She Sleeps In My Skin

Episode One: The Woman Under the Ink The dead woman had excellent taste in tattoos. I own a tattoo studio in a narrow old shopfront in Camden where the upstairs windows lean slightly toward the street, like the whole building is trying to hear gossip. My place is called Blackbird. I didn't name it. The previous owner did, and changing a tattoo studio's name felt like renaming somebody else's dog. Customers already knew where it was. The sign was expensive. I am sentimental when sentiment saves money. Tuesday mornings were usually quiet. That Tuesday smelled of disinfectant, burnt coffee and the cinnamon candle my apprentice kept lighting even though I'd repeatedly explained that mixing cinnamon with the smell of antiseptic made the studio feel like a Christmas-themed hospital. I was halfway through answering messages when a man walked in carrying a cardboard box. Late fifties. Raincoat. Wet hair. The particular expression people wear when grief has turned the volume down on everything around them. “Nell Arden?” “Depends who's asking.” He glanced at the black gloves on my hands, the tattoo machine beside me, then back at my face. Good. Still me. “My sister was a client of yours. Marianne Cole.” I remembered her immediately. You remember certain clients. Marianne had been seventy-one and tiny, with white hair she dyed pink at the ends. She came in six months earlier asking for a naked woman surrounded by moths across her ribs. I loved her on sight. She sat through four hours without complaining, then told me she'd endured childbirth twice and a disappointing marriage for thirty-eight years, so a tattoo needle was hardly going to impress her. “She okay?” Stupid question. The box answered it before he did. “She passed away on Saturday.” “Oh.” There are entire courses about how to speak to grieving people. I've never taken one. I generally stick with not saying things that would make me want to punch someone. “I'm sorry. She was brilliant.” That made his mouth twitch. “She liked you.” “She had questionable judgement.” This time he actually smiled. Then he put the box on my counter. “She left instructions. Most of her things went to family, but this was marked for you.” That was how I inherited a dead woman's occult collection. There were six books, none in English. Three packets of dried herbs. A small brass key. A silver hand mirror cloudy with age. And the sketchbook. Black leather. No title. The pages smelled faintly of smoke. Most were filled with drawings: flowers, anatomical hearts, women with antlers, strange geometric marks, snippets of handwriting in several languages. Then I found the design. It covered an entire page. A woman curled inside a circle, knees drawn toward her chest, her hair turning into vines that wrapped around the ring. Tiny eyes hid among the leaves. Beneath her body was a crescent shape that might have been a moon. Or a blade. Around the outside were words written in a language I didn't recognise. It didn't look old-fashioned. At the time, I just thought it would look incredible beneath my sternum. I'd been tattooing for fourteen years. I wasn't precious about my own skin. There are pieces on me I love and pieces I'd happily sand off with furniture equipment if that were practical. I also knew better than to tattoo symbols I didn't understand. Apparently knowing better and doing better remain separate hobbies. I photographed the page. That night, after closing, I printed the stencil. The sensible thing would've been waiting until someone else was in the studio. Instead I locked the door, turned the music up, pulled my shirt over my head and stood shirtless in front of the long mirror beside my station. The design sat perfectly below my breasts. Almost too perfectly. I remember thinking that. Then ignoring it. Tattooing yourself is awkward. Anyone who makes it look sexy online is lying. I spent nearly three hours hunched at an angle that made my spine hate me, stopping every twenty minutes to swear. The strange thing was how little it hurt. The needle moved over my skin and I felt pressure, vibration, heat. But barely any pain. At one point I stopped the machine. The studio went quiet. I could hear someone breathing. Not outside. Not upstairs. Close. I looked at the mirror. My own reflection stared back. Black bra. Hair twisted up badly. Ink smudged along my ribs. Nothing behind me. “You're tired,” I told myself. My reflection moved its mouth. I didn't. I stepped back so quickly I kicked the tray. Ink caps hit the floor. The reflection was normal again. “Absolutely fucking not.” I should have stopped. Instead I finished the tattoo. Pride kills more sensible decisions than alcohol ever has. By eleven, the last line was in. I cleaned the skin. The design had changed. I know how ridiculous that sounds. But the woman's eyes had been closed in the drawing. Now they were open. I touched one gloved finger to the tattoo. Something touched me back. From inside. I ripped my gloves off. The sensation vanished. I stood there breathing hard, staring at my stomach. Then a woman's voice said, very clearly, Cold. I froze. The voice had not come through my ears. It came from somewhere behind my ribs. “No.” So cold. I grabbed my shirt. “Nope.” Where am I? “Nope, nope, definitely not.” I got the shirt halfway over my head before my right hand stopped moving. Not cramped. Stopped. My fingers slowly opened. I wasn't doing it. My arm lifted. I watched my own hand turn palm-up. Then it reached toward the mirror. I fought it. Nothing dramatic happened. There wasn't a supernatural wrestling match. It simply felt like somebody else had taken hold of the strings running through my muscles. My fingertips touched the glass. A memory hit me. Not mine. Candles. Hundreds. A woman's laugh somewhere close. My hand—except it wasn't my hand, not exactly—resting on bare skin. A mouth against my shoulder. Then blood. So much blood. I tore myself away from the mirror. The memory disappeared. I was on the floor before I realised my knees had given out. The voice inside me whispered a name. Sabine. I sat there with my back against the cabinet. “What?” My name. Her voice was clearer now. Young. English, but not modern. The edges of her words were wrong somehow. Softer in places. Sabine Wren. “That means absolutely nothing to me.” Silence. Then: You sound different. “You're dead.” Another silence. Longer. Yes. I slept with every light on. Calling it sleep is generous. Around four in the morning, I drifted off on my sofa with a kitchen knife under the cushion, which would have been useful against precisely nothing happening to me. I dreamed of a woman. Dark hair pinned at the nape of her neck. Brown eyes. Freckles. Not ghostly. Not eerie. She was standing beside a river in a blue dress, laughing at somebody I couldn't see. I liked her laugh. At breakfast, Sabine said nothing. At ten, I opened the studio. At eleven-thirty, she discovered coffee. The first sip hit my tongue. Inside me, she gasped. What is that? I nearly spat it across the desk. “Coffee.” It tastes burnt. “It is burnt.” Why are you drinking it? “Because adulthood is mostly developing dependencies and pretending they're preferences.” She went quiet. Then I felt it. Amusement. Not heard. Felt. A small warmth inside my chest that did not belong to me. The intimacy was haunting.. You can avoid a voice. You can ignore words. It is much harder to ignore somebody else's feelings moving through your body. By lunchtime, we had established several facts. Sabine remembered dying. She did not remember how. She remembered the year.

