Cold Shadows (Ellie Jordan, Ghost Trapper Book 2)

by JL Bryan

“He’s coming,” whispered the voice near Stacey.

  “Do it now,” urged the voice near me. “If he kills you, you’ll be his. Not ours.”

  “Do it.”

  “Do it.”

  Crane moved the ornament toward his wrist again.

  “Don’t do it!” Stacey yelled, only to have her face lifted and slammed into the floorboards.

  Crane dug the sharp glass deep into his arm, with a look of determination on his face. Fresh red blood leaked out all over his arm.

  I struggled, trying to yell for him to stop, and trying to get free. The boy-ghost wasn’t nearly as strong as the poltergeist, but I’d already wrestled the poltergeist earlier that night, on two different occasions, and I was so dizzy and weak that I could barely cling to consciousness.

  Isaiah stepped around the broken railing and walked directly toward Crane. Crane shivered, sitting down in front of the Christmas tree again, still cutting himself with the broken glass angel.

  “Do it now,” one of the boy’s voices urged.

  Crane winced as he stabbed himself deeper, ignoring Stacey’s pleas for him to stop.

  Isaiah towered over Crane. He opened his large, filthy right hand, and the long belt unrolled from it.

  It looked like all the ghosts wanted Crane. The different ghosts may have wanted him for different reasons, but the underlying motive was probably the same: Crane seemed to have powerful psychic abilities, and the presence of someone like that can amplify a ghost’s powers.

  Maybe the two boys planned to use Crane to stage a revolt against their father, while the father wanted to use Crane to make himself stronger. It was only a question of whether Crane would kill himself and join the boys, or Isaiah would kill Crane and lay claim to his spirit.

  Either outcome was awful and completely intolerable to me.

  I kicked and struggled some more, and did my best to cry out, trying to distract Isaiah’s ghost.

  “Shh,” a voice said beside my ear.

  “Hey, Whippy! I mean, Isaiah!” Stacey shouted. “Isaiah Ridley! Look over here, it’s your boys. Don’t you want to punish them? They’re being really, really bad—”

  “Shh,” both voices whispered.

  The ghost’s hold on me had relaxed enough that I could speak.

  “Over here,” I said, my voice a little croaky. “Isaiah, look, your boys are over here--”

  I got slapped across the face for that. I slapped back, even though the boy holding me was insubstantial. Sometimes you just have to slap on principle.

  Isaiah turned from Crane to look in our direction, his attention shifting to Noah and Luke.

  Then he flickered a few times, but he didn’t move anywhere. He kept appearing and disappearing right at the same spot.

  Down the stairs, the door to the hall creaked open again.

  “Jacob?” Stacey called.

  Footsteps sounded again, but these were lighter and slower than Isaiah’s could have been. They also had a wet, sloshing sound to them.

  Catherine’s ghost became visible through the broken railing, the pond water still surrounding her, as though she had to perpetually drown again and again.

  She climbed up the stairs and turned toward her husband’s ghost.

  Isaiah flickered again, this time reappearing a few feet away, deeper into the attic. He flickered back and back again, retreating as Catherine’s ghost approached him.

  She raised one hand high above her head, and Isaiah fell to his knees. He raised a hand, too, but in more of a defensive gesture, as if he expected a blow to his head.

  His chest rose and fell, and he let out a weird, ragged sob.

  “It’s time,” Catherine’s ghost whispered. It was the only thing she’d said since walking into the house. “It’s long past time.”

  Isaiah gave another sob when she reached for him.

  The layer of pond water suspended around her hand hardened in the freezing air near Isaiah. Sharp icicles encased her fingers. She reached closer, and a paper-thin layer of ice formed along her arm, almost to her shoulder, with a cold crackling sound.

  There was no poltergeist to protect Isaiah now.

  Catherine’s face remained dead-vacant, with no expression at all.

  She stabbed the long, sharp icicle of her index finger directly into the hole in the left side of Isaiah’s head, the exact place where she’d shot him a hundred and sixty years earlier.

