Ghost Silk (Ghost Perfume, Book 2) | ✔

15 - Pay a toll - Part 1

Rose (continued)

"Radiant one, write my name."

"Radiant one, I am Gideon Thorne. Write me next."

"Quiet," Emma Beldam said. She was smiling. She pushed another young woman forward.

"Coraline Beldam," the one she'd pushed said to me. She looked like Adelaide.

I pulled a piece of my thread to twist with hers, sewed it tight, and cut it off. Pain melted out of her expression, as pain flared in my chest.

"Thank you, priest."

It was awkward to write while holding the book in one hand. I tapped Gabriel. "Give me your back."

He turned so I could open my death book against his back. I wrote her name backwards and she crossed over.

Seraph Beldam was next. An elegant man, who must have been Alaric Beldam, kissed the back of Emma's hand and urged her through. He followed after, thanking me gravely.

"The Blackwoods are next," Morgana said in a tone you couldn't argue with.

"Then the Holloway family," another said, pushing closer.

Laughter from the back of the group. It was a girl with purple-pink hair and some of the biggest muscles I'd ever seen. She stood with her arms crossed beside the giant in the Speedo.

He grinned when our eyes met. His expression was open and kind.

"Could you call Adelaide again?" Jackal said.

I did as he asked and kept ferrying revenants.

The Blackwoods. The Holloways. The Thornes, who were Jackal's closest relatives.

Lysandra Rift. Henry Rift. Lazar and Elizabeth Rift.

Dorian and Vesper Frost.

The twins Alain and Lumia, who smiled at me and thanked me more fervently than all the others.

More and more.

I tried to commit their names and faces to memory, but I had a growing headache from the strain on my thread. I wished we'd brought water. Not to mention nose plugs for the horrendous smell of the volcano, which had grown into a physical monstrosity crouching in the cave with us.

I shifted on my feet, unsteady, and Michael instantly caught me around the waist. "Are you tired?"

"I'm fine." I really was. I was in pain and exhausted, but I didn't have the intense fainting feeling that used to come over me when I threaded too many ghosts. I felt like I could go on for hours. "I don't know how you're keeping a straight face with this smell, though."

They chuckled.

"You get used to the sulfur," the purple-haired girl said. She was one of the last three remaining. She introduced herself as Sarah Nightshade, "and this is my brother, Samuel." She nodded at the nearly-naked giant.

"Call me Sammy, priest." When he grinned wide, I could see he was missing several teeth.

"And this is our baby sister, Thalassa. She goes by Thal."

Thal, who was taller than Sarah and solemn-faced, bit at her nails as she stared at me.

"You looked wobbly, priest."

"Don't worry about me. Should I write Thal or Thalassa?"

"It's any name she answers to," Jackal said. "The Inezchet only wrote Matthew for me because they didn't know that I changed my name after I died. It's the same for my idiot cousin Bobcat, but I think he must be embarrassed about it because he told you his old name, Robert ..." He wrung his hands, staring out of the cave.