The Gravedigger's Brawl (22 page)

Noah leaned closer. “You want to hear that a homicidal ghost is after you?”

Ash frowned. “Not when you put it that way.” He turned to Wyatt. “You're not making it up?”

Wyatt gestured to the array of historical documents laid out as proof and shook his head. He met Ash's eyes, looking a little scared, but not breaking eye contact.

“I guess . . . I appreciate the thought?” Ash finally said. “But now I'm even more freaked out, okay? What do you propose we do?”

“You can't go on like this,” Caleb said.

Ash glared at him and crossed his arms, but he knew Caleb was right.

Wyatt reached for Ash's hand. “Let me call the people who worked with us to set up the exhibition.”

“What people?”

“We did a lot of consulting with local ghost hunting societies,” Noah said. “Exorcists, ghost . . . purgers, whatever they're called.

Wyatt nodded and smiled at Ash. Ash remembered him talking about the several groups he'd contacted, including an affiliate of the Atlantic Paranormal Society and a Wiccan spiritualist.

Ash hung his head and tried to come to terms with whether he should be embarrassed or relieved. Even if it was all bullshit and Wyatt was just humoring him, it wouldn't hurt anything. If it was real, though, if there really was some homicidal ghost after him because he had curly dark hair and liked men, he wanted help. But this was too much. It was ridiculous. “No.”

“Ash.”

“I said no, okay? I'm not a fucking sideshow.”

“That's not what we're saying. We're just looking out for your peace of mind.”

Ash closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He could still see the milky blue of the apparition's eyes, and it sent shivers down his spine. “Fine,” he said after taking a minute or two to simply breathe.

Wyatt stood to retrieve his phone from his satchel. As he dialed, Noah looked around at the others and smirked. “Is this an appropriate time for a ‘who you gonna call' joke?”

Caleb rolled his eyes and tossed a napkin at Noah's face. “It's a good thing you're pretty, lad, or I'd have to kick you out of bed.”

“I'm bendy too.”

“Aye, you are that,” Caleb said with a laugh.

Ash covered his face and retreated to his bedroom before any further mental images could embed in his mind.

Wyatt wasn't sure what to expect from the people he called to come to the bar. They were a Wiccan group of spiritualists who helped people with possible hauntings and houses that needed spiritual cleansing.

The members he'd spoken to had seemed nice enough, and surprisingly normal and reasonable when Wyatt expressed his doubts about the whole thing. They arrived at Gravedigger's the next Sunday, the first day the bar had been closed down and empty since they'd made their plans. Four of them showed up and greeted Wyatt and the others, requesting they not be given any information about what had been happening until after they had completed their tour of the tavern.

Ash sat on the bar and bounced his knee on a stool as they walked around the tavern. They reminded Wyatt of people in a trance. They were silent and peaceful as they moved, cocking their heads back and forth as if they saw and felt things Wyatt couldn't.

One of the women—Gwynn, Wyatt thought—came up to Ash and studied him until Ash shifted. “Your gift is stronger than most,” Gwynn said to him. “Are you the one having these experiences?”

Ash nodded.

“Some people are more sensitive than others. I believe that's why you've been targeted. We don't encounter many evil beings,” she said, as if it were an everyday statement. “But I fear you have one here. It is very strong. Don't worry.”

Ash glanced at Wyatt in silent accusation, but Wyatt smiled back. It was unsettling, and he wasn't even sure if he believed in any of it.

The lone man who had come with the team stood at the bottom of the stairwell that led upstairs and retrieved a sketchbook from his bag. “Is there a downstairs?” he asked without turning around. He was peering up the steps.

“There's a root cellar,” Caleb said. “You can only get to it from outside now.”

“But the entrance used to be inside?”

“Yes. Where the bathroom is now.”

The man nodded and started up the stairs.

“The house has been renovated?” one of the women asked Caleb.

“Several times, yes.”

“You've been doing renovations recently, though?”

“Little by little, over the last decade or so.”

“And in the last few months?” the woman asked. “Anything large?”

“We completely redid the kitchen. There was a fire, it had to be gutted.”

The woman was nodding. “Renovations can disturb the spirits. To them, this is still their home. They want to know what you're changing and why. Fire is especially troubling to them, though. It can cleanse them. The fastest and easiest way to rid yourself of a ghost is to burn the house down.” She laughed, as if anything about what she'd just said had been funny.

“I see.” Caleb scowled at Wyatt with the same accusing kind of look Ash had given him. Wyatt was hard-pressed not to laugh.

The team moved around for roughly an hour before congregating once more in the bar room. The man turned his sketchbook around and tapped it to get Ash's attention. “This man is not happy.”

Ash lost all color as he stared at the drawing—an uncanny likeness of the tintype of Vincent DuBois Wyatt had produced from the museum. Instead of a Confederate uniform, though, the man in the drawing was wearing a long black coat and a top hat. His eyes, even in the charcoal drawing, were intensely disturbing. They seemed luminescent somehow.

Wyatt shivered and looked away.

“There has been much pain here,” Gwynn told them. “There are spirits that need to be freed and we can guide them by doing a cleansing of the structure and showing them the light. Most ghosts are merely the spirit of a person who has died, left in this plane of existence for one reason or another. They cannot see the light when they die for various reasons, whether because of unfinished business, addiction, or a sudden, confusing, painful death.”

“Addiction?” Caleb asked.

“Oh, yes. That's one not many people know of, but addicts quite often cling to this world. Even in death, they are plagued by their cravings. Bars and taverns, crack houses, and rehab centers are especially haunted places.”

“Huh.”

“Most spirits are harmless, merely confused or lost. This one, however, he doesn't want to leave,” she said as she pointed to the charcoal drawing the man still held. “A simple cleansing may not be enough.”

