Ghost Moon

by Cheree Alsop

  “No!” the woman screamed.

  I grabbed Jeffie under his arms and threw myself into a roll. The sound of the bus slamming into the sign and the light pole just past it was so close I felt it through my lungs. I crouched over the child, my knees pressed into the rough pavement and my arms raw with road burn that would soon heal. I could feel the toddler shaking in my arms. I barely dared to open my eyes.

  “Jeffie?”

  “He’s there! That young man saved him!”

  “Over there!”

  I looked down at the curly haired boy. Large tears filled his eyes but didn’t spill over as though he didn’t know if he should cry.

  “You’re alright,” I told him.

  The sound of footsteps was followed by hands patting my shoulders.

  “My Jeffie!” the woman said.

  I rose with the boy in my arms. Other hands supported me. I gave the woman a shaky smile.

  “Maybe he’ll stay with you now?”

  Tears flowed down her cheeks when I held her child out and she accepted him from me. Jeffie clung to his mother and began to cry.

  “I doubt it,” she said with a watery smile.

  She threw her free arm around me and hugged me tight. To my shock and dismay, others who had been watching did the same thing until I was trapped in an enormous group hug. The cloud of dust and debris from the accident settled around us.

  I forced myself to breathe and reminded myself that this was how humans showed affection. It didn’t mean I was under attack, and I certainly wasn’t supposed to defend myself. But it was hard to calm my instincts past my racing heartbeat and the adrenaline that flowed through my body.

  The woman finally stepped away. “I don’t know how to thank you enough.”

  “I don’t need any thanks,” I told her.

  “What’s your name, son?” one of the men who had been discussing numbers asked.

  “Zev,” I replied.

  He held out a hand. “Zev, that was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen anyone do in my life. Well done.”

  I shook his hand in a bit of a daze.

  Other hands were held out. I noticed cellphones raised and pointed at us.

  “You’re bleeding,” someone said.

  I looked down to see red coating the knuckles of my hand. I lowered it.

  “It’s fine,” I told her. “No big deal.” I needed to get out of there. Others who had seen the accident were rushing over to us.

  The bus driver had climbed out of his vehicle along with the other passengers. He looked from the damage he had created and then back at the road, but the ghost was gone. By the look on his face, he wondered whether it had actually been there.

  I caught snippets from the crowd.

  “He was glowing.”

  “His clothes were from some other time.”

  “I don’t believe in ghosts. That must’ve been something else.”

  “Can I take down your information?”

  I realized the young woman was addressing me.

  “What?”

  “Your info,” she said. “Name, address, phone number? I write for the Township Times and want to get your story. We could use more heroes in this town.”

  I was at a loss for words. Cellphones were pushed closer to my face. If they were waiting for a heroic statement or something, I definitely wasn’t their man. Heck, I wasn’t a man at all.

  “I, uh, I’ve got to go to work,” I said, backing away. I stumbled over the curb and caught myself as the crowd followed.

  “I can take you there,” the driver of the bus offered. “It’s the least I can do!” He glanced behind him at the wreckage the bus had created. “It might take me a minute. I’m sure there’s paperwork or something I’m supposed to fill out.”

  The sound of a siren in the distance caught my ear. I shook my head. “I’ll walk, thanks.”

  “Wait, I need to get a statement!” the woman from the paper said.

  I jogged around the corner and didn’t stop until I was far enough away that the commotion of the crowd had faded into a whisper. I ducked between two buildings and leaned against the wall of the closest one. It took several minutes for my breathing to return to normal. The last thing I needed was to phase in the middle of the city during the day. That would definitely be the story they weren’t expecting.

  A clock chimed five times somewhere within one of the buildings. My heart skipped a beat. I was late. I pushed off the wall and started running.

  Chapter Two

  “You’re late.”

  Alia’s statement came as more of a question than an accusation.

  “Sorry,” I told her. “I got held up. It won’t happen again.”

