Ghostly Games Episode Two

Chapter 1

Lisbeth McQuarrie

I had one option. To save him. But beyond that, I needed to decide if I would reveal myself or not. Was Winchester Stone worth it? Should he get to know my secret? Was there even any point in questioning? No.

I thought all of this blindingly quickly as I dashed toward him, as my heart froze in my chest but my limbs paradoxically moved faster than they ever had before.

The half spirit stone wasn’t the only thing I’d kept in my pocket. Or rather, the only thing Winchester’s wardrobe had preserved when it had changed my garb. I also had my mist cloak. It was still folded neatly on the other side of the crystal. I ripped it out of my pocket now, using the last few moments of darkness in this room to cram it over my face. I was so very thankful for the fact it adhered to my skin on its own without even a charge of magic from me. For I would need every single blast to fight back these half-ghosts.

Lisbeth, Winchester cried, where the devil are you?

I burst out of the room toward him.

The mist cloak would only hide my face. Who knew if he would catch enough of a glimpse of my clothes to recognize me? For time was not on Winchester’s side.

I didn’t know if I had the ability to go up against the indenturing spell and actually knock him out, but I didn’t need to. That ghost struck him from behind in a deadly blow. Or if not deadly, then one there to render the enemy unconscious in the swiftest, most efficient move possible.

I heard the crack as the half-ghost’s green-magic-covered hand struck the back of Winchester’s skull. His limbs were thrust forward, and his head fell back, but his eyes somehow reached toward me, or at least their desperate gaze did. One finger twitched my way, and his bottom lip dropped open. But then his eyes slid into the back of his skull. I thankfully reached him in time, wrapping an arm around his middle and dancing wildly with him to the left before the half-ghosts could strike him again.

They hissed their calamitous warning at my intervention. If I had been a witch with a weaker stomach, perhaps I would’ve shaken. Instead, I let it bolster me. I kicked out with my left foot as I spun further to the side, found a thankfully safe patch of wall, and pressed Winchester’s comatose form up against it. His long body folded in half, and his face soon pressed against mine. I felt the steady, quiet caress of his breath, and I can’t tell you how much it gladdened my heart. Though I was aware he was still alive, it spoke to a basic, primal sense in me. For it is breath that is the final adjudicator of existence.

And it was breath I would breathe into my magic to end this before it could escalate. I might have saved Winchester. He might’ve been knocked out. But unless I could destroy those two half-ghosts and exorcise them, our secrets would be found out, nonetheless.

I’ve had quite enough of this, I snarled. I would not let Winchester go, but nor did I need to. I spun and pressed him against the wall with my back. His face, cold but still warm enough to constitute as being alive, pressed against the shoulder of my dress, rucking it up and dragging it down slightly. I shan’t tell you the kind of tingles it sent racing across my skin and over my back, but it was distracting indeed. Could it distract me from saving him? Did you even need to ask?

I still had access to my soul crystal. I drew it out and unashamedly called on its power. I didn’t need to use Wintersmith’s lessons. I drove my mind into the crystal, communing with it on a far deeper level than I had ever tried to commune with anything before. I accessed it with my soul, wrapping the strands of my existence around it. And the resultant wave of force it created was the greatest I had ever seen and certainly the greatest I’d ever produced.

The half-ghost in front of me could not lurch back in time. He received the brunt of the wave. It shot into his chest and threw his arms out wide. I hadn’t had the chance to describe these fiends to you yet. I’d been remarkably – and justifiably – distracted. Distraction was thrown by the wayside as that half-ghost displayed itself fully, only 20 centimeters from my nose. It had a wispy form, and yet it had features that were far more solid than ordinary ghosts’. They lent the mind to stagnation, a dangerous thing for any witch. Perhaps you found that a curious statement. Pause and listen.

Stagnation is one of the most dangerous concepts in natural magic. It fundamentally goes against what it is to be alive. Things must move, continue, live, die, be broken down, and begin the cycle again. True stagnation removes them from that cycle. And all of the energy that had been pumped into their existence then goes to waste. Something similar to that process was occurring inside the half-ghosts, and I imagined it was what kept them on the precipice of life and death.

I could have described what the creature was wearing: some form of thick, woolen black coat that trailed down around its ankles, hiding the majority of its wispy, gaunt form. There was no point. Nor did there need to be a reason to describe its face. All I cared about was the intersection of its ghostly ethereal energy with what was left of its body.

