The heavy curtains were closed, allowing no light through. Our only illumination came from one of the intricately designed, tall lamps. It had an imitation wood neck leading to the light-brown cloth shade. It was something that I’d seen in the ol’ country stores my mother frequented during a decorating phase.
Robin began to grumble and slapped the book closed. “It just keeps talking about a Ouija board.”
“What about the window?” I asked.
Aidan stopped me by grabbing my wrist in his chilled hand and pulling me back. “Wait a minute, Nora.”
I began to protest when his grip tightened.
We stepped back together, shuffling around the coffee table.
Alerted to a disturbance, I held still, searching the shadows, the walls, and the scary masks for any signs that we weren’t alone.
Robin, who was close to me, gasped.
A jerking step back had me hitting the couch behind my knees. Taking Aidan with me, I plopped unceremoniously back onto it.
“That wasn’t here a second ago,” Robin said, easing in beside me on the couch.
Laid out on the seventies style coffee-table near my knees was a Ouija board.
The letters and numbers were usual, along with the giant YES and NO. In the center of the board was the planchette—the teardrop—shaped wooden piece—which acted as the indicator. I remembered a Halloween party as a teenager where they had one out. I refused to play along, but watched from behind the couch as my friends squealed and gushed whenever it happened to spell a nonsensical short sentence.
“What is that doing here?” I picked up the planchette and turned it around in my fingers. It seemed like an ordinary game piece, no scary symbols or anything.
Read was leaning forward in the chair, hands clasped in front of him. “So we get to talk to dead people,” he said dryly.
Robin closed the Talking with Spirits book she’d been holding. Setting it beside the game on the coffee-table she whispered. “Like…real dead people? Ghosts?” She looked to Read.
“I think that this is our first Challenge,” Aidan said. “My parents had this very same game. They used to hold séances for the neighbors when I was a kid.”
I reeled back for a second. To expose your own child to something as morbid as calling the dead seemed wrong to me.
Robin’s eyes were round. “That’s dangerous, isn’t it? I mean, they didn’t believe in what they were doing, right?”
Aidan shrugged not looking up. “My parents are…different.” He swallowed and kept his face turned away.
I immediately felt ashamed. He was probably embarrassed and we weren’t helping. “Sorry,” I whispered.
“Me too,” Robin said and added after a moment’s pause. “Actually it’s kind of neat. Maybe people really did get to talk to ghosts in your house. Plus, you’ll know how to play this.”
Aidan took the teardrop-shaped planchette from my hand and put it back down on the board. “This doesn’t seem right. According to my parents…” he said the last sentence slowly. “…you have to be careful that you don’t call up something dark.”
“Like what?” Read asked guardedly.
Aidan almost smiled, “Like demons.”
Read barked a laugh, probably the loudest sound to have pierced the little room since our arrival. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t flinch.
Aidan continued, “Poltergeists, dark spirits, you know, the seedy underworld sort. Our neighbors at the time were convinced their apartment was haunted. Turned out it was bats in the walls.”
I frowned and decided to veer the conversation back. “We can be specific on what we call up, right?”
Aidan jerked his head up. “I don’t know,” he offered a helpless shrug. “Like I said, my parents dabbled in this when I was young, not me.”
“Well, I watched one once.” I glanced at Read, knowing he had been at that party. When he gave me a blank stare I continued. “Uh, so I remember a little ceremony they read off the pamphlet and then people would ask to contact a spirit. They have to touch this though,” I put both my fingers gently on top of the planchette. “I remember Phoebe yelling at Read to keep his touch light.”
Mentioning her name swept a moment of stillness through our group.
Robin’s eyes were wide when she whispered, “You did? When was this?” Instead of asking me, she asked Read.
Read nodded. “Yeah, I remember now. It was high school, before we met you.”
“What kind of ceremony?” Aidan asked.
I let go of the planchette and ducked my head to peek under the four-legged coffee table for a box or instructions, but couldn’t see either. “Um…” feeling silly I glanced at Read for help.
