Four diagonal slashes had appeared in the leg of his trousers, and between his fingers, blood welled.
Lunaris rattled like an earthquake, cabinets vibrating, as the wraith materialized out of the ether like ink dripped into water.
It had its claws around Kessian’s hip, its head bent over him. I couldn’t banish it with my talisman, I couldn’t teleport us elsewhere with Kessian in its grip, and I didn’t know how it could appear like this with no warning from Lunaris or without breaking my wards, so I lashed out with the only weapon I had left—my fists.
I wasn’t a trained fighter, but I’d read enough books to know not to tuck my thumb in my fist or I’d break it, and I had enough anger in me to numb the fear of fighting something so intangible. I put my fist through the shadowy void of its face. The dark absorbed me, thick and viscous, but through it I struck something more solid.
Once, twice, again. Kessian rolled free from under us. The next strike of my fist sent the antlered head careening into the wall behind it.
While it was stunned, I backed up, grasping Kessian around the waist to support him as we made our way through the narrow hall. The wraith recovered quickly, moving like a spider through the door.
“We have to lure it to the trap.” I scooped his cane up from where it had fallen to the floor. “Can you run?”
His hand came away from his leg stained red. “I’m not proud. If you can carry me …”
I stumbled with him down the steps before scooping him up and running across the green. Never had I been so glad Lunaris incorporated a personal gym in her revolving door of rooms for me. Kessian wasn’t big, nor was he light, and though I’d parked as close as Lunaris could get to the hut, it didn’t feel close enough with the screech of the wraith gaining on us and my gait staggered while I adapted to Kessian’s weight in my arms. Looking over my shoulder, he went pale.
“Almost there,” I said.
The hut was in sight, but a thought occurred to me as I sped toward it. The sigil inside occupied the entire floor. If we ran in hoping to lure the wraith in with us, we would be trapped in there with it.
I had to hope we could squeeze into a corner and that once we were confined, it couldn’t harm us.
The ground vibrated with the weight of the wraith galloping behind me. My lungs burned. I put on a burst of speed when I felt a breath of cold on my neck and Kessian hid his face in my shoulder.
We reached the hut. The back-left corner was the largest outside the sigil, but still not large enough with Kessian in my arms. I dropped his legs. A cold wind touched my back as I crowded him into the corner. I braced for the sting of claws raking my back.
Blinding light filled the hut with an electric explosion. Blue sparks hit the wall above Kessian’s head. He looked past my shoulder, eyes wide, chest rising and falling rapidly.
“It worked,” he whispered.
Slowly, carefully, I craned my neck to look over my shoulder.
Shadows filled the confines of the sigil. They roiled and curled against the invisible prison, prompting a punishing burst of sparks. The darkness recoiled as if shocked.
At the center of it all was a figure darker than the shadows, its head held low so its antlers didn’t puncture the ceiling, its focus solely upon us.
Kessian’s hands squeezed my arms. “How do we get past it?”
“Break down the wall?”
The wraith tilted its head like it was listening.
Kessian looked at the scant few inches of ground between the circumference of the sigil and the wall of the hut. Experimentally, he reached with one arm, hand flat against the wall. The wraith’s focus followed his movements.
“Quickly. Like putting your hand through a candle flame,” he said.
The second he moved, the wraith lunged, throwing itself at the perimeter of its prison like a rabid animal. Kessian recoiled back into the corner for safety. I caged him in, one hand to either side of his head.
“Okay. That didn’t work. Maybe you should try and talk to it.”
I looked at him incredulously. “Talk to it? It’s barely human.”
“It’s a part of you. Maybe a part of us. It’s got some connection to all the people who’ve died. Isn’t that how it works with ghosts? You soothe them by making right whatever wrong led to their death in the first place?”
In our position, I’d try anything, but—“You’re the one who’s good with words.”
“They’re not my family. And you’re a lot better than you think. If I’d died this way, I wouldn’t want tact. I’d want honesty. Nobody ever has to worry about you lying to them.”
