Morgan stopped her work for the third time this hour to make sure she really did have everything she needed. The crystals were all made, the bath salt jars were freshly clean and ready. She had her measuring cups and postage boxes so Skylar could help. She had even gotten through half her grading. There really was no reason not to make use of her new chalkboard and try another summoning. She’d gotten Sean with a birthday cake--sort of. Who was to say she couldn’t get Constance with a proper circle and a little blood? At least, practice getting the circle, right? The board had even come with chalk in three different colors, just waiting, begging to be used. Morgan checked her phone to see where the planets were. Still Aquarius season, so not great for her, but her Mercury was almost in a water sign. It was all so...promising. Enough to give her pause and make her look around the room once more. It didn’t feel very much like skirting around the curse if the universe was setting everything up so nicely for her. But if she waited until things were more dire, what would that achieve? Morgan pulled up the spell on her phone again. This was not Cassie approved, but at least she had salt this time. She could line the place if she decided to get serious. Which, she wouldn’t. Probably. (What if this was her one door and she was missing the good kind of signal? Or what if that was just what the curse wanted her to think?)

A knock at the door startled her out of her thought loop. Right. Skylar was stopping by the house to visit. Good for her! Making friends with grownups was kind of pitiful, but she’d been there before herself. Sometimes you had to take what you could get. “Hey, come on in!” She stepped back and signed, Good afternoon! Happy to see you. She’d watched a couple of videos online and had mostly memorized the greeting, plus two other words. Work there, Magic there. 

Skylar really, really, really didn’t want to be here. Her head had been aching all day, she’d barely been able to eat anything, and her body just felt run down, even though she’d slept ten hours the previous night. And… what made it worse was she knew exactly why she was feeling this way. Ricky had told her as much. It was because she hadn’t transformed. Apparently, all her problems were a direct result of not turning into a seal, which she didn’t quite follow. She wasn’t a seal who could sometimes be human. She was a human, a normal human. With… quirks. Taking a long drink from her thermos of coffee, Skylar sighed as she walked up to Morgan’s house. This was going to be good for her. This was going to be something good and helpful and nice. Because Morgan had been nothing but nice and helpful, even after Skylar had been dismissive of the whole magic situation. Knocking on the door, Skylar offered what she hoped was a bright smile as Morgan opened the door.

The signing threw her for a second. For one thing, she was going way too fast for her fingers, so they came out garbled. Skylar could tell what she meant, but it wasn’t the best use of sign. “Hi! Thanks for having me.” She said. Setting her coffee down, she let out a small laugh and signed, What do you mean by work there, magic here? 

Oh, thank god Skylar could talk just fine, maybe (probably) even read lips! Morgan saw the two whole words she’d learned outside of the basic greeting repeated in a new way, one she had no idea how to answer. She winced. “Sorry. Just--different tasks I have going on today! Um, I’ve got some bath salts that need to go into those very uh, hashtag aesthetic jars, and I have this shiny new chalkboard that has a lot of magic potential! I’m not going to do anything to it, I should clarify, I’m going to use it to make some more elaborate circles that I’m using right now.” Only after she finished did she realize just how fast she was prone to talking sometimes. Sorry, she signed, the only other word she’d thought make handy use of. “I talk fast sometimes, and I don’t always realize. Can I get you some sweet tea?”

“No problem.” Skylar said, waving it off with a laugh. “I was joking. Sorry, I didn’t mean to make fun.” She said as she took look around Morgan’s house curiously. There were a lot of odds and ends, and a lot of jars as well. What were the jars for? Watching Morgan intently, Skylar did her best to match the lip movements with what she was hearing, but it wasn’t easy. Morgan was speaking just a bit too quickly for her. “Ah. It’s okay, really! You said something about aesthetic jars? Is that what these are for?” She said, gesturing to the mason jars that were set up. “Tea? No, no, I’m good. Thank you though.” Skylar said as she picked up her thermos from where she’d set it down. Being around other people usually helped take her mind off what troubled her, so hopefully helping Morgan would do the same.

