Dark Whispers: Spirit Caller, #2

By Krista D. Ball

A rash of teen suicides shakes the remote Newfoundland village that Rachel Mills calls home. As Rachel helps the school investigate, painful memories from her past – events she's worked very hard to forget – resurface and won't go back into the grave where they belong.

As if she didn't have enough problems with her personal life!

Her beloved 93-year-old neighbor falls ill. The man Rachel's in love with moves into her house–along with his girlfriend, the most perfect woman in creation. And a strung-out wreck of a woman claiming to be Rachel's biological mother shows up on her doorstep.

But it isn't until a local boy with a talent for spellwork is attacked by a mysterious stranger that Rachel asks the question she's avoided her whole life: how powerful can a Spirit Caller like herself become.

This is Book 2 of the Spirit Caller Series and is a 120 page/30,000 word novella.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Krista D. Ball
• Release date: Feb 24, 2013
• ISBN: 9781498962759

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

For Sale: One Annoying Spirit

Let’s clear something up straight away: I am not hiding in my bedroom. Yes, I’ve been here for the last seven hours with the door closed and my music blasting. That’s to block out the world and the troubles that surround me, to allow me the quiet to concentrate on the important things, like meditation and research. I am not hiding.

So when a woman’s silky smooth laugh drifted into my room, piercing through my blaring music like some kind of crazy voice magic, I did not cringe. Not even a little. Nor did I put my headphones on. That would have meant I really was hiding. I did what any responsible, mature adult would do in the same situation: I turned up the music.

Are you hiding from the tall man again?

I fell off the edge of my bed and my ass hit the carpeted floor. Gaaawww!

Rachel, you okay? Jeremy shouted, a moment later.

I’m fine, I shouted back, glaring at the elder spirit who now stood in my room.

An amused expression flickered across her features. It is cowardly to hide from the tall man.

I’d first met the spirit last autumn, when a well-meaning local kid dabbling in magic had called up the entire spirit population of Newfoundland’s Northern Peninsula. Her appearance varied slightly, either in dress or length of hair, but she’d been appearing to me all week as a young woman, as opposed to middle aged as before. Her straight black hair had beads and feathers mixed into her braids. She wore what I assumed was traditional dress for her people, lots of furs and animal hide.

I told you that you weren’t welcome in my home. Not until I find out why you can manifest near me without ripping my mind apart. Then, you won’t be welcomed because you’d make me crazy.

You keep summoning me, Spirit Caller.

I ignored her pet name. I am not summoning you.

Intentional or by mere chance, nonetheless, here I am. She tipped her head to one side. Perhaps your power is maturing, so your mind is adapting to my presence. Your subconscious wishes to know more about me and my people. It is calling out to me.

All I want to know is what’s wrong with me.

The last week had been a whirlwind. The sudden disappearance of my ability to sense the other. Two suicides in town. And Jeremy, aka The Tall Man. A crisis would not be complete without him complicating things.

Like I said, I’m not hiding. I’m working. I sat back on my bed and picked up the book I’d been reading, only to slam it shut a moment later. Ok, it wasn’t really a research book. It was a novel, but – BUT – it was a paranormal novel. That totally counts as research.

I looked at the various items on my windowsill. The old medicine bag that had been around my neck when I was abandoned as an infant. Photos of my loved ones: Mom, Dad, Mrs. Saunders, Manny, friends from high school and university. Reluctantly, I had also included a photo of Jeremy. I’d used the items to set up a magical ward around my house after the events of last September.

I would never have thought of doing that before, but things had changed.  I knew my ward was flimsy and amateurish. A real Wiccan or pagan could have set it up like spiritual razor wire. Mine? I couldn’t see it, but the elder spirit had told me it resembled streamers wrapped around my house instead of scary wires.

For the most part the ward worked, though. Spirits left me alone, getting the hint that I wasn’t available to chat. Except for the last week. That’s when it started. The loss of the other. My ability to see spirits hadn’t changed; exhibit A is camped out in my bedroom. Rather, I’d always experienced headaches, confusion, and sometimes brain-crushing pain when in the presence of the supernatural. Not now. I should not be able to sit here, casual as you please, with a thousands upon thousands year old spirit poking at the mirror on my dresser.

I wonder if it’s stress.

The elder spirit tipped her head in an exaggerated thinking pose. Hmm?

"There has to be a logical reason why my ability to sense the other is gone, yet you’re still hanging around. Last time we met, your voice made my nose bleed. I blew out a frustrated breath. I think I liked that better."

The elder spirit made a face at me before leaning forward to study a photo of me and Jeremy that was on my dresser. Does the tall man still copulate with the leggy woman?

I gritted my teeth. If you insist on haunting me, then please do something useful.

What would you like me to assist with?

You could help me figure out why you don’t make me want to claw my eyes out.

Have you recently bumped your head?

I rolled my eyes. It’s not a concussion.

Then I must conclude your mind is fraying at the edges, little Spirit Caller.

I narrowed my eyes I’m not a spirit caller. Why would anyone want to call spirits? What a stupid skill. I do not need to be haunted by a … how old are you again?

Old, she said, not looking away from the photo. Rachel Spirit Caller, you should tell the tall man that you wish to bear his children. I am certain your ancestors will be pleased to hear you pray for a new, impossible deed.

I rolled my eyes at her. What is your name?

The elder spirit examined a potted ivy that hung from my ceiling. It has been a very long time since my name was evoked. She sniffed the plant, even though she was a spirit and had no sense of smell. Can you handle its use?

Spirit, what is your name? I demanded. If she would not leave me alone, I wanted to know who she was. Hey, I might be able to use her name to banish her. That’s what they did in paranormal romances.  Maybe it worked like that in the real world, too. It’s possible. Don’t look at me like that.

You may call me Dema. It was what my people called me as a child.

Dema, I said, bowing. I am honoured that you shared your name. Now, please, go away.

Dema snorted. It pleases me to see that you are able to speak to me without your brain attempting to escape your skull. I can now be your…sidehorse? Is that the word? And then the elder spirit, whose presence once forced me to my knees, disappeared from my room as if she was a part of my imagination.

Sidekick, I muttered to the empty room.

For all of my life, whenever something spooky was nearby, I’d gotten a spine-crawling sense of the other. Since moving to Newfoundland and being smack in the middle of Other Central, I’d gotten used to the everyday sensation of it. Now there was nothing. And the shabby wards around my house weren’t enough to keep out the sensation; they merely kept the weaker spirits away.

Which leads to the most burning question: why on earth had Dema been able to chat me up like we were old friends and I not collapse to my knees, dry heaving and gasping for air and pounding on the floor trying to get someone’s help. I felt nothing. Absolutely nothing.

What the hell was wrong with me?

Rachel! Jeremy called out. We made supper. Did you want any?

We. We. We.

I really hate that word.

I’ll be right down.

Normally, supper with Jeremy would have me weaving around his legs like a cat in heat. Well, maybe not that bad, but close. Unfortunately, there is that we. You see, Jeremy is living with me temporarily. So is Donna, a.k.a. the leggy woman the tall man is copulating with.

Yeah.

I was hungry and tired of hiding – I mean working – in my bedroom, so I headed down to join the love birds. A plate of pasta was thrust into my hands the moment I reached the bottom of the stairs, by a living, breathing goddess.

I didn’t know which was worse: the spiritual crisis I was having, or the on-going crisis that was my love life. Either way, I needed to fix both.

And soon.

CHAPTER 2

’Twas a Dark and Stormy Night

It was a dark and stormy night. A good paranormal romance could never have a