by Stacey Jay
"Reverto! Reverto!" I hurled everything I had at the clones, but it didn't do a bit of good. There were too many of them for the reverto spell to work. They wouldn't be going anywhere unless I miraculously gained more power or worked the pax frater corpus -which was impossible since I certainly hadn't memorized the entire thing.
I was out of options. Unless…
No, I couldn't try the flame command-not yet. I hadn't even had the chance to practice it once. I was likely to screw up the hand motions and end up shocking myself senseless and providing the corpses with an easy feast. Better to stick with what I knew I could handle.
"Desino! Absisto!" I focused my magic as best I could and hurled the power at the zombie closest to me. It froze in its tracks. The second-stage animation-arrest spells were fairly simple. Unfortunately, they only lasted for a few seconds, maybe a minute, tops. This was only buying me time, not really helping solve the-
I suddenly had an idea. The real Shane really was an average Unsettled, though Mom hadn't seemed convinced she'd spilled the real reason she crawled from her grave. If I could get the 411 from Shane, Mark her, and send her back to her rest, maybe all these other Shanes would go with her. Surely they wouldn't be able to animate if the person they'd been cloned from was at rest?
Or so I hoped. Otherwise, heading back into the house was probably a very stupid idea.
"Absisto!"! used my hands to guide the spell toward the zombies on the porch steps, running past them as soon as they were momentarily out of commission.
"Megan!" I heard Mom scream, and could only hope Dad had pulled her to safety.
There was nothing I could do for her now except try to get rid of these zombies. Hand-to-hand combat was useless.
"Desino! Absisto! Desino!" I managed to freeze enough of the clones to get in through the back door. The living room was blessedly empty, but I could see the first two zombies that had attacked me making quick work of the door to my parents' bedroom. I had to work fast.
"Shane! Tell me what it is you don't like about your death!" I said, rushing toward the real Shane, who still stood by the front door, looking nearly as freaked out as I felt.
"My cousin… my shoes…" She trailed off, looking like she was going to cry. I'd never seen a zombie cry before, and it was completely unnerving.
"Desino!" I screamed at the zombie that was coming at me from the back porch.
I took Shane's hand and threw open the front door. There weren't any zombies on the front lawn, thank God, so I pulled her through and slammed the door behind us.
"Okay, you want your shoes to go to charity. You're positive that's all."
"And… I want the police to know that it wasn't an accident." Her voice was small, childlike, and I felt a shiver run up my spine. I'd only had one murdered Unsettled as a kid, but I remembered it well. A six-year-old zombie had crawled from her grave to tell me about the foster father who had abused her into an early grave. I hadn't been able to sleep well for months after.
"Desino! Absisto!" I stopped the two zombies that were coming out the door, and then kicked them back inside while they were still frozen. The toppled over like big, corpsey bowling pins. Jeez! I wished I had a key so I could lock the door from the outside!
"What happened? Who was it?" I asked as I pulled her toward the mailbox
"My older sister. She ground up nuts and put them in the milk shake she made for me after I had my tonsils out."
"I'm sorry, I don't understand." The zombies were starting to come around the side of the house. "Desino! Absisto!" Crap! How much longer could this go on before one of our neighbors came out to see what was up? The houses were pretty far apart in our neighborhood but not that far. Even if we survived almost certain zombie death and managed to find the freak who'd called me before she spilled our secret, we still might have to flee the state.
"Hurry, Shane, explain to me! I want to help you, but you have to hurry!"
"I'm deathly allergic to nuts. My sister knew that when she put those walnuts in there. She wanted to get rid of me so that all of my grandmother's inheritance would go to her and she wouldn't have to share. She was going to inherit a million dollars already," Shane sobbed, swiping a hand across her nose. "I don't know why that wasn't enough."
"Desino! Absisto!" I hated to interrupt her, but there were zombies getting uncomfortably close.
