Banished

by C. J. Archer

  "But I don't want to go back," he whined.

  "You either go back or have your soul crushed."

  He glanced over my head at Quin and sighed. "If you'd seen that place, you wouldn't be giving me this choice." He nodded at the fight, still in full swing around us. "This…this is what I want—"

  I stuck the knife into his chest. He screamed so loud that I felt sure everyone must have heard it. He gurgled something, his lips moving furiously, but no words came out. I withdrew the knife and pushed my hand through the hole. I pulled out the soul and crushed it. The dust turned into a gluey mass in the spilled ale near my feet.

  I tucked the knife back up my sleeve and caught Quin's hand. I dragged him after me and out through the door. Dusk had surrendered to the night and I headed to the darkest spot on the street, away from the lamps. I still held Quin's hand as I slumped against the brick wall of Miss Marble's Coffee House.

  "I had to do it," I said, breathing hard.

  He clasped my shoulders and rubbed his thumbs in soothing circles. "I know."

  "But I'm not sure he deserved to have his soul turned to dust." My lower lip wobbled so I bit it. I did not want to cry in front of him. Not over this.

  Quin cupped my face in both his hands. "Cara," he murmured. His honey-thick voice slid over me, caressing me as gently as his thumbs along my cheekbones. The tenderness brought my tears even closer. "You gave him a choice. I heard you. It's more than we gave Malborough or the ghosts at the house."

  "I know. I think that's what bothers me. I gave him a choice and he still chose nothingness over Hell."

  He kissed my forehead, his lips lingering for several aching thumps of my heart. "You did the right thing. Don't be sad. Not for these souls. They're bleak and cruel and deserved their fate."

  I sighed and rested my head against his chest. He hesitated, then closed his arms around me. I felt rather than heard him sigh too, as his body relaxed against mine. A single, thunderous thump of his heart sounded against my ear. It never ceased to amaze me that he could be dead and yet have a functioning body.

  "Are you sure you're not alive?" I murmured.

  "I'm sure." He sounded like he was smiling. "I exist here temporarily, and I can cease to exist on this realm if my body dies. My soul will immediately return to Purgatory if I do, just as it will when this task is over."

  I tilted my head and frowned up at him. "But…surely if you can die here, you can also live."

  "The administrators of Purgatory have granted it so that I can complete their tasks when needed. But that's all."

  I placed my hand over his chest. His heartbeat was so strong, his skin warm. It seemed impossible that he could truly be dead. Although my head knew it, my heart didn't want to believe.

  "Cara." He brushed his knuckle down my cheek and gave me a sad smile. "You won't find the answer you seek. What you want…it's impossible." He dropped his hand, when I needed it to hold me, and turned away. His deep sigh lingered in the crisp air after he walked away.

  I trotted to catch up and we walked side-by-side back to the stream. I didn't bring up his life, or death, again, even though I had questions and doubts. For one thing, if the administrators granted him the living body for temporary assignments, why couldn't they grant it to him forever?

  By the time we reached the stream and collected the sword from its hiding spot beneath the bush, I'd calmed down somewhat. He was right about The Red Lion ghost. The man must have done despicable things in his lifetime to be sent to Hell in his afterlife, and I had given him a choice.

  Quin removed his jacket, tie and waistcoat and spread them over the bush then strapped his sword to his hip. He looked every bit the avenging warrior, albeit a well-dressed one in trousers and shirt. He didn't ask for Jack's knife and I kept it tucked up my sleeve for safekeeping. I would probably need it again.

  "Ready?" I asked.

  He nodded and we headed back up the bank and across High Street to the shops. Nobody was about. Everyone was indoors, either at home or in one of the pubs. We could patrol the village without worrying about villagers seeing us.

  "We'll head to the police station again," he suggested. "It seems to be a place they like to haunt."

  I tried to think like a spirit who'd suddenly found himself out of Hell and back in the realm of the living. Where would I go? What would I do if all the people I knew were dead? I couldn't think of anywhere in particular to haunt. In fact, it struck me as a rather dull existence, but I suppose I wasn't maliciously inclined.

