Winchester Stone
Lisbeth… Lisbeth… Lisbeth… I couldn’t spit the sentence out, even in the privacy of my own head. For why use words when actions are far more appropriate? All I had to do was reach my fingers out and clasp Lisbeth’s tender hand once more to confirm yes, she was a dead practitioner, just like me. She’d been sitting right underneath my nose. Or rather, running, kicking, jumping, and otherwise saving the day.
But while we’d had time previously, it was soon taken from us. That perilous moan shook up through the floor once more, this time louder and grating, sounding like someone trying to digest their teeth first by turning them to dust in their own mouth.
Lisbeth had already been through the ringer, but that didn’t matter. Somehow the ribbon transforming her skirt into trousers still worked fine, and it enabled her to take a quick step up to me. “You have the book. We must get out of here.”
Yes. We had to flee. But go where? My tired, fraught mind pointed out. Lisbeth was the witch Bram was after. This was the book Bram was after. And Bram had always been after me.
For a few seconds, my mind ground to a halt, the gears of my thoughts no longer working. For the exact thoughts they tried to transport up through my cerebellum were simply too heavy and far, far too destructive.
But circumstances conspired not to let me pause another second. A large section of the ceiling above crumbled down. Lisbeth, showing her usual speed, agility, and importantly, loyalty, shouldered me out of the way. When that wasn’t enough, and the ceiling continued to rip itself to shreds, she grasped me by the arm and dragged me down into the main section of the ritual room.
And there, I imagined she would aim for the door.
We must have been followed. That was the only thing to conclude. And my mind couldn’t even begin to guess what that meant. Had we been followed by a mere spell that had tracked our progress? Or had our conversation been captured, too? I had been practicing some form of a silence spell since my abode, but did that count? Especially when I had no clue what I was up against.
I could think all of these thoughts freely only because I had someone else to save me.
Lisbeth launched herself toward the door, somehow darting through the falling ceiling with skills alone. She didn’t even have to use a shred of magic.
She inclined her head half to the side, using her left ear to hear what was happening on the ceiling as she stared at the ground. And with that, she dodged everything that fell, even most of the smaller chunks of paint-encased plaster. Paint that had once shown such a startling mural, I hadn’t even begun to get to the bottom of it.
But what was at the bottom was very important, because another zombie hand suddenly thrust through the ground. It angled toward Lisbeth’s ankle. She kicked it out of the way, her dress and hair flying around her. She looked like some kind of swirling children’s toy. Though that, of course, ignored her two central abilities: her grace and her bare-knuckled determination.
She showed the latter as a zombie sliced out of the ground just before her. Without pausing, without even grunting for breath, she locked one of her brown buckled shoes against it, grunted, and forced it back. This time she did use magic. She cast it on her hand first, then let it charge over her body. It chased around her waist, shot into her leg, pushed up her foot, and charged into the zombie’s face.
It was just as the fell brute opened its mouth and screamed. I was not in the direct line of sight of its mouth, but I imagined, with a scream like that, it detached its tonsils from its throat. For who cared what kind of damage one did to a dead man’s body? Especially not Bram Stone.
I was finally jolted out of my reverie as Lisbeth dragged me another step toward the door. I saw something out of the corner of my eye – the slightest of darting ethereal movements. Then the same ghost who’d led us here appeared, sallow-cheeked, even for the dead. “Miss,” she cried. “This way. Now. Before it comes. It has crimson soul stones, and you won’t have a chance. Now,” the lass called.
I didn’t have the time to appreciate the fact that Lisbeth appeared to know this ghost. She spun quickly, dragged me over, and soon discovered the hidden door. In her usual Lisbeth style, rather than use her hand, she kicked it with another charge of magic, and my oh my, it was an impressive sight. But more than that, effective. And just in time.
Something shuddered from underneath her feet. It was no mere zombie. I could tell that, for the resultant energies that spread before it like the first few splatters of rain of a drenching storm drenched me in turn. They shook my dead practitioner energy, grasped hold of it in a violent grip I’d never felt, and told me to flee, flee, flee.
Lisbeth must be feeling something similar, because she turned over her head just as she opened the secret passageway. “Whatever is after us?”
“A question for another time when it’s not trying to kill us,” I counseled, locking my hand on her shoulder and shoving her forward.
