by S D Hegyes
“It’s why she’s picky about who she adds to the deck,” Jenny told Gloria, standing proud. “I was lucky she liked me.” She winked at Sorsha.
Sorsha sighed. “I have to trust those I add to the deck. The last thing I need is a malevolent spirit running around using my body to commit murders.” She shuddered and the hair on her arms stood on end.
“Has that happened?” Gloria asked.
“No.” Sorsha’s answer was soft. “But other things have. I guess you’ve realized by now we can interact with each other?” She held out her hand to the girl. “Go on. Take it.”
Gloria did.
“I can touch you, and you can touch me. There’s been a number of spirits in my past who’ve tried to attack me.” She’d found several scars in various places on her body after waking from her coma. Some, the hospital staff explained, were from the blast. Others they had no records of. It seemed she had though. Sorsha had found her own file among those of the spirits in her deck, and it had a list of scars and where they’d come from. She couldn’t remember getting them, but at least she had an idea where they came from.
Out of the corner of her eye, Sorsha saw Jenny look up, and she wondered if Larz had moved closer.
“Is that why you won’t ask Ray to join the deck?” the child asked.
“No.” Sorsha dropped Gloria’s hand after giving it an affectionate squeeze. “Ray doesn’t want to join my deck, and I don’t add anyone who doesn’t want to be there. Apparently, I’ve done that once before, and it didn’t end well.”
“You honestly don’t remember anything before you left the military?” Larz asked, his voice low.
She shook her head and twisted around to look up at him. “I was caught in a grenade blast that should have killed me. Killed most of my teammates. Anything dealing with my powers?” She shook her head and mimed cutting off her head.
“Gone. Completely. I’ve pieced things together here and there—and learned even more, I believe—since then, but any prior knowledge I had is gone.”
Larz took in that information, a thoughtful expression on his face. He chewed on his lip ring, which Sorsha found a completely endearing habit she’d seen him do a couple times now.
She returned her attention to Gloria. “Like I said, I won’t make you join my deck. That’s just what will happen if you do.”
“Could I see you do a psychic reading?” Gloria asked. Her eyes shone with excitement and hope.
It tugged at Sorsha and made her smile. “I don’t have anyone to do a reading for.”
Gloria pointed at Larz. “What about him?”
Larz hadn’t heard Gloria, she knew, but when Sorsha looked at him and said, “Him?” he looked uncertain.
“What?”
“Gloria wants me to do a reading,” she explained.
Larz grinned. “I’ve never had a reading done. Never thought they’d work.” He shrugged. “What the hell? Why not?”
Sorsha patted the grass beside her and twisted around so she could face him as he sat across from her, hands on his knees. “Do I need to do anything?”
She shook her head. “Nope. Just sit there and look pretty. There’s a reason I can do this over the phone. As long as I know someone’s name, that is.”
He nodded. Sorsha took a deep breath as her heart hammered in her chest. Knowing that she knew Larz in some way made this even more nerve wracking. Would she find out how she knew him? Part of her hoped so.
Holding the deck of cards in her hand, minus Jenny’s card, Sorsha said, “Larz Kazal.”
She watched her power flare and the eye sockets of the skull glow orange, vapors billowing around the skull in twisted jerks.
Then the smoke turned yellow.
“That’s new.”
“Oh?”
“It’s usually orange,” she said, glancing up at him. “I’ve never seen it yellow.” She pointed to her eyes. “Are my. . .” She let the words trail off as he nodded.
“They are.”
“Weird.” She flipped over the top card, revealing the spirit, and swore. “This is about to get interesting,” she muttered, her shoulders slumping, as translucent vapors poured out of the card like water from a jug and settled in the form of a man holding a weapon.
“Sorsha Phantom,” the spirit said in a gruff voice.
“Private Thaddeus,” she returned. She saw Larz’s eyes widen out of the corner of her eye, but she kept her attention on the new spirit who looked around crossly.
“Having some kind of party, Phantom?”
“No, sir. Doing a reading for him.” She gestured to Larz.
Private Thaddeus had been in the cavalry at Little Big Horn, and he was the one spirit Sorsha hoped to avoid. He turned to Larz. “Been a while since I’ve seen him.”
A hundred questions ran through Sorsha’s mind, and she was glad Larz couldn’t hear the spirit at the moment. She didn’t ask her questions. She doubted the private would answer if she did anyway. Better to keep her mouth shut.
“I take it he wants to know something,” Private Thaddeus said.
Sorsha shrugged. “Maybe. This is more a demonstration for Gloria.” She pointed to the child. “I promised to find her killer.”
At those words, the private looked at her, and she thought she saw a glimmer of respect on his face. It was gone a moment later as he frowned again though, so maybe she’d mistaken it.
“Alright.” He stepped forward, and Sorsha shuddered and gasped as the soldier’s form merged with her own. She hated the feeling. She knew the moment he’d settled, and she lost control of her body.
“What do you want to know, boy?” There was no mistaking the private’s voice coming out of Sorsha’s mouth.
“That is so cool!” Gloria said, clapping her hands.
Larz stared at Sorsha, his dark eyes wide and his mouth open in shock.
