Two Halves Series (51 page)

“I don’t have much time, sweetheart. There’s a witch chasing me. Her name is Miranda. She’s threatening that Aseret will kidnap the children.”

“He won’t get his hands on them,” I growled.

“You cannot protect them without her.” She placed her translucent hand on Xela’s shoulder. “He’s grown too strong for the keepers.”

“How do you know?” I tried to touch my mom but failed. Her ghost vibrated.

“Because the real Xela knows his secret. You have to trust her.”

“She’s lying, Mom. She’s a black witch. And what is she doing among you?” I pointed to the witch.

“Not the Xela you know, darling, not this one.”

“Help.” Xela’s voice had weakened even more.

My mother’s ghost swirled, disappearing like vapor being absorbed into the witch.

Xela’s frail body stiffened. “Your mother and aunt are helping to keep Miranda’s spirit away,” she whispered. “They cannot do it much longer. She’s been attached to this body for decades. And she’s powerful—very powerful.” She shivered as she uttered the warning.

“You’re saying I never had Xela’s soul—your soul—in me?”

“No, it was Miranda. Her magic is strong. She changed my body as well.” Xela’s voice was different from the one I’d heard in my head—not crackly, but genuine, with true emotion flowing through it.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“I’ve known his secrets for decades. My magic is one of the few that can help you.” She took a slow breath; her energy seemed to drain with each exhalation. “I lived in a lair similar to this one until events over twenty years ago cast my soul adrift.”

“Your soul?” I repeated, trying to concentrate.

“Aseret entrusted Miranda to punish me for not turning Xander to serve the underworld.”

Xela’s cheeks flushed.

I covered my mouth to hide a smile. Life radiated from Xela’s body when she mentioned my best friend’s name. “You’re his soul mate.”

The passion of true soul mates reminded me of William. The lust I’d felt for Xander yesterday was Xela’s. I sensed the same desire in her now and couldn’t mistake it for anything else. Xela had tried to get to Xander through me, connecting her lost soul with my body.

My limbs tingled. “He’s keeping you here because he thinks he can change you back.”

She nodded.

“Can he?” Curiosity pulled me closer to the witch.

“I don’t know. He knows I’m lost in this body. He doesn’t know about Miranda but suspects it’s someone else. I can see him here, trying to get through, but I cannot speak. She won’t let me.” The contours of Xela’s face tensed, then softened. She swiveled her shoulders forward, then back, as if she were getting used to possessing her own body again.

“Then how come I can hear you?” I crouched in front of her, keeping our gazes leveled.

“It takes much of our essence to keep Miranda astray. We cannot do it again. Today is the only day for the switch.”

The wind howled outside before entering the cave. My hair fluttered around my face when the breeze hit my back.

“What switch?” I stood and stepped back until my shoulders hit the wall of the cave.

Suddenly, I smelled pancakes in the air and could almost taste the warm syrup flowing off their edges. Only one person made my favorite food smell mouth-watering.

Two ghostly figures now stood beside Xela’s body, partially embedded in her silhouette as if emerging from her arms. My mother was back, along with my Aunt Helen.

I gave my head a sharp shake to make sure I wasn’t dreaming, then focused on my spine, where the sensation of chills would normally arise, but there were none.

“We’re helping her, but we cannot for long,” my aunt said.

“You’re helping Xela,” I repeated.

“You must too, darling,” my mother whispered.

“If you don’t trust me, trust them.” Xela pointed to a corner and twirled her finger.

I turned toward the brush. The black roses unnaturally blooming in the cave turned crimson in the middle and out walked Crystal and Ayer.

“How in the world . . .”

“Hi, Mama,” Crystal said, and my children smiled.

I ran to them and squeezed each until they wiggled out of my embrace. “What are you doing here?” I asked before facing Xela again. “How dare you involve them!” I growled and felt my fangs against my bottom lip.

“But, Sarah, they are involved.”

“Mama, you can trust her,” Ayer said.

How could I? Yet I trusted my children. They knew their destiny better than me.
But they’re only three.
“Why are you here?” I looked into their round eyes that shined like polished buttons.

“Don’t worry, Mama, you will be back.” Crystal cupped my cheek with her palm. Her warmth soothed my anxiety. It wasn’t unusual for her to speak in riddles we couldn’t understand, and I understood this gesture perfectly. She wanted to ease my worries and knew her touch would do it.

