He grabbed my arm, and I tried to twist away, but, this time, he was prepared for me.
“I said it’s dangerous. You need to get out of here. There’s a reason there are a team of keepers.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “It was because I wasn’t here. But I’m here now.”
“And who,” he asked with disgust, “are you?”
I didn’t think when I answered, but the answer shocked me.
“Rue Hallow.” What happened to little Veruca Jones who had sometimes gone by Meg? She was gone. Rue Hallow. The name settled over me, and I knew who I was—maybe for the first time ever.
“And you think because you’re a Hallow you can fight the ghost that has killed Hallow after Hallow?”
“No,” I said, “I think I can win because I am the Hallow Heir.”
“There is no Hallow Heir,” he said, but he dropped my arm.
“There is now.”
I didn’t follow. I led. I led the way through the trees, the oaks, and then the cypress, and then over the crumbling wall to the graveyard. Somewhere along the way the guy had been joined by four others.
They used military hand talk or whatever and sidled along. I didn’t figure I could sneak up on whoever was doing this and considering the weight of the spell that was growing on the edge of my mind, I figured pure luck was going to save us.
Otherwise, we’d all die.
*
I could see the pentacle on the ground, and I could see the person in the center of it. Ghosts surrounded her, but I didn’t need to know which one was the killer ghost. There was one that was darker than the rest.
The figure was cloaked in black. But I knew who it was. The keeper dude—whoever he was—and his team of keepers spread out. I assumed they were using me as cover or a distraction. Cold and brilliant really.
“Mandi,” I said. “You’ve been very naughty.”
She laughed a high-pitched cackle that screamed insanity.
“If you were so willing to break the rules,” I said casually, “you probably could have let me enroll in the classes I wanted.”
The laugh filled the clearing again, and ghosts rushed me, but I pulled on the power that filled me—I had already tapped this area—earlier when she’d attacked my mother. I suspected that she didn’t realize I was already accessing the area she intended to use.
My eyes were fixed on her, but the ghosts of my ancestors rose between me and those who had been called out of the world of the dead.
When she realized that her attack had been ineffective, she screamed. It was this unholy yell that might have chilled me if I wasn’t…too mad to care.
This woman had killed bubbly little Chrysie. Now she would have to call her mom and tell her she was a vampire.
This woman had tried to kill my mother. And had killed my aunt. And my grandparents. What would my mother have been like if that hadn’t happened?
“You seem young to have murdered my grandparents,” I said casually.
She laughed again. “Are you trying to draw me out? Into a confession? What do you think that will do for you?”
It was then that I caught sight of the body slumped by the grave. Another Hallow? My eyes burned with fury. Who was she going to kill now? What if that were Bran? It wasn’t. But it so easily could have been if she were here. Gods and monsters. Gods and monsters. And this woman.
My eyes narrowed, and my mind raced, but I wasn’t sure what to do. I didn’t know how to access the ether. I had no necromancy training. I wasn’t going to be able to fight off these ghosts. This was no ex-husband haunting a bookshop out of spite—the only ghost I had ever faced before. But…
But…I had taken hold of that ghost. I had reached out instinctively as the ghost had tried to beat up Ingrid, and I had stopped him. And the memory led me down a path in my mind to a power that I barely knew was there…it was different. If the magic I normally used was the light of the sun—this was the cool rays of the moon on water.
I pulled it into me—never letting go of the power I was used to wielding—uncertain I could hold both, but…it seemed I could. As I was grappling with my power, the team of keepers attacked. They came out with one of those spelled guns, and a net, and…they were thrown, almost casually, by the ghosts.
“Was that your plan?” Mandi laughed again. Maniacally. I heard the age in her voice, and I wondered how old she was.
“No,” I said as if bored, and I sat down on the grave of my kin and let the power of my family seep into my very bones. “They’re not with me.”
Her voice was insane and shrieky as she yelled, “Don’t lie to me.”
“Never met them before,” I said crossing my legs. “They’re my wannabes.”
I could see the bodies of the team moving, and I could see their spirits still in their bodies, and I knew they weren’t dead. But they weren’t my problem. I wasn’t here to protect them. I was here to protect Bran. And me. And my mother. And Chrysie. And whoever that Hallow was on the grave over there.
“I guess they’ve been replacing the keeper with those folks,” I said and yawned. I had become so infused with power, I was certain, I could step off the ground and fly away. But that wasn’t going to end this death cycle.
“Mandi, why the Hallow family?”
“They thought they could just…push me around.” Her voice sounded like nails on a chalkboard, and I wondered how many ghosts were living inside of her.
“Because they were keepers?” I cracked my neck as if I were stretching. I wasn’t. I was letting the power crackle through my veins.
“Yesssssss,” she laughed, and her eyes changed color green, then blue, then black. I could only see it because of the magic brimming through me.
“You’re kind of a whack job,” I said. “I’m guessing original Mandi wasn’t so whack-a-do.”
The spirit of the Hallow bloke who was the next sacrifice or whatever flickered and I reached out and tucked it back. Another Hallow wasn’t dying tonight.