“I don’t have all night, boy. What do you want to know?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I honestly didn’t think this would work.” He gave Sorsha and the soldier an apologetic smile.
“Of course it would work. She’s a phantom. Just because you’re not doesn’t mean her powers wouldn’t work on you. Her abilities work on all humans and supernaturals alike.” He’d never been one to mince words, Sorsha remembered.
Humans and supernaturals? Is he trying to say Larz isn’t human? Sorsha thought, and started when the spirit answered in kind.
Of course he isn’t. He wouldn’t be able to see your abilities if he was.
“Mine don’t work on her.” Larz grinned. “Foolish of me to believe the opposite would be true too.”
Private Thaddeus snorted through Sorsha. “Foolish indeed.” He turned toward Gloria. “Seen enough, kid? If he doesn’t have anything else, there’s no reason to stick around.”
“You’re not going to tell his future?”
“There’s nothing he wants to know.”
“Why can’t Sorsha remember. . .” Larz chewed on his lip ring.
“You? You want to know why she doesn’t remember you?”
Larz didn’t have to say anything. It was obvious in the pain that flickered across his face.
I knew it! I knew he looked familiar. I just don’t know why, Sorsha thought.
Once again, Private Thaddeus shocked her in responding to her thoughts. She’d never had a spirit have a conversation with her while they were in her body. You met him ten years ago, before you left Shaded Glade. Helped you leave actually.
That made Sorsha pause. Larz had helped her leave Shaded Glade? She’d figured someone had in some way. Why hadn’t she ever asked Charlotte about it? If she’d been in control of her body, she would have contacted her friend right then. She felt dumb that she hadn’t thought to do that since getting out of the hospital. It hadn’t seemed important at the time, and maybe it wouldn’t change anything, but at least that would be another mystery of her past solved.
“Because she died.”
Lar
z’s eyes widened and even Sorsha started at that information. “What?” he said aloud even as she thought, What?
“She died,” Private Thaddeus said. “Only for a short time, and if she hadn’t been a phantom, it would have been permanent. However, her power—the full extent of it—kicked in. It’s happened twice before, although she can’t remember those times either.”
“The scars on her bicep.” Wait. Larz knew about that?
“That’s right, boy.” The private nodded. “She died, and then she pulled the spirit from one of her comrades and lived again. Seems the exchange was that she forget about the supernatural—again.” He reached over with Sorsha’s hand and patted the man’s knee. “Consider this a chance to start over, and this time? Maybe stick around.”
Before Larz could ask anymore questions, the private stepped out of the phantom.
Sorsha gasped, cold air filling her lungs. She watched Thaddeus’ form return to the card she still held in her hand, breathing heavy.
She leaned forward, placing her hands flat on the ground, careful not to bend the card. She felt nauseous, her stomach churning unhappily. She swallowed lungful after lungful of air, trying to settle her stomach.
“Are you alright?” Gloria and Larz asked at the same time.
She chuckled, realizing Larz had no clue their questions had been said in sync. “I’m good,” she said. “Happens every time.” She groaned and sat up straight as her stomach settled. “God, I hate that so much.”
A shudder ran through her, and she combed her fingers through her hair, finding it damp with sweat. She groaned again, yanking her jacket off. The chilly night air cooled her skin, and she sighed in relief.
“You alright?” Jenny asked, laughing.
“I’m fine. That’s uncomfortable enough as it is, but Private Thaddeus makes it as unpleasant as he can when he’s in charge of the readings.”
“Why does he hate you?” Gloria asked, fear apparent on her face.
Sorsha gave her a reassuring smile. “He was the first spirit whose haunt I changed, and it was accidental. I didn’t have his permission. That was ten years ago.” She turned to Larz, who swallowed audibly.
“Let me guess,” he said. “When you’re possessed, you still hear the conversation?”
“Yup.”
“Figures.” He gave her a shy smile. “Guess you have some questions for me?”
“I do, but I’d rather not hear any lies, so I won’t ask. You’ll tell me when you’re ready.” She shrugged one shoulder and pulled her jacket back on. “Or you won’t.”
She pulled her cell phone out and looked at the time. “It’s late,” she said to no one in particular. “I’ll give you some time to think about it, Gloria. Let me know what you decide.”
“You’re still going to find out who killed me, right?”
“Of course. That won’t change, no matter what you decide. Goodnight, Gloria Murphy. Sleep well.”
The spirit child nodded, yawning. She stretched out over her grave and sank down through the soil, like she had last time.
Jenny watched her and then turned to the phantom. “Thank you, Sorsha.”
Sorsha tipped her head down. “You’re welcome, Jenny.”
“Get the asshole who did this.”
Sorsha’s eyes narrowed and her voice tightened. “I plan to.”
11
The drive home was silent, but it wasn’t the easy silence that had existed when they’d gone to the cemetery.
Sorsha kept glancing over at Larz, wondering if he felt as awkward as she did. Then again, she was the one who had no memory of who he was and what they’d meant to each other.
“I’m not going to bite you,” he told her, grinning.
Bite. Another flicker of a memory that disappeared before she could catch it. She shook her head. “I didn’t think you were,” she told him.