She teetered slightly, overbalancing for all of about a few centimeters before she righted herself. How she had developed the equilibrium and gymnastic capabilities, I did not know, but everything was starting to slide into place. If Lisbeth McQuarrie was really like me, then she must’ve been on the run for most of her life. But unlike me, she hadn’t had money and privilege to hide behind. And, it seemed, unlike me, she’d made friends with the very ghosts she was meant to control.
For as she set foot inside the passageway, that ghost shot up, one wary eye on me but the situation clearly dictating she be brave, nonetheless. “Close the passageway door. There’s a shield. It needs wizard magic.”
I did not reach out and try to capture the ghost. I simply didn’t have the time. And as a sinking feeling clunked through my gut and slammed onto the floor beneath me, it told me I may never find the time again. Unless I acted. This very second. So I spun.
Before Lisbeth could turn and fumble through the requisite wizard magic to find the correct spell, I lifted the door back from where it had sunk into the floor. A tricky spell indeed. Especially for a man like me – so fresh from so many devastating fights.
But there is one thing that is germane to all humans, across all time and across all places. Just when you think you’re out of energy, if something you need is threatened, you will find more. And I will leave you to unpack that particular statement. I was busy with the door.
I grunted, lifting it as high as I could then hurling it toward the ceiling. I wasn’t actually picking up a real door. I was interacting with the magic that had spread through the dirt. A lot like human nerves, if I were a witch, perhaps I would mistakenly think the dirt had partially come alive. But as a wizard, I appreciated it meant I had finer control over every single particle. Good, because they soon led me to the one thing I needed: the central spell amongst their midst.
Wizard magic, indeed – it was incredibly strong. I could feel it tickling between my fingers, jumping up my body, and jamming its way between every tooth. It was used to dirt, particulate and many numbered. It sought to find the same multitude in my own body, and the only thing close were my cells. I would not let it have them. I took it in hand.
It smelt and acted old. And though I’d never had much to do with the man, I got the sense of Wintersmith. If I had had the time, I would’ve appreciated the overarching sense of age. Wintersmith had been a very intriguing wizard indeed. Perhaps no one else could have started the Magical Academy. The Academy itself had long since departed from its original roots, but even if half of the legends of Wintersmith were true, then he was a wizard like no other.
I got a sense of that firsthand as I finally reignited the spell protecting the door. Just in time. A fraction of a second too late, and something would have powered through and shot toward us.
I was no longer visually aware of what was beyond the door, but I could certainly feel it.
I was tired of describing the differences between witch and wizard magic to you, but this was a timely lesson. For whatever was beyond the door felt like it was beyond all of my knowledge, too. All the fine, important facts I had learned over the years became irrelevant in the face of its power. And, importantly, its darkness.
Even Lisbeth shook as I turned, went to grasp up her hand, and intended to drag her away quickly. But I was forgetting who my indentured was. She was the one who grasped my hand first, and she pulled me away with far more speed and certainty than I could have ever used on her.
“Sarah-Anne,” she snapped competently at the ghost, “where’s Wintersmith? The game has changed. Shouldn’t we go back to the crypt to find him?”
My slow, terribly tired mind took some time to catch up. She was speaking of Wintersmith as if he was still alive. I might have just regaled you with tales of the old man’s power, but they were very much legends.
Unless they weren’t. Unless Wintersmith was a ghost. And, by the sounds of it, in charge of my indentured here.
When Sarah-Anne didn’t answer, Lisbeth cleared her throat hard. “The game has changed. Whatever Wintersmith originally intended is no longer possible. We must reconvene and plan something new. We must do so now. For I fear the very king of this twisted country will now be after us. And he will not be kind.”
“Right you are, Miss,” the lass whispered. “Very well. I’ll take you back to Wintersmith. He won’t be happy.” She winced.
Lisbeth, being Lisbeth, simply snorted derisively. Was it attractive? Let me ask you this – did it need to be attractive?
If I had been careful of my thoughts then, I would’ve realized I was a changed man. I would’ve once answered that of course, a woman’s place was to be there for men in any way she could, whether it be of service or simply visual distraction. Now a twinge chased through my stomach as I realized what a simplistic and useless metric that was. Especially for a man like me, who needed all the assistance he could get, or—
Or, indeed. We had already traveled down a section of the tunnel, and we had reached another. That did not, however, mean we were far enough away from the ritual room to be safe or out of earshot. A critical fact, for there was suddenly a scream. It bounced off the walls. It reached high, and it screeched with the kind of voice that would make even demons shake in their boots.
I twisted my head around wildly, the ligaments trying to snap in their eagerness to catch sight of that fiend.