  We rounded a corner and I paused, throwing my arm across Quin to stop him too. "There's two," I whispered with a nod at the police station on the opposite side of the road. "They're trying to pull off the boards protecting the broken window."

  He squinted into the darkness. "I see the boards moving. Only two?"

  "Yes. Come on."

  He held me back as he scanned the area. "As long as those boards stay in place, they have no access to weapons."

  "Then we'll be able to defeat them easily if I tell you where to strike."

  "We risk them leaving as soon as they recognize us."

  True. It was simply luck that the one in the pub didn't disappear. I looked up and down the street, and finally settled on a plan I suspected Quin wouldn't like. "You go back the way we came and skirt around to the rear of the police station," I said. "Hide in the shadows between that tree and the wall of the station. When you're in place, give me a signal and I'll pretend to be somebody out for an evening stroll. They won't recognize me in this light if I keep my face averted and I pretend not to see them."

  "I take it I am to attack when they take an interest in you?"

  "I'll draw them to your hiding place. Be sure to keep to the shadows until the last moment."

  He hesitated. "There will be no chance to speak to them and give them a choice."

  "I know," I said heavily. "But you're right. They're aware of us now and what we are here to do. If they're still on this realm then they've made their choice."

  He withdrew his sword. "When you hear an owl's call, cross the road." And then he was gone, sprinting back down the road behind us and into a side street.

  I kept to the shadows at the corner until I heard the owl a few minutes later. I couldn't see Quin at all, and I hoped it wasn't a real owl hooting.

  I lowered my head and crossed the road. The blade's tip bit into the skin on my palm as I lowered it into position in my hand. My footsteps echoed in the darkness, catching the attention of the spirits. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that they were two burly men with gunshot wounds in their chests.

  "Here's somethin' tasty," one of them said, slapping the other in the arm. "Want to have some fun?"

  "How?"

  They considered what to do next as I drew closer. "We could lift her skirts."

  The other one sniggered. I braced myself for their juvenile game. As my skirts lifted, I stopped, turned and glanced around, as any normal woman might do. The two ghosts laughed at their antics and went to do it again. I walked off quickly and they followed. The second time my skirts lifted, I was right near where Quin ought to be hiding.

  I stopped again, scooped up some soil from beneath the tree and dropped it on the shoulders of the one who'd lifted my skirt. He frowned and went to brush it off just as Quin emerged from the shadows, grabbing the attention of both ghosts.

  I plunged the knife into one as Quin cut through the chest of the soil-covered spirit. We both pulled out the dark masses of their souls and crushed them before either ghost seemed to realize what had happened. Their dust blended with the leaves and earth beneath the tree.

  Quin sheathed his sword and dusted off his hands. "That was a clever idea."

  "Thank you." I bent and scooped up some more dirt, filling my pockets. "For next time."

  There was little need for talking as we patrolled the village. We came across another spirit at the railway station, placing stones on the tracks. The lure of a lone female again proved too much
temptation, and he would have been easily led to Quin's hiding spot if I'd bothered to draw him in that direction. Since he was alone, I was able to remove his soul without Quin's help.

  We picked off single spirits here and there as we encountered them. Some simply lounged about, staring up at the stars, looking bored, while others were in the process of emerging from windows after committing some sort of mischief.

  "Those were numbers eight and nine tonight," I said as we dispensed with two spirits removing tools from the blacksmith's shop.

  Quin tilted his head to the side, listening. I heard it too. A woman, screaming. The sound was faint, distant but unmistakable.

  We walked quickly in the direction of the scream. By the time I reached the base of the hill leading up to the Butterworths' house, I was out of breath. I wished I'd left my corset on the bush along with Quin's clothes.

  "I know these people," I said, grasping his arm to slow him down. "They'll think it odd for me to be walking around at night with a man."