“No, I think you earn the right to tease,” Morgan said, trying to reassure her. “I tried to be competent in your language over the course of forty-eight hours maybe, with nothing but youtube and willpower. But, grab a pillow! Make yourself cozy!” She grabbed some tea for herself and sat on the floor with her shiny new board. It was so smooth it didn’t even look real. Morgan broke the seal on the chalk. It was good to practice, right? “You can put the TV on and make yourself at home if you want, but if you really want to help, You can use the measuring cup to put two scoops into the jars.” Morgan beamed over at the girl,who, now that she wasn’t moving quite so fast, really did seem in need of some kind of pick-me-up, poor kid. 

Shaking her head, Skylar shrugged. “I appreciate you trying at the very least. It’s more than a lot of people do.” She said, the thought making her slightly melancholy. Ack. No, no, no. Watching as Morgan picked up a neat little chalkboard, she settled down on the proffered pillow, her legs curling under her. “Oh, that’s okay. I’d much rather do something productive than just use your cable.” She said with a smile. Looking at the set up in front of her, Skylar set to work doing as she was told, putting two scoops of… stuff into the jars and screwing the lids on. “What are these jars full of anyways? Magic salt or something?” She asked curiously.

Morgan began drawing the circle. After so many years of alchemy, she was pretty good at freehand, though everything that went in would need more precision. She couldn’t help but smile at the tingle that went up her hand from that new-supply feeling. She looked up at Skylar to make sure she could see what she was saying alright. “Salt, lavender oil, dry roses and yarrow, and ground crystals. Very relaxing, but less real magic and more mind over matter fluffy magic,” she admitted. She got up and went for her chalk compass. “This, on the other hand, will hopefully be real magic someday. Thank you for deciding to help me out, by the way.” 

All of the things Morgan rattled off sounded just like normal herbal stuff that you could find in any shop, which Skylar realized was exactly the case as the woman finished speaking. Hm. So there were still some parts of “magic” that weren’t exactly flame throwers and turning garbage into candles. At least some things still made sense. Lavender was just relaxing because it smelled nice, not because it had any crazy property to it. “No, don’t worry about it. I needed to get out of the house anyways.” She said as she filled another jar with salt mixture. She watched as Morgan grabbed a small instrument and tilted her head, intrigued. “What’s all of that for? The chalkboard and things.”

Morgan hesitated, compass in hand, as she started to section off her array, making room for each of the runes and sigils she would need to make this work. And, terrifying as the feeling was, she couldn’t help but feel excited. She had a name. Constance Bachman. She had to be related to Sean and Agnes, even if she hadn’t been able to find her name in the geneology list. Maybe a spinster aunt? Or a lost sister? Either way, she was findable. And if Morgan actually managed to hack herself a successful, specific, ghost summoning with this, it would be the craziest and most amazing feat of magic she’d ever accomplished. Which meant she definitely wouldn’t today. Or that if she did, she’d get some static-y bitter brother of Sean’s. Or maybe some minor pesky demon. But she had to thread the needle between knowing the curse wanted to screw her over and manifesting some progress. It could work. And, well, who was Skylar going to talk about it with anyway? “Reason A for getting a big board is so I can make my crystals faster. The more material I can fit and work with, the more I can pop out at a time. My pop socket lid is great, but really not practical. But this,” she explained. “Is something different than my normal bag of tricks. I’ve got this project about spirits and their living descendants.” She began marking out the basic runes for summoning, then constructing the smaller circle she had designed to get Constance. Hopefully, anyway. She reached over for the version she’d sketched out on paper. She smudged away one of the sigils and drew it over again, clearer this time. “If it works, I might be able to bring someone over. Wanna see?”

