The Ghost Host: Episode 2 (The Ghost Host Series)

by DelSheree Gladden

  “But do you trust me?”

  Morton’s brows pull together. “Yes. You know that.”

  I meet his gaze, though I hate what I’m about to say. “Then trust me to make sure Malachi follows protocol.”

  His brows go from pinched to rising closer to his hairline. “You’re willing to do that? Commanding him in the alley was different. You were protecting yourself. This is different. He won’t like it.”

  No he won’t. In fact, I’m almost positive commanding Malachi to protect Timothy instead of me will destroy any chance of reconciliation between us. I know my role, the importance of what I’m supposed to do. Timothy’s destiny is no less integral to keeping the physical and spiritual realms from imploding.

  “Yes,” I say with more conviction than I thought I’d be able to muster.

  Morton thinks for several long moments. Griffin remains silent, as he has been for this entire conversation. Super helpful, but whatever. Nothing he offered up was going to be in support of Malachi anyway. Like father like son, I guess.

  “Fine,” he finally says. “Set it up. I have a few things I need to take care of before then.” He stands, then points at the torn notebook paper on the table. “I want a full analysis on this before we attempt jumping realities.”

  “Yes, sir,” Griffin says. He watches his dad shrug back into his suit coat. “Any luck finding an Egyptologist who can help with the book?”

  Morton suddenly looks tired. Seeing it dumps a bucket of guilt on me. “Yeah,” he says. “Yancy tracked someone down. Should be here tomorrow.” He grips Griffin’s shoulder. “Keep an eye on her until I get back.”

  “I’m not a puppy,” I argue before Griffin can respond.

  Turning a derisive look on me, Morton says. “Have you ever had a puppy?” When I shake my head, he snorts. “You should get one, then try to argue with me.”

  I scowl at him once his back is turned. Griffin chuckles. Him I ignore.

  Morton is gone a moment later, off to do who knows what. Stuff well beyond my security clearance and pay grade. I don’t particularly like being handed off to Griffin like a three-year-old, but we do have work to do. Moving closer to Griffin, I settle in to study Timothy’s notes. So does my babysitter.

  After two hours, my fingers are stiff from writing and Griffin’s rubbing his eyes from staring at the computer screen for too long. Deciphering the handwriting of a first grader is tedious. His incomplete thoughts and wandering commentary on anything and everything he could think of make things a bit of a challenge as well. At least there isn’t any French to conjugate.

  Griffin pushes the laptop away and leans back in his chair. “Okay, read me back the key points. I’ve lost track of half of what we learned.”

  “The monsters didn’t appear until after his dad died, and have been wandering the Field of Reeds since then.

  “The dull grey of this place is new. It used to look exactly like reality. The longer the monsters are there, the darker it gets.

  “The pull of the Feather seems to lead Timothy toward souls, which takes him closer to the monsters…which is how he got attacked.

  “The more souls he gets, the easier it is for the monsters to track him. It’s not just the light, though. Something else is attracting them.

  “Timothy can’t sense the monsters, only hear and see them once they’re close. He can’t talk to them, and has no way of fighting them. Whatever the light was that his foster mom saw, I’m almost positive it was the souls reacting and not him. Who knows if they’ll be able to do it again? The salt headband seems to be doing something to hide him, but not enough.”

  Groaning as he stretches, Griffin settles back into his chair before speaking. “I was hoping I’d just forgotten any other really useful bits of info.”

  “No such luck.” I sigh and toss the notebook aside. “Maybe the stories will be more helpful.”

  Skepticism lines Griffin’s features. It’s hard not to feel the same.

  For a while, neither of us says anything. Griffin’s eyes are half closed before I speak again. “Did you know about this stuff?”

  He forces one eye back open. “What stuff?”

  “The Egyptian stuff. That it’s real?”

  Griffin shrugs. “Not the Egyptian myths, particularly, but I’ve run into enough things I thought were fantasy to redefine the word for me.”

  “Like what?” I ask. “Fairies, elves, Santa Claus? You’ve gotta tell me if Santa Claus is real, because if he is, I have a bone to pick with him.”