"I think she might have been sorry after. She came and cried by my bed when I was in a coma… but it was too late." Shane was shivering and brought a hand up to her mouth and began chewing on her already ravaged nails. There was no doubt in my mind she was naturally Unsettled. She looked like she'd done the dirty work of getting out of her grave, and if a murderous sister wasn't enough to pull you from your eternal rest, I didn't know what was.
Still, the girl on the phone must have somehow gotten to Shane between her grave and our house and used Shane as her latest evil "experiment." That was what she'd said; I remembered it now-that she loved playing with the dead and that experimenting was so much fun. That. Witch. If I hadn't wanted her to pay before, I certainly did now. Messing with some poor, tortured soul who had been murdered was just… evil.
I wished I had the time or the heart to question Shane about what said evil girl looked like, but I didn't. The zombies had figured out where I'd run to and were closing in fast. There was no way I'd be able to hold them off for much longer. I didn't have a second to spare.
"Desino! Don't worry, Shane. I'll make sure your sister doesn't get away with this," I said, smoothing a piece of dirty blond hair out of her face.
She was younger than I'd thought at first, probably no more than thirteen. I was only three years older, but I felt almost motherly at that moment-I wanted to comfort her, and I also wanted to make sure her sister rotted in prison for the rest of her life.
"Thanks." She smiled and threw her arms around me for a hug. For once, I didn't mind the smell of death because the gratitude in her eyes was as real and alive as anything I'd ever seen.
"Just go get some rest." I touched her forehead lightly. "Rest in peace, Shane."
Seconds later, she dashed away, disappearing down the street with preternatural speed. I spun to check out the zombies, who were still approaching at Night of the Living Dead shuffle speed across the yard. With. No. Sign. Of. Stopping.
My guess had been wrong, and now I was going to die before I could keep my promise to Shane, before I could tell my parents I loved them one last time, before-
No! Hell, no. I wasn't going down yet, not before I at least gave my last resort a try. I traced the circular pattern for the flame spell in the air with as much confidence as I could, then forced my power out across the yard as I screamed the command. "Exuro!" I gasped as I was knocked off my feet by the force of the magic coursing through me, but I kept my hands directed at the approaching clones, praying this was going to work.
Seconds later, my prayer was answered… a little more thoroughly than I'd expected.
"Whoa!" I scrambled back into the street as the grass near my feet burst into flame, my head spinning dizzily from the amount of power I'd used. Not only had the Shane clones gone up like a crack-house mattress, so had the grass, the oak tree in the front yard, and part of the wooden door to our garage.
Oh. Smack. This was bad. This was very bad.
"Megan!" My mom and dad came running around the side of the house, but my relief at seeing them alive was short-lived. Mom gaped at the fire and then at me, looking like she was going to bust an artery or something.
And that was before the Settlers' Affairs ambulances pulled up the street.
Several Settlers of the Elder variety jumped out, staring at the lawn in abject horror before whipping out cell phones. They were too busy running damage control to pay much attention to me, but I knew my respite from a major crackdown wouldn't last long. I saw the looks they were shooting my way. No matter that I'd saved my family and myself, I'd also broken a big, hairy Settler rule.
Executing comma
nds above your station was a super-big no-no. Probably because it led to things like this.
***
"Mom, please, can't we just-"
"No, we can't. This is not debatable, Megan." Mom sighed as she pulled to the side of the smooth black pavement that wound through the Hidden Hills Cemetery, the swankiest cemetery in Little Rock. Midnight on a school night or not, I still had to seal Shane's grave, so here we were.
Shane hadn't lived in Carol but in a posh section of the capital. Still, for some reason, she'd booked it the forty miles up to my house instead of going to one of the Settler teens in her area. I assumed it was because the person who had cloned her had directed her my way, though neither Mom nor the Elders would tell me anything.
Well, Mom had spilled a little. She'd told me the person who sent Shane must have suspected she was murdered because only a soul with that kind of burden had the psychic energy needed to make a batch of clones. She'd also said that only someone very dangerous-translate, someone crazy deep into the black arts-would be able to pull off such an intricate spell. Unfortunately, after that, the Elders had pulled Mom aside and she'd refused to tell me anything else.