“Lisbeth—” I began.
“Listen to me, Winchester. I will not let you die in these tunnels. I have taken a mission to protect you, and I shan’t be giving in. Whatever happens next, we run. Do you understand?”
Honestly? No. She had taken a mission to protect me? She meant the indenturing… didn’t she? No, she did not, for I did not see any magic flare around her wrists as she twisted and ran even faster than she had before.
I saw her determination, all right, and I suddenly realized it was the only thing that had truly held her to my side. For if Lisbeth McQuarrie had wanted, she would’ve found a way around the dark magic of the indenturing spell and left me long ago. Something else had pinned her to me, and it seemed as if I was likely to meet that thing soon. As long as we got out of these tunnels.
I didn’t catch a glimpse of the creature behind us, but I certainly heard its cry and certainly felt its destructive capacity. The tunnel continued to shake. I could see the damage racing across the ceiling in time with every step that fiend took. At first it was slow. But I felt the pound, pound, pound as it started to run.
The only sound that was louder – or at least, more memorable – was Lisbeth’s steady breath. Did she gasp or rattle or cry? Did you really need to ask such a question? Return and read the rest of her tales, and they would give you the answer.
“Faster, Miss. I think others will come upon us soon,” Sarah-Anne warned.
“Where do these paths lead? Does one lead straight to Eastside Cemetery? I fear going up onto the city street. I believe we have everything the king and Bram want. They won’t leave us alone from now on.”
… They won’t leave us alone from now on?
Those words slowly melted into me. I was like some warm dessert. And they were as cold as ice. Slowly but surely, they sapped away every single speck of warmth. Then they left me there, running with Lisbeth, appreciating everything had changed. I had not lost everything, but the time for subterfuge was over.
My brother would know who I was. And no matter what tricks I tried to play, he would come after me.
I shivered. I assumed it was just a slight move, but it couldn’t be, because Lisbeth, despite the hairy situation, turned and looked at me simply. She tilted her head down slightly and stared at me from across the bridge of her nose. She was already holding my hand, but why did I get the impression that steady stare was yet another flat, stable floor for me to stand upon? As everything else shook out from underneath my feet, as the world I had once known crumbled, Lisbeth’s gaze was an invitation to stand straight and true by her side.
She was holding my hand, but my fingers still tightened around hers. An unconscious move, but a deep one nonetheless.
“Just around this corner, Miss. Then we will branch off into a different section of the tunnel that leads to Eastside.”
“Wait,” I cried, realizing something far too late. “We still don’t know how Bram is tracking us.”
“I think it was those Ley lines,” Lisbeth suddenly said. She clicked her fingers. “I don’t know how they work, but come to think of it, I think I saw some of those red ones in the tunnels.”
“What are you talking about, Lisbeth?” I was out of breath as I demanded that, but Lisbeth obviously had a lot of experience with running and speaking. I imagine she’d been running the larger part of her life, so it only came naturally to her.
“When I saved you from those half-ghosts in the palace, the only reason I defeated them was that I understood that the red Ley line was being used to assist them in communicating with one another. Though I suppose what you could conclude there was it was being used to control them. I think it’s what our enemies are using to move the dark creatures around the palace and keep them under their thumb.”
I shook my head for so many reasons. She had imparted so much knowledge, I needed an accountant to keep track of it. One thing, however, struck and stayed. “You saved me in the palace? I… didn’t fall down the stairs at home?”
Lisbeth McQuarrie just smiled at me. “A story for another time, Winchester. What you care about now is I don’t think they can hear us. But they can probably track us. Now, how do I do this while running?” She swiped her hand to the side.
It took me a moment, but then I realized she was attempting to interact with the Ley lines always surging through the floor around us. They rose up through the walls and ceiling too. It looked like the very lines of life – like the energy that lightened the universe, bringing light, love, and life to all.
It took me a while to realize what she was doing, because my entire life, I’d had to pretend Ley lines didn’t exist in front of other people. Now it was almost mesmerizing to see somebody else interacting with them.
Mesmerizing, that was, until I heard a ferocious shake power down the corridor.
It was accompanied by a hiss, and then, quite fantastically, a growl. Horrifying, it promised that if it were to ever wrap its teeth around our throats, it would not let go until we had been bled dry.
I reached past Lisbeth’s shoulder. To do that, considering we were still running hand-in-hand, it meant that I had to press my arm against hers. It anchored me, and it did many other things to me I chose not to describe at this moment. But at least it gave me the force I required to grasp hold of a whole bunch of Ley lines and draw them close.