  Isaiah let out an agonized wail and rose to his feet.

  Catherine turned and dragged her husband toward us, while he staggered and stumbled along behind her.

  Stacey and I didn’t dare move or speak as they passed us. Catherine still walked at her creeping-slow pace, but a couple of times, they ghostly pair flickered forward several feet at once.

  When they reached the stairs, Catherine paused, forcing Isaiah to pause with her. She turned her cold death-mask face to look at us, and then she said the last words I would hear her say:

  “Come, boys. It’s time to go home.”

  Then she turned and started down the stairs, towing Isaiah’s ghost along with her.

  I felt the weight lift off me, and Stacey gave a cough and rolled up to a sitting position.

  After Catherine and Isaiah began their descent, I finally had a glimpse of Noah and Luke. They were shadowy, filmy figures, walking with their heads hung low, trailing like obedient ducklings behind their mother.

  Stacey and I both ran to Crane, who had watched all of this in wide-eyed silence, just like we had. Even then, I didn’t want to speak for fear of distracting the procession of ghosts from their descent.

  “Crane? Are you okay?” I whispered as quietly as I could.

  Stacey embraced him, holding his head against her chest as if he were her own child. It had been hard to watch the little boy cutting himself.

  I inspected his arm. Most of the scratches seemed shallow, practice cuts while he worked up his nerve. I was pretty sure there would be a lot more blood if he’d actually hit a major vein or artery, but I’m no doctor, and he needed to see one as soon as possible.

  We tiptoed to the broken remnants of the railing and looked down. The four ghosts were on the landing, walking slowly at Catherine’s pace. An eyeblink later, they were down the stairs, filing out through the door to the hall.

  We followed them down.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  After we stepped off the attic stairs, we saw the procession of ghosts far down the second-floor hall, approaching the big central staircase.

  Jacob and Toolie stood in the side hall where the children’s rooms were located. They were staring after the apparitions, Toolie clinging to Jacob’s arm.

  “We’re back,” I whispered, startling both of them.

  A horrified look crossed Toolie’s face at the sight of Crane—wet with blood from his wrist to elbow, more drops of blood spattered on his shirt and jeans.

  “Crane!” she ran toward him, taking his arm in her hands. “What happened?”

  “I’m okay,” Crane said. “It’s over now.”

  Toolie ushered him off the to the master bedroom to wash and bandage his wounds.

  Stacey, Jacob, and I continued after the ghosts, moving as slowly and quietly as we could manage, as they walked silently down the main stairway to the front hall. The entire situation had the eerie feeling of a late-night funeral march, but without a note of music or a word of prayer.

  Downstairs, Juniper and Gord stood in the living room doorway, watching the ghosts walk by. Gord clutched his daughter’s hand in one of his own. With his other, he squeezed the handle of his rolling oxygen tank in a white-knuckled grip.

  They both gave me frightened looks as I descended the last stairs—where were their missing family members, and how were they supposed to react to a group of specters haunting their hallway?

  I placed my finger to my lips. Above all, at that moment, I didn’t want to interfere with the process of exorcism that seemed to be underway.

  The shattered b
ack door swung open again, sloshing through the puddle of accumulated rain on the floor.

  The four ghosts blinked away, and then they were outside, shuffling toward the swollen pond that took up most of the yard. The four of us who were still living followed them at a cautious distance.

  The ghosts grew blurry in the heavy rain.

  Catherine, devoted mother and lethal wife, dragged Isaiah into the water, still moving in her slow but relentless way. A scrim of ice formed on the surface of the pond when Catherine pulled him under the surface. The thin ice melted quickly as fresh rain poured down on top of it.

  Noah and Luke followed them down, one after the other, until the entire family was completely submerged in the dark water.

  And then they were gone.

  * * *

  I sent Stacey and Jacob to turn on the power while the rest of us gathered in the kitchen. Toolie served iced tea. Crane’s arm was fully bandaged, and he nibbled slowly on an Oreo cookie. Gord and Toolie sat with their kids while I leaned against the counter, feeling both jittery and exhausted. It was almost three in the morning.

