Hey Bruce. Kind of a bizarre night. Sorry if I seem a little shaken up.
So we found—or I guess Ty’s Sensor found—this dagger in the weapons cache at Southwark Cathedral. Which is pretty random since we were just in the area because of the Shadow Market. (I guess whoever put the dagger there was probably also in the area for the Shadow Market, come to think of it.)
I write to you tonight by witchlight, sitting in the hallway outside our bedroom. Which is very creepy in itself, because basically everywhere in this house is creepy except our bedroom, at this point. (Well, some of it is not creepy because it looks like a construction site, but whatever.) I couldn’t sleep at all, and I didn’t want to keep Julian awake.
First the good news: Ty was awake, and we weren’t even home (to be fair, it takes a solid hour to go between Chiswick and Southwark) before he had texted Julian a translation of the text on the dagger. Turns out it’s Farsi. Julian read it out loud:
I wanted so much to have a gleaming dagger, that each of my ribs became a dagger.
He grinned at me. “Hot,” he said. “Reminds me of you.”
“You mean, when I was exclusively driven by thoughts of revenge?” I said.
He looked hurt. “No,” he said. “You just like a good dagger.”
“Not sure I would turn all my ribs into daggers, though,” I said. “Ribs seem important to keep inside your body.”
“One rib?” suggested Julian.
We didn’t get home until after midnight, but there was no way we were going to bed without showing the dagger to the ghost. We didn’t even have to discuss it, we just immediately went to the dining room.
We’ve been wrestling with how to address our ghost. He’s often quite moody so it’s hard to know what name he prefers. Julian’s been going with “Spirit,” like Ebenezer Scrooge. You know, “Spirit, show me no more!”
Anyway, Julian said something like, “Spirit, we wish your attention. We have something to show you.” The candles all flared up in response, which was a neat trick, though it did not make things less creepy.
We put the dagger on the table and asked the ghost if it was the owner of the dagger, or at least recognized it. Which was a long shot, given that it responded so negatively to the flask. But it seemed like the place to start.
Suddenly the wind picked up and all the candle flames went sideways. Which was a surprise, because this is one of the few rooms in the house with intact windows, and it wasn’t windy outside. And the wind didn’t just gust, it continued, getting louder and softer, higher and lower in pitch. Julian and I just looked at each other. We had no idea what was happening.
After maybe a minute, the wind began to break into little bursts, and then —
Hang on, just had to take a moment. I shivered again, remembering it.
Then a voice spoke through the wind.
It was faint, and at a whisper, and it barely sounded like a human voice at all. But the wind spoke. The ghost spoke.
We almost bolted. If Julian hadn’t been there I definitely would have bolted. And I think he would have, if I hadn’t been there. It wasn’t even the words. It was that there were words at all. The ghost was getting stronger.
I mean, remember, it just started with random poltergeist stuff, knocking things over, and then it could write in the dust. And now it could speak. Why was it getting stronger? Was our presence doing it? Was it the repairs, somehow? Did the dagger make it stronger?
And how strong would it get?
Julian got his voice back first. “Mine?” he said. “You’re saying the dagger is mine?”
And then—by the Angel, Bruce, the hair on my arms is sticking up just to write this—the wind spoke again, and it said, “CARSTAIRS.”
I couldn’t speak. Julian said, “Emma? The dagger is hers?”
The wind shifted direction. All the candle flames tilted the other way.
“Home?” I said. “Home, like, our home? Los Angeles?”
“Or this home?” Julian suggested. “Maybe it needs to be taken to someplace in the house—”
The wind kicked up loudly and said, in the strongest voice it had managed so far:
The wind dropped, the candles went out, the room was bathed in darkness. The ghost had gone. I could feel its absence. The silence hurt my ears.
I have the dagger with me now. I took it to bed with me and I don’t want to let it out of my sight, for some reason. I keep turning it over and over in my hands. “Cirenworth” meant Jem, of course, so maybe it was his dagger, once upon a time. Or maybe it belonged to someone who lived there when the ghost was alive. The image of Carstairs ancestors of the past keep going through my mind. When I close my eyes, I feel like I can see whoever owned this dagger once, standing over me — protectively, even, as if they know we’re related and want to stand by me, even through the centuries.
I think Magnus is right that the ghost means well. I don’t think a malevolent ghost would be as helpful as this one is clearly trying to be. And the faeries working on the house seem totally unbothered by it, which they wouldn’t if they thought it had evil intent. Which makes me think the ghost isn’t part of the curse, but instead, maybe the ghost is trapped here by the curse.
Okay, I feel a little better after writing all that down. I think I’m going to go put the dagger someplace safe and try to get some sleep. Thanks for listening as always, Bruce. You’re a pal.
And tomorrow – we get to see Jem and Tessa and Kit and Mina, because we’re going to Cirenworth!
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