Malachi deserves an explanation. I should take the blame and do what little I can to not come between their friendship. I dart past Kyran and into the bathroom instead, hating myself for being such a coward.
13: A Feather
(Echo)
Griffin pulls into a space at the hospital and turns off the car. I reach for the door, but his question stops me. “Do you normally talk in your sleep? You didn’t seem surprised when I mentioned it.”
“Yep, to ghosts,” I say and climb out of the car.
Griffin is next to me a few seconds later. “I’m guessing, like Timothy, you don’t remember the conversations when you wake up, right?”
I shake my head, only mildly curious about what I might have said. “Learn anything interesting?” He doesn’t answer, and I turn to look at him. His pensive expression slows my steps. “Griffin, what?”
He hesitates a moment longer before saying, “You said the name Francis.”
My sneakers squeak against the tile, thanks to my sudden stop. “Francis, as in the vengeful ghost trying to kill me, Francis?”
“I…don’t know. You were mumbling. I couldn’t tell if it was someone else warning you, or Francis trying to get inside your head.”
Great. Just great. The salt headband Kyran’s aunt made me has been awesome, especially when paired with the necklace and bracelets she gave me. My sleep is still filled with strange dreams and nightmares, but no ghosties trying to scramble my brains. How long before Francis finds a way around the protection of the salt? It isn’t foolproof. Nothing is.
I think about that night in the hotel, on the way to Georgia, when the guys stayed awake to record what I said to the ghosts. My little sisters had just clued me in that I talked to ghost during the night right before I moved out. I’d had no clue before that. Since then, I haven’t worried about the talking too much. I know I need to use it as a tool to discover more about Francis, but that means asking for help.
“Uh, this is going to sound weird, probably,” I begin, “but could you, um, stay over again…tonight? To listen to what I say? I’d ask…” My words fade out because I’m pretty sure I really don’t need to explain.
Griffin scoffs. “Yeah, asking either one of them will end up in a massive fight.” He shakes his head. “I told Kyran to be patient,” he mutters.
My stomach twists. “You saw that this morning?”
“Door was still half open,” he says. Sighing, he runs a hand through his hair. “Which will cause less trouble? Me staying with you, or you staying with me?”
“I…I don’t know.” Both are likely to go badly. “My place, maybe?” That seems less devious or whatever, right? It’s stupid, because Malachi is one hundred percent wrong about Griffin, but that doesn’t mean I want to intentionally piss him off.
Griffin gestures for me to start walking again and I follow his lead. We’re waiting for an elevator when he says, “You still need to settle things with him.”
Scowling, I don’t respond. I am perfectly aware of the gigantic mess I’ve made of my relationship with Malachi. Reminders are not appreciated. I’ll fix it, or whatever the next best thing is, once Francis and Timothy are dealt with. Griffin can keep his mouth shut about it until then.
Thankfully, he does. For now, anyway.
The guard outside Timothy’s room greets us with a nod. He doesn’t ask for IDs this time, and goes back to watching the hall once Griffin opens the door. As soon as it opens, Timothy’s head pops up and a smile spreads across his mouth. He’s alone in the room but doesn’t seem scared, thankfully. He’s too focused on me to worry about anything else.
“Echo!” he says. “You’re back!”
“Of course. Sorry I didn’t make it by yesterday.”
“That’s okay. It gave me more time to work on my homework for you.” He shoves a spiral notebook in my direction.
There’s a long, dark pencil mark across the page, trailing from the last word. We must have startled him coming in. He broke off mid-sentence, but the big clumsy letters cover almost the whole page. “Great job, Timothy. I’ll read everything you’ve written in a minute, but can I ask you a few questions first?”
“Okay,” he says. There’s a hint of wariness in his voice, but he moves over so I can sit on the bed with him.
I take my place next to him and pull his little body into my lap. “Do you remember when your dad gave you the light?”
Timothy nods slowly. “Kinda. It’s hard to remember.”