“Fantastic,” she muttered as she blinked quickly. She used the kind of curious tone you might if you had gone to the museum for the first time. As if this was some startling curio and not the very thing that could save our lives.
“Pay attention, Lisbeth,” I growled. “What is it—” Before I could question what it was she was after, my own eyes saw it for themselves.
Often Ley lines are white. They can take on other colors but in a haphazard fashion. Yet I could see crimson red lines – far tinier and harder to spot than the rest.
I reached up and snatched hold of one, grasping it in a tight hand. It was just before Lisbeth could. “I think those strands—” she began.
She tried to explain, but my mind darted off elsewhere. My lips froze. My teeth did too. And that march of stillness climbed down my neck, threatening to claim my whole body. It told me that the force I held now was not just dark, but it was dark in the extreme.
Some foul creatures can’t help what they are. They were not born into opportunity. They were born into the darkest realms possible. Their genes dictate they hunt for flesh with very little choice in the matter. Others? Ah, others have all of the choice, and that makes them darker indeed. You might be a human, and you might not have a forked tail. You might not speak in tongues but instead speak in the greatest language of the land. How irrelevant. If you use all of those skills to ruin the lives of others, to drag them down into the darkness and trap them, then you are worse, by far.
And I could feel such dark control in this red strand. I shouldn’t have to tell you it had the flavor of my darned brother.
“Whatever you’re going to do,” Lisbeth spat quickly, “I suggest you do it, because things are about to get tricky—” she predicted.
Indeed they were. I heard that monster crash through a wall behind us. The floor shook, and it distracted me at the wrong moment.
“Miss,” that ghost screamed.
“I know,” Lisbeth cried as she backed away into me, the move familiar. To my body, not necessarily my mind.
I quickly understood it was familiar because she must’ve done this when she had protected me in the palace.
I thought I almost caught a glimpse of it. I had previously caught a glimpse of peach taffeta and now understood what it meant. But what’s the point in understanding if you don’t have time to appreciate the facts? And I very soon wouldn’t even have time to appreciate my own breath.
The creature now cried out from in front of us. For it had crashed through the tunnel and come upon us from ahead.
Lisbeth didn’t even scream, let alone acknowledge our changing fortunes. She spun to the side. “I wish I had a soul crystal,” she muttered. Then she kicked at the wall. What a waste of energy. Did she honestly think she could tunnel through?
“Just a little further down, Miss. There’s a tunnel on the other side, but be—”
“Quick,” I screamed over the top of them as we finally caught sight of the monster hunting us. I had spent some time telling you that certain dark creatures had little hand in their own existence. They had been born into their baser desires. They hadn’t chosen their path. Evolution had. But maybe I needed to throw out that quaint conclusion now as my darting gaze locked on the creature.
It was massive. You already knew that. This tunnel understood that fact, too, for it had put up with the percussive forces of its every damaging footstep. But that was not its most important feature. It was dense. An adequate term, for it was made, not of matter, but of energies quickly racing around one another and combining in the center. They were ferociously dark. The energies, though mostly of the same kind, occasionally moved, jolting out only to be sucked back in. And as they forced their way out, they looked like groping hands in the dark.
While the creature did technically have a head, insofar as it had a gaping maw, I could tell that it was there to swallow its prey, not to interact with the world like ordinary living creatures.
It was a feature to make its enemies more terrified. For it quickly became apparent it could swallow with the rest of its body, too.
It shot forward, but a stone chose that exact moment to loosen from the ceiling and rain down. All the creature had to do was push one of its long, spindly limbs up, and the rock fell into its outstretched hand with a squish and a splatter. It was instantly digested. For the dark energy swirled around it and broke it down without pause.
I didn’t think there would be anything on God’s green earth that could make Lisbeth scream. She let out a quiet yelp now but soon returned to the task of kicking through the wall. I turned, ready to grab her by the middle and haul her around. For we had no time. The end was surely here. But Lisbeth McQuarrie had spent the last however long teaching me one fact. The end never came for her. For she always found a way to run.
“There,” she spat just before one of her violent kicks managed to break through the wall.
It crumbled down and revealed a stunted tunnel beyond. It was small enough that I would have to crouch, but I did not care. She re-gripped my hand and dragged me in.
Sarah-Anne went to linger. She looked terrified.
