Possession (6 page)

“Now keep your wits
about you. And good luck,” he said with finality.

I started to walk toward
the fence. Halfway there, I turned back. Walter still stood there, watching me.
My chest squeezed unexpectedly, and I lifted a hand and waved. He waved back. With
a deep breath, I turned back to the asylum. My heart was pounding hard in my
chest,
and my hands were trembling a bit, so I stuck them in my pockets.

I’m about to admit myself into an insane asylum
.

I had no idea what I would
face once inside. I wasn’t even sure if the spell would work. But if there was
a chance I could get Luke back, I had to go through with it. I just hoped I was
up for whatever challenge waited for me inside.

I stared into those dark gray eyes and my mental fog finally
lifted. My memories were at last intact. I knew who I was. I remembered the
journey I had gone through with the old mage, the decision to enter the insane
asylum, the spell I’d done to make Luke’s spirit inhabit Dean’s body—everything
that had brought me to this moment. Tears streamed down my face. Luke was there
in the room with me. He was in a different body, but it was him. I sobbed,
cried out his name, and ran into his arms. He held me for a long time.

“Colina, I thought I’d lost you,” he whispered.

I tightened my grip
around
him. “How long was I gone?”

“Two weeks. The last time I saw you, you were
heading out to Dr. Barton’s office to see if you could find a spell.”

I remembered now that Dr. Barton had a collection
of magic books in his office. With
Mildred’s
help,
I’d been sneaking in at night and going through them, trying to
learn all I could. Dr. Barton’s collection was extensive. It made sense—when
you dealt with the mental illnesses of those who wielded complex
magics
, research was important. Even so, Barton didn’t seem
to have much interest in magic. I would bet that he inherited the collection
from the office’s prior tenants. If he had any talents of his own, I hadn’t seen
them yet. Even if he didn’t have any magic of his own, it didn’t really matter
in a facility like this. I knew this asylum was for those without a lot of
power, or without enough presence of mind to control what power they did have.
It was for the less violent loonies who weren’t much of a danger.

I could still picture the one particular old
volume that had caught my eye. I remembered leaning down and reaching out to
grab it. There was a flash of orange and a rush of noise, and then…nothing.

“I touched a book… There was light and sound… That’s
all I remember.”

“The book must’ve been enchanted—it gave the
spirit the extra power she needed to possess you. With it, she was stronger
than you were.”

“One moment I was there, and the next I was gone.”
When I underwent the second ritual, a spirit had possessed me. The spirit of
Wanda had rushed into me and pushed me down, but when that happened a part of
me had still been there. I’d heard Wanda’s voice coming out of my lips. I’d
listened to Luke as he talked with Wanda. I was aware of what was going on, and
I was still somewhere in my body. This time, the spirit must have been stronger
to completely take over my consciousness.

Luke’s left hand came up and cradled my head.
“Morgana possessed you.”

I gasped. “The second victim?” Months ago, an old
woman had jumped from the asylum’s roof to her death…or so the official report
stated. But Mildred was convinced that old woman, Morgana, had been the
killer’s second victim. I’d never met Morgana—she’d died before I admitted
myself—but Mildred had. If Mildred was right and the woman had been
murdered, then it made sense that her spirit would be trapped here. And when I’d
been vulnerable, that spirit possessed me.

Luke nodded. “Mildred recognized Morgana as soon
as she took you over.”

When he finally let me go, I took a step back and
gazed into his face. I wondered how long it would take me to get used to the
way he looked now. Gone was the blond hair and chiseled face. The face I was
looking into belonged to an attractive stranger. But then again…it didn’t. The
expression in his eyes, his voice, and the way he moved… Luke was in there. He
was with me again, and that was the only thing that mattered.

I reached up and touched his lips. “You’re
walking.”

He gave me a wide smile. “I didn't have a lot to
distract me during your little vacation. It’s been hard work, but I'm slowly
building up my strength. My body’s getting stronger every day.” A dark shadow
passed over his face. “His body.”

I reached out and grasped his hand. “
Your
body. You've every right to take
it. He was an empty vessel. You know Dean never made it back after the ritual.
You’re the one who told me how dangerous the rituals are and how people get
lost
sometimes. Dean
was lost
.”