“We’ll watch over you. Don’t be afraid. Ever,” Ayer said.

And my son would help with the fear. “I’m only afraid for you.” I smiled.

“Mama, you’ll be stwonger as a spiwit when we need your help. We can draw on youw full essence. Xela needs your body to help us too, and you’ll be able to work together,” Crystal added. Although she spoke through a lisp, my daughter sounded like an adult.

“We will?” I widened my eyes.

The children perked up. “Yes, you can help us. Learn what it’s like to be a ghost.”

Somehow, what my children said didn’t seem daunting. They made it feel like a natural step. “All right. If you say so,” I agreed.

“Yay!” They jumped up and down.

Now the “switch” made sense. My children needed me to give my body to Xela and let my soul flow into hers. I had to do it for my children. They understood our destinies better than I did, and I had to trust them. My stomach grumbled as the nausea of my memories in a witch’s body returned. I pressed my hand just below my ribcage. “I can’t do this,” I whispered.

“You have to.” My mother nodded her encouragement.

“Will I have my body back?”

“We cannot promise,” my mother’s sober tone echoed throughout the lair. “Only if we can find Miranda’s and reunite her soul to die with her own body. The risk is great for you. If we cannot find the witch’s body, you will be stuck in a ghost’s form, alongside her soul.”

“She doesn’t scare me. Not anymore. And I think I can do it. I can help. For the children.”

“It won’t be pleasant, Sarah,” my aunt warned.

“They’ll know I’m gone. William will know.” But I wondered if he would. After all, he hadn’t the last time.

“No one will know if we trick them. Anything can alert Aseret to strike earlier. Take this.” My aunt handed me a ruby ring. I could almost feel her fingers brushing mine. “It’s a fake. It doesn’t have powers. You’ll know what to do with it.”

The ruby shone in my palm. It looked identical to the one I wore. I held it up, examined it closely, and couldn’t tell the difference.

“Crystal, honey, you keep this hidden.” I removed my real ruby from my finger. “It will be our secret, okay?”

“Yes, Mama.” She tucked the ring into the pocket of her slacks.

“Do you know what I’m about to do?”

The kids nodded, both saying, “We know, Mama.”

“I love you so much.” I hugged them hard, as if I were saying goodbye, and dared not think I would never hug them again.
This is temporary. Everything will be all right.

As I pressed their deceivingly frail bodies to mine, I snuggled my nose between them and tried to memorize their smell. The mix of my vanilla and aloe tinged with William’s woody musk blended with their honey-lemon scent. I wondered when I would feel their touch again. Then I kissed each one over and over, only hoping it wouldn’t be long before I saw their pudgy pink cheeks again.

I straightened, wiping my eyes with my sleeve. “Send the kids back first.”

They squeezed my legs. “We love you, Mama.”

My spine froze with the thought that this might be the last time I saw them. I shook it off. “Go home before Daddy finds you gone. I don’t even want to know how you snuck out.”

They nodded, backing up until they stood within the crimson-hearted roses. Then they were gone, and the red shade in the blossoms faded to black again.

I squared my shoulders and, with my chin held high, said, “Let’s do it.”

Chapter 5

Expecting the switch didn’t mask the pain. Unlike the first time, when Xela—or Miranda—stole my body, I didn’t sleep. My soul detached from my limbs as if torn from the flesh, and for a moment, I wished I’d been asleep this time too. The air in the cave wrapped around the white light I became and flowed through me, stinging as if it were salt poured on a fresh wound.

From above, I looked at the empty corpse lying on the dirt floor at Xela’s feet. My dead body. Motionless, empty, without a glow, skin almost gray. Even the colors of the orchid tattooed on my left wrist seemed bleached.

It takes time to get used to,
my mother’s voice soothed in my head.

My ghost drifted ever so slowly over the three feet that separated me from Xela’s slumped form, passing her soul on the way. I didn’t see what the witch Xander had fallen in love with looked like. Similarly composed of light, her soul wasn’t like the one I imagined. Perhaps because I’d expected Miranda’s: the black soul of a wicked witch. Xela’s appeared more like mine than I’d have liked—clear and bright. For the first time, I’d felt like we had something in common.

