by L. J. Smith
The world rocked under Cassie’s feet.
Faye couldn’t be saying—oh, she couldn’t be saying what Cassie thought she was. Cassie stared at the older girl, feeling something like ice congeal in her stomach.
“You see,” Faye went on, “I happen to have a lot of other friends. And they tell me things, interesting things they see and hear around the neighborhood. And you know what? Last night one of those friends saw something very, very interesting on the bluff.”
Cassie sat, her vision blurring.
“They saw two people on the bluff out near Number Twelve. And those two people were . . . well, shall we say they were getting very friendly themselves? Very friendly. It was pretty hot, the way I heard it.”
Cassie tried to speak, but nothing came out.
“And you’ll never believe who those two people were! I wouldn’t have believed it myself, except that it reminded me of a poem I’d read somewhere. Now, how did it go? Each night I lie and dream about the one—”
“Faye!” Cassie was on her feet.
Faye smiled. “I think you get the point. Diana hasn’t read that particular little poem, has she? I didn’t think so. Well, Cassie, if you don’t want her to hear it, or to know about what happened on the bluff last night, I’d say you’d better start being my friend and fast, don’t you think?”
“It wasn’t like that,” Cassie said. She was hot and shaking with fury, with fear. “You don’t understand at all—”
“Of course I understand. Adam is very attractive. And I always suspected that ‘eternal fidelity’ routine of theirs was just an act. I don’t blame you, Cassie. It’s very natural . . .”
“That isn’t what happened. There’s nothing between us—”
Faye smirked. “From what I hear, there was very little between you last night—sorry. No, really, I’d like to believe you, Cassie, but I wonder if Diana will see it the same way. Especially after she learns how you conveniently forgot to mention that you’d met her boyfriend over the summer—when he awakened you, I believe. How did that poem go again?”
“No . . .” Cassie whispered.
“And then the way you looked at him when he appeared after the initiation ceremony—well, Diana didn’t see that, but I must admit that my suspicions were aroused. The little scene on the bluff only clinched it. When I tell Diana—”
“You can’t,” Cassie said desperately. “You can’t tell her. Please, Faye. She won’t understand. It’s not that way at all, but she won’t understand.”
Faye clucked her tongue. “But Cassie, Diana is my cousin. My blood relation. I have to tell her.”
Cassie felt like a rat running frantically in a maze, searching for a way out that didn’t exist. Panic was pounding in her ears. Faye couldn’t tell Diana. It couldn’t happen. The thought of how Diana would look—of how she would look at Cassie . . .
And at Adam. That was almost worse. She would think they had betrayed her, that Cassie and Adam had truly betrayed her. And how she would look then . . . how Adam would look. . . .
Cassie could stand anything but that.
“You can’t,” she whispered. “You can’t.”
“Well, Cassie, I told you before. If we were friends, really good friends, I might be able to keep your secret. Diana and I may be cousins, but I’d do anything for my friends. And,” Faye said deliberately, her honey-colored eyes never leaving Cassie’s face, “I expect them to do anything for me.”
It was then, at last, that Cassie realized what this was all about. Everything went still around her, too still. Her heart gave one great thump and seemed to sink like lead. Down and down and down.
From the bottom of a pit, she asked Faye emptily, “What kind of thing?”
Faye smiled. She leaned back against the bed, relaxed, the robe parting to reveal one bare shapely leg.
“Well, let me see,” she said slowly, drawing the moment out, relishing it. “I know there was something . . . oh, yes. I’d really like to have that crystal skull Adam found. I’m sure you know where Diana’s keeping it. And if not, I’m sure you could find out.”
“No,” Cassie said, horrified.
“Yes,” Faye said, and smiled again. “That’s what I want, Cassie. To show what a good friend you are. Nothing else will do.”
“Faye, you saw what happened last night. That skull is evil. There’s already something awful on the loose because of it—if you use it again, who knows what might happen?” And, Cassie’s numbed mind suddenly suggested, who knew what Faye might be planning to use it for? “Why do you want it?” she blurted out.
