“That was Guardian,” the woman said. It was more of a question than a statement.
Taking in deep, slow breaths, I nodded to answer. I then stood up, trying to catch a numb emotion I could hide behind. “Landen in this life.”
She stared at the closed door for a second, then briskly walked past me into another room that was off to the side. The house had a lingering burning odor to it, but seconds after she left me I smelled rosemary, along with other scents that were nothing less than Earthly.
I followed her, hearing the floor creak with each step I took. The room she went in was lit by candlelight. It was a musky, aged room. Decorated with antique furniture, a red velvet couch with a high back was adjacent to black chairs with backs that reached well over whomever would sit in them. A dark wood desk was off to the left of the room, and a narrow table was before it. On that table was a golden chalice, a silver tray, and an array of candles, all lit and all white, with the exception of one: the red one in the woman's hand. A small dagger was in her other hand, and she was carving something in the red wax as her lips whispered words I could not hear. She sat the red candle in the center of the narrow table, then waved her hands over the wick, which ignited a flame that reached at least six inches in the air before settling in flow with five white candles next to it.
After emptying a small velvet sack into the chalice, she bowed her head in what looked like a prayer. A moment later, she raised her hands and placed a bundle of green leaves before her candle display, igniting it with a glance. The burn was slow, and the aroma of sage filled the room.
“Who are you?” I mumbled.
“Saige,” she stated as she reached for a white candle and poured a circle of wax around a golden chalice.
“No, not what are you burning—who are you?”
She turned to me, gray eyes locked with green. “Saige. The witch that is going to help you tonight.”
I glanced at the desk behind her altar to see a laptop computer, phone, iPod deck, books, and more plants than any office should have. My gaze drifted back to her, to the fashion jeans she was wearing, the symbolic yet elegant jewelry that lingered on her wrist, fingers, and neck. She didn’t look like a witch. She looked like an eccentric, wealthy, older woman.
“Looking for my broom?” I heard a bit of humor in her voice, laced with evident contradiction.
“Only if it can fly me to wherever Landen went.” She needed to know that sarcasm was a language I spoke fluently.
Her soft lips echoed a painful smile. “I’ll bring him back to you.”
I smirked. “I have no doubt he will come back. It’s what he’s doing when he’s gone that has me bothered.”
She glanced at her altar. “I intend to stop that, too.”
I furrowed my brow. “I wasn’t aware that a witch had the power to stop someone like Landen.” I was trying to politely tell her that her candles and herbs could not compare to what Landen and I had become. The fact that Perodine herself could not stop us made that notion fact.
“Were you aware of witches at all?”
I didn’t know if she was intending on being rude or not, but her tone was harsh.
I took in a breath before I spoke. “Let me be blunt: if you’re trying to shock me with the claim that you practice witchcraft, you’re ranking fairly low on my ‘wow’ scale at this moment.”
In my mind, all the evil that I’d fought flashed into view, causing a gust of wind to assault the glass pane windows behind her desk.
Her gaze shifted to the window. I saw a familiarity in her glance and turned to see who she was looking at. Not seeing anyone, I returned my attention to her, only to see her nod then walk past me toward the front hall.
“Where are you going?” I asked as I followed her.
She opened a hall door and pulled out a black pea coat. “I told you. To help you. To stop this.”
“How do you know where he went?”
She opened the front door and stopped short, as if she were staring at a mass of people, but there was no one there. “The dead outnumber the living in this town. They know where they are.”
“You see the dead?” I asked, swallowing nervously, wanting Charlie and Draven right now. They were the only ones I trusted to see lost souls.
She stepped out on the front porch as if she were sliding through people. “I do more than see.” A few steps later, she glanced to her side. “Keep her here. Don’t let her follow me.”
“Keep who here?” I asked, stepping forward, only to feel an icy wall blocking my way. Panic, anger, and frustration vibrated in my soul, causing thunder to rumble, the wind to pick up, and lightning to strike the street before her home.
“You.”
I struggled to move forward, but the icy wall pushed me back into the house. The door then slammed in front of me. I rushed to it and did everything in my power to open it. As I focused my energy on the door, prepared to break it down with a glance, it began to rattle violently as an icy chill claimed the air. My panicked breaths leaked fog from my lips. Thinking it was my fear that was causing it, I tried to find a calm feeling. When one came, the cold air remained. It was so chilling that all the mirrors and framed portraits on the wall began to ice over. My heart raced. I’d faced a ghost before: Donalt. This energy around me didn’t feel as angry or demonic, but it was still demanding, and it still made me question if I could overpower it. The last time I’d fought Donalt alone, I ended up in a coma, fighting my own subconscious. I didn’t have time to sleep now.
I cautiously stepped away from the door, finding warmth in the air behind me. I stepped further back until I reached the room she’d lit the candles in—her study. From the threshold, I watched as the rest of the house began to freeze over. I felt a tense energy daring me to move from the room I was in. Paralyzed by fear, I held in a breath and let one warm tear stream down my cheek. I was in a prison, one in which Landen had purposely placed me.
