Her gaze moves up the scratched wall, deep gouges ruining the wallpaper and paint, toward a large hole in the ceiling.
“Where’s my mother?”
“Hell if I know,” Mercia snaps. “She climbed through the hole when I came in.”
Rachel moves back to the staircase and takes the steps two at a time. “Mom,” she calls, following the banging coming from somewhere on the second floor. The sound is muffled, though, coming from within the walls. “Mother?”
The bangs are replaced with a persistent scratching, like oversized rats scuttling about.
“Mom.” Her voice grows more frantic as she runs to the hallway wall, pressing her ear against the smooth surface. She moves quickly past the bathroom, searching for Jenny.
Please don’t get stuck in the wall. Please don’t get stuck in the wall. Please don’t get stuck in the—
A loud crash resounds, coming from inside her mother’s bedroom. Laughter follows—manic laughter, in a high-pitched, creepy tone. Rachel runs for the bedroom and bursts inside, only to find her mother sitting on her haunches on the wall. Not against the wall, not in front of the wall. No, no. Jenny Cleary has to go and defy both logic and gravity by sitting on the wall. Vertically. In her hands, she’s holding what appears to be some long dead critter, and there’s a massive bite missing from its side. Her mother stares back at Rachel through glazed over eyes, eerie giggles interrupting the sound of chewing. Fur spills from her mother’s lips, dropping to the floor.
“And I’m out.” Mercia throws up her hands and backs out of the room. “I did not sign up for an exorcism, thank you very much.”
“I did not sign up for an exorcism, thank you very much,” her mother mimics Mercia in that same creepy high-pitched tone. She cackles, tears another piece of mummified flesh off the creature, and chews.
Rachel is too horrified to look away, only hears Mercia’s retreat back downstairs.
“Wow,” Greg says beside her. If it had been any other day, this might have startled her, but yeah. He’s the least of her problems. “This is ... Wow.”
“Go find Mercia,” Rachel says.
“She left as I came up,” Greg answers. “I can’t blame her.”
Jenny drops her half-eaten dinner and lies back against the vertical wall, before she rolls up. She comes to a sudden stop. Jenny gets onto her hands and knees, climbs over the hindrance, and scuttles across the ceiling.
“Mom?” Rachel’s voice quivers on the word.
“Mom,” Jenny mocks, crawling over the ceiling, moving closer to the door where Rachel and Greg still stand in shock.
“Mommy—”
“Mommy,” Jenny interrupts in an unnerving whine.
A sob wiggles its way out of Rachel’s throat as she follows her mother’s movements, until Jenny comes to a halt above the doorway and busies herself with scratching at the wallpaper.
“Mom, get down from there this instant.”
Jenny suddenly stands on the ceiling, coming face-to-face with Rachel, before an inhuman voice growls, “I’m not your mother.”
Greg slams the door in Jenny’s face, snapping Rachel out of her own fear. She spins on him and sees that his eyes are still fixed on the closed door. From how pale he is, she won’t be surprised if he drops out of school and drinks himself to death.
“Greg?”
“Yes,” he says.
“It’s okay.”
He blinks rapidly, before focusing on her. “That was not okay.”
Rachel scratches the back of her neck, grimacing. “I’ll admit it’s weird, but I can fix this. I can—”
“You need to call a priest immediately. That’s what you need to do.” Greg turns around and walks down the hallway.
“I don’t think a priest is going to be much help.” Rachel follows him, glancing over her shoulder to make sure the door hasn’t opened again. “I mean, I know what it looks like, but that’s not exactly what’s happening here. She’s not possessed or anything of the sort.”
He reaches the staircase and begins his descent. “Your mom literally climbed up the walls.”
“Yeah.” She can’t argue with him on that particular point, but this isn’t a religious problem whatsoever. It’s a Fae problem. A huge Fae problem. “Greg, wait.”
He comes to a grinding halt at the bottom of the staircase and turns to look at her. She stops on the step above the ground, right in front of him, and reaches up to pinch the bridge of her nose. After Rachel has gathered her thoughts, she drops her arm and stares at him.
