The Fire With No Name (Ghost Crimes #3)
Content Warning: Destructive Rain Storm, Destruction of Possessions and Home, Discussions of Heavy Topics, Irreality, Hallucinations, Psychedelia, Spirit Possession
Ezra loomed over where Star sat on the floor of their apartment.
“You might be a natural at spirit channeling,” it said, “but you’ve never developed your magical talent in any serious way. That’s why basics like this are necessary.”
Star stared at their feet. No use complaining, they thought. Ezra might look like a hot topic disaster, but it knew what it was talking about.
“I understand that,” they said. “I just can’t hold my gaze like that.”
Ezra ran a pale hand through its bleached blond hair. It was tall and thin, dressed in all black with black nails and lips to match. “I know. But that’s not a reason to give up. If this was easy, everyone would do it. But enough practice can conquer any barrier.” It smiled. “Mastering object concentration is important to developing your magical talent. It creates avenues for power to flow and allows you to unlock secrets contained within the objects you concentrate on.”
Star nodded and looked across their room again. The wall was featureless, but Ezra had put a blue dot on the wall. They held their gaze, unwavering.
Then Ezra’s phone rung.
“Shit, sorry.” Ezra fumbled with its phone. “I need to take this.”
It strode out the door in a few steps while it flipped open its phone. Before it closed the door behind it they heard, “Hi, dad.”
They returned their gaze to the dot. They fought with their eyes to keep them fixed on it. The wall around it blurred and the dot came into greater focus. Despite the distance, the texture of it came into focus. The upper left part of it was coming off the wall slightly. The dot wasn’t perfectly smooth. They struggled to make out the exact features of it as they formed a singular texture, a unitary whole.
The door creaked open. They struggled to keep their gaze on the dot and not look to the door. A few moments pass and the dot remained in their vision.
Then it fell to the side.
“See? You’re doing much better already.” Ezra put a hand on their shoulder. “More practice and you could’ve held the gaze while I got the call, left the room, and came back.”
“It provides a sort of clarity,” they said. “The intense focus lets me see things I would’ve missed on a casual inspection.”
Ezra grinned. “Enough time and you can see more than you could ever imagine.”
Star smiled. “So what did your dad have to say?”
“Oh.” Ezra’s demeanor collapsed. “Well, uh... I was hoping to ask you about that. Because, well, uh, he asked a favor and I’m not sure I’m equipped for it, and I told him that, but he trusts me, and that’s sweet and all but I really don’t know what I’m doing with a lot of spirit work, and certainly don’t have a lot of field experience, I’ve always focused on different things. And, well, like, I told him that maybe I could ask someone else to help and he insisted I at least come along and...”
It stopped and took a few deep breaths.
“I guess what I’m saying,” it said, “is I think I got you a job with my dad, if you’re willing to help.”
Star nodded. “I’ll see what I can do.”
The stench of cow shit greeted them at the house with a blast of wet air from the north east. The leaves of a tall oak tree rippled, partly obscuring distant dark clouds to the north east. In the shadow of the oak tree was a ramshackle house. The lawn was overgrown and the facade of the house beaten up.
In the yard a weathered man was picking up metal pieces off of the ground. He wore a denim jacket with several patches showing off bands Star had never heard of.
Ezra said, “Hi, dad.”
The man stood and turned. His skin was wrinkled and his black nail polish was chipped.
“Oh, hi, Ezra,” He extended a hand in Star’s direction. “And you must be its friend. I’m Arnie, its father.”
Star took his hand and shook it. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Arnie. I’m Star, a medium.”
“Well met.” He grinned. “You might be able to help me with the weird shit I’ve been dealing with.”
He gestured to pieces of metal chain that were strewn across the yard.
“Chainsaw broke?”
Arnie frowned. “While I was cutting the tree. It’s an old tree and it’s hard to maintain. The HOA is on my ass about it. It’s easier to just cut it down.”
His back straightened and his frown turned to a slight smile. “What I wasn’t saying is that weird shit has been happening since I started working on the tree. Branches scratching against windows, things being moved while I slept, and so on and so forth.”
