Haunted Heroine

by Sarah Kuhn

  “Excuse me, what?” Aveda blurted out. “You ‘don’t believe’? Don’t you run this group?”

  “I was trying to be courteous,” Leonora said, her gaze like ice. “But if you’d like me to be more direct, I will. You are not invited to join our society. If you try to infiltrate one of our meetings again, you will be dismissed. Or removed.”

  “Whoa.” I held up my hands in what I hoped was a placating manner. “Why the sudden hostility? We really want to learn more about all of this, to—”

  “I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” Leonora said, waving a hand. “And I would like it if you’d leave now.”

  “Now, hold on,” Aveda said. “You’re not the only person who belongs to this society. Why not put it to a vote?”

  “Oooh, yeah!” Tess piped up. Leonora sent them another admonishing look.

  “There is no vote,” Leonora said, standing up. The other members followed suit. “Please leave.”

  Aveda looked like she was just itching to start a fight, her fingers curling tightly around her notebook. I kind of was too, but I had a sneaking suspicion we weren’t going to win. Something had turned Leonora against us. I had no idea what it was, but it had come on so suddenly . . .

  We needed to regroup, talk this through, figure it out. I laid a hand on Aveda’s arm and gave her a look—not now. Let’s get out of here.

  “We appreciate your hospitality,” I said, pasting yet another big smile onto my face and motioning for Aveda and Shelby to stand with me.

  We got to our feet and exited silently, but I could feel Leonora’s eyes boring into my back even as the door clicked shut behind us.

  “What a waste of time,” Aveda growled, stomping toward the staircase.

  I was just about to follow her when the door opened a crack, revealing Tess’s bespectacled face.

  “Hey,” they whispered. “If you really want to learn more about the ghosts—come to the Halloween hauntings ghost crawl tomorrow. Midnight, meet outside Morgan Hall. Don’t tell anyone I told you about it, okay?”

  “Tess—” I began.

  “I can’t talk right now!” they hissed.

  The door clicked shut before we could respond.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  “WHAT THE HELL was that?” Aveda wrapped her arms around herself, stomping her feet to keep warm. “And why did I let you talk me into standing out in the freezing cold again?”

  “Maybe you should talk yourself into wearing an unfashionable puffy jacket,” I shot back.

  I gazed out into the endless velvet starscape. I’d convinced Aveda to come up to the Mara Dash roof with me to talk through what had happened in the ghost-hunting society meeting. I’d also texted Tess, trying to get more insight into what had just gone down, but they weren’t responding.

  Shelby hadn’t said anything on the walk back, either, hadn’t offered any insight into why she’d clammed up and started shooting Leonora death glares—I’d tried to gently ask her about it, but she’d brushed off my questions. Then she’d mumbled good-bye to us and gone back to her room. I’d really wanted to hug her, but she’d seemed closed off, lost in her own thoughts.

  I was also wrapped up in my thoughts, the story of Ghost Victoria winding through my brain on an endless loop.

  “I guess after hearing about Victoria, I feel connected to her in a weird way,” I said. “I can’t get her story out of my head. And I thought coming up here might help us put ourselves in her shoes, to really feel what she was feeling right before she plunged to her death.”

  “She was probably thinking, ‘Why is my supposed true love trying to fucking poison me?’” Aveda snorted. “It’s not that deep, Evie.”

  “Maybe not.” I leaned against the heavy stone ledge that surrounded the rooftop area. It was so blissfully quiet up here, I could actually hear myself think. The Mara Dash rooftop was another oddly shaped piece of the dorm—sort of like a rhombus. The ground was hard cement and the whole thing was surrounded by that ledge, perhaps to prevent more deadly falls. And the view was simply stunning, all eucalyptus treetops and the idyllic green of campus. A lot of that was shrouded in darkness right now, but it still felt peaceful.

  And the library build site that kept freaking me out was blessedly out of view.

