“I don’t think it gets easier,” Chrysie said. She was serious in her tone and face, but she was still bounding along on the tips of her feet. She took my hand like I was a little girl. And even though it was weird to be holding hands—it was as if my sister had reached out through Chrysie and made me feel better. Though my sister Branka would have punched me before she’d have held my hand. And then, as if Bran knew I was thinking of her, she called, and I motioned to Chrysie and answered.
“Hey,” I said, moving a little way to the side so I could talk in private. I double tapped the volume on my phone and a prepared spell popped up making our conversation truly private. “Brawny.”
“Hey,” she replied. “How’s it going, princess?”
Now that we’d irritated each other with our nicknames, we shrugged off the irritation without saying anything about it. She had been mad I’d ignored her call. But I knew she was going to let it go. There was something about being sisters where the tone of voice told buckets more than the words we bothered to speak.
“Oh, you know…bodies. Dead people. Mother's cousin showing up. Staying with us for a few days. Same old. Same old.”
“Are you stupid?” Branka’s voice was filled with derision. “Why would you let Mother's cousin into your house?”
"She's Chrysie's mom."
“So? She’s an adult. She can get a hotel.”
“Did you give her a timeline?”
“No. Damn it.” I should have. I didn’t have to explain to Branka, she was silently telling me I was stupid. I was silently agreeing.
“Are you ok?”
“Yes,” I lied. And then I cocked my head and asked carefully, “What’s wrong with you?”
“Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies.” Bran was the sort of sister who got into trouble. A lot. When I’d lived at home, I drew most of my Mother’s fire. She had the majority of her hopes pinned on me since Bran…well it was like Mother didn’t expect much of Bran. But…now that I thought about it. That didn’t make sense. Branka was a really good witch. Maybe it was our temperaments. I was a Hermione-Velma type. At least insofar as it concerned my areas of interest. I was good at what I loved. I researched it and curled up with books about it and knew theories behind those spells—like with potions. Quiz me on talking to bunnies and I’d be as clueless as a regular human. Branka, though, she was pure adventure.
“Are you ok?” I was worried now. I knew she'd know it. And I knew she wouldn't tell me the truth.
“Sure,” she lied.
We paused. A silent conversation instead of verbal. Neither of us needed to say that we knew the other was lying. We’d long since stopped pointing each other’s lies out. Instead, we had these layered conversations and occasional shouting fights. And sometimes we were bluntly horribly honest. It was a sister thing.
“Look,” Bran said. “You’re going to be ok, Princess. You got this. Find the ghost. Slay it or whatever. And get back to your extra lab class or your potion club or whatever it is that you college types do.”
“How do you know about that?”
“It was a wild, I-know-my-sister-too-well, guess. Of course, you’re in the potion club.”
“I miss your bratty face,” I said. The sudden homesickness stabbing me right in my throat and leaving behind a knot.
“Shut up. Guess what? Saffron…”
Bran told me stories of home until the knot was gone and then ended the call before I could ask her what she was up to. There was this weight in my mind where she was, and I knew that big things were happening with her. But…I also knew that she needed to be left alone. So, I told her she was horrible and I’d punch her in the throat as soon as I got home and turned my phone off . I knew when I did that she was feeling better too.
As soon as I dropped the spell, Chrysie came over and asked, “Do you feel better now?”
“Sure,” I lied, thinking again of Jen’s body, her ghost, and the killer. “So let’s go sign this statement, see what we can find out, and maybe…I don’t know.”
“Are you planning on…doing what you did last time?”
I wanted to say no. I desperately wanted to say no. I wanted to shout my no to the horizon and print it on a t-shirt. But there was this place in my gut that held the memory Jen as she was alive. And Jen dead. And the forming Jen ghost. And despite my not-liking Jen, I just couldn’t—I didn’t know how to describe it. Was this my conscience? My Mother, and for that matter Branka, would tell me to do what was smart. Branka didn’t tell me not to do things. For her—it was as if she had to do them afterward. She didn’t do that to other people, she let them make their own, stupid, stupid, stupid way.
