by Megan Atwood
“Nuh-uh. No way,” Emma said. “That wasn’t a scream you want to be a part of.”
Ophelia stomped toward Emma. “Don’t be a baby! We need to help whoever that was.”
Madeleine’s adrenaline rush was slowly dissipating. “They’re right, Emma. We need to find who that was and make sure they’re OK.”
Sophie rubbed Emma’s shoulder. “We’re all scared, Em.”
Emma gulped. “You’re right.” New strength came into her voice. “Where did the scream come from?”
“I think it came from the left, from that tunnel over there. Come on!” Ophelia said.
All five girls jogged down the hall. When they got to the entrance of the left passageway, they saw that it split off into still more tunnels.
Ophelia whispered, “Sophie, Emma, Kayley, you take that branch. Madeleine and I will take this one. Keep your phones on and your flashlights ready.”
“Why do we need our flashlights?” Kayley said. “There are candles everywhere.”
“To knock someone in the head if you need to. OK, let’s go.”
Madeleine and Ophelia crept along the stone floor quietly and slowly. The smell of mold was so powerful that Madeleine’s nose almost couldn’t take it. She felt she would sneeze at any moment. She rubbed her nose. Why was this happening now of all times? Her eyes watered, and she brushed at them impatiently.
Suddenly, Madeleine almost ran into Ophelia as Ophelia stopped in her tracks. “Did you hear that?” she whispered.
Madeleine shook her head. Then she did hear it. The sound of many people chanting.
Ophelia looked at her with wide eyes, put a finger to her lips, and started down the hall again. Madeleine followed, wondering for the billionth time if this was a good idea and still suppressing a sneeze.
The chanting got louder and more eerie, keening and wailing, one voice louder than the rest speaking in a language Madeleine didn’t understand. Finally, she and Ophelia came to an archway toward a room where the chanting seemed to be coming from. Ophelia crouched down on one side of the arch, and Madeleine followed her.
An altar of some sort stood in the center of the room with a strange symbol carved into it. Six hooded figures surrounded the table, holding dripping candles and chanting. Torches lit the room from wooden mounts on the wall. Through a gap in the formation of the hooded figures, Madeleine could barely make out the items on top of the altar—which included her necklace.
The same scream the girls had heard earlier pierced the chanting.
A female figure writhed on the ground near the altar. A deep male voice rang out, this time in English.
“She feels it again! Rejoice, for our plans will be realized! Rejoice!”
Madeleine felt Ophelia shudder, and her own terror had reached a fever pitch. Our plans will be realized? Nothing good could come of that. Her nose started itching, and she rubbed it furiously.
But this time, there was nothing she could do. With horror, she felt her body contract.
She sneezed.
After that, everything happened so fast, she wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t.
The chanting stopped. Madeleine and Ophelia began to run.
Madeleine had never run so fast in her life, and she still could barely keep up with Ophelia.
In the main hallway, they ran headfirst into Kayley, Emma, and Sophie.
“What’s going on? Why are you running?” Emma cried.
With terror in her eyes, Ophelia pointed to the hooded figures running toward them. All five girls took off down the hall again.
Sprinting as fast as they could, they made it back to the boiler room door, climbed the narrow cement stairs, and tore through the prop room. When they reached the hallway on the second floor, they sprinted to the French doors and opened them in a panic. With trembling hands, Ophelia got out the key and locked it again.
“What … the … ,” Kayley managed to get out.
The sound of footsteps echoed on the other side of the door. The girls sprinted down the hallway and ran into the closest room—Sophie’s.
Ophelia kept her ear to the door to hear if anyone was coming. After fifteen minutes with no noises, Sophie turned on the light and all five girls collapsed.
“Well,” Kayley said. “We can safely say we don’t have a ghost.”
“Yeah,” Ophelia said, “no ghost. Just a murderous cult.”
Chapter 11
At ballet class the next morning, Madeleine felt like she’d been run over by a truck.
After decompressing for a couple hours, everyone had gone back to their rooms to try to get some sleep.
