Thief of Souls Read Free Page B

mind.
    He dug the spade in the soft dirt, and flung it easily over his shoulder.
    The chill wind of a late-September night filtered through the nearby forest, filling the midnight air with the rich scent of pine. He shivered. With knuckles stiff from gripping the shovel, he struggled to zip his jacket to the very top. Then he resumed digging, planting the spade again and hurling the dirt, beginning to catch the rhythm of it, giving in to the monotony of spade and earth. He made sure not to get any dirt on the blanket he had brought with him.
    He realized he should have worn heavy workboots for the job, but his sneakers, though caked with mud, never seemed to wear out. None of his clothes ever wore out. He had just torn his jeans hopping over the wrought-iron fence, but he knew they would be fine. Even now, the shredded threads around the tear were weaving together.
    The fact was, Dillon Cole couldn’t have a pair of faded,worn-out jeans if he wanted to. He called it “a fringeless fringe benefit.” A peculiar side-effect of his unique blessing.
    The shovel dug down. Dirt flew out.
    â€œI got a scratch.”
    The small boy’s voice made Dillon flinch, interrupting the rhythm of his digging.
    â€œCarter,” warned Dillon, “I told you to stay with that family until I got back.”
    â€œBut the scratch hurts .”
    Dillon sighed, put the shovel down and brushed a lock of his thick red hair out of his eyes. “All right, let me see your hand.”
    Carter stretched out his arm to show a scratch across the back of his hand. It wasn’t a bad scratch, just enough to draw the tiniest bit of blood, which glistened in the moonlight.
    â€œHow’d you do this?” Dillon asked.
    Carter just shrugged. “Don’t know.”
    Dillon took a long look at the boy. He couldn’t see the boy’s eyes clearly in the moonlight, but he could tell Carter was lying. I won’t challenge him just yet, Dillon thought. Instead he brought his index finger across Carter’s hand, concentrating his thoughts on the scratch.
    The boy breathed wondrously as he watched the tiny wound pull itself closed far more easily than the zipper on Dillon’s jacket. “Oh!”
    Dillon let the boy’s hand go. “You made that scratch yourself, didn’t you? You did it on purpose.”
    Carter didn’t deny it. “I love to watch you heal.”
    â€œI don’t heal,” reminded Dillon. “I fix things that are broken.”
    â€œYeah, yeah,” said Carter, who had heard it all before. “Reversing Enter-P.”
    â€œEntropy,” Dillon corrected. “Reversing entropy,” and he began to marvel at how something so strange had become so familiar to him.
    â€œGo back to those people,” Dillon scolded Carter gently. He returned to digging. “You’re too young to be here.”
    â€œSo are you.”
    Dillon smiled. He had to admit that Carter was right. Sixteen was woefully young to be doing what he was doing. But he had to do it anyway. He reasoned that it was his penance; the wage of his sins until every last bit of what he had destroyed was fixed.
    The blade of Dillon’s shovel came down hard, with a healthy bang.
    Carter jumped. “What was that?”
    Dillon shot him a warning glance. “Go back to the house.”
    â€œThat woman won’t stop praying,” Carter complained, shifting his weight from one leg to the other, and back again. “It makes me nervous.”
    â€œYou go back there and tell them I’ll be back in an hour. And then you sit down and pray with them.”
    â€œBut—”
    â€œTrust me, Carter. You don’t want to see this. Go!”
    Carter kicked sullenly at the dirt, then turned to leave. Dillon watched him weave between the polished gravestones and slip through the wrought-iron fence.
    When Dillon was sure Carter was gone, he took a long moment to prepare his mind for the task