“I still don’t understand what is going on here,” Brian said. “Why now? Where have these guys been all these years? Even if we weren’t trained to watch out for Red Magic, I can’t believe that they never showed up on our radar.”
“They didn’t have magic until two months ago,” I said.
“What?” Brian asked, flipping on his turn signal about a block before we needed to hang a left. I had also noticed that he was driving about two miles under the speed limit, no doubt being extra careful because we were seven people and one dog in a car built for four. “How did they get magic two months ago?”
“They stole it from me,” Circe said.
A beat passed. “Oh,” Brian said. He pulled to a stop at a yellow light, and I stifled a groan. I understood that Brian didn’t want to get pulled over, but this was getting ridiculous.
“Brian, you have to go faster,” I said.
“I am going as fast as I can,” he replied, which was patently untrue.
I turned back to Circe. “So, if we can just steal the talismans back, will their powers go away?”
“Not necessarily,” she said. “Judging by the number, and the intensity, of spells they’ve cast so far, I think the talismans are probably about to run out. However, there’s always a possibility that the guys have figured out how to make new talismans. We’ll have to completely strip them of all magic. Your mother and I learned the ritual. We were planning to use it on Erebus, but then we never got the chance.”
“You remember what you need for it, though?” I asked, and she nodded. “Brian, do you have paper and a pen?”
“Yes,” he said. “In the glove compartment.” Circe popped it open, and out fell a stack of parking tickets.
“Brian!” I said, shocked. “I never figured you for the type!”
“I have a friend at city hall who takes care of them,” he said, then cleared his throat. “Being head football coach does have a few, small privileges in this town, and I figure I might as well use them.”
I turned toward Circe, who was already using the back of one of the tickets to write out a list. “Okay, so here’s what we’re going to do,” I started. “You guys are going to drop Circe and me at the band’s house so we can see if we can find Cassandra, Ruby, and Mallory. Then you guys take these three to round up these ingredients.”
Brian nodded, and Adrian looked to the backseat and then back at me. “Do you think they can handle it?”
“It’s shopping,” I said. “These three could handle shopping in their sleep.”
“What about Pig?” Brian asked.
“She can wait in the car,” I said. “And, Brian?”
“Yes?”
“Can’t you drive any faster?”
I had been trying hard to stay calm, but I was beginning to freak out. Cassandra going dark on text? Completely on brand. Cassandra going MIA in the midst of a rescue mission for her own mother? Not like her at all. If she wasn’t letting us know where she was, it meant she couldn’t.
“There’s no way we can beat them back to their house,” Brian said. “Even if I drove like Janis. They had a huge head start. If they are going back to their house, they would have been there at least fifteen minutes ago.” We were approaching an intersection, and the light changed to yellow. Now I groaned out loud as Brian once again hit the brakes, bringing the Explorer to a stop instead of gunning it to speed through.
Suddenly Adrian grabbed my hand and squeezed my fingers so hard that my knuckles crushed together. “Unless they stopped on the way,” he said, his voice low and barely a whisper. Then he jerked his head toward the window. Brian, Circe, and I followed his eyes, straining to see what he was talking about.
And there it was, in the bright neon glow of a Sonic drive-in: a purple PT Cruiser, drum kit in the back and four losers in the front.
“No way,” I said.
“Way,” Circe said, and this time, when the light turned green, Brian gunned it, leaving the smell of burning rubber behind us.
I gave him directions, and Brian drove like a bottle rocket, careening around corners and blasting through yellow lights, and all the while the backseat sang along to “No Diggity” like they were high on Pixy Stix and on their way to a house party. No one even mentioned the S word. I thought my epic playlist was working. We all did.
Then we turned onto the band’s block.
“Hey,” Janis said, leaning forward and punching me in the shoulder, “I recognize this street.” Oh no, oh no, oh no. Then she squealed, “This is where Superfüd lives!”
Amirah pressed her nose against the window, Ji-A clapped, and Pig started to croon. Shoot me now. Or, don’t shoot me. Shoot them. Or shoot somebody. This was definitely one of those occasions when somebody needed to be shot.