“I know it’s tough, but try really hard, okay?” I wait for Timothy to nod then ask my first question. “When he gave you the light, how did he do it?” Timothy’s face scrunches in confusion and I try to clarify. “Was the light just light, or was it attached to something, like something you could see or touch?”
He’s silent for several seconds, squinting his eyes as though trying to see something hazy. I hold my breath, pleading for something, some clue that will point us in the right direction. “He had it in his hands. Something that glowed,” he says.
“Could you see what it was?”
Timothy shakes his head. “The light was too bright to see very good.” His expression is apologetic, but then brightens. His fingers are still stiff from the attack, and make it difficult for him to grab the neck of his hospital gown. Eventually he hooks a finger and tugs at the front. Unfortunately, the ties on the back keep it from moving very far. Not sure what he’s after, but curious, I untie the back of the gown for him. He yanks it down immediately and points to his sternum.
I have to stifle a gasp at the sight of his entire chest covered with partially healed bruises. How the Devourers escaped the Hall of Judgement, or even how they were kept there in the first place, is still a mystery to me. Their capability of inflicting real damage on living beings is no question. I’m too distracted by Timothy’s injuries to realize he’s trying to show me something until he grabs my arm.
“He pressed it right here,” he says insistently.
Seeing his finger pressed against his sternum, my first thought is to stop him from hurting himself. All I see are bruises.
“Right here,” he says, tracing his finger in a wobbly circle at the center of his sternum.
I still don’t see it, but Griffin moves closer. Gently, he pushes Timothy’s hand away and studies the area he indicated. All I can do is watch him. Then, slowly, he lifts his finger and traces a faint shape, barely visible beneath the bruises, across the little guy’s chest. That’s when I finally see it.
“A feather,” I whisper.
Griffin shakes his head. “The Feather.” He sits back and stares at the boy. “The Feather of Truth. His father gave him the Feather of Truth. It’s trying to gather up all the worthy souls.”
Timothy is staring at his chest, turning his head back and forth to try to see the faint imprint. Even without the bruises, it would still be difficult to see. “A feather? You think so?” he asks. “Where’d you think it went when he stuck it on my chest and it disappeared?”
He glances back down and is quickly occupied with trying to see its exact edges while Griffin and I stare at each other. Neither of us has an answer to his question. Not really. My best guess is that the feather didn’t disappear. It’s still there, in or on his body. How? I haven’t got the foggiest. How does he get it off, out, whatever? I’m not sure, but I don’t think he can use the feather while it’s still on or inside him. How does he remedy that? No clue. I also don’t know what it means that the newest, least experienced member of Osiris’s court is in possession of the Feather of Truth.
What is happening to souls awaiting judgment? Is a never ending line forming outside the Hall of Truth? Is there some other way to judge souls? If there is an alternative way, what good does that do when worthy souls are only being released to their eternal deaths? There seems to be no way to get in contact with the other judges, from what Kyran explained to us before we left this morning. So in order to fill in our knowledge gaps, we have to train Timothy, save
the souls, and fix things.
“What does this mean?” I ask.
Griffin shrugs. “My Egyptian beliefs knowledge is a little rusty. I studied some ancient languages and cultures in college, but it’s been a while. What I do remember isn’t jiving with what’s happening. None of this is making sense.”
I’ve learned never to count anything out as far as what might or might not be real. Even so, it’s mindboggling to hear Griffin talk about all of this as though it’s real, and in a way that makes it clear he isn’t surprised by that revelation. The best response I have for him isn’t much. “Legends and myths rarely have the whole truth or get things perfectly accurate. Ghost lore is way off base on most things.”
Conceding with a nod, Griffin focuses his attention back on Timothy. “Did your dad ever show you a book, an old one, with a picture of an old fashioned boat in the front?”
Timothy’s eyes light up. “The Book of Souls? From his special family box in the basement?”
Griffin nods calmly. “Yes. Do you know how to read it?”
