Mr. Qureshi frowns. “It appears so. That was when Kazuya first had the vision about you. But I’m sure we can get things sorted. We have many classes here that are designed to help you work through this new state of being.” He hands Rafe and me separate pieces of paper that look like course schedules. “In the meantime, Kazuya can show you the rest of the school and then to your dorms. My office is just over there if ever you need anything. The door’s never open, because it doesn’t have to be.”
He chuckles to himself as he floats off.
I thread my fingers through the cold strands of my hair. They feel far more liquid than anything else, like thick streams of water flowing across my skin. “A week. Where have I been for a whole week?”
Rafe frowns. “You don’t remember?”
“I don’t remember anything.”
“Nothing at all?” Kaz asks.
I look at our Ghost Guide. “Oh, it does not encourage me that this surprises you.”
Kaz rests a hand on my shoulder. A sort of weird feeling like a cold breeze spreads across my skin. If a cold breeze had solid weight to it. “I know it’s scary. But Mr. Qureshi is right, we can help you figure it out here.”
“Can’t we like...look me up?” I tug on the ends of my hair. “Surely there’s a record of me somewhere.”
A wince twists Kaz’s face. “It’s possible. We know a little from your public records, but you don’t have much in the way of social media accounts. What we usually do in this situation is contact a living medium. With their ability to see us, and their magic, they should be able to help. But it’s also better for you to remember as much as you can on your own. Working with a Healer should start the process of finding your memories again too.”
“It’s kind of like a mystery, right?” Rafe says.
This idea does make the whole thing slightly less overwhelming and halts a full-on freak out. I offer Rafe a slight grin. “A mystery, sure. I think I’ve read enough of those to know what kind of clues to look for.”
Bam. Another memory nugget. I definitely like mysteries. Maybe I will be okay. Besides. I’m already dead. The worst has already happened, right?
The floating through doors thing continues throughout the tour. After a while, I get used to the odd feeling, but the sneezing doesn’t let up. Can ghosts be allergic to certain types of wood? This doesn’t make much sense without a body, but then, I still have a lot of ghost rules to learn. Other students appear in the halls without much warning, though no one uses the walls and no one else appears to have the same allergic reaction.
“Phasing through walls is allowed,” Kaz says, “but not kosher. Even though the limitations of the living don’t totally apply to us, we try to follow some rules to keep order.”
“Well without those, what would we tormented teens rebel against?” I drag a hand along the wall, trying to figure out the best way to describe the sensation. My fingers dip into the wood as if it were water. Only the wall isn’t water. But my hand isn’t either. It’s almost impossible to explain.
Rafe snorts at my bad teen rebel joke as Kaz leads us through a large set of double doors into a room full of round dark wood tables. Long counters line the far wall, right under four silver shuttered windows. Probably where they serve food. The smell the last meal served lingers in the air and my mouth waters.
I squint at Kaz. “Ghosts can eat?”
Rafe lifts a finger. “Hey, there’s a question I can actually answer. Yes, we can definitely eat. A friend of mine used to feed me bacon under the table.” Red flushes his cheeks and his eyes bug a little.
I bust into a laugh. “Let me guess. Shifter? Please say shifter, because otherwise, that’s super weird, dude. Not that I should make fun of anybody for their fetishes but...”
That dimple appears alongside Rafe’s grin. “Yeah, fox shifter. What are you?”
“Witch.” The word pops out before I can even consider his question. “Huh. I’m a witch. That’s a fun fact.”
“Like I said, memories should start coming back fast,” Kaz says with a smile. “And yes. You can eat, but don’t get too excited and go hog wild. You can still eat too much and feel like garbage after. You can also get tired and sick just like a living human. I know it doesn’t make a lot of sense, but as far as we can tell, we’re still tied to some of the same rules as the living so long as we still exist in their plane. We can also get hurt, which brings us to combat.”
We follow him back into the hallway and out to the next building over. Snow weighs down the branches of the pines, so they dip in front of the doors we slide through. It looks like a gym, complete with metal risers off to one side, and gray mats on the other.
“Combat goes hand in hand with Corporeal Contact,” Kaz says. “You have to master that class first. In there, you’ll learn how to pick things up. Sounds dumb, but it’s harder than you might think.”
“It is.” Rafe rubs the back of his neck. “I still have a hard time with it.”
I wince. “How long have you been practicing?”
Rafe shoves the hair out of his face, but it floats back down onto his forehead. “Time’s kind of hard too, but a couple weeks? I think? Right before the Unleashing.”
“The Unleashing?” Like other words they’ve used, this sounds familiar, but I can’t get a grip on their meaning. It slips away before I can grasp it.
“Yeah,” Kaz says, leading us toward the back door and out into the cold night again. “Supes had their powers stolen for
