Page 42 of After Life
It was gone midnight, but we still had power, something Julian had seemed surprised about when he’d gotten up around an hour before to use the bathroom. “It won’t be on long, I bet,” he yawned before crawling back into bed. He shifted beside me, flopping one arm over his head and the other off the edge of the bed as he fought the urge to roll over in his sleep. I took the opportunity to slip out of the bed and shuffle to the armchair near the room’s small fireplace. The temperature had dropped, but I was certain it had nothing to do with the weather. The snap of the chill, the way it buzzed along my skin and made my senses prickle. It was a ghost.
More than one, actually.
The whisperers, I thought. Jeremiah had been quiet since the altercation with Sandra in the corridor, and Sandra herself had been absent. So that left the ghosts who were apparently keen on having meetings throughout the house to discuss whatever spectral business needed seeing to. I pulled out the blotter paper from between the pages of the book, where Julian had left it on the side table and smoothed it over my knee. The chill wrapped around me, stealing my breath for a moment. “Do you mind?” I murmured. “I’m working here.”
A soft chuckle sounded from near the hearth, and the sound of footsteps moved down the corridor.
Outside, the storm rattled on, the shutters thumping as they fought against the wind, a soft whine of branches on the roof oddly animal-like.
Tea. I needed tea.
Pulling on my jumper, I made my way downstairs as quietly as I could which was really for naught as the storm outside covered any bumps and creaks I made going down the steps. The house itself felt still, almost empty, Sandra back in her cottage and the house battened against the storm. It was cold downstairs, and only part of that was due to the weather. The whispering spirits were frantic, the soft hiss of their distant voices teasing at my senses. I hesitated, then sighed; I wouldn’t be getting any tea any time soon, I imagined. The whispers were coming from the library, so I followed them there, flipping the light switch as I entered. The whispers fell quiet as the light flooded the room, flickered, then steadied. “I know you’re here,” I murmured. “Don’t be shy.”
A soft shuffling noise came from my left and I watched as two books fell from the shelf. Picking them up, I read the names on their spines. The first, a green, cloth-bound book with worn corners and faded gold lettering, was called A Treatise on Death Rituals in Appalachian Granny Magic. It had severely foxed pages and was almost too thick for me to hold one-handed. The other, a slim volume bound in hard cardstock with embossed lettering, making me think it was homemade, was titled Plants, Herbs, and Other Flora of Broken Palm Island: A Guide for the Discerning Practitioner. It was thinner than many paperbacks I’d read, the spine barely wide enough for the title’s lettering.
What the hell?
“Death and gardening,” I said aloud, picking the books off the floor and setting them on the end table. “I already know about the ritual. We’ve seen the book.” I waited, listening for the whispers to come back.
They were silent, but nearby. I could feel them buzzing along my skin like tiny ant-feet. “What am I looking for in here?”
The books fell off the end table, the death ritual book open to a sigil diagram labeled To Return To Me and the gardening book open on a picture of those yellow flowers I’d noticed around the island that I took to be some local sort of weed.
“Look,” I sighed. “I’m not very good with puzzles when I’m this tired. Give me a moment or two, yeah? We’ll get this sorted.”
I headed for the kitchen, unashamed to turn on every light I passed. Dark usually held no fear for me but something about the night was feeling wrong, heavy.
Grasping.
As soon as I stepped into the kitchen, all hell broke loose for a handful of seconds. Crockery pots holding sugar, flour, and coffee flew from the worktop and hit the floor, clouds of their powdery contents floofing into the air. The tea kettle rolled to one side before banging onto the floor, denting badly. The cabinet doors swung open, then slammed closed, and the rack of teacups above the stove burst into ceramic shards.
Shaking, I smoothed my hands over my pajama top and affected the most bored tone I could muster. “That was uncalled for. Very rude of you to destroy property like that.”
I eyeballed the mess, wondering if I could get to the broom cupboard without tearing up my feet or I could sneak back upstairs to grab my slippers. Before I could decide, the back door swung open and Sandra loomed, glaring and wet.
“What the hell did you do to my kitchen?”
“I...” Gesturing helplessly, I was at a loss for words. “Poltergeist,” I finally settled on, unable to come up with a good fib and knowing she’d see through it even if I did.
“Fucking hell. We’ll deal with this in a minute. I saw the light on and figured I’d grab whichever one of you it was to help me right quick. Some of the older plants near the graveyard need tying up. The stakes I used earlier aren’t strong enough and I need another pair of hands.”
I hesitated, but under her shrewd, sharp glare, I nodded. “Let me grab some shoes.”
“No need. Take my gumboots off the porch. Hurry up—we ain’t got long.”
Sandra didn’t say a word as we headed down the weaving stone path toward the graveyard. I offered a quiet apology to the library ghosts, promising I’d be back soon and to wait for me.
I wondered if they were who I felt moving with us down the path, into the rainy dark. Sandra was moving fast, her flashlight bobbing with each step. It made the shadows play oddly, disorienting me as the dark grew thicker the farther into the garden we went. “Here,” she finally said. “That vine there. It needs tending to.”
She nudged me forward, and I nearly tripped into a small, heavily canopied circle. The rain was barely reaching the ground there, the grass practically dry.
Which, I supposed, was a good thing because a small metal brazier was glowing merrily in the shadows. Smoke so thick and gray I could see it even in the darkness poured from the flames, the smell sickly sweet. Cloying, really. It burned my eyes and nose, tickled the back of my throat. I coughed, unable to stop myself, and once it started I found it impossible to stop. Unseen hands clawed at my waistcoat, my hair, pulling at me, tugging me down to the ground as I hacked and coughed. I tasted blood as I heaved for air, the ghost-hands pulling my head back until my neck twinged in pain. Pulling on my focus, I forced some of my power out, pushing at the ghosts until they let me up. But they were still close, so near that if they’d been living I’d be covered in their breath. It was impossible to discern one ghost from another—it was a tangle of spirit and anger and fear, pushing at me even as I pushed back. Finally, they eased just enough for me to roll to my knees, gasping.
“Breathe,” Sandra ordered. I motioned for her to move back, to let me get some air, but she snarled, grabbing my cravat and pulling me toward the smoke. “Breathe in!”
She jerked hard on the fabric, cutting off my air for a moment. When she loosened her hold, I gasped out of reflex, inhaling a mouthful of the bitter-sweet-thick smoke. Everything felt hot and slippery as the smoke hit my bloodstream. Sandra caught me as I sagged, my muscles suddenly week. My tongue felt too thick, words unable to form but, I realized, I was too sleepy to care.
“Here,” Sandra hissed, yanking at my neck again. She pulled my cravat off and someone else started tying it around my head and mouth, keeping me quiet. “We need to move fast. Tide’s going out and I need to clean that shit up inside before the other one gets up.”
