The Soul Thief (18 page)

This was the first time Franklin had seen her stand voluntarily near a light. Her face was pinched tight, not giving anything away.

Was this a trap?

The doctor walked out of the shadows from behind Odell.

Shit. Yes. It was a trap.

He weren’t in his scrubs this time, but wore a dark suit jacket, white dress shirt, and jeans. His hair was even more red now, and was starting to grow back. Despite how his face had fleshed out, he still had hard, beady eyes, like a weasel’s.

“So, my worthy adversary, I see you have returned,” Dr. Traeger said.

Why did the doctor talk that way? Was it because he was crazy? Or was it because he thought all of the future was gonna be looking back on this moment and judging his words?

“I almost feel sorry for you, for the path you’ve chosen,” Dr. Traeger said. “But like the other fools who won’t join me, you’re just going to die.”

With a flourish of his hand, Dr. Traeger reached into his suit and drew out the knife.

Suddenly, the pain in Franklin’s side surged. The pulse of the knife under Franklin’s skin beat harder, like a war drum.

The doctor paused for a moment with the blade before him, chanting an invocation in a language Franklin didn’t want to learn, the sounds twisting his tongue. A sickly yellow glow bloomed around the doctor, like a cloud of plague surrounding him. Then he started waving the blade through the air, like a baton, as if he were conducting an invisible orchestra.

Ghosts sprang up between them, rapidly rising, like evil fog. The ghosts were already howling as they came into being, the noise as deafening as tornado winds.

Franklin couldn’t just turn away and run. The ghosts would come after him. And all he’d be doing was leading them back across the field to Julie. So he stood his ground, grinding his teeth together, determined to stay and do what he could.

The doctor continued to wave the blade.

The ghosts surged forward.

Before Franklin could step back, they’d started passing
through
him.

The cold was so intense Franklin’s teeth started chattering. His insides felt displaced, like someone had scooped them out with an ice cream scoop, then slopped them back inside him, nothing in the right place anymore.

“Stop it!” Franklin said. The ghosts were sapping his strength, making it hard for him to even shuffle his feet.

He still moved forward, closer to the doctor, more determined than ever to stop him.

The ghosts were all angry and howling, angrier, in fact, than usual.

They didn’t want to go through him. They were being directed against what little will they had. It pissed them off more, made them colder and more frightening.

Franklin knew it was just a matter of time before he died, his heart frozen from fright and cold.

He had to stop the doctor. He caught Odell’s eye, asking her, “Why?”

“Dude’s gonna make me immortal,” Odell explained. “Do you know what level of black belt I could get to with lifetimes to study? Wetwork ain’t gonna be nothing compared to what I’ll be able to do.”

Her glittering eyes shifted from Franklin to the doctor, and she watched him intently. Greedily.

Franklin felt his own howl gathering in his throat. Didn’t she understand? The price they’d have to pay for living so long was too high.

All of Franklin’s future was being stripped from him. His life with Julie. The chance to grow old, gain wisdom with his aches.

No little girl to teach. No son to cherish. The natural cycle of birth, growth, and death, broken.

The noise both inside and outside of Franklin’s head was deafening. The cold stabbed him worse than any knife. His sorrow multiplied.

Franklin couldn’t hold it back any longer.

He threw his head back and howled.

The sound mingled with the winds, cycling up with the howls of the ghosts. It grew to an unnatural noise, born of desperation and fear.

Franklin continued to howl and pushed himself forward another few inches. He had to get to the doctor. Stop him, somehow.

The doctor paused in his conducting. His eyebrows shot up his broad forehead. He seemed surprised that Franklin was still there, able to move, able to defy him.

The yellow cloud faded and started falling off the doctor, peeling away like petals from a flower.

Was it Franklin’s own howls that was doing that? Or had the doctor lost his concentration?

Odell sprang forward. She was moving so fast her hand blurred as she struck the doctor on his right shoulder—the hand holding the knife.

Franklin would have bet that normally, that kind of blow would have sent a body flying.