Madeleine didn’t get a wink. Hooded figures kept running at her whenever she closed her eyes, and “Rejoice!” echoed through her mind.
Now, tying their pointe shoes, Kayley and Ophelia were having the same argument they’d had the night before.
Kayley whispered furiously, “Ophelia. Listen to reason. We saw a freaking cult last night! We need to tell Madame Puant.”
“And get expelled? No thank you.”
Sophie chimed in, “But Ophelia, this is big. They are stealing our stuff and using it for …” She shivered.
“For who knows what!” Emma said.
Madeleine stood with Ophelia. She knew she couldn’t lose her scholarship. “What did we really see? Maybe it’s their religion or something, and we interrupted their worship … uh, ceremony.”
Kayley rolled her eyes. “Yeah, a worship ceremony. With our stolen stuff. You guys, how did these people get into our school? And what are they doing?”
Sophie nodded. “I’m scared.”
At that moment, Madame Puant walked in and banged her cane on the floor. “Barre exercises, everyone. Trey, I saw you slacking off yesterday. Not again.”
“We’ll talk more at lunch,” Ophelia said under her breath. “I’m scared too,” she added.
She squeezed Kayley’s hand, who squeezed Sophie’s, who squeezed Emma’s. Emma reached out to Madeleine, and Madeleine felt a warm glow spread through her.
“We’re in this together,” whispered Ophelia. And Madeleine, despite the crazy night, despite the fact that a murderous cult may be out to kill her, felt better than she had since arriving at the academy’s doors.
She had friends.
Just then Trey burst through them in a pirouette to the barre.
“Get a room,” he said. Every one of them cracked up as he spun past the group.
In English, Madeleine’s body ached. Her head felt like it would explode. One look at Kayley and the rest of the girls told her they felt the same way.
Mr. Barnes rushed in looking like Madeleine felt. She wondered if he, too, had had a long night.
“Onto more Poe, class! Your papers were pretty po’, so we’ll have to look over his work again.”
The class groaned. But Madeleine saw that the usual twinkle in the teacher’s eye was gone.
Kayley turned around and grinned at Madeleine. Madeleine gasped: “Kayley, your nose.”
“What?” Kayley asked and wiped under it. Bright red blood colored her hand.
“Holy—.” She looked at Madeleine. “Madeleine, you …”
But Madeleine had already felt the first drips of blood. Across the room, Ophelia held her nose too. And Sophie and Emma.
Mr. Barnes stopped his lecture and pulled out a huge stash of Kleenex from his desk drawer. He handed the tissues to each of them.
“OK, girls, to the infirmary,” he said.
Madeleine hoped he didn’t wonder why all five of them had bloody noses at the same time. How could this have happened?
The girls began their walk down the hall to the infirmary, staring at one another in confusion above big balls of Kleenex.
“What is going on?” Sophie asked.
“Now should we tell someone?” Kayley said to Ophelia through her wadded-up Kleenex.
“Tell them what?” Ophelia said.
Kayley sighed in exasperation. “About last nigh
t! Do you think it’s a coincidence that we all have nosebleeds?”
“So we say the cult attacked our sinuses? Grow up, Kayley!”
Before Kayley could respond, they reached the infirmary and the nurse came out. This was the first time Madeleine had met him, but all the other girls said, “Hey, Nurse John.”
“Well, this looks like trouble with a capital T.” He smiled and dimples appeared. Madeleine thought he was the best-looking nurse she had ever seen. Maybe the best-looking guy she had ever seen. She would try to be sick more often, she decided. She caught Kayley smiling at her madly behind a Kleenex and kicked her lightly.
“Well, come in and we’ll take a look,” Nurse John said. “All five of you have nosebleeds?”
They nodded their heads. “Well, that’s unusual. Come in. Lie back, but not all the way back. Keep pinching your nose—the bleeding’ll end soon.”
Madeleine lay against a pillow on one of the infirmary beds and thought about the events of the past couple days. She couldn’t deny that it was strange they all had nosebleeds at the same time. And she couldn’t deny that it didn’t bode well for the days ahead.
