“Oh, really?” The spirit cocked his head. “That’s an unfortunate handicap. We need to rectify that somehow. I don’t have all the time in the world.”

“But don’t you?” I asked sarcastically as smoke rose around us.

“No. You’ll bore me eventually. And then I will try to get one over on you, and you’ll send me into the bog again.”

“Good tip.” I studied the spirit floating around him, now turning colors in the smoke. Oranges and blues—what I’d already determined as the power of the Line and spirit, respectively. But he called upon different colors, too—purples and reds, pinks and greens that reminded me of the little ribbons attached to the souls of the living. I could grab them up and yank on them when they were still in a body. But as he coiled and turned them over the pocket watch, I realized he was making a sort of box. A cage. He draped it over the item, spinning it like a spider.

“It keeps falling away,” I said, watching in awe. Feeling the pulls and yanks in the fabric of the spirit around me, telling me someone was messing with it.

“That’s because I am without a body and also because I can’t cage my own spirit.”

“I’d be caging your spirit?” Tingles of apprehension moved over me, reminding me of Kieran’s mom’s skin, kept in a cage so Valens could ensure her spirit was caught in the world of the living. Of the way spirit magic could be woven with air magic to keep spirits imprisoned in a building—the opposite of what I did with my repellent spells. The magic was complex, beautiful, but I had sworn I would never do that to a spirit. I would never be as vile and disgusting as Valens.

The spirit, sensing something was wrong, stopped his hands and chuckled. “What if you need to protect those you love?”

I squinted at him, knowing manipulation when I heard it.

“You need to learn it, but that doesn’t mean you need to use it,” Kieran said softly.

I gritted my teeth and nodded my head. His mom had been hurt by a spell like this. If he wanted me to learn how to do it, I couldn’t really say no. Besides, I did basically know how to do this. I’d already taught myself what this spirit would probably call the poor man’s version. Learning to do it correctly made sense.

Or so I convinced myself as I tried to replicate what he was doing.

A half-hour later, I was doing the spell like I’d been trained all my life. All it had taken was a guiding hand, so much easier than trying to figure it out myself without knowing the rules.

“Right. Good work. Now, through the watch, I am tied to you. Maybe you can slap me in a body and I can be tied to you in— No, that’s not right. Never mind.” The spirit’s face soured. At least he had standards.

“What if I lose the pocket watch?” I asked.

“Yes. Good point. You could use the watch to compel me more easily. If someone else should get the watch, I will still be tied to it, but the new holder will not be able to compel me unless they break your magical hold and apply their own. Given the power you applied, only a Demigod or Hades himself could make that happen.”

“But I thought you said you wanted to be free?” I asked, sensing a trick.

He shrugged. “You’re easy to trust. What can I say?”

“He knows that he is vulnerable with that watch out in the world,” Kieran said, studying the spirit. “You are easy to trust, that’s true, but he’s only doing it because you’re likely the only one he can trust in the Hades line. If that watch fell into almost any other hands, he’d end up right where he was in life.”

“But there are a few things people can use to summon and bind him, aren’t there?” I replied.

The spirit was analyzing Kieran the same way he was being analyzed. A smile slowly spread across his face. “You are older than your years, junior. Well? Answer the lady.”

“Demigod Zander has his possessions, and Zander is of Zeus’s line. He doesn’t want anyone to be able to access your spirit. Bria could give the Hermes Demigod’s guy a run for his money in thievery.”

“Cheat to win,” Bria murmured, now monitoring the incense.

“But now an item is free. If anyone finds out, there will be a race to acquire it,” Kieran finished.

“A new, untested Demigod and an untrained Spirit Walker—I normally wouldn’t play those odds,” the spirit said.

“Yeah, you would,” Kieran replied. He didn’t need to smirk with all that confidence and ego he was whipping around—it was implied. “It would make you a rich man.”

I would still need to keep the watch away from the magical klepto. Even if he didn’t immediately take it to his boss, he could still prevent me from getting training. Given I didn’t trust the side he was on, I had every reason to suspect he would attempt to nab it.

I blew out a breath. I also needed to learn the politics and manipulation side of things if I ever wanted to sit at the adult table.

Baby steps. Magic first. Politics later.

“Now.” The spirit stepped back and looked up at the house. “We need to apply the same sort of magic to this house, just in reverse. Instead of tying a spirit in, we want to push them away. Luckily, the house is tiny. It’s good practice for a beginner. That’s the thing about Poseidon. He and all his heirs are cheap, cheap. Cheap and lazy.” He turned to me. “He didn’t build his own palace; he made the ocean gobble up someone else’s hard work. That’s what happened to Atlantis. Mr. Cheapy-Cheap thought he’d save a penny or two and just sink something rather than build it himself. It’s not like anyone would want it back once it had been dunked. Everything would have been ruined. Kelp in stuff, crustaceans—tragic. And here we are, only a quarter Demigod and still as cheap as they come.”