Doctor Traeger merely shrugged, taking a half step back.

Odell kicked the hand holding the knife, again, moving faster than Franklin would have thought possible.

Still, the doctor’s arm didn’t go flying up.

The knife, however, did.

Before the doctor could grab it, Odell had snatched the blade away.

Just as quick, she tossed it toward Franklin with an easy, underhand throw. “Do your thing,” she instructed him.

Franklin normally wouldn’t have been able to catch the blade. But it came straight to his hand, the haft smacking firmly against his palm.

It had, after all, always liked him better. It also felt to Franklin like the blade was relieved to be away from the doctor.

But now what did he do?

Doctor Traeger turned to Odell. “I would have made you immortal!” he snarled.

Odell just shrugged. “And then what? We’d –a’ killed each other off, one by one, ’til there weren’t no one left. Always gotta have new recruits. Fool.”

Franklin’s surge of relief didn’t last.

Now that he held the blade, the ghosts was turning to him. The blade throbbed in his hand, the power evident.

But the power of the ghosts was there too, the cold passing over him in waves.

Like the last time Franklin had held the blade in the face of ghosts, he felt a calm take over him, almost like a heavy curtain had been drawn between him and his emotions, his anger and his fear.

The blade moved Franklin’s hand, bringing it up toward his face, like a knight giving a salute to his opponent.

One of the ghosts separated himself from the rest, a middle-aged white man. He wore a fancier jacket than the others, with brass buttons running in two lines down the front and embroidered patches on the tops of his shoulders. His face grew more distinct as he stood there, with a beard and mustache forming beneath his hollowed-out eyes.

Hell, Franklin would have sworn he kinda looked like Karl, or Karl’s great-great-great-granddaddy.

The ghost held up his sword and gave the same salute back to Franklin.

Then he attacked.

Franklin had never been in a sword fight before—the closest he’d come had been attacking the creature the previous year, using corncobs as swords. He jumped back, swinging the blade wildly.

It caught the soldier’s blade with a high-pitched
ting
.

The ghost pressed forward, fighting with finesse.

Franklin let the blade move his hand more, defending himself.

He couldn’t back up none, though.

That ghost wasn’t getting through him. Wasn’t gonna be able to cross the field and go attack Julie, next.

That ghost needed to go back to where it came from. Pass back along into its well-deserved rest.

Franklin weren’t no expert with a blade or fighting.

But he knew his duty. He’d been helping ghosts pass along most of his life.

The blade knew what to do, though.

Franklin stood tall and proud and started pushing back, directing his
will
and his
intent
at the ghost. Trying to use the blade, too, to send the ghost along. Back to where it came from.

The ghost still fought. He got in a good blow, the ghost’s sword passing through Franklin’s arm, the cold burning through his bones.

Franklin knew he couldn’t survive too many blows like that. They was too chilling, likely to freeze his soul.

So Franklin pressed on. He wouldn’t give up. Finally, he got a good solid hit on the ghost’s chest.

The ghost stepped back, fading as it did, losing its shape as it turned to mist.

The next fancy-dressed ghost stepped up. He didn’t need as much convincing, and weren’t fighting as hard. He faded almost before Franklin finished his third pass with his blade.

The ghosts spreading across the field thinned out.

Franklin realized he was fighting the generals, and as they passed, they were taking their troops with them.

Still, some of the men fought desperate hard. They were still fighting the war. Even with the cold the ghosts generated, Franklin found he was sweating.

A solid hard noise made him look up.

Odell had flattened the doctor. She was sitting on his back. She grinned at Franklin and gave him a thumb’s up.

Finally, only one ghost remained, steely-eyed and angry. He wasn’t a general, but a regular enlisted man. The bandages around his head bled dark, glittering blood. His uniform had holes along the sides, through which the ghost’s pale skin gleamed.

He didn’t come forward to fight Franklin, though. He cackled madly, the sound sending chills down Franklin’s spine.

Was this the solitary ghost he’d seen at the battleground earlier? The one who’d been with them in the trees for a while?

