I shake my head and continue walking, and when he jogs up beside me, I say, “No.” Just that one word.No.A horrible word, in its way, and it doesn’t matter how many necromancers tell me thisis the right thing to do, theonlything to do, I will never lose that initial surge of guilt. And I’m not sure I should.
“Just listen,” he says. “Please.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry.”
Iamsorry. So sorry. I’m the girl who wrote stories about heroes. I’m still the girl who scribbles those stories when she has a spare moment. My heroes are no longer anonymous creations. They’re inspired by people I know. At first, by people who made sacrifices to help us. Lately, by two of our friends, Maya and Daniel, who juggle postgrad studies with helping supernaturals.
Maya and Daniel help others, and I don’t, and it’s killing me a little more each day. I create characters by putting myself in the shoes of others. I can imagine only too well what it’s like for ghosts. They wander the world, trapped between dimensions, needing something done before they can cross over. Yet they cannot interact with our world. Cannot speak to anyone... until one day, they see a necromancer.
They recognize the faint glow that marks us like an old-fashioned pay phone sign. The shining light in the darkness. At last, here is a way to communicate with the outside world. A way to accomplish what they must accomplish to cross over. They pick up the receiver... and there is nothing. The line is severed. The necromancer walks on, heart hardened to their pleas.
“Just two minutes,” the guy says. “Two minutes of your time, miss.”
Keep walking.
Keep walking.
For ghosts, we’re that one pay phone in the desert. For necromancers, though, ghosts are toll booths that spring up in our path everywhere we go, and to pass, we must agree to pay the toll without knowing what it is.
Please tell my wife I love her.
Sure, I can do that. Just pop an anonymous letter in the mail.
Please find my grandfather’s watch and give it to my son.
I have classes. I can’t hop on a plane and fly to your house.
Please find my killer and bring him to justice.
Do you see me? I’m a twenty-one-year-old student. Not a cop.
Please tell my wife she’s a no-good cheating whore, so I can rest in peace.
Wait. What? No. Hell, no. Now leave mealone.
My faith in humanity has been tested by the sheer number of the last kind. Ghosts trapped in this realm by bitterness and a need for revenge. I’ve taken to humming “Let It Go” as my answer, which works much better on modern ghosts.
Then there are the ghosts who treat necromancers like an Internet connection. They want us to pop off an e-mail. Or check the stock market. Hey, you there, necromancer, can you tell me how the Cubs are doing this season? Can you tell me how my favorite TV show ended? Simple requests, easily completed, but once you start doing them, you never stop, and pretty soon, you have a dozen ghosts wanting weekly coffee dates, during which they watch you creep on their family and friends’ social media accounts.
Just say no. The mantra of necromancers everywhere.
So I say it to this guy. And I keep walking until he leaps into my path with “It’s a matter of life and death.”
“It usually is,” I murmur... and walk through him.
He swings around to get in front of me again. “No, seriously. It’s my little sister. She’s—”
“No,” a deep voice rumbles behind me.
I glance over to see a guy stalking our way. Now, I’ll be blunt—if I didn’t know Derek Souza, he’d send me scurrying away awhole lot faster than this ghost would. Six foot three. Built like a quarterback. With a scowl known to send small children running. Shaggy dark hair and a broad face, rough from old acne scars. Derek is... well, I think he’s the hottest guy ever... which puts me in a fan group of one.
“Did she tell you to go away?” he says.
The ghost sputters.
“Yes,” Derek says. “She did. Now go.”
The ghost glances at me. “How can he see—?”
