Stacia Kane: Unholy Ghosts

She screamed. Her stomach twisted and lurched in her belly, her legs went weak. She just had to hold him until the amulet melted, just long enough…she drove power into the fire, heating it, forcing it to burn so bright she had to close her eyes.

He disappeared again, leaving her gripping nothing, with energy surging through her body like a speeding car.

The fire. She held her hands over it as close as she could bear, anticipating his next move.

She was wrong. A Lamaru leapt for it, his face twisted toward her so she could see the thief staring at her from his eyes. Possession; a clever move, but a bad one. He’d forgotten humans could be hurt, that they died.

Terrible’s knife flashed. Blood spattered over her hair and face. The witch fell, still scrabbling at his throat with clawed hands. The thief emerged from his body like the moon rising over the trees.

The witch’s blood hit her fire, building it with more of Ereshdiran’s own power. The thief wavered, trying to disappear. His ugly, bulging eyes shifted to the right, watching, as the ghosts advanced on him.

Another plane landed. Another, practically on top of one another, the precision in their movements as breathtaking as it was terrifying. Still the sky was full, still the amulet burned at her feet. It hissed and popped as the copper melted.

“I compel you!” Chess squeezed her finger, shook it and her arm. Blood flew from her wounds into the air, ran down her hand to the ground. She lifted it, pointed her dripping finger at Ereshdiran, and shoved as much energy as she could pull from the ground into her next words, so much her throat burned and her eyes watered. “I summoned you and you are compelled! By blood and power you will obey me! Ereshdiran tama longram !”

For one heart-stopping minute the ghosts didn’t move, and her stomach flew into her throat. If she’d been wrong about Ereshdiran’s origins, or if she’d brought them here but wasn’t able to control them, they were all dead. Had she used enough power?

Ghosts brushed past her, through her, stalking Ereshdiran. His mouth opened, a smudgy hole in his face as they crowded around him, closing in, closing ranks.

Terrible’s breath caught. Chess dragged her gaze away just long enough to see him, his head thrown back, for once ignoring everything around him. His fingers closed around hers. “Look,” he said quietly. “Look at them.”

The planes cut patterns through the air. They shot straight up into the sky then dove back down. And every minute it seemed more of them appeared, more and more, different planes, newer-looking ones, older ones.

Movements across the field. Bumps’ men, victorious, dragging bodies across the gritty landscape. Where was Bump? She hadn’t seen him since the ritual started. He’d probably gone back to his car, waited and watched, let the others do the work. What else could anyone expect?

Her legs weakened suddenly, like someone had smacked her in the backs of the knees. Before she could straighten she felt them, felt people waking in their beds all over the city with their hearts pounding, already forgetting the details of their nightmares but glad to be awake and alive.

The fire went out. Chess looked down and saw only a river of gleaming copper, already cooling into a twisted shape in the grass. She held her hand over it, opened up. Nothing. Clean. The copper was empty…and so was she. No more thief lurking inside. Nothing but her own self, and the overwhelming power of the earth and the ghosts. She closed her eyes, held on to it for a minute. Feeling good. Feeling alive, and actually glad to be so. Then, regretfully, letting it go. That power wasn’t hers. She released it, let it seep down through her body to ripple out from her feet.

A pale, shriveled hand thrust itself into the air between ghosts, Ereshdiran’s hand, closing into a desperate fist before shrinking back on itself and disappearing. Chess shivered, and suddenly she couldn’t stop shivering. Balancing on her own was impossible; she leaned against Terrible, clutching at his shirt, and realized he was shaking, too. The ground was shaking, rolling beneath their feet like it was trying to give birth.

Too late, she realized her mistake. She’d taken earth energy and combined it with her own, used it to call and power the ghosts; now she’d returned that ghost-tinged energy to the ground, and it was reacting to the unnatural mix. Violently.

As the world started to spin around her, as she half-ran, half let Terrible drag her toward the fence and the parking lot, she saw the planes were disappearing one by one from the sky, from the runways. It was like a meteor shower overhead, lights zooming through the darkness and popping off. She hadn’t Banished them, hadn’t had a chance…hadn’t needed to.

She stumbled. Her ankle screamed but she ignored it, her legs aching and her breath coming in gasps. Bump’s men caught up, passed them.

The dilapidated wooden building collapsed. Water surged from the well beside it, a geyser of sewage. Chess ran harder. They weren’t far now, the fence was just ahead—

Cracks formed in the mud, snaking in front of her, to the sides. Blackness oozed around the edges of her vision. She couldn’t keep up this pace. Rocks flew through the air, chunks of concrete, sharp bits of gravel that stung everywhere they hit.

The fence ripped, poles falling apart. The rusted links bounced and dissolved under her feet as they ran across it and got in the car. Terrible started the engine and threw it into reverse, slamming the gas, sending a shower of gravel out from under the big, broad tires. The last thing Chess saw as they drove away was an enormous slab of concrete from the runway, standing vertical, sinking like a wrecked ship back into the earth.

Terrible lit two cigarettes and handed her one, keeping his eyes on the road. She didn’t think she’d ever had one that tasted better.

It was over, the whole thing was over. No more Ereshdiran, no more Mortons, no more danger. She could go home, once she’d bought a new mattress. She could go back to working on her own job and not Bump’s.

“So,” she said, grabbing the baby wipes out of her bag and scrubbing her exposed skin with it. “So that was fun.”

“Ain’t a usual kind of night, leastaways.”

“What’s going to happen to them? The ones Bump caught, I mean.”

He glanced at her. Right. She probably didn’t want to know the answer to that one. She could probably guess anyway.

“I guess Bump’s not going to be able to use the airport after all, huh.”

“Look like not.” He shrugged. “Bump always got other plans. You ain’t need to worry. You did what he asked, aye?”

There was that damn twinge of guilt again. No, it hadn’t been her fault that the airport collapsed on itself. But she’d called the ghosts. She’d done it to save her life, to defeat Ereshdiran, but she’d called them, and she’d done it without caring what happened to the airport.

It wasn’t the thought of Bump making her feel guilty. He’d used her, jacked up her debt with some bullshit about interest and used it to force her into an investigation she didn’t want to be part of. Hell, if she hadn’t been out to Chester and found that amulet, chances were none of this would have happened. She could have asked the Elders for help to Banish the Dreamthief from the Mortons’ place. Brain would be alive. Randy might be alive.

Randy had slit his own throat, that was true. Getting involved with the Lamaru, calling or allowing them to call such an entity…She shook her head. Foolishness, but foolishness she could almost understand. That need to belong was so strong in people, it seemed. So strong she fought against it every day. So strong that even when she thought she’d beaten it for good it popped back up.