“He's malicious. Very much so,” one of the other women said.

“And he's fixated on the young man,” Gwynn told Wyatt with a concerned glance at Ash.

“Why?” Ash asked.

“I can only guess. You do look quite like him. You're a fixture here, a place he still considers his. You're more sensitive to his presence than others. And I understand you were attacked? He may even see you as an easy target or lost due to your injury.”

“Lost?”

“Yes.”

“That's the word he used. He said he seeks the lost.”

She nodded, unperturbed. “Don't worry.” She began taking out twined rolls of what smelled like sage and setting them on the bar. Wyatt knew from his research that they were called smudge sticks.

“It can be risky,” the man said as he set the charcoal drawing down on the table. “There's the possibility that it won't work and will provoke him further.”

Gwynn nodded. “And especially strong spirits have been known to insinuate themselves into anyone who is not sober, is unsettled, or is overly emotional.”

Wyatt looked at Ash, thinking that he sort of qualified as all three at the moment.

“It may be best if you leave while we do this,” Gwyn told them.

“I'm sorry, leave?” Caleb said. He bent an ear toward Gwynn like he might have misheard her.

She nodded.

“I'm not comfortable with that,” Caleb said. Wyatt was surprised he was that polite about it, from everything Noah and Ash had said about him.

Gwynn looked at a loss for a moment, but then she brought her hands together and rounded her shoulders. “Well then, perhaps it's best if you join us in the cleansing. I'll instruct you and we can each take a room.”

Wyatt and the others looked from her to Caleb. No one in the room seemed to want to do that.

Caleb rolled his eyes. “All right. Let's get this over with then.”

Wyatt groaned inwardly, but he tried not to let it show. He was there to support Ash, no matter how freaking strange he found this whole thing.

Gwynn gave them each a smudge stick and a plastic bowl, then instructed them to stand in a circle in the middle of the room. Wyatt had to fight not to be cynical about this hippy dippy stuff. While he might believe in ghosts, the rest of it just didn't wash with him, but he didn't want Ash to see any trace of that.

Gwynn walked around and lit each of their bundles of sage, and told them to make certain the ashes fell into the bowls. Then she took up her spot in the circle.

“Now. We're going to stand still and close our eyes,” she said, affecting a calm, almost hypnotic voice. “Focus internally, and imagine a bubble of white light inside of you.”

“Wait, what?” Noah asked.

“Imagine the bubble deep in the center of your body and let it grow.”

Wyatt bit his lip to keep from laughing when he glanced at Noah, who was looking at the woman incredulously.

Delilah shoved her elbow into Noah's ribs and glared at him. “Would you just try it?”

“I don't even know how to make my brain do that.”

Ash snorted, but his eyes were closed.

As the woman continued talking, valiantly ignoring the peanut gallery, Wyatt closed his eyes as well, trying to do as she instructed.

“Imagine this bubble expanding, filling your body and moving past it, pushing negative energy away from you. Let the bubble grow until it is filling the room, and all the negative energy has been pushed out through the doors. In your mind, command the white light to stay and fill the room, right up to the walls, and tell it to stay in this room and protect it.”

The scent of sage wafted around them, and while Wyatt could feel it growing warmer, he was pretty sure it was because he was embarrassed to even be standing there listening to this, much less attempting to do it. He didn't have a bubble in him.

He cracked one eye open to peer sideways. Ash was biting his lip, his head lowered and his eyes squeezed shut. He was either taking it very seriously, or he was trying not to laugh, and Wyatt didn't think it was the latter. A shiver ran through Ash as Wyatt watched him, and Wyatt felt a sympathetic chill slide over his skin. The room was growing colder. Wyatt opened both eyes to look up, not sure why his gaze was drawn that way. There was nothing out of the ordinary, and certainly no giant white bubble chasing evil out of the building.

“This is ridiculous,” Ash muttered.

There was a fine line between believing that the bar was haunted and standing here trying to form a thought bubble to chase away evil beings. Wyatt also had a feeling that the others were all just as nervous as he was. The only outlet seemed to be laughter. Caleb cleared his throat as they all began to snicker. “You know, maybe it's better if the professionals take care of this.”

“I believe that's best,” Gwynn agreed.

They filed out onto the patio to wait. Wyatt sat next to Ash, whose knee bounced so rapidly that Wyatt thought he might get seasick just watching. His nerves were starting to spill over, and Wyatt felt like they were spreading to the rest of the group too, making everyone tense and edgy. Delilah paced, her arms wrapped around herself. Ryan was going from table to table, straightening chairs, the grating sound of metal on the concrete adding to the edgy heft in the air.

“Ryan,” Caleb finally said through gritted teeth. “Sit down.”

“Please,” Noah prompted. He put a calming hand on Caleb's shoulder.

“Sit down, please. Now.”

Ash snorted and shook his head as Ryan found a chair and slid into it. Ash leaned closer to Wyatt's ear. “Noah and Caleb need to reproduce and make little Buddhist ninja babies.”

Wyatt laughed before he could stop himself.

It took another twenty minutes before Gwynn appeared in the doorway. She was still holding a smudge stick in one hand and an abalone shell bowl in the other. She snuffed out the smudge stick in the convex shell and held it there until she had smothered out the embers and it was no longer smoking. Then she took the ashes and sprinkled a line across the doorway.

“Health code violation,” Caleb grumbled under his breath.

Wyatt glanced at him, but his attention was drawn back to the woman when she spoke. “I went through each room on both levels, and Frederick addressed the root cellar. It's hard to tell if there is still a presence here now. Give it perhaps a week or two, and if you're still experiencing things, we can return and try something more aggressive.”