Page 11 of A Lost Light

Hopefully she got the point. We needed somewhere to play around with our new toys. Somewhere outside the pocket world, but where the SA and the cult wouldn't be able to find us. I placed the folded note on the center of the kitchen table and waved a hand over it, activating the familial magic that the spell required, linking the ancestral home to my sister. The note disappeared in a wash of magic, and I wiped my palms on my jeans. That spell packed quite a wallop. Made my fingers tingle and my palms itch.

Letter sent, I turned to the others. “Well, now we wait, I guess.”

There was really no reason for usallto be crammed into the kitchen like this. But I refused to leave them out of anything to do with this whole mess. It was their lives at stake. They should know everything that went down. And usually they had opinions, welcome or not. But today, everyone was uncharacteristically quiet. I think they all felt the same sort of foreboding anticipation that I did. We were only a few small steps away from getting involved in some sort of actual physical confrontation with the crazies out there in the real world. And I wasn't surewhatwas going to happen when we did.

Zhong was the first one to break the silence. He shuffled over and dropped a kiss on my forehead before moving to the fridge. “I'll get lunch started.”

“I'm going out to the back courtyard,” Niamh said evenly. I could just see her preparing for battle already. She had targets set up out there for her bow, and that look in her eyes said she was ready to hunt.

Ambrose winked at me, always the one to act like everything was some big joke and the world wasn't falling apart around us. “I think I'll stay here and help Zhong. It's been a while since I took a turn in the kitchen.” He darted in and kissed the edge of Dyre's jaw before ambling off to ask Zhong what they were making today, leaving the necromancer glaring after him to cover his embarrassment.

I smirked at Dyre's discomfort over the boogeyman's show of affection. Dyre caught that and glared at me even harder than he had been glowering at Ambrose. Then he shook it all off and turned to Elijah, who was standing near the doorway, a bit apart from the others.

“You need to start using your magic,” he informed the newly animated angel. “You can't keep holding back and being afraid of your own aura.”

I arched my brows at this. What was he going on about? But Elijah's gaze slid to the side as he rubbed the back of his neck. “I know.”

I had only caught ghostly glimpses of the old Elijah. He had been barely more than a misty wisp of faded magic when I first met him. Nothing more than a ghost with a little extra magical… juice, to my medium abilities. The longer he spent around us, the more I'd caught a peek at an almost human projection. But after Dyre helped us transfer his anchor from the bestiary to the new anchoring charm so we could destroy the book… well, Dyre had given him a little extra boost, and you could clearly see a good deal of the handsome man Elijah had once been.

But that glimpse of him had been taller and leaner than the body he wore now. Broader through the shoulders. His features had been fairer and more chiseled, where now they were blunter. The body Elijah currently inhabited was a bit shorter than I thought the ghost should be. Elijah's new face had round cheeks and a square jaw. His eyes were brown, where they should be brilliant blue. And I was pretty sure Elijah had been fair-haired, rather than this dark brown color.

Even though I knew Elijah as a ghost with hardly any form at all, somehow, this still seemed weird. Like talking to a stranger.

“What do you mean?” I asked Dyre, forcing myself to pay attention to more important things than what the guy looked like. I dipped my head to make Elijah meet my gaze. “Is there something wrong with your magic?”

Elijah sighed and straightened. “I have no idea. I'm just a bit… hesitant to find out.”

“You were a powerful angel,” Dyre said, crossing his arms over his chest and looking down his long nose at his newest creation. “It's easy to guess as much given how strong your ghost was and how long you have clung to this plane. But I felt it, when I transferred your soul spark into that body. This corpse was oncea member of the high chorus. But your spark was much larger than his, stronger.”

Okay. News.

Elijah huffed out a sigh. “Yes, and I've barely gotten control of this body. What if my magic burns away whatever remnants of the previous owner have been making this all work?”

“Then the body will be all yours,” Dyre said easily.

But I could see Elijah's doubts. “Are you certain? You said you've never done this before. Never created a… revenant.”

Dyre's lean cheek flexed as he clenched his jaw, and his voice was deeper and less mortal when he spoke, a bit of ancient wraith bleeding through. “You choose to doubt my skillsnow, spook? After I've already re-anchored you twiceandgiven you new life?”

No doubt, the necromancer duo were the experts in this area. But I could also understand Elijah's fears. I don't think I'd want to be experimenting with my life that way either. I kept my mouth shut, though. It really wasn't my decision, and I wasn't about to encourage Elijah to do something that might end up killing him for good this time.

To my surprise, it was Aahil who broke the silent staring competition between Dyre and Elijah. “Did you lose your balls in the transition between dead and alive?” the jinn demanded in an exasperated tone.

We all turned to stare at him, and he waved a graceful hand dismissively, his gold eyes on Elijah. “Have you somehow failed to notice how good these idiots are at holding people together? If they kept me from killing myself or becoming permanent flames, I'm sure they can handle one stupid revenant.”

I shook my head at him. That littleasshole…

But Elijah was actually nodding. “Of course,” he said, completely ignoring Aahil's annoying tone. “You're right. I havefaith in everyone here. It's just that I find myself strangely afraid of dying, now that I'm alive again.”

Aahil rolled his eyes. “Since when has that stoppedanyonein this cursed house of crazies from doinganything.”

Elijah let out a surprised laugh. “Well… never, I suppose. Though I assumed you were all just braver than most.” He glanced around at me, Aahil, Dyre, and Hasumi.

I barked a disbelieving laugh. “Brave? Do you evenknowhow much time I spend wanting to run away, cry, or just fucking give up?”

Elijah's expression softened as his gaze met mine. “I do, actually,” he said softly. “Which is why I've always thought I could never be that strong.”

“Everyone is scared of themselves sometimes,” Ambrose piped up from across the room as he got out the cutting board and a knife. “Even boogeymen and scary necromancers. We are all just really good at pretending we're not.”

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