Frost

Prologue

Hello and welcome to Book TWO. If you've come from Burning you are in the right place! If you have not, please back up and start there or you will just be confused. See the external link at the bottom.

Once again for prologue skippers this is not essential for the book but fun for later and may also have you recognize some things from the last book.

I'm very excited to get back to the story and introduce a few new characters to you as well. I really hope you enjoy and let me know your thoughts in the comments!

This will be a similar POV shifting story and may end up being a little more mature than the first one.

Ok now we begin!

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Four years after it had been banned the smell of decayed smoke still stubbornly stuck to every fabric chair. Even the cracked plastic on the bar stool had smoke still oozing out of its foam center.

It was not her choice to meet here. She hated the smell of smoke. Smoking killed people and the owners hadn't even bothered to clean the yellow sludge off the walls that years of it had left behind. The man didn't smoke either. Maybe he thought meeting here added to the drama of what he just told her.

"So, Lily is dead." The woman swirled the dregs of her pale beer.

The unfortunate, greasy man next to her nodded. His trucker hat had a yellow stain around the top. "The body was seen."

"It's wonderful, don't get me wrong but you could have told Mary that over the phone. Did I really need to come out to your..." the woman readjusted her own hat as she searched for the proper kind words to describe the town and then failed. "Look the point is if you have something else to say, say it."

"But they made a new one."

"A new what?"

"Lily. They made a new one."

She sighed. This was becoming ridiculous. She'd need another drink to keep talking to this kind of guy.

"I don't know what that means." She told him finally and watched his face fall with a touch of satisfaction. If he was looking for a head pat from them, he wasn't getting it from her. Not when he made her come in this stinking place. Not when she knew what kind of people he worked with and what they did to animals. Barbarians. Only out of necessity did her church group work with them.

"A new..." his eyes shifted as though someone might be listening in. It was eleven am. The only other patrons were professionals who likely stopped believing what they heard years ago and a thin man who was crying into his glass of dark liquor. "...assassin."

She was becoming irritated now. "We know they have others."

"No, no, Erica. One just like her. I don't understand how but it came straight from the top. They have a new Lily."

Maybe she did need a second beer for this conversation. She flagged down the bartender to have a fresh bottle brought and drained half of it. The man looked impressed and leaned in to continue. She really wished he wouldn't. His breath was sour.

"The demons can make a new one when the old dies. This one they call Bracken and he's worse."

"Worse? How could anything possibly be worse than that monster? She murdered the Pastor. She nearly killed her daughter."

"This one is off his leash."

"Speak plainly." She snapped leaning toward him with a sharp finger held out making him nearly fall off the bartstool. "You've been jerking me around since I got here."