Page 32 of Tortured Soul (Soulless #1)

“And? How did they get their hands on it? How did they even create something like this?” Carter asked, opening his damn mouth for the first time .

“I don’t know.” I shrugged.

His eyes were cold as he continued. “Did you not think it pertinent to ask them?”

“I was a little busy fighting them off my ass, you brainless pigeon .”

Arc cursed under his breath as Carter’s fists tightened over the table.

“Does anyone care to explain to me ? What is this?” Dimitri insisted, leaning as if ready to come between us.

Arc’s hand reached forward to grab the electronic device, but I jumped to take it before him, my heart racing.

I didn’t feel like having it pointed at me once again, thank you.

His mismatched eyes studied me for a bit, one of his eyebrows sliding up.

“It’s something that can track Immortals and give you some information about them when you point it in their direction,” I said, turning it around to find the switch button.

Dimitri’s gaze caught mine at my answer and they held for a charged second.

Yeah .

Turning it on while also making sure it was pointing toward Carrie, I leaned to the side to allow Dimitri to check the screen.

The scale over the screen lit up, an arrow pointing to the third level out of ten, a steady beep coming out of the remote like device. Processing… was written on the screen and blinked every second or so.

They all inched closer over the table to see it, the room silent.

The writing stopped blinking and they all gasped.

“What the fuck,” Carter said.

“What, did you not test it before to see?”

“Of course not,” he groaned. “We found it in a box. It had no manual or explanation, just a post-it saying that they needed to use that tracker when they went outside to scout the perimeter.”

“And were you not curious?” I asked, as Dimitri came closer, his chin resting on my shoulder to read what it said.

“That’s fascinating,” he mused in my ear.

“The team found it last night,” Arc cut in. “Didn’t have time to really play around with it.”

“I’m a bit disappointed to be worth so little, to be fair,” Carrie mumbled, watching the small text that appeared on the screen.

Demon, Common.

250 to 500 YO.

Estimated threat: Medium.

Reward: $5,000 - Outside potential bounty.

“I’m not sure how they get as much data just by scanning you, but it obviously only focuses on a bigger database, not the actual Immortal it points to,” Arc mused, rubbing his chin between his thumb and forefinger.

I hummed, turning to point it toward Carter, skipping Arc sitting between them.

“Hey, don’t point that shit at me,” he growled, trying to move to the side to avoid being on the radar.

“Stop acting like an ass,” Arc barked, pushing him off him and back into his spot.

Carrie chuckled next to me as she leaned to watch the screen. The scale lit up, pointing to the seventh level.

“Impressive.” Dimitri scoffed. “The guy’s a seven acting like a fucking twelve.”

“There are only ten,” I said, narrowing my eyes.

“My point exactly.” He grinned, turning his face to a sulking Carter.

I rolled my eyes in exasperation.

As the screen stopped blinking, the data appeared before me.

Angel, Higher.

Ageless - Fallen 100 to 250 Y ago.

Estimated threat: High

Reward: $30,000 - Outside potential bounty.

“Hey, not so bad.” Carrie chuckled. “If we add it up with the bounty on your head, you’d make someone pretty rich.” She paused, scanning the document. “Yeah, about $120k. Almost what I paid for my shitty apartment back when I lived in New York.”

“ Great ,” he gritted out.

“It even gives an approximation of when you fell,” I said, moving the screen slightly to show him while making sure it still wasn’t pointing at me. “Is it accurate?”

He grunted, turning his face away.

I’ll take it as a yes, then .

“Do him,” Dimitri said, nodding toward Arc.

I stared at him, waiting for a straight out refusal.

He didn’t, only held my gaze instead .

I turned the device and waited, Dimitri looking over my shoulder.

The scale blinked, pointing to ten.

Even though I was expecting this, it still made my breath hitch.

The silence was deafening as we all waited for the data to appear on the screen.

Unknown, Unknown.

1,500 to 2,000 YO

Estimated threat: Unmeasurable - Should flee.

Reward: $5,000,000 - Outside potential bounty.

