Deck 13: Three Lost Souls

By Ethan Somerville

After being summoned, ghosts Carrie, Joseph and Dylan lose their link with the Moon Princess and must find their own way home.

Meanwhile, witch Mama Yaga attempts to unravel the horrible spell Dr Ellis O’Coulter cast over the Queen Mary and inadvertently destroys her own portal. Unfortunately, there is only one person with the power to help her to return.

Carrie, Joseph and Dylan embark on a hair-raising adventure through the planes, dealing with ancient beings, trading dark secrets, and confronting skeletons from their own pasts.

And if Mama Yaga ever wants to see the Moon Princess again, she must place her trust in a powerful enemy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Storm Publishing
• Release date: Apr 24, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005465773

Ethan Somerville

Ethan Somerville is a prolific Australian author with over 20 books published, and many more to come. These novels cover many different genres, including romance, historical, children's and young adult fiction. However Ethan's favourite genres have always been science fiction and fantasy. Ethan has also collaborated with other Australian authors and artists, including Max Kenny, Emma Daniels, Anthony Newton, Colin Forest, Tanya Nicholls and Carter Rydyr.

Book preview

Deck 13

Three Lost Souls

By

Ethan Somerville

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SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Storm Publishing on Smashwords

Deck 13: Three Lost Souls

Copyright © 2022 by Ethan Somerville

www.stormpublishing.net

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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Chapter 1

A point of light appeared on one wall of the cabin and cycled open to reveal a large, glowing portal. A slightly stopped old woman stepped through. From one pocket of her old patched apron, she drew out a pair of steel-framed spectacles with various lenses attached, and put them on.

Oh, excuse me! The old woman reddened furiously, even though the room’s occupants couldn’t actually see her.

Not that they would have paid her too much attention otherwise – they were far too busy doing … what they were doing.

The ghost witch Mama Yaga quickly stepped back through the portal to give the pair some privacy.

Obviously the room’s haunted reputation hasn’t dampened their ardour at all, she grumbled under her breath, "or perhaps it only made them more excited!"

Old Mama Yaga swirled the portal back down to a small hole and waited beside the wall with her arms folded, one pointy-toed slipper tapping impatiently.

Even ghosts could get bored.

Mama Yaga had finally accomplished what she had spent many previous months practising. She had mastered the art of interacting with the land of the living.

A few days after that fierce battle with the dark magician Dr O’Coulter, Mama Yaga spent several hours meditating. Then she travelled back to the deserted wilds of her native Russia, to the place where she had felt the most comfortable. Carrie had told her about how she had taught Joseph and Dylan, in a quiet, familiar place, and the old woman thought this might work for her.

So, in a green field near her old home, she attempted to shift some autumn leaves around. Unfortunately, like all the times before, nothing happened, and Mama Yaga grew increasingly impatient and frustrated. Surely if three novice teenagers could learn to interact with the living world so quickly, then so could she, a very learned and experienced cunning-woman!

However, because she had spent so many years aboard the Moon Princess believing that she was still alive, this had created a significant block in her mind. Even though on the surface she accepted the truth, some part deep in her subconscious did not. She would have to overcome this first, and accept that she really was one hundred percent ghost. But how on Earth did she accomplish this? She would have to mediate again, calm her frustrations.

Mama Yaga was about to sit down on the grass when she noticed the sky darkening as a large autumn storm approached. Lightning flashed in the depths of thick, ominous clouds, and thunder followed with a threatening rumble. The wind picked up, and those leaves she had tried to disturb began to swirl and dance on their own.

The mage turned to scurry back to her portal, to the safety of the Moon Princess. Then she stopped and wondered what the heck she was doing. She was a ghost, and completely insubstantial! Bad weather would have absolutely no effect on her!

Stupid! She made a fist and whacked herself in the forehead. There! Positive proof of what she’d suspected – that subconsciously she still felt she was alive.

Mama Yaga turned to face the oncoming storm, both hands now clenched into determined fists. If she could sit down and meditate in the middle of that raging tempest, achieve a state of complete tranquillity, then she would have finally overcome this deeply-buried belief.

She sat down in a cross-legged position in the middle of the meadow, hands on her knees with palms facing up. Lightning flashed again, brighter this time, and thunder crashed. She flinched. The storm was approaching with deadly ferocity. It was going to be a good one.

