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“It’s time for war,” Zoe said.
Keira sat in the corner of Blighty’s cosy café, sinking into a plush high-back chair as she hugged a mug of hot chocolate. She didn’t feel very warlike.
Zoe was in the zone, however. She’d tied a bandanna around her neck and spread her binders of conspiracies out over the rough-hewn table. Mason, wedged between the two women, was trying to defend his small slice of tabletop from the overflowing piles of notes.
“Your binders get fuller every day,” Mason said, trying to nudge blurry photos of pigeons away from his drink.
“Small details can still be important, even if it’s not immediately obvious how.” Zoe flipped through a folder, scattering diagrams and photos with each reckless page turn. “We’re creating a tapestry here. Everything is connected.”
Mason wordlessly held up a sticky note from the pile. It read: Bigfoot?? Bigfoot’s GHOST???
Zoe snatched the note back. “Tapestry, Mason. Focus on the tapestry.”
Keira chuckled, but she still felt a small ache on the inside.
It had been three weeks since Keira had discovered Artec and its cemetery. That was three weeks with very little progress made on what had turned into the biggest problem of her life. And that was saying something, considering how many catastrophes she was juggling.
Keira had arrived at Blighty with no memories except for her name and no possessions except for a small amount of money and an old photograph.
Her earliest memory was of being chased by masked men with guns and dogs. She didn’t know who they were, but they’d made one thing clear: they wanted to kill her. She’d taken refuge in a cemetery. And that was how she’d discovered an unexpected gift of a second sight that allowed her to sense and see the dead.
She’d spent the following weeks hiding in the groundskeeper’s cottage behind the graveyard, helping to clear some of the spirits that had become trapped there, while also becoming friends with two residents from the nearby town, Zoe and Mason. Together, they’d been attempting to piece together Keira’s unknown past—with very little progress.
Then they’d had a breakthrough that allowed Keira to put a name to the group she’d always thought of as the organisation. Artec. A seemingly innocuous company that owned a graveyard just a few hours from her current home.
She’d been to the cemetery, though. And it was anything but benign.
And she’d understood why Artec was so intent on hunting her: Because she was the only one who could see what they were doing. And she was the only one who could stop them.
Weeks had passed since then. It wasn’t that she’d achieved nothing. She’d made good progress with the ghosts in Blighty’s own graveyard. She’d worked to clean up her home, the little cottage hidden at the edge of the forest. And she, Zoe, and Mason had held so many meetings that they were starting to feel like permanent fixtures at the café.
But they kept circling around the same sets of problems: Artec was powerful. It wasn’t afraid to employ violence to keep its opponents quiet. And Keira and her friends had no real idea of how they were supposed to topple it.
Keira suspected she’d have a better idea of what she needed to do if she had her memories back. But they were locked up somewhere inside of her, buried so deep that she was starting to think she might never get them back.
“Look, here’s the problem.” Zoe leaned forward, her fingertips spread across the mountain of information. “I’m chasing rabbits down holes because I’ve exhausted what I’ve been able to dig up on Artec. I exhausted it in the first week. I don’t know that we’re going to get any major breakthroughs. I think we just need to make a leap of faith and see where it takes us.”
Mason’s mouth twisted. “I understand that. But…calling us underprepared would be an exaggeration. We still don’t know where their central office is, what defences they have, or even what we need to do to bring them down.”
“You’re bringing my spirits down,” Zoe muttered.
Mason only shook his head. “If we get this wrong, the most likely outcome is death for all of us.”
A figure appeared at their side. Marlene, the café’s most efficient and least emotive employee,
dropped a plate of hot chips on the table, sending newspaper clippings from the eighties scattering. “I have no clue what you lot are scheming about,” she said, “and I really think I want to keep it that way. Just try not to die on company property. It would upset the other patrons.”
“I’ll do my best,” Keira said, giving her a tight-lipped smile.
Zoe sighed, running a hand over her face as Marlene left. “I get what you’re saying, Mason. I just don’t know what more I can do.”