She remembered living in London. She remembered being twenty-seven. She remembered the tattoo. Sort of. She called it a binding mark. I called Marianne's brother immediately. He knew nothing about it. Marianne had bought the sketchbook at an estate auction fourteen years earlier. “Whose estate?” He checked paperwork. “Some academic. Callum Graves.” My stomach did something odd. That name. Sabine's voice sharpened. “You know it?” I don't know. Fear moved through me. Hers. Strong enough to make my palms sweat. I searched the name. There were too many Callum Graveses. Then I added the name from the sketchbook. Sabine Wren. One result. A university article. The Wren House Murder: New Evidence in an Unsolved Georgian Death. Written by Dr Callum Graves. Published three months earlier. There was a photograph. Early thirties, maybe thirty-five. Dark blond hair. Stubble. Serious mouth. I opened his staff page. Historian. Lecturer. Specialist in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century domestic crime. There was an email address. Do not. Sabine's fear punched harder. “You want answers.” Not from him. “You don't even know him.” Neither do you. Fair. I emailed him anyway. He replied in nine minutes.

Ms Arden, Where did you get Sabine Wren's mark? Please do not photograph it again. Do not copy it. And whatever you do, do not place it on skin. Call me immediately.

I looked down at the fresh tattoo beneath my shirt. “Oh, you're going to hate this.” I already do. I called him. He answered before the second ring. “Nell Arden?” His voice was lower than I'd expected. “Yes.” “Tell me you haven't tattooed it.” I looked around my empty studio. “Well.” He swore. “Where are you?” “Why?” “Because if you've put that mark on your body, you should not be alone tonight.” Sabine went utterly still inside me. Then she whispered something that turned my skin cold. I remember his voice.

Episode Two: Rules for Possession Callum Graves arrived at my studio carrying a leather satchel. No dramatic coat. No silver crucifix. No haunted-house bullshit. Jeans. Grey jumper. Dark coat damp from rain. He was taller than his university photo suggested. Also better-looking. There are men who become less attractive the moment they start speaking. Callum managed the opposite. He stepped inside Blackbird, looked at me once and said, “Show me.” No hello. No handshake. I folded my arms. “If that's how you approach women professionally, I'm surprised the university keeps you.” His eyes flicked down my body, then immediately back to my face. It was quick. Still noticed. “Your tattoo.” “I know.” Sabine had gone silent. Not absent. I could feel her there, pulled deep into whatever part of me she occupied. Callum shut the door. “Did anything happen after you finished it?” “Define anything.” “Nell.” I hated how naturally my name sat in his mouth. “Yes. Something happened.” I told him. Most of it. I left out the strange pleasure of feeling Sabine discover coffee because it seemed irrelevant and, frankly, personal. When I finished, Callum didn't look shocked. “You believe me.” “Yes.” “Immediately.” “Yes.” “You could at least pretend this is unusual.” “It is unusual.” “You have an extremely disappointing face for unusual.” Then he asked to see the tattoo again. I took him into the closed booth at the back. Pulling my shirt up in front of a stranger should not have felt intimate. I spend half my working life looking at people's bodies. Skin becomes geography fairly quickly in this job. But this was my skin. And Callum looked at it too carefully. He crouched in front of me. The design sat between us. His fingers stayed several centimetres away. “May I?” “Touch it?” “Yes.” “Okay.” His fingertips landed beside the ink. My body jerked. Callum caught my hips before I hit the cabinet. The second his hands closed around me, another memory tore through my head. A man standing in candlelight. His face was Callum's. Not similar. His. Same mouth. Same grey eyes. Different hair. Longer. Tied back. Blood across his shirt. Sabine was looking at him through tears. He raised a knife. I shoved Callum away so hard he fell backward. “What the fuck?” He stared up at me. “Nell—” “Don't.” Sabine's rage flooded my bloodstream. For several seconds, I could barely separate us. My fear. Her hatred. My pulse. Her memory. He killed me. Callum went pale. I realised I'd said it aloud. “What?” “She says you killed her.” “Nell, I was born in 1991.” “Strong alibi.” He stood slowly. Sabine wanted me away from him. Everything in my body screamed it. And beneath that— Something else. Recognition. Not mine. Not exactly fear either. Callum rubbed one hand over his face. “Thomas Graves.” I stopped. “My ancestor.” Sabine whispered the name. Thomas. I felt her grief. Callum opened his satchel and took out photocopies. A portrait. The man in the memory. Thomas Graves. Callum's face wearing 1812. “You knew.” “I suspected Sabine's death involved him.” “You neglected to mention he was your bloody twin.” “He isn't.” “You understand genetics, yes?” “Nell.” “You walked in here knowing you look exactly like the man who murdered the ghost living inside me.” “I did not know she was living inside you.” “Minor distinction.” Sabine surged forward. My hand moved. Callum caught my wrist before I hit him. That frightened all three of us. I yanked free. “Sabine.” He killed me. “He didn't.” His face. “I know.” His hands. “They're not his.” Callum watched me. I hated being watched while I argued with someone nobody else could hear. “Can she control you?” “She just tried.” His expression changed. “We need rules.” I laughed. “Wonderful. A haunting policy.” “I mean it.” So did I. That night, Sabine and I negotiated possession. I sat cross-legged on my bed with a notebook in front of me and felt ridiculous. “Rule