by L. J. Smith
With one finger Julian sketched some lines in the air, a shape like a vase turned on its side. “That’s Perthro, the rune of gambling and divination. It’s the cup that holds the runes or dice when they’re cast.”
“Oh, really?” Jenny said weakly, not having the first idea what he was talking about.
“I’ll tell you something interesting about the people who discovered those runes. They loved gambling. Crazy about it. They would bet everything—including their freedom—on one throw of the dice. And if they lost, they’d go into slavery cheerfully, because they had made a promise and they always played by the rules. Honor meant more than anything to them.”
Jenny looked away, hugging her own arms. She felt very cold. She wished there were somewhere to hide.
“Are you going to keep your promise?”
What could she say? That it was a promise she never should have had to make? Julian had forced her to play the Game in the beginning—but Jenny had come to him looking for a game. Looking for something scary and sexy, something to provide excitement at a party. Julian had just given her what she’d asked for. It was her own fault for meddling with forbidden things.
But she couldn’t—she couldn’t.
Teeth sunk into her lower lip, she looked at Julian. She could hardly meet his eyes, but she did. She shook her head.
There. Now it was out. She didn’t have any excuses, but she wasn’t going to keep her word.
“You know I could just make you.”
She nodded. It was what she expected. But at least she wouldn’t have gone to him willingly.
He turned to look down at the ocean, and Jenny waited.
“What do you say we play another game?”
“Oh, no,” Jenny whispered, but he was going on.
“I could just force you—but I’ll give you a sporting chance. One throw of the dice, Jenny. One more game. If you win, you’re free of the promise. If you lose, you keep it.” He turned back to look at her, and in the eyeholes of the mask she could see midnight blue. “Do you want to play, or do we just resolve this here and now?”
Don’t panic—think. It’s your only chance. It’s better than no chance.
And the wild part in her was responding to his challenge, surging to meet it. Danger. Risk. Excitement.
“One throw of the dice,” she said softly. “I’ll play.”
He flashed her the wolfish smile. “No holds barred, then. No quarter asked or given—for any of the players.”
Jenny froze. “Wait a minute—” she began.
“Did you think I was going to fool around? This game is deadly serious—like the last one.”
“But it’s between us,” Jenny said desperately. “Just you and me—”
“No.” The eyes behind the mask were narrow. “This is a game for the original players, for everyone who was in the paper house. No more and no less. On my side, myself and the Creeper and the Lurker. On your side—everyone who helped trick me and betray me. I’m going to catch them one by one, starting with Little Red Riding-Hood.”
“No,” Jenny said, in terror. Oh, God, what had she done? Summer had died in the last Game. . . .
“Yes. And it starts now. Ready or not, here I come. Find my base and you can stop me from taking them to the Shadow World.”
“Taking who —?”
“Your friends. Find them after I take them and you all go free. If not”—he smiled—“I keep them all.”
Jenny didn’t understand. Panic was rioting inside her. She wasn’t ready—she didn’t know the rules. She didn’t even know what game they were playing.
“Julian—”
Quick as a cat, quick as a striking snake, he kissed her. A hard kiss, and Jenny was responding before she knew it.
When it was over, he held her tightly to his chest a moment. She could hear his heart beating—just like a human heart, she thought dizzily. Then he whispered in her ear, “The new game is lambs and monsters.” And he was gone.
Gone from the balcony, just like that. The warmth dissolved from Jenny’s arms, and she was standing alone.
She could hear the music again. It might all have been a dream, but she could still feel Julian’s hard kiss on her mouth.
The shadows on the balcony had lightened in his absence. Jenny looked around fearfully. Julian had said that the Game would start now. Julian didn’t say things he didn’t mean.
But she couldn’t see anything unusual. The dance was going on inside the ballroom. Jenny turned and gripped the railing of the balcony, looking over.
Spotlights softly lit the beach below. One of them caught the glint of copper.
Audrey! That was Audrey down there, and the dark-haired figure beside her must be Eric. They were yards away from the other people on the sand, walking hand in hand down the beach. Into the darkness.
