Page 33 of Grave Expectations

“These don’t look fun,” she murmured.

“No,” Alaric said quietly behind her. “They don’t.”

She turned the page anyway.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

“This is silly,” Roz said, staring at the dead plant.

“Absolutely. It doesn’t need blood, it needs water and sunlight,” Alaric said.

Roz glared sideways at him. He smiled back good-naturedly.

“Okay, here goes nothing.” Roz pricked the tip of her finger with a needle, squeezing the pad of her finger until a drop of blood collected there. Then she let it fall onto the plant.

They both leaned forward, staring at the dead plant.

Nothing happened.

“Does it say anything else?” Alaric asked, shifting to look at the old grimoire. It lay open to the page about the trials, which were short and didn’t include much information. Did they expect future necromancers to just pass the information along?

“No,” Roz said, starting to stand. Alaric grabbed her wrist suddenly. “Wait, look.”

The plant was no longer dead. Sometime between when she looked down and when she glanced back up again, it transformed from a collection of dead, sagging leaves to something upright and green.

Alive.

“It worked!” Roz said.

“Of course it would,” Alaric replied.

“What happened to ‘it needs water and sunlight’?”

“It still needs that, lest it die again. Come, let’s put it on the windowsill.” Alaric tried to grab the plant, but his hands moved through it. It seemed his ability to touch things were limited. While he was able to undress her and bring her to multiple orgasms, his grasp on the rest of the corporeal world was flimsy at best.

“I got it,” Roz said, taking the plant to the windowsill in her kitchen. She paused at the sink, lightheaded from standing so quickly. The exhilaration of the magic must have gotten to her. All those years of being seen as less than by her family, and now she was suddenly capable of magic that hadn’t been seen in generations.

It was a lot.

“One trial down,” Alaric said.

They tried a few more experiments that afternoon, all of which she failed at. She couldn’t heal a wound (her fingertip bled until she put a bandage on it), ill people didn’t recover (they visited a hospital—though maybe it needed more time?), and she couldn’t reanimate animals.

That night, they cuddled on the couch and watched movies, and Roz was struck by how normal it felt. Maybe having a ghost for a boyfriend wouldn’t be so bad?

The next day, she paged through the trials, considering her options. They all felt so small, like she was eight years old again, being asked to meditate and sit still instead of play outside. She wasn’t a child anymore; she should try something bigger.

“Which one are you trying today?” Alaric asked. Despite the fact they were creeping toward the Pumpkin Festival, he seemed unbothered, unhurried. He hadn’t asked again about the curse, or how she planned to lift it. He just…trusted her.

That morning Alaric watched her work in the cemetery, unable to help as he had previously. He couldn’t hold things for long, something she knew was frustrating him despite him not mentioning it.

She’d read more about blood magic, devouring everything she could within the short few chapters that mentioned it. Then she went on to the tether, trying to understand it more.

Tethering was temporary, a lifeline extended to the other side to bring a spirit to this world. Alaric could touch her because he was tethered to her, their connection strong because of her blood. But the tether would weaken if not reinforced, and he’d slip back into the state of a ghost.

Today she wanted to reinforce the tether. It was a type of blood magic, though some necromancers without the skill could do it. She’d just have an easier time, since she needed only to pull from herself.

“Not a trial,” she said carefully. “A…reinforcement.”