“Yes, I am. And you’re Ivan?” He didn’t answer and before she could say more, he shifted past her and raced down the stairs.
She recalled their first encounter back in Cobbscott, and wondered again, is it really possible to know you hate someone, so instantaneously? And how did he get so lucky as to have his own room? While the rest of them shared.
She frowned, following him. Ivan hopped out the back door, yelling hello and goodbye before disappearing back inside the house and out the front door.
Irving Mochrie had returned home from the hospital early that morning and was sitting outside at the back of the house, near a lit fire pit, clearly impressed with this Ivan.
“Look at that, already off to work. Never an idle moment, that one.”
Off to the side, Jae was practicing some sort of balancing spell. He had many items stacked atop each other; his hand balancing the items without touching them. It was impressive.
Colin sensed Meghan’s arrival, but didn’t look as he was too enamored by watching Jae.
Irving Mochrie, still heavily bandaged, did acknowledge Meghan’s arrival.
“Good morning. It is nice to meet you, properly, although I wish it were under different circumstances.” His tone was kind, and yet held a hard edge.
“I can’t believe you’re home already, after what those Scratchers did to you,” said Meghan. “Oh, I’m sorry. It’s nice to meet you as well. It’s just surprising to see you looking so well after what happened to you.”
“Yes, that was some ugly business. But the wounds will heal. We all have a price to pay for this lifestyle we lead.” He tossed her a terse smile. “I’ve already spoken with your brother, but I must thank you personally for your assistance in saving my life. And I am deeply sorry about your uncle. He would have been proud of your bravery.”
“Thanks,” she said, growing agitated that so many believed their uncle to be dead. She jumped, startled by the sound of glass shattering. A dish Jae was balancing had fallen and broken against a rock. He started to lose control of the entire stack, but his father used magic to stop it before they all plummeted to the ground in a pile.
“Pay attention, Jae.” he scolded harshly. “You’ve got a month’s worth of work to catch up on.”
Jae looked worn out. Meghan wondered if he’d slept at all, and had a twinge of guilt for having such a restful night.
Irving shifted in his chair, wincing a bit. Sheila Mochrie joined them from inside.
“Ivan’s off,” she told Irving. “Says he won’t make it home for dinner, another long day ahead.”
“I’ve never seen a young man so dedicated to his work,” proclaimed Irving.
Jae lost his concentration and the stack of items smashed to the ground.
Irving glowered in Jae’s direction, huffing. “Keep trying. Always keep trying, Jae.”
“Yes, Dad.” He flicked his wrist and the broken items magically repaired themselves.
Irving went back to his conversation with Sheila.
Meghan grabbed a meat pie that Sheila had stacked in front of her, trying not to listen in, but could not help it.
“Not nice, Sis,” Colin chided into her mind.
“They’re not exactly keeping it down,” she shot back.
“We cannot judge the Banon,” Irving was insisting in a low voice. “Has she ever led us astray?”
“No, she hasn’t. I was wrong to even think it.” Sheila disappeared into the cottage, followed by Irving a moment later.
“What was that about?” wondered Colin.
“It’s okay to listen in on other’s conversations now is it?”
“I got curious.” He shrugged.
The twins twitched uncomfortably. Had Jae’s parents been speaking about them? Were they not as welcome in the Mochrie house as they’d been led to believe? Maybe they should take up Billie’s offer and move in with her. Meghan got up the courage to ask.
“Jae. It’s not a problem is it, us staying with your family?”
“Problem? No. People are just a little slow to warm up to strangers is all. It’ll take some time, but they’ll come around.”
He wasn’t as reassuring as the twins had hoped.
“I know your parents probably feel obligated to take us in, but we could always go to Billie’s, if you think it would be a better idea.” Meghan bit her lip nervously.
“No. No. You’re fine here. Really.”
“Okay.” Meghan still wasn’t sure, but she’d give it some time. “What’s there to do around here anyway?” She had an urge to keep busy.
