“Sierra, you have to get back,” Ebony repeated. “Are you listening to me?”
I wanted to listen to her advice but something else was fighting to win my attention. I couldn’t help but look past her, and noticed the other girls were all looking at us. No, at me. As if they knew who I was, and like Ebony, expected me to do something to stop all of this, to help them. They looked so young, and I didn’t doubt that at least half of them were barely out of their teens.
As I stood among them feeling their strong need for freedom, I understood we were all in the same boat, but someone had to rock it. There was only one thing I could think of that would do just that.
“Eb, I can’t get back because I don’t know how.”
“Come on, we can’t stay like this forever. We’re in limbo, being used like some sort of net, and I’d rather die than stay here forever.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her this wouldn’t be a state she would linger in forever. I was pretty sure even catchers had a certain reserve of energy that would eventually wither away to nothing. I could already see it on a few of the girls, who were fading in color. Just like the spooks did before they ceased to exist.
No one trapped inside this gray place was going to make it out of this unscathed. The only thing left to do was to contact Professor Spooker. Maybe he had an idea or two about what was going on. Even if Mace made it sound like the professor and I connecting would instantly set his scheme on track, he could be bluffing.
“Sierra?”
I looked at Ebony, trying to shake the bleak thoughts. “I have to get inside.”
She turned to look at where I was pointing. “Are you fucking serious? You’re going to try crossing into the ghostly patch?”
I nodded. “There’s no other way.”
“That’s unnatural, and wrong. It might not even be possible!”
Some of the other girls mumbled their agreement. No one thought this was a good idea and I was pretty sure it sucked as well, but what choice did I have?
“I’m going to try.” I have to try.
“No, Sierra, you’re like a ball of burning energy, we can all see it around you.” Ebony shook her head. “If you go in, we don’t know what will happen. You’re volatile, can’t you see it?”
She wasn’t making any sense. “What’re you talking about?” I was the same as they were—a spirit forcibly torn away from my body.
“Look at us, and then look at you. We’ve got slight auras around us, but yours is blazing. You look like a ball of energy ready to blow.”
“Maybe that’s the only way.” I took a step away from her before she could try to stop me or convince me this was the insane idea I already knew it was. I started toward the hole in the wall, and had no clue what was about to happen or if I would even go anywhere, but it was worth a shot. “I’m going to save you, Eb.” That’s what I came here to do.
“I’m not worth so much destruction,” she whispered. “Don’t do what he wants you to.”
Glancing over my shoulder one last time, I looked Ebony in the eye and forced a smile. Then, I did the same to the other girls. None of them returned it, but it was okay. I was scared too.
We were all going to die either way.
At least now, I’d go out fighting.
When I was close enough to the wavering wall, I extended a tentative hand. My fingers went right through, feeling warm and gooey like sticking my hand into warm honey. I swirled both of my hands through the wall, enjoying the solidity of it. At last, something felt real.
I sucked in a breath, ready to step into it, when someone grabbed my hands and pulled me in.
Chapter Sixteen
As soon as I was yanked over the threshold, I collapsed to my knees.
Until now, I hadn’t known living people could even pass into this patch. Then again, whatever I was now, it wasn’t exactly living. I was caught in the same state of limbo Mara had told me about in the hospital, and the thought made me feel a sense of dread unlike any I’d ever felt before.
After all the dangerous and bizarre situations I’d found myself in during my life, and especially during the last month, this had to be the worst. What if I couldn’t get back into my body? Or worse, what if I got trapped inside the ghostly patch forever?
That thought was enough to get me moving.
I got to my feet but it took a little longer than usual. Unlike the movements I’d made in the gray-ghost swirling atmosphere, in here I felt like I was moving against a strong current. These spirits were no longer swirls sucked in through the bodies of spook catchers. Here, they looked like images from a hidden projector, and all moved about their business without taking any notice of me, which was probably a good thing.
My feet were floating above the ground, my toes barely skimming the surface below. This reminded me of the dark patch I’d encountered several times, because it always felt as if I were nowhere but everywhere. A completely different pocket of reality, which I was starting to understand might be the measure of different patches.
“I can sense your power,” a male voice said from behind me. “You must be the one she told me about.”
“What?” I spun around, very slowly. My voice reverberated around me as I moved sluggishly, until I was facing an older man. Unlike the other projected spooks, he looked solid. I could see the wavering wall behind him, not through him.
“You’re the one,” he said, extending a hand toward me.
I managed to avoid him by stepping back. “Who are you?”
“I’m Professor Claude Spooker.”
“So you’re the one Mace wants me to meet, why?”
He frowned. “I remember that name…but I’m not sure why.”
“Probably because he killed you, or at least has banished you amongst these ghosts.” It had just occurred to me. The fact neither of us attracted anyone else’s attention but could see each other, made me think the professor might still be strapped to a chair somewhere. How long had he been there? And did it mean that spook catchers weren’t the only ones Mace had included in his pathetic plan? Not if this man was any indication. Catchers were only female, and the professor was clearly a man.
