“The shock,” the girl murmured, gaze dropping. “It has been great.”
“I’m sure it has. But we’ll need you to help us identify the dead. You can do that, I presume?”
“Yes, my lady, I will —”
She broke off midsentence and ran for the front door. Daigo lunged through. She didn’t shriek or fall back but only cursed and started to veer. Ronan was already in flight, grabbing her by the shoulders and taking her down. He pinned her to the floor.
“Possessed,” he said to Moria. “Like Wenda.”
“Hmm.”
Wenda had been a girl from Edgewood, one of the survivors who’d accompanied Ronan and Ashyn across the Wastes. In Fairview, Ashyn had learned that the girl they knew as Wenda was long gone, her body possessed by a spirit tasked with bringing the Seeker.
This could be the same situation. And yet… Moria finally recognized the sensation she’d felt earlier. It was similar to the one she’d noted near the resurrected mummies. A sense of disturbance, which Ashyn had not noticed with Wenda.
Tyrus stepped into the room, having caught enough of the conversation to know the girl was possessed. He studied her briefly before walking to Moria.
“Can you trap the spirit in there?” he whispered. “I know you can command it out…”
If she could trap the spirit, they could question the girl. But that was not something she’d ever covered in her studies, there being no scenario where one should need to do so.
The world is changing. My role in it is changing, and I hadn’t even mastered the old one.
“I don’t know,” she whispered back. Then she turned to Ronan. “Can you fetch Ashyn?”
He nodded, and Tyrus took his place, standing at the girl’s back with his sword tip on her neck.
“Do you know who I am, spirit?” he asked.
“Tyrus, son of Emperor Tatsu and his first concubine. I am well versed in the affairs of the empire, your highness. I have a name, too. It is Guin.”
Moria crouched in front of the girl as Daigo took his place beside her.
“You stole a body and a name?” Moria said.
She had expected the girl to put on a performance when Ronan jumped her. To cry and sniffle that they were making a dreadful mistake. To babble and protest when they spoke of possession. Now, as Moria asked the question, the girl merely raised her dark eyes to hers.
“I stole neither. Guin is my name, and I found this body spirit-abandoned.”
“Spirit-abandoned?” Moria said. “Is that like finding an empty wagon by the roadside?”
Tyrus snorted a laugh, but Guin only held Moria’s gaze. “You mock, but that is exactly what it is like. I found it without an owner, with no owner likely to return, and so, being in need of conveyance, I took it. You won’t need magics to keep me in here. I’ve no intention of leaving.”
“And the spirit who owns that body?”
“Gone.”
“Dead?”
Guin wrinkled her nose. “I’d not take over a corpse. That would be like stealing a wagon with two broken wheels and the others about to shatter. When the shadow stalkers possessed the villagers, there was confusion. Some spirits were taken out of the wrong vessels. Like this one.”
“And you were one of those spirits?” Moria asked. “Taken from your body?”
Guin laughed. “I have been without a form for a very long time, child.”
“What are you?”
Guin smiled up at her. “You are a Keeper, are you not? Tell me what I am.”
“A marine ghost, an honorable spirit, a ruined spirit, or the vengeful dead,” said Ashyn, appearing behind Moria.
“Ah,” Guin said. “The Seeker. They are known to be brighter than their sisters.”
“Oh?” Moria said. “Forgive me. I thought I was the one who saw through your ruse and knew you for a possessing spirit.”
“True. I’ll give you that, then. You are clever. Your sister, however, possesses more conventional intelligence. She is the book-learned one.” Guin looked at Ashyn. “Which type am I?”
“You can get free, yet you choose not to,” Ashyn said. “Despite the fact you may suffer imprisonment or even torture. You are desperate enough to keep a body that you’d risk that.”
“She uses a human name,” Moria said. “Guin.”
“There are four primary types of human spirits that remain in the first world. First, marine ghosts, those who died at sea and attempt to drown others.”
“No sea nearby,” Moria said.
“See how clever she is?” Guin said.
Moria ignored her. “There are also honorable spirits, great men who were terribly wronged and cannot control their wrath.”
“And ruined spirits,” Ashyn said. “Those unable to pass over to the second world. However, if she’d merely failed to pass over, she would appeal to me for help. That leaves…”
“The vengeful dead,” Moria said. “Which is the same as honorable spirits, only the vengeful are women. It is an insult to our sex. The name ought to be the same.”
“I agree,” Guin said. “And now that you have solved the mystery, as I said, I will remain in this body, on the understanding you will hold it captive and question me. I only ask that when you have what you need, you will free this body.”
“We must speak to the court Seeker,” Ashyn said. “If the spirit that belongs in that body can be returned to it —”