“There’s Grimble, other than that, not much other than school. Or magic practice. I should warn you that tomorrow I’ll be back in school. I haven’t heard any word as to what they’re going to have the two of you doing.”
Meghan frowned. The way he said it was as if they needed to be kept busy. “Wait, there’s school in the summer here?”
“School is sort of always in session around here.”
“How awful,” she replied.
“She hates school, or learning, period,” Colin explained.
“Is Ivan still in school?” she asked.
“No, Ivan graduated when he was sixteen, already been working near a year. Youngest to graduate ever! Usually, we don’t get to graduate level until about age sixteen or seventeen.” Jae sounded like he was trying to be proud of Ivan, but it came across as more of a sore subject.
“How about today?” asked Colin. “Are you busy?”
“Maybe I can talk my dad into letting me take you into Grimble.” Jae ran into the house and came back out, smiling. “I can’t believe it. He said yes. Guess he figures getting you two acquainted with Grimble is as important as magic practice.”
They departed immediately. The twins felt a nagging desire to keep moving.
“What’s Grimble like?” asked Meghan.
Jae thought about it, unsure of how to explain.
She added, “Let me guess, another one of those ‘we have to see to understand’ things?”
“Sorry, kind of.”
As they walked, Meghan got curious. “Sorry, Jae, I don’t mean to pry, but why don’t you all stay here permanently? It’s safe here, right? You’re not that large of a group and there’s no Scratchers here, right?”
Jae laughed. “I forget how little you know about us. It’s true, the Scratchers didn’t follow us here, but we are only one of nine groups of traveling Svoda.”
“Nine?” repeated Colin. “When do you see the other groups?”
“We don’t. That’s why we are working so hard to get back home, for good. We all have friends and family in the other groups. It was done that way on purpose, so that if one group was wiped out, the whole family wouldn’t be lost.”
“That’s absolutely appalling,” breathed out Meghan.
“Yes, it is,” Jae agreed.
The twins now understood Billie’s actions the previous day, too. The woman in the photo; whoever she was, it had been thirteen years since Billie had seen her. The picture was getting clearer.
“No wonder they don’t trust anyone,” sent Meghan to Colin.
“The words, welcome to Hell come to mind!” he declared. She had never heard her brother use such a strong word, but agreed with his sentiment.
They stepped through the wooden door onto the steps of the wagon. Outside in Grimble, the sky was darker and the foggy air smelled stale. There were trees, but they were leafless and dead.
“Is there a way, Jae, to at least keep in contact with the other groups?” asked Colin, hesitantly.
“We do leave messages behind. Problem is, sometimes another Svoda group may not get them for months, or years.” Jae stopped at a small stone bridge. Two tall dead trees grew up out of the bridge, and the streambed below had long dried up. With the exception of a few Svoda Gypsies (who couldn’t take their eyes off the twins) the town was deserted. They crossed the bridge, and so far, Grimble did not prove impressive. The buildings were empty and ru
n down. Nothing looked open for business.
Then, as they stepped off the bridge, everything changed. The town was no longer dilapidated or deserted. It was bustling. With people whose bodies were caged in silvery essence. Some hovered just over the ground. Some walked on it, although never quite touching. Some floated hurriedly through the air. Businesses were open and busy, but there was nothing colorful or lifelike to the town. It was drab, almost foggy or hazy… the sky overhead dissolving upward into a gray abyss.
Without any warning, a floating body scurried right by Colin’s face. His jaw dropped, his mouth gaping.
“Is- Is that a ghost?” asked Meghan.
“That’s why it’s a little hard to explain,” said Jae with a laugh. “Grimble is a ghost town,” he explained. “And when I say ghost town, I don’t mean a deserted old town with abandoned buildings and the like.”
“No. Clearly…” said Meghan, stunned at the sight.
Colin forced his mouth closed.
Silvery essences floated into and out of walls, buildings, and even the ground. Some you could see straight through and some looked almost alive until you looked close enough to see the silver shimmer encasing their bodies.
