A Haunting at Midwinter by Kai Butler

Author:Kai Butler [Butler, Kai]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi

Chapter Five

King looked at me, and I gave him the sort of look that said what I thought of his promise to protect and serve. He pursed his lips in annoyance.

“Do we know anything else that will hurt these things?” he said.

“These ghosts?” I said. “These poltergeists? These beings from beyond the veil? The afterlife?”

“These things,” he said. “Which may or may not be ghosts. Or they could be the remnants of a spell gone awry.”

“I mean, salt,” I said. “Iron, probably.”

I pulled out the book, but it hadn’t changed since the first time I’d skimmed it: specific on killing, vague on the how-to. Laurel had said that it wasn’t her specialty, and that there were people who specialized in getting rid of ghosts. Her opinion was that my client, Mr. I Was the Top Rated Rental of 2019, What Are These One Star Reviews, wanted a bargain basement ghost hunter.

Seeing these ghosts, I did feel like I’d bitten off a little more than I could chew with this one. Maybe I’d charge him double. If he didn’t sue me into next year for all the water damage I’d left in the attic.

King was reading over my shoulder and raised an eyebrow. “This isn’t very helpful.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know any alchemy texts that would be better,” I muttered. “The fire poker is maybe iron?”

Not that I wanted to test it in front of him. Iron and me don’t mix. I don’t burn if I touch it, but it isn’t good either.

“Are we ok to leave the circle?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I mean, do we have a choice?”

With a sharp nod, he took a quick step out of the circle and over to the fireplace. He picked up the fire poker and the shovel for good measure, although that one looked like it was about as flimsy as something could get. I took out the canister of salt.

While King examined his weapons, I looked towards the attic. I could feel the salt still flowing upwards from the water softener and pooling in the attic. It was dripping down the stairs we’d left open, a slurry of salt and liquid that none of the ghosts could cross.

Oh. I had an idea, but it would take work and the assumption that King knew as much about witchcraft as I knew about alchemy.

“The rain,” I said.

He squinted at me, and I realized that he couldn’t hear me through his spell. Bracing myself, I left the circle and came close to where he was standing.

“The rain,” I repeated. “I know a spell that might be able to make it a weapon.”

He nodded. “Okay, so what are we looking for?”

“Any evidence of bones?” I said. “Or hair. Or a spell.”

“From the 1800s?” he said, gesturing around to the pristine white walls, the new crown moulding, the polished floors.

Point to the officer.

“Well, something,” I said. “Anything.”

We started in the living room, with the assumption that that was where she would have practiced her fake seances. There wasn’t anything but the scent of cinnamon that we tracked to a plug-in room freshener.

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