Geist Read Free Page A

boss—the one that had jumped out in front of Daniel's gun when he'd tried to kill me. 
    The one that died instead of me. 

-3-
    Back To The Physical

    Geist immediately became Joe again. He pressed his hands against the outside of the egg. "Please, Zoë. I am terribly sorry. I was only looking for the perfect form—" 
    "Don't ever look inside my mind again!" I screamed at him. "Got that?"
    He nodded and stepped back, his head bowed "I am...so very sorry. It is just that...this is the first time I have been released from my previous form. This feels..." 
    I watched him—not sure about him. Or it. "What's wrong?" 
    "I—I am not sure, Zoë. I am sure I will sort it out momentarily. And whatever it is I am experiencing will not interfere with my ability to serve you." 
    "So you..." I moved to the egg's barrier again. "Let's get back to the host thing..." 
    "Yes. I was speaking of Hosts," he said and started pacing again. His strange way of acting was really starting to freak me out. But seeing as I was physically trapped inside of a glass-like egg inside of the Abysmal plane—who was I to judge freaky? 
    "Yes, back to hosts," I did want him to get back to that. It was just easier to look at Joe and talk to him though. But I wanted the real Joe.
    And I wanted the real Dags. 
    "There—" Geist said and stopped. "That image you just gave me." 
    "I told you not to look at my mind." 
    "I did not. You broadcast quite well. I would suggest if you do not want to alert the whole of the universe to your whims and internal dialogue, to tone it down some." 
    I got the feeling that that was the first time this thing had ever said tone it down . "Oh-kay. Point taken. But I was thinking of Dags. What's he got to do with hosts?" 
    "My previous Mistress was able to find physical beings with weak barriers against her intrusion. She would force her ghost upon them and thus draw from their essence in order to walk within the physical plane."
    Wow. She did that? "So the bodies I used to see her in, in the physical world—like the guy in the hood and the clown with the weenie mouth—" A while back during one of my many hospital visits the Phantasm had shown up in my room as a clown with a wiener for a mouth. It was not an image I liked remembering. 
    "Those were not bodies. Those were projections of herself once she became powerful enough to no longer need the host." 
    "Can I get that strong?"
    "Only if you fully embrace your role and become the Phantasm. At present, you must rely on hosts. Such an ability should come easily to you because you are by nature Irin, and by design, Wraith."
    "By design?"
    "You were born in nature as a keeper of the borders, but it was by someone else's hand that you became a harbinger, Zoë. You became the Wraith when the balance of Ethereal and Physical was mingled with the Abysmal." 
    Oh. I had never had my existence explained to me like that before. 
    Geist continued. "By taking a host, it puts less of a strain on your physical body while it is tapped into the Abysmal." 
    "Tapped into?" I said as I started to look around the murky green confines of the egg. It was at once both limiting and limitless. In front of me was this Geist in Joe's form. But if I looked behind me into the darkness of the egg, I could see the universe unfold for me. Vast. Limitless. And damn scary. "So am I, like, fueling things here? Like a battery? Am I plugged into the Abysmal, or is the Abysmal plugged into me?" 
    "Yes and no." He answered, pursing his lips. "Both of the opposing planes—Abysmal and Ethereal—contain thrones such as this one. They are opposing points of power. Polarity. The planes do not feed from you, you receive from them." 
    Riiiiight . I waved my hand. "Okay, so back to the host. What has this got to do with Dags?" 
    "You have the capability to create a link with him." 
    I moved back again. "A link?"
    "You have one of the pages." 
    I instinctually put my hand to my breast where I'd tucked