第 9 页

No answer.

"Debby? Chris? It's Cassie."

Maybe they couldn't hear her. There was another room behind the boiler room; she could glimpse it

through an archway beyond the machines.

She edged toward it, worried about getting oil on Laurel's pristine dress. She looked through the

archway and hesitated, gripped by a strange apprehension.

Drip. Drip.

"Is anybody there?"

A large machine was blocking her way. Uneasily, she poked her head around it.

At first she thought the room was empty, but then, at eye level, she saw something.

Something wrong. And in that instant her throat closed and her mind fragmented, single thoughts flashing

across it like explosions from a flashbulb.

Swinging feet.

Swinging feet where feet shouldn't be. Somebody walking on air. Flying like a witch. Only, the feet

weren't flying. They were swinging, back and forth, in two dark brown loafers. Two dark brown loafers

with little tassels.

Cassie looked up at the face.

The relentless dripping of water went on. The smell of oil and stale alcohol nauseated her.

Can't scream. Can't do anything but gasp.

Drip and swing.

That face, that horrible blue face. No more lady-killer smile. I have to do something to help him, but how

can I help? Nobody's neck bends that way when they're alive.

Every horrible detail was so clear. The fraying rope. The swinging shadow on the cinder-block wall. The

machinery with its dials and switches. And the awful stillness.

Drip. Drip.

Swinging like a pendulum.

Hands covering her mouth, Cassie began to sob.

She backed away, trying not to see the curly brown hair on the head that was lolling sideways. He

couldn't be dead when she'd just danced with him. He'd just had his arms around her, he'd flashed her

that cocksure smile. And now-

She stepped back and hands fell on her shoulders.

She did try to scream then, but her throat was paralyzed. Her vision went dark.

"Steady. Steady. Hang on there."

It was Nick.

"Breathe slower. Put your head down."

"Nine-one-one," she gasped, and then, clearly and distinctly so that he would understand, "Call

nine-one-one, Nick. Jeffrey-"

He cast a hard glance at the swinging feet. "He doesn't need a doctor. Do you?"

"I-" She was hanging on to his hand. "I came down to get Deborah."

"She's in the old science building. They got busted here."

"And 1 saw him-Jeffrey-"

Nick's arm was comforting, solid. "I get the picture," he said. "Do you want to sit down?"

"I can't. It's Laurel's dress." She was completely irrational, she realized. She tried desperately to get a

grip on herself. "Nick, please let me go. I have to call an ambulance."

"Cassie." She couldn't remember him ever saying her name before, but now he was holding her shoulders

and looking her directly in the face. "No ambulance is going to do him any good. You got that? Now just

calm down."

Cassie stared into his polished-mahogany eyes, then slowly nodded. The gasping was easing up. She was

grateful for his arm around her, although some part of her mind was standing back in disbelief-Nick was

comforting her? Nick, who hated girls and was coldly polite to them at best?

"What's going on here?"

Cassie spun to see Adam in the archway. But when she tried to speak, her throat closed completely and

hot tears flooded her eyes.

Nick said, "She's a little upset. She just found Jeffrey Lovejoy hanging from a pipe."

"What?" Adam moved swiftly to look around the machine. He came back looking grim and alert, his

eyes glinting silver as they always did in times of trouble.

"How much do you know about this?" he asked Nick crisply.

"I came down to get something I left," Nick said, equally short. "I found her about ready to keel over.

And that's all."

Adam's expression had softened slightly. "Are you okay?" he said to Cassie. "I've been looking

everywhere for you. I knew something was wrong, but I didn't know what. Then Suzan said you'd gone

to look for Deborah, but that you were looking in the wrong place." As if it were the most natural thing in

the world, he reached out to take her from Nick-and Nick resisted. For a moment there was tension

between the two boys and Cassie looked from one to the other with dawning surprise and alarm.

