𝐇𝐨𝐦𝐞┃ Anthony Lockwood┃2┃

Chapter Thirty - Just James And Skully

Nola knew at once, when she slipped through into the moonlit office and eased the door shut behind her, that she was in the presence of the dead. She could feel it in the prickling of her scalp, in the way the hairs stirred on her arms, in the coldness of the air she breathed. She could tell it from the clots of spider webs that hung against the window, thick and dusty and glittering with frost. There were the sounds too, centuries old. The ones that she had traced up the empty stairs and hallways of the house. The rustling linen, the crack of broken glass, the weeping of the dying woman: all were louder. And there was the sudden intuition, felt deep in the pit of Nola's gut, that something wicked had fixed its gaze on her.

Mind you, if none of that had worked, the shrill voice coming from her rucksack might also have given her a clue.

"Eek!" It cried. "Help! Ghost!"

Nola glared over her shoulder. "Will you cut it out? So we've found the phantom. There's no need for you to get hysterical."

"She's just over there! Staring, staring with her hollow sockets! Ooh, now I see her grinning teeth!"

Nola snorted. "Why would any of that bother you? You're a haunted skull. Now calm down, you pansy."

She shrugged the rucksack off onto the floor and flipped up the canvas top. Inside, radiating a smoky greenish light, was the infamous glass jar with the human skull clamped in its depths. A hideous translucent face pressed against the glass, nose bent sideways, poached-egg eyes flicking to and fro.

"You asked me to raise the alarm, didn't you?" The skull said. "Well, this is me raising it. Eep! There she is! Ghost! Bones! Hair! Ugh!"

"Skully, will you please shut up? You're a ghost yourself!" In spite of herself, she could feel its words having an effect on her. She was staring into the room, unpicking its shadows, hunting for an undead shape. True, she saw nothing, but that brought little comfort. This particular ghost worked by special rules. With feverish speed, she began rummaging through the rucksack, pushing the jar aside, sifting through salt bombs, lavender grenades and iron chains.

Two seconds later, she had a mirror in hand. It was a peculiarity of this Visitor that it could not be seen directly, even by agents with decent psychic Sight. It was said to be the spirit of the murderous Emma Marchment, a lady who had lived in the building in the early eighteenth century, when it was a private house and not the offices of an insurance company. After dabbling in witchcraft and allegedly being responsible for the deaths of several relatives, she had been stabbed by her husband with a spear of glass from her own smashed dressing table mirror. After that, she appeared only in reflections – in mirrors, windows and polished metal surfaces – and several employees of the company had recently lost their lives to her surreptitious touch. Hunting her was a ticklish business. Nola's team that night had brought in hand mirrors, and there'd been a lot of slow shuffling backwards, and much wide-eyed peering over shoulders into dark corners. Nola, she hadn't bothered with any of that. She had trusted her senses and followed the sounds, and not reached for her mirror until that very moment.

She held it up and angled it so that she could see the reflection of the room.

"Nice bit of kit you have there." The skull said. "Real quality plastic. Lo-o-ve the pink ponies and rainbows on the rim."

"So, I got it from a toy store. It was all I could find in the time available."

Moonlight flashed confusingly on the glass surface. Nola took a deep breath and steadied her hand. Instantly, the image stabilised, becoming the bright grid of the window, with cheap curtains hanging either side. Beneath the sill was a desk and chair. She panned up, round and down, seeing only a moonlit floor, another desk, filing cabinets, and a hanging plant suspended from the darkly panelled wall.