Red flashes in his pupils, almost imperceptible, but this time Rachel is certain she’s seen it.
“What explanation can you possibly have for what’s going on with your mom?” Greg says. “It’s messed up beyond comprehension.”
“Obviously,” Rachel says, her mind reeling as she studies Greg, searching for whatever plagues him. “It’s just—”
She stops speaking as she spots the broken mirror propped up against an armchair. Rachel feels the muscles in her forehead contract into a frown. She turns to look at the mirror, which reflects Mercia lying half-conscious against the sofa. Mercia opens her eyes and looks directly at Rachel through the mirror.
She snaps her attention back to Greg before he can figure out what she’s seen.
“You’re right,” she says. She reaches out to hold on to the bannister. In her peripheral, she sees Mercia struggling to her feet.
“I’m glad you’ve come to your senses,” he says. “Do you guys still have a landline or—”
“It’s in the kitchen. We barely use it, but it works,” Rachel says. “I could be wrong, but I doubt there’s an Exorcisms ‘R Us on the internet.”
He smirks. “Leave it to you, Rachel Cleary, to make an inappropriate joke at the worst of times.” Greg begins to turn, but she quickly grabs him by the shoulder and forces him to look back at her. “You okay?”
“No,” she whispers.
It’s not entirely a lie.
Rachel leans forward into him, wrapping her arms around his waist. Behind him, a royally pissed off Mercia stalks closer, a lamp in her hands. There’s blood dripping down her forehead, matting her blonde hair to her head, and a bruise blooms on her temple.
Meanwhile, Greg wraps his arms around her shoulders, squeezing her tightly against his chest, whispering sweet nothings into her ear.
Mercia raises the lamp over her head and nods to Rachel, who pulls away from Greg.
“Greg,” she says, gently running her hand over his cheek. He looks at her with those stormy eyes, so full of hope. Rachel smiles. “This thing between us ...”
“Yes?”
“It’s so over.”
Mercia brings the lamp down over his head, smashing the porcelain into a thousand pieces. Bits rain onto the hardwood floor, tinkling as they touch the ground. He crumples to his knees and drops onto his side, unconscious, lying amongst the broken shards.
Mercia’s foot connects with his side a couple of times before she spits onto his chest.
“That’s what you get for knocking me out, you A-grade piece of—”
His eyes shoot open before she can finish her sentence. She shrieks and jumps back. This time, Rachel takes point and kicks him upside the head with as much force as she can muster.
“I’m getting real tired of guys acting like they can get away with treating girls like dirt,” Rachel says through gritted teeth.
Greg goes limp and his eyelids shut a second time.
“We need to tie him up before he wakes again,” Rachel says.
“No,” Mercia says in a stern tone. “We need to get out of here now. We can go to my aunt’s house and—”
“I’m not stopping you from leaving, Mercia. If you want to go, then leave.”
Seventeen
Bad to the Bone
Rachel can’t leave her mom by herself. Even if Jenny’s current state scares the living daylights out of Rachel, she can’t just go. Regardless of all the drama, the growing cha
sm between them, their crumbling relationship, she refuses to leave her mom to deal with this alone. If this is the decision of a sentimental fool, then so be it. She simply can’t. Besides, if something dire happens to Jenny Cleary while she’s re-enacting a scene from some independent exorcism film, Rachel won’t ever be able to forgive herself.
Mercia calls her an idiot for making the decision, but leaves it at that.
Together, they tie Greg up—fixing his hands behind his back and his feet together—and half-drag, half-carry him into the destroyed living room.
“This isn’t Greg,” Rachel groans, straining as they lift him onto the sofa.
“I know,” Mercia grumbles. She drops his lower body onto the floor. “Jeez, he’s heavier than he looks.” She wipes the sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand.
“Use magic on him the way you did with Mrs. Crenshaw?”
