Spirit Caller 01 - Spirits Rising

did; otherwise, the native spirits you’ve summoned might see the local people as invaders and come after all of us. I need to know so I can put them back before someone is hurt.”
    Manny licked his lips before letting out a long sigh and slumping back into his chair. “I was only trying to contact the spirits of the Vikings. For strength and stuff.” He shrugged. “I get picked on at school for being fat.”
    Contacting any dead spirit was a complicated, dangerous process for someone who’d never had experience doing it; however, asking the collective energy of an area for help was fairly benign. “How did you do it?”
    “I downloaded a spell off the Internet and—”
    “The Internet? You used a spell off the Internet ?!” I rubbed my forehead. “What were you thinking?”
    His face flushed even more. “What’s so bad about that?”
    It took all my strength not to lash out at him in that instant but I recovered quickly. It was unfair to blame an isolated teenager for doing what teens do best: make mistakes. “All right, all right. Show me the spell you used. I might be able to figure out how to put them back.”
    Manny said the spell was downstairs and left to fetch it. I looked at Jeremy and sighed. “Well?”
    “LeBlanc is never going to stand for demon summoning.”
    I rolled my eyes. “Spirits, Jeremy. They are spirits.”
    “Whatever. The fact is, we have a couple dozen rampaging dead things and there is no way we can put that in a report.”
    David came in first. I gave him a warning glare, but he ignored me. It was his strongest trait. “What’s going on? Tell me the truth.”
    “Manny summoned the spirits,” I said quietly.
    “Manuel is engaging in witchcraft? We have murderous spirits in our town because of his devil worship?”
    I shushed him. “He’ll hear you. First, witchcraft is not devil worship. Second of all, he didn’t understand what he was doing. I’m not excusing it, but let’s not jump down his throat. We still need to put these spirits back into the grave permanently.”
    Jeremy chewed on his lip, then said, “Doesn’t sunrise automatically fix all the spooky things? That’s what happens in the movies.”
    “Real life isn’t like Buffy. They’ll just disappear for the daytime, since the sun hurts them.” In other circumstances, I would have smiled. “They keep coming back.”
    “Wasn’t your witchcraft powerful enough? Prayer can banish demons.”
    I stared at him and let out an exaggerated sigh. “I sense the supernatural. I do not control it. I have almost no power of my own. My banishment spell was amongst the most complex that I’ve ever done and it probably didn’t do more than just annoy the spirits away. They will be back and, from the feel of it, a lot more are coming. I think he’s resurrected the entire lineage of the native people in this area by calling on the Vikings.”
    David shook his head. “I don’t like all this witchcraft talk and I don’t like that my son is involved.”
    Something inside snapped. I whirled on David and screamed at him, “If you’d spent more time paying attention to your son, rather than sticking conversion tracts to my front door, maybe your son wouldn’t have gotten involved.”
    David rocked back on his heels. My heart thudded in my chest. “I saw the tracts in your basement.”
    David squared his shoulders and raised his chin. “I will not apologize for trying to bring the word of God—”
    “The word of God?” I snarled. “You’ve been taping those things about dying and burning in hell to my door!”
    “I only want to open your eyes to what awaits you unless you accept Jesus—”
    I held up a hand. “Don’t or so help me, I’ll get back on a plane and leave you all here to clean up this mess.”
    David stopped speaking.
    “So,” Jeremy said into the awkward silence, “let’s stay on target here. We all agree we need to work together so that the creepy, scary spirits can go back to wherever spirits come from and leave us alone.” Jeremy looked around. “Right?”
    I frowned, a hint of heat rising in my face. “Yes,” I said, growling out the word. Then, I took a deep breath and settled my anger at David. “You’re right, Jeremy.” I turned to David and said, “I wouldn’t even ask you to be involved, except for Manny. He’s the one who can help. Can you at least understand that?”
    Creases formed in David’s face and, for the first time, I noticed the worry lines around his