  Chuckling, he doesn’t bother to open his eyes. “I’ve yet to run into Jolly Old Saint Nick, but I don’t count anything out anymore.” That seems to be all he’s interested in saying on the matter, but then one eye opens. “What’s your problem with Santa?”

  “I asked for an infrared camera when I was eight and I got a lousy kiddie camera instead.”

  “What did you want an infrared camera for?” Griffin asks.

  I stared at him, incredulous I have to explain. “To take pictures of the ghosts and prove to my parents that I wasn’t nuts, of course.”

  His brows pull up and he nods. “Right. Of course.”

  Given our introduction and Griffin’s prior knowledge of the ghosts, I assumed he knew as much about them as his dad. Not knowing the ghost-oriented purpose of an infrared camera gives me pause. He said weird stuff was a family interest, but that doesn’t necessarily mean ghosts. There’s plenty of bizarre stuff out there to keep a person busy without ever running into ghosts.

  “What kind of cases do you usually work?” I ask. “Not hauntings or soul-deaths, I’m guessing.”

  Griffin shrugs. “I’m not completely inexperienced with ghosts but, no, it’s not my usual crowd. I deal with the living for the most part, regular crimes with few obvious leads. Unexplainable cases as well, but not as often.”

  “What kind of unexplainable cases?”

  He hesitates, and I wonder for a moment if my minimal security clearance is going to make him clam up. The corner of his mouth twitches. “Revealing frauds who are causing real harm, recruiting those that aren’t and have real talent. Debunking claims of supernatural influence on occasion. When the claim isn’t fake, I find the right people to deal with it and help where I can.”

  “Sounds kind of vague,” I say, knowing he’s holding back but not pressuring him to tell me anything he shouldn’t.

  Griffin frowns. “At some point, I’ll tell you more. Right now, just know I have no doubts about your abilities.”

  I’d laugh at him if he did, after what he’s seen just on this one case. Then again, Malachi saw plenty before finally giving in, if he really ever did. Part of me still thinks he’s waiting for someone to jump out of a closet with a camera in hand and tell him it’s all a big joke. “Do you think Malachi will ever really believe?” I ask without thinking.

  If Griffin’s surprised by my question, he doesn’t show it. Instead, he considers his answer. “I don’t think Malachi’s problem is believing. He’s seen more than enough to believe the supernatural world exists. What he can’t bring himself to do is accept that truth. He can’t refute what’s happened, but he can keep thinking there’s a rational explanation for all of it.”

  “Echo Simmons and rational aren’t very well acquainted,” I grumble.

  Griffin chuckles. “Maybe Malachi can introduce you some time, because they seem pretty tight.”

  I laugh, but it’s wry and a little sad. Not because Malachi doesn’t want to see what’s right in front of him. I get that. Paranormal crazy is scary. It’s life-threatening at times. It makes me sad because it answers the question I’ve been trying to put off answering for months. Malachi and I aren’t doomed just because I’ve screwed things up. We’re never going to work out because I don’t think he’ll ever completely accept me for me. How can he if he’s unwilling to embrace the part of me forever bound to the ghosts?

  15: Few and Far

  (Echo)

  It only takes until everyon
e shows up for this plan to turn into an epic battle of wills.

  I stand in the center of a circle of salt as I listen to Holden and Kyran argue over which symbols should line the circle, to Griffin try to give Malachi instructions on how to protect me only to have Malachi argue with his techniques, to Zara and Cerise fighting Morton when he tells them they can’t stay because this is official business, and to whatever else might be going on out of earshot. Let’s not forget the swarm of ghosts lining the circle, which of course only I can see and be utterly weirded out by.

  Ghosts tend to be loners unless something big is going down. Usually something that involves death. They’re a morbid group, but I supposed you can’t really blame them. I’m really hoping to not die on this little trip, so watching my friends move in and out of nearly two dozen staring ghosts without realizing they’re there is beyond freaky. What am I getting myself into? It’s a bad idea to ask, but I can’t resist.

