Six Signa
SIX
S IGNA
Signa had lost Aris, the only one who could help her, to a bout of competition.
Both he and Blythe were half out of their chairs as they hovered over the bowl, flames illuminating the severity of their faces.
Elijah, for his part, was only encouraging the two, seeming to find great amusement in the newlyweds.
Perhaps Signa might have, too, had one of the spirits not followed them into the parlor.
It was the young redhead Signa had first spoken with.
She seemed to be suffering from great confusion, not abnormal for a spirit withdrawing from her loop for the first time, but concerning nevertheless.
Spirits like this were loose cannons, primed to fire at any moment.
The spirit seemed most comfortable settled behind Aris, though her face darkened any time he showed affection toward Blythe.
Each hostile glance made Signa’s stomach tighten.
She clenched the edge of her seat, ready to spring to her feet should the need arise.
“Relax, Signa,” Blythe chided from across the table, golden threads holding her blond hair back. “The flames won’t leap out and burn you. Just sit and watch if you’d like.”
Signa could only hope that was true. Especially considering that the spirit’s focus seemed to be shifting to the flames.
It was mesmerized and no longer moving, which made Signa tense further.
A wandering spirit stuck in its loop was fine.
But one so consumed by the game that it did not even blink? She had a bad feeling about this.
Elijah managed several raisins before he winced, though Signa expected the sound was fake given that he smirked when Blythe leapt upright.
“How many was that?” she demanded.
“Eleven,” Elijah said. “Think you can beat it?”
“Of course I can.” She smoothed out her dress, assessing the bowl with a strategic eye before she quickly dipped her hand in and plucked out two raisins at once.
She looked quite smug with herself as she popped them into her mouth, repeating the action several more times before she eventually tried to scoop up too many at once.
Only then did she jump back with a soft squeal, whipping her hand from the fire.
The spirit flinched at her outburst but was otherwise still invested in the flaming bowl.
“Thirteen!” Blythe declared, singed but unhurt. Gloating, she twisted toward her husband. “Beat that.”
He scooted her to the side. “I intend to.” The spirit straightened as Aris positioned himself before the bowl and lowered his hand to the flames. Horror twisted the spirit’s face as he did so, her chest rising and falling in hastening gasps as her eyes began to pool with bloodied tears.
“Aris,” Signa warned softly, but the man was oblivious.
Pushing his sleeve up with one hand, he dipped the other into the bowl with a level of determination typically reserved for matters of far more significance.
The spirit leaned in with him, letting out a worried shriek as the flames licked Aris’s skin.
So shrill was the sound that Signa doubled over in pain, covering her ears.
Even Blythe stilled, the hairs along her arms rising. She shivered, perhaps thinking it only a strange chill. When Aris reached for the flames a third time, blood streaked down the spirit’s face. “ Stop it! ” she screamed. “Oh God, somebody open the door! Jules!”
The bottle of brandy shattered, shards slicing Elijah’s skin. He gasped and drew in his arm while the liquor spilled onto the table, making the flames surge higher.
Aris cursed as the fire singed his hand, whipping it out of the bowl with several colorful choice words and clutching it close to his chest. The spirit was stumbling back, covering her eyes and shaking her head over and over again, as if doing so might somehow banish her fear.
She cowered, falling to the floor and hugging her knees tight.
Signa, head spinning and ears threatening to bleed, grabbed hold of the pail of sand, fighting her nausea long enough to douse the flames. Tendrils of smoke wisped upward from beneath the sandy mound.
Across the table, no louder than a breath, Blythe whispered to Aris, “How many raisins did you get?”
He cast her a withering look, though Blythe paid little mind to it. She was already bent to inspect the hand that Aris nursed. He winced as she set gentle fingers upon it, emitting a beautiful diffused glow as she healed the raw, burnt skin anew. Aris watched in awe all the while.
“Cellular regrowth,” Blythe told him proudly. “I imagine it’s all very scientific. You can be impressed with me, you know. I am rather amazing at what I do.” She looked around the table next, reaching for her father’s hand, damp with brandy. A shard of glass had cut the back of it.
“It’s only a scrape,” he said, shaking the liquor off his skin. “I can manage.”
While Elijah had accepted his children’s oddities, he wouldn’t allow himself to rely on them for anything more than transportation, which had been enough of a struggle convincing him to accept. Though Blythe didn’t look thrilled by his refusal, she nodded all the same. “Is everyone all right?”
Human or otherwise? Signa thought. The spirit was breathing a little easier now that the flames were doused, though she still seemed antsy.
Her translucent arms were wrapped around her knees, and she lowered her head between them, perhaps in an attempt to steady herself.
When she shifted one of her feet, Signa caught sight of something that nearly made her lose all the contents in her stomach.
There were no soles to the bottoms of the woman’s slippers. More disturbing were the festering holes of burnt flesh where skin should have been.