It can’t affect me, she thought. It can’t touch me at all. As such, lightning is just light, and wind and thunder are but sound.

She closed her eyes, cutting off the brilliant flares of illumination, the sight of the grasses bowing, trees swaying and leaves fluttering off into the air. She couldn’t feel the wind at all. Only the sound of thunder reached her, but even though it grew louder with each report, it began to seem more distant – like she was hearing it through one of those silly picture-boxes. What was it called? Ah yes, a television!

The storm continued to roar and crash around her, but Mama Yaga remained steadfast, as immovable as a mountain. It can’t hurt me, she thought again. It can’t even touch me.

She opened her eyes, and saw that it was raining. No, not just raining but pouring. The wind sent blinding sheets of water lashing the long grasses almost flat against the ground. The liquid passed right through Mama Yaga, but she felt nothing. No icy wind, no dampness, no pressure.

When she stretched her arms out, she saw that her woollen sleeves were perfectly dry.

I am dead, she thought, and thus completely untouched. Closing her eyes again, she proceeded to empty her mind once more. This time, the sound of thunder also receded until she experienced nothing but peaceful, perfect silence.

When she opened her eyes again, hours must have passed because the ferocious storm was gone as though it had never been, and a brilliant full moon shone down from a beautiful, star-speckled sky. Droplets still clinging to the grasses sparkled like gemstones. Not a single gust of wind marred the perfect evening.

The old woman realised that she had sunk into the soil, almost down to her waist. Of course, she couldn’t feel the wet ground either. Its presence beneath her feet was merely an illusion. If she so wished, she could float right through the entire planet. She concentrated and floated back up to the surface. Her mind was still as calm as a millpond.

A single leaf fluttered down in front of her and landed as lightly as a butterfly. She stared at it, and hardly concentrating at all, she imagined nudging a feather. The tiny leaf jumped a couple of inches. Excitement gripped her, but she had to make sure that the brief movement hadn’t been caused by a breeze.

She calmed herself, put all elation from her mind, and tried again.

The leaf moved again, this time taking a more definite leap of almost a foot.

Yes! Mama Yaga wanted to whoop and punch the air like a modern teenager. She had overcome the first, and hardest hurdle.

After that momentous occasion, it was as though a tap had been opened inside her mind. After only a few hours of practising in that storm-swept field, she felt like an old hand at moving things around with her will.

She returned to the Moon Princess, ate the largest meal she had ever consumed, and then sought out Carrie, Joseph and Dylan to tell them the good news. Unfortunately, she couldn’t find the kids anywhere, and supposed they’d gone off to do their own things.

No matter. She would run into them eventually. She went back to practising.

Now, as she lounged against the wall in the stairwell between decks 12 and 13, she felt she was controlled enough to at least start examining the massive spell Dr Ellis O’Coulter had woven over the Queen Mary.

She glanced through the small portal.

If only that energetic young couple would hurry up and finish their shenanigans!

Mana Yaga appeared about eighty years old, her long hair as white as snow, and pulled into a big bun on top of her head. She had a beaky nose, a pointy chin, and bright blue eyes. She usually wore a shapeless grey dress with a patched apron of many pockets, and a multi-coloured shawl with long tassels draped around her shoulders. Even though she didn’t need to, she used a gnarly old shillelagh to help her walk. This heavy walking stick could become a weapon, and not long ago she’d used it to bash an invading demon.

At the moment it was stashed in one of her pockets.

In another of those multi-dimensional pockets she carried a second walking stick, this one more elegant and capped with a dragon’s claw clutching an orb. It had belonged to Dr O’Coulter, and she thought it might be able to help her unravel his spell. In the rest of her enchanted pockets she had packed spellbooks and magical supplies.

She glanced through the portal again. Finally! she exclaimed in relief. The pair on the bed had fallen asleep at last.

Mama Yaga enlarged the hole and re-entered the haunted cabin known as B340. Inside, she adjusted her spectacles with the many lenses. She could see all the runes without them, but the glasses made everything clearer, divided the various schools of magic into different colours, and provided labels.

My word, she marvelled at the huge spell covering the room. She had known it would be intricate, but nothing like this. It was by far the largest, most detailed rune she had ever seen. She could tell that it had started as a simple binding spell, but Dr O’Coulter had been adding to it over the years until it now covered the entire room, and resembled a work of art.