She moved away from both. "I'm all right," she said. And, strangely, saying so made it almost true. It was

partly necessity and partly something else-her witch senses were telling her something. She had a feeling

of malice, of evil. Of darkness.

"The dark energy," she whispered.

Adam looked more keen and alert. "You think-?"

"Yes," she said. "Yes, I do. But if only we could tell for sure . . ." Her mind was racing. Jeffrey. Jeffrey's

body swinging like a pendulum. "Usually we use clear quartz as a pendulum ..."

She snatched Melanie's necklace off and held it up, looking at the teardrop of quartz crystal.

"If the dark energy was here, maybe we can trace it," she said, fired with the idea. "See where it came

from-or where it went. If you guys will help."

Nick was looking skeptical, but Adam cut in before he could speak. "Of course we'll help. But it's

dangerous; we've got to be careful." His fingers gripped her arm reassuringly.

Nick was looking skeptical, but Adam cut in before he could speak. "Of course we'll help. But it's

dangerous; we've got to be careful." His fingers gripped her arm reassuringly.

At first it just spun in circles. But then it began to seesaw violently, pointing out a direction.

SEVEN

Cassie followed the motion of the crystal. It was pointing upstairs, she decided-the opposite direction led

into a wall.

"We'd better get out in the open, anyway," Adam said. "Otherwise we might not be able to follow it."

Cassie nodded. She and Adam were speaking quickly, tensely-but calmly. Their violent agitation was

held just under the surface, kept down by sheer willpower. Having something to do was what made the

difference, she thought as they climbed the stairs. She couldn't afford to have hysterics now; she had to

keep her mind clear to trace Jeffrey's killer.

In the hallway outside the custodian's office they ran into Deborah and the Henderson brothers.

"Adam, dude, what's goin' on?" Chris said. Cassie saw that he'd been drinking. "We were just comin'

down for a little liquid refreshment, you know-"

"Not down there," Adam said shortly. He looked at Doug, who seemed less inebriated. "Go get

Melanie," he said, "and tell her to call the police. Jeffrey Lovejoy's been murdered."

"Are you serious?" Deborah demanded. The fierce light was in her face again. "All right!"

"Don't," said Cassie before she could stop herself. "You haven't seen him. It's terrible- and it's nothing to

joke about."

Adam's arm shot out as Deborah started toward her. "Why don't you help us instead of picking fights

with our side? We're trying to trace the dark energy that killed him."

"The dark energy," Deborah repeated scornfully.

Cassie took a quick breath, but Nick was speaking. "I think it's garbage too," he said calmly. "But if it

wasn't the dark energy, that means a person did it-like somebody who had a grudge against Jeffrey." He

stared at Deborah, his eyes hard.

Deborah stared back arrogantly. Cassie looked at her as she stood there in her short black tank

dress-more like a sleeveless top than a dress-and her suede boots. Deborah was belligerent,

antagonistic, hostile-and strong. For the first time in a long while Cassie noticed the crescent-moon tattoo

on Deborah's collarbone.

"Why don't you help us, Deborah?" she said. "This crystal is picking something up-or it was before we all

started talking. Help us find what it's tracing." And then she added, inspired by some instinct below the

level of consciousness, "Of course, it's probably dangerous-"

"So what? You think I'm scared?" Deborah demanded. "All right, I'm coming. You guys get out of here,"

she told the Hendersons.

"So what? You think I'm scared?" Deborah demanded. "All right, I'm coming. You guys get out of here,"

she told the Hendersons.

"All right," Cassie said, holding the crystal up again. She was afraid that it wouldn't do anything now that

their concentration had been broken. And at first it simply hung at the end of the chain, swaying very

slightly. But then, as the four of them stared at it, the swaying slowly became more pronounced. Cassie

held her breath, trying to keep her hand from trembling. She didn't want to influence the crystal in any

way.

It was definitely swinging now. In toward the boiler room and out toward the front of the school.

"Due east," Adam said in a low voice.