“Ah…” He looked lost. I’d never actually seen what he looked like in life, but right now he was an incredibly thin, short man with dark eyes, a tight mouth, and gaunt cheeks. He looked more like a wraith than anything else, with a shock of white hair sticking up at the top of his head.
“Do you know why you’re here?” I asked. If only I could answer the same about myself.
“You smell nice,” he said, lifting his nose to sniff the air between us. “Like fresh energy. You probably taste sweet too.”
When he jumped me, I didn’t expect it, so I couldn’t dodge out of his way in time. He wrapped his bony fingers around my shoulders and sniffed at my neck. When he bit me it felt as if the world around me shifted. As if the ripples made the whole place shuffle slightly.
There was no pain, just a strange sensation twitching inside me…like I was slowly deflating.
It took a lot of shrugging and pushing against the current of energy he possessed, but when I finally managed to pry him off me, a fine line of orange light seemed to be spilling from me. Was I bleeding energy?
“What the hell did you do to me?”
His face looked hideous—sharp teeth, hollow eyes, my energy dripping down his chin like blood. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t supposed to do that, but I’ve been starved for so long. Do you know how lonely it gets when you’re segregated from everyone? To be left in limbo, not quite dead and certainly not alive…”
I didn’t bother with a response. I was too freaked out and pissed off to do either. “Look, I don’t know why I’m here, but Mace Clamber thinks you and I will eventually break this barrier and allow everyone to slip out into the living world.”
He scratched his chin and was slowly becoming the gaunt man I’d first spied. “Why would he want us to do that?”
“I think it’s w
hy he’s been keeping you here,” I said, very weary of his movements.
For a moment, Professor Spooker didn’t say anything. “You’re the one he was waiting for. From the family I never should have told anyone about…”
What the hell was he talking about now?
“The name Clamber sounds so familiar…why?” He scratched the top of his head. “I knew a Mason Clamber once. A very ambitious young man who wanted to know everything there was to know about ghosts, during a time when most didn’t believe in them. You have to understand that I confided in a great many people—my two assistants and this Mason fella. I let him intern with us for a few summers. He was there the first time I revealed what the chair could do.”
“Wait a minute, you know about that thing?”
He nodded. “Of course I do, I designed it! Have you seen it?”
“I’ve seen more than one. Why did you build such a thing, and who did you test it on?”
He shook his head, and I wasn’t sure if it was because he didn’t remember or because he didn’t want to tell me.
“Professor Spooker, I need to know.”
“I didn’t mean to,” he said. “But she was the only one…”
I suddenly remembered the few things Oren had told me about this man, and my stomach turned. “You used it on your daughter?”
“Yes!” His spiky teeth reappeared. “I want to have another little taste of you, please.”
“Your daughter?” I hoped it was enough to get him back from wherever he kept slipping to. “Why did you do something so horrible to her? You knew it would split her in two.”
He shook his head. “The chair is capable of seamlessly putting spirit and body back together. But only when they haven’t been separated for longer than six hours at a time.”
“What happens if they’ve been separated longer?” I wasn’t sure how long Ebony had been strapped in, but I was betting most of the other girls had been attached for a while. And Mara, how long had she been that way? Roe had told us about her slipping into a coma last month. Was that what Mason meant by advanced state?
“I don’t know. I just know it gets harder for the two to reconnect every hour that passes.”
“Listen to me, what does Mace know about my family that he wants to use against me?”
Professor Spooker looked me in the eye. “You look like her, you know? She’s the most powerful spook catcher I know, and she could even speak to me in here. You’re her granddaughter, and she wanted me to make sure I told you what she didn’t have time to.”
“What’s that?” My whole body shook with the need to know.
“Your line of spook catchers is a strong one,” he said. “She always knew that, could feel it in her bones, and she knew that each generation got stronger. The daughter of the daughter carries the gene, and reaches full power when the grandmother dies.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. Was this why so many people thought I was special and powerful but I had no idea? Had my familial line passed on a legacy no one bothered to tell me about?
“She knew you would be strong and your power would attract the wrong kind of attention, so she made you even stronger. But adding witch blood to strengthen you wasn’t enough.” All of his maniacal tendencies seemed to have passed, and he just looked like a shriveled-up man. “I don’t have long. I think he knew that.”
“He knew what?”
“Mason must have known I would combust whenever such a powerful source of energy came anywhere near me. Taking some from you made it so much worse. I’m so sorry.” His body was changing color, slowly turning amber. “I must control it for a little longer. You need to know.”
I reached for him, to help keep him upright, but he was the one who stepped back this time.
“You have to listen to me. She wanted you to know that you have witch blood running through your veins so it can make you stronger. She also ensured you were touched by the demonic when you were just an infant. A gamble she won, because it helped you become who you are now.” His body flickered. “It’s something her grandmother did to her, and went all the way back to the very beginning. She was supposed to teach you, so you could one day do the same to your granddaughter and not be ignorant of the power.”