“Sounds like you upset some sort of spirit,” Star said. “Your kid came to the right person to deal with the issue.”
They stepped toward the tree and looked toward Arnie. “I’m going touch your tree and try to see if anything is there. Probably there’ll be no visible change, but I don’t want to do it without your permission, first.”
Arnie nodded and gestured for them to continue, the frown returning to his face. Star pressed their palm against the tree and close their eyes.
The physicality of the bark pressed against them, the roughness of the bumps and divets. They stopped all movement beyond steady breathing, keeping their hand in the same place. The bark had a hole the shape of a beak. It was cracked and broken apart. And the energy of it flowed like water up and down the trunk and into their hand, bringing a warmth with it. The energy had its own bumps and divets. Places where growth hadn’t been as good as it could’ve been. Scars from previous trauma. And a swirl far above them in the top of the branches.
The flow of the warmth increased, filling their hand hand more, becoming scalding. They pulled their hand away and shook it a bit.
Arnie frowned. “So there’s something in there?”
“Yes,” they said. “And not something that liked me poking around.”
“So what are you going to do?” Arnie smiled. “I just want some peace in the house.”
Star looked to Ezra and mouthed, ‘I’m sorry.’
They turned back to Arnie. “I think I’m going to need to stay the night to see what the spirit does.”
Arnie nodded. “The two of you can get Ezra’s old room.”
Ezra groaned and glared at Star.
Arnie led the two of them into the house, it was quiet and odorless inside, through a small front room and into a kitchen separated from a living room by a counter. Dishes were piled up in the sink, but the counters were clean. The living room had a simple couch, a record player between two filled bookshelves, and a table with simple chairs around it.
“There’s only one room the two of you could stay in upstairs.” Arnie pointed toward the narrow stairs to the left of the entrance of the living room. “I never figured out what to do with Ezra’s room when it moved out.”
Ezra led them up the stairs into a cramped upstairs with two rooms, one on each end of a hallway. Its room had a single bed, a comfortable office chair, and a bare desk.
“Not much room.” It sat on its bed. “My dad’s never really been all that rich, so this is the best house we could ever get. And it doesn’t have my stuff in it anymore.”
“That’s ok,” Star said. “I wasn’t planning on getting much sleep tonight, anyway. Tonight is when I get started on my work.”
Ezra sighed. “I guess I wasn’t going to get much sleep tonight, either. What’s the plan?”
“We wait for your dad to fall asleep, that’s when it sounds like the spirit is the most active,” they said, “then we go follow the noise and see what’s going on and what we need to do to communicate with whoever is doing this.”
“And if talking to it doesn’t work?”
“Well,” they said, “I’m not exactly an expert on restraining spirits, yet, despite my training with you. So I guess that part is as much on you as it is on me.”
Ezra sighed. “Please don’t fuck this up, ok? I love my dad. His life has been hard enough as it is. Poverty, multiple stints in mental institutions, raising me as a single parent. I don’t want him to have to deal with more than he has to.”
“I will do what I can.” They put a hand on its shoulder. “I can’t promise we can get him a perfect outcome, but I can promise that I’ll be his advocate with the spirits as best I can.”
Ezra smiled. “Thanks.”
Ezra unpacked a bag of its tools. Various rods and crystals and cloth with sigils on them. Star left its room to allow it to deal with the tools and headed downstairs.
The house had a sort of stillness. There wasn't any particular smell nor any sound. The air flowed only slightly and the energy of the space moved much like the air. There was a sort of stability to its movement.
They sat in the middle of the living room and closed their eyes to meditate.
They reached for the movement of the energy in the room, again. The stability came into focus. The energy moved in two ways, a double spiral through the house. The two flows of energy were dancers moving with in sync. Arnie’s energy infused into the space, giving it structure.
Beneath the spirals, another energy moved, rolling like a wave. Where it passed through, the spirals were disrupted and the wave broken. Where the spirals moved in harmony, the wave moved discordantly with them. Not strong enough to break the stability, but its power was growing.
