by Norah Wilson
“We’re not going to stop!” Maryanne said.
“No.” Alex waggled one of her lip rings. “We probably should. I mean, that’s the only way to be totally safe, right? But I don’t want to do that any more than you do. So we’ll just have to be smarter about it.”
“Yeah, smarter,” Brooke said. “Which means you can’t be going out to Bryce’s in the evenings because it’s too risky for us to get out there to back you up.”
“Back me up?” Maryanne stood. “The only thing you’ve done so far is jam me up. I had everything under control before you barged in.”
Brooke huffed out a breath. “Didn’t look like it to me.”
“Well, you had no business being there looking! Just like the time when we were in the shed and you literally poked your nose—”
“Okay, okay! Enough about that.” Alex said. “It’s over and done with. But Maryanne, if you go back to the Walker house again, you can’t go after that key. Having been caught up there once, it’s too risky. You burned up your only plausible explanation, so if you get caught again, Bryce will know you’re up to no good. He’s already suspicious enough.”
“I totally agree,” Maryanne said. “Not that it’d do me any good to go poking around again in Seth’s room anyway. Bryce pocketed the second key when he saw it lying in the valet box.”
Brooke hissed. “What? He got Seth’s key?”
“It’s okay. We don’t need a key,” Alex said. “Thanks to my ill-spent years in middle school, I could pick the lock on that cabinet with my eyes closed. With the appropriate copper tools, of course.”
“Copper? So you’re proposing getting into that shed in caster form?” Maryanne’s eyebrows had disappeared behind her bangs. “What about the iron nails Bryce has reinforced the place with? They would shred us.”
“Well, they might not literally shred us,” Alex said. “They might prevent us from getting through. Or if we could move through them, they might deplete us to the point we got stuck halfway in and halfway out.”
“So how do you propose we get in?”
Alex shrugged. “Maybe you could somehow make sure the door doesn’t latch properly. We’ve seen how hard it closes.”
Maryanne shook her head. “Bryce always double checks it. Unless there were some kind of emergency—”
“The windows,” Brooke said. “Maybe we can get in through the windows.”
Both girls looked at her.
“You know we can’t do that,” Alex said. “We don’t know what would happen if we went through another pane of glass—a different pane of glass—while we are out there in caster form. We know our casts break away from our bodies when we cast out. What could happen to our casts if we go through another sheet of glass?”
Brooke’s heart raced as she thought about it. “I don’t know, but I think we need to find out.”
Chapter 18
Darkly Drawn
Alex
Alex pulled her sleeve down over her hand and scrubbed it one final time over the attic’s second window, then wished she hadn’t when she saw the results on her sleeve. Ugh. Black hoodie or not, it was probably ruined. There had to be decades’ worth of grime on that window pane.
It had taken the three of them almost an hour to dig their way through all the crap stored against the back wall of the attic. Of course they’d had to work quietly so as not to alert anyone to their nocturnal activities. Brooke had knocked over an old coat tree, but Alex had dived for it. She’d caught it before it hit the floor, but her sudden leap hadn’t been exactly soundless. They’d frozen, waiting, but no one had come to investigate. Eventually, when their heart rates had recovered, they’d gone back to work. With hardly a whisper between them, they had moved boxes and the few odd pieces of furniture. Working in the candlelight, they’d barely seen the dirt-covered window when they’d first uncovered it. At the sight of it, Maryanne had crept down the stairs, then down the hall to the bathroom to retrieve a sponge, which they used on the window until the stars in the night sky beyond finally showed through. And now her sleeve had taken care of the last of the grime.
She let out a breath. Shoving her hands into her sweatshirt pockets, she dug out the straws she’d pulled from the broom downstairs earlier that night. Then she turned back around to face Brooke and Maryanne. She held her right hand out, fisted, holding the straws tightly in her suddenly sweaty palm. She knew which of the three straws was the shortest—the middle one. They were all poking out at exactly the same height in her hand, so the others couldn’t tell. It had to be fair. Alex would let them pick, and take what was left over for herself.
