Page 69 of Deadly Maiden

Hands on hips, she nods, making her shorter hair curl about her neck. That’s cheating, that pose. It lifts her breasts, accentuates all her delicious curves, and I pause to drink in the sight. It makes my heart sing. I am ready to agree with her, and I’m sure this will be bad.

“Continue,” I prompt.

“I haven’t yet explained the gheist gun but you know it uses getharum, which is also known as gheist, and therefore…” She inhales, exhales, frowning. “I’m hoping I can recharge the crystal from what is in here. If I can do that, maybe we can recharge the crystals for the disguises. The magik is so close to the same form—getharum and etharum.” I must look puzzled, and I am, because she adds, “I can feel a ghost, here, maybe even two. Gheist is the essence of a ghost.”

A chilling fact. I should, perhaps, have guessed that.

I step past her to study the graveyard, rest my hand on the hilt of my sword. Nothing moves apart from the sparrows and a few grasshoppers. What did I expect? I can’t see ghosts.

“Is this dangerous? Do you know enough?”

“I think so? I’ve been in a graveyard recently, with Landos, when he bought an ampoule of gheist to recharge the pistol.”

“That’s not a lot of know-how. You should really study this first.”

“Uh-huh. And I get to do that how? We need this now. Saphora…” She waves vaguely westward. “She’s across the Fathomless Sea.”

This is painfully true. I don’t want to watch her die or be disfigured…eaten by a ghost.

*Same here.*

I grunt, nod to Wyntre. “If you think you know enough, because I can see part of this is simply your innate magik, then do it. I’ll jump on any ghosts that try to hurt you.” I smile weakly.

“You do that.” She comes over, goes up on tiptoes, and drags my head down for a brief kiss. “There. That’ll make it better.”

I’m chuckling at that but also sad, because… Because we have so much here, so much potential love, and I’m not worthy. I need my magik to return. It came back after that battle. Or before it? Can I count that shifting explosion that killed the enforcers? I don’t know. I’m in the dark and useless unless I can fix this.

Wyntre removes her rucksack from Blossom and rummages, pulls out the box that contains the gun.

“First, I want to show the gun to you. Properly. Let’s sit. I’ll get a blanket.”

This I can do. I retrieve my bedroll that is strapped to Snake-eyes, and spread it on the barest patch of springy grass, squash it as flat as possible.

Wyntre kneels and unpacks this gheist gun and the ampoule from the raven. I sit cross-legged opposite, admiring her as much as I do this new weapon. Though we’re still disguised, as usual I can see through hers. Her cute, shorter hairstyle frames her face, and the blueness contrasts with her rose-red lips.

“I figure I should tell you a bit about where it comes from and so on. So we both understand this equally. This gun derives from Aos Sin magetech, and Landos got the diagrams and all from someone I don’t know. He worked on this for a year, making his own version. I was with him when he bought the gheist in an ampoule, and I have seen the gun pulled apart. So, here goes.”

She sucks on her lip then dismantles the gun into several parts that she names—barrel, butt, bullet chamber with some decorations on the side—a snake entwined with tiny pink flowers. Trigger, blueish warnite crystal. There’s even a spot to clip an ampoule onto.

“This still has some gheist charge”—she taps the crystal—“but I used some shooting the blood hawk.”

“Of course.” I’m mostly just nodding. Here I am listening to a necromancer girl describe the bits and pieces for a weapon that uses necromancy, and I am okay with it.

“This is no more evil than any weapon,” I muse, mostly convincing myself. A quiet unease remains. Bad things do look better in daylight.

“I never thought it was. This isn’t necromancy though.” She studies me. “I guess the gheist sort of is? Except Landos said some people have the knack or talent at collecting it. They are not necros though.”

“Okay.” I was wrong, but still, my thought stands. “How do you know you can collect this essence of ghost? Or even change it to etharum for our pendants?”

“I don’t.” Rapidly, she clicks, twists, slots the gun pieces back together. “And the bullets go here.” Wyntre unhinges a smaller chamber in that central part. “So you know what to do if you need to. And! The bullet comes out here, from the open end of the barrel. Please point it the right way.”

“Sure.” I grin. “I had decided that already.”

“Then.” She unfolds her knees and rises. “It’s time to try this. First, I will see if I can collect some gheist.”

Side by side, we enter the old graveyard. Is it scary or eerily quiet? No. The breeze swishes the grasses. Sparrows flit past. Our boots crush the gravel, the dirt, the dead leaves. The sun beats on my neck, and wavering leaf shadows dapple our path.

We wander beneath trees and past gravestones that are intact, but most are sunken into the ground, askew, or covered by leaves and mold.

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