one. My body is mine.” Yes. “No taking control without asking.” Yes. “No surprises.” A pause. “Sabine.” Yes. “If I say stop, you stop.” Yes. “And if you can't?” Her answer came quieter. Then you make me leave. Neither of us knew how. Lovely. Rule two covered privacy. This became complicated. She couldn't stop hearing what I heard. Could not stop seeing what I saw. But she could retreat. She described it as sleeping. When she slept, I barely sensed her. “Can you do that deliberately?” I think so. “Then if I say I need privacy, you sleep.” Another pause. For bathing? “Yes.” Why? “Because I don't want a Georgian woman critiquing my shaving choices.” Her amusement warmed me again. Rule three was touch. Because Sabine felt it. Everything. Pressure. Heat. Pleasure. Pain. Not with exactly the same intensity as I did, but enough. I discovered that when I scratched an itch on my shoulder and she made a tiny startled sound. “So if somebody touches me…” I feel it. The thought sat between us. I had been single seven months. Not tragically single. Quite successfully single. I enjoy men. I simply enjoy leaving their homes almost as much. But now every future kiss came with a dead woman in the room. Or technically in me. “That's going to be inconvenient.” Sabine did not answer. “What?” Nothing. “Oh, don't start doing that. You live in my organs.” I am not in your organs. “You understand the general point.” I lay back. The tattoo felt warm. “Did you love someone?” The warmth vanished. I hadn't meant to ask. Then she showed me. Not deliberately, I don't think. A woman. Red hair. Green dress. Freckles across her nose. She was lying beside Sabine in tall grass, skirt pushed up around her knees, laughing. The sight hit me strangely hard. I knew that face. Not because I had seen it before. Because something underneath thought I had. “What was her name?” Sabine went quiet for so long I thought she had gone to sleep. Then: Eleanor. The name hurt. I pressed my hand against my chest. “Your lover.” Yes. “What happened to her?” I don't remember. That was when someone knocked downstairs. Nearly midnight. My studio was closed. I grabbed the heavy torch beside my bed. The knock came again. “Nell?” Callum. I opened the upstairs window. He stood on the pavement. “What?” “I found something.” “Tomorrow exists.” “I think Sabine was murdered because of the mark.” That got him inside. We sat at my kitchen table. Callum spread photographs and copied documents across it. Sabine remained present, watching through me. Thomas Graves had been a surgeon. Sabine Wren had been the daughter of a wealthy merchant. She died on 18 October 1812. Cause recorded as fever. Buried privately. Except her body vanished from the family crypt three days later. “Thomas stole her body?” Callum shook his head. “No. According to this, he was looking for it too.” “Then why does she remember him with a knife?” “I don't know.” One document had a list of names. Women. Ten of them. Beside each name was the same symbol now tattooed beneath my breasts. “What is it?” “A vessel mark.” “For what?” He met my eyes. “A soul.” Inside me, Sabine recoiled. Callum explained slowly. There had been a group operating in London around 1800. Wealthy people obsessed with extending consciousness beyond death. Not resurrection. Transfer. They believed a human soul could be fastened to living flesh through ink mixed with the dead person's blood. My stomach turned. “What was Marianne doing with it?” “I don't know.” “You've been researching this.” “For four years.” “Why?” His eyes shifted away. There. A lie. Not spoken yet. Still a lie. “Callum.” “My family kept records.” “Try again.” Silence. Then he unbuttoned the top of his shirt. I expected a tattoo. Instead, across his chest was a scar. Circular. The same design. Except someone had cut it out. Deep. Ugly. Old. Sabine surged forward so sharply my breath caught. Callum's gaze locked on mine. “My mother tattooed the mark onto me when I was six.” “What?” “She believed Thomas Graves had been reincarnating through our bloodline for two centuries.” “Jesus.” “She thought I was next.” He buttoned his shirt. “She tried to stop it.” I didn't know what to say. So naturally I said the wrong thing. “Is she still alive?” “No.” There was nothing neat in the way he said it. No tragic pause. Just fact. You want him. My face heated. Callum was still talking. I stopped hearing half of it. “Shut up,” I whispered. He frowned. “I didn't say anything.” “Not you.” You looked at his mouth. “Sabine.” “What is she saying?” “Nothing relevant.” His mouth moved. The bastard was smiling. “I dislike both of you.” Sabine's amusement ran warm beneath my skin. Callum's smile became real. And that was the first moment the three of us were in a room together without somebody being terrified. It lasted perhaps twenty seconds. Then Callum reached across the table for one of the photographs. His fingers brushed mine. A shock went through me. Not magical. Ordinary attraction. Warm hand. Rough fingertips. The soft scrape of his thumb across my knuckle. I looked up. He had noticed too. Sabine felt it. Her breath—not real breath, whatever she had—caught inside me. Callum didn't move his hand. Neither did I. It was barely a touch. It landed everywhere. Eleanor. Sabine whispered the name like a wound opening. The kitchen disappeared. For one violent second I saw red hair across a pillow. A woman's bare shoulder. Sabine's mouth against it. Then Callum's thumb moved again. I came back gasping. He snatched his hand away. “Nell?” “I'm fine.” I wasn't. Sabine wasn't either. Her grief tangled with my arousal so tightly it was l, if I'm being completely truthful, hotter than it had any right to be. That was the first time I realised this haunting was going to get very complicated. Very quickly.