  “So the...poltergeist...was holding all the...other ghosts here?” Gord asked, while the lights flickered on overhead.

  “Essentially,” I said. “The poltergeist knew it was rooted here by Eliza’s ghost, and if the ghost left the house, the poltergeist would have been destroyed. That’s why it was protecting Isaiah’s ghost, too. So once the poltergeist was gone, there was nothing to stop Catherine from entering the house and finishing the job she began when she was alive—getting rid of her husband.”

  “That’s so wild,” Juniper said. She sat in a kitchen chair, her knees drawn up to her chin. “So if I didn’t make the poltergeist, why was it bugging me?”

  “It needed a new host,” I said. “It needed someone living to feed on. This is a really strange case, because I’ve never heard of a poltergeist so old. It must have been dormant for a long time...and Catherine’s ghost must have been dormant during that time, too. Something may have happened recently, maybe in October, that really jolted these spirits awake.”

  Juniper frowned. Her Halloween seance had likely awoken both the poltergeist and Catherine, which was another reason the poltergeist might have attached itself to her.

  “It’s my fault, too,” Crane said. “I think I woke them up. I woke up the boys.”

  “You didn’t intend to do it,” I said. “Anyway, the ghosts have left the building. We’ll need to return in a few days to check over the house, but after an exit like that...I’d say you’re probably in the clear.”

  “The house certainly feels safer already,” Toolie said. “Not so heavy and dark.”

  Crane nodded.

  “And what happens to Eliza?” Juniper asked.

  “We’ll take her to a remote cemetery where she can be at peace,” I said. “We know a few of them, and I’ll bring her to the nicest one. Lots of old magnolias and wildflowers. Lots of songbirds and rabbits. She’ll be much happier than she ever was here.”

  Juniper nodded, but she still looked troubled about it.

  “So her father killed her?” Juniper asked.

  “Her father’s ghost,” I said.

  “But why? He really liked his daughter, right?” Juniper asked.

  “The poltergeist looked just like Eliza,” I said. “Maybe Isaiah’s ghost witnessed the poltergeist killing his sons and thought it was Eliza. In his confusion and grief, he attacked his daughter instead of the poltergeist she’d created.”

  “It’s just all so sad,” Toolie said.

  “And then there was light, huh?” Stacey said, entering the room with Jacob. She was blushing and he was smiling kind of awkwardly. I wondered what they’d been up to back there, besides tinkering with the power switches.

  “And then there was sleep,” I said. “Mrs. Paulding, I have to sweep up some broken cameras in the upstairs hall. We’ll come back for the rest of our gear in the morning, if that’s all right.” The thought of collecting the cameras, microphones, and the heavy stamper was far too much. “That will give us a chance to do a quick check of the house, too.”

  “Of course, of course,” Toolie said. “And I’ll clean up the mess, don’t worry about it.”

  “There’s broken glass--”

  “I’ll take care of it. Go on.” She sighed. “It’s sad to think of those people trapped in this house for so long. Especially the kids.”

  “It is,” I agreed.

  “You figure they went off to Heaven? Or Hell?” Toolie asked.

  “Those are two possibilities,” I said. “The important thing is that they’ve moved on to wherever they’re supposed to be. That’s all we really know.”

  Toolie nodded, thinking this over.

  We collected the ghost trap from the hall and headed outside.

  “Five more ghosts, totally annihilated!” Stacey said, once we were on the driveway and away from the clients. “We should start a scoreboard at the office.”

  “Does the poltergeist count as a whole ghost? Or just half?” Jacob asked.

  “That one should count as two or three ghosts,” I said. “Thanks again, Jacob.”

  “Yeah.” Stacey gave him a hug that seemed to linger for many, many extra seconds.

  “Look, I’m happy to help you guys out,” Jacob said, “But it seems like you always invite me in right at the evil-ghosts-ripping-people-apart stage.”

  “Maybe we’ll invite you in earlier next time,” I said.

  “Yeah, at the boring library part,” Stacey said. “You can squint through old deeds and tax records with us. You’d love it.”

