sounded sincere, but Isabella's right. Spirits can't be trusted any more than people.”
“So we try to help her out, but be prepared in case she's actually some malicious spirit purposely trapped in the pen?” Leah said.
“That's my plan,” Isabella replied. Now that Maryann had the protection charm in her pocket, her aura was back to normal but the pen was glowing with the dark miasma. “Also, she may not be evil, but after centuries trapped in that thing, she might be insane.”
“That's probably not any better.”
“No, probably not.” Isabella lowered her voice. “I need you two to find a church.”
“What, at two in the morning?” Leah exclaimed.
“I don't know what Maryann's divination will turn up, if she can even do anything, but I know about banishing ghosts and I think the way we're going to have to deal with this ghost is for me to open a door to the Other Side and summon it out of the pen.”
“Why a church?” Nora asked. “Why not a cemetery?”
“People don't die in cemeteries. Well, not usually. Churches are liminal places, or at least some of them. I need a door I can open and if anything goes wrong, well, it would be good to be on holy ground.”
“Why do we have to find a church? I mean, it is two in the morning and we know pretty much nothing about this city. Nothing will be open anyway and we might end up getting arrested for trespassing or something.”
Isabella sort of sighed. “Because you have faith to guide you to a church we can use. You two look; I need to figure out how to safely carry that haunted pen,” she said, and got some supplies.
“I really don't get how she has faith in us but not faith in God,” Leah said to Nora. “It's kind of contradictory.”
Nora shrugged. “There are a lot of things I don't understand,” she replied diplomatically. “So I have faith and trust it will all work out. Now, let's get to work. I don't know exactly what I'm seeing with Isabella's spell, but the weird black stuff on that pen doesn't look very nice.”
“Agreed.”
Maryann couldn't concentrate on her divination and after three attempts she got frustrated and put her supplies away. Nora and Leah pulled up a map of the city and searched for churches in the area until they found one they both agreed hopefully wouldn't lead to having to call someone for bail money. Isabella wrote out some charms to open doors, hold spirits, and banish spirits and eventually settled on using another pen to roll the haunted pen off the desk and onto a piece of paper with a hold charm on it. The pen spun around on the paper twice and then was still. Isabella quickly wrapped it up without touching it.
“I can't make heads or tails of anything,” Maryann huffed. “That ghost has got me all messed up right now.”
“Don't worry, I have an idea. Get dressed and make sure you bring your notebook. Nora, Leah, do you know where to go?”
“Um, yes, sure, totally,” Leah replied.
“Good enough.”
In a few minutes, they headed out on the deserted streets looking for the church. It was on the outside of town in a somewhat run-down neighborhood although the building itself looked well kept up. There was no adjoining cemetery; the church was too small for that. There was, however, a shabby park on the neighboring lot. All the businesses in the area had closed up hours ago, so Isabella parked as far from the street as possible. Leah grabbed the emergency kit and they followed Isabella, who was looking for a door to open. In the park area near the church, she found two trees that arched together.
“Okay, this will work. Maryann, draw a circle for that pen.”
Maryann used sidewalk chalk to draw a protective circle in the grass. It didn't all stick, but she wasn't concerned about that.
Isabella laid the pen in the center of the circle, still wrapped in the charm. “Okay, give me a sec.” First, she cast a spell to open a door to the spirit realm. Since everyone still had spirit sight, they saw the space between the trees glow brightly for a brief moment and then dim into what kind of looked like a moving curtain of dark fabric hung between the trees. Then she cast a spell to summon the ghost out of the pen. The pen shook, jumped in the air, and fell back down. A translucent figure of a short woman wearing what they guessed was a toga appeared.
“Am I free yet?” Livia asked, looking around. She sort of frowned.
“Hey, she's speaking English!” Leah said.
“That's part of the spell I cast,” Maryann replied. “She may still be speaking Latin and we just understand her.”
“You are free to go beyond to your afterlife,” Isabella answered. “You are free of the pen, I think, and I've got a door open for you. It should go wherever you need to go.”