  She studied my face from her place behind the cash register of the clothing store. If she read something there, she chose not to comment on it. “It’s fine. We just got a new shipment of pants that need tags and placement.”

  “I’m on it,” I said.

  As I marked the newly arrived jeans from the price list Alia had given me, I couldn’t help wondering at the dramatic change my life had taken. I used to be a battle-hardened warrior defending my vampire Master’s Lair against all manner of paranormal threats; now, I worked at a store in Township’s mall to help pay for the clothing, food, and other necessities Mrs. Willard had invested in to provide for the werewolves she had allowed to take over the forest behind her house. Though there were only five of us left now, the impact of feeding and clothing the twenty-five who had originally left with us had taken a toll I was determined to repay.

  At Professor Shipley’s insistence, I had started college after we destroyed the dark coven who had kidnapped his wife. The same day, Alia’s coworker had gotten engaged and informed the owner of Yours Threadly that she was moving. Alia had offered me the job and I accepted on the condition that the money I earned went directly to Mrs. Willard.

  The professor had wanted me to experience what it meant to be human. I couldn’t think of anything more human than going to school and working part time. I also wasn’t sure what I felt about it. The human experience certainly felt a bit more regimented than I had expected. Life at the Lair had revolved around a strict schedule of guarding, training, kitchen duty, more training, and a few hours of sleep here and there. I hadn’t anticipated that human life would fall into a schedule as well.

  Between learning human biology, art history, college English, and a plethora of other classes the professor had enrolled me in, as well as perfecting the finer arts of folding shirts so that the sleeves didn’t stick out and making sure the creases of the pants stayed even, I felt as fully immersed in human life as I ever wanted to get. The chemical scent of the dye used to turn the jeans blue made my nose crinkle. Yep. Somewhere down the line I had become domesticated.

  A familiar voice made me lift my head. I listened for a few seconds before crossing to the door that separated the storage room from the store. I plastered a small smile on my face and pushed the door open.

  Janie, Alia’s friend who worked with Isley at the salon that occupied another wing of the mall, gave me a wide-eyed look from where she held out her phone to Alia. Her hair had changed from pink to blue since the last time I had seen her. The pungent odor of hair coloring substances and bleach wafted from her in a heady wave.

  “Is this you?” she asked.

  I glanced at the phone. “I doubt it. I don’t carry a cell.”

  “Not the phone,” she replied. “The video.”

  “Really, Zev?” Alia said, looking up from whatever she watched. “You were delayed?”

  I lifted a shoulder. “Yeah. The bus was late.”

  “You mean the bus that nearly ran over the baby you saved?” Alia replied. “That bus?”

  I nodded with a tightening sensation in my stomach.

  “Have you seen this?” Janie asked. “It’s amazing!”

  Though I wanted to point out that I didn’t need to see it because I had been there, I kept quiet and walked over to joi
n them.

  Janie pressed the play button on the video. Below it, the number of views kept going up.

  I watched a shaky recording of the bus swerving. From the distance, it was hard to see why it had jerked so suddenly toward the bus stop, but the shouts of alarm and chaos of the crowd were captured clearly from a viewpoint across the street.

  I picked myself out from the crowd, a young man with dark blonde hair, taller than the majority around me, and wearing nondescript clothes that looked accurately as if they had been chosen from a second-hand store. I shifted my gaze to the toddler’s mother as she nearly dropped one of the bags of groceries and let go of the toddler’s hand to right it. He tottered away toward the curb without a care for the vehicle careening toward him.

  Even though I knew the outcome, it was hard to watch the bus draw closer to the child. I heard Janie’s breath catch as she watched him take his awkward step off the curb. There was no way anyone would save him in time. The mother ran forward, but was too far away. Others cringed, sure they were about to see the child be killed.