  “But we’re in agreement that something’s weird about Leonora, right?” I continued. “I can’t figure out why she just turned on us like that. Except that there seemed to be some weird tension between her and Shelby—but even that was mostly on Shelby’s side.”

  “Perhaps she could tell we weren’t ready to pledge our undying loyalty to her and to obey her every word,” Aveda said.

  “She does have total cult leader vibes,” I mused. “And somehow she’s got all those kids under her spell, afraid to do anything without her say-so. Tess was the only one who pushed back, but even they seem weirdly cowed by Leonora. And what’s up with this mysterious ex-member who was kicked out? You could just feel that there were things they weren’t telling us.”

  “Maybe that’s part of their schtick,” Aveda said. “So should we go on this Halloween hauntings crawl or do you think it will be more of the same?”

  “And how will we go on it if we’ve been banned from the ghost-hunting society?” I said. “Ugh, I really wish Tess would text me back. I have so many questions for them.” I glared at my phone, willing Tess to respond. That didn’t work, of course, so I turned my attention back to the endless sky. “Hey, Annie,” I said slowly, my gaze wandering over the glittery constellations. “What we’re dealing with here—I mean, do you think it could actually be ghosts? Like, a whole new supernatural threat, entirely separate from our demon friends?”

  “Maybe,” Aveda said. She was also staring out at the sky, her face thoughtful. The sky was gloriously clear tonight, and there was something mesmerizing about all those stars, so beautiful against the peace of the Morgan campus. “It certainly doesn’t feel like anything we’ve encountered before—these spirits have so much history, and such specific stories attached to them.” She pulled her leather jacket more tightly around her, shivering against the chill. “You know, my parents have always been so superstitious. When I was a kid, they’d tell me stories about ancient Chinese ghosts who would haunt me if I misbehaved.”

  “Did you believe it?” I asked.

  “I always said I didn’t,” she said, smiling faintly. “My parents and I had such a contentious relationship, my first instinct was to disagree with them about basically everything. Very bad Asian daughter. But late at night, when I couldn’t sleep . . . well, whenever I heard a strange noise or anything like that, I’d get scared. And I’d try to talk myself out of being scared, but it was sort of like I was getting scared just in case.” Her smile widened. “Just in case ghosts actually existed.”

  “Oh, man,” I said, returning her smile. “Don’t let that get out—‘Aveda Jupiter’s Scared of Ghosts, Actually,’ is not a headline that goes with your badass image.”

  “What about you?” she said, meeting my gaze. “Did you believe in ghosts—or do you now?”

  “Hmm.” I turned back to the darkness. “I’m not sure. On the one hand, there’s so much unexplained creepy shit in the world. On the other, we’ve been confronted with a certain kind of demon threat so much over the years, it’s hard to imagine some all-new supernatural thing coming for us now. Like, what’s next? Vampires? Werewolves? What else is lurking in the shadows out there?”

  “But if it is our usual demon friends behind this business, what are they after?” Aveda said. “Why terrorize a fairly benign-seeming college, what does that get them? And these spirits aren’t really doing anything outside of scaring people and causing some light property damage and . . . I guess making people be super honest about their desires via spiked punch?”

  “I keep coming back to what the society members said about passing over,” I said
, turning it over in my mind. “Could it be that all of the spirits that have passively haunted this place for years got fed up and decided to be less passive about it? That they’re ready to freaking pass over already, and sick of not getting any help from the college’s current inhabitants?”

  “I could see that.” Aveda nodded. “Especially since any ‘help’ they’re getting comes from society members standing around and taking notes and not actually doing anything.”

  “But it sounds like they used to do things,” I said. “Tess seems eager to continue in that vein, but Leonora won’t let them.”

  “Maybe it will help to see the society in action, then,” Aveda said.

  “Yeah, if nothing else, I’m curious about what they actually do on this ghost crawl,” I said, just as my phone buzzed against my hip. I pulled it out of my pocket and saw that it was Bea calling.

