Grave Danger

by K. E. Rodgers

  It was the kind of talk only lunatics made and she wasn’t buying into it. “You only think that because the demon is tricking you. It wants you to take lives so it can use you as his host. You’re the one who has been committing these terrible murders, aren’t you?”

  That grin remained on his young and still handsome face. “You’re a clever little ghost aren’t you?” he said in a patronizing tone. “Yes, and it was so easy, even easier to place the blame on those flesh-eaters across the bridge.”

  “Why,” was all she could get out her mouth, watching Leah struggle against her invisible restraints.

  “Why?” he shouted and it reverberated around the room. “Because those bastards wouldn’t let me join them, they refused to make me a member, so they had to go. If I couldn’t be an S.S. then at least I could take everything they held precious. No one would come to St. Augustine with monsters roaming would they? Their pretty built up world would crumble then. Wouldn’t it?”

  Clarissa felt the dagger warm even more against her body. It wanted a life, it wanted Jackson’s. She stepped closer so that only Leah and the enormous chair were between them. “I can’t let you harm any more people,” she said sadly. She reached for Leah, slipping through the restraints and cutting them away with her gifts.

  Leah crumbled into her arms and held on to Clarissa with every last bit of strength left inside her body. Clarissa held her, trying to sooth her friend with words of comfort. Then Leah’s body stiffened just before Jackson made an unholy shriek.

  Clarissa was forced to throw Leah away from her where she slid across the floor with the momentum and another thought of push from Clarissa. Jackson lunged at Clarissa with a force that knocked them both onto the ground with Jackson on top.

  She tried to slip out of his grasp, but he held her pinned with a force she could not shift through. His face loomed over hers, only inches away. Her chest rose and fell with her breathing and Jackson was momentarily distracted by the sight of it. Then his focus shifted back up to her face.

  “I always thought you were rather pretty for a ghost,” he said, rubbing his cool finger over her bottom lip. “You and I could have been so good together, but you never noticed me like that. You’d rather have a soulless beast than me.” He leaned down and crushed her astonished lips with a kiss meant to hurt.

  Clarissa felt it happen, a pulling motion that started out on her lips and continued straight to the core of her soul. Her body stiffened as she realized that Jackson was tugging on her soul, trying to take it from her like the day she had given him the lesson. But he meant to take her soul completely from her body, leaving her nothing but a vapor of energy that would slowly disperse into the atmosphere.

  It was a reaction born of desperation and need to survive. The dagger at her stomach found its way to her hand as if it could read her thoughts. Clarissa broke the contact of their joined lips emitting a scream that echoed not just in the room but far into the city. Those with a keen ear for the supernatural could hear its wave of energy for miles.

  Jackson pulled back at the noise, his chest hovering above her and she made her move. The dagger fueled by the momentum of her arm and the daggers own thirst for death found contact in Jackson’s chest in a dead center mark over his wildly beating heart.

  They stared into each other’s eyes then down at his chest where the dagger was logged. He pulled it out, a smile covering his mouth as his life blood seeped out running over Clarissa and onto the floor where it pooled and congealed.

  Maude and the other sisters stormed into the room, drawing up short when they saw the scene in front of them. Clarissa dropped the dagger, taking hold of Jackson’s face as he continued to smile. Then his expression turned to a look of pure horror as his eyes cleared from the fog and he looked once more down at his blood stained chest. He fell away from her to land on his back, his hand over his heart.

  Clarissa moved with him, leaned over his body, the shinning tears from her eyes streaming down to fall in glowing puddles across his bloodied chest mingling with the blood in beautiful macabre swirls. “I don’t want to die, Clarissa,” he whispered those words before his face went blank and his breath fell short and stopped.

  “No,” Clarissa whispered angrily.

  “I always said you where a bit of a drama queen,” Olivier Prince’s smooth voice said from the other side of the room. He was holding Debora in his arms, looking between her and Clarissa. “You’ve rounded up the cattle quite nicely I see. I have to give you credit, Clarissa, you are good at your craft.”