Read shrugged. “I barely remember the party, let alone the ceremony.” This was plausible. Read was drunk most of that night. “I think we had to ask for something that wouldn’t wish us harm or something like that. Then that weird goth-chick—Remember her?—She did that thing with the candles.”
I remembered her running her hand over them and dripping wax on the planchette, but that part wasn’t in the pamphlet, according to Phoebe.
Swallowing, I realized no one was saying anything and it would be up to me. Tilting my chin up so I wouldn’t have to look at anyone, I said to the room, my voice cracking. “We need to use this board, but we only want to talk to something that doesn’t wish us harm.” Hell, I felt like a moron. I knew Aidan was watching me and didn’t look at anyone.
Aidan cleared his throat. “What she said,” he joined, in followed by Robin’s meek, “Ditto,” and a grunt from Read.
I smirked, feeling a rush of giddiness. “I think we have to touch it. That’s all I can think of for a ceremony, considering we’re all out of candles.”
“And I thought I was so prepared for this weekend,” Aidan muttered wryly.
Robin giggled, Read and I cracked smiles. It felt good for a little humor to interrupt the seriousness. I think we would have laughed at the smallest joke at this point; anything to break the tension.
“Okay,” I said. “On the count of three, we all touch the planchette.”
“Okay,” Robin whispered, her hands hovering. We all leaned forward, crowding shoulder to shoulder as I started the countdown.
“One, two…three.”
We all reached out to touch the game piece at the same time when it darted out of our reach and to the opposite end of the board.
Robin scrambled off the couch in a blur, and peeked above Read’s chair. “What the hell!”
Read and I and fell back into our seats. My back pressed against the couch, getting as far away from the board as I could.
“Whoa,” Read breathed, eyes wide.
Aidan had frozen. He was the only one who hadn’t moved and he stared at the game piece, puzzled. He reached out slowly, but the piece didn’t move again. He brought it back toward us and I hesitated before scooting forward in my seat when he said. “Try again?”
In a hoarse whisper I warned, “But, it moved!”
Robin nodded vigorously, unable to speak.
Read was already leaning forward, hands out to touch the planchette. “Come on, Robin.”
At his request, Robin inched her way around the chair and smiled at Read weakly. “If you say so,” she said to him softly.
Aidan’s eyes met mine, encouraging me to reach out.
Robin eased back into the couch beside me and sat close enough that I could smell her shampoo.
Together we floated reluctant fingers over the teardrop shape, glancing at one another, waiting for someone to chicken out.
Robin took a deep shaky breath and nodded to me without looking.
“One,” I said slowly, eyes darting to each of my friends. “Two…three.”
The minute our fingers brushed the top of the game piece, it darted away.
Though I had an inkling that it might happen again, I still screamed and jumped on top of the couch cush
ions. “This is stupid!” I barked, my hand over my chest to slow my heart.
Robin had darted off the couch again and was half-way across the room when she finally realized there was nowhere to run. Read was standing now, hovering over the Ouija board, looking startled.
Aidan had jumped this time, but otherwise didn’t move. “I guess we can’t all touch it at the same time?”
Balancing on the dark cushions, I waited for Aidan to grab the planchette and put it at the base of the board, away from all the letters.
The shape didn’t move and we just stared at it trying to decide what to do.
“Ask it a question,” I whispered from my high vantage point.
Aidan frowned and asked the most obvious question on all of our minds. “Will Damien give our friends back?”
The plastic teardrop twitched before taking off across the board. Each pause was swift and at first I didn’t realize it was spelling something out until half way through.
Robin’s hand rose to her lips, staring at the magical game-piece. Easing back to us, she didn’t sit on the couch, rather knelt on the other side of the coffee table to watch.
The clear, plastic window stopped over a ‘V‘, then it went to an ‘E‘, then to an ‘R‘. I watched in petrified fascination as the planchette stopped cold.
“Never,” Read growled. “It said, never.”