“This isn’t like any other ghost town I’ve ever seen,” said Colin. “This is… really cool.”
“Oh, I think one of them touched me,” whined Meghan. Jae and Colin broke into amused laughter.
“It does take a bit of getting used to,” warned Jae. “But don’t worry, the worst it can do is leave you feeling the cold, creepiness of death.”
Colin continued laughing at Meghan until he felt the rush of something icy against his skin. A ghost floated up out of the ground on the exact spot Colin stood. It bellowed something about getting out of the way and flew off.
“Not so pleasant, is it?” chided Meghan, with a shudder.
Colin frowned.
Jae took off into the town. “C’mon. Something I wanna show you guys.” They jogged a few buildings down and stopped at the least colorful candy shop the twins had ever seen. Each item was black, gray, or some other version of that color. “Wait here,” said Jae, racing inside.
A group of ghost children had gathered outside of the shop, arguing. The twins wondered where all the ghosts came from. Jae exited the store handing the twins a black piece of soft candy. “Watch,” he said, nodding toward the arguing ghost children.
A few of the ghosts were daring another ghost to try a certain kind of candy, which he did not want to do. Eventually, he caved. He shoved it in his mouth and seconds later, he was no longer a ghost, but a living boy!
He ran crazily, not believing he was solid and alive again. Seeing the living Colin, Meghan, and Jae, he rushed over, rubbing his hands over their faces.
“I can feel things again.” As instantaneously as he had transformed into the living boy, he changed back into the ghostly boy. His smile faded and he went back into the candy store, exiting with a pocketful of the candy.
“Was that supposed to be funny?” asked Meghan, equally troubled and stunned by what she had witnessed.
“No, that wasn’t. He’s probably new here. The older ones are teasing him.”
“Older ones?” Meghan scrunched her face. “Just how long have they been here?”
“Hard to say. Weeks, months, years… many years.”
Meghan wanted to ask what kind of ghost town this was, and where all the ghosts came from, but Colin was eagerly holding the candy Jae had given him.
“So what are we holding?” he asked, looking over the candy.
His mouth spread into a wry grin. “Candy for the living.” He popped a piece into his mouth. The twins watched his body dissolve into a ghostly image of itself. His silvery body floated off the ground.
“It only lasts about thirty seconds,” he yelled down to the twins, floating higher and higher into the air. “But it’s like nothing else you’ve ever tried!” Meghan didn’t wait. She popped hers in and closed her eyes, hard, as if expecting something to explode. She transformed and floated past Jae, already on his way back down.
“This is so cool,” she shouted. “Colin, try it! It doesn’t hurt or anything.” Not wanting to be outdone by Meghan, he popped his in. Colin’s body tingled all over, kind of like a light zing all through him, and then just like that, his body was floating and encased by the silvery essence of a ghost. He passed his sister as she descended back to the ground. He drifted nervously to the rooftop. The movement didn’t feel natural at all and he grabbed the edge of the building. His eyes widened and he held in a startled breath.
A cloaked figure stood atop the roof. The figure held a leaf in its hand, speaking to it. A distressed female voice replied back, seemingly out of the leaf.
How? How were voices coming out of a leaf?
“We’re not ready yet. I hope it’s not too soon for them to be there.”
“I think we can use the situation to our advantage,” argued the cloaked figure; it was a man’s voice.
He was cut off by the female voice. “Behind you!” it warned.
The cloaked man turned, enraged dark eyes piercing at Colin.
He let go of the roof and started his descent. But halfway down, he began to change back into his human form and plunged toward the ground.
Meghan closed her eyes. Colin was about to fall, hard. He’d be injured for sure. Jae, thinking smartly, used magic to slow him. Colin landed on his feet with a soft thud. Meghan and Jae scurried to his side.
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
Colin rubbed his neck. “I think so.”
“That was too close,” said Jae, relieved. “If you’d gotten injured, mom’d never let us have ghost candy again. Dad already hates it.”
