Nash twists her lips a little. “Me too. I was starting to go a little stir-crazy sitting around. Wuornos usually keeps us pretty busy, but this project has all his attention.”
I let out a tiny chuckle. “Not going to lie, he’s kind of intimidating. I could tell he has a one-track mind with some things.”
Nash begins to nod, and she might have replied, but she’s cut off by Remy’s and Felix’s voices as they approach. “Thanks for getting me out of there. He can talk for hours about nothing.”
Felix steps over the salt and stones. Remy’s eyes move up and down, noting his friend’s movement, and then he does the same. “What did I miss? Hey.” He tips his chin toward Nash, acknowledging her. The tops of her cheeks tinge pink as she meets his eyes briefly before looking away.
When Remy stops near the side of my chair, I look up at him. “Nash is going to stay with us and hopefully help get this situation sorted. This is our saferoom. We’re not supposed to talk about the ghost or acknowledge it anywhere but in this room.” I think that’s everything, but I look at the others to fill in anything I might have left out.
“What do the rocks do?” Remy hasn’t studied magic in a long time. His interests always lay elsewhere, and then when he manifested and found out he was only a two, he dropped all magical courses that were not required.
“They add protection and deflect negative energy,” Nash answers simply. I feel even more gratitude toward her in that moment. A lot of people might have talked down to him for his lack of awareness, but she didn’t.
“Nash has the protection amulets. We could probably do yours first if you need to get back to your meeting,” I tell Remy, then glance at Nash for confirmation.
Remy makes a dismissive tsking sound. “I gave him half the day.”
“That was maybe twenty minutes,” Felix corrects him.
“You try talking to him. It felt like I lost half my life.”
“This will be quick and easy,” Nash inserts, interrupting the bickering before passing each of us a small wooden spell disc that’s already been tied to a cord. “Like most charms, they need to touch your skin to be effective. Blood of the wearer will activate them, so that means no mixing them up, and you really shouldn’t even take them off.”
That’s fairly standard for personal charms. I am a little surprised that it’s a disposable wooden disc and not something that would last longer though. As if reading my thoughts while I examine the smooth circle, Nash adds, “Just like salt, the spell erodes and weakens over time, using the disc is more of a reminder it’s not a permanent fix.”
“Good to know.” I move to loop the cord around my neck, but I feel Remy’s hands over top of mine, taking over the job. I hold the disc against my chest where I want it to lie while he adjusts the strings and ties the knot. As soon as it’s secured, I stab the side of my finger on my shield necklace and pierce my skin—the blood that lingers on the tiny needle will only strengthen my shields. Once I have a fat bead of blood welled up, I smear it on the wooden circle. The smell of fresh sage envelops me for a moment, but it disappears just as quickly. If there was any question if Nash created these herself, it’s now gone. Her signature, while somewhat unfamiliar, is easily recognizable to me.
I move to stand so I can help Remy with his amulet. When he tries to bend over, I use his shoulder to push him down into the chair I vacated. Making sure I’m not choking him, I tie the ends of his cord in a tight knot so it can’t come off when he’s working out. I can just barely see the wood circle at the top of his shirt. It looks a little strange, since Remy doesn’t wear shields and protection jewelry like I do. He twists his neck from left to right, proving it feels as foreign as it looks.
Felix already has his tied when I turn to him, but Gray is waiting for me, holding his in his fingers, so I walk around behind him and knot his too. “Do you need a prick?” I ask him.
“Got one of those, but I could use your needle.”
I expect a joke like that from Remy, but Gray about knocks me out of my socks with that one, especially with Nash here. It takes a moment for it to sink in, but once it does, I don’t hold back the chuckle. Leaning over his arm, I offer my pendant. Gray stabs his thumb against the metal then squeezes his finger for the blood to bead up.
When I finish, Felix is waiting to use my pendant. I didn’t think of it before offering, but this is a really good way to renew the protection they put into this necklace when they gave it to me years ago.
Lastly, I go back to Remy, and we complete invoking the charms. “Now it’s time for research and acting as normal as can be. If this is a new manifest, it might not know your patterns and idiosyncrasies yet, but still try to behave as if you normally would. Negative entities feed off of anything like disruption, chaos, anger, and even frustration.”
“Good thing it wasn’t here a few weeks ago,” I mumble under my breath, which makes Nash grin. “How about we grab some lunch? Then we can see about getting into some of those records you mentioned.”
“Sounds good, I’m starving.” Remy hops up.
“Is Ash still here? Will she be coming?” I try to adjust my expression so it doesn’t look like my eyebrows are going to disappear into my hairline, but I think I’m a little slow.
“Shit, I forgot she was here.” Remy looks at the doorway like she might materialize there. “We probably shouldn’t leave her alone in the house with you know what hanging around. She’s under an NDA, so can we bring her? Otherwise, I can’t come,” Remy pleads.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Nash’s head moving from left to right as she looks between the two of us. “I don’t care if she comes. Is she going to want to come back to the house once she finds this stuff out though?”
One corner of Remy’s lips curls up. “Maybe not.” He shrugs.
“That leaves you going to her then if you have shit to do,” I warn.
He waves his hand dismissively. “We can do that over the phone or on a video call. She was here today so she could capture a photo of us, but we’ve got other stuff to do, so that can wait.”
“A photo of us?” I question.
“To put in the statement,” Remy confirms.