“I’ve already used too much today. My well is drying up fast, and I’ll burn out if it empties out now. What I need is food and rest to replenish my reserves.” She bends down and grabs hold of Greg’s legs a second time and groans as she lifts him again. “Greg is probably going to think you tied him up so you could have your way with him.” Mercia giggles. “Naughty minx.”
Rachel grins, shakes her head. “I have no idea why he’s so obsessed. We never got past second base.”
“Some guys are into that.” Mercia sets down his legs on the sofa, his knees folding over the ripped armrest. “Always wanting what they can’t have. They’re like a dog with a bone, can’t stop themselves from wanting the fantasy they’ve built up in their head to spill into reality.”
“You sound like you know a lot about it.”
“I see how guys treat Holland.”
“Oh,” Rachel says.
They exit the living room together, and Rachel leads Mercia to the kitchen, where she scrounges up enough ingredients to make them each a couple of sandwiches. Rachel washes the meal down with coffee while Mercia sips on a glass of water. She watches as Mercia takes her goldmint pill and swallows it with the remainder of her drink.
A bang comes from upstairs and they both look up to the kitchen ceiling.
“I should probably go check on her,” Rachel says. “Feed her something decent, before she decides to eat another dead rat or squirrel.”
“Mind if I don’t come along?” Mercia asks. “Someone needs to keep an eye on your stalker.”
Rachel pulls the bread closer to make another couple of sandwiches for her mother.
“Your mom doesn’t love you,” Mercia says after a while. “She really wants to, but she doesn’t.”
“I figured as much,” Rachel says, not looking up.
“It doesn’t bother you or change anything?”
“I love her enough for the both of us,” she says, cutting off the crust, the way her mother prefers. “Also, she’s all I have left in this world.”
“That’s not true,” Mercia whispers.
Dishing up her mother’s meal on plastic would be better than providing her with anything breakable. She places the sandwiches on the plate, fills the cup with water, and walks out of the kitchen. Mercia’s words doesn’t bother her as much as they should—Rachel has suspected for years that her mother’s feelings toward her aren’t the typical motherly kind. It has driven a wedge between them even more, no doubt, but Rachel didn’t lie about how she feels about Jenny Cleary. She does love her enough for the both of them.
She makes her way upstairs, back to her mother’s bedroom, and knocks twice before opening the door.
Jenny is sitting in a corner, staring away from the door. Her hair is dirty, hanging in knotted strands over her slumping shoulders.
A tearing noise, like strips of paper being shredded, comes from her direction.
“Mom,” Rachel says. She hesitates at the door. “I brought you dinner.”
When her mother doesn’t move, Rachel steps inside. Another pause. Rachel evaluates the situation, before she walks across the carpeted floor and stops a few feet away from her mother.
“It’s not much, but—”
A croaking sound emits from her mother’s throat. The sound stretches on for an impossibly long time, before Jenny sucks air into her lungs, wheezing loudly. She repeats this process a few more times. Rachel places the plate and cup on the floor behind Jenny after a while, deciding not to bother her.
Rachel backs up to the door again. “Try to eat something on the plate.”
She closes the door and makes her way back downstairs, where she finds Mercia sitting on the armrest by Greg’s feet, inspecting her nails.
As Rachel nears, she notices Greg is fully awake, and there’s foam stuffed into his mouth to keep him quiet.
“What’s this about?” she asks.
“He called me something I’d rather not repeat,” Mercia says, holding her hand out to check her nails. “So he loses his talking privileges.”
Muffled words escape the makeshift gag. Rachel looks down at Greg and shrugs before making her way to the other end of the living room. She takes a seat on an armchair across from them.
“We’ll probably get in trouble for kidnapping him, holding him hostage, or something, right?”
“Nah, the Pearson family may have a lot of pull in this town, but the Holstein women rule it. Well, apart from Mrs. Crenshaw. That old lady is an institution even the Holstein witches regard sacred,” she says, lowering her hand to her lap. “We just do it quietly, unlike this hotshot who thinks the sun goes down every time he takes a seat.”
Rachel snickers.
“We’re going to have to take shifts if we want to get any sleep tonight. I know I took a nap this afternoon, but I’m dead on my feet. Can you take the first shift?”