Adrian leaned forward and turned down the music, and Brian slowed the car to a crawl. The block was dark and lit only by the moon, which was almost full. All of the streetlights seemed to be out, and I doubted that was a coincidence. We made one pass by the house, and then Brian stopped the Explorer down the street, next to the van.
“That’s Dion’s,” Circe said. “He spent so much time fixing it up.” It was like she was talking to herself, and for a second I wondered how she knew. Then I remembered that she’d said she’d been checking up on them. It seemed she’d kept a closer eye on her children than they, or anyone, had ever guessed.
Brian stopped the car, and Adrian hopped out, peered into the windows of the van, and then quickly came back. “It’s still empty,” he said. “And it hasn’t moved from when I was here before.”
“Lemme out, lemme out!” Ji-A cried. “I need to have Superfüd sign my dress!”
“Stay in the car,” I hissed at her. “That dress is Valentino, and no one is going anywhere near it with a Sharpie.”
“Esme, you’re so mean,” she said with a pout. “I don’t understand why you hate Superfüd so much.”
“I hate them because they kidnapped Cassandra’s mom, kidnapped me, and used a spell on all my friends,” I said. “I also hate them because they have a stupid name and they make bad music.”
“It’s like you don’t even have a good reason,” Ji-A responded, her voice sounding small and wounded. Brian looked at me, and we rolled our eyes in unison, a unified gesture that made me wonder if I was becoming more like him or if he was becoming more like me. Neither was a welcome thought.
“Okay,” I said, “Circe and I will go look for Cassandra and the others.” I turned and addressed Janis personally. “Janis, we would be remiss in showing Amirah and Ji-A a good ole Spring River time if we did not take them on at least one late-night Target run.”
“Oooh,” Janis said eagerly. “I love Target. It’s a whole vibe.”
“I know,” I said, nodding vigorously, “and Circe put together a list of things that Superfüd likes. It’s their rider for the after-party, so we need you guys to go get everything on the list and then bring it here. And hurry.” I passed the list back to Janis, and she started reading it.
“Greek yogurt, calamine lotion, lavender oil, sleep masks, a mouse skull…” Her head jerked up sharply, and she narrowed her eyes at me. “What kind of after-party are you planning for them?”
“Think of it as a little going-away thing,” I said.
“Target does not have mouse skulls,” she said, raising an eyebrow. “At least not this time of year.”
“I know where we can get one,” Adrian said, making us both look at him.
“Okay,” I said, smiling. “Have fun, and see you soon!” Then Circe and I climbed out of the car. I realized I’d left my phone in the car when I could hear strains of “Wonderwall” drift out the window as they turned the corner and drove away.
Circe and I turned and started toward Superfüd’s house. If their neighbors had been barbecuing earlier, there was no sign of it
now. In fact, the whole street seemed dead. We were still a few houses away when Circe stopped suddenly.
“Do you feel that?” she said, and I did. There was something in the air that made my jaw tighten and my fists clench. I felt hot, but cold, breaking out simultaneously in beads of sweat and goose bumps. The spells that Superfüd had cast on their house were now screaming. I started to rub my arms, trying to keep them warm, but touching my own skin made me start to itch. My gums had that swollen, just-flossed feeling, and I had to fight the urge to pick at my cuticles.
By the time we were standing in Superfüd’s yard, it was unbearable. My skin felt like it was on fire, and there was a high-pitched shriek in my ears. I had trouble concentrating and had to fully focus to even get a sentence out.
“Wh-what is g-going on?” I asked, stuttered. I tried to clamp my hands over my ears, but that didn’t help at all.
“The protection spells know they’ve been violated,” Circe said. “They’re on the attack now.” I nodded and started to follow her. I felt like a skeleton, each step making my bones knock together, and the shrieking wouldn’t stop. It felt like my body was going to vibrate apart from the inside out. We made it a few yards before we triggered the motion lights. I clamped my eyes shut against the blinding brightness of the lights. The Red Magic was overwhelming. If Cassandra and the others were still here, how could they stand it?