Chapter 12
By the time everyone’s nosebleed had stopped, it was lunchtime. The girls reconvened outside the infirmary.
“I want to put my bag away. Let’s all meet by the stairs, then go to lunch,” Ophelia said.
“We’re not done with this conversation,” Kayley grumbled. “I still think we should tell someone.”
Borrowing Kayley’s move, Ophelia rolled her eyes. “We’ll talk more about it at lunch.”
When Madeleine got back to her room, she crawled into bed without even taking off her shoes. She was so tired. All she wanted to do was sleep.
But the shriek from Ophelia’s room brought her out of her sleepy reverie.
She ran to Ophelia’s room and barged in without knocking. Ophelia’s face was stark white as she stared at her dressing table. On top of it sat five dolls that looked a little like each of the girls. Each of them had pins stuck right in their hearts. Bloodred smears surrounded the pins.
Madeleine put her hand to her mouth. Just then, Kayley, Emma, and Sophie came to the room and knocked into her. She heard each of them gasp, in turn.
Emma whispered, “Is that blood?”
“I don’t want to find out,” Sophie said.
Kayley looked at Ophelia. “Now do we tell someone?”
Ophelia, face still pale, turned slowly toward her. “Yeah, I think now we tell someone.”
It was the right thing to do, Madeleine thought. But her heart sunk. Admitting she had broken curfew meant the end of her scholarship. And maybe worse, the end of her new friendships. But somebody could get hurt. and that somebody could be one of the very friends she was afraid of losing.
“Let’s go,” she said.
Madeleine had never been inside Madame Puant’s office, and she was amazed by the sheer grandness of the whole place. Red velvety carpet blanketed the floor, like the hallway’s, only nicer, and Madame’s desk was made of a dark, ornately carved wood. Madeleine could see cherubs and trees and nymphs …
But all of that fled from her mind as Ophelia began to explain why they’d all come.
Goodbye, Dario Quincy Academy … , Madeleine thought.
She looked at the ground while Ophelia finished. The quiet seemed to stretch for minutes. Madeleine started fidgeting. She just wished Madame would expel them and be done with it. And, of course, get rid of the cult.
Finally, Madame Puant said, “So, let me get this straight. The five of you found some secret tunnels under the school. And then found a room where a circle of hooded figures stood chanting around an altar—an altar filled with your stolen trinkets—and then they chased you down a stone tunnel? And today you all had nosebleeds at the exact same time, and five bloody children’s dolls appeared on your dressing table? Is this what you’re telling me? Ophelia?”
When Madame said it like that, it sounded ridiculous, Madeleine thought. She could hear the doubt in Ophelia’s voice too: “I know it sounds crazy, Madame, but …”
Madame cut her off with a wave of her hand. “It doesn’t sound crazy, Ophelia.”
Madeleine found the strength to look up. Maybe Madame did believe them, after all.
Madame went on, “It sounds like a desperate ploy to either get attention or to get out of class or the hysterical rantings of five girls who talked themselves into something ridiculous.” She trained her eyes on Madeleine. “I thought you’d be better than this, Madeleine. You are an exemplary student and this … well, this is just absurd.”
Madeleine’s face turned hot with shame. But it quickly cooled as she asked herself, what about the dolls?
“Madame,” she said excitedly, “We have proof. You mentioned it yourself—the dolls! Come look!”
The girls all nodded excitedly.
“Very well,” Madame said. “Let’s have a look at these dolls. Though I’m inclined to believe you constructed them yourself too. But—I’ll humor you.”
Madeleine felt excitement rippling in her stomach as they walked to Ophelia’s room. Earlier, she had wanted nothing more than to not tell Madame. Now, she was desperate for Madame to believe them.
Ophelia opened her door with a flourish. Only a “ta-da!” was missing. For a second, Madeleine had to fight the urge to giggle.
But when they stepped into the room, there was no reason to laugh. The dolls were gone.
Madeleine’s jaw dropped. “Madame, I swear they were here!”
