“The worst cases are exorcised,” Fray says. “Others are locked into their Places of Power. And some of us... Are just ignored.”
He's talking about himself, obviously. I'd forgotten he held himself responsible for his wife's death.
He nods at my thoughts. “I never knew why The Shadow Lady didn't do anything. I think maybe she thought I'd punish myself enough, or the town would. Or maybe she just didn't think I'd hurt anyone else.”
“Or she didn't think you did it.”
Opening my mind, I show him what I saw when I was in his memory, drawing his attention to his wife's expression, to the way she seemed to direct the thoughts he didn't think she wanted him seeing, the fact the knife was sitting right next to her hand in the first place... He shakes it all off though. “No. That's just what you want to see.”
“Then maybe it's what The Shadow Lady wanted to see.”
Hold on... “Shadow Lady?”
“We had a Lady back then.” His smile is tinted with a nostalgic fondness. I poke at the feeling the smile brings. It almost has to be jealousy.
“What happened to her?”
“She burned out,” he whispers, then clears his throat. “It takes a lot of power to rule Shadow. They get spread really thin and eventually just fade.”
“Then what?”
“Then they merge with The Spirit.”
I shudder. “Why take the job then?”
“Don't ask me.” He snorts. “I don't have a clue. And no intention to contend for office. Ever.”
“Glad to hear it.” My eyes drift close again as I let the music wash over me. I wish I could get a CD of it. Then I could take it home and play it for Finn. Would he like it or think it's too soft? I wonder where he is and what he's doing. And if he's alright. His mood didn't strike me as particularly safe.
“He's fine, luv,” Fray breaks in.
Opening my eyes shows me his profile as he watches Colleen sway. “And you base this belief on what?”
His mouth twitches. “Ever the cynic, aren't you.”
“So, nothing?” I bite the inside of my mouth, not as happy to be here as I was before.
Fray laughs softly at my expression.
The laughter merges with a roar and the music falters. The musicians miss a few notes, but they refuse to stop playing while the sound blasts its way through the room.
“What's that?” I hiss, sitting up straight and looking around with a sense of panic no one else seems to be sharing.
“Hard to say.” Fray's calm nearly to the point of boredom. “No one's ever seen it. At least not and been able to tell.”
I stare at him. “You're kidding.”
“Nope.” He gives me a shrug. “I told you there were monsters.”
“Right. Monsters that scare the monsters.” I frown at him. “No one's acting scared.”
“Because it won't come in here.” His hand waves about vaguely. “At least, it never has before. I wouldn't suggest leaving though.”
“Because I won't come back to tell you what I found?”
“Probably not.” The corners of his mouth are twitching.
“It was just a sound effect, wasn't it?”
His mouth stops twitching and breaks into a massive grin. “That's my theory.”
I stare at him, watching his eyes twinkle. Is he messing with me? “Why would someone want us to think there's a monster out there if there isn't?”
“So we stay here.”
“But-”
Fray shakes his head. “This room is safe. There's too many of us for The Spirit to gain a foothold. But once you get away from the crowd...”
“It's like being on the edge of the herd with lions in the grass.”
“Right.” He kicks his foot against mine to draw my attention away from the walls of the cavern and back to him. “And coming here without everyone else is like not having a herd in the first place.”
I shiver.
There's a commotion near the edge of the room and the music halts. Colleen looks to a figure draped in a dramatic hooded cloak until he waves a hand and she gestures her band to start up again.
The Shadow Lord.
My throat's tight as I force a swallow.
“You want to get it over with?” Fray asks, standing before I answer. He holds out a hand for me and I take it gratefully.
Is this what Gretel felt like as she walked with her brother through the woods?
Fray is steady, his hand warm and comforting. I'm trembling. My mind tries frantically to remember what it was I wanted to ask The Shadow Lord about. I know I had questions. I have no idea what they were.