Except that I would be going to SA headquarters for an official review tomorrow after school, which was so not good news.
I'd never personally known anyone who'd gone up for review, but I'd heard stories. Sometimes all you got was a major chewing out, but sometimes reviewed Settlers just disappeared.
"Mom, please," I begged one last time. "At least tell me if using the flame command is the only thing I'm in trouble for. I'm your only child-don't you want me to be prepared to defend myself?" If even the classic only-child argument didn't work, I was screwed.
"No, Megan, I'm sorry. I can't."
I was screwed.
"Okay. Fine." But it wasn't fine-not fine at all.
"Honey, you're not going to have to defend yourself. You didn't do anything wrong, you-" She broke off, digging her fingers into her temples in a way that left no doubt this night had given her a migraine. "You did do something wrong, but I'm glad you did, even though you could have seriously hurt yourself if the Elders hadn't been there to help you deactivate the spell. Still, I'm glad you're alive and safe, and I'm going to do my best to keep you that way."
"Then why won't you-"
"I just can't tell you anything more about the review. If they use a lie-detector charm, I don't want you to fail because I said things I was told not to."
A lie-detector charm? Why would they work a lie-detector charm? Did they think I was lying about the phone call and the death threat? Or about how I learned the flame spell? Or maybe it was something totally unrelated to tonight. Maybe I-
Headlights suddenly cut through the darkness behind us. I tensed for a second, wondering if maybe the person who'd raised the zombies had decided to come after me personally when Mom's cell rang.
"Yes, that's us. Thanks for coming." She snapped the phone shut and turned to me. "I asked Ethan to meet us. I wanted to make sure you had a manifesting third-stager around for protection just in case."
"Oh, thanks," I mumbled, wondering where my bodyguard had been when I really needed him.
"Don't give him a hard time," Mom said as Ethan pulled up and parked behind us. "I can tell he feels horrible that he wasn't there tonight."
"Well, he should feel horrible. It was his job to guard me, right?"
"Yes, it was, but it's also his job to get an education so he'll have something to fall back on when his active Settling days are over. He has a huge test tomorrow and needed to study, so I told him I could handle watching you for the evening." Uh-oh, now Mom was pissed; she was getting her militant voice on. "If you want to blame someone, blame me. But I thought you of all people would understand that Settlers have more going on with their lives than their responsibilities to the dead."
And now I was getting pissed. "Yeah, I do understand. I didn't even want to be a Settler again, let alone start learning third-stage stuff, but I didn't have a choice. It's not fair that I'm getting in trouble for trying to defend myself."
"Well, no one said life was fair," Mom yelled.
"Thanks, Mom. You know, someone almost killed me tonight," I yelled back as I opened the door to the car. "But you're right, don't cut me any slack. I'll just go settle this grave and we can go home to the house I ruined because I'm sure you're pissed at me for that too!"
"Megan-"
"Whatever!" I slammed out of the car and stormed up and over the hill toward the older family plots without even checking to see if Ethan was following me. I didn't want to look at him or Mom or anyone else right now. Not when I was seconds away from bawling my eyes out.
How could the night have ended like this? I couldn't believe I was the one in trouble. I'd just received a death threat! It wasn't just unfair, it was cruel, and it made me feel more alone than I ever had in my life. Like I didn't have anyone on my side, no one I could trust.
Dammit! I was crying by the time I reached Shane's grave. I just couldn't hold it in.
"Don't cry, Schmeg." Ethan's voice was as soft as the hands he laid on my shoulders. Hands I shrugged off with a violent twist.
"Don't." I pawed through the pockets of my jeans, searching for the safety pin I'd shoved in there before leaving the house.
"Listen, I'm sorry. You don't know how sorry."
Argh! I couldn't find the freaking pin anywhere. "Do you have a needle I could use?"
"Yeah, and I'll give it to you as soon as you let me apologize," he said, his voice sounding weird.