Skylar watched as Morgan divied up the board with chalk, still not quite sure what she was looking it. Magic seemed to be a bit different than she thought it was. Winston had just kinda… done magic when they’d done it. But, she supposed that there was probably some method to the madness. Continuing to screw the lids on jars, she listened as Morgan offered an explanation. She wasn’t really sure what she meant by pop socket lid-- was she talking about the thing on the back of phones? Not wanting to interupt, she continued to listen. “So… you’re using a chalk board to summon a ghost?” She repeat, just trying to wrap her head around all of that. Ghosts. Ghosts were real. Okay. And you could use chalk and weird little doodles to make them appear? Mmmm, that was less okay. Even though she didn’t really want to see the odd little circle, Skylar scooted closer, “That’s interesting. They look like something out of Skyrim, honestly.”

Morgan was almost finished. She laid it down on the floor and examined her handiwork, then knelt down to add in the minor markings of the array. “What’s a Skyrim?” She asked. “Wait, don’t tell me--it’s that new show on Netflix right?” No, that sounded wrong. Morgan was more preoccupied with getting all the connecting lines just right anyway. “Sorry,” she said, looking up again. “I’m old. Like way old. I follow Grey’s Anatomy, and I have my supernatural crime shows, and food network. But tell me about Skyrim! I’m just going to grab some salt from the kitchen real quick.”

Raising an eyebrow, Skylar tilted her head in surprise. Mm. Well, after Alain had sent her the weird old French music, it shouldn’t be that surprising that some people weren’t as in the know with video games and stuff. “It’s a video game. You play as a Dragonborn, someone who’s got the spirit of a dragon, and can read and speak the ancient language of dragons. It’s…” She paused, realizing that she had no idea if dragons were a real thing. Were they real? Was Skyrim real? “It’s a fun game!” She finished, offering a slightly stressed smile. Oh dear. “Are you using table salt..” She asked. So, magic consisted of weird little runes on a chalkboard and table salt. Good to know, good to know. 

Video games. Morgan probably should have guessed something like that. There hadn’t been time or money to that when she was a kid, and though now, as far as she could tell, you could download one off the internet for thirty dollars, it seemed like an alien existence. “It sounds like fun!” She said brightly. “Fantasy conception is one of my favorite interests. Oh--and it’s not table salt, or not just table salt. It’s a mix this exorcist friend of mine told me about.” She came back out with the mix and started shifting around some objects in the room. She would need to get the real estate for this eventually. And maybe--maybe this could happen. “Hey, Skylar, do you think you can write the alphabet out for me real quick? 

“It’s a neat game, mhm.” Skylar said with a smile before taking a long sip of coffee. Thank God for this new thermos, honestly. Alain had been right about investing in one of these. And she honestly needed it now more than ever. As Morgan explained the mix of salt, Skylar watched with interest as she moved things around. Was this a big spell..? She had been under the assumption that the… spirit would just pop out of the chalk board kinda like a hologram in Star Wars or something. But then again, what did she know about magic anyways? “Huh? Oh, sure. On the chalkboard or somewhere else?” She asked, picking up one of the pieces of chalk from where Morgan had left them.

“Huh?” Morgan looked up from her work distractedly. “No, just grab a pen and paper from my grading pile over there. If I do, hypothetically, get a ghost in here, it’s going to need a way to talk to me. Especially, uh, since I can’t see them!” She was finished. She was finished and she felt like she’d stolen a cookie from her mom’s jar. Like she should run and enjoy her spoils or stay and get as many into her hand before she was caught. Morgan started to work on the salt circle, was going to fetch her dad’s old athame, just cleaned, before she realized just how this might look to someone who just learned that half the mythical creatures they’d read about as a kid were real. “Um, you don’t have to stick around for this part if it’s too much,” she said. “My cat is around somewhere if you’d like to meet her, or I can take it from here,” she offered. “Unless you can secretly see ghosts, in which case I will literally pay you to stick around.”