Faye shook her head tolerantly. “That’s my little secret. Maybe, if we become good enough friends, I’ll show you later.”
“I won’t do it. I can’t. I can’t, Faye.”
“Well, that’s too bad.” Faye’s eyebrows lifted, and she pursed her full lips. “Because that means I’m going to have to call Diana. I think my cousin has a right to know what her boyfriend is doing.”
She reached for the phone and pushed buttons with an elegant, scarlet-tipped finger.
“Hello, Diana? Is that you?”
“No!” Cassie cried, and grabbed Faye’s arm. Faye pushed the mute button.
“Does this mean,” she said to Cassie, “that we have a deal?”
Cassie couldn’t form a yes or no.
Faye reached out and caught Cassie’s chin in her hand, as she had that first day on the school steps. Cassie could feel the hardness of long nails, the coolness and strength of Faye’s fingers. Faye was staring at her with those eyes, those strange honey-colored eyes. Falcons have yellow eyes, Cassie thought suddenly, wildly. And Faye’s fingers gripped her like talons. There was no escape. She was trapped . . . caught . . . like a white mouse caught by a bird of prey.
The golden eyes were still staring at her . . . into her. She was so lightheaded, so afraid. And this time there was no rock beneath her feet to steady her. She was in Faye’s second-floor bedroom, trapped away from any help.
“Do we have a deal?” Faye said again.
No escape. No hope. Cassie’s vision was blurring, going dim; she could barely hear Faye over the rushing in her ears.
She felt the last drops of resistance, of will, drain out of her.
“Well?” said Faye in her throaty, mocking voice.
Blindly, scarcely knowing what she was doing, Cassie nodded.
Faye released her.
Then she pushed the mute button again. “Sorry, Diana, I got the wrong number. I meant to call the Maytag repairman. ’Bye now!” And with that she hung up.
She stretched like a giant cat, replacing the phone on the nightstand as she lay back. Then she put her arms behind her head and looked at Cassie, smiling.
“All right,” she said. “The first thing is, you get me that skull. And after that . . . well, after that I’ll think of what else I want. You realize that from now on I own you, Cassie.”
“I thought,” Cassie whispered, still unable to see for the gray mist, “that we were friends.”
“That was just a euphemism. The truth is that you’re my captive from now on. I own you now, Cassie Blake. I own you body and soul.”
The Captive Part I
Chapter 1
Fire, Cassie thought. All around her she saw blazing autumn colors. The yellow-orange of sugar maple, the brilliant red of sassafras, the crimson of sumac bushes. It was as if the entire world was flaming with Faye’s element.
And I’m trapped in the middle of it.
The sick feeling in the pit of Cassie’s stomach got worse with every step she took down Crowhaven Road.
The yellow Victorian house at the bottom of the road looked as pretty as ever. Sunlight was striking rainbow sparks off a prism that hung in the highest tower window. A girl with long, light-brown hair called out from the porch.
“Hurry up, Cassie! You’re late!”
“Sorry,” Cassie called back, trying to hurry when what she really wanted to do was turn around and run the
other way. She had the sudden, inexplicable conviction that her private thoughts must show in her face. Laurel would take one look at her and know all about what had happened with Adam last night, and all about the bargain with Faye.
But Laurel just grabbed her by the waist and hustled her inside and upstairs to Diana’s bedroom. Diana was standing in front of the large walnut cabinet; Melanie was sitting on the bed. Sean was perched uneasily in the window seat, rubbing his knees with his palms.
Adam was standing beside him.
He looked up as Cassie came in.
Cassie met those blue-gray eyes for only an instant, but it was long enough. They were the color of the ocean at its most mysterious, sunlit on the surface but with incomprehensible depths underneath. The rest of his face was the same as ever: arresting and intriguing, pride showing in the high cheekbones and determined mouth, but sensitivity and humor showing there too. His face looked different only because last night Cassie had seen those eyes midnight blue with passion, and had felt that mouth . . .