Instead, I asked, “Do you know if the police here will be able to handle a ghost?”
Such a weighty, nausea-inducing, stupid question.
“I—” Chrysie had long since finished her food and was still up on her toes. She was graceful beyond belief. The gawky version of her was long gone. I wondered if she would have become graceful like this on her own. Or was this the vampire magic? Maybe a combination? A speeding up of what she could have been with time? I needed to get some books on vampires. I was coming to suspect that this was a combination. Her innate joy and the grace of a vampire.
Then again…I did have a huge library. I could probably ask Martha to show me the books about vampires. Most of the time, I forgot all the benefits that came with Martha and spent my time worrying about my World Lit paper that was due and the fact that I wanted to replace the Portion Club President with myself. I was so much better at brewing. Did it matter that she was a senior and I a Freshman? I mean…I didn’t think so.
But first. Bodies. And statements. And thinking about my conscience and responsibilities.
Officer Drake showed me the statement he’d written up and I read it through and signed it. When I was done, I asked, “What do you do if it was a ghost that pushed Jen along?”
Saying her name made Jen more vibrant in my head. I felt almost as if her ghost were tickling my neck. Was that a thing? We were still studying basic necromancy in my 101 class. But I did kind of feel like the ghost of Jen was following me around. Maybe it was the memory of who she had been following me. Made of my imagination and confusion. And…guilt.
Officer Drake looked sad for a moment and then said, “Rue Hallow…you are nothing like your mother.”
His teddy bear eyes drilled into me. I knew that he was judging me against the woman he remembered. She'd have been about my age...she'd... Stop, I told myself. Stop. The truth was I took his statement as a compliment but that made me feel guilty. Maybe it was living where her parents had lived, but I realized something as I'd lain under the roof my family had built. She had lost them all.
And she'd made sure that I hadn't. I had Daddy, Bran, and my mother. My mother who was a snake, who drilled you in magic, who taught me the names of the stars and showed me how to brew potions with the grace and skill of a true master. But she'd been there. She'd had the chance to be the keeper. If she had taken that role, she'd have died.
Luck had kept me alive. What were the chances she'd have been as lucky? Zero. She'd left behind the "calling" of generations. She'd broken the chain of history. And she'd given me a family in doing so. But maybe not. She'd also given me skills in magic. Real and vibrant skills. I might not be a necromancer, but I was not helpless.
She'd done that. She was becoming something else in my head than only my mother, and I wasn't sure what to do with that change.
But Jen had a family too, didn't she? Parents who'd been told their daughter was dead while I'd slept, fought with the Hallow Family Council and had a cheeseburger with avocado with my cousin.
I didn't want to be my mother. But that didn't mean that I didn't respect that she'd been left in an impossible situation. And I'm not sure what I would have done differently. It made me feel both sad and happy and I wasn’t sure what to do with those feelings. I finally said, “Ok.”
I didn’t know what
else to say, and he smiled at me gently before he admitted, “We’re a police station. Not the Presidium. Jennifer Abuela clearly caused her death. There isn’t anything else we can do.”
Now that filled me with a furious rage against the universe. I started at him. He shuffled and then explained, “This is what keepers are for.”
Oh, Hecate. Was he joining in to the idea that it must be me who found the Talisman? But no. He had kind eyes. Big, dark brown. They reminded me of my Dad’s light blue eyes. Which was weird but so true. This cop was explaining life to me. And he was doing it as gently as my dad would have. It was probably the memory of my dad that made me ask the next question.
“Was she a witch?”
He shook his head.
So, even if someone found the ghost that had edged Jen farther down the suicide road than she’d have gone on her own…it wasn’t like the revelation could comfort her family. Hey, you don’t believe in ghosts or witches because who does? But it turns out your daughter died because she was manipulated emotionally, we found the ghost that did it and sent that ghost through the thinning between the afterlife and this life. Feel better! Hugs!
