As I rolled the ring between my fingers, I was struck with the mortifying realization I was trying to show off for my mentor. Unless I wanted to court a possible disaster, I counseled myself to stop while I was ahead.
“Mari, is there any reason you know of—or can imagine—that would explain why Moira does not want to show herself?” I asked. Coaxing forth a recalcitrant ghost could take hours and hours. We didn’t have hours and hours, we had only until midnight, which was less than an hour away.
Maritza drew closer to the light, an oblong box clutched to her chest. I noticed she’d exchanged her sweater for my shirt and had buttoned it up to her neck. I stifled a pleased smile.
“My sister and Heriberto had an extraordinary bond,” she said, shaking her head. “Her death tore the family apart. We lost track of Berto’s wanderings—except for when he showed up on the verge of dying—and none of their daughters stayed in Massachusetts to carry on Moira’s work.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” My teacher and I stared at one another. I broke the connection and urged her to thread a few needles.
“Bas?” Mari’s voice held a dash of amusement.
“Yes?”
“I understand you wanting to work naked—almost naked—with the little plants, but why are you again down to just your underwear?”
I couldn’t stop the heat from flushing my face, neck, and upper body.
I was an oddity. That realization had dawned on me from one moment to the next early in my life. The blissful ignorance of childhood had given way to a pre-teen’s self-conscious awareness that I was different, even amongst Magicals.
And especially amongst necromancers.
“I find the vulnerability of working naked, or nearly so, gives me greater receptivity when I’m courting a ghost,” I said. “And truthfully, I cannot stand to get my clothes dirty. Everything I wear is bespoke. Off-the-rack clothing never fits the way I want it to.”
I chose not to add that I liked the physical sensation of hanging out with the dead. Beings talked to me long after their hearts stopped beating and their bodies had been embalmed. Perhaps I was a spirit walker, like my great-great-grandmother on my mother’s side. I felt that to peer too closely at my affinities would impinge upon my access to the spirit realms.
“Do you ever consider they’ll want more from you?” Mari asked. “Do you worry about being possessed by something stronger than you, something wilier, something with truly evil intentions?”
“Frankly, no.” As much as I wanted to bare my inner workings to Maritza and explain why I was as confident as I was, we had work to do. “Are your needles prepared?”
“They are.” She swept her forearms forward and up. Two needles floated in the air in front of her fingertips. The thread dangling from each was attached to its own spool on the floor by her feet. “And we are ready to do your bidding.”
I snugged the gold ring onto my pinky, opened the lid of Moira’s basket, and turned my full attention to finding the dead Brodeur sister’s spirit and welcoming her under my skin.
A cloth measuring tape, its numbers, and eighth-inch marks faded. A plain wooden spool of silk buttonhole thread in cerise. A tiny pair of scissors shaped like a bird. Three needles, sharp at one end and slightly tarnished at their centers. I withdrew the spool first, then the measuring tape, and placed them on the floor. The scissors came next, then the needles.
I hovered my hand over the objects. I needed more. “Maritza, please bring me the necklace on your sister’s altar.”
Mari dashed out the door and was back in a few heartbeats. I draped the offered chain around my neck and settled myself cross-legged in front of the objects I had rearranged in her brief absence. “Find a chair and sit in front me,” I said.
Once Maritza settled, I began with an invocation to a pantheon of mythological figures associated with death and the afterlife. As I called out each name, the corresponding symbol lit up down the outsides of my arms and legs. Mari let out a breathy ooh.
I kept going. Calling the deities was the easy part and when I finished, I paused. The silence and the light radiating from my limbs spread through the room. I welcomed the familiar sensation of floating, followed by the quiescent appearance of Moira Brodeur sliding into my body.
My hands began to move of their own accord, unfolding the five paper figures and spreading them out on the wood floor. I unrolled the measuring tape, then a length of the deep red silk thread, and snipped off a piece about six feet long. It called to be divided into thirds, with each piece inserted through one of the needles. My hand was stopped when I went to knot the first piece.
I set the threaded needles in front of me, breathed in and out slowly, and waited for instructions.
“This is not about the daughters,” I said, picking up the scissors. I cut apart the three smaller figures, set the two still joined aside and took up a needle. I loved a well-tailored article of clothing, but I had little by way of hands-on experience with sewing except for basics like reattaching buttons. Inviting Moira’s knowledgeable hands to guide mine, I folded the first little figure’s hands over its heart, poked the needle through the layers of paper and back up, and pulled the thread through. I set the needle aside, held my breath as I tied the perfect bow, and repeated the actions with the other two figures.
“Moira wishes you to bring her daughters together.” Her longing permeated my voice. I reached past the glowing circle of candlelight and salt and handed the dolls to Mari. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. “They are the ones who will continue her work.