  Glancing at a ghost I’ve known since I was a baby, I ask, “Liza, why are there so many ghosts here?”

  Her expression is a mask of pity.

  “Do you know where I’m going tonight?”

  She hesitates, then nods uncertainly.

  “You know there are Devourers there, right?”

  Shivering, the lines of her spiritual body blur for a moment and I fear she’s going to run off. I try not to ask any of the ghosts for anything. They always want something in return and will turn to violent means to get it if they have to. Liza is different. I still don’t like putting myself in debt with any ghost, but she has nothing she wants from me. Her family died out ages ago, moving on as they should have, leaving her here. As far as I can tell, nothing is holding her back but her own fear. I think staying here as a bound spirit is preferable to meeting up with her past, but I have no idea why.

  Slowly, Liza lifts her incorporeal chin to meet my gaze. She nods, acknowledging my question about the Devourers, but then turns her head from left to right very deliberately.

  “I shouldn’t go?”

  Her head shakes faster.

  “I should go?”

  She nods.

  Okay…. Not me then. The Devourers? I think for a moment before I realize what she’s trying to say. “The Devourers are in the Field of Reeds, the Dreamside, whatever you call it, but they shouldn’t be, right? It’s not good that they’re there.”

  She nods frantically and puts her fists up in front of her chest as though she were about to box someone.

  “I should fight them?” I ask, a knot forming in the pit of my stomach. Malachi coming is a matter of protection. That last thing I want to do is launch an all-out war on the Devourers. We’re nowhere near prepared for that.

  Liza nods again, pointing to the other ghosts around the circle.

  I’m tempted to step out of the circle and let her pass her message through me, but we’re short on time and coming in and out of a ghost’s control can be tortuously slow when you’re in a hurry. I tighten my thinking cap a bit and puzzle out her charades. “I need to fight them in order to protect the ghosts still on Earth?”

  Her bobbing says I hit the mark. She gestures toward my head very specifically, before pulling her hands apart and slashing at the other ghosts. It’s not hard for me to figure that one out. I’d already suspected as much.

  “If I don’t stop the Devourers from escaping, they’ll come here and eat all your souls.” That’s what Devourers do, after all. I’m still fuzzy on one thing, though. “How will they escape?”

  Liza mimes eating, then places her hands on—and a little bit through—the shoulders of the ghost next to her. And I suddenly feel like I’m going to throw up. The more souls they eat, the more powerful Devourers get. That’s not news. The fact that their growing power is their ticket out of the Field of Reeds and into the living world is, is a really, really troubling one, because they already attempted to escape once. Timothy paid the price for that failed attempt. I doubt it will take many more souls before they can hitch a ride at the end Timothy’s nightly visit, kill him on their way out, and go merrily on their homicidal way.

  It’s a testament to the fact that I’ve been hanging around Griffin too much lately that the first words that come to mind in response to that realization are pretty much all four letters. One in particular.

  I turn to tell the rest of the crew to stop their stupid bickering and pay attention, but when I look away from Liza I realize they’re all staring at me. Freezing under their gazes, I say, “Uh, so I guess you guys heard all that?”

  “All except the last part,” Morton says in a tone that clearly indicates I should promptly fill him in.

  That’s pretty much what I thought. “Well,” I begin, “if we don’t figure out how to lock the Devourers back up in the Hall of Truth, they’re going to keep eating souls and grow powerful enough to escape to our world by tagging along with me or Timothy when we try to escape. Soon. That will clearly be a really bad thing, so how about we stop debating things that don’t matter and get this show on the road?”

  Everyone stares at me.

  No one moves like I asked them to.

  “Now,” I say more firmly. “Malachi, get over here or I’m going without you.”

  He blinks, looks to Griffin for some reason, then steps into the circle. “This is a really bad idea,” he mumbles.

  “No kidding,” I hiss, “but it has to be done and we’re the only ones who can do it.”

  “Why you? Why not just take me in there with him? There’s no reason for you to put yourself at risk for some kid you barely even know.”