Episode Three: What She Feels When He Touches Me Callum became part of my life with irritating efficiency. At first, there was a reason. Research. He brought documents. I provided Sabine. We learned quickly that memories returned when something triggered her senses. Lavender brought back her mother's dressing room. Red wine gave us a dinner in 1811 where Thomas Graves sat opposite Sabine and barely spoke. A violin piece made her cry so hard my face ended up wet. Touch was strongest. Specifically Callum's. Which was inconvenient because by then I wanted him touching me for reasons that had nothing to do with history. We avoided discussing that. Adults are very good at avoiding obvious things while believing ourselves emotionally sophisticated. One Friday night, Callum came over carrying takeaway and a nineteenth-century diary. “Romantic,” I told him. “I brought Thai food.” “I'm already overwhelmed.” We ate on my floor because I'd buried the table beneath research. Sabine liked chilli. I discovered this when I bit into something vindaloo-level hot and she reacted with delighted astonishment while I tried not to die. “You realise you're encouraging her,” Callum said. “She was murdered at twenty-seven. Let her enjoy curry.” Tell him I think his food is bland. “She says your food is bland.” His eyebrows lifted. By midnight, we'd translated enough of the diary to find Eleanor. Eleanor Hart. Companion to Sabine Wren. That was what the record called her. Companion. Women can share a home for thirty years, sleep in the same bed, write letters full of longing and still get called companions because apparently lesbianism was invented around 1974. Callum read the entry aloud. “October seventh. S.W. continues to refuse the arrangement. E.H. has become an obstacle.” Sabine's fear rose. “What arrangement?” Callum turned the page. Then stopped. “What?” He looked at me strangely. “Nell.” “What?” “There is a description of Eleanor.” “So?” He handed me the book. Dark red hair. Grey-green eyes. Scar through the left eyebrow. A birthmark beneath her right ear. My fingers went cold. I have grey-green eyes. A scar through my left eyebrow from falling off a bike when I was twelve. And beneath my right ear— I didn't need to check. Callum already knew. Sabine knew too. She came forward so suddenly I felt dizzy. Eleanor. “No.” My voice came out harder than intended. Callum stayed very still. “Nell—” “No. Absolutely not.” Sabine's grief flooded me. “I am not Eleanor.” I know. “No, you don't.” I know. “I am not somebody's reincarnated girlfriend.” Callum quietly closed the diary. I stood and paced. “I hate this shit. Do you know that? Past lives. Destined lovers. Souls finding each other. It's romantic until everybody starts telling you who you're supposed to be.” I am sorry. Her apology stopped me. Not defensive. Not dramatic. Just sad. I sat down again. Callum watched me. “What?” “Nothing.” “You're staring.” “I've never seen someone resolve an argument internally.” “It saves time.” His smile appeared. There it was again. That annoying mouth. Sabine felt the change in me immediately. You should kiss him. I nearly choked. “What?” Callum looked startled. “What?” “Nothing.” You want to. “Stop helping.” “I haven't said anything.” “Still not you.” Sabine was amused now. Traitor. Callum looked between my eyes as though he could somehow see her. “What did she say?” “Absolutely none of your business.” His smile deepened. That did it. Maybe I was tired. Maybe I was angry about being somebody's reincarnation. Maybe I had spent two weeks sitting close enough to smell his aftershave while pretending I had no interest in the shape of his hands. Whatever. I leaned over and kissed him. There was a second when he did nothing. Then his hand came up behind my neck. He kissed me back. Callum was not a gentle kisser. Thank God. Not rough either. Just certain. His mouth settled against mine and something inside me unclenched so suddenly I hadn't known it was tight. His fingers slid into my hair. I moved closer. Sabine felt everything. I knew because her presence flared inside me. Not jealousy. Shock. Pleasure. Grief. Too much of all three. I pulled back. Callum's breathing had changed. Mine wasn't impressive either. “Sabine?” I am here. “You okay?” A pause. Yes. “Do you need me to stop?” Callum went completely still. He understood immediately. Sabine's answer came carefully. No. My pulse jumped. “Are you sure?” Yes. Then, after a moment: I can sleep if you prefer me to. Privacy. Rule two. Instead I realised something uncomfortable. “I don't know if I want you to.” Silence. Callum's eyes stayed on mine. “What are you saying?” “I don't know yet.” That was true. I could feel Sabine waiting. I could feel Callum waiting too. Nobody pushing. Nobody making the decision easy for me. I reached for him again. “Stay awake,” I told her. Then kissed him. The second kiss was different because now all three of us knew. Callum's hand slid to my waist. Sabine felt it. So did I feel her feeling it. There is no normal language for that. Pleasure echoed. His thumb moved beneath the hem of my shirt, touching bare skin. Warmth went through me. Then came back stronger. My breath broke against his mouth. Callum pulled back half an inch. “Was that you?” “Mostly.” His eyes darkened. “Jesus.” “Don't get smug.” I climbed onto his lap before I could think myself sensible. His hands landed at my hips. Firm. Steady. He looked up at me. “Tell me if anything feels wrong.” It didn't. His mouth found my throat. I closed my eyes. Sabine's reaction moved through me like another pulse. Her memory flashed beneath it. Eleanor's fingers unlacing a dress. Laughter muffled against skin. A woman's hands that looked like mine. Then Callum bit lightly at the place beneath my ear and the past vanished. I gasped. “Again.” He did. No hesitation this time. His palm travelled up my back beneath my shirt. I was painfully aware of every centimetre. Of him. Of Sabine. Of myself. Not disappearing between them. I caught his jaw and made him look at me. I kissed him harder. The room heated quickly after that. Clothing became irritating. His jumper hit the floor. My shirt followed. Callum