Feeling my shoulders sag, I crawled down to sit next to Aidan again. Damien will never give our friends back? “Can we win them back?” I asked.
YES.
Before anyone could ask another question, the device began to spell out something else.
W-E-A-K.
Robin inched forward on her knees. “Weak? We won’t get them back because we’re weak or they’re weak?”
“No, we’re not weak,” I reassured. Glancing toward the coffee-table pointedly I argued, “And we’ll be getting through this. We’ll get our friends back, with or without Damien’s help.” I stopped myself. “I can’t believe that I’m fighting with a game.”
Aidan tilted his chin up, piercing eyes alight. “Or with the entity controlling the game.”
That was eerie.
Y-O-U-W-I-L-L-D-I-E, it said.
“Die!” Robin hissed. “Of what? How?”
When the planchette didn’t twitch, Aidan repeated her question.
Y-O-U-R-W-E-A-K-N-E-S-S.
“No,” I shook my head at Robin. “It’s lying, Robin. Don’t pay attention.”
“Let me take it.” She didn’t look at Aidan as she spoke. As she reached to take the planchette from him, her eyes were bright with unshed tears. When Aidan didn’t move, she looked up at him. “Please.”
Aidan looked at me, then her before easing his hand away. He didn’t seem warmed with the idea.
Taking it, she asked in a shaky voice, “How will I die? What is my weakness?”
“Robin,” I protested through gritted teeth.
C-H-E-A-T. It spelled.
I grabbed the planchette away from her before she could ask another question. “You won’t cheat, Robin. We don’t even know how to cheat here.”
I placed the piece back on the board and my fingertips were on it when it began spell.
“How do we beat this?” I demanded. I had to force myself from moving it to where I wanted it to go. It was strange to feel it shift beneath my fingers, slashing toward each letter and pausing before flinging across the board.
S-A-C-R-I-F-I-C-E, it said.
Beneath my fingertips the planchette went dead, leaving me with that ugly word. I hated that word.
“What does that mean?” Aidan asked. “Does it mean just for you or all of us?”
I shook my head, staring at the game piece. “I don’t know—” Before I could finish, the game piece began to move again.
O-R-T-H-E-Y-D-I-E
Maybe we should have listened to Damian and split up. Would Phoebe still be gone if we had? Even so, she wanted to go without figuring out the clue. At the same time, it had been the right door all along, but how were we to know then?
The teardrop beneath my hand began to move again. I jerked my head down as it started to spell: B-L-O-O-D-S-A-C–
I heard footsteps beyond the walled-up kitchen and jerked my hands free of the planchette.
Stiffening on the couch, Aidan laced his fingers in mine and squeezed, trying to keep me calm—probably trying to keep us both calm. Robin darted around the coffee table and latched onto Read’s arm. “What is that?” She whispered.
Unable to answer, I stared at the bare wall as it began to waver and wobble like it was made of Jell-O.
First an arm that broke through the warped wall, then a foot, a shoulder.
I braced myself, gripping Aidan’s hand hard as two people entered the room, stepping through the wall where the kitchen doorway used to be. Behind them, the wall gained density, appearing just as solid as it should be.
The faces were very familiar and I had to choke back my gasp.
There was a blonde girl with a round face and blue eyes the color of dark jewels. The boy had wild reddish-brown hair with a light scruff and electric blue eyes.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It was us.
A translucent Nora and Aidan stood against the wall, facing our group. It was surreal staring at my face. She made the familiar expressions I’d seen in photographs.
The Smokey Nora and Aidan wore our clothes, but they were rumpled, dirty, and wet. The other me was soaked, her dyed blonde hair matted to her skull and water dripped from her fingertips to the rug. The other Aidan was similar; pale and wet, though his roan hair was sticking in all directions. Together they were chilled, hazy, unhappy, and dirt-stained.
Uncertain, the real Aidan and I glanced at each other. At the same time our clones turned to glare at each other.
