14
I can’t decide, Coby said. Did he leave you happy or sad? He was staring out my bedroom window at the front drive, and must have seen Bennett drive away.
A little of both, I admitted. Not wanting to discuss it, I said, Did you manage to get closer to Neos? Learn anything new?
The Beyond is weird. I can’t get used to it. He gave me a look. I’m glad I don’t have to.
Reminding me that he expected me to dispel him when this was all over. Well, did you learn anything about his ashes? Or about Rachel? Did you see her?
No, but they’re together. At least, there are whispers of her—I can’t tell if she’s really with him, or just along for the ride. You know how ghostkeepers get when they linger.
Not really.
Crazy. Jumbled and confused, like a tangle of wires. But she wasn’t lying, his ashes are definitely at Thatcher.
I sighed. This wasn’t helping. You don’t know where?
No, he admitted. He wants to possess you, but he’s afraid to attack you openly. He’s got some plan with your ring and his ashes; they’re like … symbols.
Talismans, I said. That’s what they called my mother’s amulet.
Yeah. The ring will give him power, and I’m not sure, but I think he needs his ashes to possess you. You’re Emma Vaile, he can’t take you the normal way.
Ashes …., I said, lost in thought.
What? Coby drifted closer.
I almost told him about the vision with Neos and Bennett, but instead said, It just reminds me of this dream I had in San Francisco before I had any idea I was a ghostkeeper. Of a smoky man made of snakes, inside my house; he was … The snakes were rising from my dad’s collection of funeral urns.
Your dad collects funeral urns?
I almost laughed at his expression. He’s an antiquities-dealing ghostkeeper. But that’s not the worst part. When I brushed my teeth the next morning, there were ashes in my mouth.
Like dead people’s ashes? he asked. That’s just gross.
No kidding. I still don’t understand how they got there. I just hope the dream wasn’t prophetic.
Do you get those? Coby asked. Prophetic dreams?
I thought about my vision in the Thatcher playing field, of Neos standing triumphant while Bennett drained my power. What was Bennett planning? I hope not.
I woke early, feeling antsy, and tossed and turned for a while. As I lay there thinking about ashes and dreams and Bennett, I heard the faint hint of music. Sounded like a Bach cello piece, one of my dad’s favorites. I got out of bed and followed the music down the hall, half hoping that my dad was surprising me with a visit.
The sound came from the open door of Mrs. Stern’s office, and I stepped in, still wearing my flannel pj’s. Mrs. Stern sat behind her desk, typing on her laptop. She was beautiful and imperious, wearing all black, her dark hair slicked back into its sleek ponytail. The thought of her checking her Facebook feed almost made me smile.
“Are you all right, Emma?”
“I heard the music and thought it was maybe my dad.” I tried to give her a reassuring smile. “I’m fine.”
She looked at me more closely. “Are you sure?”
“I—I don’t know what to do, I—” Then I was crying, ugly gulping sobs that I expected would make her regret she’d ever asked the question.
Except she just said, “Oh, dear. Come here.”
I went to her and she enveloped me in a hug. She led me to the yellow couch under the window and cradled me until I finally got the tears under control and settled into that weird hiccupping breathy noise you make when you’re a little kid.
She handed me a tissue. “Do you want to tell me what’s happened?”
I shook my head, then told her anyway. It helped to unload about my feelings for Bennett—even if it was a little weird telling his mother. And I explained I would never get over my guilt in Coby’s death and that he wanted me to dispel him, and about being haunted—literally—by my dead aunt and the man who tried to kill me. “And all the kids at school. How am I supposed to keep them safe?”
“I don’t know,” she said, after a moment. “That all … sucks.”
Enough that I wanted to stuff my face with comfort food. She caught me eyeing the breakfast tray on the coffee table. A white coffee cup held the remains of frothy milk and espresso, and there was one half-eaten croissant and another whole one.
“Are you hungry?” Mrs. Stern asked, offering me the plate.
“A little.” I grabbed the croissant and took a perfect, flaky-buttery bite. “Oh, my God.”