paused when he saw the tattoo. Sabine's mark. Her body drawn across mine. For a second everything became serious again. I took his hand and placed it against my ribs. “My skin.” He nodded. “Your skin.” “Mine.” “Yes.” Inside me, Sabine whispered: Yours. Something loosened. Then Callum kissed the tattoo. My knees nearly gave out though I was already straddling him, which felt unfair. The sensation went straight through me. Sabine reacted too. Her pleasure flashed back. I made a sound I would have denied under oath. Callum looked up. “That?” “Do it again.” He did. Slowly. His mouth traced the edge of the ink while his hands held my waist. Heat gathered low and deep. And every time pleasure rose in me, Sabine's response touched it and sent it back changed. Not doubled exactly. Layered. Like hearing your own voice echoed. I pulled Callum back up and kissed him until I forgot whose hands were shaking. We made it to the bedroom eventually. Barely. I hit my knee against the bedframe and swore. Callum laughed into my shoulder. I threatened to throw him out. He called my bluff. Then his hands moved over me again and conversation became unnecessary. I stayed in control. Every step. Every touch. When I wanted more, I told him. Callum listened. He could be demanding without taking. There was an edge to him that I liked. A roughness when I pulled him closer. A hunger he stopped trying to hide once he knew I wanted it. He kissed my mouth, my throat, the scar through my eyebrow. He touched me until my thoughts started arriving out of order. Then he looked at me with that unbearable serious face and asked quietly, “Still you?” I laughed. Breathless. “Very fucking much.” His forehead dropped against mine. Something about his expression almost made the whole thing sweet. So I bit his lower lip. Fixed it. Later, when the room had gone quiet, I lay with my head against his chest. His heart beat beneath my cheek. Sabine was silent. Too silent. “Sabine?” Nothing. I sat up. Callum stirred. “What?” “She isn't answering.” Fear came quickly. Then the tattoo burned. I doubled over. Callum grabbed me. The room vanished. I was somewhere else.

Sabine's body. Thomas Graves stood over me. No. Over her. His face was wet with tears. There was blood on his hands. Eleanor lay on the floor behind him. My face. My old face. Dead. Sabine was screaming. Thomas raised the knife. But he did not stab her. He cut his own palm. Then hers. He pressed them together. “Forgive me,” he said. Sabine stared at Eleanor's body. “What have you done?” “I can keep you.” “No.” “The mark needs living skin.” “No.” “You'll wake again.” Sabine fought him. Thomas held her down. Not to kill her. To tattoo her soul into someone else. Into— The memory ripped away. I woke with a gasp. Callum held me against him. Sabine was alert now too. Repeating one sentence. Again and again. Eleanor killed me.

Episode Four: The Body Remembers I did not sleep after that. Neither did Callum. Sabine disappeared somewhere deep inside me and refused to speak. At six in the morning I showered until the water went cold. It didn't help. I looked at my face in the steamed mirror. Same scar. Same eyes. Same small birthmark beneath my ear. None of it meant anything to me. I kept saying it. “This is my face.” Callum stood in the doorway. “Yes.” “My life.” “Yes.” “I don't owe her anything because a woman who looked like me did something two hundred years ago.” “No.” “Stop agreeing so calmly. It's irritating.” He leaned against the frame. “You want me to argue?” “I want someone else to be having this week.” That finally got a laugh. Sabine returned that afternoon. I remember. I put down the tattoo machine. My client was due in twenty minutes. “Everything?” Enough. I locked the front door. Callum came over. We sat upstairs while Sabine gave me the past in pieces. Eleanor Hart had loved her. They planned to leave London together. Sabine's father discovered them. He threatened Eleanor's family. Thomas Graves was their friend. A surgeon. Obsessed with the experiments being conducted by a physician named Dr Vale. The vessel mark. Transfer after death. Thomas believed he could help them disappear by faking Sabine's death. Except Eleanor changed the plan. Why? Fear. Money. Her younger brother would lose everything. Her mother would be turned out. Sabine's father offered Eleanor a bargain. Help complete the soul experiment willingly, and her family would be protected. Eleanor agreed. “She betrayed you.” Yes. There was no rage in Sabine now. Just exhaustion. “But why kill you?” She did not mean to. A memory. Eleanor crying. Sabine furious. A struggle near the fireplace. Sabine falling. Her temple striking stone. Silence. Eleanor on her knees beside her. Thomas arriving. Trying to revive her. Failing. Then making the worst decision of his life. “He transferred you.” Yes. “Into who?” Sabine showed me. A servant girl. Seventeen. Unconscious. The mark fresh beneath her breasts. My stomach turned. “He used somebody without consent.” Callum went rigid. His family's sin sat visibly on him. Sabine continued. The transfer failed. She became trapped in the mark itself. Moved from skin to skin every time it was copied. Sleeping between hosts. Occasionally waking. “How many?” I don't know. “Marianne?” A wash of grief. Yes. “She knew you?” She heard me near the end. That explained the box. Marianne hadn't randomly left me the sketchbook. She had chosen me. Why? Maybe Sabine recognised something. Maybe Marianne did. I wasn't sure I wanted the answer. Callum found the final piece that evening. A letter from Thomas. Never sent. Addressed to Eleanor. Except Eleanor was already dead when he wrote it. He confessed everything. Sabine's body had been hidden. Eleanor, crushed by guilt, begged Thomas to perform the same transfer on her. He refused. So she copied the mark onto herself. And died three days later. “Suicide?” Callum shook his head. “According to Thomas, the mark killed her.” Sabine's presence shifted. She wanted to find me. Then Callum read the final lines. The mark does not preserve the dead. It calls them toward what their soul recognises. Sabine remained because she sought