The insane were the easiest to control, Luke had
said. That’s why Walter brought me here. We’d been intent on finding someone,
but not just anyone—Walter knew about Dean’s family. He told me how Dean
became lost during the second ritual—the possession. Dean had gone
through the ritual, but he’d been overpowered by a spirit. He never made it
back. Even after his family finally banished the spirit, Dean didn’t return. He
was an empty vessel, and I took advantage.

I did the ritual Walter taught me to bind Luke’s
spirit to Dean’s body. I’d used the enchanted medallion and brought Luke back.

But something went wrong. Luke now lived within
Dean, but he’d only been able to come out during the witching hour, when the
world was quiet and people slept. It was the only time so far that Luke could
bring himself forth and truly possess all of Dean’s faculties. I’d been trying
to find a way to help Luke stay at the surface permanently before my unplanned possession.

Luke pulled his hand out of mine and clenched both
hands into fists. “It feels wrong to be here like this. You should have left me
in between—” I flinched back as though he had struck me.
Doesn’t he want to be with me?

He must have seen something in my expression
because he reached out and pulled me into his arms. For a long moment we stood
together, my head resting against his chest. I could hear his heart beating.

He whispered in my ear. “Colina, I love you. I
think I’ve loved you ever since you first walked into my uncle’s magic shop.”

Surprised by his words, I pulled back. I knew he
loved me, but to hear him say he loved me back then, when we first met… Was it
true? I looked into his gray eyes. The flame I saw within them now was not
stirred by anger.

“If I remember correctly, you wanted to throw me
out into the street,” I teased.

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “I knew
you were trouble the minute I set eyes on you.” I started to laugh before his
expression turned serious. “But I also knew from the moment I saw you that I
was a goner. You pulled at my heart then—you know you have my whole heart
now.”

“Love at first sight?” I gave a loud guffaw. “You
plied me with questions for hours.”

His right hand came up and rested on his chest,
covering his heart. “I swear to you, something powerful happened the first time
I laid eyes on you—at least for me. That doesn’t mean I was happy about
it.” He reached out and grabbed my hand. “I gave you such a hard time because I
didn’t want to believe it was true.”

“Stop teasing me.” I remembered watching him talk
on the phone back at the magic shop and how I’d been drawn to him then. My
feelings had just grown stronger each day we were together.

“I’m only telling you how I feel. I knew you were
the one for me then, and I want nothing more than to be with you now. And I’m
telling you this so you understand… I would give anything to be with you.”
Sadness filled his eyes. “But I was brought up to believe that when your time
is up, it’s up. For me to come back like this…it’s not natural. It’s not right.”

I cut him off. “But it was my fault you died. If I
hadn't been so reckless…so full of anger… I didn't care what happened. I only
cared about getting my revenge.”

“If I had it all to do again, I wouldn’t do
anything differently. You didn’t force me back into the hotel—I went of
my own free will. I went to help you, to try and protect you. If I hadn’t been
there…” He stepped closer, his fingers coming up to caress my face. “It doesn’t
matter. You made it out alive.”

“But
you
didn’t,” I whispered, my eyes swelling with tears. Rather than replying, he
pulled me into his arms again. I squeezed him tight before continuing. “I had
to bring you back. I couldn’t lose you. I couldn’t lose someone else I loved.”

His hands came up and brushed through my hair. “
Shhh
, I’m here
with you now.”

I knew that he felt what I’d done was wrong, but I
would make him see that taking this empty body so he could be here with me was
the right thing to do.

His arms tightened around me and I realized it
wasn’t something he would have been able to do a few weeks ago. I looked up
into his face. “You’re getting stronger. Soon we’ll be able to escape this
place.”

His arms squeezed my waist. “Before we escape, we
have to decide where to go.”

That was a good question. Where would we go? His
family had a target on my head.

Before Luke’s death, before the asylum—before
any of it—I had brought forth zombies and caused a mass murder. Because
of those atrocities, the death dealers were not just hated by the populous—they
were hunted. Vigilante mobs had formed in the span of a few months, and a dozen
death dealers had been beaten. A few had even been killed. Death dealers across
the city now walked in fear for their lives.

