Danny stepped in as things escalated. “I don’t think Mom and Dad would mind if we buried the girls with them. Do you, Grace?”
Grace was grateful Danny was this openhearted to understand the girls’ feelings. He had the wisdom to find the ideal solution.
“No, you’re right. I think they would be pleased with the company.”
Grace turned back to face the gathered ghosts of the girls. “My mother and father are buried in the Birchmore cemetery. They’re at a wonderful spot on a small hill with a beautiful tree watching over their graves. We could take you there and have you buried with them.”
“There space there for all us?” Sabra glanced at the multiple graves in the room and the ghosts standing together with her.
“One person outside can control fire. He can cremate you. We can transport the ashes to the cemetery to join my parents.”
Sabra motioned for all the girls to gather tight around her. She was arguing vehemently for one side. Pro or con, Grace couldn’t tell for sure as she was trying not to listen in on their conversation. After a few minutes of discussion, they came to a mutual agreement, and they gathered around her and Danny again.
“Fine. We okay to go be with yo momma an’ daddy,” Sabra conceded, and the other girls nodded their assent as she spoke.
“It’s okay for me to let the others in and begin their work?”
“Yeah, they okay to start.” Sabra turned to lead the girls off into another part of the building.
Grace said with relief. “Thanks for coming up with such a great solution, Danny. I thought for a second we would be at an impasse, here.”
“Mom and Dad would be happy to have them, if they knew.” A touch of sadness colored his voice. But he turned back to business. “I’ll go hang out with the girls while you work, try to keep them distracted while their bodies are cremated. I’ll also check on the knives while I’m at it.”
“Sounds like a solid plan. But no manifesting until we’re sure all the other Paranorms are out of the building. We still need to keep that ability of yours a secret.”
Chapter 43
While the rest of the Paranorms were working the floor, Grace ran out to pick up decorative boxes to hold the ashes of all the girls. It took trips to three different discount stores, but she finally found enough boxes with flower patterns for each girl to get a separate box. She wanted to make sure they were all handled with dignity and respect in this last treatment of their physical remains. She thought having their ashes buried in beautiful flowered boxes would please them.
When Grace got back, the other Paranoms were gone. Fuoco was still moving from one mound to the next. He was controlling the fire he wielded to reduce the remains to the smallest amount possible but also ensure none of the ashes mixed between the mounds.
While Fuoco finished the last mounds, Grace worked on putting out the boxes, one beside each of the piles of ashes. “Danny, can you get the girls to come out and help identify which mound belongs to whom? I want to name each one before we take them to the cemetery.”
“Sure, Grace. They’re curious about what you’re doing. Now that the others are gone, I don’t think they’ll be shy about coming out to help.”
Grace knelt by the side of what was once one of the mounds and waited as the girls followed Danny back onto the main floor.
“I got each girl a special box for her ashes.” Grace held up a box to show them. “I want to put the right name with the ashes to bury them with their names. Does anyone object?”
All the ghosts shook their heads while coming closer to see the boxes she put out.
“Is everybody happy with their box?” Grace searched the girls’ faces to confirm they were all satisfied.
They were all pleased enough with the selections, and Grace started moving from one box to the next. She noted the name of the girl with a black marker on the lid of each of the boxes. For about half of the remains, there was no ghost to tell them which name to use. Instead, Grace added the name of a flower to the lids, in honor of the unknown girls: Rose, Lily, Iris, Daisy, and so on, for her favorite flowers. Her mother would be pleased having this garden of boxes and girls with her. Grace could imagine her looking over them and keeping them safe next to her on the hill.
She paused from her work when Fuoco finished and came to find her.
“All done, Grace.” He looked tired but pleased at what he had accomplished.
“Thank you for all your help, Fuoco. It will make a huge difference for the girls to be out of the warehouse and somewhere safe. I want to get this done for them while things are a bit quiet, and the ashes are still in one place from your work.”
Fuoco looked down at the growing collection of filled boxes at Grace’s feet.
“I think what you’re doing for them is fantastic. I’m embarrassed to say that it never even crossed my mind to do something like this. I was concerned about removing every trace of evidence that could implicate Paranorms in what happened here.”
Grace looked at him curiously. “If you were that worried, why didn’t you burn down the entire building instead of only what’s inside?”
Fuoco laughed. “We try to keep things to the necessary minimum. Burning down the building would take a tremendous amount of energy, and it would risk someone noticing the fire. That could lead to an emergency response and a whole lot of Norms coming to the location in a hurry. This way we can take care of the evidence without the Norms being the wiser. If anyone ever does stumble onto what we’ve done here, it’ll look like a fire happened in the building, but it never got strong enough to burn it down.”
Grace nodded. “Necessary minimum. Makes sense.”
“Do you need me for anything else?” he asked.
“If you wouldn’t mind, could you stay until I’m finished? The Glamour is still out there, and possibly an accomplice. I wouldn’t want them coming back to the scene of the crime and catching me off guard while I’m finishing up with the girls.”
