I’d been practicing using hellfire to dispel magic. It was still hard for me to track where it was, so I’d only been able to do it a couple of times. I’d been doing what I’d done to the grocery store, trying to reach out my consciousness until I felt that same cold wall. I’d happened to run across it once in the coffee shop. A customer came in that was consumed by that feeling. I excused myself to the back, and while she was sitting in the lobby, I’d tried to focus my attention on her. I envisioned the hellfire burning, not her, but the magic surrounding her. I did that until I thought that it worked, and when I went back out, the cold wall was gone. She did come up and ask us to turn the heater off. I took that as a sign that it had worked, given that the air conditioning had been blasting the lobby at seventy degrees.
Today, I had a day off from the coffee shop, so I decided to put up a glamour Lindsay had taught me that shielded me from everyone’s view, magical creature or not. I wore the leather vest and pants that I’d become so comfortable in and brought my scythe along. I had missed it. I couldn’t necessarily tote it around Earth, but the way it amplified my energy made me so much more comfortable, and I felt much safer.
I walked out of the apartment building and stopped. There she was. The spirit that wandered this area often, the one I’d seen for months. She hadn’t been around the past few days. Today, though, I watched her pace along the fence. I smiled, more comfortable than I’d ever felt before around spirits.
“Hello,” I called to her, grateful to hear my own voice again.
She didn’t react at first, and I worried maybe she couldn’t hear me, but when I repeated the greeting, she whipped around to face me and stopped. She’d noticed before that I could see her, but I’d never addressed her. Her eyes immediately went to my scythe.
“Hello. My name is Myrcedes,” I spoke softly, not wanting to scare her. Were spirits scared of me? Should they be? I didn’t know. This had never been something I’d addressed in reaper training. “Can you hear me?”
She nodded silently. I couldn’t discern her expression as one of excitement or fear.
“What’s your name?”
She was silent for a while before she finally spoke. “Elaine.”
I’d never heard a spirit speak before. Her voice mostly sounded normal, but there was an inexplicably ethereal quality to it.
“Elaine,” I nodded. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“I’ve seen you before,” she spoke slowly. Her skin was dark, and so was her hair, but despite that, she was translucent. She was older than me, maybe in her late forties. “But never like this.”
I nodded. “I’m a reaper. You know what that is?”
“No,” she shook her head. “Is it bad?”
“No,” I smiled. The conversation was slow. I knew she must be scared. “It’s my job to help people who’ve died cross to a different place.”
Her face lit up. “That happens?” I nodded, and a look of sadness crept onto her face. “Why didn’t it happen to me?”
I paused. “I… I don’t know, Elaine. I’m new. But I want to fix that. Will you trust me?”
She nodded enthusiastically. I was a little surprised at how easily she trusted me, but then again, she quite literally had nothing to lose in doing so.
“Stay here, Elaine.” I smiled before heading back into my apartment. Daath and Syrion had taught me that anytime I planned to leave my body, I needed to keep it safe somewhere. I went back to my bedroom and laid down before channeling my energy like I did when world jumping. Only this time, I made a point to leave my physical figure behind.
I opened my eyes and saw Elaine. She was no longer transparent. When I was on the same plane, she was fully opaque, and I could see her features better. She had smile lines on her face and a very positive expression. I took her hand and smiled back at her.
“Ready?”
She looked as though she was about to cry and nodded. “Ready.” Her voice sounded completely normal, as well.
I squeezed her hand, and a tear slid down her cheek. It must have been years since she had felt someone’s touch. I nodded and closed my eyes, searching for that string of connection that I felt when collecting a soul, but it wasn’t there. I searched, but I couldn’t find it.
“What’s wrong?” I could hear the concern in her voice.
The problem was, I wasn’t sure. “Well… how long have you been, um…”
“Dead?”
“Y-yeah.”
“About four years,” the spirit was clearly uncertain, but that was enough of an answer. Surely, after so long, the tie to the Bay had faded. I needed to find my way there on my own, but I was determined to do so.
“That’s alright,” I smiled to reassure her. “I just have to figure out how to get there. Trust me, Elaine.”
She smiled. “I do.”
A wave of relief hit me, coupled with a feeling of necessity. It was necessary to do this. This woman had been wandering aimlessly for at least four years, assuming she’d be doing so forever. If anyone deserved to cross to the Bay of Souls, she did.
I took her hand again and closed my eyes. The string to the Bay wasn’t there, but I tried to envision it, anyway. I would feel it reach out to me, inviting me. I thought of that invitation, the way the Bay looked from across the water, the way the ground felt when I landed, and the way the air smelled. I took a deep breath, and when I