The back of her neck burning in embarrassment, Skylar nodded and did as Morgan told her. “Sure! Will do!” She said, hoping her tone sounded bright and not mortified. Mmm, yeah the alphabet made more sense to be written on a piece of paper. Writing out the alphabet in clean, large letters, Skylar tilted her head in surprise. “You can’t see ghosts? I thought that if you summoned them you’d be able to see them. But, um, sorry. Dumb assumption, I guess.” She said as she printed out a large Z. When Morgan offered her an out, Skylar chewed on the inside of her cheek. A big part of her wanted nothing more than to just… pretend that this wasn’t real. She wanted to forget everything about this. But, she couldn’t just run away from magic. It was here and she should know more about it. “Um, sorry. I don’t think I can see ghosts, but… I’d like to stay, if that’s okay. I just, I want to know more about all of this.”

“Oh, gosh, I wish,” Morgan confessed. “I honestly thought that too, but as it turns out you need some kind of special ability for that. And, for the record, not a dumb question. Didn’t you only learn all this weird shit was real two weeks ago? You’re harder on yourself than I am on actual students. There’s a lot to learn. Too much, really. I’ve known magic was real my whole life and I just figured out the ghost thing a while ago.” She smiled brightly at Skylar, hoping she felt better and went for the athame. She’d laid the salt thick. If, even, anything happened, they would be safe, and she could vacuum away the evidence before Cece came home to ask questions. And maybe if she was lucky Skylar would be willing to help with that too. She grabbed one of her novelty bowls, a tragic indulgence from the dollar store during her Traveler’s Rest stay, the happy faces of the Disney princesses already peeling away, and positioned herself over the circle. Then she put Skylar’s alphabet paper and pen in where it wouldn’t disturb the runes. “Let’s just hope this doesn’t turn out really anticlimactic, huh?” She raised the ritual knife and began to chant. So far so good. Then came the time for her blood offering. Morgan pressed the knife into her arm, voice hiccuping only a little as the pain sliced into her. So far, so good. Then she looked down into the bowl to make sure she had enough and the world shrank down to the size of a single drop of blood. She went silent and the rising magic and the knife both went whizzing away from her. 

“I… Yeah, only the last two weeks, with the karkinoids.” Skylar said with a shrug as she moved over to the side, letting Morgan do all the final preparation work on the spell that she had laid out. But… No, Morgan didn’t need to know about her situation. Not after she mentioned how there were people going around trying to steal teeth for potions and stuff. Skylar watched, curiously as Morgan pulled out a weird little disney princess bowl and set it down. Were princesses important for this? Fingers curling up at her side, she forced herself to watch as Morgan began to say words she’d never heard before and then draw the knife blade-- What the fuuuuuuck was she doing? Before Skylar could react, tremors began to fill the room, the bowl of blood shaking violently-- A sharp pain lanced through her right shoulder, searing and hot, as the knife flew towards her and lodged itself into her body. Letting out a scream of pain, Skylar fell to the ground, a large spout of blood splattering across the room. “MORGAN!” She cried out, panic threatening to overwhelm her as she stared at the knife sticking out of her.

Morgan didn’t hear or notice anything except the blood in the bowl. She shoved the plastic into her mouth with both hands, guzzling the liquid ravenously and licking the sides where it had stuck. And there was more, streaks puddling on the floor and the coffee table. Morgan dropped the bowl and threw herself down to lap them all up. When she pulled away at last, panting and dizzy, her face stained from nose to chin, and saw her dad’s knife lodged in Skylar’s arm. “Oh fuck.” She licked her lips in spite of herself and scrambled to her feet. Keys. She needed her phone and her keys so they could get to the car so they could drive to the hospital. Fuck. The fucking blood clinger. She should’ve known it wouldn’t have worn off that quickly. “It’s okay, it’s okay!” She cried, her voice jumping higher each time she said it. The edges of her vision felt blurry and she grabbed an empty mason jar while she was at it. “Come on, we’re taking you to the hospital, okay! Also, hold this to collect any blood you lose! This is fine, you’re gonna be fine!” She, on the other hand, looked like a walking crime scene, but maybe if she bulldozed ahead on the knife inside the girl’s arm they wouldn’t have to go into it. 

