"'Don't let anyone see you use your powers, Rian, You'll bring ORBIT down upon all of us, Rian," muttered Rian in a high, mocking tone while waiting on the wooded edge of Madrona Bay' middle school for the sixth period to end. Frustrated and bitter, he passed the time watching crows hunting for bugs under the damp carpet of leaves and pine needles. "'But don't worry, I'm just go up to this weird van that's hunting metahumans and kick the fucking ant nest by levitating the fucking car!'"
For emphasis, Rian tossed a pinecone at a thatching ant mound about fifteen feet away. Instantly, the red-headed ants began swarming the offending object. We're dead. We're so dead. Alll of us are fucking dead.
Before he could fret any further, the bell signaling the end of school sounded. Forcing himself not to run, Rian went inside the school to look for Lavender.
The search did not take long. Almost as soon as he entered the eighth graders side of the building, Lavender ran up to him with a brightly colored slip of paper clutched in her hands.
"Rian, over here. Dean called the school," said Lavender, slightly breathless. Excitedly, she waved to a harried-looking woman with a baggy, beaded shirt just outside of a classroom with black desks containing rows of microscopes and a giant power of the periodic table. "Bye Ms. Green! C'mon, Rian! Let's ride!"
Before Ms. Green could say anything further, she was accosted by a group of students asking several different questions about a test. Taking advantage of the distraction, and the chaos of the quickly filling hallway, Lavender and Rian slipped away. Upon finding a quiet hallway, Rian picked Lavender up and ran home.
Within minutes of arriving home, Lavender's sweater vanished.
Shivering in a camisole, Lavender quickly summoned a new sweater. This one was still fuzzy, but now it was dark green and had a reindeer with a red pompom nose.
"It's so cold," said Lavender, yawning.
Breath fogging in the cold sitting room, Rian pulled his hoodie closer to himself and nodded vigorously.
"You want any of Eochaid's old clothes?" asked Rian, knowing that Eochaid had at least a half dozen old wool sweaters shoved into an old wardrobe in his room. It's got to be tiring, summoning and re-summoning clothes all day, every day.
"Nah, I'm good," said Lavender, grinning. "Corey already gave me one of his sweaters. But it's really itchy, so I'll keep using my summoned sweaters." Cackling maniacally, Lavender gestured at the fireplace and summoned a box of matches. "Fire?"
"I'll get the wood. You grab the stew pot," said Rian, darting to the mud room. Wind rattled the cracking window panes. A looming branch on a nearby tree creaked ominously. Shivering, too, Rian quickly grabbed an armful of wood. Lavender was running through the sitting room archway with the large pot of half frozen stew by the time Rian returned.
Just as he began stacking the wood in the large fireplace, Rian heard Lavender shriek.
"Lav?! What's wrong?"
"You didn't hear it?" Lavender barreled back into the sitting room, her face pale. "Did Corey and Theo get back early?"
Rian shook his head. "We should be alone…"
"I heard someone walking around upstairs," said Lavender, whispering hoarsely. "Do you think there's an intruder?"
"Let's go check,"
"It was above the kitchen,"
Rian darted upstairs. It was his room that was above the kitchen. Throwing his door open, Rian found his room empty. The only thing out of place was his window. Several crows were swarming nearby. On, a large, shiny crow with a single white wing feather was staring straight at him. Another crow pecked a green glass bowl where Rian usually left a pile of peanuts.
"Are you glorified pigeons looking for handouts?" asked Rian, huffing out a snort. The large crow with the white wing weather made an affectionate, crooning 'hoo-wah' sound, then hopped up onto the open window sill as if to enter Rian's room. Rian waved it out before grabbing a bag of peanuts from a drawer under his bed. "No, you know the rules. You guys stay out there. I don't want you tracking in feathers or pooping in my room."
With a mildly offended caw, the crow flew off the window sill, roosting in a nearby tree. Rian tossed a handful of peanuts into the bowl. Though the other crow took a peanut within moments, the other flew away and out of sight.
Rian stayed for several minutes, watching as more crows came to partake in the peanut feast. Then, after running back downstairs, Lavender pointed down a pitch black hallway that led to Eochaid's room. She was shaking, but this time it was from fear, not cold. "I think this house has a ghost,"
"A ghost?" Rian shook his head. "No, you definitely heard something. But it was just the crows opening my window. They probably knocked something down."