We join the line of people waiting wordlessly to speak with The Shadow Lord. Fray rubs the back of my hand with his thumb, trying to calm me down. I resist the urge fling my arms around him and cling for dear life.
Far too quickly, the people in front of us have gone up, leaving us next. Fray drops my hand and I have to snap my jaws shut to stop from crying out at the abandonment. His palm goes to my back, guides me forward.
“My Lord.” Fray bows before the robed man. “May I present Drew Elizabeth McKinney?”
The figure nods.
Even standing right before the man, I have no idea what he looks like. The cloak covers him completely, its hood keeping his whole face hidden even though I'm certain his features should be visible.
He reaches a hand toward me. He didn't do that for the others. Am I supposed to shake it? Kiss it? Put something in it?
He extends a finger and places it on my forehead.
The phrase 'marked by death' appears in my thoughts and even though nothing's been said, I feel dismissed. Fray takes my hand again to lead me away, getting me almost back to the door we came in from before shaking overtakes me to the point I can't walk anymore. Big violent shudders pummel me, making the trembling from before look static.
“It's alright. He has that affect on people.” Fray's arms close around me and he holds me tight. “You're fine.”
“I want to go home,” I whimper.
“Of course, luv.”
With a clap of thunder, the room, and everything else, vanishes.
My body is completely numb. My sight is completely black. Only the ringing in my ears gives me hope I haven't been plunged straight into The Spirit.
Slowly, vision and feeling return. The thunder still echoes in my ears, but Fray's gone and I'm in dimly lit room, facing a set of over-puffed curtains.
“We call to you, good spirit,” a familiar voice intones. “Come to us this night of All Souls and tell us what message you wish to send.”
Turning, I look around a stranger's bedroom. There's a lot of pink lace and flowery frills, like a room decorated by a six year old girl. On white walls, candlelight flickers over posters of women posed with guitars. A desk is cluttered with books and loose pieces of paper. And in the middle of the room four figures bend over a ouija board.
Oh, yay. I've been summoned to a séance.
Chapter Nineteen
“Do you feel that?” one of the girls whispers over the thump of a distant bass. “It got cold.”
“Spirit?” My sister Rain looks around the room with wide eyes. “Are you here?”
The girls all stare at the planchette on the board between them. Each of them have a finger on the little piece of wood.
“Spirit?” Rain asks again. “Can you hear us?”
I lean over her shoulder and she shivers, moving her gaze to look in my direction even though she doesn't focus on me. I push the little pointer to where the the word, “No,” is etched on the board.
“No?” one of Rain's friends puzzles.
“Must be a sarcastic ghost,” another figures.
“Or one of us,” the third mutters.
“Spirit, what is your name?” Rain asks.
I spell out McKinney.
One of the girls shrieks and springs away from the board. The unbeliever rolls her eyes. And the other one trades an excited look with R
ain. “Is it your granddad?”
Granddaddy McKinney died years before Dad dragged us to Pine Ridge. I hardly remember him and can't imagine that Rain does at all. “Are you my grandfather?” she whispers.
No.
“Who are you?”
Why not tell the truth? She'll get freaked out, she'll call the other me, and then they'll all laugh about it and try to figure out which one of them was pushing the planchette. D...R...E...W.
Rain shrieks.
The others stare at the board. One of them tries to laugh in a nervous way. The cynical one says, “I need a cigarette,” and leaves.
I didn't know Rain's friends smoke.
It takes my sister three times to manage to get her cell phone to dial mine. “Drew?”
I can only imagine what the other me thinks.
“Is she alright?” one of the girls asks.
“Are you okay, Drew?” Rain asks the me on the phone. A horrible, sick feeling sloshes through my insides at the sight of tears in her eyes. My shoulders slump in guilt over my stupid little trick.
Rain'll be fine. Until I die and then she'll be convinced she was warned and should have stopped it. Dammit. I'm the worst sister ever. Poor Rain...