Star focused on the wave like the dot on the wall. Everything else melted away. The aroma of grass and trees after a storm overwhelmed them, the sound of wind passing through leaves effused the space. The spirals were distant, nonsensical. An order imposing itself on an already ordered space.
The wave swelled and fell. Anger and pain flowed through it, brilliant orange and red fire drawing lines across it. The wave flowed from the tree moving through the grass, passing into other trees and spaces, running into other barriers, worse so than the spirals.
The chime of music came from behind them while the fragrance of oregano wafted through the air. They opened their eyes. Color drained from the world. Everything appeared dull and distant, as if the space didn't exist. They stood, their joints cracking.
“Ah.” A voice echoed from miles away. “You’re back.”
The world blurred and sounds became distant. All that remained was their grip on the bookshelf. Buzzing filled their head.
Everything cleared up and they were on the floor. Ezra was running toward them.
“I’m ok.” Their voice slurred as they spoke. “That was just really intense. Give me a moment.”
Ezra helped them up and into a chair.
“Dad made pasta,” it said. “I’ll get you a plate.”
Star nodded. “Thanks.”
Ezra brought them pasta with a red sauce and cheese. It and Arnie sat at the table. The sauce was chunky and filled with veggies. With each bite, color returned to the world.
Arnie put down his fork, finished with his plate. The smile on his face aligned with the clockwise spiral in the house.
“So,” he said, “what was that about?”
Star swallowed. “I was getting a feel for the energy of the space. I went too deep and it was overwhelming. I was left everything feeling dull when I came back.”
“Was that what’s causing the issue?”
“It was the energy of the tree,” they said. “It was was like waves in a pool after someone big jumps in. The spirit’s energy flowed through it like lines of fire.”
Ezra said, “Is it powerful?”
Star nodded. “It doesn’t change what needs to be done. It just lets me know what it is whoever is doing this is like.”
Arnie got up and got a second plate of pasta. Star savored every bite of theirs.
“It was beautiful,” they said. “Or maybe sublime is the right word. It was like looking down from the peak of a mountain and seeing the whole of the world laid out before you.”
Ezra and Arnie stared at them and they smiled back. Arnie frowned, taking on the energy of the counterclockwise spiral, and returned to his food. The rest of the meal continued in silence.
At the meal’s end, Ezra collected the plates and took them to the kitchen and the now empty sinks and washed them. Arnie excused himself from the table after a brief chat.
“It’s late and I should start getting to sleep.”
He left up the stairs to his room and Ezra came to join Star.
“So this spirit will do its work while dad’s asleep?”
Star nodded. “Your dad’s energy pervades this space and gives it an order the spirit is less capable of effecting. But he’ll have less control of it and less power behind it when he’s asleep. So it’s the perfect time for the spirit to act. For now, though, we should return to your room and wait for anything to happen.”
Wind picked up outside of Ezra’s window. The wooden fence around the property rattled. Star closed their eyes centering themself. The wave grew in the absence of the double helix, a tide rising against the house. They bolted to the door.
The air was pierced by a horrendous scraping of wood against glass then a crash downstairs. They turned back to face Ezra.
“Come on.” They motioned forward. “It’s time for our work to begin.”
They hurried down the stairs, the footsteps of Ezra behind them. A blast of cold air met them at the bottom. Their nose was assaulted with a mixture of cow manure and freshly rained on grass. Glass was scattered around the floor, the window in the kitchen was shattered inward. Pots and pans were flipped.
They stepped into the kitchen. The air around them swirled. They closed their eyes and reached out to it. They were underwater. Everywhere around them was the energy from the wave. Color filled their vision, a brilliant red and orange, anger and hate. Something reached back to them. A familiar heat touched them and they yelped and withdrew. The wind blew past them and up the stairs. A door slammed. Arnie screamed.
Ezra winced. “Shit, shit.”
It scrambled up the stairs and Star scrambled after it. The door to Arnie’s room was torn off its hinges. Another blast of air hit them from inside the room. Arnie lay on the floor coughing and sobbing. Behind him his window was shattered outward. Papers were scattered on the floor.
Ezra knelt by its father. It looked up. “This needs to end.”
Star nodded. “Stay with him.”
