Page 2 of Ghoul Me, Maybe

ELIAS

T he tide drags at my ankles, pulling me backward like it’s trying to remind me who I belong to. Who I was . But the wind shifts, and with it comes something sharp. New. Like the air’s gone electric.

I freeze mid-step, foot buried in salt-wet sand, and lift my head toward the cliffs. Someone’s here. Not just another tourist with a camera and a death wish. No, this one hums.

She walks like she doesn’t care who’s watching. Which means she knows they are.

The girl—no, woman—steps onto the edge of Wrecker’s Bay like she owns it. Dark hair twisted in a knot, shoulders set like a soldier, and a scar slicing her brow like punctuation. She looks like she’s been punched by the world and decided to punch back twice as hard.

And gods help me, I feel her.

Like a lightning strike down my spine, my senses scream awake. My vision sharpens past the usual dream-haze. The colors deepen. The rot in the sand, the brine in the wind, the long, long hunger in my chest—I feel all of it, all at once. It’s like waking up in the middle of drowning.

I stagger.

She doesn’t see me. Of course she doesn’t. No one’s seen me in a hundred and fifty years.

But I see her.

I see her because something in the damn veil’s tearing at the seams—and she’s the needle.

The Maiden groans behind me. The shattered hull, wrecked on the rocks, pulses once. I can feel her agony echo up my spine. She remembers too. The betrayal, the relic, the blood.

“Sienna,” I breathe, not knowing where the name comes from.

She’s standing near the same spot I died. Well, part of me died. The rest of me got caught in this gods-forsaken loop. Wake with the tide. Drift through the mist. Forget. Repeat.

But now…

Now I remember her eyes.

Not her face. Not her name, even. But her eyes . They belong to the man who cursed me. Jonas Vale.

“Impossible,” I growl, walking toward her. Or, more accurately, letting the fog drag me toward her like a dog on a chain.

Each step I take, more of me sharpens. The fog that’s wrapped me like a shroud starts peeling back.

The beach tilts.

I grab a mossy stone to keep myself upright and hiss when I feel it. Feel . That hasn’t happened in decades. Not real touch, not weight, not pressure. The veil’s thinning, and she’s the crack letting the storm through.

I’m close enough to see the map in her hand now. Her fingers curl around it like it’s made of bone. She’s muttering under her breath, something bitter and sarcastic. I like her already.

The relic’s near.

I can smell it—brimstone and salt, and something older, darker. It’s calling to me, like it always does.

“Turn back,” I whisper, voice like gravel and fog.

She doesn’t hear it. Not yet. But her spine stiffens like something cold brushed against her soul.

Then she bolts. Smart girl.

I stay rooted in place, heart hammering in a body that hasn’t had a heartbeat in over a century. I press a palm to my chest just to be sure. Nothing. No thrum. Just magic and rage and something else I don’t dare name yet.

A shape forms in the surf. A figure with no face, walking where no man should walk.

I stiffen.

Not mine.

I know every ghost who haunts this beach, every memory stuck in the rocks, every echo in the sea. This one? This one doesn’t belong.

“You feel it too,” I say aloud, turning to face it.

The shadow doesn’t answer. Just stands there. Watching me. Or maybe watching her retreating back.

The tide licks at my heels. Behind me, the wreck whines, a sound like a dying animal and rust splitting bone. Something’s shifting beneath her ribs. Something wants out .

“Not yet,” I mutter, placing a hand against her barnacled side. “Not yet, old girl.”

For now, the Maiden still obeys.

But just barely.

Later—when the fog curls tighter and the moon slices clean through the clouds—I stand at the shoreline again. My form is flickering, caught between what I was and what she’s making me. I don’t like it. Don’t understand it.

But I want more.

I haven’t wanted in a long time. Not like this.

When the waves lap up past my knees, I see the shadow again. Only now, it’s closer .

“You were warned,” I snarl. “This place is mine.”

The shape tilts its head, and for a second I swear it smiles. Then it fades.

Coward.

I stare back up toward town. I can’t follow her there. Not yet. The veil’s thicker inland. But it won’t stay that way.

No, she’s dragging the past back to shore whether she knows it or not.

And if she’s Jonas Vale’s blood?

Then she owes me. Everything.

She’s gone now—back up the path toward the chapel, her figure swallowed by mist and memory. But the imprint she leaves behind sizzles in the air like lightning that hasn't yet found ground.

And me? I’m still here, chest tight, fingers curled into fists of nothing.

For the first time in I don’t know how long, I feel .

Not just the pull of the tide or the hunger of the curse—I mean pain .

Sharp, precise, as if someone reached into my ribs and scraped out what little peace I’ve made with being forgotten.

I sink to my knees in the surf.

The water laps at me, indifferent. But I feel every grain of sand grinding into phantom skin. Every pull of the tide is a heartbeat now. Every drop of wind across my jaw a brand.

And gods help me, I miss being alive.

She’s more than a spark. She’s a match to a powder keg I didn’t know I’d buried.

I watch where she stood, the fog still curling like it’s trying to hold her shape. I don’t know her name yet. Don’t know why her presence cleaves through the fog like a blade.

But I know her.

In the way storm clouds know the sea.

In the way the wreck creaks and cries when she draws near.

In the way every part of me aches toward her like gravity.

And when I whisper into the night, “Don’t come back here,” it’s not a warning.

It’s a prayer.

Because if she does—if she walks that shore again—I don’t know what I’ll do.

But I know I won’t be able to look away.