Eddy’s earnestly waiting, like she genuinely believes I can. She’s got nothing to gain by lying, and my pyjamas prove I wasn’t dreaming when I woke up.
It can’t hurt to try.
Most magic, at its most basic level, works through intent and visualisation, so I start there. Choosing the very recent memory of myself warm and cosy amongst the blankets, I focus on the sensation of soft fabric and the chill-kissed air on my toes.
My butt hits the mattress, all of the weightiness returning in a rush. My eyes slide closed as I’m forced to process it all over again.
What in magic’s name happened to me? Can I switch at will?
It’s not hard to test the theory. Becoming a ghost is easier, like stepping back into a familiar pair of worn shoes, but being solid…
I never realised just how huge the difference was. My memories must’ve faded, because having a body is so much more profound than I recall. Even the tiny chest-pang that follows that thought is enormous.
“I’m not supposed to be alive.” I rub one hand with the other, trying to come to terms with the alien sensation of warm skin covering muscle, tendon, and bone.
Not that I’m complaining. Ilongedfor this. I just never thought it would be so…intense. I have so many questions, chief amongst them: “If I’m not a ghost,what am I?”
Leo pushes forward, coming to stand at the foot of my bed as he rakes his gaze over me again. “I don’t think you were ever dead.”
“They stabbed me through the heart.” I return his serious stare with a defiant one of my own. “I bled out on that altar.”
I remember it vividly. I relive it every single night. My hands flutter up to my sternum, and I flicker to my ghostly self a second time. That’s when I realise my cracks are gone in this form too; as if they were never there in the first place.
“If you were dead, we’d have needed powerful necromancy to bring you back,” Leo argues, as I drag myself back to solid formagain. “Accidentally touching you wouldn’t suffice. Reanimation—the kind I’ve read about, anyway—doesn’t look like this.”
“There has never been a case like mine for you to make that assumption,” I say, though his points are valid.
“None of the forbidden books I’ve read mention a ghost cracking.” He pauses, hawkish eyes drilling into mine. “What exactly happened when you were sacrificed?”
His tone holds a streak of distrust a mile wide, but he’s forced to step aside when Jasper takes advantage of my long silence and perches on the bed beside me, opening his grimoire. A few words into his murmured incantation, I relax. He’s only using a divination spell to check on my healing.
“I already told you. They stabbed me. I bled to death. You saw and heard the rest, and I’ve spent thousands of nights reliving it. I don’t understand why their spell went wrong.”
Leo rakes his fingers through his curls. “But for what purpose? What was the ritual supposed to accomplish? If they wanted your magic to protect the building, and they’d done it before, what was so different about you?”
I flicker out of existence again, seeking relief from the rush of fear that turns my gut inside out. The loss of control interrupts Jasper’s spellwork, and he sighs.
“Stay still, lass,” he murmurs, placing his hand on my ankle.
Somehow—and I wish I could explain why—I can still feel him, even though I’ve ghosted. Everything else, including the bed, is nothing. His touch is the exception. Stranger still, it sucks me back to corporeality without even trying, and ohmagic, I stifle a moan.
He’s so warm. The heat of him sinks into my skin like sunlight. I want to roll in it, get as close as I physically can to the source.
We could have sex.
I bat that thought away as swiftly as it arises.
Now is not the time…and now that I have a real body, there are massive implications to taking any of them to my bed. I indulged myself before, justifying our encounters as making the most of whatever limited time I had left. I never believed anything could come of what happened with Lambert and Jasper.
Now entangling myself with the heirs—with futureparriarchs—will have very real consequences. Allegations of favouritism would abound if I were to enter even the most casual kind of relationship with one of them. I could destroy the Arcanaeum’s reputation. And romance is a gateway to betrayal. Edmund taught me that.
Though, I must admit, it’s hard to believe Lambert or Jasper would ever use me that way.
I know them far better than I really knew Edmund,the traitorous, touch-starved voice in the back of my mind whispers.I’m no longer a naïve little girl with a crush.
Leo coughs pointedly, and I snap back to the conversation with burning cheeks. All four of them are watching me again.
“Sorry,” I mumble. “I wasn’t expecting… It’s been a long time since someone touched me.”