“Let’s lay it out on the table again,” Keira suggested, setting the food to one side.
Zoe began shuffling through her stacks. Keira caught glimpses of zoomed-in pictures of meteors, esoteric symbols, a nautical map, a mandala of eyes, and inexplicably, an illustration of Dracula with tiny love hearts drawn around him.
“Ignore that,” Zoe said, quickly shifting it aside. “That one’s just for me.”
When she was finished, the table held only the core information—everything they knew about Artec.
They had a map of Pleasant Grove, the cemetery they’d discovered. Even though the map was just black lines on white paper, Keira could still picture the scene easily. The rows upon rows of spirits, chained to their graves. Screaming. Contorted. Fighting against their restraints.
Somehow, Artec had found a way to hold the dead in the land of the living. No one except Keira could see or hear them. No one else knew the kind of torment they were suffering. Families visited, unaware that their loved one was still there, just feet away, voicelessly howling.
Next to the map was a brochure Zoe had managed to acquire: a sleek piece advertising Artec’s renewable energy branch. That was the whole motivation behind the graveyard.
Ghosts were made of energy. Any action—materialising, influencing the temperature, attempting to interact with the living in any way—used up that energy. But they regained what they spent by slowly absorbing it from the atmosphere. Strong ghosts gathered energy quickly and could appear often. Weaker ghosts might only be visible every few weeks.
Artec had turned its
ghosts into batteries. Wires ran underground, beneath the graves, harvesting electricity from the trapped spirits. They then sold it as renewable energy. It turned out that no one asked very many questions about where the power was coming from, so long as it was cheap enough.
Zoe had also collected four more cemetery maps, each with different addresses. That had been one of the worst discoveries. Artec hadn’t stopped with Pleasant Grove; it was just one of five graveyards spread across the region, all established within the past few years, and all offering cheap burial packages. Keira hadn’t visited any of them. They’d collectively agreed that the risk of being spotted was too great. But she could imagine what she’d find there.
A clone of Pleasant Grove. Rows upon rows of the howling dead.
Sticky notes were scattered over these papers, filled with the questions. Where’re the headquarters? Artec had an office listed, but Mason had driven past it one weekend and found it was just a small corporate space inside a business park. That was where they sold their burial plots to the public, but it wasn’t where the minds behind the company worked. Artec was shockingly good at keeping its business affairs private.
More sticky notes read: How do they trap the dead? Power is stored—where? Can wires be cut?
In answer to the last one, Keira was fairly sure the answer was no. Or at least, the wires weren’t what was keeping the ghosts in place. She could draw energy from the cables if she managed to touch them, though—enough to kill a person. But the company could easily replace any cables Keira managed to damage, with no impact to the business.
Finally, there was one last piece of paper. It contained a photocopy of the Artec business name in the process of being registered in four other countries.
“It’s my professional opinion that we need to act fast,” Zoe said, stabbing her finger at that final piece of paper. “If they start expanding into other countries, we’ll have no way to reach any of the new graveyards. Even if we
could afford the plane tickets, Keira doesn’t have a passport. And without Keira present, there’s nothing we can do.”
“I know.” Mason was patient as always, but worry lines were forming between his eyebrows. “But we still don’t know where to even start.”
Zoe dragged the first map forward. “We’ll drive to Pleasant Grove and play it by ear. Keira’s instincts led us where we needed to go last time. She’ll be able to do it again.”
Keira tried for something that was half-smile, half-grimace. “To be fair, I nearly got us all killed last time.”
“We’re still here,” Zoe said pointedly. “And the fact is, we can sit and brainstorm and mastermind this for as long as we want, but the longer we take, the more of an advantage Artec gains. You know they’re looking for you. If we give them enough time, they might just find you.”
That was a horrible truth. They were looking for Keira. And they weren’t going to give up, not after what she’d done at Pleasant Grove.
“Keira’s carrying the worst of the risk, so it has to be her decision,” Mason said. “But I would strongly, strongly advise caution. We might only get one shot at this. We can’t afford mistakes.”
