by Smith, L. J.
A shiver ran up her spine as she stared out at the ocean, but no answers came to her. She perceived the immeasurable span of the water and its waves, but her internal rhythm didn’t synch to it the way it usually did. For once, it didn’t appear to her that the sky and sea were waiting, watching, and listening to her.
She began to feel feverish, achy, and clammy. You’re not actually sick, she told herself, but she still returned to bed and buried herself deep within her covers. Minutes passed, maybe an hour, but she couldn’t rest. Every time she drifted toward a loose, mind-numbing sleep, she’d startle awake. How could she allow herself to rest at a time like this?
Her Book of Shadows was in arm’s reach within her nightstand drawer. She pulled it out and paged through it, searching for some hint or clue as to what to do next. But she knew deep down there were no magical shortcuts. She would have to go to Cape Cod and battle the hunters herself. It was the only way. She could die trying, and she knew it, but she couldn’t think of a better reason to die.
Her thoughts were interrupted then by another knock at her bedroom door, this time louder and less gentle.
“Mom, I’m sleeping,” she called out.
“It’s Adam,” said the voice behind the door.
Cassie didn’t tell him to come in, but he turned the knob and opened the door anyway. “Your mom said you weren’t feeling well,” he said, closing the door behind him.
Cassie watched him with indifference. “I’m fine,” she said.
He kicked off his shoes and sat on the bed beside her. Something glistened in his eyes that made Cassie realize he was going to try to sweet talk her.
“I don’t recall telling you to make yourself comfortable,” she said.
He didn’t flinch. “I get it, Cassie. You’re angry with me. But please hear me out.”
Cassie made no reply.
Adam took that as his cue to continue. “You know I’m always on your side,” he said. “And I want to save Scarlett just as much as you do. We all do.”
“Then there shouldn’t be a problem,” Cassie said. “We all want the same thing.”
Adam furrowed his brow. “I wasn’t finished,” he said. “I want to save Scarlett, but I’m worried about how this is playing out. And I don’t want you, or any of us, to get hurt.”
“This is beginning to sound like a broken record, Adam. All anyone talks about is how dangerous everything is, how we can’t perform magic, how we can’t go after the hunters. I’m beginning to think Faye is right. This Circle is a bunch of cowards.”
Adam pitched forward slightly, as if Cassie had socked him in the gut. “I’m not a coward,” he said.
Prove it, she wanted to say, but she felt a spasm of self-reproach. Battering Adam would get her nowhere. There would be no convincing him to see this her way.
“I’m not a coward,” Adam said again, tightly, and for a moment Cassie glimpsed something in him that she found frightening. A commanding power that always lay dormant inside him. If only she could harness that power to work for her rather than against her on this.
Cassie knew deep within her soul how powerful the Circle actually was when they worked together. They didn’t need to rely on a protection spell to keep them safe. Why couldn’t Adam see that?
“I can’t talk about this with you now,” Cassie said. “I need some time to myself. To think.”
Adam stood up. His eyes turned as dark as the sky in a storm. “I love you,” he said. “And if you have to be upset with me in order to prove that love, that’s fine. But I’m not willing to lose you.”
He put his hands on his hips. The sun glimmering through the window brought out all the different colors in his hair, the shining waves of red mixed with brown and gold.
“If time is what you want, okay,” he said. “I’ll be here when you’re ready. But I have one request.”
He paused to make sure Cassie was listening carefully to him.
“What’s your request?” she asked, still not returning his gaze.
“Don’t do anything rash without talking to the Circle first.”
Cassie buckled. That wasn’t exactly a fair thing to ask of her.
“Promise me,” he said.
She made the mistake then of looking into Adam’s pained, loving eyes. He wasn’t a coward. He was a good, brave soul, and he always wanted the best for everyone.
“Please,” he said. “Don’t do anything reckless.”
Cassie was no less angry with him than she was when he arrived, but she also loved him with all her heart. And she was powerless against the urge to put his troubled mind at ease. “I promise,” she said.
