Ghost Silk (Ghost Perfume, Book 2) | ✔

10 - Tear me in two - Part 2

I stared at the ceiling of Michael's bedroom.

I hadn't passed through the portal as I promised I would.

I would have done it – risked, even, that the portal would deposit me out in the forest again, or on the roof, or in a ditch – if it weren't for the cameras everywhere in the house.

I wondered where Michael slept tonight. He'd told me to take his bedroom again. Since everyone had been out all day, the window in my bedroom had not yet been fixed.

I closed my eyes. How could I have betrayed Vi and Di?

But I had.

I turned restlessly for my phone. Maybe Gabriel could be persuaded to ask Michael to lift the punishment. If he could speak to him face-to-face, he might have a chance. 

In fact, I wondered if Gabriel could lift the punishment himself. Even though Gabriel had been at home less than ever, slight shifts in the dynamic between Michael and Gabriel had been obvious ever since Gabriel's promotion.

Their status at work and their status at home had always seemed tied.

Rose: hey do you know when you'll be able to come back?

My message stayed unread for several minutes.

It was unusual that he didn't answer immediately. I'd texted him earlier, asking about his hand, and he'd answered immediately. But he could be sleeping now ...

It stayed unread.

* * *

ghosts

Normally Vi and Di avoided watery land at all costs. Where there was water, the worms could swim wherever they wanted, unconstrained by tunnels.

But now Vi and Di were invincible.

So it didn't worry them that they flew over the Lotus swamps, that great watery desert that met a part of the sunflower fields.

"Up ahead," Vi shouted. A band of ghosts, stuck in one place. Obviously eaten up by a worm. "They look massively depressed."

Di pretended to play a trumpet. "We 'ave to tell you something," he announced to them in his loudest whisper.

"Wait, le's free 'em," Vi pointed out. She took hold of one ghost's arm and began to drag him away from the others.

"Kid, let me go," he slurred.

"I'm freeing you," she shouted. "Di, you gotta do it too."

Di imitated her, dragging a woman away from the group. She protested weakly.

The ones they dragged eventually woke up from the stupor, as they moved far enough away from the depression worm.

"How did you do that?" the man exclaimed, giddy with freedom. "You tough kids!"

Di eagerly played the pretend trumpet again.

"You gotta listen," Vi said. "A priest sen' us. There's a pries' waiting in the ol' temple to strengthen everyone."

The man and woman who they'd freed looked at each other.

They burst into peels of laughter and refused to believe them.

* * *

Rose

I was in a hallway, grey and white and blue. It was familiar. It was a school hallway, though it resembled no hallway in particular. The floor was marbled tile, the ceiling lights fluorescent. Lockers lined one wall.