Colin had to tell them about the man on the roof. “Jae, is there a safe place to talk around here?” he blurted out.
“There’s a pub not many Svoda visit. Why?”
“Let’s just go there,” replied Colin.
Meghan and Jae eyed Colin questioningly, but didn’t ask more. As they entered the pub, the twins and Jae caught an adult aged ghost peeking around a corner of the building. Was he spying on them? The ghost, noticing he’d been caught, floated away.
“Huh, that’s odd.” Jae shrugged it off and scoped out a table near the back.
One lone member of the Svoda was working behind the counter, alongside a pretty ghost waitress. Jae bought three tonics and returned to the twins.
“They like it when we come here,” explained Jae. “They need living people to do work for them sometimes, for when other living people happen to travel through.”
“Other living people travel through the doorways, too?” questioned Meghan.
“On occasion,” he answered.
Meghan was about to ask where exactly all the ghosts came from when Colin interrupted.
“Is it for sure safe to talk in here?”
“What’s going on, Colin?” asked his sister. Colin waited for Jae to answer.
“As long as we’re quiet, yeah, it’s fine.”
“I saw something weird on the roof of the candy shop.”
“I knew something was up,” retorted Meghan. “Otherwise you’d have never stayed up there that long.”
Colin ignored her and continued. “There was a man in a cloak on the roof, talking into a leaf that he held in his hand.”
“What was he talking about?” asked Jae, unfazed by Colin’s news.
“All I heard was something about not being ready and hoping it’s not too soon for them to be there.”
“Them?” questioned Meghan.
“The only them being discussed at the moment is you two,” said Jae.
The twins grew distraught. Colin sent a thought to his sister.
“Are we safe here? Should we stay?”
“Where would we go?”
Jae interrupted their thoughts. “How strange, that he used a leaf. That’s definitely magical.”
“Plus, I think it was the leaf t
hat caught me looking.”
Jae spit out his tonic. “You were caught!”
“Yes, but only for a second because I started falling.”
“What should we do, Jae?” asked Meghan, panicking.
“I have no idea. But if it was you they were talking about, and then they caught you spying…”
“But why would they even be talking about us? I realize it’s big news and all, two strangers living with you guys, but it just doesn’t make any sense. It’s almost like they expected it to happen or something.”
“How would they?” Colin asked. “I mean, no one could have known that.”
Meghan shrugged.
Jae let out a hasty breath.
Another thought dawned on Colin.
“Um, Jae. I don’t understand how it all works, but is there any way we could use a leaf to try to reach our uncle? Or anyone from our world?”
Meghan perked up, but Jae promptly smothered the idea.
“We do use leaves to send messages, but only in the same world we are in. I’ve never heard of any way to gather enough magical energy to send one to another world, never mind figure out how it would get there. Or how the message would transmit. Sorry… I don’t know of any such way.”
The twins resigned to defeat.
“So who could the guy on the roof have been talking to?” wondered Meghan.
“It would have to be someone in Grimble,” Jae told them.
Colin let out a long sigh. “But how would anyone in your group have any idea we might come to live with you?”
“I really don’t know how to answer that. It makes no sense.”
The topic ended as from the corner of her eye, Meghan noticed that the spying ghost was back, hiding in a dark corner inside the pub. She used her head to subtly point it out to the others.
“Can things get any more bizarre? I’ve never known a ghost to spy before,” said Jae, who shook his head. “Excitement sure seems to follow you two.”
“For reasons unknown…” Meghan uttered softly.
The trio decided to test the ghost. They left the pub and trekked slowly, to see if it followed.
“Where do all these ghosts come from, Jae?” asked Colin as they walked.
Finally, thought Meghan.
“Best I understand it, Grimble is a waiting room of sorts. I guess this is where the dead come if they have unfinished business to attend to before they move on. Grimble is set aside though, for those with some tie to the magical world.”
The Book, The Witches, and the Doorway (Fated Chronicles Book 1) Page 22