“Not sure how they can claim such a high reward if they should flee, but alright,” Dimitri mocked over my shoulder.

Unknown. What was I expecting? They had no idea what he was as he was the only one of his kind. They were probably spot on for the level of threat, though.

“Well, that was enlightening,” Dimitri said, stretching his legs under the table and getting a murdering look from Carter.

“Scan him,” Arc said, eyes unreadable as they landed on the Nephilim.

Dimitri grinned, tilting his head to the side.

“Why, do you want to compare our sizes?”

Carrie coughed her water through her nose.

Arc’s eyebrow rose once again, the corner of his lips lifting in a strange smile.

“I’m just curious. Nephilims are a wide mystery for humans and Immortals alike, I wonder what it will say about you. I remember a time the news talked about capturing them to try and understand better what made them so different from the rest of us.”

Dimitri’s jaw ticked, but he kept his smile on.

“Sure. Go ahead.”

I hesitated, but only shortly, before I scanned him.

Like it did for Arc, the arrow pointed to a blinking ten. Carter’s jaw dropped.

“Well, well, well,” Carrie crooned. “I was expecting an eight, or a nine at most.”

“I’m full of surprises,” he said, the red swirling in his eyes as they landed on me.

When the screen showed the data, Carter cursed. Arc frowned.

Nephilim - Higher .

1,500 to 2,000 YO

Madness - 100%.

Estimated threat: Avoid at all cost.

Reward: ——

“Can’t put a price on what’s known to be deadly.” Dimitri grinned, stretching his limbs once more.

“Or, it means you’re worth shit.”

Carter looked way too proud of his little jab, but I felt my blood boil in my veins.

Dimitri’s hand landed on my thigh, sliding underneath my dress, unbothered.

“Sure, whatever rubs your ego. How’s your pride?”

“What about you, Lola?” Arc asked, interrupting what would probably have been a violent exchange, his eyes piercing my very absent soul, making my boiling blood suddenly freeze.

“There’s not much about me.” I shrugged it off. “It would probably say the same thing it said about Carrie, to be honest. Just a common demon.”

No one said anything, but all their focus was on me. Great .

“I’d like to—” Arc started, as he leaned forward to take the device from my hand, but Dimitri was quicker, swiftly grabbing it away first.

“I’ll do it. Smile for me, lille fugl .”

I tried to force my panic down, so as to not alarm anyone. They were my mates, what if they felt that something was off?

I forced a smile as Dimitri pointed it at me.

I braced myself, holding on tightly to the sides of my seat.

But nothing happened.

“Weird,” Dimitri mused. “Do you think it doesn’t say anything because of your missing soul?”

My heart was racing.

“Is that possible?” Arc asked, skeptical.

“It might,” Carrie said, frowning and turning her head to watch the device better.

“What do you mean, missing soul ?”

Right, I forgot about that .

Carter had stood up abruptly from his chair, sending it falling to the ground behind him .

He ripped the device from Dimitri’s hand to look at it, but at that same moment, I felt the air around me shift and the thin hair on my arm rise.

The device broke in Carter’s hand, as all our eyes were locked on him.

“For fuck’s sake, do you have no control over your own strength?” Dimitri chastised.

“I—I didn’t do anything.”

“Dude, it was fine five seconds ago, and now it’s in pieces. You obviously did something.”

“I swear, I—”

“Never mind.” Arc sighed. “I guess it didn’t work on Lola anyway. You believe it has to do with the missing soul?” he asked Dimitri.

“ What missing soul? ” Carter repeated, his voice clipped but louder than before.

“I mean, yeah, maybe. Why would it not work on her, if not that? It worked fine before, and she’s the only one missing it.”

The angel’s jaw twitched at Dimitri’s obvious decision to ignore him. I could tell Arc found the whole thing strange, as Carter was staring at the broken thing in his hand with a confused face.

But, for some reason, he didn’t push it.

“Alright, we played around enough. As I told you yesterday,” he said, turning to me, “the camp—I’ve been getting some threats.

