To Kill a Sorcerer Read Online Free Page B

doors, stepped outside, and emerged onto another patio, alone. A kidney-shaped pool shone with underwater illumination. The water sparkled blue, twinkling in the lights. As I gazed into the shimmering depths, it startled me to see a blurry shape moving there. The shadow turned at the far end and came toward me.
    Before I could step back, the ghostly figure of a woman burst from the water. Clad in a transparent green gown, she loomed over me, arms reaching. Her eyes were black pools of madness, and her mouth formed a crooked grin.
    “Oh, hell no,” I said.
    Parting her lips in a pantomimed scream, revealing blackness tinged with raw red, she rose slightly, then pounced. I instinctively raised my arm to ward her off, but she slid through it. Her lunatic eyes filled my vision. I shivered as she possessed my body.
    Charges of electricity sparked my insides. My arms jerked as if in seizure. I took an awkward step to the side, not of my own accord. The pool glittered at my feet. She was trying to force me into the water. Fighting, I made to step away, but electric current coursed through me again. I moved in the wrong direction. Now I teetered on the lip. Another surge of otherworldly power and my body leaped into the pool.
    After splashdown, I rotated onto my back. My limbs made no effort to prevent me from sinking despite mental orders to keep my body afloat.
    I was the car, but the green ghost was driving.
    I willed my body to thrash to the surface. Nothing happened. Like a doll a child had dropped, I descended slowly. Water pressure squeezed my eardrums. The coarse surface of the pool’s bottom scraped the back of my head as I settled to a stop. My legs and arms stirred gently. I tried moving again, but the spirit of the woman remained in control, keeping me motionless.
    Trapped inside my unresponsive flesh, I felt like the lone survivor in a torpedoed submarine.

Five
    Tuesday, December 21, 10:01 p.m.
     
    I held my breath and prayed no one would come out of the house and find me down here. This astral presence would eventually release me, and I did not want to have to answer questions about the encounter. The Sofia picture had been bad enough. Now here I lay, waiting for someone to notice a six-foot-tall man in evening clothes lying at the bottom of a lit swimming pool.
    Drowning was not possible. There were other ways to kill me—if only briefly—but holding me underwater was not one of them.
    For a brief, suspended moment, blind terror engulfed me at my helplessness. My greatest nightmare is to be captured by an enemy who tortured and killed me, then observed me come back to life while still under restraint. If my captors realized I could not die and existed at their mercy, how many horrifying deaths might they invent for me while they held me as their prisoner?
    It took me a moment to relax, after reminding myself I had no enemies at this party. At least, none who wanted me dead.
    My initial shock at this etheric invasion slowly wore off. I had seen spirits many times, but never had one invaded my body. Cautiously, I allowed the woman’s psyche to seep into mine, that I might know why she was trying to commit murder. A rising screech began. I immediately threw up filters to keep the woman’s emotions from overwhelming me, but her feelings raged, fiercely intense, smashing through my mental barriers. Like wildfire cresting a dry hill, burgeoning terror broke over my mind, bringing a bizarre mosaic of dark images.
    She’s sitting in a chair . . . a man, standing in front of her, slashing . . . searing pain across the chest, deep laughter, strong arms moving in front of her, a shiny blade that brings unbelievable agony with it . . . looking down, seeing the blade ripping her insides, spilling them into her lap . . . her small hands push at the arms, trying to make them stop . . . her mind regresses to that of a terrified child as she realizes she is going to die . . . now her hands fall into her lap, too,