Both Maryanne and Brooke looked as scared as she was. But as Maryanne wet her lips, it struck Alex that there was more than fear and anxiety in her face. There was…what? Almost a longing…to…get it wrong? A new surge of fear washed over Alex. Fear for Maryanne.
The three of them had agreed that they had to try it—not just to access the cabinet with Walker’s journals, but for safety. If they were going to keep casting despite what Betts had said—and they damn well were—then they had to be ready for all possibilities. They needed to know not just everything Ira knew and wrote in his journals, but also whatever it was Seth and Bryce had written about them. They had to take it to the next level. The prey had to know what the hunter knew. On that thought, Alex clenched her hand a little tighter.
“I’ll go first.” Not surprisingly, it was Brooke who took that step forward. In typical no-nonsense fashion, she yanked out a straw. The one on the far right.
“Long straw, I’m guessing.”
“Yep,” Alex confirmed. Then she locked eyes on Maryanne. And oh, crap, she didn’t like the look in those eyes.
It was there. That suffering that really only seemed to abate when she was casting out. But lately…lately that pain had seemed follow Maryanne even when they were out there. Not that she’d wanted to stop. God, she was addicted to the night. Yet Alex had found more and more when they were soaring that if she turned, she was likely to see that Maryanne had fallen back. Fallen away, even, as if something had stopped her dead in her path. She’d be still sometimes. Listening, with her head cocked and her hands unmoving. What she heard in those casting nights and Mansbridge days, Alex wasn’t sure.
Alex pulled her free hand through her cropped black hair. “Ready, Maryanne?” she asked.
The other girl drew a shuddering breath. “More than ready.”
Maryanne drew the shortest straw.
Oh Jesus H. Christ!
She’d wanted that straw—the short one. Alex knew damn well Maryanne had been hoping to draw it and the look on her face now proved it. She wanted to face the unknown. Maryanne wanted to be the one to drift in caster form through that pane of glass and take the chance on never coming back. What if she couldn’t conjure up the strength, if strength was needed, to return? Or the will? What if she wouldn’t? Maryanne’s eyes glowed now because she wanted to be the one to risk…everything.
And that was why Alex couldn’t let her. In a split second decision, Alex squeezed her ring finger in. Her nail creased her palm, but it also did what it was supposed to do. It snapped the remaining straw.
“It’s me,” Maryanne said. She nodded her head vigorously, as if trying to convince herself. “Okay. That’s okay. Good. It’s—”
“Not you.” Alex held up her own straw. Short as a toothpick now. She quickly dropped the other half, hoping neither girl saw her do it.
Maryanne’s shoulders slumped. Brooke’s eyes narrowed with suspicion, and Alex had to turn away from them both as she spoke. “Looks like I’m the volunteer.”
“Not too late to change our minds,” Brooke said. “I know we all agreed, but Alex, you don’t have to—”
“I can go,” said Maryanne. “Seriously. I know we agreed to pick straws, but I’m ready.”
Alex turned back around to her friends. “Hey, it was the luck of the draw. I got the short straw. I’m going.” She stared at them both. “We know
the plan, right?”
“I’ll watch over your original,” Maryanne said.
Neither Alex nor Brooke argued with that. Maryanne knew more about first aid than either of them, having taken mandatory courses at the summer camp she used to work at in Ontario.
“That’ll leave me to watch what…?” Brooke’s words trailed off.
“Watch to see what happens to my cast,” Alex finished for her.
And that was just it. They had no idea what would happen. She’d scoured Connie’s journal—yet again—even though she’d known Connie had never addressed what would happen if a cast went completely through another window. Not even hinted that she’d done anything like this. The girls knew that a cast could partially move through another glass—thanks to Brooke’s antics—but to pass through it completely? None of them had a clue what would happen.