The Game starts now. . . . I’m going to catch them one by one, starting with Little Red Riding-Hood.
Red—like Audrey’s hair.
“Audrey! Audrey! ” Jenny screamed. Her voice disappeared into the background of music without even a ripple. She could feel how small and faint it was compared to the roaring of the ocean. Jenny looked around wildly; there was no way from the balcony down to the beach.
Audrey and Eric were walking out of the range of the lights now, heading into the shadows.
“Audrey!”
Audrey didn’t hear her.
Something about dances always went to Audrey’s head.
For instance, she didn’t really like Eric, the boy she was presently kissing. She just couldn’t help it—something about dances got to her. All the lights—and the dark corners. The sparkly dresses and the compliments and the music. It was better than shopping.
And Eric was a pretty good kisser, for an American boy.
Not as good as Michael, though. Michael Cohen was a world-class kisser, although you’d never think it to look at him. It was one of the best-kept secrets at Vista Grande High, and Audrey meant it to remain that way.
She felt a slight twinge of guilt, thinking of Michael. Well, but she’d told him she didn’t care about Eric. She was doing it to help Jenny.
Who was up in the hotel trying to deal with Brian and his unwanted attentions. Maybe it was time Audrey did something about that.
“Eric,” she said, detaching herself and neatening her hair. “We’d better get back.”
He started to protest, but Audrey was already turning. She hadn’t realized how far they’d walked away from the lights of the hotel.
“Come on,” she said uneasily.
She had only taken a few steps when she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. It was on her left, on the land side. Something in the shadows, a quick bright flicker.
Maybe just some small animal or bird. “Eric, come on.”
He was sulking. “You go, if you want to.”
Oh, fine. She began walking as quickly as she could. Her bare feet sank with each step into the soft, crumbly, faintly damp sand.
The hotel spotlights seemed miles away. The ocean stretched out to her right, unimaginably vast. To her left darkness blanketed a slope covered with ice plant. Between the darkness and the sea, Audrey felt small and vulnerable in comparison. It was a bad feeling.
She turned suddenly and looked into the darkness. She couldn’t see anything now. Maybe nothing was there.
Then she heard a cry behind her. Audrey whirled, straining to see in the darkness. Something was going on back there—some kind of activity.
“Eric? Eric!”
Another cry. And, louder, a terrible sound that Audrey could hear over the ocean. A guttural, vibrating snarl. A bestial noise.
Sand was spraying. Audrey could see some kind of thrashing. “Eric! Eric, what’s happening?”
The thrashing had stopped. Audrey took an uncertain step forward. “Eric?”
Something glimmered, coming toward her.
Not Eric. Something blue and shining. Like an optical illusion, there and then
gone. Audrey tried to make her eyes focus—and the lost time was fatal. By the time she saw it clearly it was almost on her.
Oh, God—it was unbelievable. In the Shadow World the wolf had looked like a wolf. Huge, massive, but just a wolf. This thing . . . was a phantom.
Like something painted with luminous paint on the air. Nothing in between the brush strokes. Not exactly a skeleton—something worse. A specter. A wraith-wolf.
The growling was real.
Audrey turned and ran.
It was right behind her. She could hear its growling over the roar of the ocean, over her own sobbing breath. Her legs were beginning to ache already. The thick sand sucked at her, dragging her down. It was like running in slow motion.
She was closer to the lights. If she could just get there—but it was too far. She would never make it.
The ground opened up in front of her.
That was what it looked like. A hole, black against the gray sand. Black with flickering electric-blue edges.
The sand that had been her enemy helped her now, allowed her to catch herself and fall to her knees. She fell right on the brink of the hole, staring down in disbelief.
God—God. It was like nothing she had ever seen. Endless blackness forever. Down at the very bottom there might have been the shimmer of a blue flame.
Audrey didn’t want to see any more. She staggered to her feet and ran toward the slope on her left. If she could climb up through the ice plant—maybe she could lose herself there.