I think we both hold our breath. Morton is trying to track down someone within the FBI who can translate the book. It’s not a high priority field of study in the Bureau. The possibility that it might take too long, that help might not arrive before the Devourers win this battle, is so real I feel it breathing down my neck.
“No,” Timothy says slowly, “but Dad told me stories from the book.”
“What kind of stories?” I ask.
He shrugs and fidgets with the blanket. “My friends at school made fun of me when I told them my dad knew Osiris. Dalen said that was stupid, because Egypt wasn’t real, just like stuff in movies like Thor isn’t real. My dad said it was true, though, and I believed him…but all my friends said I was lying and made fun of me, so I asked my mom and she said they were just bedtime stories and I shouldn’t tell people about them.”
Still unable to look at us, he picks at the thin woven blanket beneath us. Sympathy makes me hug him a little tighter. “Well, next time you see Dalen you can tell him he’s absolutely wrong about Egypt. It is a real place, unlike Asgard. At least, I’m pretty sure Asgard isn’t real.” I shake my head, not exactly against the idea of Thor suddenly showing up in my life, but that’s hardly here nor there.
“The stories, though, those are harder to explain to people. When I told people I could see ghosts, everyone thought I was insane. Even my mom and dad. They still do sometimes. There’s a lot that exists in this world that most people can’t see, so they call it a story and pass it off as pretend. Only certain special people get to see the secret parts of the world. People like you and me.”
Timothy stares up at me in surprise. “You can see ghosts? Are they scary?”
“Sometimes,” I admit. “Mostly they’re nice and just want to ask for my help.”
“What kind of help?”
“Passing on messages to their families, saying sorry, things like that.”
He ponders that for a few minutes. I’m not sure what he thinks of my secret. I have one more for him that I’m sure will provoke a clear reaction.
“I can also see your monsters,” I tell him quietly.
His head snaps up, eyes wide with a mixture of fear and amazement. “You can? You really see them? You know they’re real? Can you fight them? Do you know how to make them leave me alone?”
One of his questions demands an answer more than the others. I hesitate giving it when my conversation with Griffin yesterday slips back into my mind. He argued that Malachi has no value as an asset to the FBI in relation to this case. I should have realized he was wrong after Kyran hinted that Timothy’s monsters might be the same as the Devourers, but I had a lot of other things on my mind at the moment and ever since.
Glancing over at Griffin, he meets my gaze and I know he’s realized the same thing and isn’t very happy about it. Even so, he nods after a moment. Turning back to Timothy, I offer a small smile. “I really can see them, so I do know they’re real, and yes…I know how to fight them.”
“How?” he demands. “Can you teach me? They’re getting closer and closer every night. They’ll find me soon. They’ll take the light and kill me!”
“It’s not something you or I can do, but my friend Malachi can fight them. He’ll help me protect you.”
Timothy frowns. “Really? Why would he want to protect me?”
“Malachi can see the monsters too,” I tell him. What I don’t say is that even if Malachi refuses—which I’m pretty sure he won’t—in the end, he won’t have a choice.
I hate the idea of commanding Malachi. Even though I know his purpose in life is to defend people like me from the Devourers, it still feels wrong to force him to take that kind of risk. He hates it, the feel or loss of control, or both. I don’t think it will come to that this time, even though Timothy isn’t his responsibility, but I know there will be a time when it will. I wish I could promise him I’ll never use my power over him, that protecting me or someone else will always be his choice, but I know it would be a lie.
“Echo,” Timothy says quietly, “my dad’s stories are real, aren’t they? It’s not the Dreamside I go to at night. It’s the place my dad told me about, where all the good people go after Osiris and the others judge them, right? And the monsters, they will kill me if they catch me and take the light—the souls—away. All the stories are true, even the scary parts.”
Unfortunately, the scary parts are usually the ones most likely to be true. I don’t tell him that, though. Instead, I say, “Yeah, I think so, some of them anyway. We just don’t know which parts of each story is true yet.”
Timothy frowns. “Should I write down the stories too?”
