Dead Witch Walking

by Nova Nelson

  I mustered the strength to slip my staurolite back on. “I just kicked him out.”

  “Kicked who out?”

  “The Fifth Wind. He had control of the body, but I got it back.”

  I was only slightly aware of Leonardo now hovering a few feet behind Donovan, gazing at me like I might be the actual one to fear in this whacked out scenario. “We have to get back to the inn,” I said.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” Donovan insisted. “I’ll send an owl to Stella and Kayleigh Lytefoot, and we’ll get you taken care of.”

  But as the flash from before, what I’d seen through the Fifth Wind’s eyes, resurfaced in my memory, I felt a small surge of energy fuel my muscles. Pure adrenaline, probably.

  I pushed myself to sitting. “No, listen. We have to get back. We have to get to the inn.”

  “The inn?” asked Donovan. “Why?”

  “Because he’s there,” I said. “The Fifth Wind is there.” I turned my attention to Leonardo. “And he was right outside your room.”

  Chapter Twenty

  As smart as it would have been for one of us to stay behind with the body to make sure it didn’t get back up and walk off again, no one volunteered for the job. I would have been the obvious candidate since I was useless with a wand, but considering this was a Fifth Wind right outside Serena’s door, I might actually prove useful in some other way back at the Ram’s Head.

  Donovan took one last look at his uncle, mumbled something about calling for Stu later, and that was good enough for us.

  I’ve never been especially athletic, and working out just isn’t done in Eastwind—with clean eating, no fast-food, walking everywhere, and (I assume) the miracle of magic, it’s just not necessary—so sprinting all the way from Fulcrum Park to the nearest edge of the Outskirts was not my favorite event of the evening.

  It definitely beat possessing a dead body, but that was about it.

  I felt the first inklings of a cramp in my calf right as the inn came into view, and I thanked the apathetic stars that I could slow down now.

  Or so I thought.

  Who knew how Leonardo had been spending his time in Avalon, but he didn’t seem at all winded, and he sprinted all the way to the front door. By the time I got inside, I could hear him not-so-stealthily hurdling the stairs.

  At least Donovan’s bartending hadn’t prepared him for this, either, and I was thankful for that. He stayed only a step ahead of me as we made our way up and then down the hallway to room four. Leonardo had left the door open behind him, and I cautiously stepped inside, expecting the worst—torn sheets, toppled furniture.

  But it was fine. The room looked perfectly put together. The bed was even made.

  And in Leonardo’s hands was a letter. He glared at it as if willing it into flames. His slender shoulders hunched, and he moved his lips silently as Pookie jumped off the bed and proceeded to do figure eights between his legs.

  I exchanged a glance with Donovan, and he seemed to be of the same mind: approach with caution.

  Slowly, as if in a trance, Leonardo lowered the paper and stared ahead at the bed. Then he looked back over his shoulder at us and said, “She’s gone.”

  I refrained from saying, “Duh,” but only because “gone” meant a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Some people used it to mean someone was dead, but I knew that dead didn’t always mean gone.

  Tanner is gone.

  I put it out of my head.

  “What do you mean?” said Donovan. “Someone took her?”

  “Not according to this.” He shook the letter.

  “What does it say?” I asked.

  He stared back down at it, as if there might be different words this time, and then he read. “Dear Leonardo. I’m sorry, but I can’t marry you. Even if you didn’t age, I would know the truth. I can’t live with that. I’m heading back to Avalon and I hope you don’t go looking for me. I need to start over. I’m sorry. Goodbye.”

  He looked up at us, a bitter potion of shame, anger, and loss swirling in his blue eyes.

  Donovan stomped forward. “Let me see that.” He yanked the letter from his brother’s hand. “You sure this is her handwriting?”

  Leonardo nodded.

  Donovan looked at me. “I don’t buy it. She was taken.”

  Those words did just enough to shake his brother from his cloudy stupor. “You don’t?”