I couldn’t believe this. Did my grandmother sleep with Oren on purpose, so that her daughter’s daughter would be stronger and immune to whatever dangers lay ahead? I felt like such a failure because I’d let her down.
Wait a minute… How had she exposed me to the demonic? I cringed, not wanting to know, even if it probably explained the whole dark patch thing.
“You are very strong, Sierra Fox, and you’re sure as hell not going to die here today. Even if it’s what he wants, I won’t let it happen.” The professor was now turning orange, and I knew we were running out of time. “Your grandmother was stolen from you at a young age by fate, but she was then taken hostage. Until the day she moves on to the afterlife, you will never come into your full powers, and someone is making sure this doesn’t happen.”
I knew exactly who it was, Mace—or Mason—Clamber. The fact he’d been young when the professor was in his prime so long ago made no sense, but knowing he was involved with the dark group so eager to tap into my energy source, I had no doubt age wasn’t a barrier.
“You must find your grandmother. You need to help set…her free…” His skin was now glowing orange-red. “Until that day, you will never overcome the Obscurus.”
I looked up, hadn’t expected to hear the name. “Who are they, why do they want me?”
“They want your power for their circle.” His skin was now red and looked as if flames were going to shoot out from beneath his body. “It’s time, Sierra Fox. Take my hand.”
“But we’ll blow up.”
“Not you…I will.”
“I don’t want to be responsible for that—”
“This is not your doing, but you will need to end it.” He took my left hand in his right and although he looked like a piece of heated coal, he didn’t burn me. “Are you ready for this?”
“What are we doing?”
A small smile spread along his lips. “The opposite of what Mason intended. He wanted to use your energy and blood to open this portal, but we’re going to use it to permanently close it.”
This was exactly what I’d done to close off the ley line rift near Roger Hocking’s gravesite.
“Gorge, it’s showtime,” Professor Spooker called, looking around.
The orb I’d once imprisoned, delivered to this very place, and then saw drift out from the cemetery ground before shooting up into the sky, appeared out of nowhere. Orbs didn’t have features or limbs, they were pure balls of energy that resembled jellyfish, and I was a little scared about its presence.
“What’s the orb doing here?”
The professor didn’t reply, instead he took my other hand and the world exploded in a burst of red, amber and blue. I couldn’t see a damn thing but felt the weightlessness of being transported somewhere else.
“Goodbye, Ms. Fox,” called the familiar voice of Mrs. Wicker. “It was a pleasure to know you.”
The shock of hearing her voice made me wonder if I was dead, but then my eyes snapped open and I sucked in a deep breath.
Mace was standing near my chair, but the guards were gone. It was just us and the unconscious girls. The restraints around my wrists and ankles were undone. Had Gorge taken care of them too?
“What the hell’s going on?” Mace asked, advancing on me.
I looked past Mace and caught a glimpse of what was going on. The orb was bouncing off each one of the girls like a demented beach ball, in the same way he must have done to me. Some responded with a sudden intake of breath, others went completely limp and I watched helplessly as their spirits headed for the shrinking portal.
I waited until all the girls had been released from their restraints and watched the orb hover near the wall, once again taking on its familiar jellyfish shape. The hole was now as b
ig as a truck tire and I knew why Gorge was waiting. As soon as the orb hit the wall, this place was going to blow. I needed to get the surviving girls out of this nightmarish room.
Mace bent over me, placing a hand on each armrest. He looked mad as hell. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m doing exactly what you wanted me to do,” I replied.
His eyes narrowed. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Not wasting another breath on the wicked son of a bitch, I yanked the helmet thing off my head. My scalp ached and the lines attached to my arms pulled at my skin, but held. I focused on wrapping my fingers tightly around the edge of the metal helmet. When I had a tight grasp, I swung it and smacked him in the temple. He recoiled, so I whacked him another two times for good measure.
Mace crumbled to the floor with red-black blood pooling beneath him. Was that black stuff the same as what Mauricio oozed? I was pretty sure it confirmed he was tainted by the demonic.
I exhaled, trying to calm my breathing, and was about to pull out the drip line and the thing sucking out my blood, when someone yelled, “Ms. Fox, don’t do that!”
With fingers poised over the line, I looked up to find a familiar face approaching. “Roe, what are you doing here?”
“I’m here to help,” he said, with a rueful grin. “But you can’t be yankin’ the IV line off like that. I’ll do it the right way.”
“We don’t have time!”
“Hush, I know what I’m doin’.”
Before I could protest, Roe carefully disconnected the IV line from my arm, taking the time to apply enough pressure before bandaging it up. He did the same to the other arm. I was grateful to be free from the macabre machine.
“Thanks.” I attempted to sit up, but my head spun for a few seconds.
“Take it easy,” Roe whispered.
Sucking in a deep breath, I took my time getting off the chair. Roe helped me onto my very shaky legs, and even held me steady while I limped all the way to the girls. Only three of them had their eyes open, and looked as dazed as I felt.
The orb was still hovering by the wall, watching me. The hole had now closed to the size of a basketball.
Split at the Seams Page 25