  “Hey, Baby Sis,” I said, hitting answer. “What’s happening?”

  “Just your favoritest ever sibling, calling with super important and hard-hitting news!” she exclaimed, giving me a toothy grin. “Why are you guys in the dark?”

  “Excellent question,” Aveda muttered, giving me a look. I ignored her.

  “We’re getting some fresh air after our very first ghost-hunting society meeting,” I said. “Which I can tell you about in great detail later, but please share this hard-hitting news.”

  “Well, first of all: your punch was totes supernaturally spiked,” Bea said. “Scott told you they detected some chaotic supernatural energy, yes? He and Nate did some more in-depth analyses of it and they discovered that it contains an extra component that was definitely added magically—like, whoever did this didn’t just dump something in there, it was enspelled. And this spell makes humans feel like they need to say whatever’s in their heads out loud—like they’ll probably die if they don’t.”

  “So it was like truth serum,” Aveda grumbled. “Lovely.”

  “We still can’t determine the origin of the energy, though,” Bea said, twisting a purple lock around her finger and screwing her face up. “But it’s not like anything we’ve seen before. So maybe this is something new.”

  “Like, ghosts are actually real, is that what you’re saying?” Aveda said, her brows drawing together. “Because if so, I might have to apologize to my parents all these years later for not believing them. Did they get anything more off the bracelet?”

  “That energy gave us a code—and again, it’s not like anything we’ve seen before. It’s just this rando sequence of numbers.” Bea hesitated, her eyes widening. “Evie, you didn’t ask why I’m the one telling you all of this—you know, instead of Nate.”

  “I’m pretty sure I know why,” I said, trying to shove aside the weight that seemed to have permanently settled in my heart. “I don’t think we’re speaking right now. And no, I don’t want to talk about it. But don’t worry, Bea, I’ll fix it.”

  I manufactured a smile. I had no idea how I was going to fix it, especially with all the other stuff going on. But Bea had a special bond with Nate—he was like a big brother, an uncle. Something she’d never had since all she’d really had was me. His unwavering love for her, the way he encouraged her to pursue her passions and truly appreciated all the things her giant brain could do . . . it was just another thing that made me adore him. And I didn’t want her to see just how deep our problems went at the moment. I swallowed hard, ordering my tears (which were way, way too frequent these days) to stay put.

  “No worries,” Bea said, a little too quickly. “I mean, okay, I should say I’m not worried about you and Nate as a unit. But I am worried about you, Big Sis. Is this ghost investigation on top of the pregnancy stressing you out?” She leaned in so close to the camera that she was nothing more than a giant eyeball ringed with thick black liner. “Do you need me to come home?”

  “No,” I said quickly. “Of course not. You’re out there finding yourself away from the fam and I applaud you making space for your own personal growth.”

  “Wow,” Aveda said. “Those joint therapy sessions are really paying off.”

  “Although,” I continued, “it’s kinda interesting that you’re thousands of miles away and somehow more involved in the family business than ever. I mean, you’re still doing all this research and you’re currently seeing Lucy more than we are.”

  “We can talk about that in the next joint therapy session,” Bea said, pulling back so we could see her whole face again. “Like I said, I am totes fascinated by all this ghostly stuff, and I want to help you guys out. And on that topic, here’s the real news.” Her grin widened and she paused, giving us an extra theatrical look.

  “Come on, Beatrice, spit it out,” Aveda said, making a “go on” gesture. “We’re freezing our asses off, dead-ending on leads, and trying to figure out how one prepares for a ghost crawl. Don’t hold out on us—this better be good.”

  “Oh, it is,” Bea said, clearly relishing every word. She took a deep breath and gave us another huge grin. “I found Julie Vũ.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “TESS!” I KNOCKED insistently on their door. I was trying not to make a huge ruckus and wake everybody up, but I also needed them to answer. “It’s an emergency!”

  “We found Julie!” Aveda yelled, not bothering to keep her voice down.

