Page 43 of Ghostly Touches

I nod. A heavy, tension-filled silence follows. It’s broken when Viktor swears violently and slams his fist into the wall. It smashes through, leaving a hole in its wake. Kwil pushes himself off the wall and paces the room. Theo’s jaw ticks, but it’s the only outward sign of anger I can see.The only one who doesn’t seem upset is Jonah, whose tail is flailing back and forth with excitement. At least, I think it’s excitement. I can’t really tell.

“She’s a goddamnmortal!” Viktor roars and kicks a chair. “Jesus, we have a ticking death clock hanging over us now.”

Well… I’m kind of mortal. But no need for them to know that. Best to let Viktor think he needs to tread lightly around me.

“There has to be a way to rectify this situation.” Theo shakes his head slowly. “There’s no way we can make this work.”

“Something in the book might be able to help us,” Kwil says after a minute. “Maybe we can use it to reverse this.”

Jonah growls and shakes his head.

“Doesn’t appear our friend here is a fan of that plan,” Theo notes. “I wonder why.”

“We need to figure out how to help him,” I tell the Ghosts. “You can ask him why when he can talk.”

Theo hums once, deep in thought. “I don’t know how to help since the book is spelled so we can’t read any of the pages.”

“There are potions that can make the ink appear if it’s a simple spell. They sell it at any apothecary, so maybe start there?” I suggest and then add, “Maybe we can also ask the pharmacist if they sell potions that could counteract whatever curse Jonah suffers from?”

Theo’s eyes bore into mine. I wonder if he’s still feeling the effects of our souls touching. I know I am. Thus, the headache.

“Shit,” Kwil shouts suddenly, causing me to flinch. He turns to me. “Willow, you’recursed. Which means nowwe’recursed, since we have a piece of you in us. And if Theodon’s theory is right, and your curse has to do with monsters coming after you, then it makes sense why monsters were coming after us in droves in the Third Realm while the Elders had you. If they start coming for all of us in this world, we’re even more screwed. The Brotherhood is going to see these monsters all congregating in one area and come to exterminate them. Not only do we have creatures coming to kill us, we’ll have a bunch of Ghosts right on our heels soon enough.”

From the look on his face and judging by the tone of his voice, I know this is supposed to be bad, but I can’t fathom why? Isn’t extermination exactly what we’d want? And the more Ghosts the better to help us, right? Viktor swears again, and even Theo looks horrified.

“This is just getting better and better,” Viktor yells and throws up his hands.

“W-wait, why don’t we want more Ghosts to help us?” My head is reeling.

The color in Theo’s face drains away as he swallows hard. “We are supposed to be at our posts in the Third Realm. If they find out we’re here, they could kill us for desertion. It’s a crime in our Brotherhood.”

“Add desertion to the long list of crimes they’d kill us for…” Kwil mutters as he turns his back to us.

Oh. Well, shit. Suddenly, I feel ill.

“I need some air,” I croak as I run out of the room.

My breathing sounds loud in my ears. In my chest, my heart is beating rapidly, almost painfully. I can hardly feel my feet as I stumble through the house. Eventually I find the front door. I fling it open and nearly throw myself outside. Judging by the dark clouds, it looks like it could rain any minute. I don’t care, and I hurry up the driveway. The house is situated on what appears to be an abandoned piece of property. I can smell cows, and there’s a rooster crowing off in the distance. Any other time I’d be worried about where the hell I am, but right now, I’m trying not to panic about the life altering mistake I’ve dealt us all.

Shit! Shit, shit, shit.

To the world, I’m a necromancer. And as a necromancer, my job is to communicate with souls, not tamper with them. When I realized what they wanted from me, I should have told the Ghosts, “Sorry, no can do” and kicked them out. It must’ve been the awe of having real life warriors in my house that caused me to feel bold enough to tackle their conundrum.

My parents are going to be so pissed. Not only have I destroyed a witch’s soul, which is a no-no, but now I’ve gone and accidentally merged souls together, which is probably even worse than obliterating one. I’ve broken some serious rules, and now I’m tethered to three Ghosts and a man stuck as a Shadebroode. And on top of that, I was stupid enough to touch a cursed book.

I lift my face to the sky and close my eyes. With some deep breathing, I try to calm my racing heart. Maybe if there was a way out of this, I wouldn’t feel so trapped. Unfortunately, I don’t see a situation where we all go our separate paths without a shit ton of problems.

“Please, can you help me?”

My eyes pop open with a start. In front of me stands the spirit of a child who’s no more than ten. He stares up at me, eyes full of fear. I fight back a heavy sigh.Of course,someone else needs my help.It’s not like I don’t require any assistance of my own right now.

“What’s up?” I ask him, crouching down so I’m at his eye level.

“I can’t find my mommy.” His bottom lip quivers.

“He’s been saying that for five years now. I tried telling him his mom is long gone, but the kid just won’t listen.”

I look up to find another spirit lingering close by. He’s dressed in a polo and khakis. Behind him are at least five dozen more. Where the hell did all of these spirits come from? As I stand there taking in my audience, more of them start popping up. Soon there are over a hundred spirits standing before me. I throw my hands up in frustration.

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