  “What are you doing here, Olivier?” She turned to touch Jackson’s lifeless face once more before she stood up to face her ex-fiancé.

  “What are you doing here,” he mimed back at her. “I guess that means you haven’t really grasped the full spectrum of tonight’s events.” He shook his head at her ignorance as he came closer to her, Debora in his arms. “That poor stupid boy,” he said as he looked down at Jackson’s still form on the floor. “I think now would be a good time to make your grand entrance Francisco.”

  Clarissa stepped back as a bright light seeped out from the hole in Jackson’s chest cavity. It moved over his form for a moment only to move away and become solid revealing the figure of Francisco Fatio, one of the Eidolon Council members. He eyed Clarissa up and down.

  “You never did notice me, Clarissa.” His face made an angry frown as he approached her. “Your eyes looked right through me every time even when I smiled at you or tried to get you to notice me. I was invisible.”

  “So you used Jackson’s body to commit murder against the people who work for you?” This made no sense at all.

  “His life essence was strong,” he commented, licking his lips. “It was easy to take over him and he never remembered the crimes he committed when I was using him. Those poor fools trusted him so easily, never suspecting that I was underneath.”

  Olivier pushed Debora away from him and into Clarissa’s waiting arms. She held the other woman to her as they both watched him stroll over to where Francisco stood now eyeing Leah who had regained herself and was pressed against the wall hoping no one would remember she was there.

  Olivier held him back with one outstretched hand when Francisco would have lunged after Leah. He held the ghost in a stunned suspension. As the women watched they could see most of Jackson’s life’s essence seep out of the ghost’s pores, a life unto itself, and reach for Olivier. The death bokor smiled as he too tasted the life essence of the psychic young man.

  It occurred to Clarissa then as it should have much earlier. The reason Olivier was so strong in his abilities was because he was stealing them from other psychic beings. And that was why he killed her, not because he was angry but because he wanted her gift. But he hadn’t gotten it. She had been too strong, even for him.

  The ghost and he were in it together this entire time. Olivier had planted the dagger he’d used against her in Maddy’s home knowing that it would draw itself to her. He’d been hoping that she’d use it against Corrigan and his family and when she hadn’t he finally agreed to come to the city to force her to remember her past with him. Thinking to force her back to his side and using Jackson as bait to do it. He’d used a boy to make a point, that she was destined to kill. But she had changed since he had known her and she’d never trust the words of this man again.

  “I see the gears working in your ghostly brain, my dear,” Olivier said as he let the ghost out from his suspension.

  Francisco glared angrily at the death bokor. “You always take more than your share,” he complained.

  “Don’t be such a baby. Friends share.” Though Clarissa knew that Francisco was no friend of Olivier, he had no friends, just people he manipulated into working with him. “You can have the witch.”

  At that, Francisco’s face turned to instant joy. He turned to see Leah steadily making progress away from them. She turned fearful eyes when she realized they were talking about her.

  She screamed as the ghost lunged a
t her from across the room. Clarissa only had a moment to think before she rushed them, knocking Francisco away from Leah. She pushed the other ghost with power he could not compete with, forcing him up against the wall, his feet dangling above the ground.

  “What are you going to do?” he teased her. “You’d never kill one of your own kind, you know they’d force you out of the community. I am a respected councilman and you are nothing but a troublesome girl.”

  Clarissa squeezed the mental hold she had over his throat watching his face bulge and the ectoplasm in his system to color his cheeks. He made a struggling movement, kicking his feet in the air. She closed her eyes as she concentrated, letting everything else fall away as she thought committing the worst crime of her existence.

  “No,” he blurted out of tight lips, but it was too late.