“As much as you can remember,” I say, giving him a gentle hug. “We’ll be doing homework, too. Next time I come to visit we’ll compare, okay?”
He nods and sinks against me in search of comfort. I know the feeling of having the rug pulled out from under your feet all too well. The day I realized my friends weren’t just imaginary and posed a serious threat, it left me more unsettled than simply needing a hug. I would love nothing more than to sit with this little guy for the afternoon, take his mind off the frightening realizations he’s facing, but I can’t. Time is too short and we both have tasks that are integral to keeping him alive. Such is the life of an anomaly.
“Timothy, can you take me to the Dreamside again?”
He glances up at me then drops his gaze quickly. “I was going to ask you if I could bring you in tonight. I’m scared to go there by myself anymore.”
Another part of his experience I understand all too well. Maybe the situation is different, but the reasons are the same. Even with my salt headband, I fear falling asleep pretty much every night. “You can pull me into the Dreamside whenever you need me, okay?”
Timothy throws his arms around my waist. “Thank you!” He squeezes so tight he actually surprises me with his strength. Suddenly, he lets go and looks up at me. “Can Malachi come too?” he asks, desperation and hope making his voice higher than usual.
Frowning, I’m not sure what to say. “Can you do that?”
The question gives Timothy a moment’s pause. “I’m not sure. Maybe if he’s with you. Holding your hand, maybe? I haven’t met him. Finding you and pulling you in was hard. I don’t think I can find him unless he’s with you real close. Is that okay? Can you try that?”
Glancing over at Griffin for help, I’m not terribly encouraged by his weary expression. This is not going to go well. The innocent request has disaster written all over it, but my mess of a personal life can’t be a barrier to protecting this little boy. “Sure,” I say with a sigh. “I’ll try.”
Griffin scrubs a hand over his face. I want to bury mine in a pillow. My attempt at smoothing things over with Malachi made everything ten times worse. I can only imagine what kind of trouble asking for his help to travel into another realm in order to protect a stranger will cause. Epic comes to mind.
14: Bound
(Echo)
“Well, this went to hell faster than I was expecting,” Morton says with a shake of his head after we tell him our plan. He tosses Timothy’s “homework” onto his kitchen table and exhales slowly.
“I don’t think it’s all that bad,” I mumble.
His eyes narrow and focus squarely on me. “It’s a powder keg.”
I want to tell him he’s being dramatic, but I keep my lips sealed. He can’t stop Timothy from pulling me into the Dreamside, but he can stop Malachi from being present. This is official, a work matter. He gets the final word and there’s not much I can do about that except plead my case. Or, Malachi’s.
“You can trust him. You don’t have to like him, but you can’t argue that he’ll do whatever it takes to protect me and Timothy while we’re there.”
“You, sure,” Morton grumbles, “but you’re not my main priority right now. Timothy is. There’s no guarantee he’ll protect him if he has the option to bail and save you instead.”
Tensing at the attack on my friend, I glare at my boss. “Malachi wouldn’t do that. You know damn good and well that he and I having sex wasn’t his fault. You can’t hold that against him forever.”
“It’s not just that,” he snaps. “It’s his behavior the last few months. He doesn’t know how to compartmentalize his emotions in order to get the job done. I can’t count on him to follow protocol, and that makes him a liability. Francis would have gotten to you in that alley if you hadn’t command Malachi again. Mistakes like that cost lives. Do you really want me to put Timothy’s life in Malachi’s hands when you know he’ll choose you over that boy? It’s not even a choice! He literally has to protect you first. Which means I can’t trust him.”
His words hit me harder than I expect. It’s not that I’m not fully aware of Malachi’s forced dedication to me. I guess I just never looked at it from Morton’s perspective. He’s right, in the most basic sense of things. No matter what’s screwed up between us on a personal level, Malachi’s loyalties lie with me. Not the FBI. Not Timothy. Not anything or anyone else. It’s kind of a shock, and leaves me with only one possible response.
The Ghost Host: Episode 2 (The Ghost Host Series) Page 12