Chapter Two
I thought it was the wind at first, but I was starting to think it was whispers that I could hear in the hallway and throughout the rest of this house. Charlie. I needed Charlie. She could help me out of this prison, tell me what to say to these invisible images that were guarding me.
I paced the room, trying to remember everything she and Draven had told me about what they did, how they did it. I remembered her telling me to show them my love, the emotion they’d forgotten. I did my best to clear my mind and find that emotion, but even when I thought I had it, nothing brought down the door to my prison. I let out a frustrated grunt as I stamped my foot.
Then an idea struck me: Nana. I was in my home dimension, the one I found Charlie in. The one Draven’s grandmother was still in.
In a frantic rush, I walked over to the desk, picked up the phone, and pressed the ‘O’ for an operator. When the electronic voice said, “City and state, please,” I froze. I didn’t know. I knew what passage the house was behind. I even thought I heard them say ‘Salem’ before, but there was more than one Salem. When the recording repeated its request, I slammed the phone down.
Squeezing my eyes closed, I tried to remember everything I knew about them, anything that would help me find them now. As I fell into the seat behind me, the glow from the charging light on the laptop flickered to my side. I turned to the computer, finding it on and not secured with a password. It wasn’t long before I found my way online.
I Googled the lyrics to the song that led me to Charlie in the first place: ‘An angel fallen, a devil risen, our fate is calling, this world will not be our prison.’ The search engine produced thousands of results. Most of them led you to a place for a free download or other bands covering the song. I moved the cursor to YouTube. The first video that came up had over seven million hits. When it began to play, I heard the camera operator talking to someone with her over the roar of a crowd.
“God, Draven Michaels is going to be on stage any second! Is it wrong to hate Charlie?” the girl said with a playful laugh.
“So jea
lous,” another girl said.
The crowd began to cheer as a spotlight focused on Draven’s dad.
“Evan is on stage stand up so you can see it,” the camera girl said.
I watched as Evan, Draven’s dad, introduced his son’s band. I didn’t wait to watch them play. I clicked away and typed: ‘Evan Michaels Salem’ into the search engine. A few clicks later, I was sure I’d found a number that could be his. I wasn’t sure if it was an office or a home phone line, but it was worth a shot.
I glanced at the clock: it was 1 a.m. here. I didn’t want to wake anyone up, but as far as I was concerned, this was an emergency.
Three rings later, a man answered the phone. In the background, I heard people laughing and instruments that sounded like they were tuning up.
“Um...hi, Evan?”
“No, sweetie, this is Zack, his partner. Can I help you?” I heard him move into a quieter room. I was sure my trembling voice had made him wonder who I was.
“I...um...look, I need Nana.” Well, didn’t that sound ridiculous?
“Charlie?”
“No, I’m a friend of hers.”
“Is she okay?” he asked, trying to maintain a calm composure for my benefit.
“Yeah, safe. I need Nana, though. Do you have a number I can have to reach her?”
He hesitated. “I have Evan’s cell, but I doubt he’ll answer at this hour. I’m going to give you that, and the house number. If they don’t answer, you call me back, and I’ll drive over there for you.”
“Thank you,” I gasped.
“You’re okay? I don’t need to call the police or anything?”
“I’ll be fine when I talk to Nana.”
“All right,” he said, sighing just before he read the numbers off to me. “What was your name? So I can tell them you’re looking for them.”
“Willow.”
“Okay, Willow. You call me back if Evan doesn’t wake up when you call.”
“Thank you,” I said as I hung up the receiver, then dialed the numbers again as soon as I had a dial tone.
The first led to Evan’s voicemail. The second rang four times. On the fifth ring, a tender voice whispered, “Hello.”
“Nana?”
She hesitated, as if she were trying to place the voice. “Did something happen?” she asked in a fearful tone.
“They’re all fine, safe in Chara, but I’m not.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know. New Orleans. Listen,” I said as I swallowed and glanced at the ice-covered hallway outside the study. The whispers ceased as if they were listening to my conversation. “How do you see the dead? How can you make them listen to you?”
“What dead? Willow, what happened?”
“It’s a long story.”
“I’ve got nowhere to be.”
“I do. Landen is furious and he’s going to kill Silas and I’m trapped—a witch told the dead not to let me out of this house, and I have to get out. I have to stop him.” I cringed at the absurdity of my words.
“What did Silas do? Did he hurt someone?”
“No…I don’t think...my...my...my friends died, and he brought them back. I think he brought them back.”
“Are you trying to see your friends now?”
“No. I want these ghosts to let me out of here!” The frustration and anger in my voice caused thunder to rattle the entire house.
“How do they feel, Willow?” I could hear her rustling around and the muffled voice of a man I assumed was Evan.
“Cold.”
“A mean cold?”
I focused my eyes on the hallway. “A protective cold. They don’t want me out of this house. It’s not an evil feeling.”
“Put the phone on speaker, Willow.”
I fumbled with the buttons on the phone until I found a way to project her voice into the room.
“Now what?” I asked.
“I’m listening. While I listen, I want you to sit down and draw in slow, deep breaths. I want you to fall into yourself.”
“I don’t have time to meditate.”
“I agree. Find a wall to hide behind, find a mental totem. Allow yourself to look out at your surroundings without your emotions stabbing the atmosphere.”