  “Hey!” I hissed, glaring at her. “We need to work up to that information, we can’t just bombard them with it right away—”

  “We can if they’re not opening the door,” Aveda said, glaring right back at me.

  “That might make them not want to open the door even more—”

  I was cut off by Tess opening the door.

  We both swiveled to look at them. They had changed into pajamas, but they didn’t look at all rested. Their eyes were bloodshot, their tuft of pink curls a rumpled mess.

  “Where?” they said, their eyes widening with urgency. “Where is she?”

  “She’s in a hospital,” I said, repeating what Bea had told us. “And we think she’s mostly okay,” I added hastily, as Tess’s face paled.

  “Oh,” they said, their expression turning alarmed. “Oh god . . . I knew it. I knew she just had to . . .” They trailed off, shaking their head vehemently.

  After she’d gotten nowhere calling Bay Area hospitals, Bea had gotten the brilliant idea to look at things from the other direction. Instead of trying to track down Julie Vũ, she looked up students who had been in other accidents where the college might be liable—in those cases, if the student didn’t have a preferred facility listed on their intake form, they were all sent to the same hospital, a small, out-of-the-way facility crammed into the backwoods of Alameda, a picturesque town located on an Oakland-adjacent island, just across one of the Bay Area’s many bridges. This particular facility was so tucked away, it hadn’t been on Bea’s radar.

  “Then I called that hospital, pretended to be a distraught friend of Julie’s, and asked to talk to her,” Bea had explained triumphantly. “I finally convinced them to pass me over to her sister.”

  “And her sister spilled everything?” I’d said hopefully.

  “Nope, she hung up on me,” Bea chirped. “But now we know that Julie’s there for sure.”

  I had suggested to Aveda that we go to the hospital, try to speak to Julie’s sister in person. See if she’d let us talk to Julie. And if she wouldn’t, well. We’d figure out a way. I’d thought of bringing Tess along because maybe we could get some answers out of them about the ghost-hunting society. I was starting to put some pieces together, little bits of information coalescing in my brain.

  And I had a hunch Tess knew way more about the Julie situation than they were letting on.

  Also, Tess seemed to be Julie’s only friend—seeing each other might do them both a world of good.

  “We’re going to her,” I urged, laying what I hoped was a comforting hand on
their shoulder. “There’s some stuff we want to talk to you about, and we thought you could come along. I know you’ve been looking for Julie, too.”

  Tess hesitated, their gaze flicking from Aveda to me and back again. Conflict brewed in their eyes—they were at war with themselves about something. They studied us both for a long, weighted moment, silence descending over us.

  Then finally, something in their eyes resolved, as if they’d made a decision that was a long time coming.

  “Okay,” they said, nodding firmly. “Let’s go.”

  Tess grabbed a stocking cap and a puffy jacket, and stuffed their feet into fluffy Ugg boots, growing more decisive with each motion. They didn’t bother to change out of their pajamas, just threw the coat on over them.

  “I’m ready,” they said, putting their hands on their hips—as if steeling themselves for battle.

  “Wow, Tess,” I said admiringly. “You really do look like a warrior.”

  “I kinda feel like one,” they admitted, falling out of their pose. “But I’m sure Leonora would disagree.”

  “Fuck Leonora,” Aveda said with feeling.

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Tess said, their face turning grim. “Let’s go find Julie.”

  * * *

  Tess was silent in the backseat as Aveda drove us through the darkened streets of Oakland. It was very late, nearly three a.m. In just a few hours, the sun would start to poke through—but for now, the pitch-black darkness felt appropriate for our mission.

  My gaze slid to the side, trying to communicate wordlessly with Aveda. We couldn’t tell Tess everything Bea had relayed to us, but if the hunch I was developing was correct . . . they might know some of it already.

  “Hey, Tess,” I said, keeping my tone soft and gentle. “What did you mean earlier, when you said you knew Julie ‘had to’ do something? What was it?”