Madame glared at each girl in turn. “You have wasted my time and the time of this academy. You are banned from class for the rest of the week. Maybe you can use that time to think about the ramifications of making up stories!”
She turned on her heel to exit, and Ophelia said to her retreating back, “Wait! We’ll show you tonight! At midnight!” But Madame disappeared before Ophelia could finish.
Ophelia slumped on her bed and put her head in her hands. The other girls flopped on the floor.
Madeleine was shocked—they couldn’t go to class for a whole week. A day hadn’t gone by where she hadn’t been in a studio since she was three years old. Not one day. Even when she’d gotten an injury, she’d gone to the studio to watch the others.
Even so, Madeleine was relieved. They hadn’t been kicked out.
“You guys, this sucks,” she said. “But—we didn’t get kicked out.”
Kayley, Sophie, and Emma nodded their heads. Ophelia continued to stare at the dressing table. Finally, she spoke. “Listen, I know what we saw. We just need proof, that’s all.”
Sophie looked up glumly. “How are we going to do that? Why didn’t we take the dolls with us? That was so dumb.”
Ophelia nodded. “It was dumb. And it was dumb not to take pictures or video last night. Which is why we’re going back tonight.”
Chapter 13
Kayley crossed and uncrossed her arms. “No. Way.”
Ophelia grabbed Kayley’s shoulders. “Think about it. This is the only way to prove to Madame Puant what’s happening! And I don’t know about you, but I don’t want some freakish cult trying to kill us in our sleep. And don’t you want your grandma’s gloves back?”
Kayley looked away. Madeleine knew that Ophelia had won.
“Yes. We have to go back tonight,” Emma said.
Everyone looked at her. She shrugged. “Look, I was freaked out last night, but now I’m just mad. Ophelia’s right. We need to end this thing, whatever it is. And this time, we come with cameras.”
“OK,” Sophie said. “But don’t you think they’ll be expecting us this time?”
“That’s a good point,” Ophelia said.
Madeleine sat up. “The prop room.”
Kayley stared at her. “Yeah, the prop room. What about it?”
“Wouldn’t there be cloaks? Or something in there we could use?” Madeleine asked.
Ophelia sat up too. “Yes! Last year we put on a ballet
that had, like, a million grim reapers.” Madeleine scrunched her face up. “Don’t ask,” Ophelia continued. “Anyway, I know exactly where they are. Brilliant, Madeleine! Maybe that’s where they got their cloaks …”
Madeleine felt the glow from before. Never at her old school did she have friends like this.
Emma said, “I bet I know where the cloaks are too. Sophie and I will grab five now, and at midnight, we’ll go down to the tunnels and bust those suckers.”
Sophie gawked at Emma and Emma shrugged. “No one is looking to go into the prop room today. Besides, we’re banned from class—what else are we going to do?”
Sophie gave a slow smile and said, “Beats sitting in our rooms for three hours.”
Kayley said, “Well, if the wonder twins are in, I guess I am too.”
“Me too,” Madeleine said.
Ophelia grinned. “Damn straight you are.”
Dressed in cloaks that shaded their faces, the five of them stood outside the tunnel doors and took deep breaths.
Getting to the tunnels hadn’t been easy. Hall monitors were patrolling the halls more frequently than they had the night before. Madeleine didn’t think that was a coincidence. But the girls made it to the dank and musty tunnels without incident. As they stood in front of the medieval-looking door, each of them grabbed another girl’s hand in what had become their sneaking-around formation. And then Ophelia turned the knob.
Madeleine cringed while the door creaked open. She really, really hoped this plan would work.
When they stepped out to the hall, no one else was there, but candles flickered in their holders. The hooded figures were around somewhere. Madeleine knew it. Now the girls just had to sneak up to the room and film them.
Easy peasy.
Madeleine’s hands started to shake. She felt a cold sweat break out over her body. The image of the hooded figures chasing her kept flashing in her mind.
Ophelia whispered, “Let’s go.”
They clustered together and began to tiptoe down the dark hall.
When they reached the branch of the tunnel they’d gone to before, they heard no chanting.