Alex twisted a lip ring, then dropped her hand when she realized what she was doing. That was quickly becoming a habit when she was nervous, and the last thing her friends needed was a show of nerves. Hands at her sides, she walked toward the stained glass window—toward the Madonna in it. God, if she could only talk, instead of merely looking down. Alex raised her hands to the glass and touched her bleeding feet. “See you on the other side,” she called back quietly to Brooke and Maryanne. She felt them both crossing the floor behind her and she moved very quickly, to tap her way out into the night, those learned words, those powerful words, keeping rhythm with her tapping.
“I want out, I want out, I—”
Alex was out.
She barely let herself feel the night—the sheer awesomeness of it—before she moved back in through the wall, avoiding the nails as best she could. They were always careful moving through walls, but this time she was extra careful. She didn’t need even that small injury, that pain, before she embarked on…she wasn’t sure what. Slowly she emerged through the wall back into the attic. Automatically, her gaze flew to her original on the floor, and simultaneously her original looked at her cast self. God, that was freaky! Even freakier than looking at herself through the stained glass window as they always did.
Her gaze moved to Maryanne and Brooke, who stared back at her, wide-eyed and unblinking, as she moved toward them. She rose up, then down. Showing off a little bit, trying to freak them out. It was different. Alex knew it was—seeing a caster when you weren’t in cast form yourself.
“Oh wow,” Brook whispered. “You look like—”
“Like a black ghost,” Maryanne shook her head in awe as she studied her. “Just…empty.”
Alex opened her mouth to say something—one last ‘wish me luck’—but before she uttered a word, she realized they couldn’t hear her. On the floor, her original moaned the frustration.
“I’ve got you.” As if that had been her cue, Maryanne was at her side, already lifting her arm to take her pulse at the wrist. “I’ll watch over your body.”
“And I’ll watch over your cast.” Brooke moved toward the window on the opposite wall. “Let me know…somehow…if you need help.”
Alex appreciated the sentiment, though by the faltering of Brooke’s words as she said them, they both knew Alex would be pretty much on her own in this. Still, she nodded.
Brooke reached to squeeze her shoulder. Her eyes widened even more as she felt that press of cast on flesh. “So this is what we feel like to the others,” she breathed.
Alex walked up to the window.
She put her hand out. Touched the glass. Then with just her fingertips, she pressed through the glass. Brooke had done this before, right here at Harvell House and then again the other night when they’d been spying on Maryanne over at the Walker place. She’d said there had been no sensation at all. That’s exactly what Alex felt now—not a blessed thing.
She stuck her right arm through. Her right shoulder. She was doing it! Part of her cast self was in the attic, and part was outside. The window was dividing her, but certainly not hurting her. Not cutting her by any means. She shouted, “So far, so good.” Then she laughed; the other two couldn’t hear her.
Alex stuck her head through the glass. When all seemed normal, she leaned further until both her shoulders were out. She looked at her arms in the night, then arched to look back toward the other half of her body still in the attic, divided by the window. That creeped her out big time. Suddenly she wanted to bring the rest of her out into the night—now! Yet, she realized she should keep doing this as she had been: slowly, and carefully.
Then Alex realized something else—slow wasn’t an option anymore. Careful was out of the picture.
It was pulling her!
“Oh God,” she breathed. The darkness—the night! She wasn’t in control anymore. It was as if once she’d reached the halfway point, it wasn’t up to her. She was being sucked out of the attic now. Sucked out and pressed in somehow. She kicked, but her leg barely moved. Then Alex’s entire cast was pulled completely through the glass…and into absolute and utter blackness. Alex disappeared within it.
Fuck! The night had disappeared—she had completely disappeared. And oh, God, she couldn’t feel her heart thundering! She couldn’t feel her original at all. In that moment of realization, fear itself tried to consume her.
Calm down, she commanded herself. Figure it out.
Except she couldn’t see a thing. Couldn’t distinguish herself or anything else. All she could feel was the weight of the absolute darkness—oh, help!—pressing down more and more by the moment. God, she was drowning in it! Worst of all was the loss of the dual consciousness. The loss of connection with her original. She couldn’t see through those eyes anymore. Couldn’t hear. Couldn’t feel what was going on.
