Luther Ross lived on the island of Roatan, just north of Honduras. Even in the ghost world, this is well off the beaten path, which is why someone like Ross would choose to live here. The ghost world, like any other, has its laws. Poltergeist activity breaks most of them.

A poltergeist reaches into the living world and manipulates objects. Fortunately for the Fates, it’s not a major problem because few ghosts can do it. Most so-called poltergeist activity isn’t ghosts at all—it’s earth tremors and faulty construction and bad wiring and bored teens.

The few true poltergeist ghosts find their services in high demand as teachers. When something is rare, it’s always cool to be one of the few who can do it. There’s only one problem. Most poltergeists haven’t learned their power at all; they’re born with it.

Almost all poltergeists are really telekinetic half-demons. Something about the power of telekinesis allows it to transcend dimensions, so after death, some find that they can continue to mentally will objects to move in both the ghost world and the living world. Yet they can’t pass on this power to a nontelekinetic any more than I can teach a binding spell to a non-spell-caster.

That doesn’t keep telekinetic half-demons from selling their “services” on the black market. To disguise the true source of their powers, they pose as druidic or Vodoun priests, or other supernaturals with minor, easily faked abilities. They’ll pretend to teach a student, all the while manipulating the objects themselves.

Luther Ross was different. When I first heard of him a year ago, I also heard that he was half-demon and dismissed him as someone too stupid to even hide the source of his powers. Then, a few weeks ago, I discovered that he was a Gelo, an ice demon, not a telekinetic. It’s damned near impossible to fake the powers of a Gelo. So it would appear Luther Ross might be the real deal, someone who truly had learned how to move objects in the living-world dimension.

Getting into Ross’s classes wasn’t easy. To evade the Fates and their Searchers, he holed up in remote locations like Roatan, and gave out the transportation code only to students he personally approved. At least a dozen of my contacts had tried to get into his class, and failed, so I’d decided that when I had time to take his classes, I’d skip the application process. I’d tracked down someone who had directions to his latest school location, and I’d paid a pretty price in spells and transportation codes to get them.