Not by word or look or deed, she told herself fiercely, staring down at the ground because she didn’t dare look up again. But her heart was pounding so hard she expected to see the front of her sweater fluttering. Oh, God, how was she ever going to be able to carry this off and keep her vow? It took an incredible amount of energy to sit down by Melanie and not look at him, to block the charismatic heat of his presence out of her mind.
You’d better get used to it, she told herself. Because you’re going to be doing a lot of it from now on.
“Good; we’re all here,” Diana said. She went over and shut the door. “This is a closed meeting,” she went on, turning back to the group. “The others weren’t invited because I’m not sure they have the same interests at heart as we do.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” Laurel said under her breath.
“They’re going to be upset if they find out,” Sean said, his black eyes darting between Adam and Diana.
“Then let them be,” Melanie said unemotionally. Her own cool gray eyes fixed on Sean and he flushed. “This is much more important than any fit Faye can throw. We have to find out what happened to that dark energy . . . and now.”
“I think I know a way,” said Diana. Out of a white velvet pouch she took a delicate green stone on a silver chain.
“A pendulum,” Melanie said at once.
“Yes. This is peridot,” Diana said to Cassie. “It’s a visionary stone—right, Melanie? Usually we use clear quartz as a pendulum, but this time I think the peridot is better—more likely to pick up traces of the dark energy. We’ll take it down to the place where the dark energy escaped and it’ll align itself in the direction the energy went and start swinging.”
“We hope,” Laurel murmured.
“Well, that’s the theory,” Melanie said.
Diana looked at Adam, who had been unusually quiet. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s worth a try. It’ll take a lot of mental power to back it up, though. We’ll all have to concentrate—especially since we’re not a full Circle.” His voice was calm and even, and Cassie admired him for it. She kept her face turned in Diana’s direction, though as a matter of fact her eyes were fixed on the walnut cabinet.
Diana turned to Cassie. “What about you?”
“Me?” Cassie said, startled, tearing her eyes away from the cabinet door. She hadn’t expected to be asked; she didn’t know anything about pendulums or peridot. To her horror, she felt her face redden.
“Yes, you. You might be new to the methods we use, but a lot of the time you have feelings about things.”
“Oh. Well . . .” Cassie tried to search her feelings, scrabbling to get beyond the guilt and terror that were uppermost. “I think . . . it’s a good idea,” she said finally, knowing how lame that sounded. “It seems fine to me.”
Melanie rolled her eyes, but Diana nodded as seriously as she had at Adam. “All right, then, the only thing to do is try,” she said, dropping the peridot and its silver chain into the palm of her left hand and clasping it tightly. “Let’s go.”
Cassie couldn’t breathe; she was still reeling from the impact of Diana’s clear green eyes, slightly darker than the peridot, but with that same delicate transparency, as if there were light shining behind them.
I can’t do it, she thought. She was surprised at how stark and simple everything was now that she had actually looked Diana in the eyes. I can’t do it. I’ll have to tell Faye—no, I’ll tell Diana. That’s it. I’ll tell Diana myself before Faye can, and I’ll make her believe me. She’ll understand; Diana is so good, she’ll have to understand.
Everyone had gotten up. Cassie got up too, turning toward the door to hide her agitation—should I tell her right now? Ask her to stay back a minute?—when the door flew open in her face.
Faye was standing in the doorway.
Suzan and Deborah were behind her. The strawberry-blonde looked mean, and the biker’s habitual scowl was even darker than usual. Behind them were the Henderson brothers, Chris frowning and Doug grinning in a wild way that was disturbing.
“Going somewhere without us?” Faye said. She was speaking to Diana, but her eyes remained fixed on Cassie.
“Not now,” Laurel muttered.
Diana let out a deep breath. “I didn’t think you’d be interested,” she said. “We’re going to trace the dark energy.”
“Not interested? When all the rest of you are so busy? Of course, I can only speak for myself, but I’m interested in everything the Circle does. What about you, Deborah?”
The biker girl’s scowl changed briefly into a malicious grin. “I’m interested,” she said.