“You think you can come here and just…just…just be the new Hallow. Keep the Thinning. You think I didn’t know you’d be messing around in my territory as soon as I saw you moping across from me and debating guitar verses yoga? Who do you think you arrrrreeee?”
“I actually had no desire to Keep anything. I’m not the servant of humanity type.”
Mandi’s head cocked, and her eye color changed again. This time, I noticed how her face seemed to flicker through personalities as eyes altered. It chilled even me, and I had been raised in a coven of witches. The thing to remember about witches is that they are as much monster as shapeshifters and vampires are. Witches hide their monster better.
I yawned, and she struck, raging, the shriek of a banshee, determined to kill. I reached up my hand and grabbed hold, yanking the spirits inside of her down. She couldn’t keep going for I was holding her with the sun and the moon, the kin and the cypress, the dead and all of the anger I possessed.
My hand reached towards her, but she was feet above my palm, poised and held from completing her dive by my very power. I spoke casually as I rose, holding her in the air over my head, “You probably shouldn’t have attacked my mother.”
Mandi’s eyes widened, and she seemed truly shocked. “She’s…a beast.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “But she’s my mother.”
I wrinkled my nose and then I slammed her down into the pentacle. It should have been there to protect her from me—but the fool had made it in the Hallow Cemetery and fueled it with the power of my ancestors. She had no right to them. Maybe, for anyone else, she’d have been undefeatable. But I wasn’t anyone else.
I was Rue Hallow. And the Hallow Heir didn’t get murdered with the power of her people. This stupid shrew had set up in the ancient cemetery of my family. My family of necromancers. Even I could do the math and see that I was stupid lucky right now. The banshee screamed carried on finally turning into a cough. The cough of hundreds. The hacking of the plagues. She was trapped in the pe
ntacle she’d created, I had taken it over, and I realized I had no idea what to do next.
“Oh,” I said. And then holding my hand to keep her locked in the air, I made my way among the mounds that signified my family until I found the one Hallow, who was yet alive.
“Hello,” I said, turning over the body and finding Dr. Hallow. I needed him to wake up right away. Because I wasn’t sure how much longer I could hold Mandi and the legion of ghosts inside of her.
He blinked and then rubbed his head as I fed a trickle of power into him.
“Don’t let go,” I heard a voice say from behind and turned to face the leader of the keeper team.
“Yes, obviously,” I replied. I shook my head and then turned to Dr. Hallow. “Hey.”
He blinked dumbly.
I toed him with my shoe—not gently.
“Hey,” I said again, and this time, when he blinked a bit of personality and life came back into him. “I seem to have caught a monster.”
“Don’t let go,” the leader of the keepers said again. He was trying and failing to get into the graveyard. “What have you done?”
I shrugged. I could see ghosts. Just the pale outlines of figures lining the graveyard. They were like rank upon rank of guards. But as I looked, I saw a gaze that reminded me of Bran, and a nose that matched Chrysie and, yes, a jaw that was all too like my own.
And my mother’s.
“I don’t think my family wants you in here.”
“Who woke them?”
I shrugged. Me? Mandi? Who the hell knew?
“Son of a…” I turned away, ignoring the guy. If he couldn’t get into the graveyard, he couldn’t help.
“Dr. Hallow,” I said, kicking his shin. “I need you to focus.”
“Yes, yes,” he said, standing and taking in the scene. “Oh, my.”
“Focus,” I snapped. “I can’t hold her forever. What now?”
He blinked several times and then said, “Did you bring the knife?”
“The what?”
“The knife! The talisman of the thinning.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
“You didn’t bring the talisman?”
I looked over my shoulder as if to ask our kin if they could believe this but I couldn’t focus. Not after what I had seen. You would think that I would be more startled by the ghost-mule that Mandi had become, but honestly, I had caught sight of Felix’s snarky girlfriend.
“Mon?”
Her gaze narrowed.
I laughed. “Are you wearing cat burglar clothes? Is that balaclava you haven’t pulled down? You know those are so people can’t identify you, right?”
She shuffled. I was betting she was blushing. I couldn’t stop myself. Perhaps it was the high of being alive, still. “Dude, Mon! Who knew? Oh my gosh…Felix alerted you when he asked you for the healer to come to my mother.”
Monica cleared her throat and glanced away. I shook my head. I had been more impressed by the keeper team until I realized that truth.
“Focus, Veruca,” Dr. Hallow said. I turned back to him.
“Oh yeah, ghosts! But are you serious? I had to kick you awake.”
“You need to focus.”
“I had to kick you awake. You need to focus.”
“Are you bickering with Dr. Hallow while we’re trying to not die by murderous ghosts?” Monica’s sarcasm was too much. My eyes narrowed, and I thought mean thoughts.
But she did have a point. They both did. It was possible the amount of power running through me was making me high. I looked back and found that Mandi was watching me with her rainbow of eyes. She was waiting for me to fail. I was guessing that would be bad. I mean…if my mother could see me now and all, she’d be scoldy right now.
“You’re creepy,” I told Mandi.
“I’m coming for you,” she said with a voice that sounded of broken glass and stormy nights.
“Yeah, yeah,” I told her. “So how do I get rid of her?”