  I considered it, and said, “Yeah, there’s no way she would leave you. I saw the way she looked at you. And it’s just too big of a coincidence that I saw a Fifth Wind outside her door just before she disappears. Unless she ordered a chaperone from another realm, this stinks of foul play.”

  Was I sure about that? Not really. But it did feel right. The pieces didn’t exactly fall into place in any scenario I could conjure, but they especially felt misshapen in the one where Serena suddenly decides to split.

  “She wants to make sure you don’t follow,” I said. “The letter was meant to break your heart, maybe enough that you sat around Eastwind moping for a day or two to give her enough time to get back home without intervention.”

  Donovan glared at me, “Are you trying to make him feel better, or…?”

  “Huh? Oh! No, sorry. I guess I should clarify. I don’t think she wrote this letter of her own free will. I think she was forced to write it.”

  “By the necromancer?” said Leonardo.

  “We prefer Fifth Wind, but yes. Probably.”

  “So what do we do?”

  I didn’t have an immediate answer for that. If Serena left with the Fifth Wind, she could be anywhere. Or she could be right under our noses.

  “What about the faun who works the front desk?” I said.

  Donovan shook his head. “It’s the middle of the night. He’s not here.”

  “No,” Leonardo said, perking up slightly and tapping his finger to his chin. “He’s here. I remember he said something about having a suite on the first floor that he stayed in.”

  “Maybe he heard something,” I suggested.

  “It’s worth a shot,” Leonardo said, already on the move, his familiar a step behind him, clearly unwilling to be left behind again.

  Donovan and I followed, and I said, “We should send an owl to Stu.”

  “Got it.”

  The sense of purpose caused him to pick up the pace as we approached the staircase, and before I could match it, I heard a voice behind me. “Nora?”

  Donovan disappeared down the staircase as I slowed and looked back.

  As tired as I was, I was unable to keep from rolling my eyes when I saw her. “You? Now?”

  It was the same demanding spirit, the one who had crashed my first date with Donovan and prompted us to head to Ezra’s Magical Outfitters.

  She folded her arms across her chest, and I tried to ignore how creepy it was to encounter a spirit in the long hall of an inn. It’d been years since I’d last seen The Shining, but if she suddenly had a twin appear at her side, this psychic would be out the door and down the street before you could say “red rum.”

  Yes, even though I saw ghosts on a daily basis and had become somewhat numb to the experience, I knew my limitations.

  “You still haven’t helped me,” she whined. “I’ve asked you twice now.”

  I glanced over my shoulder. I couldn’t even hear Donovan or Leonardo anymore. “Yeah, well. I’m still kind of busy.”

  “I just need a few minutes to talk.”

  “Like I said before, you can wait a few more hours. And I’m right in the middle of something urgent.” I didn’t miss the petulance that flashed across her face when I said that, but I also didn’t care that much about it. In the end, I had the winning hand—I could just banish her if she got too annoying. Most spirits knew what that meant without too much explanation.

  I put my back to her and went downstairs, taking my time so my weak legs wouldn’t give out under me. Maybe one of the Stringfellows had some good news.

  Both
were standing out in the cold night air next to the owl perch when I found them. I nodded at Donovan who gave the update.

  “I summoned an emergency owl and sent word to Manchester.”

  “And the innkeeper said he hadn’t heard anything.” His nostrils flared with suppressed rage. “He didn’t even hear us run inside.”

  “Makes sense,” I said. “These walls don’t let sound through.”

  Donovan caught my eye and shook his head gently to remind me not to elaborate on how I knew that. Right. Leonardo was already understandably frustrated. He probably wouldn’t appreciate it if he knew we’d booked a room next to his to try to spy on him… because we thought he could be a murderer.

  “I guess we just have to wait,” Leonardo said, and I got a glimpse of the softer emotions behind his aggressive wall. He was scared, hurt, vulnerable. All he had keeping him back from the painful belief that the woman he loved had left him was my and Donovan’s insistence that she hadn’t.