I opened my eyes, squinting to see that Circe was in front of me, and she was talking, but her voice sounded like an echo coming to me from a million miles away. I tried to look at her, but her face swam in my vision, all of her features rearranging themselves. “Focus, Esme. Focus.” Her words finally made it to my brain, and I could feel her hands on my arms, moving me around like I was a bendable doll. “We need to turn these lights out now.” She held my arms in front of me, and flexed my wrists. “Oscurokinesis,” she said, but nothing happened.
“Crap, crap, crap,” she said, starting to dig in her pocket. “Where’s your purse?” All I could do was shake my head. “Take this,” she said, pressing something small and soft into my hand. “Put it in your shoe or in your bra, someplace where you won’t drop it.” I looked down. It was a tiny pink bear, a Beanie Baby key chain, and as I looked at it, I felt like myself again.
“It’s the last Red Magic I’ve got,” Circe said. “The band overlooked it. It’s not very powerful, but it should at least make it so you can stand to be here.”
I nodded, and shoved it down my dress and into my bra, giving myself one lumpy boob that was significantly bigger than the other. The shrieking died down, until it was a tolerable buzz, and my burning skin soothed. The lights were still too bright, but in an ordinary and not supernatural way. I raised my hands on my own now, pointed my palms at the lights, and repeated the spell. We were instantly plunged back into the darkness. I took a few gulps of cool, fresh air.
“The talisman should give you some immunity,” she said. “The Red Magic is reacting with your Sitter magic, so you feel it more than I do. We have to hurry, though, because if Cassandra and the other girls are in the house, the Red Magic is probably unbearable for them.”
I nodded, then kept nodding. “The talisman’s working!” I said. “And it’s not just that the spells aren’t bothering me. I feel great.” Circe was quiet. I tried to look at her but couldn’t read the expression on her face in the dark.
We were close enough to the house now to step onto the porch. I was still aware of the Red Magic and could tell that it was popping and fizzing and felt like it was going to explode, but it didn’t affect me as much. I tried to look in the door, but could see nothing, and the large tapestry still covered the front window completely. With Circe close behind me, I crept back off the porch and around to the side of the house.
The cold February air moved around us, smelling like cold concrete and slush piles. Except for the sound of the frozen, dead grass crunching under our feet, and the bare tree branches rubbing against each other, the night was silent. I could hear Circe’s breathing behind me. As soon as this was over, I was going to have to talk to her and find out more about this talisman. I felt like running a race, or maybe just busting out in a dance routine. I wanted to talk to my friends, all of them, right now, because I was the most charming person I had ever met, and I was sure that wherever my friends were right now, they missed me.
“What we should really do,” I whispered to Circe, “is just push that PT Cruiser off a cliff, with all of them in it. Too bad we’re in Kansas and I don’t know where there are any cliffs, but I bet an overpass would do, especially if we could make sure that the purple pustule landed on its roof.” I chuckled, as I was pretty pleased with myself for coming up with the phrase “purple pustule” on the spot right then.
“Esme,” Circe said, completely missing the poetry of my words, her voice dripping with parent, “those guys are going to be back any minute, and we need to find Cassandra and the other girls so that we can get them out of here and away from this.”
“Sure, sure,” I said, nodding and reminding myself to focus, focus, focus. We finished crunching around the side of the house, and I was totally focused on the task at hand, and was wondering if Amirah and Ji-A would be willing to trade all of the clothes that they’d brought with them for one Superfüd T-shirt. We were at the band’s house, after all, so I could probably just steal one, and then give it to Amirah and she’d be so grateful to get rid of that YSL dress that she seemed to hate, and I would wear it and love it like it deserved to be worn and…
We turned around to the back of the house, and I stopped dead in my tracks at the sight of a white billowing “Ghost!” my brain mentally shrieked at first, equal parts terrified and thrilled, since I had always been somewhat offended by the fact that I, of all people, had never seen a ghost. But it wasn’t a ghost. It was a curtain, or rather a sheet being used as a curtain, sneaking out into the night through an open window. A broken window.
