“I’m okay,” Sven said.
Flo opened her eyes and looked at him. Really looked at him again, like she’d done countless times through the five years he had owned this house and slowly brought life back into it. It was like her eyes remembered what he looked like. The short hair on top, but longer in the back and braided. The funny runic tattoo inked into his scalp. The ghostly white skin and red eyes didn’t scare her and something told her they never had. And part of her body remembered the way his strong, muscular arms felt wrapped around her, protecting her. Just like that memory from the woods, when they talked about running away together.
She wanted to feel that again. Something was telling her that she had been wanting to feel that for years.
“I’m glad you are okay and I’m sorry I ran away when you saw me,” she said.
“I’m glad you came back,” Sven said softly.
“Me too.” And she was glad, though part of her was panicking just a bit.
“I think it’s time weamscraytoo,” Mercedes mumbled out of the corner of her mouth, nudging Magnus in the side.
“Amscray?” Magnus questioned, startled. “Why are you talking like that? Also, I don’t know what that means.”
Sven sighed and turned to look at his twin, his eyes narrowed. “It means get lost.”
Magnus laughed. “Okay, very well.”
“Come on, you can make me a sandwich,” Mercedes said, hopeful.
“Or I can take you downstairs and?—”
“Magnus, just go,” Sven snapped.
Magnus nodded, and Mercedes slipped her arm through his and led Magnus out of the dining room. As she passed by, she reached and gently touched Flo’s shoulder, giving her a tentative and reassuring squeeze, which made her relax.
Now it was just the two of them. There was a part of her that wanted to say so much to him, something locked away in that fuzzy part of her memories, but she didn’t know what it was she wanted to say. There had been so many nights she just watched him, longingly, but not really knowing the reason why. Just that it was right.
“It’s good to see you again,” he said gently.
“I’m glad you can see me now.”
“You didn’t seem so certain before.”
“I don’t remember much.” Flo hugged her arms. “I feel like I remembered more before, but then as the years went on and I was alone here…”
“What about the other spirits?”
“The other ghosts don’t like me much.”
He frowned. “Oh?”
“I’m a revenant or a phantom. That’s what I could figure out from reading books. Other than Mercedes, it takes too much energy for them to touch things beyond the etheric plane they exist on, and I can’t really see where they exist. Nor can I really touch them either. So they’ve always kept their distance.” And she was fine with that because in the early days, they scared her.
“I’m surprised they didn’t ask you to do more for them,” Sven teased. “They seem kind of bossy.”
Flo smiled. “I think they’re mostly jealous of me. I can solidify, but I couldn’t be seen, until Mercedes showed up. Mercedes explained a bit about what happened to me, or what she thinks happened to me, but I don’t remember any of it.”
The moment those words slipped out of her mouth her mind filled with another garbled memory.
A woman with dark hair used a knife to slice into her hand and draw blood. It hurt, and Flo could only scream through the handkerchief stuffed into her mouth.
“You’re sure this will work?” Her father asked the dark-haired woman.
“Yes. My ancestors have cursed many over the centuries.”
“Cursed? I want her to forget the ghoul, marry a respectable son of a business partner of mine. That’s all,” her father snapped.