  A blur of movement was me shoving through the crowd. Faster than should have been possible, I scooped the kid up and rolled out of the way. Dust and debris rose as the bus impacted the pole. The camera image shook, and the mother’s screams came through; then the dust cleared to show me hunched protectively over the child. Exclamations came from those standing around the one who was filming.

  People rushed forward. I rose and the cameraman zoomed into to an unmistakable shot of my face before switching to record the woman with her child.

  “Zev, that was amazing,” Alia said.

  Heat prickled across my skin and I shook my head. “It was nothing.”

  I turned away, but Janie caught my arm. She lifted my hand before I could stop her. “Another video showed your knuckles bleeding. Somebody should look at them in case….” Her voice died away at the sight of my healed skin.

  I had washed the dried blood away in the bathroom before reaching the store. There was no trace of the road rash that had torn my skin.

  I gave her an uncomfortable smile and drew my hand away. “It was just a scratch,” I said. “No big deal.”

  Janie’s mouth opened and then closed. She glanced at Alia.

  Alia pushed me toward the back room. “There’s work to do. Jalia will take my overtime if we don’t get those boxes unpacked and products out today, and we’re already running late.”

  “But Alia, I saw him bleeding. It was bad,” Janie protested, “I don’t understand….”

  “You know how those videos are,” Alia replied as I ducked back into the storage room. “Always sensationalizing. And who knows what filter they were using. You can’t believe everything you find out there.”

  I flexed my hands. They were scarred and strong, used to the finer points of picking a lock, breaking a neck without making a sound, and honing blades to the perfect cutting edge. And now, apparently, rescuing a child who would otherwise have been dead in the street. At that moment, they looked like the hands of a stranger.

  “You saved his life,” Alia said a few hours later as I helped rearrange the clothing displays.

  “You said that already,” I replied dryly.

  She looked up from the shirt she was hanging and said, “I know, but it’s true. Zev, that boy is alive because of you.”

  “He wouldn’t have been in peril if that ghost hadn’t been wandering through the street.”

  “Yes, but nobody got footage of that from what I’ve found,” Alia replied. “Believe me, I looked. Apparently, ghosts don’t film well.”

  That brought the hint of a smile to my face. “They’re camera shy.”

  Alia laughed and shook her head. “I don’t know how you can joke about this. It’s serious.”

  I sighed. “He’s alive, his mother is happy, and the bus driver doesn’t have a toll on his soul. There’s not more to it.”

  She was quiet for several minutes. I used the time to stack another set of jeans that to me looked exactly like the pairs next to them.

  “A toll on his soul,” she said, interrupted the silence. “What does that mean?” At my questioning look, she repeated, “You said the driver won’t have a toll on his soul because the boy is alive. What is that?”

  I studied the pants beneath my hand when I replied, “Lives carry weight.” I glanced at her. “Souls. Each soul is worth something, and if it is separated from its body before its time, the taker carries it as a toll he or she must pay when they leave this world.”

  Alia leaned against the desk. “In order to get to heaven?”

  I began to nod, then shook my head. “Yes, I mean no. I’m really not sure.”

  “But this is what you were taught at the Lair?”

  I nodded. I turned away from her intense look and said, “You can ask Mitch about it.”

  “I want to hear it from you,” she insisted.

  The cotton fibers of the shirt I had been straightening snagged on the frayed skin of a scar that ran the length of my pointer finger. I rubbed my thumb along it absently as I gathered my thoughts. Though Alia had chosen Mitch over me, I was still unable to deny her whatever she asked. I seriously needed to figure out why girls had so much sway over my supposedly battle-toughed heart.

  “Do you remember what Mitch told you of the Ankou who showed up when the dark coven raised the dead?” I asked. At Alia’s nod, I continued, “The Ankou is an angel of death. Some consider her the reaper, or a gatherer of souls, but she is more of a shepherd. She protects and collects the lost souls to see them safely to wherever they go next.”