“Sure, I can stay until you’re through. I’ll make a circuit inside the building while you work. Just be within earshot. Let me know when you’re ready to leave.”
“That would be great. Thanks.”
Grace turned back to her work with the girls’ ashes as Fuoco began his guard duty. It took some time to work her way around the room, labeling the boxes and adding in the ashes. Sabra followed Grace to each of the girls’ places, keeping a sharp watch as she moved their remains into their named boxes. When they reached the mound with Sabra’s body, she finally spoke as Grace began to write her name on the top of the box.
“It okay to use my real name?” she asked, the most timid Grace had ever seen her.
“Oh, Sabra isn’t your real name?”
“Sabra’s my streets name. My true name’s Shawtel. S-H-A-W-T-E-L.” Sabra said in a meek voice, as if she was afraid of how Grace would react.
“It’s a beautiful name, Shawtel.” Grace wrote the name in a flowing cursive script.
Sabra peered at the new name on the lid and smiled.
Grace smiled back at her. “Thank you for sharing your real name to help me put it on the box. I’ll take the boxes to the cemetery as soon as I can and get them buried.”
Once she finished labeling them, she put the boxes into the trunk of her car. She returned to the warehouse to find Danny and the girls waiting for her.
“Are you ready to get the Glamour’s knives, now?” Danny had been waiting impatiently for her to finish, ready to start working on the next phase of the plan.
“Yes. It’s time for us to learn more about the Glamour and his accomplice. If they touched one of the knives, we can find out who they are.”
Danny led her to where he and Sabra had hidden the knives by a back corner of the building. Under their direction, Grace moved aside several stacks of old crates and dug through about four inches of dirt and detritus covering the floor.
“I told you the knives were safe.” Danny seemed pleased with himself.
“I’m gl
ad you did such a great job of hiding them. Thank goodness I was already a mess before having to dig this out again.” She wiped her hands off onto the legs of her jeans and stared down at the knives at the bottom of the hole.
Danny had the foresight to wrap the weapons in a cloth to keep them as uncontaminated as possible. She cringed in distaste at seeing the material was one of the girls’ blouses from the discarded items at the Glamour’s torture table. She felt a deep sense of relief that the table and all the clothing were now burned to ash.
Grace lifted the covered knives out and sank back onto the ground, working to get comfortable. She looked up to find the girls had gathered in a curious bunch around her and Danny while she was busy excavating the knife.
“I’m going to find out more about the Glamour by reading the knives he used to hurt you girls. You might not want to be here if it’s going be too painful for you to watch.”
At her words, a few of the girls moved away, but a dozen stayed to watch her.
Grace unfolded the cloth until the knives were exposed. She selected one of the knives, and brought her awareness to her hands. The dark material disappeared from her arms, leaving her hands in direct contact with the knife.
Grace sat waiting for the vision to start. She shifted a bit on the hard ground, the eyes of the girls on her, waiting for her to discover something important about the Glamour—something to help Grace and her friends find him and stop him. Her chest tightened. Her somewhat unpredictable power had decided not to show up when she really needed it.
“I’m not getting anything,” she said to Danny, biting her lip and staring fixedly at the knife in her hand. “I think I have a bit of stage fright with the audience. I really need to get something from this.”
“Take some deep breaths, Gracie. It’ll come. I know it will. Try another one.”
Grace tried to ignore the shifting of the girls around her as they exchanged glances with one another. She put down the first knife, and took a few deep calming breaths. Mentally setting her intention to be open to learning what the knives had to tell her, she picked up a second knife.
Grace found herself sitting in a car on a city street late at night. Most of the people on the sidewalk appeared to be prostitutes, with a few men talking with them and a few cars cruising by. The person glanced into the rear-view mirror, and she saw the face and gray eyes of the Glamour looking back to her as he smoothed his hair and inspected his teeth.
He returned to surveying the crowd. Grace felt a wave of possessiveness flood her as his gaze fell upon one of the girls. There was no sense of desire for the girl, only a sense of ownership and a need to get the girl into the car as soon as possible. She sensed no anger or maliciousness directed at the girl, nor the mental imbalance she expected from the attacker, only a sensation of pleasure as the object of his effort came toward him as he willed her closer.
All at once, things shifted, and Grace found herself back in the warehouse. The man was standing over the girl, who was tied and gagged on a table. He was holding the knife in his hand, turning it back and forth, appearing to relish watching the light reflecting off the surface. She caught a small piece of his reflection in the blade as it turned, but this time he had brown eyes.
Grace felt what she expected from the beginning—a gleeful anticipation of the pain he was about to inflict, the beauty he was about to take for his own. Her skin crawled at the malevolent intent filling the Glamour as he turned his gaze down to the girl. She was alive and writhing in terror on the table, unable to move far due to the bungee cord binding her.
“Robyn has done his job well, once again. You are magnificent and will make a fine addition to my creation. Never fear, my dear, the pain and suffering you will soon experience is all for the greater good. It is now time for the Master to begin his work.”
At the Glamour’s words, the girl thrashed against the ropes, her screams muffled by the gag in her mouth. The Glamour chuckled and leaned in with the knife.