  "We'll keep out of sight."

  The screaming had ceased, but we could still hear talking and what sounded like someone crying. We deviated from the road and crept in the shadows of the trees instead.

  "Someone was in there!" The frantic female voice hovered between shouting and crying. It came from the garden beyond the iron gates of the Butterworth house. "I swear on the Holy Bible, someone was in my room!"

  A man's voice responded, too low and calm to be heard from where we crouched near the gatepost.

  "I don't care if you've checked! Check again! I am not going into that house until the culprit is caught. Where are my girls?"

  "Here, Mama," came another voice.

  I peeked around the post and spotted the imposing figure of Mrs. Butterworth standing on the front porch, dressed in nothing but a nightgown with a shawl around her shoulders. Her husband held her by the elbows while her three daughters stood nearby. The two elder twins had their hair in curling rags and looked decidedly annoyed at having their sleep interrupted. Jane, the youngest, held a cricket bat as she peered out into the garden.

  "I was not imagining things!" Mrs. Butterworth cried in response to something her husband said. "Am I in the habit of doing so? Am I?"

  A footman dressed in a black jacket thrown over a nightshirt appeared in the doorway. He said something and Mr. Butterworth commanded him to look again.

  "Someone was there," Mrs. Butterworth told her husband after the footman departed. "My bed linen was lifted right before my eyes, and then my nightdress too. I am not making it up or imagining things."

  "Can you see a spirit?" Quin whispered.

  "No. He may have gone." Just as I said it, a hazy figure appeared briefly at an upstairs window then disappeared. He reappeared on the ground near the family. "There's one now."

  "What's he doing?"

  "Watching the Butterworths. He's got his eye on the twins, I think."

  Quin growled low in his throat. "Cur."

  The spirit suddenly looked up at the window from which he'd jumped. "We had the wrong room!" he called. "The girls are down here now. We'll follow them when they go back inside."

  My blood thudded in my veins, heating up with my rising anger. "There's another. They're after the girls," I whispered to Quin.

  Two more ghosts suddenly appeared next to the first one. "Three now," I told Quin. I scrunched my fingers in the soil at my feet and shoved it into my pocket. "They plan on following the girls back inside."

  "Damnation."

  "How will we separate the ghosts from the family? We can't attack in their presence."

  Quin didn't answer because I suspected he didn't know either.

  The curtain fluttered at the upstairs window and another spirit faded in and out as he emerged onto the sill. "I'm goin' to enjoy playin' with those two lassies," he called down to his friends. He threw his head back and laughed. His red beard shimmered in the moonlight.

  CHAPTER 9

  "Redbeard's here too," I told Quin. "What shall we do?"

  "We wait. When the family returns inside, we must find a way in and stop Redbeard and the others."

  "But they'll lock up the house. We can't go around breaking windows and sneaking in. We'll be discovered."

  He remained silent for a long time, perhaps contemplating his options. When the footman returned and spoke to Mr. Butterworth, Quin swore under his breath. "There is no alternative."

  I watched the family closely. Mrs. Butterworth appeared to be the only one up in arms about an intruder. Her husband was trying to placate her by having the footman search the house, but I suspected he didn't believe her. Her elder daughters looked bored, and her youngest paid them no mind at all. She stood on the bottom step, facing the garden, her gaze scanning the fence line. She was the only one looking our way.

  On impulse, I stepped in front of the gate as her gaze swept past. Quin grabbed my hand and dragged me back into the shadows.

  "What are you doing?" he hissed.

  "Getting Jane's attention."

  "Who's Jane?"

  "The little girl. She knows me. She'll probably let us in."

  "Why would she do that?"

  "Her head is full of fanciful notions." Jane was ten years old with an adventurous spirit. Where the members of her family were rather silly and irritating, she was whip-smart and lively. She could also keep a secret. "She'll believe me when I tell her we're hunting evil ghosts. Look at her. She clearly thinks her mother isn't imagining things."

