woman turn into a babbling fool, but that's just what happened. The man and woman were clearly a couple, because the woman, petite, with big, soulful eyes, clung to the man's arm as she peered up at me from under the low brim of a hat I vaguely remembered was called a cloche. She was wearing a low-waisted dress, while he was in an old-fashioned-looking suit and a fedora. But what had me stammering to a startled stop was the fact that the two of them were translucent, almost transparent, an odd bluish sort of glow about them as if they were made up of the ghostly images sometimes seen on old TVs.
The word 'ghost' reverberated around in my head with growing intensity.
'We're lost. Can you help us?' the woman said, glancing up at her man.
'Uh.' Hesitantly, I held out my hand, the hairs on my arm standing on end as my fingers reached the man's arm and passed right through it with only a tiny tingle.
'We were on a ship,' the man said, looking around him. 'We were going to Canada. But now we're lost, and we don't know where we're supposed to be going. You are the one who is supposed to help us, aren't you?' the man asked, a doubtful look on his translucent face.
'You're… not real,' I said slowly, trying to understand what was going on. 'Are you?'
'I am Karl. This is my wife, Marta. We were on a ship,' the ghostly man said again. 'What happened to it?'
'Karl, I'm afraid,' the woman whimpered, pressing herself closer to her husband. 'Maybe she is the other one.'
I blinked in dumb astonishment. 'I'm Pia, and frankly, I'm a bit confused.'
'There's nothing to be afraid of,' Karl told his wife, obviously trying to appear brave for her benefit. His expression continued to indicate that he was anything but calmly confident. 'You are the reaper, aren't you? The old woman said there would be someone in town to show us the way. She said we'd know you by the light you carry.' He gestured toward my hand.
I looked down in even more astonishment. The stone-bedecked bookmark that I'd looped around my wrist while I made my escape from Mattias had somehow morphed into a small lantern shaped like a crescent moon. It dangled like a charm from my wrist, and from it, a gentle glow illuminated the area immediately around me. 'All right. This is going way beyond weird or possibly a mental condition, into the land of… well, I don't know quite what land it is. Maybe the unbelievable? Regardless, I'm not quite sure what to tell you. I don't think I'm the grim reaper—at least no one has informed me of anything like that,' I said with a forced little laugh that sounded hollow.
'She doesn't seem to be anxious to help us,' Marta said, a sob in her voice. 'What are we going to do? What if the evil one comes?'
As if on cue, Mattias appeared briefly at the end of the street. I ducked down until I could just barely see him. He stood for a moment in indecision, quickly scanning the front of the church and the street before he made a right turn and hurried off down a cross street.
'I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what it is you want me to do for you. You say an old lady told you to find me? Did she say her name?' I asked, wondering if the woman at the church could have sent the pair after me.
'She was on the ship. She said she would stay there, where her son was, but that we should go ashore and the reaper would show us the way. She said we'd know you by your light, and that there might be another one, an evil one, who did not have a light. You
'Yeah, and I'm not quite sure how that happened, but given the present situation, I think maybe I'll just move past that point. Where exactly did you need directions to? I'm a stranger here, myself, and don't know too many of the local spots, although I do have a good map.'
The couple squatted down next to me as I pulled out the detailed map I had for the area.
'We were going to Canada. To Halifax, to be with Marta's brother and his family,' Karl said as they peered at my map.
I glanced at their period clothing, and bit my lower lip for a moment. 'Would you mind me asking you when you were on the ship? What… er… what year was it?'
'It was 1922,' Karl answered quickly, looking puzzled. 'Why?'
I reached out to touch the lapel of his coat. Just as before, my hand met no resistance and passed right through him. 'I hate to tell you this, but I don't think your ship made it to Canada. I have a suspicion that it might have wrecked offshore of Iceland, and you're… well, you're ghosts.'
'Karl,' Marta said in a near wail, grabbing her husband's arm again. 'She is not the good one. She is Ilargi!'
'Shhh!' I hissed, peeping over the edge of the railing to see if Mattias had come back. The street, luckily, was clear. 'I'm not anything other than really confused.'
'Now, love, don't panic,' Karl said, patting her hand. 'She is a reaper, not Ilargi. We just need to convince her we're worthy of her help.'
'Oh, you don't have to convince me of that. I can see you're a very nice couple, and I'm really sorry to have to be the one to break it to you that you're… er… life challenged. And I would help you if I could, but I really don't think I'm the person you're looking for.'
'You're not going to show us the way?' Karl asked with a nervous glance at his wife.
Marta stared at me with bleak, hopeless dark eyes that seemed to wring my heart. 'You would not leave us to the other?'
'I'm not sure who you're talking about, but I'll tell you what I'll do—you explain to me exactly where it is you're trying to get to, and I'll find out how you get there, OK?'
'But… you know where we're going,' Marta said, her eyes moving between her husband and me. She looked strained, somehow stretched, as if she was about to tear apart into a thousand wispy bits.
'All right, then, I'll find out where you're going, and then we'll work on how to get you there,' I said, trying to sound confident and calm. 'Have you two been wandering around the town the whole time?'
They both stared silently at me.
'Let me put it this way—what's the last thing you remember?' I asked.
'We were on the ship,' Karl said.
'Yes, I got that part. But what happened to the ship?'
The pair glanced at each other.
'I don't understand,' Karl said. 'We were on the ship. The old lady said to look for you, and we found you.'
Clearly the trauma of their deaths had left them drifting, both figuratively and literally, and they didn't remember the transition between life and the afterlife.
I made a little face to myself at how quickly I'd become accustomed to the idea of ghosts and an afterlife, but I had to admit, the evidence was even now staring hopefully at me. 'OK. We'll just let that go. While I'm looking, why don't you two go down to the café on the main square. I'll meet you there when I find out where it is you're supposed to go.'
'Café?' Marta asked.
I gave them directions on where to find it, and reiterated that I would meet them there. 'I've got a few things to take care of first,' I said, straightening slowly as I verified that the street was clear of Mattias. 'But just as soon as I can, I'll try to find someone who knows what's going on. Sound good?'
'And if the other should come, the Ilargi?' Karl asked, clearly worried. 'He will steal our souls!'
'That's not good.' I made a little face as I thought. 'Um… run away?'
That evidently satisfied them, because they nodded and thanked me, drifting off down the street until they disappeared into the night. I noted with interest that the second they disappeared from my view, the glowing silver moon dangling from my wrist changed back into a moonstone hanging on a silk cord.
'Too strange,' I told the bookmark. 'But right at this moment, I'm not going to try to figure you out. I've got to get myself out of this predicament with Mattias, and much as I'd like to hunker down, staying in one spot might be asking for trouble if he comes back to look closely at the church. Better get a move on, now, Pia.'
There's really no use talking to yourself if you're not going to listen to your own advice, so I did as I was told, and crawled up the narrow stairs to the street, glancing around quickly to make sure the woman in charge of the cult hadn't been following us, before heading off in the direction opposite the one Mattias had taken.
The threat of a stitch in my side blossomed to full life a couple of blocks later, leaving me clutching my side