“Then why do you keep staring at me?”
“I’m waiting for questions that obviously aren’t coming.”
He laughed, and she felt the tension between them ease with the sound. “I keep waiting for you to ask me questions.”
She shook her head. “I said you’d tell me if or when you were ready.”
“I thought that was just to avoid talking in front of others.” His eyes sparkled with mirth.
“No. I tend to say what I mean.”
“I know,” he said in a soft voice. His grip on the steering wheel shifted as he cleared his throat. “You were always honest with me.”
“I do have a couple questions, but I promise they won’t be too hard.”
He glanced at her, searching her face, but soon returned his attention to the road. “Ask away. I can’t guarantee I’ll answer.”
She opened her mouth, but then closed it and looked out the window. Was she ready to know? She didn’t know. She thought about everything she’d learned that night.
“How long did we know each other? Were we lovers?”
Larz didn’t answer for a long time. He pulled into the complex’s parking lot and turned off the car, unclipping his seatbelt and twisting in his seat to look at her. He studied her, and she watched desire heat his gaze. “We knew each other less than a week,” he told her finally. “We weren’t lovers though. I was a little old for you.” He gave her a crooked grin, as if joking.
“I would have been eighteen ten years ago. Perfectly legal.”
He shook his head. “You called me an old man on multiple occasions. No one’s coming back from that.”
She tilted her head and studied him. He didn’t look that old. “It must have been something you said then because you don’t look much older than me.”
“Thank you. I like to think I age well.” He winked. “I think I’d like to take the private’s advice and start over. So, friends?”
“Were we not before?”
He shook his head. “I’m not certain. We didn’t really know each other well enough to declare whatever was between us anything. Besides, we were both leaving shortly.”
“So we decided it would be best not to make it anything more than it was at the time?”
“You remember?” Hope burned in his eyes.
She shook her head. “No. It sounds practical and like something I’d do.” She considered him for a moment. “Private Thaddeus said you helped me leave Shaded Glade.”
The slight frown confirmed that suspicion was true. “Yes. I tried at least.” He sighed. “I once told you I’d also escaped a bad family situation, and I wanted to help you as much as I could while I was in a position to do so.”
Sorsha remembered the scandal that had surrounded her leaving Shaded Glade. The death of the man her father had wanted her to marry. Everyone in Shaded Glade was sure she’d killed him with her witch powers. A file with Preston Barr’s name on it had been among Sorsha’s belongings after she got out of the hospital, and she remembered she’d been looking into the young man’s death off and on over the years, but she hadn’t ever found anything that incriminated her or that explained how he’d died exactly. His death was as mysterious as those of the spirits in her deck.
“It’s funny,” Larz said. “When we parted ways I thought it would protect you better. My family would have killed you if they’d known you were a phantom.”
Her eyebrows rose at the confession. She wondered if he’d meant to say that. “Apparently that happened anyway. Imagine my surprise to find that out tonight. Never been mentioned before.”
“No one noticed, maybe?”
“So, I’m a necromancer—for myself, it seems.”
Larz grinned. “There are worse things in life.”
She snorted. She didn’t believe that. How often could someone say they died, and no one noticed—them included?
A shudder passed through her. She’d died. It was hard to believe. If it had been anyone else, she might not have believed them. Private Thaddeus never lied to her though. He may have hated her, but he never sugarcoated anything he told her. If he said she’d d
ied, she had.
“You alright?” Larz asked.
She nodded. “Just tired. It’s been a long day. I think I want a hot shower and a good bit of sleep.”
He grinned at her. “I can agree with that.” He pulled the keys from the ignition and pocketed them as he climbed out of the car.
Sorsha followed suit, but as she closed the car’s door, she couldn’t help but stare at Larz. She’d known him ten years prior. They hadn’t been lovers, but she got the feeling it had only been because they’d parted ways so soon after meeting. Well, at least that explained her comfortability around him as well as her attraction to him. Apparently, she had been in the past as well. And he was a supernatural, like herself? Private Thaddeus made it clear Larz wasn’t a phantom though.
So, that begged the question: what was he then?
“You know,” Larz said the following morning, pouring a cup of coffee and passing it to Sorsha as she stumbled from her room with a yawn. “I expected an interrogation about my knowledge of phantoms last night.”
Sorsha stifled another yawn, glancing around. Larz had already made himself at home. There were small, subtle signs of his living there. She grinned. He’d moved in less than twenty-four hours before, and yet it looked as if he’d lived there months.
She held up the mug in thanks before she dectored it, adding milk and sugar until it turned pale.
“Too much going on. Too tired.” It had been nearly midnight when they’d returned home. She’d taken a quick shower, just long enough to wash the sweat from her skin, and then crawled into bed.
She’d awoken when her alarm went off, but she’d hit the snooze button several times before she gave up and crawled out of bed, throwing on jogging clothes.
“You going for a run?” Larz asked, sipping his coffee.
She nodded. “Every morning. You’re welcome to join me if you’d like.” She grinned at him and blew on her coffee. The milk had cooled it to an acceptable temperature though, and she drank half of it before she sat the mug down.