  “We can do more than wait,” I said. “There’s still snow on the ground. Maybe they left tracks.”

  While the main walkways were cleared, if they’d left the path we might be in luck.

  “Good thinking,” Donovan said. “Nora, you stay here in case Manchester shows up. Leonardo and I will take a look around.”

  I didn’t argue since I knew his logic was sound—I was garbage with a wand, so I should probably stay safe with my back to the inn, and if anything came at me from the front, I could easily retreat inside.

  Leonardo took off immediately, and Donovan only made it one step before he paused, turned back around, and planted a kiss on my lips. I melted into him for that brief moment, even as my heart raced. Despite the situation, I wanted the moment to stretch on. It was the kind of kiss that I knew I’d be thinking about for days, maybe even years to come. I grabbed the collar of his coat, hoping he’d take the hint and not pull away, that he’d say the thing that was on my mind: “Let’s go back inside.” We’d already paid for the room.

  But it was wishful thinking.

  He broke off the delicious kiss and stared down at me. Whatever he wanted to say was on the tip of his tongue, and my stomach clenched as I willed him to say it. Whatever it was. In that moment I would have gone along with it.

  But all he said was “Stay here.”

  Fangs and claws.

  I wasn’t kidding about going along with whatever he said, though, and I simply nodded as he turned and chased after his brother, the tip of his wand illuminating the ground ahead of him.

  My brain still buzzed like I’d just taken a potent shot of love potion when the ghost appeared again, just a few feet ahead of me, hovering like a buoy in calm seas. “There’s something upstairs I think you should see,” she said.

  “Can it wait? I need to stay here.”

  “Ugh! Why can’t you just do as you’re told?”

  “That’s what I’m doing right now. My boyfriend told me to stay here, and I’m doing it.”

  “No, not what he tells you, what I tell you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I don’t even know who you are.”

  “I’m a damsel in distress,” she snapped. “Can’t you see that?”

  “No.”

  “Just come upstairs for a minute. I have a feeling it will help you with your search.”

  “Why don’t you just tell me what’s up there?”

  She stomped her foot soundlessly, tendrils breaking off from her misty form and dispersing in the cold air. “Fine. If you won’t listen to me, then maybe you’ll listen to him.”

  She disappeared before I could ask who she was talking about.

  But I didn’t have to wonder, because the inn door creaked open, and before I could turn around, a strong hand covered my mouth to stifle my scream and tugged me inside.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The last thing I saw before my captor pulled me into his room was the number four on the door across the hall.

  Then the door shut in front of me, and my eyes scrambled to adjust to the darkness of the space. The hand slipped off from my mouth, but I already knew screaming would do no good. And besides, I was distracted with other things.

  He continued to drag me farther into the room, and I couldn’t get my bearings enough to fight back.

  Then I realized that this wasn’t the usual kind of darkness. No flame or glow from a wand could have penetrated it.

  I’d created this kind of darkness myself, so many months before. It wasn’t that there simply was no light. Someone was holding onto the light, holding it inside. And only a Fifth Wind could do that.

  Of course, I was already tied up in a chair before I put the pieces together.

  Dozens of candles in a circle around my chair ignited at once, and there he stood before me. The other Fifth Wind.

  And he looked nothing like I’d expected. For some reason, I’d thought he would be younger, but he was closer to Ruby’s age than mine. Although I supposed that made sense with how well he could harness his power. His hair was fully gray, but that was no surprise—dealing with the dead day-in and day-out did that to everyone. Though three raised scars marred his face from his right temple to the left corner of his lips, it was hard to miss that he would have been exceptionally attractive in his youth. In fact, had the situation been a more amicable one, I might have thought he was hot even with the scratches and the cruel effects of time.

  Next to him floated the snotty female ghost, looking terribly satisfied with herself. I wanted to tell her he’d captured me despite her lame attempts to lure me rather than because of them, but now wasn’t the time to be petty. Now was the time to get some answers and maybe, if I was exceptionally lucky, find a way to get out of here before he sent me into the afterlife for good.

