Poppy screamed, then promptly fell asleep.
On her feet.
Shockingly, she didn't even fall over. Clover grabbed her sister by her shoulders and held on, though. Just to be sure.
Violet jumped in front of them both, arms wide to deflect any attack from the banshee which soared out of the shadowy depths of the library, her ethereal form bright with necromantic energy as she let out a long horrifying wail.
"I will rend you to your bones! I'll drain the soul from your withered corpses and feed on it for all eternity! I'll-" She came to a sharp halt in front of me, the rage which had twisted her features smoothing into something a bit more surprised. "Oh. Hello, Master."
"Doris," I said. "That's not the proper way to greet people, is it?"
The little banshee looked to be barely more than a child. When she'd died, she was only ten-years old. Now, she was more than a hundred. But it would be rude to point that out to her.
She wore a long white gown whose sleeves were a little too long for her arms and ended up covering her hands. Only the bare tips of her fingers could ever be seen, and this only rarely.
When not filled with the fury of a banshee, she was a pretty little thing and should have grown to be a lovely young lady. Instead, her life had been cut short thanks to a wasting disease which couldn't be cured.
Her spirit had then haunted a local cemetery until I had been experimenting with necromancy and turned her into a banshee.
Which was better than being a simple Restless Spirit doomed to roam mindlessly yowling at anyone silly enough to be creeping through a cemetery late at night.
She gave her arms an excited little flap and smiled sheepishly at me. "Sorry! I wasn't sure who it was. I thought you might be Grimsby."
"Don't be silly," I said, patting her head. "He doesn't like to read."
"I know. But I thought he came to play with me and I wanted to surprise him!" She giggled, then turned her gaze to the three sisters and leapt into the air to fly circles around them like a little magpie. "Master, you brought visitors! Who are they? Oh! You have pretty hair! I wish I had hair like yours. Mine is white. Like everything else. I'm banshee. What are you?"
"I'm Clover," Clover said, gently plucking her hair from the banshee's tight little fingers. "This is my sister Violet. And Poppy."
"What's wrong with her? Is she dead like me?"
"No!" Violet gasped, putting a hand to her mouth. "She's just asleep!"
Doris cocked her head and frowned. "That's a very strange way to sleep. Doesn't she have a bed?"
"The poor girl is cursed, Doris," I told her softly. "They all are."
"Oh." She lifted herself above them, her clothes swaying as though under water. "I'm sorry to hear that! That must be awful. I bet you came here to find some books on curses!"
"Do you have any?" Clover asked hopefully.
"Oh, lots!" The little banshee grinned, dropping to the ground and standing proudly in front of the library. "Lots and lots! And I know where they all are, too!"
I patted her on the head again. "Doris, if you don't mind, these ladies will be staying in the tower for a while. I've given them permission to use the library. Everything except the Purple level, okay?"
"Yes, Master," she said.
"Purple level?" Clover's nose twitched. "What's that?"
"Nothing for you to touch," I told her. "There's nothing related to curses in there. It's mostly a mix of rare demonology and some other magics which would be… harmful to the reader. Please don't try to access them."
"I'd feel so much sorrow if I had to kill you," Doris said sadly. "Because you look like so much fun! Do you like to play with dolls? I used to play with dolls. And do you play Hop-Skip? I love Hop-Skip. Oh! And what about Skippy-Rope? Can you do it? I used to jump so high! Of course, now I can jump much higher. I can even jump to the top level of the library in two jumps!"
"Two?" Violet bent down to be eye-level with the little banshee. "That's really amazing."
"It is!" She giggled. "Sarah can only do it in four."
"Who's Sarah?"
"Sarah's a Poltergeist. There's five of us ghosts here. But I'm a banshee, so I'm the strongest." She blinked suddenly. "Oh! Master! I forgot to tell you. Sarah has gone missing!"
"Missing?" I frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Well, last night there was lots of noise. And Sarah said she could tell there was some big necromancy spells being cast. She told me to hide in the top level because it was so scary! Then, when it was all over, I came downstairs again and couldn't find her at all!"
