No Humans Involved

hard, that cold.

But now I needed to be cold. I had to banish these spirits. So when

I finally got back to the house, as the first light of dawn broke, I went to my room only long enough to retrieve my kit. Then I headed into the garden.

The moment I stepped out there something whizzed past me. Then the whispering started. Fingers brushed my hand. I kept walking until I reached the far rear corner, where I knelt in the shadows between the fence and a towering tiered garden bed, and tried to contact them one last time.

I performed each ritual methodically, completely focused on each step. As before, as long as I appeared to be trying to help them, they behaved, stroking my cheek or patting my hair as if telling me I was doing a good job. Though I still couldn't find any words in their whispers, I had a feeling that if I could, they'd be telling me to keep going, to keep trying.

I had to smile, reminded of when I'd first started doing this, under my Nan 's guidance. I could see myself, kneeling in the basement of her old house, trying to summon a spirit. If I closed my eyes, I could feel her in those pats and caresses, hear her encouragement in those whispers.

When I tried to persuade the spirits-again-to find another way to communicate with me, they went silent at first, as if trying to do as I asked, but soon returned to the whispering, their caresses becoming pokes and prods. Like easily distracted children.

A chill raced through me.

When I did as they wanted, they caressed and patted me. Treating me as if I were a child? Or rewarding me in the only way they knew how.

I stood. A hand pulling at my top fell away, as did the one touching my hair. The whispering continued, but lower now. Fingers pulled at the edge of my skirt, like a child trying to get someone's attention. Pulling, poking, prodding… and when that failed, hitting and pinching.

Not possible. Necromancers rarely encountered child ghosts. There were stories of young adult ghosts who'd made contact, and were later discovered to have died as children, then allowed to grow to physical maturity rather than spend their afterlife trapped in a child's body.

How would a child ghost remain a child? Only if it was caught between dimensions, unable to step into ours and get help, unable to pass over and grow up.

That's what I had-not adult ghosts but children, trapped between the worlds. I couldn't just banish children. I had to help.

When these spirits first contacted me, I'd thought it was a random event. Happens all the time. I'll go someplace new and I attract some ghosts. But was that really all there was to it? Coincidence? I just happen to be billeted at a house with trapped child ghosts, a puzzle best solved by a necromancer with connections to the rest of the supernatural world?

Where others see coincidence, I see fate. And where I see fate, I see the hand of a higher power. I'm not sure if I see 'God' as others would recognize him, but I see someone-a benevolent entity, maybe not as all- powerful as we'd like, but a concerned being with the ability to watch and the power to do something about it.

Maybe that higher power couldn't free these ghosts alone. Or maybe that's not her place-we must solve our problems ourselves and the best she could do was put someone here, in this house, who might be able to help. And maybe I've got too high of an opinion of myself if I think I'd be that person, but I still felt like I'd been given a mission, and damned if I wasn't going to do my best to fulfill it.

I PACED along the cobblestone path, Eve's ring clutched in my hand.

'Goddamn it,' I muttered. 'You said I could call you. Well, I'm calling and you'd damned well better not be ignoring me, you arrogant Cabal son-'

A sound behind me. I turned. Kristof stood there wearing… skates. And holding what I was pretty sure was a hockey stick.

' 'Son-of-a-bitch' is the phrase you wanted,' he said. 'I suppose it could have been simply 'Cabal son,' which, while accurate, isn't much of an insult.' He leaned on the stick, musing. 'Or, perhaps.'

'I didn't mean-'

'Of course you did. I wasn't ignoring you, Jaime. If you've been calling me for a while, I'm afraid I didn't hear it. But now I'm here.'

'If you're busy…'

'I was only in the penalty box. Again. Might as well serve my time here.' A murmured incantation. The stick vanished and the skates changed to shoes. 'What can I do for you?'

'I need Eve. And now it's urgent.'

I told Kristof the story. He insisted on every detail, then tried to make contact with the spirits himself.

'There's something here,' he said, frowning. 'I can make out… flashes. And I heard the whispers, on both this side and the other.'

'As if they're caught between the two.'

'I don't like jumping to conclusions, but yes, I suppose so. And they may be children-your deduction is sound enough, but one has to be careful presenting a case to the Fates. Unlike human jurors, they aren't swayed by supposition, sympathy and theatrics. They deal in facts. The fact in this case is that these spirits exist, and they appear to be unable to cross either way. I'll ask them to send Eve back.'

'Will it be enough?'

'It better be.'

THE CATERER hadn't finished setting up for breakfast, so I went into the kitchen and helped myself to a coffee.

'Another early riser, I see,' Becky said, walking in as I added cream.

I told her I'd been outside meditating. If I was going to be spending more time in the garden, it was good to establish an alibi up front, and this was one I always used in any situation where I might be seen sitting on the ground, talking to myself.

'Sounds like you found a little peace in this insanity. Now I really hope that I'm not about to undo that.' She looked troubled. 'It's about Grady. He still upset about the other night. I don't think I handled that as well as I could have. Now he's demanding- through Claudia of course-that he get a private performance to compensate.'

I could feel her gaze on me, studying my reaction.

'Sounds fair to me,' I said.

'Thank God,' she breathed. 'You're such a trouper, Jaime. I swear I won't let him steamroll over you after this.'

'He's not steam-'

'He may be a huge name overseas. But you're a huge name here. I won't let him forget that. There'll be no more costar bashing on this show.'

'Costar bashing?'

'I won't stand for it. Now, about this private seance. Do you mind watching, just to show support?'

BEFORE WE headed into breakfast, Becky's assistant, Will, came to tell her he'd conveyed the same invitation to the private seance to Angelique, but she'd refused, claiming she had a manicure appointment. Becky fumed, and I offered to talk to Angelique, but she didn't want me getting involved.

Over breakfast, we discussed the seance.

'First, where to conduct it?' Becky said. 'Mr. Simon has checked all records for this house, and the only reference to a death he could find was some has-been producer who hanged himself. For excitement, that rates about a two. Must-snore TV.'

I glanced at the hanging residual and sent up a silent apology to his ghost, wherever it was.

Grady leaned forward, tapping his knife on the table. 'Perhaps, but it's the ones whose deaths weren't reported that are the most entertaining. '

'Accidental deaths, you mean?'

A smile creased his tanned face. 'No, purposeful. Very purposeful. I have felt a dark presence in this house, a