Chapter 20 #2
Seiji snorted a little at the scale. “Sanity is a sliding scale, or so I’ve found.”
With one eye on his face, Lachlan drawled, “In other words, depends on which nook and cranny we’re talking about?”
“You do interpret me well.” Seiji cast him a quick smile, barely a curve of the lips. “This riverbank, for instance, I would rate at a solid five. Only because the area’s energy has locked down.”
“Oh.” I surveyed the area again with more understanding. “That locker effect again?”
“Indeed. The area is prone to it.”
I heard the steady crunch of gravel under foot and tracked Gwyn as she approached. She offered a water bottle, which I took, and I was happy to see she had her own about half drunk.
“Break?” I asked.
“Yeah, Mack said to take a thirty-minute breather.”
Seiji looked at her carefully, and I could see the wheels turning in his eyes. “Gwyn, I know you’re a new apprentice, but how new?”
“Oh, uh…” She blinked and looked abruptly shy, eyes not quite meeting anyone’s. “I met them here, so…”
“A week,” I completed with a shrug.
I could see the realization in his eyes. “Oh, you’re very new. Yes, please pace yourself.”
Gwyn’s shyness eased and she indicated Mack working behind her. “He said the same thing. Like, my ability is like a muscle I have to train?”
“Aye, he’s correct,” Lachlan confirmed. His eyes were sweeping the area, though, his attention mostly somewhere else. “You need to gradually work your way up. No shame there. When I first started, I couldn’t work for more than five minutes.”
“Age helps with stamina.” Seiji still studied Gwyn with a slight pull of his eyebrows. “But my concern is not your stamina. You are under good protections. I wish to boost them.”
“Y’know, the way you two are looking around is super cagey. I don’t like it.” Lachlan kept gripping his sword hilt, too, like he was ready to do a quick draw. “Did something else in those mines spook you?”
They glanced at each other before both nodded apologetically. Fuck. I braced myself even as I wearily asked, “Using my earlier scale of one to ten, how bad and what is it?”
“Nine?” Seiji offered, and even he seemed to debate this. “Only because I have seen worse.”
That was reassuring. Not.
Lachlan’s head went back and forth as he debated it. “Nine, as it’s not as bad as the Slaugh? I don’t think? It doesn’t want to kill, but possess, so…”
“In my book, that’s worse. So you know what this is?”
“I do not,” Seiji said apologetically. “I wish I did. I have a few calls to make to colleagues who might have a better idea. But I have clearly seen the energy of it possessing souls. Not live humans, of course, no one’s living up there.
But it’s somehow attaching itself to souls, consuming their remaining power. ”
Lovely. If this case got any more complicated, I’d be tempted to just lay out some C4 and call it a day. No one would blame me.
“Gwyn, you will have a hard time safeguarding yourself against this creature.” Seiji glanced at me. “You as well. I think the only one capable of fighting it off is Eli.”
“Yeah, enough said. What can we do?”
Seiji pulled an amulet out from underneath his shirt. It was interesting, like a new age crystal pendant, but there were knots all along the cord in a repeating fashion.
Gwyn, also interestingly, went from upset to intrigued. She leaned in abruptly, really staring at it. “Huh. There’s this wispy energy coming off it?”
“Hoo,” Seiji murmured, eyes narrowed upon her as if she’d just said something surprising.
Lachlan also looked super interested in Gwyn. “Huh. Bit of a turn, eh?”
I clearly missed something. “What?”
“Can’t see diddly on it,” Lachlan explained as he pointed to the amulet, “but I could feel the vibrations of the energy. Gwyn being a Medium, she shouldn’t be able to see much at all, either.”
“Two talents,” Seiji said. “Psychic Energy Reader as well, unless I miss my guess.”
Now, it was not unheard of to meet people with two psychic abilities, it was just stupidly rare.
And the stronger the talent, the more rare it was.
More typically, you saw a person with two mediocre abilities.
But Gwyn was strong, everyone said so, so she was just the ultrarare type.
Unless the Energy Reader talent wasn’t as strong? Still crazy rare, though.
Gwyn’s eyes bounced from face to face. “I don’t get it.”
“I would like to test you before confirming anything,” Seiji requested. “But that can happen later tonight. I must buy things and set up. Also, would you like an arts and crafts project?”
“My favorite thing.”
That she knew how to answer. She hadn’t even batted an eye. I snorted.
“Then we will go to the store. We need pendants for everyone. I will teach you how to make them.”
“Okay by me.” Gwyn looked at me with the can I go face.
I waved her on. “Go, go.”
She retreated to grab her bag real quick, smiling as she skipped away. She clearly was done with ghosts today and wanted to sit and do crafts. Couldn’t say I blamed her.
Lachlan turned, a foot already on the stairs. “Brandon gets two.”
Seiji shrugged in agreement before going back up.
I, however, objected. “Now wait a second, why do I need two and everyone else gets one?”
Lachlan’s face was the epitome of I can’t believe he’s asking me this. “Because, mate, if you’re possessed? We’re fucked.”
Hard to argue that.