“You’ll learn to control it,” my mother cooed again.

Before I touched Xela’s host to be transferred into the spirit realm, I wondered if I’d ever leave through the door of the cave. It would be a while before I could walk again.

The leaves outside rustled as someone pushed through them.
Xander
.

Xela’s spirit vibrated. She looked back at me; uncertainty circled her aura. I supposed she doubted if she could control herself around him. She’d been gone from this world for decades, trying to find a way back to her love through me. Now she’d see him, touch him . . . deceive him.

We couldn’t turn back, though, not now.

I entered the body I once possessed, using it as an entranceway to the hereafter of lingering souls. Inside, the ghost world seemed identical to the world I’d lived in except I saw my mom the same way I’d see anyone else and my old body, which was being taken over by Xela, appeared ghostly. It was like I entered a new dimension through Xela.

“Mom!” I ran to throw my arms around her slender figure. “How is this possible?” My arms squeezed around her, feeling the flesh as if it were real.

“I don’t know.” My mother laughed.

“But I’m not a ghost.” I examined my arms and my body, nipping the skin at my waist but unable to feel the pinches.

“You are; but as spirits, we feel just as if we were in flesh.”

Xander’s clambering footsteps echoed down the stairs. Xela had already entered my body and stood, waiting for him.
She did it!

“Come, Sarah, you need to leave this body before Miranda returns,” my mother urged. “We need to hide you.”

“Where is she?” I asked.

“Chasing us in all the wrong places.” My aunt winked. “She cannot know you’re a ghost.”

My mom pulled my hand, and suddenly, we stood beside Xela’s limp body, slouched in the chair.

“Xander will see us.”

“No, we can choose to appear for humans; now we’re not visible. Sh.”

Xander pushed the door open. “I told you to stay away, didn’t I?” he growled, placing food on a stool by Miranda’s body as he glared at mine. He looked ephemeral, like a ghost.

“Stay still,” my mother whispered when I shook my head again, reflexively trying to clear my vision.

“Did you hear that?” Xander looked right at us.

Xela distracted his acute senses with, “I needed answers, but the witch seems to be asleep.” She crossed her arms, imitating my mannerisms.

Unexpectedly, Miranda lifted her head, her cunning eyes examining Xela in my body.

I gasped.

“Don’t worry, she won’t suspect this,” my mother whispered. “She can’t see you while she’s in human form.”

“You pinky swore, Sarah,” Xander’s disappointment pinched my soul.

“I’m sorry. But like you said, it’s complicated, right?”

“Right.” Xander’s shoulders drooped as the fury on his face washed away. He glided toward Xela as if pulled by an invisible force. “We shouldn’t be here,” he whispered, his breath flowing through the cool air toward her.

Xela closed my eyes. “I know.”

I felt her struggle inside. She had mustered all the will she could find to resist him. The tension was like that of a volcano, inactive for thousands of years, ready to erupt; the suppressed passion heated the cave. Xela’s hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.

“Then why do I want to stay here with you?” Xander asked.

“I . . . I want that too, Xander.”

I tightened my lips at the sultry way she’d said Xander’s name.

He noticed the change. “I miss you.” Xander moved closer, closing his eyes. The fire flared in the pit, flickering oranges and reds. Their breathing deepened.

A cackle vibrated through the cave. Xander’s hands flew away from Xela’s hips—my hips.

“Ah, look at the lovebirds,” Miranda mocked, licking her lips.

“The next time I see you, witch, you will be dead,” Xela threatened as sincerely as a promise. Whirling toward the door, she pushed past Xander and rushed out of the cave. He followed.

The minute I saw them leave, I wanted to listen to their conversation; as if something was granting my wish, my ghost was pulled through the cave toward the forest, passing through rock and soil to the outdoors until the breeze swayed my spirit—or perhaps I moved it to the rhythm of the swaying branches; I wasn’t sure. It was close to midnight, the moon shrouded behind the clouds. I remained within viewing distance of the couple.

“You’re connected to your body,” my mother whispered. “When you think about where it is, you’ll be pulled to see it. I need to leave, but when you’re ready, just think about me and your ghost will be with me. The best time to do our job is when Xander is with Miranda. It’s the only way we know her soul is occupied. Otherwise, stay clear of her.”