Holding the crystal high in her left hand, Cassie followed the direction of the swing, down the hallway.

Outside, the moon was almost full, high in the sky, dropping west behind them.

"The Blood Moon," Adam said quietly. Cassie remembered Diana saying that witches counted their year

by moons, not months. The name of this one was hideously appropriate, but she didn't look back at it

again. She was focusing on the crystal.

At first they walked through town, with closed stores and empty buildings on either side of them. Nothing

stayed open past midnight in New Salem. Then the stores became less frequent, and there were a few

clustered houses. Finally they were walking down a road which got lonelier and lonelier with every step,

and all that surrounded them were the night noises.

There was no human habitation out here, but the moon was bright enough to see by. Their shadows

stretched in front of them as they went. The air was cold, and Cassie shivered without taking her eyes off

the crystal.

She felt something slip over her shoulders. Adam's jacket. She glanced at him gratefully, then quickly

looked at the crystal again; if she faltered in her concentration it seemed to falter too, losing decisiveness

and slowing almost to a random bobbing. It never swung as vigorously as the peridot had done for

Diana-but then, Cassie wasn't Diana, and she didn't have a nearly-full coven to back her.

Behind her, she heard Adam say sharply, "Nick?" And then Deborah's derisive snort, "I wouldn't take it,

anyway. I never get cold."

They were on a narrow dirt road now, still heading east. Suddenly Cassie had a terrible thought.

Oh, my God-Faye's house. That's where we set it loose and that's where we're going. We're going to

trace this stuff all the way back to Faye's bedroom . . . and then what?

The coldness that went through her now was deeper and more numbing than the night wind. If the dark

energy that had exploded through Faye's ceiling had killed Jeffrey, Cassie was as guilty as Faye was. She

was a murderer.

Then stop tracing it, a thin voice inside her whispered. You're controlling the crystal; give it a twirl in the

wrong direction.

But she didn't. She kept her eyes on the quartz teardrop, which seemed to shine with a milky light in the

darkness, and she let it swing the way it wanted to.

If the truth comes out, it comes out, she told herself coldly. And if she was a murderer, she deserved to

be caught. She was going to follow this trail wherever it led.

But it didn't seem to be leading to Crowhaven Road. They were still going east, not northeast. And

suddenly the narrow, rutted road they were on began to seem familiar.

Up ahead she glimpsed a chain-link fence.

"The cemetery," Adam said softly.

"Wait," said Deborah. "Did you see-there, look!"

"At what, the cemetery?" Adam asked.

"No! At that thing-there it is again! Up there on the road."

"I don't see anything," Nick said.

"You have to. See, it's moving-"

"I see a shadow," Adam said. "Or maybe a possum or something . . ."

"No, it's big," Deborah insisted. "There! Can't you see that?"

Cassie looked up at last; she couldn't help it. The lonely road in front of her seemed dark and still at first,

but then she saw-something. A shadow, she thought . . . but a shadow of what? It didn't lie along the

road as a shadow ought to. It seemed to be standing high, and it was moving.

"I don't see anything," Nick said again, curtly.

"Then you're blind," Deborah snapped. "It's like a person."

Under Adam's jacket, Cassie's skin was rising in goose pimples. It did look like a person- except that it

seemed to change every minute, now taller, now shorter, now wider, now thinner. At times it

disappeared completely.

"It's heading for the cemetery," Deborah said.

"No-look! It's veering off toward the shed," Adam cried. "Nick, come on!"

Beside the road was an abandoned shed. Even in the moonlight it was clear that it was falling to pieces.

The dim shape seemed to whisk toward it, merging with the darkness behind it.

Adam and Nick were running, Nick snarling, "We're chasing after nothing!" Deborah was standing

poised, tense and alert, scanning the roadside. Cassie looked at the chain in dismay. Everyone's

concentration had been shattered, the crystal was gyrating aimlessly. She looked up to say

something-and drew in a quick breath.

"There it is!"