Right. That wasn’t going to work. It wasn’t going to happen and there would be no mercy for them in knowing that their child didn’t choose to leave them. So what to do? A feeling of responsibility was coming over me. I looked at Chrysie, who had died because there hadn’t been a proper Keeper of the St. Angelus Thinning.
I still didn't want to be the keeper. That job was bull crap and entirely separate from what I wanted out of my life. But maybe. Maybe, I could use the brains I had. And all of the arsenal of magical training that my Mother and my coven leader had given me. Maybe, this one time, I would figure out where this ghost was and this once I’d push it through the thinning before I got back to brewing and maybe learning to fly. Helping once didn’t mean I needed to start looking after the ghosts in the thinning, did it? Nah. It meant…it was like restitution for not being there to save Chrysie. Maybe if I’d been in the room when the spell had come at her? Or whatever happened. Chrysie still didn’t remember what happened.
Maybe if I hadn’t laid protection spells only around my bed. Maybe if I hadn’t taken the brighter side of the room. There was no evidence one way or the other now, but I couldn’t help but feel like there had been clues in the room as to what had happened. It so easily could have been me who died.
Or Branka if she came to St. Angelus. I wouldn’t want her to come here I realized. It was too dangerous.
Thinking of Bran poured the guilt on and I knew that though I didn’t want to be the Keeper of the Thinning and I very much hoped the Talisman would end up in someone else's dedicated hands. And either way, I needed to help this time.
I needed this feeling of responsibility and guilt to go away. And then I’d get back to brewing and maybe figure out how the witch Ingrid from the island made her high-heels so comfortable.
I didn’t say any of my thoughts. I said, “So someone other than the cops needs to find the ghost and send it through the thinning.”
Officer Drake and Chrysie heard my tone. And Drake said, “You are a kid. And not the Keeper of the Thinning. And there are far more capable necromancers than you. No matter who your family is.”
I agreed. Completely. But I also knew I wouldn’t be able to leave this one alone. Maybe the next. But not this one.
“Sure,” I lied. Neither of them were convinced, but I wasn’t that concerned about their knowing my thoughts. That girl could have been pushed along suicide road anywhere. But…it would have to be somewhere she had actually been. Probably often.
Oh. And it would have to be somewhere haunted. That had to narrow it down a lot.
Right?
CHAPTER 6
Somehow, when we left the police station the sun was bright, the air was crisp, the sky was blue, and it was perfect weather. Perfect. And so wrong. Before Jen died, I'd planned to spend my Sunday playing with potions and doing some reading for class.
"Wanna go see Jessie?" Chrysie asked as she spun in the sunlight. Her eyes were actually closed, and I imagined she could see the shadows of leaves play across her eyelids. I could not remember the last time I'd spun like that. I wasn't judging her,I was jealous of her carefree air.
I'd made this promise to myself in the police station, but the truth was I didn't have a clue how to go about figuring out who had done this crime, how they had done it, and why they had targeted Jen. I would guess I needed to talk to Jen’s friends and figure out where she spent most of her time, but all I knew was that she was in one of my classes, and I hadn't liked her.
Maybe if I were the keeper I'd know what to do. Oh Hecate, did I think that? I had thought it. No! I don’t want to be the keeper. I cared about this one case. I knew Jen. Finn and his little team of do-gooders could handle everything else.
I’d prefer if they handled this one, but let’s be real…he’d been as shocked as I was at Jen’s body. So…so….he didn’t have that much on me. And he’d acted like I was an idiot when I’d said I’d felt Jen’s ghost forming. But I had felt Jen. I didn't even know why that was important. I was entirely helpless.
But no, I knew the feel of magic. And I knew the feel of death from when I had felt Chrysie’s. Why hadn’t anyone been surprised then when I’d seen the ghost? Maybe that was why they had suspected me with such certainty. But this time…I was sure. I knew it in my center. Jen’s ghost had been forming. And she needed help to move on.