She bounded suddenly, hurtling herself against the invisible lines of the pentacle and failing to bypass it.
“Please,” I said, scrunching my nose. “You did a good job on this pentacle. But you probably shouldn’t have made it where my dead are.”
“You can’t hold me forever.” Her eyes were rolling in fury. I was guessing she’d be starring in some upcoming nightmares.
I didn’t want to her to know that, so I rolled my eyes and looked to Dr. Hallow. “What do you think? Shall I let go and let the sun rise?”
“Spirits are not affected by the sun,” He said, taking off his glasses to rub his eyes. I heard Monica snort behind me, and I wanted to slap her
“We’ll need t….”
“The sun would be easier,” I interjected. “Like vampires. Bam!”
“Vampires can go out in the sun,” he said as if I were stupid. “You saw Chrysie in sunlight.”
“I”m not talking about real vampires.”
“Are you mentally ill?” The male keeper leader asked. I should probably figure out his name. But I suspected the amount of magic I was holding was making me a bit crazy and the energy I was burning through promised an exhaustion so deep I might sleep for weeks. The keeper dude walked the edge of the cemetery and I turned to him. Now that I was pulsating with power and not terrified for my life, I had to admit he was a bit hot. In a steak and potatoes, rippling muscles, romance novel cover way.
I sighed. Where was Bran when I needed her? Maybe because I was overfull with power, I had a sudden flash of her, diving into the ocean with scuba gear on and felt her flash of connection and interest before I snapped back to the present.
“Look,” I said. “I’ve had a rough week. Would someone please tell me how to get rid of Mandi and her many spirits?”
“You need to banish her.” The keeper leader said as if suddenly realizing that I had no idea what I was doing.
I gave him a demanding look to explain. I could see his concern as he gazed back at me. I knew that he wasn’t sure I could do it. This was apparently somewhat harder than getting rid of the bookstore ghost. I glanced around and realized that no one thought I could do it. I didn’t think I could either.
“Imagine a cage made of the night.”
I scowled, but did as he asked.
“Fuel it with your power.”
I hesitated then. I needed that power to keep Mandi and the many, many ghosts who were riding her carcass from ripping us to pieces.
“Trust me,” he said. I gazed towards him while my power continued to fuel the pentacle that housed Mandi and I met his dark eyes. I blinked, feeling a connection to him, and wondered what he was doing. But as the connection formed, his mind nudged my mind, helping me to form the cage, showing me how to fuel it. He saw how I was holding the power from the graveyard, from the cypresses, my normal magic, my necromancer magic. He saw—through the connection—how I was at my limit, and he said…
”You need to let go.”
“I can’t,” I told him, knowing the others were listening. “I’m not sure I can keep her with only the necromancy magic.
“You have to trust the ether. Connect with it.”
“I don't like it,” I told him. He knew that truth anyway. The connection wasn’t some ability to read the inner parts of me, but he caught the surface, and the surface told him that I was not at all prepared to trust something that I hadn’t even known was in me. It was like cancer. Unexpected and unwanted. Probably deadly.
“You have to trust it.”
We were connected enough that I knew he believed what he was saying.
I held knuckles white onto the power I had collected and slowly let go of my magic first. It had been the easiest gathered. It was easier for me to let it go. As I did, I was flooded with more of the cool magic. I didn’t like it, I didn’t want it, but I took it.
And then…then…I let go of the cypress trees. They slipped away, and the coolness reached to my toes. I looked around me, at the fa
mily I hadn’t known I had, and it was so hard. So very hard to let go of the power they were giving me. But as I did, I was filled to overfull with the very light of the moon, with the coolness of fall and the chill of the rain.
And when I fed that power into the cage of the night, the spirits inside of Mandi shrieked.
I hated it. I loved it. It was so right and so wrong, and I never, ever wanted to feel this again.
And then it got worse.
* * *
Chapter 18
A crack opened in the universe. A slim, sliver of shadow and but as it opened, light poured forth. Cool, starlight that was wrong and chilling and different and…alien. Everything about it wasn't right to me. Everything about it wasn't where I wanted to be. Was that because I was alive? Surely that place felt right to the dead?
“Push the cage into the light,” he said. He sounded different. His confidence was gone, but I did as he asked, Mandi—and the cage I’d formed around her moved into the crack in the worlds. She screamed and I saw a spirit stretch out of her. And then another and another until she was vomiting out darkness and horror and as she was—she changed.
Her hair fell away, her skin sucked back like the moisture was being vacuumed out. She wasn’t getting older. It was like she was being dehydrated. On and on it went until…a husk of nothing was left.
“Now let go,” he said.
I let go so fast, I was afraid that I would get magic whiplash. But the second the coolness was gone, I filled myself with the magic I knew. The warmth and the goodness. The magic I poured into brewing and lighting candles and sending thoughts to my sister.
“What the hell was that?” Monica asked. She shoved forward and this time she could bypass the boundary of the cemetery.
“I’m going to go with possessed monster killer freak,” I said. I sat back down on the grave I had slept under not so long ago. And I leaned back. I knew my kin were there though I did not touch the ether to see them.
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