Eleanor. Eleanor died seeking Sabine. I fear I made not a vessel, but a door. I rubbed both hands over my face. “So I'm the door.” “No,” Callum said. I looked at him. “The tattoo is.” We found out what that meant around midnight. Sabine appeared in the mirror. Full body. Blue dress. Dark hair. Brown eyes. She looked twenty-seven. Alive. I stopped breathing. “Sabine.” She touched the inside of the glass. My tattoo burned. Callum came beside me. His face drained. “Don't touch it.” “I wasn't planning to.” Sabine's reflection looked at him. Then at me. She is near. “Who?” I knew. Of course I knew. Eleanor. The mirror behind Sabine darkened. Another shape appeared. Red hair. My face. Not exactly. Older somehow. Harder around the eyes. Eleanor stood behind Sabine. Sabine turned. For two hundred years she had been looking for this woman. The moment should have been beautiful. It wasn't. Eleanor reached through Sabine. Straight toward me. The mirror cracked. Pain tore across the tattoo. I fell. Callum caught me. My right hand moved without permission. Not Sabine. Something else. I slapped Callum hard enough to split his lip. He staggered back. “What the fuck?” My mouth opened. A voice came out. My voice. Not my words. “Thomas.” Callum froze. Inside me, Sabine screamed. That is not me. I fought my own body. Eleanor had control differently. Sabine moved like another set of hands. Eleanor moved like memory. My muscles recognised her. That terrified me more. She stepped toward Callum using my legs. He backed away. “Nell.” I tried to answer. Nothing. Eleanor raised my hand to his throat. Callum did not grab me. Instead he said my name again. “Nell.” My fingers touched his skin. Warm pulse. “Nell Arden.” Something snapped into place. My life. Blackbird. My stupid cinnamon candle. Fourteen years tattooing. Bad relationships. Good sex. Burnt coffee. My mother ringing every Sunday whether I answered or not. Callum's mouth against mine. Mine. I forced one word out. “Run.” He didn't. Idiot. Instead he kissed me. Terrible paranormal strategy. Effective, though. The shock broke Eleanor's control for half a second. Long enough. I bit Callum's lip. Hard. He jerked back. Pain exploded. Sabine surged forward. For the first time, I let her take full control deliberately. Now. She came through me like a wave. My posture changed. My breath. My hands. But I remained there. Watching. Feeling. Not gone. Sabine faced the mirror. Through my mouth, she said, “Eleanor.” The room went still. The spirit inside the glass looked at us. My own face from two centuries ago. Then she cried. No haunting scream. No monster. Just a woman crying. Sabine's grief hit so hard my knees shook. Eleanor reached toward us. Sabine stopped her. “No.” One word. It came through my voice differently. “Not this body.” Thank God for Sabine Wren. Eleanor's hand lowered. Sabine continued. “She is not me.” Then touched my chest. “And she is not you.” The mirror cracked again. Eleanor looked at Callum. Hatred crossed her face. Sabine caught it. “Nor is he Thomas.” Callum wiped blood from his mouth. “Appreciated.” Wrong moment. Still funny. Eleanor's expression shifted. For one second, she looked almost embarrassed. Then the room filled with cold. The mirror shattered. Eleanor vanished. Sabine released me. I collapsed into Callum. He held me so tightly I could feel him shaking. “She'll come back,” I said. “How do we stop her?” Sabine answered. Destroy the mark. I looked down. “No problem. Laser removal. Six sessions and mild regret.” Not only yours. Of course not. Every copy. The sketchbook. Marianne's source. Anything Thomas created. Callum's family archive. All of it. And one more thing. The first mark. The original design had been tattooed onto Sabine's corpse before she was buried. Her body had never been found. Callum knew where it was. I could tell by his face. “You've known this whole time.” “Not exactly.” “Callum.” “My family owns a house outside London. There is a sealed room beneath it.” I stared. “You people are exhausting.” “We can go tomorrow.” “Tonight.” “Nell—” “Your homicidal ancestor's girlfriend just used my body to assault you.” “She wasn't my—” “You understand what I mean.” He looked at me. Then nodded. “Tonight.” We left at two in the morning. Before we did, I went upstairs to change. Callum followed. He stopped in the bedroom doorway. I pulled my shirt off. His eyes dropped to the tattoo. Then lower. Then away. “We should go.” “We should.” Neither of us moved. Sabine was awake. Quiet. Callum touched the split in his lip. “You bite hard.” “You're welcome.” He laughed softly. The fear of the last hour sat between us. Adrenaline does strange things. So does nearly losing your body. I needed to feel mine. I put my hand on his chest. “Touch me.” His eyes searched mine. “Nell.” “I need to know what's mine.” Understanding changed him. His hands came to my waist. Slowly. Not hungry. Grounding. I kissed him. His palms moved over my back. My shoulders. My hips. Every touch said the same thing without saying anything stupid. Here. Here. Here. Your body. I pulled him closer. The kiss deepened. Sabine remained with me. Not intruding. Present. Warm. Sad. When Callum's mouth moved down my throat, pleasure sparked through us again. Me first. Sabine echoing. This time it didn't frighten me. I knew where I ended. His hand slipped beneath my bra. I caught my breath. “Still you?” he murmured. I smiled against his mouth. “Keep asking and I'll start charging.” He laughed. Then kissed me again. We did not make love. It was rougher and simpler than that word. Clothes half removed. My back against the bedroom wall. His forehead against mine when control started fraying. My hands gripping his shoulders. His mouth swallowing every sound I didn't want the neighbours hearing. It was not about romance. It was about being alive in my own skin. And when pleasure finally broke through me, Sabine felt it too. Her response was not hunger. It was grief. Beautiful, terrible grief. Because she remembered what being alive had felt like. Afterward as Callum held me. Inside me, Sabine whispered, Thank you. I didn't ask what for. Some things do not improve when explained.