Skylar began to hyperventilate as she stared at the knife in her arm, her vision narrowing at the edges as she tried to focus on anything other than the knife-- “What the fuck are you doing?!” Skylar screamed, pointing at the bowl of blood that Morgan had just drank from. Scrambling away across the floor, she let out a cry of pain as she tried to put as much distance from her and Morgan, who was apparently some kinda vampire? “G-get away from me!” Skylar said, rivulets of blood running down her arm to pool on the floor. The more she struggled, the more and more blood poured from around the knife still lodged in her arm. “I’m not going anywhere with a vampire! An-And I’m not,” She let out a groan of pain as her arm screamed in pain, “Going to make you a to-go cup!”

“Oh my god you’re making it worse!” Morgan shrieked, starting to panic herself. She screwed her eyes shut. Maybe if she didn’t see the blood she wouldn’t have some weird blood-clinger blackout. “I’m not a vampire, it was a magic tick! I thought it had worn off  but apparently not! I mean, would you rather be the juice box? Come on!” But no sooner did she settle this in her head than did she slip on the floor and come face to face with the fresh streams of blood from Skylar. Morgan forgot everything she was talking about and licked them up like her life depended on it.

As Morgan tried to convince her that she wasn’t some kind of vampire out to suck her blood, Skylar remembered what Ricky had told her. Selkies had more blood than other people, making them prime targets for vampires. “A magic tick? That’s, that’s a thing? WHAT THE FUCK!” Skylar screeched as Morgan dropped down and began to lap up her blood from the floor. Skylar watched in horror and reached behind her to pull herself up to her feet-- she needed to get out of her, she needed too… As she stood up, what blood was in her head, immediately rushed out and her vision went white around the edges as fell back to the ground, woozy. “I… I… I’m…” She couldn’t fully make out words any more, all she could do was grasp at a nearby mason jar and hold it to her still bleeding shoulder.

Morgan slithered her way over the floor, lapping every drop until her tongue felt rough and every drop had been siphoned. She groaned, still thirsty, and made a grab for Skylar, but missed as the girl stood up. Her head hit the wall and she lost her balance, going splat and rolling onto her back Slowly, her brain cleared again. Maybe anticlimactic would’ve been better after all. “Skylar??” She asked. “Are you still there? Can you drive yourself maybe? Or, I don’t know, call an Uber? There’s Uber in White Crest, right?” She was afraid to get up again. Afraid the floor would fall out from under herself. Afraid of the red, tangy blood. It was still on her rough-scraped tongue and in the back of her, hateful and terrifying. But in the moment it hadn’t been. God she was so screwed. “Skylar--?” She croaked.

“Mmmnot good. No’ good.” Skylar said thickly, her head heavy as she continued to try and get away from Morgan. Holding the mason jar in her hand, she did her best to siphon some of the blood that clung to her skin into the jar. “Don’ eat me… ’m… fishy. Wouldn’t tas’ good.” Her words slurred together as she slid the mason jar towards Morgan. Uber? Her phone. Her phone! Pulling her phone out of her pocket, Skylar swiped her thumb across the screen to send a garbled text before setting it down on the ground, “Please don’t eat me.” She mumbled.

This was not going to be a good day. And really, Morgan should’ve known better than to hope for getting away with anything for long. She reached across the floor and grabbed the jar, stomach-lurching at the precaution and inched, achingly, to a sit. “I promise on whatever will make you feel better I do not want to eat you!” Never the less she sipped the blood. It didn’t soothe her like it did earlier, so maybe she was past the worst of this. “Come on, Uber’s going to take too long and you need help.” She was unsteady on her feet, but she had what she needed and she could just about make it to the door, to-go cup in hand as Skylar had so kindly put it. She staggered out and took a deep lung full of fresh air. She had no idea how she was going to explain this to Ricky, or anyone else for that matter. How far was the hospital again?

“Not an Uber… Ricky, he’s gonna… gonna help me. Can’ go hospital.” Skylar said, shaking her head back and forth. As she continued to struggle away, she fell flat on her back onto Morgan’s floor, the knife still sticking out of her shoulder. Fatigue and blood loss overtook her and Skylar passed out right in the entryway of the front door.