I still didn’t know her relationship with Lisbeth – because I didn’t know anything about Lisbeth, apparently. Yet I reached around, grabbed Sarah-Anne’s shoulder, and yanked her through just before the monster shot toward us, many mouths appearing in its energetic body and opening wide to consume us all in one go.
“It’s over. It’s over,” Sarah-Anne stammered uncontrollably. “That’s a manifestation of the curse. It’s escaped. They’re calling on increasingly dark creatures, and we will have no chance. It’s over—”
“Pull yourself together, Sarah-Anne,” Lisbeth said in a voice that was equal parts strong yet kind. It spoke of a person who could soothe your soul – while saving your skin.
And yes… I suppose I had just thought that.
The only person who’d ever been able to soothe my complicated soul was Grace. Yet all thoughts of her were far from my mind and far, far from my grip.
Lisbeth had been doing most of the fighting and running until now. I couldn’t leave this all up to her. Especially when the creature smashed into our smaller tunnel, causing so much damage, there was a cave-in to our side.
I thrust a hand out, forcing magic from the tips of my fingers. It spun into the stones and broke them apart before they could disrupt us. But I would need to do more.
Lisbeth was too busy concentrating on fleeing. I, on the other hand, had the time – a fraction of it, at least – to stare at the Ley lines. I’d already broken one of those red strands, but there were more.
It was hard to say whether we came upon them or they came upon us, but I imagined it was a bit of both. If you had asked the old me, I would’ve told you that Ley lines were dead. Or rather, considering they did signify important life-giving energy, what they were was unintelligent.
You certainly wouldn’t be holding a conversation with them. Nor could they assist you knowingly.
Why, when I sifted through one now, did it feel as if the other Ley lines directed me to the tiniest of filamentous red strands between them?
It was as if they knew there was something wrong in their midst and they were reaching out to me to cleanse it.
As a dead practitioner, I had taken. On every occasion I could. But had I ever given back?
We wizards didn’t have to. We understood the singular nature of will. To truly practice magic, you must apply that will to this world. You must change it in every way you can.
But I had never accepted the other part of that bargain. For it would also change me.
I snapped the strand. And for the first time since the chase had begun, that creature let out a cry as if I’d rendered a blow.
Lisbeth turned around, startled. “What did you do? Whatever it is,” she concluded quickly without even sucking in the breath to finish another sentence, “keep doing it.”
Keep doing it I did. As we ran, as I willingly let Lisbeth lead, I did the hard work of sifting through the Ley lines. While some of those red strands were very visible, the rest – and the majority – were not. It was almost as if the invisible strands were there to lure you in. Traps, if you will. If somebody snapped them, then it would become apparent that a dead practitioner was nearby and could interact with your spells. But the majority of the traffic was taken by the smallest strands. And you had to concentrate just as much as I did to break through them. And break through another I did a second later.
The creature behind us now roared. Bloodcurdling, it was unquestionably angry, but it had an undercurrent of something far more dangerous. Existential fear. Why did I get the impression that I could hear my brother, wherever he was in the kingdom, screaming the same lament?
Probably a hope and nothing more, but I let it power me as I grasped up another tiny strand and cracked it. “You shall have to teach me how to do that. When we get to Wintersmith. If, of course, he allows me to live,” she muttered.
I took nothing of that comment. I was starting to learn enough about Lisbeth to know when she didn’t mean her words. It still was, however, an indication of the quality of her relationship with Wintersmith’s ghost.
I could be cruel to you and tell you that Lisbeth would have the same kind of relationship with everyone and anyone she encountered. Her battering ram of a personality simply did not get on well with others. But I knew something else – how we wizards thought. If I was Wintersmith and I had access to somebody like Lisbeth, with her raw power and unstoppable force, I would control her too. And no, I couldn’t see the irony of that statement, considering she was my indentured.
I did have control of her. Or at least ought.
She yanked me along again, and it was just before I could snap another strand. “Lisbeth,” I growled.
She turned, her hair attractively furling around her face. “I just assumed you didn’t want to be knocked out by falling stones. My mistake. I can thrust you back into them if you’d like?”
Cruel words, but… bear with me, the way she said them, the way her lips moved, the way her hair bounced, the way her entire body worked with her lips to convey that statement… it would’ve held me in place if I weren’t running for my life.
“Whatever you’re doing, Master,” Sarah-Anne stammered, “keep doing it. I don’t want to go back and check on that creature, but it seems to be weakening. We need to get it to slow. We can’t lead it to the cemetery. Please,” she encouraged.
Without complaint, I continued.