They turned and marched down the stairs and out the door. Mud splashed against their legs and rain soaked their hair. They stared up at the massive tree as they approached.
They reached out and touched it like they did before. They closed their eyes and breathed. The physicality of the tree filled them. The heat was there, again, and they avoided it for now. They felt every nook and cranny of the bark, every capillary of the trunk, every movement of the branches. They were the tree.
They couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t smell. The wind rustled through them and rain rolled off of their leaves. They reached deep into the ground, their roots surrounded by mycelia of countless fungi fed them. They reached far to each side, scraping against a tilted structure beneath their canopy.
They had been a sapling here initially, so many leaf falls ago. This was their home. It had been through the presence of many humans.
A fire filled their capillaries, but did not burn. They shared their space effortlessly. Their space was for sharing. For the squirrels to make their homes, for the birds to make their nests.
The fire had no name, but they knew nem. They were nir home.
The fire with no name echoed through the whole of the tree. “Who are you?”
“I am a medium,” Star said. “I wish you no harm. I merely wish to speak with you.”
Heat lashed out at them and they gritted their teeth.
“I haven’t harmed you, fire.” They struggled to hold their voice steady. “You have reacted to every attempt to reach out to you with hostility and violence.”
The heat retreated. “You may not have, but your kind has. Was it not your kind who destroyed our forests? Was it not your kind who paved our ground? All for your profit.”
Star shook their head. “It may have been humans who did that, but not all humans were involved in that. Your forests were destroyed by those who live here for profit. My people were torn from our homes and taken here in chains for that same profit.”
“But you speak for the human in the house,” ne said. “You help one who seeks to destroy yet another of my homes.”
“I am a conduit between your kind and his. You can speak through me as much as he can.”
The fire with no name swirled through the trunk. “Why would you speak on my behalf?”
“It is what I do. I give the injuries of the past a voice. If you come with me, I will give you a voice. I will let you speak. You can tell the human in the house how he has hurt you.”
“And why should I believe you?”
Star lowered their defenses and let go. Their memories and thoughts poured into the tree.
It was middle school. They met their first spirit and she told them that she had been hurt and abused. They listened to her and, then, let her enter their body. She told the bullies who had hurt her what they had done wrong. They had been beaten for it. The spirit moved on and they had cried in the bathroom. The bullies had never left them alone.
It was freshman year of high school. A boy who had been killed for being gay spoke to them. He had died decades ago, but he still missed the one boy who was kind to him, even if he never loved him back. They looked him up and tracked him down. He worked fast food. The boy never worked up the courage to ask Star to speak to him, so they hadn’t.
It was graduation day. A spirit cried in a stream outside of their high school. A housing development was going to be built over the summer and the spirit’s home was going to be radically transformed and zie couldn’t handle it. They sat with the spirit and talked with hir all day helping hir calm down. They never went to their graduation, but their regret was that they were powerless to stop the construction. They slept by the stream with only the spirit to keep them company. They hadn’t been home in over a year.
It was two years later. A spirit was hidden in the backroom of the grocery store. They spoke with her every day while they stocked shelves. She didn’t remember how she died, but she appreciated the company. One day she asked them to help her move on. It took them three weeks to set up, but they finally performed a séance for her in the homeless encampment where they slept. They missed her after she was gone.
It was four years after that. A spirit spoke to them while they were taking someone’s order at the fast food joint they worked at. The man who was ordering had stalked her for years before she had committed suicide. They let her take them over and she punched him in the face. They spent the night in jail and they worried over how they’d make rent without that job.
It was five years more. They spoke with their first client at their job as a psychic. Her cat had died. They let her speak to her one last time. She lived in a rundown apartment and they refused to let her pay them their full rate for what they had finished. They’d lived like that.
It was five months ago. They were invited over to a house where an exorcism had taken place, a ghost was murdered.
It was three months ago. The ghost of a father asked them to find who robbed their grave before the police so his children wouldn’t go to jail.
It was two weeks ago. They helped a ghost visit his lover one last time before moving on.
It was this morning. Their friend’s father had asked for help. He struggled with his life and his child was all he had left.