  I know where he’s coming from, but his words hit a button that sparks a deeply buried rage. My jaw is clenched as I say, “Do you want to know how many times I was some kid and nobody ever bothered to help me?”

  Malachi is clearly startled by the venom in my voice, but he doesn’t get a chance to respond.

  “Here,” Kyran says as he steps up next to me. “Drink this.”

  He presses a mug into my hands, his fingers lingering on mine, though this time out of fear rather than seduction. I lift the mug to my nose and sniff. Not gagging is a challenge. “What is this? Is smells horrible.”

  “Something to make you fall asleep quickly,” he says. “Thought you might need it with this crowd staring at you the whole time.”

  Glancing around, I realize he’s right. More right than he even knows. All my living friends are positioned around the circle, not-so-alive guests filling in the gaps between them. “Thanks,” I say appreciatively. “I hadn’t considered that.”

  The corner of his mouth tips up a little. “Whatever you need.”

  He steps away then, and I almost ask him if he has something for Malachi, but a gulping sound draws my attention. Malachi pulls a mug from his lips, scowling either because of the taste, or because of Kyran. Probably Kyran. He hands the mug off to Zara and gestures for me to hurry up. Closing my eyes, though I know it won’t help, I chug the nasty tea and hand my mug off to whoever will get it away from me.

  A few seconds later, Malachi and I are sitting in the circle, cross-legged with our knees touching. I doubt that small amount of contact will be enough, however, so I extend my hands to him and take a deep breath. Thankfully, Malachi takes them without pause and squeezes. We don’t say anything. My eyes droop and my thoughts go fuzzy much faster than I was expecting. My last fleeting thought is to wonder why on earth we didn’t start this already lying down.

  ***

  I’m jerked sideways unexpectedly. I start to cry out, but a hand clamps over my mouth. That doesn’t really help me not panic. Malachi’s voice does.

  “Shh,” he whispers.

  His body is tense, something I’m well aware of given that mine is cinched up against his. Distracted for a second or two by that sensation, I’m slow to realize what spooked Malachi. I glance around us in shock. The dull grey light I remember from two nights ago has deepened to long shadows and hazy darkness. Visibility can’t be more than fifty
feet. If the light that usually brightens this place up really is souls, this can’t be a good sign at all.

  Twigs snap behind us and Malachi whips me around before I can even process the sound. Red pulses around the imprint of the talisman on his forearm. The fiery light bathes a terrified Timothy in the alarming color. “Turn that off,” I hiss as I pull out of his arms and rush to Timothy.

  “Sorry,” he whispers, “it was harder to find you this time, and I couldn’t link to Malachi at first.” He huddles against me, his whole body trembling and freezing cold as I hold him.

  “How long have you been here?” I ask.

  He shrugs before burying himself deeper into my embrace. “It’s hard to tell, but it’s scary here and it felt like a super long time.” Tears splash on my collarbone and I cradle him against me even tighter.

  “It’s okay. We’re here now. We’ll protect you from the monsters, okay?”

  More tears slide down his cheeks and onto my skin. “For how long?”

  I glance up at Malachi, who’s splitting his attention between the sobbing Timothy and the creepy forest around us. He doesn’t like being here any more than I do, but he lays a protective hand on Timothy’s shoulder. “As long as it takes,” he says quietly but resolutely.

  Slipping my hand from Timothy’s back, I rest it on Malachi’s and squeeze. A sad smile flashes across his mouth before his attention is stolen by another snapping branch. “Should we move?” I whisper.

  Timothy tugs on my jacket—a piece of clothing I don’t realize I’m wearing until now. It’s only now I feel how much colder it is than before. Putting aside fashion and weather, I look down at Timothy. His bright eyes are full of fear, but steeled with determination. “I can show you my hiding place. They don’t know where it is yet.”

  Malachi hears what he says, and I don’t think either of us are keen on letting a six-year-old take charge of such a dangerous situation. Of the three of us, Timothy is the only one who knows anything about this area. Malachi shrugs, though he’s chagrined to do so. We don’t have a lot of other options.