  Clarissa held firm, knowing he’d never be able to fight her. Francisco struggled against the hold, his pupils dilated and his hands clutching at something near his heart. A hole emerged from the energy waves that covered his skin revealing the interior of his body, a light not unlike the tears that had spilled from Clarissa’s cheeks, falling out into rivers to spill on the floor beneath him. His ectoplasm held some of the essence of life keeping him intact and his was spilling out quickly like blood in a human.

  Something emerged from the gaping hole in his chest cavity, an almost smoky substance that quivered in its loose form. It was being pulled like a steer on a lasso closer to Clarissa. She held open her hand letting it settle into her palm. It was cold, like holding a ball of ice, but glowed like the lights of the heavenly hosts from above.

  Francisco watched as his soul was held in Clarissa’s hand, the thread that connected him to it was tight and starting to break one delicate thread at a time.

  Olivier came to stand just behind Clarissa. She could feel his presence now, but she kept her eyes closed. She couldn’t look at Francisco without losing her hold.

  “You are a truly talented woman, Clarissa.” He brushed her gently waving hair from her shoulder, placing a kiss on the side of her neck. In the past that intimate kiss would have made her feel special, now it only made her feel sick. “Forget my past mistakes and join me. Francisco was too reckless in his greed. I wouldn’t have let him kill your witch friend. I only wanted to show you the full magnitude of your gifts.” His hand reached out to touch the soul within her grasp, squeezing it, causing Francisco to cry out in anguish. “End his existence, take his soul and join me,” he said, his hand going under hers to hold her hand in his own, connecting their powers.

  Clarissa felt his strength flow through her and it made both of their skins glow in an otherworldly light. It was like two lightning bolts had found one another, crackling with their combined intensity. Once it had been everything to her to have him by her side holding her hand as she administered extermination on the abominations of nature.

  “No,” she whispered. “I am not God to play with the souls of men.” She released the soul letting it go back to its host body.

  Clarissa opened her eyes to see the soul of Francisco hover in front of his body. When it should have returned to him, it was snatched up by the force of something stronger than anyone in this room. His hand held the quivering soul of a man who had damned his soul for all eternity.

  “Death,” Maude whispered as she stood by her sisters.

  He inclined his head to the collective women, eyeing them each before focusing his attention on Clarissa. “You have chosen wisely this time, Clarissa.”

  Death held tightly to Francisco’s soul as the room was filled with the man’s horrendous screams. Clarissa and the others were forced to cover their ears from the intensity of his voice. The damned cried endlessly and forever and there was no absolution from their crime.

  A blast rent through the atmosphere around the collective people, hitting Clarissa full force as she was the closest to the scene. It knocked her to the ground, her eyes shut tightly against the blinding light. Her own scream escaped her mouth, but it was covered up by a deafness that stole her away into an empty nothingness.

  Chapter 27-

  A warm hand touched the cool surface of her face. She moaned drawing closer to its heat. Clarissa’s eyelashes fluttered open to the sight of a fallen angel, his iridescent blue eyes filled with concern and beneath that a love she was beginning to think could be everlasting.

  “I didn’t know that ghosts could pass out,” Corrigan said, his voice rough with raw emotion. “You scared me for a moment. I thought I lost you.”

  Clarissa smiled up at the person she would miss most in this world if she was forced forward onto the next plane of existence. Then a line from one of her collections of beloved movies popped into her head. Reciting a line from Tom Cruises character in Far and Away and with her most convincing Irish accent she said, “For a moment there, you did.”

  “Clarissa,” a woman’s anxious voice said before Eleanor’s frowning face came into view. “Are you all right? You’re not crossing over are you?” She touched Clarissa’s cheek, before turning to Corrigan as she pushed him away from them. He moved back with a curse that Clarissa didn’t think to translate. Eleanor didn’t care. “Oh, we were so worried about you. I heard your scream. Actually everyone within a fifty mile radius heard it.” Eleanor ran her hands over Clarissa as if she was a doctor and not a ghost.