But it was fast. It came up on her left side, cutting her off, forcing her to swerve. It turned with her, forcing her to swerve again. To circle back toward the hole.
Audrey stumbled again and heard a snarl right behind her. Hot breath on her neck.
She didn’t have the breath to scream, although there was a screaming in her brain. She clawed her way up and was running again.
The way it wanted her to go. She realized that too late. The hole was in front of her, almost beneath her feet. She couldn’t stop herself this time.
CHAPTER 10
In midair she was knocked to the side with stunning force. A brutal blocking tackle. She landed with her face crushed into the sand. Not in the hole, on the beach.
Chaos was going on above her. On top of her. A whole football team scrimmaging there. Thick snarls, gasping breath, then suddenly a yelp. Sand fountained around her.
Then it all stopped.
Audrey lay still for a moment longer, then rolled over to look.
Tom was half sitting, half crouching in the sand, his dark hair wildly mussed, his face scratched. He was breathing in gasps. In his hand was a Swiss Army knife, the blade not shining but dark. The wolf was gone. So was the hole.
“Is it dead?” Audrey panted. She could hear the hysteria in her own voice.
“No. It went into that crater thing. Then the crater disappeared.”
“Oh,” Audrey said. She looked at him, blinked. “You know, we’ve got to stop meeting like this.” Then she collapsed back on the sand.
“Audrey! Audrey, where are you? Audrey! ”
Audrey had seldom heard a voice filled with so much terror, but she was drifting in an endorphin cloud of overexertion. She could barely rouse herself to wave a hand without looking.
“We’re here!” Tom shouted. “Here!”
The next moment Jenny was on her knees beside them. “Oh, God, what happened? Are you all right?”
“The wolf happened,” Tom said. “She’s all right, it’s just reaction.”
“Are you all right? Oh, Tom, you’re bleeding!”
Sounds of hugging. Normally, Audrey would have let them have their reunion in peace, but now she said, “Eric’s back there. I don’t know if he’s all right.”
“I’ll go see.” Tom detached himself from Jenny’s arms and went. Jenny turned to Audrey, golden dress shining in the gloom.
“What happened?”
“It tried to chase me into a hole. A hole,” she repeated, before Jenny could ask, and described the thing she’d seen. “I don’t know why, but it wanted me to fall in.”
“Oh, my God,” Jenny whispered. “Oh, God, Audrey, it’s all my fault. And if Eric is dead—”
“He’s not dead,” Tom said, coming back up. “He’s breathing, and I can’t even find any bleeding or anything. The wolf didn’t want him; it wanted Audrey.”
It was only then that Jenny asked, “What are you doing here?”
Tom looked at the ocean. “I didn’t think anything would happen here—but I wasn’t sure. I hung around in the hotel just in case. When I saw Audrey going down to the beach, I kept an eye on her from the deck up there.”
“Oh, Tom,” Jenny said again.
“Thank God you did,” Audrey said, picking herself up. She was bruised, but everything seemed to be in working order. Her brand new Oscar de la Renta, though, was another matter. “It’s a pity you couldn’t have saved the dress, too.”
As they climbed the sandy ocean ramp up to the hotel grounds, she said thoughtfully, “Actually, I suppose you saved my life. It doesn’t really matter about the dress.”
“We can’t be the ones to tell the police about Eric,” Jenny said. “Because we can’t afford to lose the time, and because they might separate us. But we can’t just leave him there, either.”
There was a fine trembling in all her muscles, her reaction nearly as severe as Audrey’s. Deep inside her, though, was a steel core of determination. She knew what had to be done.
“Why can’t we lose the time?” Tom asked.
“Because we’ve got to get the others,” Jenny said. “We all need to go somewhere and talk.” She saw Audrey, who was slowly making repairs to her hair and dress, give her a sharp glance. “I’ll explain later; for now just trust me, Tom.”