“I'm sorry, sweetie,” I tell her, getting a little choked up myself. “I wasn't thinking. Like usual.”
She's talking to TOM, trying to downplay the panic that was in her voice when she called. I can't blame her for not wanting to tell TOM what happened. The living me never believed in ouija boards. She'd just make fun of the kid.
“I'm so sorry,” I say again. Then I leave the room in a hurry, unable to stand watching her freak out over her paranormal experience.
There's a lot of noise in the hall and more when I get to the stairs. On the ground floor, there's music and talking. About half of my school is packed into a handful of rooms. I kind of expect Finn to be here, but if he is he's hidden in the crowd. And there's no point in me staying without him.
I slide through the partially opened front door, then stop. On the porch, looking out across the house's front yard toward the mountains and talking to Rain's friend, stands Cooper Finnegan. Faint orange-tinged light from the globe by the door hits his hair, dancing on the strands much as the shadows of the night play on his face. He gives the cigarette Rain's friend pulls out a disapproving look. “Yeah, yeah,” she says with an eye roll. “They'll kill my lungs. But what else am I supposed to do? Drink myself into a stupor? Kill my liver? Maybe run over a few little kids?”
He gives her a wry smile. “I take it things aren't working out too well with that girl.”
“No,” she grumbles, looking disgusted. “She's straight.”
“Sorry,” Finn offers. “Unrequited love's a bitch.”
“Too bad she isn't.” The kid drags on her cigarette, reminding me I haven't had one since I died. “Maybe then I wouldn't be so crazy about her.”
Finn shakes his head. “You'd think that, wouldn't you?”
“Not your experience?”
“Not really.”
They look out, watching the stars for a while. I consider interrupting, but Finn looks relatively at peace and I'm loathe to interfere with that. So I stay back, watching and waiting for a chance to slip past without being noticed.
“What about that cheerleader?” the girl asks after a while. “The one trying to mount you in the hallway earlier. That's Rain's sister, isn't it?”
“Believe it or not.”
“I can't believe everyone thinks it's the other one who's the freak,” the girl states. “That Bobbi... No offense, but I don't think she's all there.” The girl taps her hair with her hand, careful not to touch the lit bit of the cigarette to any of it.
Finn makes a soft harrumph. “Explains her interest in me.”
His companion flicks some ashes toward him. “Don't dig for compliments. It's not attractive.”
He laughs at her. “Like I had a shot with you anyway. You're a lesbian.”
“True.” She gives him a grin. “Doesn't mean you couldn't at least try though.”
“Many apologies.”
Leaning over the railing, Finn stares at something while the girl continues to smoke. “What are you hiding from?” she asks.
He doesn't answer her.
“Bobbi?” she guesses, her eyes on him while she drags on the cigarette. “She is hot, if you can get past the Stepford qualities.”
“Never said she wasn't,” Finn admits, not happily.
“Just not your type?” The girl tilts her head. “What is then? Not hot?”
He takes a while to answer her, then says, so softly I'm not certain I hear it, “Someone who'd never wear a sweater set.”
The girl laughs and jams the end of her cigarette against the rail, grinding out the fire. “Silly boy.” She flicks the butt out into the grass. “It doesn't matter what they're wearing. You're just going to take it off.”
She kisses his cheek, then goes back inside while I huddle as far into the shadows as I can get.
Finn goes back to whatever it is he's doing out here all by himself. Thinking, I assume.
He pulls out his phone and toggles it on. Its display casts a glow on his face, showing me things the low wattage porch light didn't. He doesn't look good.
Sliding the phone back into his pocket, he turns his attention outward again and mutters, “Sun set hours ago.”
My hand goes to the side of the house, holding me steady. He's out here worrying about me.
Gathering my courage, I move toward him. “Finn?”
His body goes still, then he turns. “You okay?” he asks, his voice a strange combination of emotions.
“Yeah,” I answer.
“Everything went alright?” His tone is cooling down, deadening.