“And what about you, Suzan?”
“I’m interested,” Suzan chimed in.
“And what about you, Chris?”
“I’m—”
“All right,” Diana said. Her cheeks were flushed; Adam had come to stand at her side. “We get the point. We’re better off with a full Circle, anyway—but where’s Nick?”
“I have no idea,” Faye said coolly. “He’s not at home.”
Diana hesitated, then shrugged. “We’ll do our best with what we have,” she said. “Let’s go down to the garage.”
She gestured at Melanie and Laurel and they went first, elbowing past Faye’s group, who looked as if they wanted to stay and argue some more. Adam took charge of Sean and got him out the door, then began herding the Hendersons. Deborah and Suzan looked at Faye, then followed the guys.
Cassie had been hanging back, hoping for the chance to speak to Diana alone. But Diana seemed to have forgotten her; she was engaged in a staredown with Faye. Finally, head high, she walked past the tall girl who was still semiblocking the doorway.
“Diana . . .” Faye called. Diana didn’t look back, but her shoulders tensed: she was listening.
“You’re going to lose them all,” Faye said, and she chuckled her lazy chuckle as Diana went on to the staircase.
Biting her lip, Cassie stepped forward furiously. One good shove in Faye’s middle, she was thinking. But Faye rounded smoothly on her, blocking the doorway completely.
“Oh, no, you don’t. We need to talk,” she said.
“I don’t want to talk to you.”
Faye ignored her. “Is it in here?” She moved quickly to the walnut cabinet and pulled at a handle, but the drawer was locked. They all were. “Damn. But you can find out where she keeps the key. I want it as soon as possible, do you understand?”
“Faye, you’re not listening to me! I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going to do it after all.”
Faye, who had been prowling around the room like a panther, taking advantage of this unique opportunity to examine Diana’s things, stopped in her tracks. Then she turned slowly to Cassie, and smiled.
“Oh, Cassie,” she said. “You really kill me.”
“I’m serious. I’ve changed my mind.” Faye just smiled at her, leaning back against the wall and shaking her head. Her
heavy-lidded golden eyes were glowing with amusement, her mane of pitch-black hair fell across her shoulders as her head moved. She had never looked more beautiful—or more dangerous.
“Cassie, come here.” Faye’s voice was just slightly edged with impatience, like a teacher who’s put up with a lot from a backward student. “Let me show you something,” Faye went on, catching Cassie’s elbow and dragging her to the window. “Now, look down there. What do you see?”
Cassie stopped fighting and looked. She saw the Club, the in-crowd at New Salem high school, the kids who awed—and terrorized—students and teachers alike. She saw them gathered in Diana’s driveway, their heads gleaming in the first rays of sunset: Suzan’s strawberry blond turned to red, Deborah’s dark curls touched with ruby, Laurel’s long, light-brown hair and Melanie’s short auburn and the Henderson brothers’ disheveled yellow all highlighted by the ruddy glow in the sky.
And she saw Adam and Diana, standing close, Diana’s silvery head drooping to Adam’s shoulder. He was holding her protectively, his own hair dark as wine.
Faye’s voice came from behind Cassie. “If you tell her, you’ll kill her. You’ll destroy her faith in everything she’s ever believed in. And you’ll take away the only thing she has to trust, to rely on. Is that what you want?”
“Faye . . .” Cassie seethed.
“And, incidentally, you’ll get yourself banished from the Club. You know that, don’t you? How do you think Melanie and Laurel are going to feel when they hear that you messed around with Diana’s boyfriend? None of them will ever speak to you again, not even to make a full Circle. The coven will be destroyed too.”
Cassie’s teeth were clenched. She wanted to hit Faye, but it wouldn’t do any good. Because Faye was right. And Cassie thought she could stand being blackballed, being a pariah at school again; she even thought she could stand to destroy the coven. But the picture of Diana’s face . . .
It would kill Diana. By the time Faye got finished telling it her way, it would. Cassie’s fantasy of confessing to Diana and having Diana understand vanished like a pricked soap bubble.