It was no wonder she’d been so perturbed by the flames. The soot, the scorch marks, the coughing… It was a fire that had killed these spirits, though Signa guessed most had gotten lucky and died by the smoke before the flames consumed them, given that they weren’t all burnt to cinders.
It seems that I have no need for you after all , she thought, shooting the words to Death. I am doing just fine uncovering this mystery on my own.
His response came a few seconds later, distant and vaguely distracted. I’m glad to hear it.
She closed the bond between them, still annoyed. The spirit’s reaction wasn’t an answer to the question of what had transpired on this land years ago, but it was a clue. And one that would lead her closer to learning how to help them.
“What on earth happened?” Blythe asked as she looked over the shards of glass, some of which Elijah was still brushing from his shirt.
“Perhaps one of us knocked it over in our excitement,” he suggested, though given the way his eyes skirted across the room to land solely upon Signa, Elijah seemed to already have guessed the true reason behind the accident.
Signa nodded once, discreetly. Elijah was no stranger to spirits; he’d been haunted by one on the day they’d first met.
He knew their eccentricities far better than either Blythe or Aris, just as he knew there were few coincidences in the world.
“It’s no trouble,” Signa told him, needing the excuse. “I can clean up the mess.” She moved as if to start, but Blythe was beside her not a second later, helping to carefully scoop sand back into its pail.
“I’m the one who forced the game. Let me help—”
“I insist that you let me handle it. You’ve been working for ages on the palace, and it’s the least I can do.
” Signa didn’t mean for the words to come out so aggressively, it was just that the spirit was still in the corner and its cries were getting louder again.
Already Signa’s head ached with a pain only spirits could cause, and her patience was wearing thin.
She looked to Aris, who understood his cue to step in.
He winced, immediately drawing Blythe’s attention. He squeezed his hand, face pinched in a look of great pain. Perhaps too much pain. “The glass,” he told Blythe. “I think there may be a shard embedded in my palm.”
Blythe grabbed his hand with a ferocity that would make any nurse cringe. She brought it to her face, inspecting it. “I don’t see anything.”
“It’s there,” he urged, wincing again. “Here, come look in better lighting. Perhaps in the dining room…” Blythe managed only a quick apology over her shoulder before Aris drew her away.
Elijah, however, remained behind. He glanced once to the sand, then to the corner where Signa was trying to keep her eyes from wandering.
“Do I want to know what’s actually going on?” he asked.
She scrunched her face. “I doubt it.”
“Would you like my help?”
She shook her head, to which Elijah responded by sighing and squeezing her shoulder on his way out of the parlor.
“Whatever you do, be careful. I’ll be in the study if you need me.” He was gone a moment later, leaving Signa alone with the distraught spirit. Double-checking that all the others were out of earshot, Signa shut the door and hurried to sit beside the woman, who frowned and curled herself tighter.
“Are you all right?” Signa tried to place her palm on the spirit’s back, only for her hand to pass through cold air. Still, the spirit sniffled, seeming to appreciate the gesture.
“ That man was burning ,” she said, dabbing the bloody tears from her cheeks.
“That man’s name is Aris, and I promise you that he is quite well. The fire didn’t harm him.” It was perhaps not her wisest idea to engage with the spirit, and yet Signa found herself drawing her own knees up and leaning against the wall. “You’ve seen fires before, haven’t you?”
The spirit’s head jerked up so fast that, had it been alive, Signa might have heard its neck snap. She stilled, bracing herself as the spirit’s body twitched and flickered out of view and then back a second later, seated across the room.
“ There was a fire ,” whispered the spirit. “I’ve been in a fire. There was a fire…” Her body trembled, then snapped straight again. This time when the spirit looked at Signa, her face was softened with a frown and it looked as though she had never been crying.
“ I am looking for Jules ,” she whispered. “Have you seen him?”
Signa had dealt with spirits like this for years, and still she shuddered each time one behaved so erratically. “I know Jules,” she said at last, trying a new approach. “Who should I tell him is looking for him?”
The spirit sat straighter, the glow around her suddenly brightened. “ Odette ,” she said, then paused, seeming surprised by the name before excitement overwhelmed her. “Tell him Odette is looking for him! Let him know to hurry, we cannot begin until he arrives.”
“Very well, Odette. I’ll let him know.” Signa wasn’t quite sure what to do with the name, but she was relieved to have it.
She was relieved, too, to see the spirit back on her feet, smiling and perfectly oblivious to the fire that had terrified her only moments ago.
Smoothing out her tulle skirts and adjusting her headpiece, Odette offered Signa a wave before she gracefully fled the room.
Alone, Signa’s heart began to thunder, though it wasn’t from fear.
Her blood rushed with excitement, but she masked the feeling as she turned her attention to the once-flaming bowl of wet sand and set to work cleaning it up.
She may not have been able to magic the mess away like Aris or Death could, but at least something good had come of this night.
All it had taken was a flaming bowl of raisins, and Signa was two clues closer to helping these spirits and getting them out of Wisteria for good.