"No, they were footsteps, Rian," said Lavender, shaking her head. She pointed down the dark hallway again. "I heard a phone ring just now. Then someone was talking. Back there I went back there to look, but… Nothing. Do you know anyone who's Irish? They sounded Irish. Like, really Irish."
Irish? In less than half a second, Rian stopped feeling the cold. The blood drained from his face. Heart pounding, Rian turned to a dark hallway just off the side of the front sitting room. Barely paying attention to his surroundings, he ran. But barely a picosecond later, his ankle twisted painfully when a puddle of Corey's slime caused his foot to skid over the old floorboards.
"OW! Shit-," muttered Rian, hopping on one foot as his ankle twisted painfully. Moving at a slower pace, Rian limped up to a set of double doors. A tree with braided branches and roots was intricately carved into them, naked and stripped bare of leaves from the winter season. The door handles were tarnished brass.
Rian knocked on the dark stained oak wood, then slowly opened the door. The room was as he expected. The fireplace was cold, as was the air. The four post, king-sized bed was still freshly made and covered in a thin but growing layer of dust. The dark green rug where a positively ancient rocking chair and wardrobe were resting on top of were the room's only embellishments.
At the end of the hallway, Lavender cowered behind the archway into the main sitting room. Only the top of her head was poking around so that she could watch Rian enter the room.
Loudly, she whispered in a hoarse tone, "Is the ghost gone?"
"Yeah…" said Rian, a sharp pain lancing across his chest. Truthfully, Rian didn't know what he was expecting. A solid person who was alive and well? A ghost? It was a pipe dream. Even if Eochaid had returned as a ghost, it was unlikely that he would want anything to do with Rian. If he were alive, Rian wasn't certain that he wanted to actually see Eochaid.
Hurt, and more than a little angry, Rian walked further into the room. Breath rapidly coming in and out formed fog that quickly vanished in the cold. Father, are you really a ghost?
Hands shaking, Rian shut the doors. "Well, Father. It seems you're up to your old tricks again… Did you send the crows? To say 'hello' in your own fucked up way?"
The only thing that answered Rian was silence.
Right as Rian turned to leave, his eyes spotted that the bedside table was cracked open. Heart hammering, Rian opened it. Inside was an old pocket watch and an old velvet bag that looked slightly fragile. Shoved next to the bag was an old leather book that Rian tried not to look at. The formation of the pores on the leather creeped him out. Esoteric symbols were etched into the hide.
It was a spell book. One that Rian had used before.
Curious, as he did not remember seeing the velvet bag the last time he opened the drawer, Rian picked it up. In addition to several various charms, there was a hagstone and a bottle of medication.
Lamotrigine? The hell is that? As Rian also knew that Eochaid was nearing two centuries old, he tossed the medication back into the drawer without any further inspection. Spiros probably moved it when he was raiding the room for shoes…
Rian froze.
Underneath the bag, was a flat object wrapped in tissue paper. It was decorative, with a green background and gold horses whose swirling tails were twisted into braided knots. Heart hurting, Rian carefully unwrapped the object. Wrapped inside it were two clay plates with handprints pressed into them.
"Whatever. Joke's on me, I guess," muttered Rian, wrapping the plates back in the tissue paper. Setting the bag back on top of the clay plates, Rian slammed the drawer closed. A lock clicked into place.
Furious, Rian stormed back down the hallway, into the main sitting room, past the front door and into the kitchen. After grabbing a handful of old greasy paper and cardboard out of the burnables box, Rian marched back to the fireplace in the main sitting room.
Rian ball up the cardboard while Lavender arranged the logs in a stacked formation. Soon, the paper was coming to life in a blaze of hot fire that quickly died down, leaving the logs scorched and burning quietly behind it. Soon, there were enough coals that the covered pot could be placed on a wire grate inside the fireplace.
Once this was done, Lavender and Rian both curled up on one of the velvet, plastic covered couches.
Looking slightly awkward, Lavender summoned a deck of neon purple playing cards.
"So I guess this Eochaid guy is pretty special? Spiros said he was kind of like a dad…"
"Yeah... And it's so him that the guy's playing tricks on you, instead of comforting me in my grief," said Rian, shuffling the cards for Lavender. "I feel like the least he could do is find me in a dream and say 'hey, don't worry about me. I'm dead and in heaven!'"