  He followed my gaze to Jane who was now approaching the gate at the end of the drive. Her family took no notice of her. "I still think it's a terrible plan."

  "At least it is a plan. Have you got a better one?"

  He merely grunted.

  "Miss Moreau?" whispered Jane. "Is that you?"

  "Yes," I said, revealing myself to her before stepping back into the darkness again. "Jane, I have something very important to ask of you."

  "Is it spies? Were they after my mother?"

  "No, not spies."

  "Not that Myer fellow?" She wrinkled her nose.

  "No. It was ghosts."

  "Ghosts!"

  "Shhh."

  But it was too late. Her father had heard her. "Jane? Come away from there."

  "I'm just picking flowers," she called back. She plucked a rose from the bush. "We don't have long," she said to me, all seriousness. "Tell me about the ghosts."

  "They're intent on doing harm. Quin and I must stop them."

  She peered past me, scrunching up her eyes and nose at Quin's outline, just visible beside me. "He's a very large fellow."

  "With special powers that send evil ghosts back to the afterlife."

  "You can see them, can't you?"

  I nodded. "Jane, I need you to unlatch this gate. Then you must leave a door or window open for us to get inside the house. We have to stop them before they do harm."

  Her father called again. When she didn't answer, he stepped down from the porch.

  "Quickly, Jane," I whispered. "You must decide now if you will help us. But please, even if you decide not to, you must not tell anyone that you saw Quin or I here. Do you understand?"

  Mr. Butterworth strode up the drive. "Jane! Come here! Now. We're going inside."

  "Jane?" It was difficult to convey urgency in a whisper, but I must have managed it, because Jane turned to her father.

  "Coming," she called. "Just one more flower." She picked another rose, unlatching the gate as she lifted the flower to her nose. Then she trotted back up the drive and slipped her hand into her father's.

  They returned to the porch then all five of them went inside. The footman closed the door. The click of the locks were loud in the silence.

  The ghosts lounged on the porch, waiting. None had shown any interest in Jane's wanderings, and I was convinced that we hadn't been seen.

  Quin stood close behind me, his heartbeat thumping out a steady rhythm against my back. It seemed to take forever for the g
hosts to disappear. Once they did, I could picture them, wandering through the house, looking for the twins' bedroom. I grew restless, watching, waiting for Jane to open a door. It seemed to take forever.

  It wasn't the door she opened, however, but a window. An upstairs one. I groaned.

  "There's a pipe running alongside the ivy," Quin said. "I can climb it."

  But could I?

  We swung open the unlatched gate and crept into the garden. We avoided the gravel drive and the grass muffled our steps. With the ease of a monkey, Quin climbed the pipe, occasionally using the ivy to leverage himself up. I studied the pipe. Perhaps I could do it. I was contemplating where to place my foot when the window nearest me opened.

  I jumped back into the shadows and flattened myself against the wall, but it was only Jane.

  "Psst," she hissed. "Come in this way."

  The ground floor window was more accessible, although I still managed to snag my skirt and land awkwardly in the room beyond. Jane helped me to my feet.

  "This way," she whispered, grabbing my hand. "I saw my sisters' door open but no one was there."

  We tiptoed up the stairs and I silently thanked Mrs. Butterworth for decorating them with a carpet runner. There wasn't enough light for me to see by, but Jane seemed to know her way in the dark. I allowed her to lead me and we met Quin in the upstairs hallway.

  "Which is their bedroom?" I asked Jane.

  I could just make out her silhouette pointing at a door. If the ghosts had opened it, then they'd closed it again after entering. They were inside, doing God knew what to the girls. It would only be a matter of time before one or both of the twins awoke and screamed. The entire household would once again be in uproar—and we would be the first to be blamed for violating the girls.

  I let go of Jane's hand and headed toward the door, but Quin held me back. "Jane, light those candles."

  She took the three-pronged candelabra and disappeared into another room.

  "Cara, I'm going to open that door then move down the hall to where you'll be hidden from view."