Page 59 of Left Hand of the Divine
“We don’t need her, Bernard,” Jack hissed as he confronted the older ghost.
“Yes, we do. We need help. We’ve tried solving this on our own, and we’ve gotten nowhere. Now, unless you have anything useful to say, back off,” Bernard said, his tone short and sharp. Boy, the guy might be fading, but his spirit definitely wasn’t.
“Sheesh,” Lila whispered out the corner of her mouth. “I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of Bernard.”
No, we definitely would not. The guy probably spent his life in a courtroom as a cutthroat lawyer. And yet he looked so sweet.
“We heard that you were looking into the possibility that our fading might be connected to the drained vampires, and we’ve been waiting for you to visit the area,” Penny said. “Have you found anything?”
I shook my head. “Not yet, but I am looking into it.”
This was going to be my priority. The ghosts looked at me with desperation and a flicker of hope that made me feel like I’d been selfish pining over my own misfortune. It paled in comparison to theirs. They were literally fading into nothing before their own eyes with no idea why.
Lila stepped towards Penny, her head tipped to one side in thought. “Why couldn’t you come and find us?”
“We can’t leave the Cemetery District,” Penny replied, as that answered everything. But it didn’t make sense.
“You can’t leave?” I asked, looking at the rest of them. They all shook their heads. “Why?”
Lila grabbed my arm, her energy zapping my skin. “They must be bound here.”
Lila started to frantically search the room, lifting cushions and peering behind all the knickknacks. Clouds of dust filled the room, swirling in the shafts of moonlight filtering through the moth-eaten curtains.
My friend was going crazy. “What are you doing?”
She whirled around to face me, her eyes wild and bright. “There must be a rune or something hidden in here. Something that’s holding the ghosts so they can’t leave this place.”
“But Penny left,” I pointed out.
Lila froze. “Maybe it’s over the district itself. Can you do the dead sight thing you can do?”
I snorted. “Excuse me. My what?”
The rest of the ghosts looked at me with a mixture of curiosity and wariness.
“You know, when you go into your Reaper form and peer beyond the Veil?” Lila said frantically, her hands waving all over the place.
I walked over to her by the window and took her hands in mine. “Lila, if there was an enchantment holding the ghosts here, we would be able to feel it, even if we couldn’t see it. The only thing I can feel is them.”
She looked over at the ghosts before turning her gaze back to mine. “Can you just look? Please? For me?”
Her brows pinched, and she hit me with the puppy dog eyes. Gods, she was good at that.
“Urgh. You’re as bad as the twins. Fine.”
“Yes,” she squealed and clapped her hands. “I knew you would.”
Of course I would. I’d do anything for my friend. I just didn’t want her to be disappointed if there was nothing there, and it was risky because ghosts were susceptible to the pull of death magic. They’d be hit with a desire to cross over. It didn't matter if they were ready or not. Kind of like how an incubus inspired lust. Ifthey weren’t careful with their pheromones, they wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything because there’d be orgies around them all the time.
I turned to face them and tried to arrange my face into a reassuring expression. “I’ll do this fast, and I’ll try not to claim any of your souls, but if you could resist the pull of my scythe, that would be great.”
“Gee, inspiring speech,” Jack mumbled.
I threw him a frosty look, but he just shrugged and folded his arms. “You do know, the more of a jackass you are, the harder it is to resist crossing over, right?”
Jack narrowed his eyes at me but didn’t say anything. Pfft, that was what I thought. All bark and no bite.
I took my friend’s hand and gave it a quick squeeze. “Try and hold them back.”