A witch like me was sworn never to kill. Especially a dead practitioner. All I would end up doing was creating more ghosts that would then turn around and haunt me immediately. It was anathema to the power – and trust – I had built.

But can you really kill something that has been artificially suspended on the cusp of life and death? Especially with the darkest magic of all.

If I had ever questioned the moral worth of my enemies, there was no point. The question died on the wind, was crushed into dust, and was thrown all around me like somebody’s last rites. The magic used to sustain these creatures was truly evil. It suggested a mind – or minds – that had lost the sanctity of life long ago. Existence had become a process of acquisition for them. They were like accountants rather than people. What they cared about was taking more and leaving their enemies with less. And that’s precisely what the dark magic did as it ran through this half-ghost’s body.

My attack might have knocked it into the air and spread its arms out wide, but I certainly hadn’t defeated it yet. With a cry, it regained its strength and fell down to one knee. The resultant crunch sounded like somebody slamming a heavy wooden bat onto an egg.

Its friend had never paused. It certainly had dodged back to remove itself from my attack, but now it saw an opportunity and swept in from the side. It made this clicking noise before it moved. It got its comrade’s attention, and it was clear they would now hunt me as a pack. It would be one thing if I could move. I could dart away, get some distance, and think of a plan to corral these two monsters and exorcise them in one go. But I was stuck with my body pressed against Winchester’s heavy form. If I so much as took half a step, he would crumple onto the floor, and these vicious brutes would kill him soon afterward. Or perhaps not – I quickly had to challenge that thought. If they were sent by his brother – and that seemed so very apparent considering how evil he was – then they would use Winchester.

Do you think I would let that happen? Maybe I ought. For never a greater brute than Winchester had ever been met. But this was my brute for now. And I never lost a mission.

I clapped my hands together, securing the soul crystal against my palm with my thumb. It was hardly ergonomic, and I felt a spasm twinge into my wrist, but it gave my body the force to connect to the soul crystal even more. It was my only weapon. If I used all of its power, I would be left with my own meager strength. But I remembered Wintersmith’s lesson. I could pull incredible force from a soul crystal if only I knew how to connect with it in the way it wished to be connected to.

Soul crystals were objects. They weren’t alive. Or at least perhaps that’s what a wizard would say. For it is so much easier to use an object without having to ask it how it wishes to be used. If something isn’t alive – if it’s yours to take, to destroy, to crush, then don’t pause. Do as you wish. If, on the other hand, you’re a witch, living in the middle of the natural cycle of everything, if you lose your respect for the living, you lose everything.

Now, one of the half-ghosts hissed.

It plowed into my side. I wrenched my hand back and shoved it. But the other ghost came from the other side. It accurately predicted that I needed to save Winchester – that he was an easy way to get to me. It ferreted its energy-covered hand behind me, grabbed his throat, and squeezed.

Never, I roared. I would never let them win.

And I would never give up until the very end. I lashed out, grabbed the ghost trying to strangle Winchester behind me, and threw it against the wall. But as I had already been at pains to explain, it was only half-ghost and half alive. Ghosts might shrink back at using human weaponry. This creature had no such compunction. It elbowed me, grasped a gleaming dagger from its belt, and went to press it against my throat. Press it, mind you – not run it down my jugular.

It’s very hard to conclude anything about your enemy in a breakneck fight like this, but my mind was used to working quickly, and it threw up the most pertinent fact. They didn’t want me dead. They had recognized I was a dead practitioner. While they were technically half alive, they did not have intelligences to speak of, and they were most definitely working for someone else. Which meant they had been given orders to search for me.

I thought all of this blindingly quickly. Then I shoved the creature off just as it attempted to rip Winchester’s poor throat from his poor neck.

The other ghost grabbed me, locking its fingers around my wrist. It pulled me to the side.

I screamed. I fought. I squeezed the soul crystal, and behind me, the very worst thing happened. And no, the ghosts did not get their hands on Winchester again. They did not rip out his throat. But he started to rouse. He muttered one thing into my neck. Grace. I did not think I had ever heard anyone – especially a man – say something with so much gentle energy. His words were like a caress. They were the vocal equivalent of the most tender of kisses, and I had to put up with such a thing sliding along my neck just as one of those