Nothing very specific, just a few letters addressed to me with lists of names.

Names of people they snatched from us, sometimes with details that made us think they’re being tortured and their powers used against their will. ”

Dimitri tensed next to me, and I automatically grabbed his hand under the table to settle our laced fingers over my thigh.

“Have you sent anyone farther to try and find them?” he asked, but I could hear the strain in his voice.

“We did. They never came back, or couldn’t get far enough,” Carter said, as Arc rubbed his forehead.

“What kind of Immortals have you sent?” my old friend continued.

The angel shrugged. “Guards and scouts, usually lower demons or angels. We tried to avoid sending Earthwalkers on those types of missions. ”

“Obviously,” Carrie added, fumbling with the documents in front of her in search of something.

“Send me.”

My head snapped to the side to look at him. His nonchalant smile was gone, as well as any playfulness in his eyes.

“Send you,” Arc repeated, staring straight at him.

My hand tightened around his.

“The electronic thing said I was the biggest threat there is. No reward on my head for them to capture me, no bounty. Nephilims may enter in the Earthwalker category, but I’m stronger than most demons or most angels.

My blood might run red, but trust me when I say I didn’t take much after my human mother. ”

I straightened on my seat, unable to resist leaning closer to him.

Dimitri was a hothead. Impulsive. He was used to doing dangerous things and acting brashly.

But he had just gotten here. And I didn’t feel ready to let him go just yet.

“Dimitri—”

“Done,” Carter said, sliding the map closer to him. “There are hundreds of our people that are imprisoned somewhere. If you’re so good at tracking, find them and come back here so Arc or I can go on the rescue mission.”

“Hold on, we should talk about that. He’s—”

“A grown man,” Dimitri crooned in my ear.

“I’ll be fine, zhizn moya .” I gave him a concerned look.

“I’ll be careful . I promise I won’t get too close, alright?

” he swore, lifting his hand to cup my face.

“I’ll just look for a sign of their base or see if something is there, then I’ll come back to get back up. ”

I didn’t like that. Something didn’t feel right.

“He’s not leaving today right?” I asked Arc, whose face was impassible. “Right?”

“I’m sorry, but the faster he leaves, the faster he’ll be back, and the faster we can take action,” Carrie said as Arc remained silent.

“Wait, did you plan this? Were you planning on him going to scout the territory for you ?”

“I was about to ask him if he could, yes,” Arc finally said, looking at me before turning away from my angry face as my eyes must have betrayed what I was thinking.

Then go yourself . Better, send Carter …

“He did say he was a good tracker, and we need someone powerful who can’t be easily captured.

Apparently, he’s the most powerful of us. ”

He nodded toward the shattered device Carter had left on the table in front of him.

“But it’s—we were supposed to—” He came here because today was special. He came here because he wanted to be with me. “What if the madness starts acting up, huh?” I turned back to Dimitri.

His smile was soft. His touch on my face warm and reassuring. But the red was still swirling, the madness dancing in his eyes like it was celebrating its victory. There was no way to determine how and when his mind could switch. He might not be able to carry on with the mission.

“Then it’ll be a bloodbath,” he said, his tone overly sweet. “There’s nothing like spilling a little blood to appease the mad beast sharing my mind.”

My throat bobbed. Carter, Arc, and Carrie were silent in the background, probably aware that they wouldn’t be of any help convincing me.

“Everything is going to be okay, zhizn moya . I’ll only be gone a few days. We’ve spent decades apart, a few days are nothing.”

I wanted to yell at him that it was not nothing.

That the decades were in fact almost a century and it had been literal hell being away from him for so long.

That even though I didn’t have my soul, having him near made me feel whole.

That losing Blake had already been agony, and my heart wouldn’t be able to take losing him too.

But I didn’t. I didn’t have to, because Dimitri could read me like his favorite book.

“I promise I’ll be back. And if I have to leave again to bring back the people this camp has lost, I'll come back to you again, this time for good.” My eyes widened. “No more running. No more letting the madness take control. I belong with you, zhizn moya .”