So much for sneaking in, I thought. “Cassandra,” I said to Circe, and she nodded. “But if they climbed in to get in, why can’t they just climb out?”
“That might just be it,” she said. “Maybe they can’t get out.”
“Okay,” I said. “Then I’ll just go in.” I held up my palm toward the window and broke the rest of the glass off the bottom of the pane. As soon as I did it, the shrieking in my head made a little woomba-woomba-woomba sound. “Ooooh,” I said, turning to Circe, “it didn’t like that.” I wiggled my eyebrows. “It’s mad.” I turned back to the window and now flicked the last remaining piece of glass with the tip of my finger. It made a light tinkle as it hit the frame, and the shrieking quivered again. I giggled. “I’ll be right back.” I turned and was starting to climb through the window, when Circe grabbed me.
“Esme, listen to me,” she said, turning me around to face her. “Look me in the eyes as I am speaking,” she said. “Do not look away from my eyes.” I did as she said, and for a second, it felt like I was staring at Cassandra. The same dark brown irises, laced with fire someplace deep inside.
“Okay,” I said.
“The talisman will keep you from being overwhelmed by the Red Magic because it is Red Magic,” she said. “It will protect you and make you more powerful, but it will also make you forget what and who you really are. So listen to me when I say this: Your power comes from being a Sitter. It comes from your heart. Your biggest power is that you care, and that makes you vulnerable, because anyone who cares about anything or anyone other than themselves is going to be vulnerable. Red Magic makes you feel invincible because it makes you not care about anything but yourself. And no matter how powerful you are, if you don’t care, you’re never going to be able to help your friends. My daughter. So, when you go in that window, don’t forget who you are. Don’t get distracted.” I nodded. “And hurry.”
She let me go, and I turned around and climbed in. The inside of the house wa
s even darker than it had been outside, not even a glowing clock. I stood still for a minute to get my bearings. I was in someone’s bedroom. Two someones’ bedroom, it looked like, since there were bunk beds. For grown men. Whatever.
The bedroom was empty, so I moved on, out into the hallway. Even with Circe’s talisman, it felt like I was moving through chaos and static. “Focus, Esme, focus,” I told myself. I took small steps, feeling around as I walked, and came to an abrupt halt when my foot hit something on the floor. Something soft. I started to step over it, but realized that it was bigger than I thought. It wasn’t a piece of clothing or a stuffed animal (which wouldn’t have surprised me, considering the bunk beds). Even though I was squeamish, my Sitter sense told me that I needed to know what it was, so I crouched down and put my fingers out to feel it. I reached forward in the darkness and felt my fingers find flesh. A foot. That was attached to a leg. That was attached to a person.
Oh my God. Their pant leg was hitched up, revealing a stretch of calf above their sock, and that was what I had first touched. I’d never felt a dead person before, but even so, I was pretty sure that this person didn’t feel dead. In fact, if I were very still, throughout all the frizzled energy in the house, I could hear them breathing. I worked my hands up the leg, feeling denim, and then the fuzz of a sweater, a furry knit with bits of metallic. It felt like a sweater I owned. It was my sweater. It was Mallory. I gasped.
She was lying facedown, and I grabbed her by the arm and shoulder and rolled her onto her back. Still not knowing who was in the house, I shook her and whispered her name. Then again. Nothing. I put my head down next to her face and could feel her warm breath on my cheek. She took long, slow breaths, like she was in a deep, deep sleep. “Mallory, we have to get out of here,” I said, trying to pull her to her feet, but her body was like a bag of sand. Crap. I could pick her up with my kinesis, but I was scared to use my powers, since there was no telling what they might trigger the Red Magic to do. Feeling panic, I looked around me, but could still just barely make out where walls ended and doors began.
Spells Like Teen Spirit Page 30