  “Stop fussing over her, Elle,” Richard said as his face came into view on the other side of Eleanor. “She’s a tough cookie, aren’t you, death bokor.” He winked at her and Clarissa cringed before looking at Eleanor.

  “I thought we were friends and you would keep something like that from me?” Eleanor made a pouting motion with her lips like an insulted child. “Not to mention him,” she threw her hand to where Corrigan was standing with his brothers. “You’re dating a flesh-eater.” She said it in a tone that Clarissa couldn’t help but take as funny.

  “That’s not funny,” she said.

  “Leave her alone, Eleanor,” Henry’s voice could be heard just behind her. He moved Eleanor gently out of the way so he could lean over seeing for himself that Clarissa was all right. “You okay, Clarissa?” He smiled down at her, a dimple showing in his scruffy cheek. “I told you, you were something special and I’m never wrong about these things.”

  “You just want credit for unmasking me,” she said. “Can you help me up now?”

  Henry and Richard got on both sides of her, helping her to regain her feet. She wobbled for a moment. The blast had made her shaky. As soon as she was on her feet Corrigan was by her side pulling her away from the two ghost men. He pulled her to stand with his sisters and brothers who had joined him.

  The flesh-eaters and Clarissa stood on one side of the room while the ghosts stood on the other, both sides watching the other with suspicion. There were several ghosts she recognized standing there besides Henry, Eleanor and Richard, including the remaining council members and some of the S.S.

  Cyrus walked out from behind the crowd of ghosts to stand at the front of the divide. He inclined his head toward Clarissa before his gaze settled on Ambrose. Ambrose walked forward from his position behind Chas to meet Cyrus on his side of the dividing line.

  “I told you Francisco was not what he appeared.” Ambrose spoke to the slightly taller but younger man; in deathly years. “It was his doing along with the death bokor that murdered your human servants. You wouldn’t believe that one of your own could do something so heinous, even when members of your own council spoke out against you.” His eyes went to Hanna who nodded her head in agreement. She had known there was something odd about Francisco; that he was growing too strong when if anything he should have grown weaker.

  “Where is this death bokor?” Cyrus looked through the mass of people on both sides. He did not remember seeing the death bokor, Olivier, when he and the others had reacted to Clarissa’s scream of anguish. Instantly, he had known what that sound had meant.

  “He escaped,” Leah said from the Eidolon si
de of the room. Her arms where around her grandmother's body in a deep hug, afraid that if she let go they would be separated. “When the blast came I saw him fall but he recovered quickly and was out of the room, using some kind of illusion to hide him from the others who were coming.”

  Leah looked once toward Jackson’s still body that had been moved to a dark corner of the room before she hid her face in grandmother’s soft shoulder. Clarissa’s own gaze went to the still form in the corner. There she saw Maddy bent over her grandson, tears streaming endlessly from her eyes, her face looking older than she was. Her mouth made movements, prayers to guide her grandson’s soul to a better place. He was too young to die, but Clarissa knew that Death did not discriminate.

  “We reinstate our contract with the LeMoyne family,” Cyrus said in his most authoritative voice.

  Ambrose inclined his head saying nothing more. He stepped back, returning to his wife’s side. She clutched his hand inside her smaller one. He brought her hand to his mouth where he placed a gently kiss on the side of her knuckles.

  “I gave the dagger back to her,” she said.

  “I know,” he answered back.

  Cyrus’s attention was back on Clarissa. Once again his gaze raked her body from head to toe. By now she was used to his intense stares. “So do you now choose to be with the LeMoyne family and cease your association with the Eidolon community? You have already made your feelings clear about me and under the circumstances I can understand your bitterness to the council. There is no obligation that states you must leave the city, only that you would not be a citizen of the Eidolon people. You of course would still be under the protection of us as you still remain a citizen of St. Augustine like any other human.”

  “I don’t see why I have to choose between being a member of your community and being with the LeMoyne’s. Aren’t we all under one community despite our differences; we are a community of the dead.”