From binding ghosts the rune had grown to controlling them, harnessing their energies, and then transferring this power to keep the spell running, and sustaining the caster. Dr O’Coulter had been feeding on their essences for years.

Where on Earth did she start working on something like that? All the sigils were so entangled and intertwined, that if she pulled on the wrong one the entire thing could fall apart like an old rotten blanket. She had no idea what so much highly concentrated magic would do when suddenly released. Maybe it could cause a backfire big enough to take out half the boat!

She certainly didn’t want that.

This was going to be harder than she’d first thought. The old woman dipped a hand into another apron pocket and drew out a thin book. She tapped on its cover, and it puffed out to become a hefty volume ten centimetres thick. She opened it to a blank page and started transcribing the thing. Because it was a three-dimensional enchantment, covering all four walls and the ceiling, she had to draw each surface separately. This took her about three hours. But by the end she thought she had a faithful representation of the thing.

She marvelled at it again, the sheer genius of Dr Ellis O’Coulter – and the magnitude of his evil. She had to concede that the black magician was considerably more powerful than her.

However, he still hadn’t deserved to get sucked into Hell. Not when a path to redemption still remained.

Mama Yaga headed back to the Moon Princess for a snack to replenish her energies, then quickly returned to the haunted cabin. She wanted to undo this spell as quickly as possible. Although no more spooks remained trapped aboard the Queen Mary, she didn’t want any new dead to become ensnared. It was still possible. As the ship had been converted into a hotel, it was always occupied, and anyone of its occupations could die at any time.

Meanwhile, after four hours, the slumbering lovebirds in the bed had not stirred.

Right, now to take this thing apart, Mama Yaga thought. She decided to focus on the spell’s outermost edges, located on the ceiling. Here, the sigils were simpler and spaced further apart. O’Coulter’s last additions appeared to be cosmetic only, runes of compliance and control to keep the trapped spirits dull and docile. Hopefully, this meant they would be easier to undo.

The old witch lifted her gnarled hands to cast a remove magic enchantment. She flicked it off with an extravagant flourish, but nothing happened. The sigil remained, glowing and taunting her with its continued existence.

Of course! Mama Yaga chastised herself for her stupidity. She hadn’t concentrated on trying to affect the land of the living. She took a deep, virtual breath and emptied her mind of all distractions. The trick was to cast the spell as surreptitiously as possible. If she knew the skill mental shaping, that would be even better.

But she had never mastered subtlety. As a country witch, her customers had expected loud chants and dramatic hand gestures. The more bangs and flashes, the better. Otherwise, they didn’t feel they were getting a proper service.

Mama Yaga cast the remove magic spell as slowly and carefully as she could. She pointed her hands at the sigil, and it shimmered, flickering slightly.

Had it worked?

Abruptly, the sigil flipped over and exploded in a shower of sparks. Mama Yaga yelped in surprise and stumbled backwards, almost falling through the sleeping couple.

But the damage was done. When the sigil reversed, it struck another rune nearby, and this one evaporated too!

Oops, said Mama Yaga, with a sinking feeling in her ghostly stomach. She had tried her hardest to be careful and do this piece by piece, but the blasted rune was going to unravel anyway!

Obviously, she had been too careful, her remove magic spell emerging as too powerful. Still, it was doing what it was supposed to – destroying the main enchantment. And nothing appeared to be exploding just yet, so that was good.

One of the sleepers on the bed twitched and groaned, probably sensing the magic in her dreams.

One by one, with increasing speed and energy, the sigils began to dissolve and disappear, each one affecting and destroying those next to it in a domino effect. The big, glowing rune unravelled and dispersed from the ceiling and walls. Mama Yaga watched it ripple across the glowing portal to Deck 13.

Oh no, she gasped, and launched herself towards the hole.

Unfortunately, she was not quick enough. The vanishing magic was racing now, and flowed across the portal as she approached, wiping it away.

The portal disappeared with a big puff of magical sparks, and Dr O’Coulter’s big rune unravelled all the way down to the single original circle on the floor, where he’d stood to start the thing. The ring glowed brightly for a second, then it vanished too.

Mama Yaga was left hovering alone in the dark without any way to return.to the Moon Princess.

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Chapter 2

After being drawn through a mysterious portal, young ghosts Carrie Garland, Joseph Dean and Dylan Chase found themselves floating near the ceiling of a perfectly normal basement room. The walls were lined with untidy shelves crammed with toys, cleaning fluids, towels, bags