I couldn’t tell you how many of these red strands swarmed through the Ley lines, but I could assume I needed to destroy every single one to have a chance. And I could confidently promise you that the creature would not let me grasp such a chance.
“It’s gone quiet,” Lisbeth began.
Indeed. But not for long.
It roared again. It was going to get ahead of us.
I sliced my gaze to the side, preemptively looking for a section of the wall to blast through. But that’s when Sarah-Anne let out a wheeze of a scream. “There’s nothing but solid dirt around us. We are—”
We were not done for.
My entire existence up until this point, I had looked after myself. I had done that by carefully controlling my every experience. By never running into trouble, and critically, by never helping others. For it is often through the vulnerability of assisting people that you encounter tricky situations you can’t control.
My old personality would’ve laughed at me and pointed out I’d always been right. If only I had stuck to my old principles, I wouldn’t be in this perilous situation.
But now?
Now indeed. There was another roar, and once more, the fell creature got ahead of us.
This time Lisbeth didn’t run with me hand-in-hand. She didn’t grunt that we could get through this. She trembled, and it was one of the most frightening moments of my life. When a stalwart can’t take it anymore, it’s a very good indication that it’s over. But it would never be over for me. Not now I had finally found my reason to fight.
I roared. I reached to the side. Even though you could claim this was nothing more than a frantic waste of energy – and the last few seconds of my precious existence – I snatched up the last tiny red filament of Ley line I could see. And I snapped it.
It was just as Lisbeth turned, just as my indentured threw her arms around my back, using her body to protect me. But there was nothing to protect me from. For as the strand cracked, there was a great cry.
The creature was thrust back. I had previously told you it looked as if there were hands inside it. There were many mouths, too. I had simply assumed that the energy making it up could transform into multiple shapes. I had not thought that they were multiple shapes being held together by a single spell. As I broke the last red lay line, that spell broke in turn.
The creature let out another great cry you’d be able to hear from the moon. Then it stumbled down to one knee. No, three knees. Four knees – oh, to hell with it. You didn’t need to know how many different body parts I saw. The only pertinent thing was the fact it started to break. As energy sloughed off it like a snake losing its skin, it jolted the remains of its head up, opened what had once been its largest dark maw, and cried out. The promise was clear. It would come back. And next time, it would kill.
Just before it could break apart completely, it shot toward Lisbeth.
It was my turn to spin with her. She might’ve tried to sacrifice herself for me, but I would not let her do that when it mattered most.
I roared, expecting the creature to land a deadly, parting blow, but it didn’t.
I’d forgotten who I was dealing with. Lisbeth didn’t take kindly to people upsetting her plans. Before the creature could strike me, she pivoted, placed her foot between my legs, and actually threw me to the ground. Then she jolted forward, magic flaming around her fist, and dispatched the creature with one last blow.
She landed, her hair sliding over her face, a single droplet of sweat slipping over her brow, splashing onto her lips, and splattering off them as she smiled. She patted down her skirts and rose. The ribbon separating them into trousers finally broke – after putting up one hell of a fight – and her skirts fell about her legs attractively.
With her mussed-up hair, she looked… it would be a dangerous distraction to describe it.
She reached a hand down to me. “Winchester, you’re not here to save me. It’s the other way around. I’ve been given the job to protect you, because you… must be protected,” she muttered. She’d started off strong – in usual Lisbeth fashion – but toward the end there, the words had become trapped on her trembling lips. And why had they trembled? When had they trembled? When Lisbeth McQuarrie had tried to answer exactly what it was that I was to her.
I let her grasp my hand and pull me to my feet. I let the momentum take me forward a step or two until it was easy enough to settle a hand on her shoulder. And this close, why, it was easy enough to see her response. Her eyebrows flattened, her lips puckered up then froze, and her attention, oh, all of her attention locked on me silently.
If I had wanted to take something of this moment, other than how much my proximity stilled her, I had forgotten a very key fact. “Miss and Master, we must get out of here. Wintersmith awaits. The city, oh, the city has never been in a more perilous situation. Don’t you two remember that?” the ghost demanded.
“We’re here to save everyone. So it’s time to leave.” With that, I reached down, plucked up Lisbeth’s hand, and finally took the lead. Insofar as one can take the lead when it turns out they’ve always been on the back foot, when it turns out they’ve never known a thing about their indentured and likely still didn’t. I could walk ahead of Lisbeth McQuarrie, but that would only ever be when she chose to stay behind me. And I would soon find out that was not and never had been her place.