Zoe looked like she wanted to argue, but then her expression softened. “You’re right. I just… I’m starting to feel trapped.”
“Hence the eight pages of werewolf fanfiction labelled Highly Important,” Mason guessed.
“Hey, don’t trash-talk my work. You won’t believe the kinds of dark-web networks I had to scour to find—oh. Oh no.”
Zoe strained as she stared towards the counter. The little bell above the café’s door chimed whenever anyone entered or left, but it was such a constant presence that Keira had long since stopped noticing it. She stiffened, sitting forward in her chair, suddenly afraid that she’d lowered her guard too far. “What?” she whispered.
“Look.” Zoe’s voice
was full of part reverent shock, part horror. “Dane’s here.”
Keira followed her gaze. Dane Crispin, the final heir to the Crispin estate, stood ahead of the counter as he placed an order.
Keira slumped back, relief flowing through her. “Don’t scare me like that. We like Dane now, remember?”
There was a time when she’d feared him nearly as much as she feared Artec. But then she’d discovered what had made the man so reclusive, sullen, and bitter. His ancestors, back to the town’s founding, had continued to haunt the estate. And they had been draining Dane’s energy and goodness to gorge themselves.
Dane was changing now that the spirits were gone. She’d seen him in town a few times since the purging of his estate, and from what she’d been told, that was more than he’d been seen in nearly a decade. His clothes were still shabby, but he was putting them together with care. His hair held premature rivers of grey, but he’d awkwardly cut and combed it.
And he seemed to be trying to reintegrate himself back into the town. He fumbled with his wallet as he placed an order with Marlene.
Zoe looked horrified. “They’re flirting.”
“What?”
All three of them craned forward. Dane dipped his head as he spoke to Marlene. Marlene leaned towards him, probably because it was hard to hear his request in the crowded store.
“I’m fairly sure they’re just talking,” Mason said, faintly amused.
“She’s smiling.” Zoe’s eyes had narrowed. “I know Marlene. I’ve known her for years. And she’s never smiled at me. Not even once.”
Keira thought that might have more to do with Marlene’s opinion of Zoe than her opinion of Dane, but she decided to bite her tongue on that.
Mason sipped from his drink. “For someone who hates the gossip mill, you’re a surprisingly active participant.”
“That’s the cardinal rule of gossip.” Zoe’s owlish eyes didn’t even blink as she tracked
every minute movement. “It’s awful when it’s about you. Fantastic when it’s about anyone else.”
Dane passed over payment, then stepped aside to the waiting area.
Three weeks hadn’t been long enough to fully revitalise him—Keira suspected he might never completely shake the effects—but he had some colour in his cheeks and his papery skin seemed slightly softer. His roving eyes landed on the group at them, and he raised a hand in greeting. A small smile flitted over his mouth.
The three of them waved back. Keira sometimes saw him at her cemetery, paying his respects to his one remaining relative, but it has been a while since she’d gotten to speak to him properly. She was trying to give him space. She suspected she was too much a reminder of his previous life.
Zoe’s phone buzzed. She pulled it out of her pocket and squinted at the number. “Huh.”
“What is it?” Keira asked.
The look of confusion didn’t fade. “It’s my neighbour. She never calls me—hang on, I’d probably better take this.”
Zoe hopped up and held the phone to her ear as she pushed through the café’s doors, the bell chiming overhead.
Keira watched her go. She waited until Zoe was well outside, then leaned closer to Mason. “Do you think Zoe’s acting…odd?”
He released a held breath. “You noticed it too? I wasn’t sure if I should say anything.”
Keira nodded towards the stacks of notes. Zoe had always been passionate about research, but her tangents had never been this wild before. It almost felt frantic. “When she said she was feeling trapped…”
“I don’t think it’s about Artec,” Mason agreed. “Things aren’t going well at home.”
Zoe’s mother was sick, and it was serious. That was as much as Keira knew. Zoe kept her home life close to her chest, but in the few vulnerable moments they’d shared, Keira had picked up that her mother wasn’t seeking treatment.