  Long shadows from the candles stretched out toward the corner of the room where his mammoth of a hellhound sat, alert but stone still. She watched me intently, and I perversely wondered if I could ever train Grim to be so attentive when greasy meat wasn’t involved.

  The female spirit broke the silence. “I asked you nicely to help me.”

  “It wasn’t that nicely,” I replied, grunting against my painfully tight restraints.

  “Sure it was. But you refused. Too busy. Ha! I know what being blown off looks like. That’s why I decided to go to him.” She nodded at the sinister figure next to her. “He promised to help me as soon as I helped him.” And now she turned to the silent man. “A deal’s a deal. You got her all tied up. She’s not going anywhere. How about you fulfill your end of the—”

  But he had already shut his eyes and on a deep inhale and with a flick of his wrist, she was sucked into a pinprick hole in the fabric of reality and disappeared. There was hardly enough time for her to scream, then she was gone. Banished.

  Sweet baby jackalope. I blinked, looking at the space where she’d just floated so confidently a second before. He hadn’t even tried to help her, and it was clear he’d had no plans of doing so from the start.

  Idiot woman. I would have helped her if she’d just waited a little longer. And, you know, not schemed behind my back.

  The Fifth Wind laughed, a deep, smoky rumble from the chest. “You’re welcome to call for help.” His voice was hoarse, like someone had rubbed his vocal cords with sand paper for the last twenty years.

  “No point,” I said. “The stone walls are soundproof.”

  He narrowed his espresso eyes at me. “Yes, but knowledge doesn’t usually trump fear so easily. At least it didn’t for her.”

  He nodded to something behind me, and I struggled against my bonds to look, already fairly sure what I would see.

  Serena was slumped over in an armchair, her chin on her chest, her eyes closed. A few strands of her silky hair hung down in front of her face, reflecting the flickering candlelight.

  “Don’t worry,” said our captor. “She’s fine. Just under a Somnian Spell. I would never harm her.”

  He said “Somnian Spell” like I’d know wha
t he was talking about. Maybe I should have, but I sure as swirls didn’t.

  “You know her,” I said. Ugh. Of course he did. The clues came together so seamlessly now. Too late, of course.

  “We go way back.”

  “You’re the Fifth Wind she used to date.”

  He grinned. “Nice to know she still talks about me when I’m not around.”

  “Who are you?”

  He took a few steps back and sat on the end of the bed, still observing me like I was some especially exotic animal. “You already know who I am. At least you know the important bits. After all, you were inside me for a moment, weren’t you? What did you see?”

  “Nothing but the door to Serena’s room. What’s your name?”

  He cocked his head to the side, not answering immediately. “That hardly seems relevant.”

  “Maybe not to you, but it’ll be entirely relevant to me when I break out of here and curse your name.”

  He chuckled, and I could sense a shade of surprise in it. Good.

  I may not know much about him, but boy, was I good at pegging a man’s type. And from that single laugh, I had him.

  He was the same type as Count Malavic. Bored, over-confident, and starving for stimulation.

  “Call me Mannan.”

  Okay, definitely not his real name, but that was fine. I didn’t know how to curse someone based solely on their name anyway. I knew it was a thing, but it was far outside my current skillset.

  “And how long ago did Serena leave you, Mannan?”

  His upper lip twitched, and I saw the shadow of a snarl flash across his face. “You think you know something, but you don’t.”

  “I know she looks about thirty years younger than you. So my guess would be that, say, twenty years ago, she decided you were aging a little too quickly for her, could no longer ignore that she would vastly outlive you, and decided to move on.”

  “Not even close.”

  “You sure? All right then. In that case, she just decided she didn’t like you and left. Doesn’t have to be anything fancy. Just a good old-fashioned ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ and then a last kiss goodbye.”