Tom’s hazel eyes were dark, puzzled, but after a moment he nodded. “Let me get cleaned up a little; then I’ll go tell them at the front desk that there’s somebody unconscious on the beach. Then we can go.”
When he went, he took a note to send up to the ballroom, too. It was from Jenny to Brian, explaining that she had to leave the prom without him, and that she was sorry.
Jenny shut her eyes and leaned against the wall. Think, she told herself. Don’t collapse yet, think.
“Audrey, we both need to call our parents. We’ve got to tell them—something—some reason why we’re not coming home tonight. And then we need to think of somewhere we can go. I wonder how much a hotel room costs?”
Audrey, with two bobby pins in her mouth, just looked at Jenny. She couldn’t speak, but the look was enough.
“We’re not doing anything dangerous,” Jenny assured her. “But we’ve got to talk. And I think we’ll only be safe when we’re all together.”
Audrey removed the pins and licked her lips. “What about Michael’s apartment?” she said. “His dad’s gone for the week.”
“Audrey, you’re brilliant. Now think of what we say to our parents, and we’ll be fine.”
In the end they settled for the old double-bluff. Jenny called her house and told her mother she would be staying at Audrey’s; Audrey called her house and told Gabrielle the housekeeper that she would be staying at Jenny’s. Then they called Dee, who had her own phone, and had her come out to the hotel in her jeep, while Tom took the RX-7 to his house to pick up Michael. Finally Tom went back out for Zach, while a cross and sleep-wrinkled Michael let the others into his apartment.
It was nearly one-thirty in the morning when they were all together.
“Caffeine,” Michael mumbled. “For God’s sake.”
“Stunts your growth,” said Dee. “Makes you blind.”
“Why isn’t there anything in this refrigerator except mayonnaise and Diet Coke?” Audrey called.
“There should be some cream cheese in there somewhere,” Michael said. “And there’s Cracker Jack in the cupboard; Dad bought a case at the Price Club. If you love me at all, bring me a Coke and tell me what’s going on. I was aslee
p.”
“And I nearly got killed,” Audrey said, coming around the corner in time to see his eyes widen. “Here.” She distributed Diet Cokes and Cracker Jack to everyone except Dee, who just snorted.
What a mismatched group we are, Jenny thought, looking around at them. Michael and Audrey were on the couch, Michael in the faded gray sweats he wore as pajamas, and Audrey in the ruins of her saucy little black dress. Dee was on the other side of Audrey, dressed for action in biking shorts and a khaki tank top, long legs sprawled in front of her.
Tom, on the love seat, was windblown and handsome in jeans and a dark blue jersey. Zach sat on the floor by the table wearing a vaguely Oriental black outfit—maybe pajamas, maybe a jogging suit, Jenny thought. Jenny herself was perched on the arm of the love seat in her shimmering and totally inappropriate gold dress. She hadn’t thought about changing.
She could see Dee’s eyes on the dress, but she couldn’t return the amused glance. She was too wrought-up.
“Isn’t somebody going to explain what’s going on?” Michael said, tearing into the Cracker Jack.
“Audrey can start,” Jenny said, clasping her hands together and trying to keep them still.
Audrey quickly described what had happened.
“But what’s with this hole?” Michael said when she finished. “Pardon me for asking, but how come the wolf didn’t just kill you? If it’s the same one that attacked Gordie Wilson.”
“Because it’s a Game,” Jenny said. “A new Game.”
Dee’s piercing night-dark gaze was on her. “You’ve seen Julian,” she said without hesitation.
Jenny nodded, clenching her hands even more tightly together. Tom turned to look at her sharply, then turned away, his shoulders tense. Zach stared at her with an inscrutable expression, the black outfit accentuating his pallor. Michael whistled.
Audrey, her back very straight, said, “Tell us.”
Jenny told them. Not everything, but the essence of what had happened, leaving out the bits that nobody needed to know. Like the kissing.
“He said that he’d give me a chance to get free of my promise,” she finished. “That he was going to play a new Game with us, and that we were all players. And at the end he said that the new Game was lambs and monsters.”