  “I’m excited already.”

  I gave Jacob a quick hug, too. Saved my life. Nice guy. Cute, not that it mattered to me.

  Stacey and I climbed into our van. While I waited for Jacob to pull out of the driveway, I couldn’t help noticing that Stacey was humming softly and happily to herself in a way she usually didn’t.

  “What’s with the singing?” I asked.

  “Guess who finally asked me out.” Stacey beamed at me.

  Being a professional detective, I guessed it right on the first try.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “So that’s your final story?” Calvin asked. We sat at the long table in the middle of our workshop, which includes soldering stations, a video-editing cubicle, and a big glass kiln, among other things that don’t usually go together. There’s also an espresso machine, which I’d bought Calvin as a fairly selfish gift one Christmas. He ended up using it more than I did, though.

  It was Saturday, almost a week after we’d wrapped things up at the Paulding house. Stacey and I had returned to double-check the house the previous night.

  “That’s it,” I said. “The father was abusive to the boys, the mother killed him. The little girl spawned a poltergeist that ended up killing her mother and brothers. She must have felt a lot of anger and resentment toward her family—she hadn’t hated her father like they did. And the poltergeist ultimately acted out that anger in the most extreme way. Isaiah’s ghost saw it happen, but thought the poltergeist was Eliza herself. That must be why he killed her—he blamed her for killing the boys. He probably had no idea what a poltergeist was.”

  “I told you, poltergeists made by girls and young children are the most dangerous,” Calvin said. “I’ve found no cases of poltergeists being so long-lived. You might write an article about it for the Journal.” He wasn’t talking about the Wall Street investment paper but the International Journal of Psychical Studies, the closest thing that exists to a trade magazine in our line of work.

  “Why would I want to do that?” I asked.

  “It could be good publicity for the agency.”

  “Stacey wants to start a Facebook page for us.”

  “I’m old enough to pretend I have no idea what that is,” Calvin said. He gestured toward the two items on the table: a sealed ghost trap and a large rectangle wrapped in brown paper. “So you’ll be releasing the gir
l?”

  “I’m not sure she’s in there,” I said. I fetched him a pair of thermal goggles. “Look.”

  Calvin strapped them on and leaned close to the trap. “I see what you mean. Not a sign of activity. Jacob said the ghost was very faint, though.”

  “I think she might have moved on.”

  Calvin looked up at me, the goggles still strapped to his head. It made him look a bit like a cyborg, especially combined with the wheelchair. “Her choice to enter the trap was also a choice to leave the house, to let go of her life and death and move on.”

  “And move on.” I nodded. “But the only way to check...”

  “Is to open the trap.” Calvin sighed. “All right. Set up a thermal camera, EMF meter, motion detector. And turn off the lights.”

  I hurried to arrange the gear. He watched through the thermal goggles while I set the trap to blow off its lid. Usually, I leave the trap in a carefully selected old cemetery and set it to open a couple hours after I leave—a little pocket of compressed gas opens the lid, freeing the ghost to wander its new residence. We do this for the ghosts that aren’t a real threat to anyone, like Eliza.

  This time, I set the trap to open in ten seconds, giving me just enough time to stand behind the thermal camera and watch.

  The lid popped off with a hiss and landed on the table beside the trap.

  I saw nothing on the camera, not even the slightest cold spot to indicate a ghost. There was no change in the EMF readings, either.

  “No ghost?” I asked.

  “No ghost.” Calvin turned his head back and forth, scanning the room. “Not a thing.”

  “I guess she really did move on.” I stopped recording and turned on the light over the table.

  “One mystery solved.” Calvin reached toward the package wrapped in brown paper. “Now will you tell me what’s in the box?”

  “There’s some extra good news,” I said. “A couple of days after we left, Gord found he was breathing much easier. He went to the doctor, and his emphysema seems to have vanished. They’re still testing him, of course, but he says he has no problems now, no more feeling of drowning in his own lungs. He doesn’t even use his oxygen tank anymore.”