I am sitting at the breakfast bar with two warm drinks counting the seconds. Three, Two, one ...

The door opens and Rachael enters she sees me sitting with the drinks ready and she knows everything I need to tell her.

"A hard one then?" she asks picking up the hot chocolate meant for her.

"Not physically but yes,"

"Painful?"

"It can be mentally,"

"But not magically?"

"No, it should be very simple,"

"Something rare then?"

"In this area much rarer," I sip my hot chocolate letting it calm me. It isn't working but from there we keep pretty silent and finish the hot chocolate laced with a slight bit of magic to calm the mind. I whisk the mugs clean and away when we are done and simply hold out my hand, she takes it and we are on the roof of the local hospital.

"Not inside today?"

"I will draw it to us in a moment,"

"Do we need to realm bind our target?"

"No, it is harmless to everything around it." With that I focus on attracting the being trapped here and an old woman comes through the roof joining us, she doesn't even block our view just seems to be a projection in front of us. I focus an attunement reading spell and see everything I need to know, no wonder they linger.

"Use attunement on her,"

"You said it was rude to use on others,"

"It is but a spirit makes the rudeness needed,"

She focuses, mutters, and looked at the spirit before trying again.

"No, you cast correctly,"

"But I don't see anything from it,"

"Exactly, she is not bound to heaven or hell, she is mortal bound,"

"How is that possible?"

"There are theories but the main ones are either they have no magic, they remain untouched by other realms or simply there is something we don't understand that keeps them here,"

"So what do we do?"

"Help her pass on,"

"How?"

"She died here and passively bound herself to this place, we need to break that binding and make sure she doesn't bind to us instead. Follow my lead,"

I raise my hands in a gentle fashion towards the spirit and show all the bindings, they are like thin chains clinging to her and the building and I slowly try to disconnect one, with a weak snap it disappears. Rachael watches me do another before starting. Rarely one tries to reconnect from her to one of us but before it can I shatter it. It is slow, unbinding a spirit takes a lot of care to not damage their soul. When it is finally done she gives a smile and fades away like dust in the wind.

"What happens to her now?" Rachael stares with wonder.

"I don't know," She seemed stunned by that, it is rare I have no ideas at all when it comes to magic.

"Not even a theory?"

"An unbound spirit vanishing is never seen again. Some believe they reincarnate, others believe they simply vanish to finally be at peace, some believe they become magic energy but the air doesn't get any more magic so I doubt that one. A few people think they are the force that keeps the realms divided. Honestly, there is not a single bit of evidence that suggests any of them,"

"That feels kind of sad that we can't even be sure we helped them, I can see why the hot chocolate,"

"At least they smile when they get free, it at least makes us believe we helped them but we might just be ending them. They never talk, we don't even know if there is anything left they just are,"

"What next?"

"That's up to you, I can bring you back to my home, or I can drop you off somewhere or you can just go where you want,"

"No active hunting?"

"Mortal bound spirits always make me take things easy,"

"How many have you freed?"

"She was the third,"

"Let's head back," I reach out my hand for hers and when she grabs it I focus and after a short delay, we are back in my kitchen. I stretch my fingers slightly and the mugs from earlier come back out and the kettle flows into the hot chocolate powder already add to the mugs. The magic flows in to help soothe us. Honestly, I am just copying my mother when she took me home after my first mortal bound spirit. Talk is pretty light and it is more to distract ourselves, she shares recent parties, some of her magic practice, I share just general details as a witch to her apprentice. I focus on topics based around life.

I always wonder what happens to mortal bound spirits but I doubt I will ever know ...