“Can I ask you a question?” Chrysie said. She was as pixie and spritely as she’d been when we’d first met. I hadn’t realized then we were family, and she’d sent me into near hysteria because her stuff had been on my side of the room. Maybe, possibly, I was a little OCD. Or controlling.
“Why did you say yes to my mom staying with us? I know you don't want her in the house."
She was so right. And yet. I was as surprised as she was by my answer, “It was the right thing to do.”
“But you say that you don’t have a moral compass. ”
“I understand debt though.”
Chrysie’s pixie face and bright eyes shone too bright in the sunlight. As they had since she’d died and became a vampire. She said that the sun didn’t bother her, but it made it harder for her to see as clearly. “I don’t know what you mean. If Portia asked to stay with us, you'd laugh in her face.”
“Yeah. Well. Your grandparents took my mother in.” I couldn’t help but think what it must have been like to be Mother. She lost both of her parents—who were probably as cold and snakelike as Mother, and yet—I was also sure that Mother loved me. My mother probably had the same conviction. She was a snake alone in the world and there was simply no question that Elspeth’s parents were not snakes.
It was as if ducks had welcomed a lonely baby snake into their nest. Hard to imagine. Sort of wonderful. And horrifying. It must have been so hard for them to have Mother there. With her calculating gaze and the unseen weight of her hidden grief.
“You don’t let your family stay in a hotel when you have a mansion. This is making us too serious. Let’s…you know…go find Jessie and learn about murdering ghosts instead.”
Chrysie laughed. She must not realize I was serious. I grinned at her back as she skipped ahead. And I followed her dance-walk to Jessie.
Jessie was maybe a friend. She had helped me keep Martha when the Hallow Council was using their power against me and trying to manipulate me. That was pretty friendly. More than that even. It was--fortuitous and kind. It was pure friendship, but somehow interactions were awkward. I blamed myself.
Mostly because it was my fault. I was jealous. She was smarter than me at magic, and I was competitive enough to hate her a little bit because of that. Stupid cow that I was. Added to the jealousy was that I didn't really know how to make friends. Felix had created our friendship. Being relatives had made the bond between Chrysie and me. But Jessie--she was soft and smart and had the book learning.
And I had holes in my knowledge and I was arrogant and prickly. But Jessie...she was more than that. She was the type of girl who noticed things...like passwords. And could use those passwords to get into systems that I didn't have access to.
“Hey,” I said as we walked up.
Jessie grinned and immediately handed Chrysie a packet of peanuts. Damn it, Jessie was so nice. It was irritating as hell.
“Thanks,” we both said. Chrysie could speak for herself. But it somehow meant a lot that Jessie kept snacks for Chrysie. It…well it seemed to add up to her being legitimate.
“I heard about you finding Jen,” Jessie said. “I’m so sorry, Rue. I can’t even imagine how you must feel…”
My head cocked as I looked at Jessie. She seemed sad. Too sad. And I said with sudden certainty, “You knew her.”
“Not well. Her sister works in the library too. So, you know? I didn’t know her, know her. But like…well enough to say ‘Hi’ to.”
“Who knew her, knew her?”
Jessie started to answer and then stopped to examine me.
Chrysie was the one who explained. “Rue feels like she needs to help. I think. I guess it’s pretty clear that a ghost drove Jen to kill herself.”
Jessie didn’t say anything but her gaze reminded me of what I’d said so many times. “I don’t want to be keeper.” I didn’t say it again. I waited and hoped the silence would demand that Jessie fill it.
“Jen spent a lot of time with the pseudo-kids.”
I blinked and looked at Chrysie who seemed as confused as I felt.
“They’re the ones who figure out about magic but…” Jessie shook her head and then shrugged. “They’re the kids who come to St. Angelus having no idea about magic, but they’re not stupid. So they figure things out. It’s worse somehow. Learning later, having your world shift. Lots of them want to learn to do magic. But they don’t want to ask. And St. Angelus…it doesn’t have classes for people who don’t already have a skill. You know? They figure things out and they’re left out in the cold.”
Hungry Graves: A Rue Hallow Mystery Page 5