She smiled. “I know. Anatole gives me two, because he knows I love them.”
“I’m sorry,” I said around a mouthful. “I stole your second one.”
“It’s better this way.” She ran a hand over her flat stomach.
Raised voices sounded in the hall; Natalie and Lukas were arguing over the bathroom. “It takes me five minutes to shower,” Lukas grumbled. “You can’t let me go in first?”
“Why should I?” Natalie said. “I was here first.”
“Because you take forty minutes to get each strand of hair perfect, then you stare at yourself in the mirror for an hour.”
“At least I don’t spend that long over the three-course breakfast Anatole makes me special every morning.”
“Why don’t we just shower together?” Lukas snapped. “That’s what you used to like.”
“Shut! Up!” Natalie said, venomously.
I looked at Mrs. Stern. “And I thought all the fake politeness was bad. Should I go talk to them?”
“No,” she said, standing. “I think that’s my job.”
She crossed to the door and leaned her head out. “Natalie, I just bought a shampoo that I’m not sure about. I’d love your opinion. Would you mind showering in our bathroom?”
Silence from the hallway.
“It’s Aveda,” Mrs. Stern tempted her.
“That would be wonderful,” Natalie said politely, and I watched her sashay past the office door on her way to their bathroom.
“Thanks, Mrs. S,” Lukas called out before slamming the bathroom door.
I stood, shoving another bite of croissant in my mouth. “I should get ready for school.”
“Wait,” Mrs. Stern said. “Sit down.” She sat next to me and twisted her wedding ring in a circle around her finger. “I haven’t been fair to you, Emma. It took me a long time to admit you weren’t responsible for Olivia’s death. And Bennett … well, I’d hoped your feelings for each other would fade, but they haven’t, and I see now that they won’t. His father and I made some unpopular choices ourselves.”
“Mr. Stern’s parents didn’t want him losing his ghostkeeping powers?”
“Nobody wanted him to lose his powers,” she said.
“Do you ever think you chose wrong?” I swallowed. “Does he?”
“I …” She glanced away, then turned back and clasped my hands. “You’ll never get over the guilt. But you’ll never get over the love, either.”
I walked to school with Natalie. She didn’t want to wait for Lukas to finish breakfast, so we’d started off together. It was snowing again, a light flurry that wasn’t supposed to amount to much. I buttoned my coat and draped myself in the faux-fur hood. I liked how peaceful it felt. The snow seemed to muffle the ambient noise of the world, though not the crunching of the peanut-butter toast Celeste had handed Natalie at the door.
“It’s good,” she said around a mouthful. “Want a bite?”
“No, thanks. I already had one of Mrs. Stern’s croissants.”
She raised an eyebrow, and I told her about our conversation. “What did she mean, ‘You’ll never get over the love’? Why couldn’t she just have said, ‘Yeah, it’s worth it’? Instead she leaves me totally confused about whether I want to feel guilty my whole life for stealing his powers or be miserable if I leave him, because I’ll never stop loving him.”
She crunched again. “Are you sure it’s his powers that are going to get stolen?”
“He’s super-good at taking powers now, Em. That’s part of what the Asarum does. What if he wants to take yours?” When I didn’t answer, she said, “Don’t pretend it never occurred to you.”
I shrugged. “He wouldn’t do that, not without asking me. He just wouldn’t.” I didn’t mention my vision on the football field.
“Not before he started taking the herb. He’s changed, Emma. Maybe he doesn’t feel the same anymore.”
“I don’t know what he’s planning, he won’t tell me. But I do know he loves me, and I’ll never stop loving him.”
“How do you know that?” Natalie asked. “How can you be so sure? You’re seventeen, Emma; you’ve only been together for a few months. What if he isn’t the one?”
I grew silent as we crossed the street toward school, the soft snow falling all around us.
Natalie stopped and looked at the sky, the snowflakes dotting her face. “I’m asking because … I think I’m really in love with Lukas.”
“Oh, Natalie.” I hugged her. “I’m sorry.”