And it was all because of my actions. The Phoenix
Guild wanted me to pay for what I’d done. They wanted revenge.

They wanted me dead.

I looked into Luke’s eyes, pushing back my fears. He
was alive and with me. That was all that mattered. “We’ll figure that out once
we get out of here. We need you to get strong enough so that you can climb.” Our
escape would take some planning. A twenty-foot electric fence surrounded the
grounds. We’d have to turn the electricity off, sprint across the property, and
quickly climb over the fence, somehow avoiding the staff and security
surveillance at the same time.

“But I can still only surface for short periods of
time. With the spell you did to bind me, I should be in control of this body
all the time. I’ve poured over every book in the doctor’s office. There’s no
reason that I can come up with for why I only have full possession of this body
during the witching hour.” He looked worried and frustrated.

“So we’ll keep looking.”

He took a step back and brought my chin up with
his hand. “If you touch another enchanted book, you could be possessed again.”

I thought I had mastered the art of keeping
spirits out. I hadn’t been possessed since Wanda took over my mind and body.
But Morgana somehow got in. I looked at Luke thoughtfully, trying to gauge how
he would react if I told him my suspicions—that Morgana’s spirit still
had some kind of hold on me
.

For weeks I had been someone else, but the electroshock
treatment had somehow turned the tables. It had loosened Morgana’s hold on my
body and allowed me back in control. But I thought I could still feel her in
there, somewhere within the recesses of my mind. Was it my imagination? Or was
she really in there somewhere, waiting and hoping for another chance to take
over?

I should tell Luke about Morgana, but he was
fighting his own battles at the moment. He was trying to get used to living in
someone else’s body. The last thing I needed to do was burden him with my
fears.

It’s probably
only my imagination anyway.

Luke pulled me toward him again. He leaned in and placed
his lips on mine. For a moment, I forgot about everything but being in his
arms.

He pulled away from me, his hands tangled in my
hair. “You have to be more careful. I’m no help to you during the day. I’m
barely any help now. This body is so weak.”

“You’re getting stronger.”

I heard someone clear their throat and turned
around. Mildred was standing by the doorway, watching us, a huge grin on her
face. “Sorry to break this up, lovebirds, but we can’t stay much longer. We
started out late, and…” She tapped her empty wrist. “
Ticktock
,
ticktock
. It’s almost the end of the witching hour.”

I looked around. “How can you tell?” I asked.
There was no clock in the room.

“I can feel it in my bones, child.” She looked
over at Luke. “You best be getting back to your bed. Any minute now you’re
going to turn into a frog and
her kiss won’t
turn you back into a prince. And when you tumble down and down like Humpty Dumpty,
you’ll be too big for us to put back together.”

Luke leaned in and kissed me again. He started to
move away, but I refused to let him go. I tightened my arms around him. “Not
yet. Just…just a few more minutes.”

“You’ve got to go. Mildred’s right.”

I reluctantly let go.

He stepped out of my arms and slowly, on unsteady
legs, walked over to the bed. He lowered himself down and turned to look at me.
“Promise me you’ll be—” The light suddenly left his eyes. His body fell
back against the pillows. His face slackened, and all expression left it.

I rushed to him. “Luke!” There was no response. He
wasn’t there. I could no longer reach him. I’ve been without him for so long. For
two months I had worked with Walter, hiding from Luke’s guild, feeling Luke’s ghostly
presence, unable to touch him, to hold him, to kiss him. I reached down and slid
my fingers across his cheek. Now that I finally had him back, I would do
whatever it took to keep him with me.

I turned to Mildred. “I can’t leave him like
this.”

“Come, child. We have to go. He’s safe. He’s in
there somewhere, safe and sound. We need to get moving. You know as well as I
do that at this time of the night, even the laziest orderlies make a few
rounds.”

I followed her out of the room. This time our
journey back was much more cautious. We peeked through every door, crept around
corners, and moved down the hallways at a quick, quiet pace, hugging our bodies
to the walls as we went.

Mildred whispered. “Just keep your ears open,
child. Mine aren’t so good anymore. If you hear anyone coming, let me know.”