Episode Five: She Leaves My Skin Callum's family house looked exactly like somewhere that should contain a corpse. Old stone. Too many chimneys. Trees planted close enough to scratch the upstairs windows. “Your childhood home?” “No.” “Shame. It explains you beautifully.” He gave me the finger. We went in through the kitchen. Nobody lived there now. The Graves family had apparently accumulated enough emotional damage that they finally stopped gathering under one roof. The sealed room was below the cellar. Behind a brick wall. Callum brought tools. It took two hours. Behind the bricks was an iron door. The brass key Marianne left me fit the lock. That woman had known exactly what she was doing. The room beyond was tiny. Dry. Cold. There was a coffin inside. Not dramatic. Plain wood. No name. Sabine went utterly quiet. I touched the lid. A memory opened gently. Eleanor brushing Sabine's hair. Sabine asleep against her shoulder. Thomas laughing at something outside frame. All three alive. Before fear made them cruel. Before love became something they thought they could preserve. I opened the coffin with hesitation. Sabine's bones lay inside. She had been small. The skeleton wore scraps of blue cloth. Across the bones of her chest lay a piece of preserved skin. The tattoo. Still visible. Two hundred years old. Black lines. Woman curled inside the circle. My stomach rolled. Callum reached for it. “Don't.” He stopped. “Good point.” I took Marianne's sketchbook from my bag. We had brought everything. Thomas's notes. The copies. Photographs. Every trace Callum could find. We piled them into the old fireplace. I soaked them in lighter fluid. Sabine spoke. Wait. I stopped. “What?” If you destroy it, I leave. I had tried not to think about this part. Sabine had lived inside me for six weeks. Six weeks is nothing. Six weeks is enough. She had annoyed me. Frightened me. Watched me work. Learned takeaway menus. Developed strong opinions about reality television. She hated electric hand dryers. Loved showers. Thought modern underwear was miraculous. Had become interested in women voting and then furious when I explained how long that took. She had also been there while I slept. While I cried. While Callum touched me. There are people I've known for years who have never been that close. “You can't stay.” I know. I sat beside the coffin. “Do you want to?” Long silence. Part of me. But I am tired, Nell. Tears came. I hate crying. My face goes blotchy and my nose runs. No attractive single tear sliding gracefully down a cheek. I cry like my immune system is involved. Callum knelt beside me. I took his hand. Sabine felt that too. One last time. “Can you see Eleanor?” Yes. I closed my eyes. “Where?” Near. “Do you still love her?” Her answer came slowly. I loved her. Past tense. Not hatred. Not forgiveness either. Just truth. “She loved you.” Yes. “That doesn't excuse what she did.” No. Sabine whispered, Love is not innocence. “What happens when you leave?” I don't know. “Terrible planning.” Her amusement moved warmly through me. Then another presence entered the room. Eleanor. I did not need a mirror this time. She stood beside the coffin. Red hair. My old face. But when I looked at her now, I didn't see myself. Sabine moved closer to the surface. My eyes filled with her vision. Eleanor knelt. “I looked for you.” The voice seemed to come from everywhere. Sabine answered through me. “You found the wrong woman.” Eleanor looked at my body. “Yes.” It sounded like shame. “I thought you would return through her.” “No.” “Thomas said souls recognise each other.” “He was wrong.” Eleanor's face broke. “I loved you.” Sabine's pain trembled through me. “I know.” “I was afraid.” “I know.” “I killed you.” “Yes.” There was no absolution. Eleanor reached toward us. Stopped before touching. “May I?” Sabine waited. Then used my hand. She raised it. Eleanor laid her ghostly palm against mine. Cold travelled through me. Sabine's memory opened one final time. Two young women dancing in a bedroom because they could not dance together in public. Bare feet. No music. Sabine laughing. Eleanor kissing her. Ordinary happiness. The life they should have had. The memory faded. Sabine let go. Burn it. I stood. Callum handed me the match. I lit it. The fire caught quickly. Thomas's handwriting curled black. The copied marks blistered. Marianne's sketchbook burned last. When the flames reached Sabine's original mark, the tattoo beneath my breasts began to burn. Callum caught me as I collapsed with pain. Skin split. Ink rose out of it like smoke. Sabine was being pulled away. I felt her panic. For one terrible second, she clung. Not deliberately. Instinct. My breath stopped. Her consciousness pressed against mine. Memories spilled everywhere. Her childhood. My childhood. Eleanor. Callum. Thomas. My mother. Her mother. Our bodies. Our grief. I could no longer tell which life belonged to whom. “Nell!” Callum's voice. Far away. Sabine cried out. I am sorry. “Let go.” I am trying. “Sabine.” I grabbed the coffin. The room shook. Eleanor stood in the firelight. She reached for Sabine. Sabine was afraid. After two hundred years. Still afraid of whatever came next. “I've got you,” I said. Stupid thing to say to someone you're letting go. But she understood. I felt her smile. It was good to be warm. Then she left. No explosion. No choir. No dramatic wind. Just absence. A space inside me where someone had been. The tattoo vanished. Leaving only a faint pale outline. Across the room, Eleanor disappeared too. The bones in the coffin collapsed gently into dust. And for the first time in six weeks I was alone inside my own head. I