“No,” she said, pulling back from me. “That’s just it. I do love him, but I don’t think it’s forever. Love’s weird that way, you know?”
“Yeah,” I agreed, but for different reasons. “Love’s weird.”
What I didn’t say was that I didn’t know why—maybe it was “destiny,” or maybe it was something stronger and more ordinary—but I knew Bennett and I were forever. Now I just had to figure out if I could live with taking all his powers. Or, if Natalie was right, with him taking mine.
We found Harry at the gates, buttoned up in his long black wool coat, brooding at his Droid. He looked up as we approached. “Natalie, vos es decorus.b Emma, you look like your dog died.” He frowned. “Would it come back as a ghost?”
“I don’t have a dog,” I said repressively.
“In theory?” he asked.
“In theory,” I answered, “this conversation sucks.”
“Ignore her,” Natalie told him. “She’s grumpy about the never-ending saga of her and Bennett.”
“Natalie!” I said. Did she have to share everything?
“What?” she asked. “Is that a secret?”
“No.” I sighed. “I just want this to be over.”
“You mean the thing with Bennett,” Harry said slyly, no doubt trying to get a rise out of me.
“No. I mean Neos.” It was true—it was time for me to end it, whatever it meant for me and Bennett. I’d allowed it to go on far too long.
In Latin class, I made a list of all the places we hadn’t searched yet—or hadn’t searched well enough. I actually wrote it in Latin, so if questioned by Mr. Z, I could say I was running vocab. Except in the end, the list looked more or less like: everywhere.
I planned to do a little brainstorming during Advanced Bio, trying to narrow down the location from the other direction—who’d brought the ashes to Thatcher, and where would they have put them? But thoughts about what I was going to do to Neos when I did find him kept creeping in. Yeah, I wanted this to be over, but the final confrontation was bound to be ugly and bloody—I wasn’t sure I was ready for that.
And today’s assignment didn’t help: dissecting a sheep’s heart.
Really? I said to the universe. I’m trying to track down a ghostly killer and you’re tossing me a sheep’s heart?
In typical Thatcher fashion, the bio lab looked more like a high-tech kitchen than a high school science classroom. There were four counters made of stainless steel with square sinks cut into them, and I stood at one with my three lab partners, waiting for one of the guys to start cutting.
Instead, they both stood there making dumb jokes while the other girl nibbled her lower lip.
“Oh, give me the knife,” I said.
I took the scalpel, eyed the worksheet, and made the incision. Not nearly as bad as a wraith—the sheep’s heart didn’t ooze black oil or leap up from the table to attack me. My partners took notes as I made the cuts and peeled back the flaps of flesh. When we got to the center, even the other girl was totally hooked.
“Wow,” she said. “It’s almost beautiful.”
But I stepped back, dropping the scalpel in the sink. Because the cold, dead flesh suddenly reminded me of Neos, of tearing his tongue from his mouth to get the jade amulet. What kind of person does that? The same kind of person who coldly cuts into a sheep’s heart? I used to care. I used to worry about killing ghosts. Now I hardly even noticed, and I sliced into a sheep’s heart like slicing a loaf of bread.
“I’m done,” I said, and scrubbed my hands in the sink. Then I kept scrubbing, trying to wash away something deeper than the traces of sheep’s heart.
One of the guys watching me said, “Who would’ve thought the old man had so much blood in him?”
My heartbeat spiked. This kid knew about Neos? Was he possessed? I spun on him and hissed, “What did you say?”
He stepped back in alarm. “Nothing! Nothing, it’s a quote from Macbeth.”
I exhaled. “Shakespeare?”
“Yeah, you were scrubbing your hands like Lady Macbeth after she forces her husband to kill the king. Chill out. It was only a joke.”
I ignored him and wrote down my observations, but he was right. I was on edge. Even more than usual. I felt something coming, something cold and hard and big as a freight train, hurtling toward us from the darkness.
I stared at the scalpel in the bottom of the sink. Was I going to have to cut into Neos’s heart before this all ended? How much blood would there be then?