Robin breathed, “Whooooaaaa.”
Aidan detached himself from my hand and touched the planchette. “Who are they?” He demanded of the Ouija board, agitation stiffening his shoulders.
Y-O-U, the Ouija board answered. A-T-T-H-E-E-N-D.
“At the end?” Read asked slowly. “Why is it just you two?”
I had no way of answering and bit my lips together.
At the same time, Aidan and I stood up. I just knew that if he was moving, I was too. It would be better to be closer to my friends than the doppelgängers.
Taking in a deep breath I saw Robin grab Aidan’s other hand and squeeze until her knuckles were white. Her other hand was still latched onto Read’s arm.
“How should we get rid of them?” I asked Aidan in a hushed tone.
Before he could speak, Other Nora answered. “If Aidan did his duty, we wouldn’t have failed.” Her voice was mine, though like a recording, it sounded minimally different coming from someone else.
Other Aidan’s eyes swept the room, despondent and grim. “I will never see this room again because of her,” he grumbled, gesturing to the Other Nora in disgust.
“Shut up,” she snapped, it was eerie hearing my own voice so full of revulsion. “It’s because of you that they died. You were supposed to guard the tower.”
Aidan—our Aidan—held up a hand to silence their bickering. “They? They died?”
The Other Nora sneered at him. “Yes, Phoebe drowned, Robin was eaten by spiders, Read…”
“Make them shut up,” Robin squeaked, she was looking to Read.
The Other Nora continued as if Robin hadn’t spoken. “…Read burned, and Cody well, we never found him.”
Other Nora tilted her head to the side and spoke in a low voice. “And it is all because of you, Aidan. You killed us all by bringing us here,” she hissed, raising the hairs on the back of my neck. “It was your job to keep everyone away from this place.”
Aidan took a step around the coffee table toward the fake us. I didn’t like the separation and whispered frantically, “What are you doing?”
Cody had wandered off in the dark, Phoebe h
ad separated from us by opening doors. I didn’t want to lose someone else because we couldn’t stick together.
Ignoring me, Aidan edged closer until he stood beside the boy who looked like him. Every feature was in place. The color of his eyes, the serious straight-thin lips, dark, straight eyebrows and the thick roan colored hair, it was all the same. To the two of them he asked. “Are you the future us? That’s why the Bending Time book appeared in the bookshelf?”
“We are,” Other Aidan replied, his eyes narrowing as he looked at me. “We made it, but couldn’t get through the swamp. If it wasn’t for her crazy family—”
Other Nora moved to slap him. Teeth bared she shrieked through them, as if it could contain the rage that flushed her cheeks. At the same time their bodies appeared to solidify, their translucent quality fading little by little. I hadn’t noticed until I couldn’t see light through Other Nora’s flailing arm.
The slap was sharp and echoed through the living room. Other Aidan’s head turned with the hit and he kept his face turned away, the bitter smirk betraying his amusement.
The swamp? I swallowed hard. Was that why they were so wet? Did they—I mean we—die in a swamp? It also meant that Aidan knew about my family. Out of all of the outcomes, that one bristled my hairs the most. Irrational, I know. I assure you, I’m completely aware that I am.
“How do we stop it?” Read asked the peculiar doppelgänger, his voice steady.
Other Nora’s eyes shifted to the real Aidan, though she made the small gesture seem difficult.
“We need a sacrifice,” she said. “They can all go home if someone takes their place. Someone worthy of the sacrifice.”
My muscles grew tense and still. A sacrifice, the very word was a jagged cut down my spine. To me, I don’t think there’s a dirtier word out there. To the Other Nora I argued. “That would be cheating. Damien said we couldn’t win this way. We had to beat the Challenge.” I remembered how Robin had been called a cheat. Could she try to sacrifice herself? Or worse, someone else?
Other Aidan was trying to protest, grabbing his throat trying to speak, but no sound escaped. The Other Nora seemed pleased, though I wasn’t sure what was going on between them.
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