But she knew it was a promise she probably couldn’t keep.
Chapter 23
Darkness for miles, that was all Cassie could see. A red-toned darkness like the insides of her own eyelids, but her eyes were wide open. She sensed the ramshackle house far out in the distance, hidden within the blackened night. She called out, Scarlett!
Scarlett didn’t come to Cassie in this dream—Cassie went to her. She forced her way through the pitch-black night as if blind and mad, hollering Scarlett’s name. It was like traveling through outer space in a starless universe, but with persistence Cassie hit upon what she was searching for. The house. And through the rickety door of the house, Cassie discovered Scarlett. She was bound at the wrists and ankles to a splintered wooden post, and she was screaming.
They were whipping her. Whoever they were. Cassie tried to make out the hunters’ faces, but she couldn’t. They didn’t have faces; they were formless black entities like ghosts. She could only sense their trembling dark souls and how they were frightened to the point of brutality. It was their fear driving them, fear of the unknown, of the supernatural, of witchcraft. Like Holy War soldiers, their faith in their own righteousness was unbreakable, and their capacity for violence against their enemies was extreme. They whipped Scarlett mercilessly over and over again, unaffected by her screams.
Cassie wondered why the hunters didn’t tape Scarlett’s mouth shut, to quiet her. And then the thought occurred to her like a light being switched on. The hunters wanted Scarlett to talk, to spill information—not only the secrets of her magic, Cassie realized, but the secrets of the Circle, who they were and where to find them. Scarlett cried and shrieked and spit at the shapeless hunters, but no words escaped her bruised mouth. Was she bearing all this pain to protect the Circle? And to protect Cassie?
Her beaten body hung from the wooden post limp and wilted like a dying flower. Her face was a mess of blood and dirt, and one of her eyes had swelled completely shut. Her damp red hair dripped like blood down her bony shoulders. She’d been stripped almost nude; her torso and legs were streaked with lash marks and purple welts. How much longer could she possibly take such abuse?
Like in the last dream she’d had, Cassie couldn’t move. Her feet were frozen in place at the doorway—from where she could see Scarlett but wasn’t sure if Scarlett could see her. She called out to her from where she stood.
Scarlett, I know where you are, she said. And I’ll be there soon. I promise.
With that, she jolted awake.
My sister, Cassie thought, my poor, dear sister. She’d rather Scarlett give the hunters what they wanted, to tell them the entire truth about the Circle, if it meant they’d release her alive. Better that than seeing her die to protect them. Scarlett had come to New Salem to seek out the safety of the Circle, not the other way around. How had the situation come to this?
But Scarlett was still alive, that much Cassie was sure of. And as long as she was still alive, there was still time to rescue her. Maybe if the Circle understood that Scarlett was being tortured for protecting them, they’d consider rescuing her a little more seriously. Maybe they’d finally accept her as one of their own.
And then there was a piercingly loud sound in Cassie’s ear. She looked over at her nightstand and realized her phone was ringing, but who could be calling at this time of night?
/> “Hello?” Cassie answered cautiously, half-believing it was going to be one of the ancient witch hunters from her dream on the other end of the line. But the scratchy voice that apologized for waking her belonged to Deborah.
“What’s happened?” Cassie knew if Deborah was calling her in the middle of the night that someone was either hurt or dead, possibly both.
“Someone set Laurel’s lawn on fire,” Deborah said. “Burning in the shape of the hunter symbol.”
If Cassie hadn’t just woken from a nightmare, she would have sworn she’d just entered one.
“Laurel’s been marked,” Deborah added, in case Cassie didn’t comprehend the full magnitude of the situation.
Cassie suddenly felt like she was suffocating, like one of the hunters from her nightmare had grabbed hold of her neck and was squeezing the breath out of her.
“Cassie?” Deborah said. “Are you okay?”
Cassie coughed. Laurel. Of all people to be marked, they’d gotten to sweet, peace-loving Laurel. How could this be happening?