It was this afternoon. They had promised their friend that they would be its father’s advocate whatever happened, but they had touched the wave of energy, they had felt its beauty. They would make a liar of themself.
It was this night. They had come out to end the conflict. They submitted themself to the mercy of the fire with no name.
The fire with no name had filled up their body. Like the tree, ne did not burn them.
Ne said, “You are not what I thought you were. I believe you.”
Star collapsed to their knees panting. They took a moment to compose themself.
“I’ll be your advocate with the human in the house.” They stood. “I promise you that I am on your side.”
With fire in their veins, Star turned from the tree and walked back to the house.
Arnie and Ezra sat on the couch in the living room. Ezra had an arm around its father and was talking softly to him. It looked up at Star.
“Have you dealt with-”
Star cut it off. “We need to talk. All four of us.”
They moved in front of the couch and sat cross legged.
Ezra stared in shock. “You brought that thing back with you?”
Star nodded slowly. “The fire with no name has grievances and it would be irresponsible to banish nem without talking.”
Ezra opened its mouth again, its brow furrowed, but Star locked eyes with it. They held their gaze as they did upon the dot in their room. As Ezra’s mouth moved, no sound came out. Its eyes widened, a brilliant green. There were flecks of silver in them. They darted around the room, the eyes moving frantically. The whole world slowed and narrowed and it was only the eyes. They came back returning the stare.
A needle stabbed into Star’s eye, cold, dark, and rigid. Pain exploded outward from and they struggled to hold firm. The cold faded, and then burned. The heat in their veins taking it over. A flash of orange, green, and blue covered the distance between Star and Ezra.
Ezra flinched and a hand went to its eyes. Arnie looked to Ezra.
“What just happened?”
Ezra stood and left the room. Star looked to Arnie.
“It’s not important right now. I’ll deal with the consequences later. There is someone you need to talk to face to face.”
“You mean whatever it is that’s been doing this to me?”
Heat flared through them. Their name burned away. Their back hunched and their shoulders collapsed inward as they moved their hands in front of their face, baring claws they didn’t have.
They coughed several times. Their voice was frail and gravelly. “You need to talk to me.” Silence fell and they looked up, their eyes wide. “It is my home you are attempting to take down after all.”
Arnie frowned. “Your home?”
“The tree,” they snapped. “It is where I live. I have lost too many homes. I am not going to lose another.”
Arnie nodded. “I understand. I have lost many homes myself. This house is the longest I’ve ever lived in any one place. Twelve years. Before that, I lost many homes. I’ve been evicted, I’ve had homes destroyed. But I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. The HOA says I have to do more maintenance on the tree or cut it down, and I can’t climb the tree nor can I afford for someone else to do the maintenance for me.”
They let out a low rumbling from their throat. “Why is it that they are able to control what you do with your own home? Ignore them.”
“I wish I could. But they can levy fines against me. They already don’t like me because I’m bad at maintaining my yard.” He stared down at his hands. “I could lose my home if I don’t do what they say.”
“Then we both are in danger of losing our homes.” They looked up at Arnie. “So what are we going to do about it?”
“If I had the money I could get someone to do some maintenance on the tree. Cut dead branches and such. Or someone could help me do it. But I can barely afford the mortgage on the house. Nor do I have friends to turn to for this. The best I have is Ezra.” Arnie motioned upstairs. “But it isn’t much better at that sort of manual labor than I am.”
“Dead branches? That’s the problem?”
Arnie nodded. “It’s ‘unsightly’, apparently.”
Ne considered the issue. Nir power wasn’t exactly fit for the job. Ne worked with natural processes, the wind, the movement of the tree, and those were either incapable of dealing with dead branches, trees couldn’t exactly drop them on their own initiative, or too much of a blunt instrument, the wind wouldn’t be able to destroy only the dead branches. Nor would the vessel ne currently inhabited help. It lacked the strength to do it.
But, Star thought, maybe I know those who could help. Memories of Silvia, their friend and a bartender. She was stronger than they were. And she might have friends to help as well.
Ne considered this. What would it take to get her to help?