The ghost stalked over toward Doctor Traeger.

Odell leaped off her perch, getting out of the ghost’s way.

Doctor Traeger rose unsteadily to his feet. He swayed…

…and the ghost seemed to catch him.

They embraced for a moment, a strange sight, the doctor living and breathing and in full color, the ghost white as early morning fog. They looked like long-lost brothers, holding on like they’d both just found each other after years of searching.

Then they passed through each other.

Except that on the one side, the body of the doctor fell.

And on the other, two ghosts now stood there.

The doctor started howling, a loud, startled sound that faded as he did, the other ghost grinning as he sucked the doctor’s soul away with him.

Where had he come from? Was that strange ghost another man with power? A soldier who’d been killed, and just biding his time? That was all Franklin could think of.

The blade whimpered in his hand. He took a good look at it.

Before, the blade had had three ridges on it, forming a triangular blade. One had been shaved off, and the others looked soft, faded.

The blade wasn’t an evil thing, no.

But it was wounded, and likely to strike out if Franklin just let it be. Or its power would draw another madman.

Franklin took the blade in both his hands and focused his will on
it
, now.

It was time for it, too, to pass along, to go rest.

The pain licked at Franklin’s side, pulsing once more.

The blade itself didn’t resist none. The souls that had made up the three parts of the knife unraveled, like a braid being untied, removing themselves from the cold metal. Winds sprang up across the field, rustling the grass. The smell of caves and wet, moldy earth filled Franklin’s nose. Sticky spiderwebs passed across his hands, then faded and dropped to the ground.

Franklin pushed again.
Goodbye
, he said.
Thank you
.

The blade sighed to itself as it grew hollow, emptying itself into the air and the beyond.

For a moment, Franklin found himself somewhere else. It was a land filled with forests and meadows, the air tainted with violent colors. The smell of
prey
came from every direction.

It weren’t his idea of heaven, that was for damned sure.

But the three souls that had made it up sure seemed happy to be there.

When Franklin saw the field again, he realized Julie had come marching across it. She stood next to him, her hand raised mid-air, as if she wanted to touch him but were afraid to do so.

Franklin wrapped a weary arm across her shoulders and pulled her in tight. The warm scent of her drifted up from her hair, soothing his soul.

When he looked up, he saw Odell squatting next to the doctor, her fingers lightly touching his neck.

“He’s dead,” she announced as she stood back up. “Died of a heart attack,” she added firmly. “I’ll make sure he’s found safe and secure in his bed.”

Franklin opened his mouth to volunteer to help, but knew it would probably be better if Odell did the work herself. He still tried to take a step forward, and faltered. He felt as empty as the blade he held.

Julie held him tightly as he leaned his weight against her.

“Now, what did I tell you about ending up back at the hospital?” she growled at him.

He gave her a weak smile. “Just need to rest up some.” Her warmth seeped into him, all along his side, bringing him back to life.

“You sure you okay to take care of this?” Franklin still asked, catching Odell’s eye.

“Course I can,” she said. “You two disappear.”

Franklin turned with Julie still helping, and started shuffling across the field.

“And Ray said to remind you, ‘never again,’” Odell said.

Franklin paused, then nodded. He weren’t ever gonna ask Ray for another favor, not even to pass his beer across the table. But he also knew he should have trusted Ray, that Ray would have found him a good person, a local, even, one who he could trust.

But he was still just as happy that Odell was only passing through, that she wouldn’t be sticking around, that she’d be heading back south wherever it was that she lived. He weren’t sure he’d ever trust her, not really.

As they walked across the grass, the night outside felt softer now, the air crisp and the wind chilly. Franklin shivered, realizing he still carried the blade.

“We’ll have to give this a good resting place,” he told Julie as they reached the lane.

“Tomorrow,” Julie promised him. “Or the next day.”

Or the next, or the next, or the next.

Franklin found himself grinning.

There would more days, many more days, after that as well.

Ξ

The ceremony for the blade’s burial was small—just Julie and Franklin gathered together in Franklin’s backyard.