“I’m just shocked,” Cassie said. “Go on.”
Deborah resumed speaking in her gravelly whisper. “So we’re going to have a Circle meeting early tomorrow before school. To figure out what to do.”
“Of course,” Cassie said. “I’ll be there.”
“We’re meeting at Diana’s. At six thirty A.M.”
“Okay.” Cassie felt shaky and weird. Her voice didn’t come out sounding like her own. Those invisible hands were still squeezing her throat closed, making it hard for her to breathe. “Is Laurel all right?” she managed to ask.
But the phone clicked. Deborah had already hung up. It struck Cassie as strange that of all the Circle members who could have called her with this news, it was Deborah who did it. Not Adam or Diana.
Careful not to wake her mother, Cassie got out of bed, slipped on her sneakers, and wrapped her jacket around her shoulders. Then she unlatched the front door and slinked out to the edge of their property. From high up on the bluff she had a long view of the whole block, every old house on crooked Crowhaven Road—the ones in good repair as well as the ones that looked as if they might tip over into splintering timbers in a strong wind.
Cassie strained her eyes to see far out. First, she saw that the fire had been extinguished, but she could still smell the remnants of smoke and burnt grass in the air. And then she noticed two bodies moving around in the dark, along the outskirts of the lawn. It was difficult to make out who it was through the lingering smoke. Cassie squinted her eyes, but it was no use. She considered taking the walk down. It had to be someone in the Circle. But then the bodies began moving closer, and Cassie recognized who it was. It was Adam and Diana.
Diana’s long blonde hair shined beneath the streetlights as she walked, closely and carefully with Adam, toward her house.
Cassie felt a pang of resentment. They were both up and out, together. And neither of them took the time to call Cassie themselves.
How had she drifted so far from the two most important people in her life?
Cassie turned around and went home with an emptiness in her stomach. She tiptoed across the living room floor, back to her bedroom, and gently closed the door. Then she kicked off her shoes and climbed into bed, sorry she’d ever left it in the first place.
She could guess what they were doing. They were planning, strategizing, and plotting the meeting that would happen in a few hours. That was just who they were and how they would always be. The brave knight and the high priestess, ever vigilant. They were the real influence behind the group, no matter who was called leader or who wore the Tools.
Adam may have been Cassie’s soul mate, but there would always be the Circle. And the Circle, if represented by one person, would be Diana. Not for one second did Cassie suspect that Adam was cheating on her with Diana. He didn’t have to. What he shared with Diana was something above and beyond cheating.
Cassie stared up at her ceiling, sleepless. Let them strategize. Cassie was done waiting on the sidelines. She would go to rescue Scarlett herself and destroy the hunters before they marked anyone else—and before they had the opportunity to kill Laurel.
But Cassie knew she’d need two things if she was going to fight the hunters by herself: the diadem and garter from Diana and Faye.
Chapter 24
The next morning, Cassie arrived at Diana’s house with coffee and fresh muffins. Diana looked a little unsteady accepting the bag of baked goods from Cassie, unsure of what to make of her kind gesture. Since they’d last disagreed and Cassie stormed out of their Circle meeting, they’d avoided each other. So it was only fair for Diana to be a little suspicious of such an abrupt and dramatic change of heart.
“Will you join me for a moment at the kitchen table before the others arrive?” Diana asked Cassie.
Cassie sat, pulled one of the coffees closer to her, and listened.
Diana nibbled on the end of a corn muffin. “I was up all night researching spells to reverse a mark,” she said. “To save Laurel.”
“And?”
“Nothing has been perfect yet, but it’s promising. I’m hoping to figure out a way of combining an uncrossing spell with a healing spell.”
All Cassie could think about was the diadem, but she forced herself to nod encouragingly at Diana.
“Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help,” Cassie said. She knew she needed to give Diana more to regain her trust.
“I know I’ve been acting a bit heated lately,” Cassie continued. “And I shouldn’t have walked out of the last meeting that way, when it’s so important for us to stick together.”