"What about the others? Did they see anything?"
"Hmm." She tapped her lip thoughtfully. "I don't know."
"Did you ask them?"
"I couldn't."
"Why not?"
"Well, I can't find them, either! I thought they were hiding from me, but I've looked everywhere."
I closed my eyes and tried to sense the other ghosts.
I had collected them all over the few years I had been learning Necromancy, binding them to myself with dark rituals which helped protect them from being consumed by stronger spirits. Spirits left alone in cemeteries were always prey to other spirits. They got stronger with cannibalism.
Not a pleasant way of life. And certainly not the kind of environment I would wish to leave a lady or a child even if they were dead already.
Doris was right, though.
The ghosts were missing.
Which meant only one of two things could have happened.
Either the necromantic war between myself and Reginald had frightened them so much than they had left the tower and were no longer in range of my binding. Or Reginald's little Order had left something unpleasant in their arrays which I hadn't noticed.
Normally, I'd rush back down and check them.
But after tossing the odious little man into the Death Well, I'd already had Grimsby and Penelope clean up the rooms so the girls could move in after lunch.
The arrays would be gone by now.
I ground my teeth in annoyance. I'd thought I was done with necromancy for a while. Now I was going to have to dig around my memories in search of some clairvoyancy spells to try and contact my missing librarians.
"Where do you think they went, Master? Do you think they went to the bathroom? Or maybe they're in the kitchen. Why would they go to the kitchen without me, though? They know I love to go to the kitchen. Mudge bakes really nice chocolate cookies." She sniffed at the air. "I can smell them. Do you have some? Master, can I have a cookie? Please? I'll be a good girl, I promise!"
Without thinking, I pulled the jar out of my spatial bag and opened the lid to let her take a cookie.
"Yoinks!" Her little hand whipped into the jaw and snatched a cookie. She zoomed into the air, crunching loudly. I still wasn't sure on the anatomy of ghosts, but they did seem able to consume food even if they didn't technically need it. "So yummy!"
"Umm…" Clover asked, still holding Poppy up. "Taran…?"
I held out the jar, and she took one with a happy giggle. "I'll take a second, but it's for Poppy, I promise!"
I then offered the jar to Violet, who looked about to say no.
"If you don't want yours, I can have it," Doris called down at her. "Mudge's cookies are the yummiest!"
"Well," she said. "Maybe I'll try one…"
I smiled at her as she took the cookie. Poppy gave a little snuffle and then opened her eyes. "Huh?" Then; "Cookies!"
The sound of crunching cookies and delighted feminine hums filled my ears and almost made me forget how irritated I was at the bunch of foul necromancers who'd invaded my home and now seemed to have abducted my librarians.
"Doris, when you've finished eating, can you please get me Elgar's Book of Spirit Tracing and Hemsworthington's The Clairvoyant's Encylopedia?"
"I want to," she said as she nibbled at a few chocolate chips. "But I can't."
"Why not?"
"Because of the hole."
"What hole?"
"The hole in the Necromancy section." She looked at me like I was silly for asking. "It's so huge that I can't get inside. I thought Sarah and the others might have been hiding behind it, but why would they?"
"A hole," I sighed, reminding myself that she still had the awareness of a child despite her age. I couldn't blame her for forgetting important details. "What sort of hole?"
"Oh. It looks like one of those things you like to make when you're angry."
"A portal."
"Yes!" She munched happily. "Only it's more weird. I don't like the way it looks at me. It's creepy."
"Well, we might as well go and look at it."
"Do you think Sarah got sucked inside?"
"Why would you think that?"
"Because when I get close, it sort of tries to pull me inside."
I closed my eyes and put my fingers to my temples.
Then a voice which was like sandpaper on my spine, murmured in my ear; "Sir? Your gin and tonic is here…"
"Thank you, Grimsby," I said.
And this time, I meant it.