hated it. Immediately. I sat on the floor and sobbed. Callum stayed beside me. He didn't tell me she was free. Didn't say she'd gone somewhere better. Didn't say any of the things people say because silence makes them nervous. He just held me. Eventually I fell asleep against him. When I woke, sunlight was coming through the small cellar window. My neck hurt. My mouth tasted disgusting. Callum was awake. He smiled. I touched beneath my breasts. Smooth skin. “She really left.” I waited for Sabine to complain about his obvious statement. Nothing. Grief came fresh. Callum squeezed my hand. We buried the dust. Not in the Graves family plot. There was an old cemetery a few miles away beside a river. We buried her beneath a tree. No priest. No speeches. I carved her name into a small piece of slate. SABINE WREN Underneath, after thinking about it, I added: SHE WAS HERE. That felt enough. Callum and I drove back to London without much talking. I expected things between us to feel different. They did. Sabine had been part of our beginning. There was no avoiding that. The first time Callum came to my bed after she was gone, I nearly stopped him. Not because I didn't want him. Because the silence felt wrong. He sensed it. “You okay?” “No.” He waited. I touched his face. “There used to be an echo.” Understanding came slowly. “You miss it.” “I miss her.” “Yes.” “But I don’t need a ghost to want you.” His mouth twitched. “That would be damaging to my self-esteem.” “Your self-esteem survives everything.” “Apparently not biting.” I looked at the faint scar on his lip. “That was funny.” “It was assault.” “You kissed an actively possessed woman.” “You told me to run.” “You ignored me.” “I have flaws.” “Several.” Then he kissed me. Gently at first. But his hand slipped under my shirt and the kiss changed. There he was. There I was. No echo. Just me. Strange how much more exposed that felt. Callum's mouth moved to my neck. His fingers traced the pale outline where Sabine's mark had been. I shivered. “Still you?” That question. I laughed softly. “Only me.” He looked up. Something in his face shifted. “Is that okay?” I understood what he was really asking. Was enough still enough? I slid my fingers into his hair. “Ask me in five minutes.” He grinned. I pulled him back to me. The loneliness did not disappear. Neither did grief. Bodies are not magic like that. But pleasure came without echo and I learned its shape again. Mine. His. Nothing borrowed. Nothing inherited. No dead woman hidden inside it. And maybe because I had spent weeks sharing everything, I stopped hiding so much. I told him what I wanted. He listened. I told him when to slow down. He did. His hands at my hips. My mouth against his shoulder. His name leaving me without a ghost's memory attached to it. When pleasure finally tightened through me, it felt smaller without Sabine. Cleaner. Lonelier. Completely mine. I cried afterward. Callum wiped my face with the corner of the sheet. “Great review.” “Shut up.” “Wasn't sure if—” I kissed him before he finished. He learned quickly. Months passed. Blackbird stayed Blackbird. I got the cinnamon candle banned. My mother continued ringing on Sundays. Callum continued leaving books in my flat and pretending this was not how men slowly move in without admitting it. I kept expecting Sabine to return. A voice while I drank coffee. A feeling that wasn't mine. A complaint about hand dryers. Nothing. Then, on the first anniversary of Marianne's death, a woman came into the studio. Young. Maybe twenty-five. She wanted a memorial tattoo for her grandmother. I asked what she had in mind. She pulled a folded piece of paper from her bag. “My grandmother drew this.” I opened it. A woman curled inside a circle. For one second my blood stopped. Then I looked properly. Different. No vines. No hidden eyes. No blade. Just a woman sleeping peacefully inside a crescent moon. “Her name was Marianne,” the woman said. “She used to draw this all the time near the end.” I couldn't speak. The client looked worried. “Is it bad?” “No.” I laughed. Then wiped my eyes with my wrist like an idiot. “No. It's good.” She wanted it on her shoulder. Small. Simple. I tattooed it carefully. Nothing happened. No voice. No cold. No ghost. When I finished, the woman looked at herself in the mirror and smiled. I heard Sabine then. Not inside me. Maybe memory. Maybe imagination. One quiet sentence. Warm. I smiled. That night, Callum found me standing shirtless in front of the bathroom mirror, studying the faint scar below my breasts. He came behind me. His hands settled on my waist. I watched us in the glass. Just us. “You okay?” “Yes.” He kissed my shoulder. I leaned back against him. The mark on my skin looked almost like a sleeping woman if you knew where to look. I used to think hauntings were about dead people refusing to leave. I don't anymore. Sometimes the dead are ready. It's the living who keep opening doors. Because we miss them. Because guilt makes us greedy. Because love can turn possessive if you're frightened enough of losing it. Sabine taught me that. She also taught me ghosts have terrible opinions about television and no tolerance for weak coffee. I kept her slate by the river. Callum and I visit sometimes. Not on anniversaries. We go when the weather is decent. We sit under the tree. I tell her things in my head. I don't expect answers. And when Callum takes my hand, nobody else feels it. There's sadness in that. But there's something else too. Something Sabine fought two centuries to understand. Love does not become more real because it lasts forever. Sometimes the kindest thing it can do— is let go.