"Can he do that?" Lavender began digging around in her backpack as Rian obsessively shuffled the cards, withdrawing a spiral bound notebook. Summoning a fuzzy pink pen, Lavender began doodling over a page of notes.
"...Kind of," said Rian, with a half-hearted shrug. "He knows the Morrigan."
"The Morrigan?"
"Celtic triple goddess. Crows. Cows. Eels. Wolves, too," said Rian, abandoning the cards. He couldn't get his mind off of the puddle of slime. Nor could he stop noticing the layer of slime coating the floorboards near the fireplace. Jumping off the couch, Rian grabbed a broom and began sweeping in a flurry. Within a few literal seconds, he was finished.
Grabbing a mop, Rian continued ranting. "The Morrigan doesn't get mixed up with fucking sorcery. Everyone calls her a witch. She's not a fucking witch. That's christian propaganda. The Morrigan doesn't need to get mixed up with sorcery. The Morrigan already is magic."
Rian scrubbed angrily at the slime. "Now Father has a fucking grimoire, like the ancient fucking fuck that he is! I'm pretty sure he stole it from another wizard."
Breath fogging as he gave a shaky exhale and darted around with the mop Rian finished the cleaning before shivering again. Even with the fire, it still felt cold.
Glancing at the cracked sitting room window, Rian said, "We should get some blankets."
"Oh, yes. I'd love to curl up under a blanket," said Lavender, summoning up a heavy, Christmas themed quilt.
"No, that'll just vanish in a few hours and then we'll have to do everything again," said Rian, running back into the hallway and throwing open a closet where piles of blankets had been shoved inside. Pulling all of them out, Rian began transporting them into a pile on the plastic covered couches. Then he darted down to the basement, grabbing nails and a hammer.
"What are you doing with that?" asked Lavender, pulling a blanket around her shoulders.
Rian went back to the basement for a stool. Once he was back upstairs, Rian grabbed a thick comforter and began pulling it up over the cracked sitting room window. "Grab the other side, would you?"
By the time he asked, Lavender had already jumped up. By the time Corey and Theo were clambering through the front door with bags of food in their arms, the open archways and windows in the living room had been entirely covered by the blankets. A few hours later, Spiros' jeep roared into the driveway.
Running into the house, Spiros sped toward the hallway.
"Guys, there was someone in Eochaid's window!"
"I knew there was a ghost!"
"Ghost?" Spiros swore, then ran down the hallway. Rian followed him, throwing the double doors open once again.
"We already looked for him!"
There was still nothing in the bedroom. Nothing except dust and freezing cold air that felt at least ten degrees colder than the rest of the house.
Saying something that sounded like a prayer in Greek, Spiros crossed his hands over his chest and backed out of the room.
"Rian, we should get out of here," said Spiros, terrified. "We need to get out of here. Now,"
"Spiros, relax. There's nothing here,"
"That's my point. I saw someone," said Spiros, in a hushed whisper. Face pale, he pointed at the window. "Someone right there. There's no one here!"
Rian ran to the wardrobe, throwing it open. Nothing except for a few well-tailored suits that looked like something a fashionable man would have worn over a century ago. Desperate, Rian looked out the window. He can fly. It can't be a ghost. But if Father is alive, why isn't he telling us that he's alive?
Forming the sign of the cross once again, Spiros sped out of the room while saying another prayer in Greek. Rian followed him, standing just outside the main sitting room.
"Spiros?"
Spiros ignored Rian, rushing upstairs. A moment later, Spiros stomped back downstairs. Now he was holding a blue cord and a can of spray paint.
"No painting on those doors!" yelled Rian, as Spiros rushed past him.
In a burst of urgency that Rian wasn't superstitious enough to understand, Spiros began tying the handles of the double oak doors together, knotting the cord with a Hercules knot.
"Will that keep the ghost away?"
"If it is a ghost," muttered Spiros, tightening the cord.
"Wouldn't that piss the guy off if he's really back?" asked Corey, looking frightened.
"We're dead meat no matter what we do, so let's just hang the thing up, and worry about it later. Best to cover all our bases," said Rian, collapsing back onto where he had been lounging on the plush couches. Plus, a stupid piece of cord would not be nearly enough to keep Father in that room if he's really back. It would just be a mild nuisance.
"Corey! Theo!" called Spiros, storming down the hallway and into the sitting room. "Fight ring?"
"We'll tell you about it later," said Corey, following Spiros. "But I need to get warmed up before I fall asleep and start hibernating."