Marta Zhao

First seen in Book 10: Chapter 96 when she presents herself as Dolores the maid to Violet and Charlie. She then introduces herself in Book 10: Chapter 102 as being trapped by the poltergeist Bert. Her debut Point of View Chapter is Book 11: Chapter 72

BOOK 10
10-ch 114 Marta tells Violet and Charlie that when she was 18 years old, Bert captured her, and held her captive for almost 50 years in the house and trapped in time. She mentions that after ball number 242 she was going crazy. In the car she asks if they still make AMC Gremlins as it was her foster family’s first new car

10-ch 119 Marta tells Violet she can talk to Lilac because she’s a medium, which is why Bert captured her, because she can communicate with ghosts

BOOK 11
11-ch 2 Marta channels Charlie's grandmother Billie to chastise his parents for trying to kill him.

11-ch 8 Marta states that her abilities are still rough as she was trapped when it was all new to her

11-ch 39 Marta states she has trouble distinguishing the spirit world from the living world. She states she wants peanut butter, a roast beef sandwich, cold milk, and a whole cake - freshly baked - all to herself. She wants to go on a whole tour of food to make up for the years of eating she missed out on. Charlie introduces Marta to the pack as a medium from the 1950s who saved them from a poltergeist who trapped them in a house. When she sees the food Tom made in the kitchen, she calls him her hero.

11-ch 49 Marta tells Cali that to her knowledge, she does not have the skill set to be a fortune teller. She summons Cassandra to speak to Cali as a spirit of the house had sent her to speak to Cali

11-ch 50 Cali wonders if Marta is still in high school but she tells her that she’s old enough to be Cali’s grandma

11-ch 56 Marta tells Big Mac that she has always been able to sense ghosts but didn’t realize it was special until Bert had trapped her and used her to attract ghosts and other spirits so he could trap them and pretend he was still a butler. She clarifies that she never really had to contact ghosts and that most are always near those they want to keep an eye on. Marta states she doesn’t know how to summon spirits, or call them directly

11-ch 69 Marta states that Lilac returning to the physical world, tethered to her, has never happened to her before and that it shouldn’t be possible

11-ch 72 Marta clarifies that as Bert’s prisoner, she never had a chance to get a handle on her medium skills and that he leeched power from her as a living spiritual battery. She states that she’ll never date anyone because it’s too much drama. She also states she is not a hugger.

11-ch 97 Marta tells Big Mac she doesn’t do basements because they are too dark and too small. She tells Violet that when she was trapped in the house with Bert she read all of Agatha Christie’s books four thousand times and has learned to love a good mystery

BOOK 12
12-ch 57 Lilac tell Marta she’s really pretty and she thinks about when she first saw him that he was cute. But she also states she hasn’t been with anyone since the 70s and remembers the last guy she was with.

BOOK 15
15- ch 9 Marta recalls her time at the foster home where they played musical chairs for a birthday

15-ch 17 Marta learns from Big Mac that she is not just a medium but a spiritual bridge

15-ch 104 Marta tells Lilac her shampoo is lemon verbena

15-ch 113 Marta admits she lost her virginity to a guy who was a friend of a friend that just sort of happened but would’ve been a scandal during her time

BOOK 16
Marta is captured by York and brought to the ghost pond to meet Letifer, she escapes with the help of Lilac's wolf. In Ch 75, she is part of the spell that creates the orb from Didi and Astrid's sacrifice to trap Letifer. In Ch 87, Big Mac states she entrusts the orb to her to use when the time comes. However, this orb was a decoy that she had lost when she fell asleep in Ch 99. She realizes she's more powerful than she knows when she unleashes a magical blast that destroys all the revenants attacking in Ch 119. She loses Lilac and is caught by York again when she is looking for him in Ch 130. She meets Letifer again, who tries to suck out her life force in Ch 132. She manages to retrieve Lilac's spirit and seal Letifer in the spirit portal she summons, creating a white streak in her hair in Ch 135. The book ends with Lilac returning to life and believing that Marta has died.