prologue

The rain hadn’t stopped for three days. It was the kind of rain that swallowed sound, that blurred the edges of the world into shadows and static. In the city of Blackthorn, rain wasn’t cleansing—it was a weight. A steady reminder that nothing ever really washed away.

Detective Jonah Voss leaned against the hood of his unmarked sedan, cigarette trembling between his fingers. He’d kicked the habit five years ago, but nights like this dragged him back. The call had come in just after midnight: another body, another scene. Third one this month. Same signature.

The morgue van idled nearby, headlights casting pale beams across the wet cobblestones of St. Brigid’s Alley. It was a narrow throat of a street, hemmed in by brick walls stained with moss and rust. The stench of rot mixed with wet asphalt clawed its way into Jonah’s nostrils.

“Detective?” Officer Ramirez called, his voice muffled by the rain. “You’re gonna want to see this.”

Jonah stubbed out his cigarette, the ember hissing against the puddle, and trudged over. Ramirez stood at the mouth of an old door, splintered from where they’d forced it open. The building had once been a boarding house, abandoned since the fire a decade ago. Now it was just a carcass: blackened beams, shattered glass, graffiti scrawled in tongues Jonah couldn’t understand.

Inside, the air was damp and heavy, carrying the coppery tang of blood. His flashlight cut through the dark, revealing peeling wallpaper sagging like skin. Then the beam landed in the room at the end of the hall.

The body was waiting.

A young woman, mid-twenties maybe, sat propped against the wall. No struggle, no sign of restraint. She looked almost peaceful, if not for the way her chest had been split open. Her ribcage splayed like a grotesque book, pages of flesh peeled back with surgical precision. A single black feather rested in the cavity where her heart should have been.

Jonah’s jaw tightened. “Same as the others.”

On the wall above her, written in blood with neat, deliberate strokes, was a verse:

“When the devil is questioned, he speaks in riddles. When he is cornered, he tells the truth.”

“Christ,” Ramirez muttered, pulling his coat tighter.

Jonah crouched, studying the feather. Raven, maybe crow. But the meticulous placement made it ritualistic, deliberate. He pulled on gloves, bagged it carefully.

A faint sound crept through the silence—a creak, like footsteps overhead. Ramirez stiffened. “Thought this place was cleared.”

Jonah raised a hand for quiet. They listened. Rain hammered the roof, wind howled through broken windows, but beneath it: movement. Someone was upstairs.

They drew their guns and moved up the staircase, wood groaning under their boots. At the top, the corridor stretched long and narrow. A door at the far end stood ajar, candlelight flickering inside.

Jonah signaled Ramirez, then pushed the door open.

The room was lined with candles, their flames sputtering in the draft. In the center knelt a man in a tattered priest’s cassock, head bowed, hands clasped. His face was gaunt, beard matted, eyes bloodshot. The smell of incense mingled with the metallic sting of blood.

“Father Marcus Hale,” Jonah said, lowering his weapon but not his guard. The name fit—the disgraced priest who vanished after the scandal ten years ago. The man who’d been whispered about ever since, a ghost in the city’s underbelly.

Father Hale lifted his head slowly. His lips curled into a cracked smile. “Detective Voss. I wondered when you’d arrive.”

Jonah felt the hairs on his neck rise. “You know why we’re here.”

The priest nodded toward the floor beside him. Jonah’s gaze followed—and froze.

There, scrawled in chalk across the rotten wood, was a circle filled with intricate sigils. At its center sat a leather-bound Bible, pages torn and marked with black stains. Surrounding it were photographs of the victims—three so far, all posed, all marked with the feather.

And scrawled above the circle, in jagged letters: “THE DEVIL’S ALIBI.”

Ramirez muttered a curse under his breath.

Jonah kept his gun steady. “You’re under arrest for murder, Father.”

Father Hale chuckled, a sound that cracked like dry wood. “Murder?” He spread his hands, palms upward, revealing streaks of dried blood. “No, detective. I am not the hand. I am the witness.”

“You expect us to believe that?” Jonah snapped.

The priest’s eyes flicked toward the Bible. “Ask him. He’ll tell you.”

Jonah stepped closer, his stomach knotting. “Who?”

“The one who wears me,” Hale whispered. “The one who moves when I sleep. I am his vessel, nothing more.” His voice trembled, but not with fear—with certainty. “You want the truth? Then you must let him speak.”

The candles guttered, shadows clawing at the walls. For a moment, Jonah swore the temperature dropped.

Ramirez shifted nervously. “This guy’s nuts. Let’s cuff him and be done.”

But Jonah hesitated. The verse on the wall, the staging of the bodies, the precise rituals—it was too meticulous for madness. Either this man was the most disciplined killer Jonah had ever met, or something darker was moving through him.

Father Hale bowed his head again, whispering words Jonah couldn’t catch. Then louder: “I will give you his alibi.”

And then he looked up, eyes rolling back until only the whites showed. His voice changed, guttural and cold, carrying a weight that pressed against the walls.

“He was with me. Each night. Each death. I am his alibi. And I am yours.”

The candles snuffed out all at once, plunging the room into blackness. Ramirez cursed, fumbling for his flashlight. When the beam cut back on, Father Hale was slumped against the floor, unconscious—or pretending.

Jonah’s hands shook as he cuffed him. But the words lingered in the air like smoke.

The Devil’s alibi.

By dawn, Father Marcus Hale sat in the interrogation room, wrists chained, eyes hollow. Outside, the press had already swarmed, cameras flashing, headlines blooming with fever: EX-PRIEST ARRESTED IN BLACKTHORN MURDERS.

But Jonah couldn’t shake the feeling. They’d caught the man—but had they caught the hand, or just the mouthpiece?

And if the devil truly had an alibi… then who was the real killer?

The city of Blackthorn had always been rotten at the core. Now Jonah wondered if that rot went deeper than flesh and bone—if it was spiritual, ancient, something that no badge or gavel could touch.

The rain kept falling, blurring the world into shadows. And somewhere, beyond the courthouse, beyond the morgue, something laughed.

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