Zoe liked to fix things. And it was in her nature to pour herself into work when she didn’t know what else to do. Between her job as a cashier at the grocery
store, caring for her mother, and working on the Artec situation, she was keeping herself almost uncomfortably busy.
“Oh.” Mason nudged Keira’s arm, his expression brightening. “Look at the cup.”
Dane had picked up his to-go coffee. His long fingers wrapped around the cardboard cup, but Keira could just barely make out the writing on it: Dane’s name. And a carefully scrawled heart next to it.
Dane seemed to feel their eyes on him. He quickly adjusted his hold on the drink to cover the writing, his lips tightly pressed together and his face flooding with colour as he hurried past them and out the door.
“Wow.” Keira slumped back, her eyebrows high. “Remind me to never doubt Zoe’s instincts again.”
“I’d recommend you continue to doubt them plenty,” Mason said, grinning. He nudged one of the notes spilling out of the folder: Are there any local cults? If no—start one?? “But she’s going to like this at least. The gossip mill lives to churn another day—oh.”
The door chimed. Zoe had returned. She didn’t hurry back to them the way she normally did, though. Instead, she stood just inside the doorway, staring at the phone held in one hand. Her expression was blank, her mouth open a fraction, her eyes wide but unseeing.
“Zoe?” Keira rose from her seat and reached towards her.
“It was my neighbour.” Zoe took two unsteady steps towards them, then stopped. Her voice was thin and strange and raspy. “She was visiting my mum. She says Mum fell. She thinks…she thinks it’s almost over.”
Keira’s heart broke. She put her arm around Zoe’s back, half comforting and half holding her up.
Mason snapped into action. He scooped the binders of notes up, cramming loose sheets of paper in anywhere there was a gap. “My car’s outside. I’ll drive you home.”
Zoe shook her head, but it was a slow movement, as though she didn’t have full control over
her body. “I can walk. It’s just…it’s just a few minutes.”
“I’ll drive you,” Mason repeated, gentle but leaving no room for arguments. “Keira, are you okay to walk home from here?”
“Yeah, of course.” Keeping her arms around Zoe, Keira supported her as they pushed back into the bright sunlight outside. “What can I do to help?”
“Probably nothing at this stage.” Mason had a parking spot right next to the café and threw the binders into the back seat before opening the passenger door for Zoe. “But keep your phone nearby. I’ll call you if anything changes.”
Keira stole just enough time to press Zoe into a quick hug. Her friend’s eyes were still wide and unseeing. She tentatively squeezed back in response to the hug, then let herself be lowered into the car. Keira stepped back as the doors snapped closed.
The car came to life and pulled away, turning quickly, and Keira was left standing alone outside the café.
Keira swallowed thickly as she watched Mason’s car vanish around the corner.
Mason was capable and kind. He was probably the best person to be with Zoe and her mother. He wasn’t qualified as a doctor, but he’d gotten most of the way through a medical degree before dropping the courses. He’d known what to do each time Keira needed help, and she hoped he’d be able to do the same for Zoe too.
It hurt that Keira wasn’t able to help, but she knew Mason was probably right. The best thing she could do was keep her phone in hand and wait to see if they needed anything.
A thought pinged in the back of Keira’s head, and she patted her pockets. They were empty. She swore under her breath.
Mason had given her a new phone after Keira’s old model had started to fail her. The upgrade was modern, sleek, and full of icons she didn’t fully understand or trust. And she’d used it so rarely that she’d forgotten it back in her cabin, where it was plugged in to its charging cable.
Part of her wanted to stay in the town centre in case Mason came back for her, but she knew that wasn’t likely. She needed to go home and wait it out there. And just hope her phone didn’t ring for her in the meantime.
The walk had grown very familiar during the time she’d spent in Blighty. Some of the store owners even recognised her and gave a wave as she passed. Harry Kennard, the florist’s son, was outside the Two Bees flower shop, morosely kicking at buckets of bouquets that Keira suspected he was supposed to be rearranging.
“Hey, Harry,” she said as she passed him, ...
