James Aubrey Bones Novels & Stories

Even if I had to, I'd drag someone down with me. A rusty axe lay in the corner of the cabin, left behind after chopping firewood. Without hesitation, I grabbed it and swung at the lock. A loud clang echoed across the entire pack's territory, sending birds scattering from the rooftops. After a dozen swings, my arms burned with pain. The lock finally snapped. I shoved the door open and bolted. Under the moonlight, my skin gleamed an eerie violet. Clearly, the wolfsbane had seeped into my bones.

A pair of crude crutches made from tree branches lay discarded beside him. The sound of the car door opening made him lift his head instinctively. Our eyes met. That face -- lined with premature wrinkles, caked in filth -- was Julian Ashford. Two years of beatings from loan sharks, starvation, freezing cold, and an untreated leg that had to be amputated had transformed him into something barely human. He looked fifty at least. Those eyes that once brimmed with calculation and counterfeit devotion were now cloudy and vacant. The instant he recognized me, his whole body seized with violent trembling.

Aubrey threw a potion at the fallen skeleton and whatever it was started eating through its armor and bones. Mammon began to recover and picked up his sword, getting to his feet. He remarked, "All these children’s tricks are getting tiresome." Callie threw a ball of fire at him. His blond hair caught fire but he shook his head and extinguished it easily. Aubrey threw a potion at him and it landed on his feet. His legs stopped moving. He growled in frustration as his legs refused to obey him, stuck on the sand as if his feet were weighed down. Callie conjured another fireball.

he explained. "What makes your body special then, Master?" asked Raider eagerly. "Pick one up and I'll tell you" said Master Bones with a slightly develish smile. Hearing these words, Raider's face became more solemn and his gaze returned to the left radius in front of him. He had a feeling this was his only shot, if this bone didn't move, none of them would. He slowly grabbed the bone in its middle and pulled towards himself.

He wanted to regain some of his lost pride. This was also his signal to the martial artists hiding inside the conference room to attack. “Timothy Bones, right?” Dustin glanced at Timothy. “You’re a really annoying fly. You get more excited the more I ignore you. It displeases me.” “What can you do to me even if I displease you?” Timothy scoffed. He still looked unfazed. Even though he had lost, he was without worry. He was part of the Bones family, which was one of the Seven Clans of Central Harbor. He had become even more important in his family after reaching the Martial Saint level.

They don’t pretend. At school, nothing changes. The same classes, the same bored teachers, the same students pretending not to feel anything. He sits in the back, doodling in his notebook, sketching bones and skeletons almost unconsciously. A morbid habit, but a harmless one. Better bones on paper than bones in his bed. At lunch, Jamie slides into the seat across from him. Jamie's got a sharp face and sharper tongue, always too curious for his own good. “You hear about the new girl?” Jamie asks.

Seraphina I looked him up before the meeting. Obviously. Callahan, Declan Patrick. Thirty-four. Eldest son of Cormac Callahan, dead three years, stroke. Took the chair at thirty-one when every analyst who tracks these things gave the organization eighteen months before collapse — too young, too much internal resistance, too many lieutenants with their own ambitions and no compelling reason to fall in line behind someone who hadn't proved himself yet. He spent those eighteen months quietly removing every obstacle between himself and absolute control. Then he turned outward and

he asked, still pretending to be confused even though he knew the truth. I let him continue acting. "Have you forgotten about Bree?" He shook his head profusely. "I don't know her. I've never heard of her." "Oh, really? Then who were you hiding in the basement of my home?" I reminded him. His eyes grew wide. Feigning anger, he shouted, "What are you talking about? Chloe Jones, I'm gravely ill and in the hospital. It's one thing to not even comfort me, but you're even making up trouble! Are you even human?"

He saw Julian and was on his feet in a second, his body positioned between the door and my bed. “Julian,” Toby said, his voice a low warning. “You’re back.” “I’m back,” Julian said, with a raspy voice. He looked at me, ignoring Toby’s defensive posture. “Lisa. We need to talk. All of us.” Julian didn’t sit. He stood by the window, the grey Seattle light catching the bruises on his neck. He told us about the House of Bone. He told us about the vault, the concrete stairs, and the smell of twenty-year-old rot.