Chapter 2
Mercury had never crossed paths with this enormous specter before. He knew he hadn’t. Mercury’s name was known, and he had a reputation that had made that name a little famous. But this ghost knew him by sight. No one ever did.
Quick as that, Mercury’s curiosity about the towering phantom turned to suspicion. Ever since Granny Grey had arrived with a warning that there were ghosts in the kingdom who knew things about him, dangerous things that could spell disaster, he’d been on edge.
He tucked his hand in his coat pocket, where he kept an inauspicious iron key, a memento of his miserable childhood and a reminder of all that was at stake should his past become known and the consequences of all he had done catch up to him.
“Welcome to the Rooster and Ram,” Mr. Jones said to the newly arrived couple. He didn’t manage to keep his eyes off their exceptionally large ghost for more than the length of a breath. “Sit anywhere you’d like. We’ve hot soup and bread on offer today.”
They nodded and turned to look at the room. Baby and Zizzy watched the new arrival with their ghostly mouths agape. The villagers inside still sat in stunned silence. Mercury couldn’t afford that.
“Come sit with us,” he offered.
“Thank you,” the man said. He and the woman, whom Mercury guessed was his wife, took seats at the table where Mercury and Tacey were sitting. “I’m Abel Vann. This is my wife, Sally.”
“Tacey Wilde,” Tacey introduced herself with a friendly but slightly bashful smile. Was she nervous around strangers? She hadn’t been with the last two clients to come to Aventine Manor.
Mrs. Vann looked across at Mercury. “Are you actually Mercury Raine? The famous ghost broker?”
So, their ghost knew immediately who he was, but the Vanns didn’t? This was growing stranger by the moment.
“I am,” Mercury said.
Mr. Vann looked around the room. “Rumor has it you have a shocking number of ghosts. I don’t see so very many in here.”
“They are all within a five-hundred-foot radius,” Mercury said.
Years of practice kept his response perfectly amiable despite his growing discomfort.
For this man, unknown to him mere moments earlier, to press however subtly for information regarding his number of ghosts was enough to make him uncomfortably wary.
“Then you do have a lot of ghosts.” Mrs. Vann sounded pleased. She also sounded like she meant to chase that thread.
His uncomfortable wariness was shifting quickly into being on the alert. Mercury needed information, so he quickly pushed forward with his own chosen topic. “To which of you is your ghost attached?” He motioned with his head toward the towering specter nearby.
“To me,” Mr. Vann said. “He is called the Violet Giant.”
“Is he your Originary?” Mercury asked.
Mr. Vann shook his head. “He’s been with me for about five years now.”
Interesting. But where was the Violet Giant before that? Who had he been attached to?
Somehow the Violet Giant had known him at a glance. Mercury couldn’t for the life of him sort out how. He had never had a portrait painted of himself, and for good reason. Until he had those answers, he needed to keep the Vanns and their ghost nearby.
“Would you both like to visit Aventine Manor?” he offered. “You are unlikely to see all of my ghosts—some of them are quite timid—but you could see quite a few.”
The couple exchanged looks. A silent conversation passed between them, the way it often did with people who’d known each other for a very long time.
“We would like that, Mr. Raine,” Mr. Vann said. “We can delay our journey a bit.”
Perfect.
They enjoyed a quiet and uneventful meal. Mercury learned the couple was from Bedfordshire. He had no connection to that county. He couldn’t think of an unpointed way to inquire as to the Violet Giant’s history, and he could sense that a direct approach would be a regrettable one.
If the Vanns weren’t in a rush to reach whatever their ultimate destination was, then perhaps he could convince them to remain at Aventine Manor for a few days. In that time, he could sort out how the Violet Giant knew who he was, and what else he might know that he oughtn’t.
So significant was his focus on the potentially dangerous answer to that question that they’d covered nearly the entire distance back to Mercury’s home before he realized Tacey was watching him rather pointedly. He also realized that he’d not spoken to her even once during their walk.
“I’m being rather dreadful company, aren’t I?” He hoped his smile of apology helped a little.
“Why is it you invited the Vanns to visit your home?” she asked.
“They seemed interested in the ghosts.”
She looked unconvinced. “I suppose they did a little. Do you often open your home to people simply because they are curious about your ghosts?”
“My home is always open to clients.”
“They never expressed an interest in swapping ghosts, so they cannot rightly be called clients.”
She was not easily fooled. Having so clever a neighbor would make keeping his secrets all the more complicated.
“Not clients yet. They have traded ghosts before, which makes it possible they might do so again in the future,” he said.
“And, even if they don’t decide to allow me to broker a trade for them, if they enjoy themselves at Aventine, they might recommend my services to others who are wishing to swap ghosts. ”
“So, it is wise from a business standpoint?” She seemed to doubt him a little less.
“And I am excited to see the other ghosts’ reactions to the Violet Giant. That alone will make it well worth hosting unexpected guests.”
She smiled a little at that. “I have never seen a ghost that large.”
“Neither have I.”
Tacey appeared satisfied with his explanation. Which was a relief, but also a source of guilt.
He hadn’t been honest with anyone about his origins in well over a decade. Dishonesty in the name of self-preservation was a necessity he couldn’t avoid. And it didn’t bother him.
At least it hadn’t . . . until now.