The Windhaven Witches Omnibus Edition : Complete Paranormal Suspense Series, Books 1-4 by Carissa Andrews (graded readers txt) 📕

In the meantime, maybe I can get Abigail to communicate with me.

As I reach my bedroom door, the hallway is flooded with a strange chill. Spinning around, I search the space, but nothing is evident.

Once inside my bedroom, I pull up short. There, on my bed, is my backpack.

The memory of setting it by the staircase rushes back to me and the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. Whoever, or whatever, must have moved it.

“Abigail?” I call out, my voice quivering.

Without waiting for an answer, I run over to the small door leading to the resurrection chamber and throw it open. Racing down the stairs, I close my eyes and summon the torches to ignite.

“Abigail, are you here?” I demand, my heart pounding.

She doesn’t answer, but I can feel her presence all around me.

I’m suddenly consumed with a vision of something outside of myself—something not my own.

As if stepping into an augmented reality, I’m in this same space, but I’m no longer alone.

Along the outer edge of the resurrection chamber, a man—Warren, my great-great-grandfather—walks the circle in a counterclockwise fashion, saying something I can’t hear or make out. Yet, without a question, there’s a knowing inside of me. It’s almost like a cellular memory. He’s attempting a resurrection.

Peering around the space, I search for the source of his attempt, trying to understand why it’s him and not Abigail who is casting this spell. In the corner of the room, a pile of sheets rests on the floor, bound in the shape of a woman.

Swallowing hard, I continue to watch as Warren kneels down, still muttering to himself. He takes out a small bottle and pours it into the center of the pentacle.

Setting the bottle aside, he takes out a small dagger, barely larger than six inches, and he slices open his left hand. As the blood runs free and uninhibited from his palm, it mixes with the blood already making its way to the outer edges of the internal pentagon. As it swirls and spirals together, a blast of energy releases, blasting Warren and all of the contents—candles, sand, salt, blood—across the room. All light is extinguished, and we’re suddenly plunged into darkness.

I hold my breath, unsure what it is I’ve just witnessed—and why.

As expected, knowing what I know about him, it didn’t work the way it should have.

However, slowly, from the corner of the room, light arises out of the pile of white sheets. Warren scrambles over to it, ripping away its bindings and unfurling Abigail’s body. He clutches her form close to his chest, tears streaming down his face as he rocks back and forth on his knees.

I don’t know how long she’d been dead at this point, but the bloating and distortion to her otherwise-beautiful features is startling. The stench released from unwrapping her enclosure reaches even to me, and I throw my elbow over my face to stop myself from gagging.

The light continues to grow, first emanating from Abigail’s abdomen, then expanding outward across her skin, until she’s nothing but a glowing orb of bright white-blue light.

“Abigail, my darling, my love. Please, tell me thou art with me? I am here—” Warren murmurs, groping at her arms.

Silence greets him, growing ever louder as the light pulls from her body and thrusts itself outside. The ghostly echo of the woman herself hovers inches above her body, then rights itself.

“Warren… What have you done?” Her words reverberate off the stone walls, an accusation hidden in their depths.

Scrambling to his feet, Warren’s face is contorted in anguish.

“Why are you displaced, my love? I followed the ritual, as you have done.”

Recognition flashes across her face and she sighs. She places a spectral hand alongside his jaw, her eyebrows tugging in.

“Warren, you know this magic is beyond you. Your gifts—they are very different from my own. You should not be meddling with such things.” She drops her hand, her gaze drifting to her still body.

“But you are here now. You can help me to—”

Abigail’s eyebrows knit together and her lips slowly tug downward.

Reaching for her, Warren’s hands go through her arms, and he stumbles slightly.

“What is it, darling? What are you not telling me?” he asks. “Why are you not re-inhabiting your body?”

If ghosts could shed tears, Abigail looks as though she might actually cry. “Do you remember the first time I realized my calling?”

“Of course, how could I not?” he says, eyeing her every movement.

She drops her hands to her sides and turns from him. “I knew the power I beheld must not be taken lightly. It was magic with devastating power,” she whispers.

Warren shakes his head, “I do not understand.”

“Wielding the power of life and death…it is but pulling the strings meant for the gods. When one string is pulled out of its sequence, the universe will respond in kind. A life for a life…”

Her words yield their own power and sense of caution—yet I can already tell there’s more she’s not telling him. And he knows it.

“Darling,” he repeats softly.

“You should not have dabbled in magic you do not have the power to wield, my love.”

“I do not understand,” he says, practically pleading. “You are here. You are with me. Why will you not simply re-inhabit—”

“Because I cannot,” she whispers.

He stares at her indignantly. “What do you mean you cannot? You are here; your body is there.” He points to her corpse, as if it’s simply a vehicle she needs to step into.

The apparition of Abigail kneels beside her body. Her ghostly hand runs along her semi-bloated arm, and she slowly shakes her head.

“It has been too long. Even for an experienced necromancer, the time has come and gone.”

“But,” he begins, dropping down by her side, “I cannot lose you. You cannot leave me here alone.” Tears emerge and he blinks them away, wildly clawing at his cheeks. “We were meant to carry on our legacy together.”

“It appears being without me is a concern