Page 29 of Adepts and Alchemists

“It ain’t a ghost,” Henner said, shaking his head.

“Henner’s got magical blood and a little talent, just like you,” Marty continued. “He knows ghosts, even if I can’t tell a ghost from my own elbow without equipment. So if you didn’t do it...”

“Someone else had to have,” I concluded. “Maybe you should fish out that spectrometer one more time. It sounds like your spook is hiding.”

“Or...” Marty began, then trailed off, biting his lip. “Maybe you should take a look?”

I breathed out a sigh, not really wanting to bother with this ridiculousness at the moment. Not when there were so many other things I could have been doing. But I followed Marty to the bathroom, anyway. And there was the writing on the surface of the mirror.

It did read: Help me. But there was something more. Three more letters that looked like: L Y D.

“Or maybe it’sher,” Marty said. “It looks like that might spell: Lydia.”

My heart picked up when I realized he was right. Could it really be Lydia though? If so, how was she reaching out from wherever she’d ended up? I’d never heard of a creature who’d been eaten living to tell the tale. That didn’t mean it wasn’tpossible. So, was Lydia here in the Hollow somewhere, but now a spirit trying to reach out to us?

“Is it possible?” Marty asked, voice rising a little in excitement. “I mean, if it’s Lydia, how would she even be doing this?”

My mind raced as the possibilities began to settle into place. I couldn’t get ahead of myself, but if I was right...

“If she’s inherited parts of Indigo’s magic, it means she’s bound to have some of Indigo’s abilities. One of those abilities is mirror walking. Indigo was always crap at it, but that doesn’t mean that Lydia would be too. She’s a different person with different skills. If Lydia’s even projecting from inside a glass bottle used to hide spirits, she’s more powerful than I expected.”

“But it’s possible that this could be Lydia?”

I nodded. “I guess anything’s possible, but I’ve never seen someone with such a patchwork of powers before.” First time for everything, I figured.

I stood, brushing the creases from my pants. I still had to verify this whole thing before I got my hopes up. But if Marty and I were right, maybe there was something more I could do for Lydia. That meant we didn’t have to spend this entire mission agonizing as we waited for news. Instead, we could track Lydia down ourselves and be proactive about it.

“Grab your equipment,” I ordered. “With any luck, we’ll get a reading on the writing.”

Marty raised a brow. “What then?”

“Then we find a medium and we go ghost hunting.”

Chapter Thirteen

Indigo

“This better not swap my consciousness,” Wanda said warningly, glowering at her cousin, who’d come to loom like an overgrown bat over my shoulder.

Alright, he wasn’t technically ‘looming’ over me. He’d come to sit on one of the overstuffed sofas in GG’s living room, long limbs sprawling in a thoroughly annoying fashion. The warlock was tall, unfairly lean, and lanky. His reach was probably double mine. He didn’t have to lean over me to hand a whisky flask to Wanda. I didn’t like my chances against him if it came to a physical fight. Not that I expected to get into fisticuffs with the arrogant man, but still. The physicality of it bothered me.

I glanced up to find Maverick smirking at Wanda. “That was a one-time thing, cousin mine. You really ought to let it go. I’ve apologized, after all.”

“A thousand apologies will not excuse the fact that I woke up that morning with a penis!” she hissed.

“A what?” I asked, hoping I’d misheard.

“A penis!” Wanda repeated. “A small, limp—”

“Hey!” Maverick interjected. “It is not. If you investigated at any point that day, you’d know that.”

Spots of color appeared high on Wanda’s cheeks. She disguised the embarrassment by tossing her hair over one shoulder with a haughty stare.

“Be that as it may, I don’t trust strange brews from you, Mav. Your track record sucks.”

Maverick contented himself with a smirk and leaned back into the couch cushions. Wanda lifted the vial to her nose and sniffed it dubiously. The liquid was thick and the lightest shade of lavender I’d ever seen. It roiled and lapped at the sides of the crystal as though trying to climb out of the container. She eyed itfor a few more seconds before downing half the vial in one go. I balked when she passed the remainder to me.

“I don’t trust the warlock’s brews either,” I said, raising my hands in protest. “What did you mean, earlier? A consciousness swap?”