  The thought of Mrs. Stein choosing to die and go with the Ankou in order to protect the world and her children from her husband’s evil actions made emotions stir in the pit of my stomach.

  I shoved the thought away and continued in a mostly steady voice, “Most souls have a place they are meant to go. But if a soul is tainted from taking the lives of others, they might be denied entrance to the beyond. Instead, they are left to wander the earth, doing what good they can to pay off their debt to the world.”

  “So that was the ghost?” Alia asked.

  “Maybe,” I replied. “But I’m not so sure. Ever since the dead were raised and then stopped again, ghosts have been appearing.” I thought of the girl Professor Shipley and I had seen. “I don’t think they’re all paying tribute to the Ankou.”

  “What about things like poltergeist and hauntings?” Alia pressed. “Are they paying off their debt, too?”

  I shook my head. “Those are tainted souls who feel they shouldn’t have to pay off anything. They’re angry and vengeful. But they won’t get in until they compensate for those they affected while here. From what I’ve read, they’re just adding to their debt and they know it, but they can’t stop. Some souls are just dark.”

  A slight bitterness filled me at my words. Alia’s younger sister Aspen had commented more than once on how dark my soul was. Isley had mentioned it as well. I didn’t have anyone else to blame but myself. Considering the years I had spent serving my vampire Master, I was surprised I had a soul left at all. There was no telling how long I would have to wander in order to pay off my debt to the Ankou.

  As if she guessed my thoughts, Alia said, “So you and Mitch believe you won’t be granted this passage to whatever lies beyond because of what you did at the Lair.”

  I nodded without saying anything. I refused to expound on my actions. They were done and I would pay the price. I had already accepted it.

  “But that’s not fair,” Alia said. “You did what you thought you were supposed to.”

  “It was still wrong,” I replied. “And deep down, we knew it. We just didn’t know a way out.”

  Until I broke out of the Lair and changed everything.

  The ripple from my actions had led us to destroy our Master, free the werewolves, and join forces with the town’s coven to protect it against certain doom by the paranormal risen from their graves. My way out had im
pacted thousands of lives, not to mention the earthquake that had followed as a result of Mrs. Stein’s sacrifice. The town was still putting itself back together.

  Though the ghosts were a concern, the witches had enough on their hands repairing the damage the dark coven had done and seeing to it that those who had survived received the appropriate punishment. The restless spirits would have to take last priority. I only hoped that didn’t result in more near-fatal bus accidents.

  “Surely you made up for that when you stopped Clay,” Alia said. “And with the rest of your pack out there helping to rebuild after the earthquake, what more could this Ankou demand?”

  I had no answer for that, and I refused to spend time worrying over something I couldn’t change. My actions had been my own, and I would pay the debt.

  “Perhaps,” I said vaguely. Not wanting to get into it further with her, I switched to a topic that wasn’t my favorite but would get her off of the one at hand. “So you and Mitch are going on a date tonight?”

  “Yes,” she said with a smile that touched her cheeks with red. “Our first real date. I’m taking him to a movie.”

  “Just make sure it’s not a tearjerker,” I told her. “Mitch is a bit of a crier.”

  Alia’s eyebrows rose. “Really?”

  The thought of Mitch breaking down over a movie made me chuckle. “No, not really,” I told her. “But if a good action movie gets his adrenaline racing, you may find yourself with a four-legged date. Bring some dog treats.”

  Alia shook her head at that. “You’re too much, Zev,” she said. She laughed and had to shake out the shirt she had ruined folding and started over. “That’s ridiculous.”

  “What’s ridiculous?”

  I glanced over my shoulder to see the werewolf whose footsteps I had been tracking through the mall. “A werewolf working at the mall. It’s demeaning, really.”

  Mitch chuckled, but his gaze held a light of interest. “How about a werewolf saving a child from being hit by a bus? That’s pretty ridiculous if you ask me.”

  I sighed inwardly. “How did you find out?”