“Sure,” Rachel says. “My bedroom is—”
“I’m sleeping in the car,” she quickly says.
“Okay, do you want a pillow or something?”
Mercia stands and shakes her head. “Nope, but thanks.”
“All right, well, I won’t lock the door. And if you see Ziggy, don’t freak out.”
Mercia exits the living room, and the door squeaks open before it closes behind her.
Rachel doesn’t move, only watches Greg as he squirms around to lie on his side. It takes a while, but eventually he succeeds and stares back at her.
“I told you I didn’t want anything serious, remember?” she says. “On several occasions, I told you it was just a summer fling, didn’t I?”
He doesn’t make a sound and doesn’t move, but his eyes are clear and she’s certain that he’s listening closely to every word.
Rachel crosses her arms. “Greg, I really didn’t want to be a jerk, but after today you’ve left me no choice. You were a Band-Aid, nothing more. I was lonely and you were willing to feel me up a bit so I could forget about my stupid life for a while. That’s it.”
He frowns.
“Yeah, I know,” Rachel says, sighing. “I could have picked anyone for the catharsis you provided. I mean, none of the football players seem too picky. The difference between you and them is, you can actually challenge me intellectually. I’m sorry, but it’s basically the only thing that sets you apart from all the other guys I may have considered for my summer fling.”
Greg’s eyes narrow.
“Judge me all you want, Pearson. You did the exact same thing.” Rachel gets to her feet and crosses the room. She hunches down in front of the sofa. “Mercia told me all about how you had to pay girls to make me jealous. Sucks to be you, Greg, because I felt nothing.”
Greg, who probably has a concussion and shouldn’t be sleeping, falls into a deep sleep a few minutes later. Loud snores emanate from him, though, so he’s definitely alive. The worst he’ll have is a headache in the morning.
Meanwhile, Rachel passes the time by scanning through THE UNOFFICIAL HISTORY OF SHADOW GROVE, hoping to find further information on how to get the Bone Carver—Ugh, couldn’t Mrs. Crenshaw come up with something else to c
all it?—off the streets. There’s not much more to go on, other than the Golvath the Lonely entry.
I should have asked Orion to tell me his version of the story. She closes her laptop. He might have had some insight into Golvath.
Rachel places the laptop on the armrest and sits back, her gaze moving to the uncovered windows behind Greg. The night seems darker, lonelier, especially without Mrs. Crenshaw’s porch light shining like a beacon.
Something flutters above her, and she looks up to see pieces of paper raining from the ceiling. Beyond the papers, there is a hole in the ceiling, and visible through the hole is her mother.
Her heart stalls for a beat or two. The hair on the back of Rachel’s neck stands on end, goosebumps travel across her icy skin.
She stands, not looking away from her mother’s demented eyes and vicious smile. It is an unbearable sight, maybe even unholy. But her mom is still in there somewhere. She has to be.
Jenny throws another handful of papers, and Rachel grabs one as it flutters down. She turns the heavy cardstock around and finds the surface smooth and glossy, the coloring bright. She snatches a second piece—this one larger than the last, and finds her suspicions are valid. Her face, or where her face should have been in the photo, has been scratched out. Rachel bends over to pick up another big piece and sees her mother and father’s half-torn faces looking back. Another piece reveals one of Rachel’s baby pictures, the face, once again, scratched out.
“Okay, what’s your point?” Rachel looks back to the hole. Her mother is no longer there. “Fine, be that way.” She tosses the pieces into the air and walks out of the living room.
Rachel exits the house and stands on the front porch, her heart aching. She inhales the fresh air deeply into her lungs, and pushes back the emotions threatening to consume her. Tears sting the corners of her eyes, but they won’t spill. She won’t allow it. Not yet, at least.
“You okay?” Mercia asks from somewhere on the dark lawn, startling Rachel in the process. “Sorry.” Amusement laces her voice.
“I thought you were sleeping in your car,” Rachel says to the darkness.
The Bone Carver Page 17