The ghost looked around her. “So that's all? I go into this door to find if I shall dwell in the Elysian Fields or Tartarus? And everything I ever wrote or helped write disappears with me?”
“You're dead. You don't have a lot of options,” Nora said flatly.
Livia tried to step outside of the circle, but jumped backwards when she hit the invisible edge. “You will not allow me true freedom?”
“We don't have the ability to do that,” Isabella replied. “Anyway, after being stuck in that pen for so long, don't you just want to go to rest?”
“I am a poet! I want the world to love me for my poetry!”
“Um, I'm sorry,” she said. “Ghosts can't really affect the world. Even if you were free to roam, you'd be less able to do anything than you are now.”
“No! I do not accept this! The gods cursed me and now my only option is to simply die? What of my poetry?”
“I'll keep it,” Maryann said. “I've got it in my notebook. We're a band. We want to be famous someday. And when we are, we'll publish your poems and give you credit.”
“But-but that's so few! I want to write more. You must let me write more!”
“We mustn't do anything,” Nora snapped. “You've been trapped for a long time. We can't give you your life back, and we won't give you Maryann's life to share. We'll take care of your poems. That's the best we can do.”
“Nooo!” she screeched, and charged the edge of the circle. She was violently flung backwards.
“You should just go,” Maryann pleaded. “If you go in peace, you'll be more likely to go to the Elysian Fields. Being angry like this won't help you find the right afterlife.”
The ghost started sobbing, but after a few minutes stood up and wiped her translucent face. “You are right. I'm sorry. But it is such a hard thing to let go, especially now. Thank you.” She kind of inclined her head towards them, and walked through the Veil. The doorway glowed and then disappeared.
Maryann sighed and dropped to her knees.
The others rushed to her.
“Oh, I guess she was still having some effect on me,” she said.
“I was afraid of that,” Isabella replied. “That's why I had you bring the notebook. I was going to burn her poems if I had to in order to break that connection.”
“I'm glad it didn't come to that,” the redhead said, standing up. “She didn't mean for this to happen.”
“Let's discuss this later,” Leah said. “We're probably, no, definitely trespassing.”
They got back in the van and returned to the hotel. They were so tired they just went to bed. In the morning, they agreed the ghost was probably just tired and desperate, not necessarily malicious.
“I wonder about who gave Maryann that pen,” Leah said as they packed up to head out on the road. “They were either completely ignorant and she's unlucky...”
“Likely,” Nora interrupted.
“Or they knew about the ghost. In which case they either thought she could help the ghost...”
“You know, I don't talk about that stuff,” Maryann said wryly.
“Or they thought the ghost would harm her,” Leah finished.
“There's also the possibility whoever gave her the pen had some idea that it had
its own kind of Muse,” Isabella offered, “and didn't realize there was a cursed ghost stuck to it.”
“So the intentions could have gone either way based on what the giver knew in the first place,” Leah said.
“We'll just have to put this mystery away for now,” Nora said. “We have no information and too many possibilities.”
“I know. We've got plenty of fans, but there are definitely people out there who don't like us. It just bothers me not to know,” Leah sighed.
“It bothers me too,” Maryann said. “But these are some really good poems. And when we get rich and famous, I'll publish these for poor Livia. Maybe it will really help her soul find some peace.”
“We can only hope,” Isabella replied.
Soon they were on the road again.
The Lyrics:
The manuscript is finished
And I believe I've done it again
Another masterpiece of fiction
Written in my hand with my pen
But the name on the cover
Is yours and not mine
It's always been this way
But it's no longer fine
Refrain: Don't write me off
I wouldn't do that to you
I just want to make sure
I get credit where it's due
This arrangement isn't fair
Why aren't you ashamed
That I write all the words
And you get all the fame?
Maybe you do some work
But I know I do the most
You get the glory and acclaim
And I'm no one; just a ghost
Refrain
The status quo will change
As I toil in obscurity
One day the tables will turn
And the credit will