“I guess.” He straightens and watches me approach. “I sort of lost some time.”
His jaw tight, he nods. “Time flies and all.” He moves around me, throws the door all the way open while I turn around, confused.
“What's wrong?” I ask.
His eyes flicker to me, but he continues his plunge into the throng in the house.
“Why are you mad at me?” The door shuts through me and I pick up my pace.
Ignoring me, Finn makes a beeline for the refreshments. There's a keg with a hand pump sitting next to the table, one of his teammates sitting by it and pulling draft. Finn grabs a beer from him and chugs it, then holds his red plastic cup out for more in less time than it takes the guy to serve the next person. The keg master laughs cheerfully as he takes the cup and refills it, growing more amused when the process is repeated two more times.
“What do you think you're doing?” I ask.
The fifth beer, he doesn't down. He takes it and walks off.
“Finn!”
“I was worried about you,” he mutters into the rim of the cup, taking a sip afterwards.
“Well, I'm sorry. It's not my fault.”
“Of course not.” He swallows about half the beer.
“I didn't have a choice about going, I told you that.” Or Fray told him that, but whatever.
He narrows a glare on me. The alcohol hasn't hit him yet, so it's a steady and sharp glare. “You promised to be back by dark.”
“Okay... First off, you're not my dad.” I get up close so my snarling will be more effective. “And secondly, when I said I lost time, I didn't mean I lost track of time. I meant I literally lost time. As in, I was gone an hour tops. Not...” My eyes seek out a clock. “It's eight o'clock? I lost seven hours?”
I look back to Finn, but he's back by the keg.
“Idiot!” I yell at him.
Storming across the room, I knock the cup out of his hand as he's drinking his sixth beer in under five minutes.
“Beer foul!” someone yells.
“Alcohol abuse!” chimes someone else.
The guy manning the keg laughs. “You need to be cut off?”
I answer with a heartfelt, “Yes!” Normally, I
have no trouble with a few beers. But drinking because you're emotional is stupid.
“I do have a test tomorrow morning.” Finn gives the guy a sheepish smile and picks up the empty cup. He tosses it in the garbage on his way to the door.
“Finn!” Without warning, Bobbi materializes in his path, wearing a demon costume that's little more than two red scarves and some horns. “You're not leaving, are you?”
“Well, I was...” His eyes take their time looking at the vast amounts of skin she's showing.
She notices the scrutiny and changes stance to grant him a better view. With a coy smile, she gives her hair a little toss. “I was just wandering if you could give me a ride to Blue Ridge Saturday.”
“Saturday?” Finn blinks, suddenly seeming to come back to himself. “You're doing Promo?”
Promo? What's promo?
Not noticing the shift in Finn's attitude, Bobbi slithers closer to him. “Yeah. Going to tell the middle schoolers they need to go to Cooper Finnegan's college.” She licks her lips slowly, drawing a line of glitter over them. Finn's eyes are drawn along it.
“It's just spit,” I mutter under my breath.
Finn's attention flickers to me, though I don't think he could possibly have heard me over all the music and chatter. He tells Bobbi, “I have to leave really early.”
“Thanks okay. I don't mind.” She's close enough now that he has to be careful not to touch her.
He takes a small step back, which is as far as he can get without knocking over the people behind him. “I don't think there's room.”
The guy directly behind him turns around. “Nah, there's plenty of room.” The teammate beams at Bobbi, letting his approval of her skimpy outfit shine bright on his face.
“You two work it out,” Finn says quickly, darting around the guy and continuing to the door.
“Talk about mixed signals,” I grumble as we start up the sidewalk. We're an easy walk from Finn's house and he didn't bring his truck. Which is good because I would've had to hurt him if he tried to drive now. That beer's going to slam into him any second.
He doesn't respond, either because he's mad at me and doesn't want to talk or because he knows what I mean and sees the problem with openly devouring a girl with your eyes then acting like you aren't interested.
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