Before he could use it, Grace wrenched herself back into her own body. She quickly visualized the dark material sliding back down her wrists and hands, cutting off her connection to the cold metal. She threw the knife to the ground as she scrambled to her feet and propelled herself a few steps away from it.
“What happened, Gracie?”
Grace shuddered and took in a deep breath. “That was the creepiest reading ever.”
“Did you see something helpful?” Danny probed.
“Not too much. But we have the answer to who the second Paranorm is, at least.”
“Who is it?”
“The whole eye color changing thing has puzzled me ever since I read Beth. I thought, at first, she was imagining it. Or under the influence of the Glamour to see something that wasn’t there. But I saw the identical thing for myself when we confronted him on the street. Nicco said there must be two people involved to explain the multiple abilities, and that scenario was the only one that made sense. But now that I’ve read the knife, I realize we are not dealing with two people, but two people in one body.”
“What do you mean two people in one body?”
“I’m talking about multiple personalities—two distinct personalities instead of the usual one personality per body.”
Danny’s face crinkled. “Wow, that’s weird! But what about the multiple abilities?”
Grace looked up toward the ceiling, searching her memory. “When I was studying psychology in college, we learned about multiple personality disorder. They called it dissociative identity disorder in the text books. Often people with DID are not even aware of the other personalities. The different personalities are able to do remarkably different things. One could be a gourmet chef, and another could be a musician, neither having the talent of the other.” Grace looked down at the knife in her hands.
“In this instance, Robyn, the Glamour, isn’t taking part in hurting the girls, only luring them. The second is the one torturing the girls and making the creature.”
“What does that mean as far as a plan to stop him, or ‘them’ rather?” Danny sounded confused.
“Our original plan of enticing the Glamour out, and challenging him to meet me one-on-one, is still the best plan. We now have more ammunition to get his attention. We know about his multiple personalities and multiple abilities. That means, rather than two people to hunt down, there’s only one body. Maybe we can use these personalities against each other somehow once we get him where we want him. But I’ve enough information to force him to meet with me, now.”
Chapter 44
Grace sat at the kitchen table, a blank piece of paper in front of her, tapping the pen in her hand against the wood as she gathered her thoughts. Murmurs of conversations from Danny and the girls floated in the open door from the living room as he worked to keep them comfortable and entertained.
Danny was turning out to be a great host, easing their fears of being in another strange place. Even if it was a home rather than an abandoned warehouse. The tall tales he was spinning were hardly believable. But Grace suspected most of them originated with stories from the Professor Espiritos he was spending time with at the colleges.
Grace was trying to figure out the best way to convince the Glamour to meet with her so she could deal with him once and for all. Since he had dictated the method of communication by leaving a note for her on her doorstep, she would reciprocate and leave a note for him, taking advantage of his original calling cards by putting the note out with the tulip and daisy left on her back porch. They were the worse for wear, but she thought he would get the point and be curious enough to read the note.
But how to get the Glamour to be where she wanted him when she wanted him? Grace was most likely the only one who knew of his multiple personalities. She should include that in the note as she read from the knife that this was something he didn’t want others to know.
Nicco told her the Glamours in history always became megalomaniacal. She could use the fact that twice now they en
countered the Glamour, and he had run from them—once on the street and once at the warehouse. She would taunt him with his cowardice.
Nodding to herself, she put pen to paper.
To my New Friend,
Writing it down brought a shiver of revulsion. But if she was going to take over this game to her advantage, she may as well go full out.
I challenge both you and Robyn to meet me at my lake house on Monday evening. See the address below. I will be at the dock at 6pm.
If you are not afraid to face me then, leave a red rose on my stairs. If you’re too afraid to come, leave a white rose instead.
She signed it The Aperto Rotto.
Grace hoped she found the right buttons to push to get him to show, but not pushed so far that he would try to do anything to her or her friends before then. She folded the note and added a piece of duct tape to the folded edge. She picked up the wilting tulip and daisy from beside her on the table and made her way from the kitchen and through the townhouse to the front door.
Stepping outside, she looked up and down the street. It wasn’t like the Glamour would just be standing around, but she checked on the off chance she would see an unfamiliar car. It creeped her out that she was relying on the Glamour to be stalking her to get a message to him, but she couldn’t come up with another way to communicate with him.
Grace bent down to place the note on the top step, using the duct tape to attach it to the concrete. She placed the two flowers on top of the note and then grabbed a rock from the landscaping along the sidewalk to hold them in place. Standing up, she glanced around one more time, still not finding evidence of her stalker.
She would need to keep checking the steps until Monday night to see if she got her answer, then come up with another plan somehow if this one didn’t work.
Grace turned around and went back inside the house, locking the door behind her. She stopped in the living room where Danny was holding court with the girls. There were only nine girls left out of the fifteen who were helping them at the warehouse. They all came with Grace when she brought their ashes home. She had opted to have the ashes with her in the townhouse until she got the arrangements made for their burial with her parents.
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