A smile spread on their face. She’d probably help if I asked.
They straightened their back and dropped their hands to their sides. “The spirit isn’t able to help with that, but I might be able to.”
Arnie made a terse smile. “I’m not interested in charity.”
They shook their head. “Not charity. I know people who can help. My friend Silvia has the muscle to do this, and my brother John could get us some equipment.”
“And they’d do that for me?”
Star shrugged. “You can pay them back by helping them in the future.”
“And what about the windows that got shattered?”
Star smiled. “Well, me and Ezra have a mutual friend who could procure you some replacements, no charge.”
Arnie opened his mouth, then closed it again and frowned.
“Would this plan work for you?”
Arnie nodded slowly. “I’ll admit, it isn’t what I expected from your help, if I’m being honest. I thought you’d do some weird exorcism, not get me to talk with the spirit and offer me help with the tree.”
“I need to talk with Ezra and wrap things up with the spirit.”
The fire with no name returned to nir tree with no trouble. Star had ascended the stairs to Ezra’s room. It sat on its bed facing the window. They stood in the entrance waiting for it to talk. The silence hung in the air for several minutes.
“Well,” it said, “what do you want?”
“I just want to talk.”
It turned to face them. “About how you promised me you’d be my father’s advocate, then turned around and became the spirit’s advocate?”
They nodded. “I shouldn’t have made that promise. I knew it was a mistake as soon as I touched the energy of the spirit.”
“What was so special about its energy?”
Star held out a hand. “I don’t think I could put it into words. But I could show you.”
Ezra hesitated then took their hand.
“Uh, we’re going to need to sit and I’m covered in mud and rain, so I’d prefer not to sit on your bed.”
The two of them situated themselves on the floor crosslegged holding each others hands. They breathed in and out together.
Ezra was cold, dark, and rigid. It prickled to the touch, like a thousand needles. They could only imagine how their own energy felt to it. Their breathing slowed together. Their heartbeats synchronized.
The spiral dominated the area around them. The cold, dark needles flowed with it.
My dad’s energy...
Star hadn’t realized they’d be able to communicate like that.
Yes, they thought, it’s beautiful. Two flows working harmoniously.
That would make sense. There are two of him. In his head, I mean.
Star nodded. His energy orders this space, but it’s not the only energy in this space. We need to go down.
They reached down below the spiral, but they didn’t need to go so far. The wave moved along the spiral, rising into the house. No longer did it break against it. They sunk beneath it. Fire moved through it, like veins through an arm. It glowed in brilliant color. Green, blue, yellow, red, orange, white, and black, all overlapping and mixing, no longer a limited palette.
Go ahead, they thought. Touch the fire.
A spike reached toward it then hesitated a moment. It gingerly brushed against it. Star reached down and touched it as well.
The wind blew across the land from the northeast. The fire with no name was the wind. Grass in the whole neighborhood, some immaculately maintained, some old and overgrown, pushed upward toward where the sun would be. The fire with no name was the grass. Mourning doves slept in the branches of the tree. The tree a home for them, too. The fire with no name was the birds. The massive oak stretched to the heavens. It had existed since time immemorial. It was a world unto itself. The fire with no name was the tree.
They moved along the wind, hopping from breeze to breeze, twisting and spiraling through the air. Laughter filled them.
Laughter, Ezra thought, is the highest emotion, containing its own opposite.
Both of them laughed, their concentration broken. Star opened their eyes. The world was washed out and dull. They closed their eyes again and controlled their breathing, holding themself there for several moments before opening them again. Color was already seeping into the room.
Ezra stared at them.
Star grinned. “Ne’s beautiful.”
“They flowed into dad’s energy.”
“They didn’t last night. They clashed with each other. An irreconcilable difference, a refusal to communicate.”
Ezra nodded. “And so they needed to talk.”
“Exactly,” they said. “And your dad could speak perfectly well himself, but the tree and the fire with no name could not. So I had to be their voice.”
They sat in silence for awhile. Ezra broke the silence. “That’s why you do this. They don’t have a voice, but you can give them one.”
Star nodded. “It’s what I’ve always done.”
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