“I tried the numb feeling. It didn’t work.”
“Willow, listen to me.” Her soft but firm voice caused me to freeze at attention. “Numb is not the answer. Your energy is powerful, and numb does nothing but bring that emotion to the atmosphere around you. I want you to feel your emotions. They are your power, but I want you to feel them on the inside.”
“I don’t get it,” I said through gritted teeth, balling my fists as the house rumbled again.
“Think about Charlie. Out of all of them, she is the only one that sees it all: the dark moments, the lost ones, the emotions—all of it. It was too much for her, too terrifying, so her father taught her to raise an imaginary glass wall in her mind. To listen to one song, to stand within herself and think clearly. He had to teach her that because the shadows reflect what the energy you put off feels. I need you to slip into yourself. Find a wall to hide behind.”
I leaned back in the chair and stared at the hallway. I wasn’t Charlie. I liked music, but I doubted it would calm me the way it calmed her. I couldn’t focus on sketching or painting because that would distract me to the point where I would have no idea where I was, or would it?
I took in a deep breath and in my mind began to sketch out what I wanted this room to look like. I wanted to take away the eerie darkness, the cold that was spilling into the room. I wanted Landen here, holding me gently in front of the fire he would build for us when he came back.
“Good job, Willow,” Nana said calmly. “Keep doing whatever you are doing.”
In the background of her home, I heard a phone ring, then Evan answer. “Yeah...yeah, she found me. I need a flight. No, not now five minutes ago.”
“Wait. What?” I said, losing my hold on the wall I was building in my mind. “You don’t need to come here. I just need to get out of this room. By the time you get here, we’ll be gone,” I argued.
“Willow,” Nana said calmly as I heard bags opening and her stuffing items in them. “Those beings with you are more corporeal than most of the shadows we help.”
“Corporeal?”
“More real. They’re ghosts, no doubt, but they are not ghosts that have forgotten that they are loved or are worthy. They remember all too clearly.” She paused as she listened to Evan in the background.
In the background, I heard Evan say, “The plane was already fueled and ready to take off in the morning, flight plan was approved wheels up in an hour.”
“You have a plane?” I muttered. I knew the house I found Draven in was nice, but I didn’t see a plane in the garage or anything.
“Evan’s company does,” she answered in a distracted manner. “They’re fine. I promise,” she said to Evan.
“Jacob is less than ten miles from her. Do I need to send him there?” Evan asked her.
“No.”
“Who is Jacob?” I asked. If he was a ghost whisperer, send him my way.
“Willow, wall,” she sighed. “A friend of Evan’s. He works in film. He’s in that city on a project.”
“Does he know anything about ghosts?”
“More than he wants to,” she said with a light echo of humor in her tone.
“I don’t understand. Why are you coming here? I’m the only one here. Landen is going to come back, and we’ll be gone. I’ll tell someone to take Charlie and the others to you so you can see they’re fine. I didn’t mean to cause this much trouble.”
“I know they’re fine,” Nana answered as I heard a car door slam. “Shh.”
Who was I to argue with her? I fell back into that wall she was making me create. I took it further. I imagined painting a girl in a field, a sphere of weather in her hand. I sketched her expressions to match what the sphere of weather would do. I created a world i
nside of myself. I wasn’t sure how long I could hold it, but I was going to use that time to figure out what Nana was not saying.
“Wall is up,” I said with a sigh. “Tell me why you’re flying here. What did you mean, ‘corporeal’?”
“There are many shades to spirits. Some are lost, only shells. Some linger for other reasons only they know. The ones with you know why they’re lingering.”
“What?” I whispered, knowing if that were true, these ghosts were like Donalt, focused on what they wanted. This is bad.
“You are in a very old city. Tragedy has claimed many lives for several reasons. The souls with you now are waiting for someone to open a door and set the ones they lost free. They will not move on until their family of souls is one again.”
“What door?”
“I don’t know. They are chanting Charlie and Draven’s name. Aden and Madison are lingered in their words as well, but the call to Charlie and you is the loudest.”
“They’re calling me?”
“My French is weak, if that is even what they are speaking, but they are telling you that their family is trapped, their energy. Someone pulled the souls of the ones they lost away.”
“The Realm?”
“I understand it to be.”
Her words ushered me into silence once again. I couldn’t keep still. My legs were dancing in place, waiting for her to speak again. The tension in the room was easing. It was as if the energy holding me in here was at peace because someone was listening to them.
“Okay, Willow. They keep saying something like rivers and dams. They are trying to tell me their energy, their families, is feeding something. They feel if you help them, it will stop something bigger, or at least begin to stop it.”
I fell back into my seat. I’d always thought Esterious was a feeding ground for evil. I hadn’t had time to contemplate if there were other avenues of the darkness I was fighting. Meeting Charlie, learning what The Realm was, had caused lingering thoughts to emerge in my mind.
Draven had no connection to Esterious, yet he found his way there. Escorts were also there, which led me to believe there may be truth to what these ghosts were saying to Nana. If I could dam the power going into that realm, into Esterious, would that weaken Donalt? All those who worship him?