Dual Heritage

By Mark Johnson

Inexplicable deaths. Desperate immortals. Why have the ancient demons resurfaced?

Sergeant Tummil almost apprehends the chaos energy Seeker who witnessed a massacre that horrified a nation: Terese Saarg. When she disappears, the case is shut down. But Tummil won’t allow himself to forget the innocent hundreds who died. If he wants answers and justice, he’ll have to start investigating where Saarg left off.

As he uncovers more details of the mysterious massacre, Tummil learns a long-forgotten evil has been released into the city. But this ancient spectre is nothing like the history books say. As Tummil sets out to discover what happened to Saarg and the hundreds who died on her watch, immortal observers discover his investigation. And they’re just as interested in him as they were in Saarg.

Should Tummil take the advice of the mysterious immortals? Or do they want him to disappear like Terese Saarg?

Dual Heritage is the prequel to the sweeping FireWall series. If you like prophecies fulfilled, ancient curses re-awoken and supernatural mysteries, then you’ll love Dual Heritage!

Check out Dual Heritage to uncover the cause of the massacre today!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mark Johnson
• Release date: Mar 10, 2020

Mark Johnson

Mark Johnson is a health and science reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, where he has worked since 2000. He was a member of the Journal Sentinel team that won the Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting on the Nic Volker story in 2011. He is also a three-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and has won numerous other awards for his reporting. He lives with his wife and son in Fox Point, WI.

Book preview

1

Sergeant Tummil shoved the door open without knocking. Examiner Reeben looked up wearily from his paperwork.

She’s gone, sir! Tummil hissed. Gods, he wanted to yell, but not at his superior. Yesterday! Took her team with her.

Reeben pushed back from his desk, removing his glasses and rubbing his eyes. Morning, Sergeant. No one tried to stop Saarg leaving?

We can’t stop a Seeker leaving on official business. Tummil couldn’t stop flexing his hands into fists. Our only lead on the massacre, and we could only stare as she walked right out the gate. Apparently, they’re going to Sumad.

Sit down, Tummil. There’s news.

Sir?

Remember Guard Captain Gorden? The massacre’s four survivors came from his guardhouse.

I remember.

He had a stroke last week, and he’s been put into a convalescent home. Reeben shuffled a sheaf of papers. Saarg’s parents took ill last week. For the first time ever, her father took a whole week off work. He shuffled another paper and looked up. Turceen Emberhorf?

Tummil recognized the name. The identity forger who sold the four survivors their new cards?

Was reported missing, yesterday. And according to this—Reeben passed Tummil a paper—Saarg’s chapterhouse have been sick, recently. Very sick.

Tummil scanned the paper. So, everyone who worked with Saarg in the last year has suddenly gotten sick?

"Everyone except her daughter, who’s been going to school like normal. Now we know the Royals at least draw the line at children."

The chair creaked as Tummil fell back into it. Saarg warned me, sir. She said the Royals would come to shut everyone up.

Including her, said Reeben. "They’ve silenced everyone who had significant interaction with Saarg, or has seen those four survivors in the last year. Then they sent Saarg overseas to find those four survivors."

Then why not mess with us as well?

Reeben muttered under his breath and looked up from the papers. Why bother? We were never the problem. The problem was evidence—which vanished with Saarg, so it’s no longer a problem.

Three hundred dead, sir. And Saarg and her crew get away with it?

Reeben kept shuffling his papers.

The silence stretched. It was interrupted by a knock at the door. The station manager entered. Examiner Reeben, she said, there’s an alert for you.

Reeben’s half-lidded eyes came all the way open.

Something’s happened in the blocks down in the Fooram District—the ones you were watching.

Reeben and Tummil sprang to their feet. They’d had Saarg followed there, but they’d never found her exact destination.

Local guards are saying there might have been deaths, she continued.

They’re not sure? asked Reeben, seizing his jacket.

2

The last time Tummil had worn a facemask had been at the massacre in the underground chamber, where he’d first encountered Head Seeker Terese Saarg.

But that had been underground, not here, in a large manor in one of the wealthier quarters. Back then, there’d been no flies. Now, flies coated the manor’s walls, floor and ceiling. The mask rendered Tummil’s vision in shades of grey. The bloodstains were grey, as were the limbs and scattered, rotting viscera. The facemask covered his nose and mouth, and still he was certain he could smell the carnage.

Reeben crouched near the remains. This isn’t at all like the underground massacre that started all this, months ago. Those bodies had been torn apart. These ones… they’ve been methodically cut open and had parts removed. His voice was toneless as he spoke into the recorder in his hand.

The skin has been flayed, with particular attention paid to the muscles. Much skin is gone, though. The organs remain. Though like the underground site a few months ago, it’s difficult to tell how many people these remains originally were. Maybe ten?

He glanced at the damaged wave transmitters on crude wooden tables. Why were there wave transmitters here, and what would have been the point in damaging them?

At a touch on his shoulder, Tummil stepped back from the mess. He nodded. Constable?

Sergeant, said the constable. We’ve got the witness ready.

Right. Tummil removed his mask. No, he wouldn’t vomit. He’d seen worse at the underground chamber. He paced to the door and checked his shoes to make sure he hadn’t tracked any gore from the house. Lead on.

The woman waited inside the property’s gate. Out on the sidewalk, constables and recruits held back journalists with notepads and stylus pens, neighbors clutching paper grocery bags and students returning from school.

He offered his hand. Sergeant Fenden Tummil.

Marjene, said the woman, evidently thinking that would be enough.

I appreciate you coming, he said, indicating the large manor house behind them. The manor contained sixteen rooms and four floors. It had been purchased under a false name with real