Diana’s eyebrows lifted, and Cassie could sense her heart filling with hope.
“And I want to help keep the Circle together, at its strongest,” Cassie said. “I truly believe that together we are strong enough to defeat the hunters.”
Diana tilted her chin at Cassie just as Adam appeared at her side door.
The sight of Cassie made his tense, watchful face loosen. Then his eyes briefly met Diana’s, and a flicker of understanding passed between them.
“I hope I’m not interrupting,” Adam said. “But I have to admit, it’s nice to see you two talking.”
Diana smiled at Adam, fully convinced the air between her and Cassie had been cleared. She gave up on her muffin and reached for Cassie’s hand.
“I’m so glad you’ve come around,” she said. “We’re going to go after these hunters here on our own turf.” Her emerald eyes pooled with tears. “That’s how I can be sure my sister is safe.”
Adam joined them at the table, grabbing a coffee, not wanting to be left out of their conversation. “And remember, Cassie,” he said, “Scarlett is a powerful witch, as powerful as you. Maybe even more powerful.” He stirred his coffee. “You have to trust that she can take care of herself.”
Soon the rest of the group began trickling in. Deborah arrived with Melanie and a panicked Laurel. Nick, looking icily handsome, stepped in behind her. They were followed by Chris and Doug, and a slinking, half-asleep Sean. Finally, Faye arrived with Suzan, who nearly knocked her over in a rush toward the plate of muffins.
For a few minutes, everyone fussed around the kitchen table, drinking and eating. The group’s chatty conversation had a different quality than usual. Cassie felt a chill coming off them, a new kind of fear. And she sensed a darkness within herself, as if with this latest threat, she’d been pushed farther out to the periphery of the group for good.
It was easy for Cassie to slip away unnoticed. She swiftly grabbed her purse and made her way to the bathroom without anyone missing a beat. Then she kept walking. She knew the diadem was hidden in Diana’s room. All she had to do was find it. And the door to Diana’s room was open, practically inviting her inside.
She paused at the threshold. There was no undoing this once she stepped inside. She had to be sure she was willing to suffer the consequences later on. But remembering her nightmares and the sound of
Scarlett screaming was all it took to convince her to take that critical step through the doorway.
Cassie had grown so accustomed to the elegance of Diana’s room. At one time it struck her as an oddly adult room for a teenager to have, but today it seemed perfect for Diana.
Now, if she were Diana, where would she have hidden the diadem?
Cassie let her eyes hover around the room and pass over each piece of antique-looking furniture. She gazed at the window seat and the many hanging prisms in front of it. The morning sun struck them full on, reflecting tiny rainbows on the opposite side of the room. Bursts of multicolored light swayed back and forth upon the goddess prints above Diana’s bed.
Cassie grinned. The goddess prints. She knew Diana, her sworn sister, so well; she didn’t even need to resort to magic to realize exactly where the diadem was hidden.
There were six prints in all. Five of them were similar, black-and-white and slightly old-fashioned. They were the Greek goddesses Aphrodite, the goddess of love; Artemis, the huntress; Hera, the queen of the gods; Athena, the goddess of wisdom; and Persephone, the goddess of all growing things. But the last print was different from the others. It was in color, and was larger and more modern. It was a young woman beneath a starry sky, with a crescent moon shining down on her long, flowing hair. It was the goddess Diana. And she wore the same white garment Diana wore at Circle meetings as well as a garter on her thigh and a silver cuff-bracelet on her upper arm. And, most importantly, on her head was a thin circlet with a crescent moon, horns upward. The diadem.
Of course, Cassie thought. It was almost too obvious.
Cassie rested her hand against the print and then gently lifted it up off the wall. Just as she suspected, the wall behind the frame had been hollowed out, and there it was. Resting within that secret cave of torn plaster and Sheetrock was a silver document box.
Cassie reached for it hungrily and unsealed its top. And there, quietly seated within the confines of that silver box, was the shimmering diadem in all its glory.