned on this being more than a one-night stint, or he would have prepared more thoroughly.

It wasn't the presence of the dead - although that was starting to get to him, too. The cities were worse; the way they wandered about, often still going to work or getting on the bus or visiting the restaurants they had frequented while they were alive. There were fewer dead out here. Fewer souls that had been missed in the crossing. It wasn't the way they lurked around, startled when they realize that he could see them, and then pressing in, as close as they could get, until they knew he was listening, until they could scream in his ears and bang on his brain and try to get him to do something about their extremely permanent condition. If anything, this place was more peaceful than others.

But something still felt very, very wrong.

Like the moments before a tidal wave, when the water tugged back from the shoreline, inch by inch.

Or the electricity in the air before a thunderstorm.

Jasper heard the chatter of the other two long before they saw them, climbing up to meet him on the ridge. Orion was stuffing his face with even more falafel. Zephyra was sunburned, her cheeks pink in the dying light, her lavender hair frizzy in the California humidity. She smiled at him as he got out of the car.

"How was backstage?" Orion asked, his mouth full.

"Incredibly memorable," Jasper answered. "Did you get everything you need?"

The two nodded, sitting down on the ridge. For once, Jasper joined them, looking out across the valley as the darkness began to take hold. Lights began to flicker from the tent, and he heard the first few sounds of mic checks as the second round of music queued.

"I think tonight is going to be fun," Zephyra said, swinging her legs over the edge.

"I hope you're right," Jasper replied. "Now, listen up, you two. Here's the plan."

Click Here to Continue to Part Three

---

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