I turned to look at him and knew immediately I wasn't really mad. I couldn't be, not when he looked so devastated. I could tell he was thinking he'd failed me, just like he'd failed that night five years ago.
Seeing him so sad and vulnerable looking made my heart flip over and my throat get tight. I suddenly realized I didn't want to yell at Ethan. What I really wanted, what I'd been dying for since I knew my family was safe from the clones, was a hug. And not just any hug-an Ethan hug.
I fell into him and started crying even harder, but he just wrapped his arms around me and held on tight. I buried my face in his chest and snotted all over his sweatshirt while he whispered things I couldn't really understand into the top of my hair. I don't know how long we stood there, but finally I calmed down enough to realize that-for the first time all night-I felt safe and… right.
In fact, nothing had ever felt as right. Nothing in my entire life.
"I promise I won't let anyone hurt you again," he said, his hand under my chin, tilting my face up to his. Before I could think what to say or wonder if I had snot dripping out of my nose, his lips were on mine and we were kissing.
Really kissing, not big brother-little sister kissing.
It was even more amazing than I'd thought it would be. Little explosions went off all the way down my spine and I got so dizzy I knew I would fall if he let me go. But I could tell he wasn't going to let me go, not anytime soon. The kiss to end all kisses was only getting more intense and showing no signs of stopping.
I found my arms around Ethan's neck without remembering putting them there. Then one of his hands was in my hair, pulling me closer and closer. Oh. God. French kissing had never been like this, never made me feel like I was becoming part of the other person, like somehow we'd become connected in a way far more intense than-
A scream suddenly interrupted both my thoughts and the kiss.
Ethan jumped away from me so fast I stumbled, but I didn't fall. Good thing too because whoever it was screamed again, louder and closer. Then Ethan and I were running across the cemetery, following a girl being chased by a Reanimated Corpse. A girl who looked a hell of a lot like Monica Parsons.
CHAPTER 12
The big buzz at school Thursday morning was all about football. Or, more specifically, how the hell the Cougars were going to win the homecoming game with two senior players out with major injuries. Word in the hall was that Mark Hastings had sustained a concu
ssion when he ran his car off the road and into a tree on the way to pick up a burger last night-which just goes to show you should never give in to late night junk food cravings.
Especially if your brakes have been disabled by a psychopath.
Monica had only agreed to go to the dance with Mark three hours before his accident and seven hours before she was attacked by a Reanimated Corpse in the Hidden Hills Cemetery. It seemed I wasn't the only Settler whose cover was blown or the only Settler who someone didn't want at homecoming.
Now even Settlers' Affairs couldn't deny that the person raising these corpses looked like they had some tie to Carol High School, which meant stepped-up security measures on campus. There was one undercover Elder working in the cafeteria and another in the library. Mom had also volunteered to come hang out but had been told to stay home.
She wouldn't qualify to be an Elder even when she was older because she'd had a kid and passed on her power. And apparently, the Elders were a cliquey bunch of wahoos who didn't want non-Elders or non-Protocol members getting involved in their investigation.
I'd never been so miserable about being right. There was no doubt about it: Someone roaming these very halls had it in for me- and Monica. Or so she would have people believe.
For me, last night was all it took to cement Monica as my prime suspect. There was no denying that her "attack" had been super-fishy. First of all, why had she really been at the Hidden Hills Cemetery? She'd said something about a phone call telling her to go check out a grave that had been tampered with, but hello, she wasn't stupid. Evil, yes-but not stupid. Why would she head out to Hidden Hills because of some weird anonymous phone call without telling SA or calling for backup of some kind?
And why-once she was there and saw the RC coming after her- didn't she banish it? She was nearly a third-stage Settler and surely had the mojo to work a reverto spell on a single corpse. So why had she run instead of working the command? She'd said she "just got so scared she forgot the spell," but I, for one, wasn't buying. She'd been studying second-stage stuff since she was twelve, for God's sake.