I’m dead! She tried to elude the thought, but couldn’t. Her original must have died when she’d cast out through the second pane of glass.
Alex opened her mouth to scream, and scream she did—like a banshee. Screamed a caster’s primal scream. But those wails were choking back inside her now, and carrying a weight of their own. Yet, in her terror, she couldn’t seem to stop them. It was like being pulled all over again—now that she’d started, the darkness wouldn’t let go, wouldn’t let her stop screaming. She’d go mad with it if she didn’t soon just give in to the weight.
She tried to throw out an arm or kick out a leg, but it was as if weights were attached to them inside the pit of nothingness. She could barely move at all, wasn’t sure she could even flinch. Alex wanted to cry. Even as she screamed, her mind wanted to give up and release her tears. Wanted to stop fighting the weight of it all, and just surrender every bit of existence to stop the press of the crushing darkness.
Surrender to the drowning. Stay down in the darkness and just let it win…once and for all, just let it—
Wasn’t that what her rapist had wanted—for the damn darkness to win?
Alex felt as if she’d been punched in the gut by the thought. He’d win. That perv C.W. Stanley would win after all if she gave up now.
But could she even fight this? Did she even know how?
With all her strength, Alex moved. First one hand slid sideways, and then the other flailed out.
Chapter 19
Tremble
Maryanne
“Oh, God! Alex!”
Maryanne pulled her eyes away from Alex’s original on the floor just in time to see Alex’s black and empty cast slide through the window on the opposite side of the attic.
One second she was inching her way, gradually and carefully, through the pane, then suddenly it seemed like she was being hauled through. Had she chanted ‘I want out’, like when they tapped on the stained glass window to cast out into the night? Did she accelerate her journey through the glass with such a wish? And more importantly—most importantly—where was she now?
“Brooke!” Maryanne called across the room. “What do you see?”
“I don’t see her at all. She’s not out there!” Brooke’s high tone betrayed her panic. “She’s gone. She…she just disappeared. I
mean, completely! As soon as she was all the way through the glass, that was it.” She turned to Maryanne. “Alex is gone, Maryanne!”
“What?” Maryanne turned to stare down at Alex’s original on the floor. “Alex! Alex, can you hear me?” She was almost shouting now, shaking Alex’s unresponsive body.
“Quiet!” Brooke hissed from across the room. “Whatever’s happening, we don’t need the whole damn house up here.”
Maryanne pulled in a shaky breath, then bit down on her lip so tightly it bled.
Brooke turned again to the window. As Maryanne watched, she pressed her hands to the glass, looking out into the dark night. “Where are you?” she muttered. “Oh Alex, where the hell are you?”
There was a low but definite moan from the floor.
“I’m…I’m here,” Maryanne said to Alex’s original—to her casterless body.
She put two fingers on the cold, clammy skin of Alex’s neck and found a pulse instantly. And oh crap, her heart rate had skyrocketed, tripping at what had to be a dangerously high level. Yet even in the dim light of the attic, Maryanne could see how pale her face was, as if every single drop of blood had drained out of her head. Her black hair fanned around her small, ghost-white face, her mouth hung open, and her eyes stared straight ahead unblinking. She looked absolutely terrifying. She looked absolutely terrified.
“Brooke! I don’t—”
Me-annnnne!!!
“Oh no!” Jason was haunting her now? The tingle moved from her scalp all the way down her body as her brother screamed to her. Screamed at her. She couldn’t handle it! Not now, in the middle of this crisis. Oh no, not anymore!
“No! No! No!” She covered her ears with her hands, dropped her head and shook it to dispel the voice that screamed her name—the voice of the brother she’d killed. But still she heard him calling her, Me-anne! Me-anne! Me-anne! “Jason, please!” she begged, tears spurting from her eyes.
“Pull it together, Hemlock!” Brooke hissed from where she stood at the window. Despite her efforts to block out the world, Maryanne heard her. “Just pull it the hell—whoa!”