by Shaye Easton
At recess, I decide to sit inside the school hall, out of the wet and away from the table perennially haunted by Lauren’s group—and now Sara as well. The corridor outside is almost deserted, only the occasional student buzzing up or down, in and out of the hall. Ahead of me, a gaggle of girls split the air with their high-pitched laughter. They turn into the hall, and their cacophony is washed into the white noise emanating from the rest of the student body.
But even in their absence, the corridor isn’t entirely empty, a student hovers around the hall entrance, pacing up and down. He finishes a lap and turns, eyes downward. He doesn’t see me until I’m almost at the entrance until he’s about to turn back around. But when he does, he stops, raises his head. Eyes tainted by fear. Caden.
“What’s wrong?”
“Have you seen them?”
I blink. “Seen who?”
He draws close, leading me over to the wall and away from any potential prying ears. “The watchers. They’re all over school.”
“Caden, you’re beginning to sound like a crazy person. What do you mean watchers?”
“You haven’t seen them then.”
“I saw the ghost in science.”
He shakes his head. “That’s not what I mean. There are people here. Underwalkers.”
A wave of dizziness washes over me. “Under—”
I’m falling before I can stop myself. My heart spikes as I lose control of my body and my sight goes dark. I’m conscious for a moment of strong arms breaking my fall, of a gust of wind mussing up my hair, and then there’s only darkness.
Darkness and a vision arising as light from the depths of my mind. An angel ready to take me to another place or maybe it’s a not an angel, but a demon, dragging me somewhere violent and horrific. Because when I emerge into the vision, it’s all just chaos. It’s flashing lights and bodies churning the fragmented dark. It’s a pounding bass and the heady stench of cigarettes and beer.
It’s a party. I’m easing through the throng and faces are becoming familiar: kids from class, peers I’ve seen in passing. I recognise Cooper and Evan, chatting with cans in their hands, eyes surveying the room.
The vision takes me out, into the dark backyard, where even more people have spilled out onto the lawn like an infestation, like a tipsy, meandering fire spreading from the house and out into the neighbourhood. There’s Lauren, chatting with Kira. There’s Sara, sitting on an upside down milk tray, half-done with a cigarette, smoke billowing from her mouth and floating like a spirit to the sky.
Behind them, an actual spirit, a ghost, emerging from the shadow of the cracked and peeling wooden fence. Kira done with her drink, steps back to toss the cup into the bushes by the fence, oblivious to the ghost. Lauren shouts, “I’m getting us more drinks!” and heads for the house. Then the ghost started moving forward. Growing closer and passing Kira. It’s heading for Sara. Its eyes are smouldering dark, burning with black fire. It’s not stopping.
I gasp, launching straight out of my vision, straight out of the dark, straight up off the ground I’d been unconscious on.
Caden’s beside me in an instant. I’m still foggy. I don’t know where we are. All I can see are those flashing lights, the puff of smoke, the eyes of the ghost, burning, burning—burning a permanent mark on my retinas. “Melissa? What did you see?”
I see a worn blue and brown carpet. Desks with the chairs left untucked. Three wide windows allowing dim light to soak the room. There’s a ringing in my ears and it won’t go away.
“I—”
Someone bounds into the room, flinging the door open, the doorknob smacking against the wall. There’s two of them, both wearing smiles too big for their faces. The second laughs, yells, “Seriously, she’s such a bitch!”
The first one’s expression crumples. “Oh,” she says. She’s seen us.
The second girl sees us too, and the laughter dies in her throat.
And now the ringing makes sense. It’s the end of lunch. It’s the bell.
“Let’s go,” Caden says. He keeps a steadying hand on my forearm as I rise to my feet. We get out of there, and it’s only a few corridors to my locker where I hurriedly collect my things, fumbling with my textbooks, trying not to think about black burning eyes. Trying not to think about the party—a party I’m sure I was invited to by Kira just yesterday, a party set to happen tonight. Caden watches me concernedly, holding his own books in one hand by his hip. I smash my locker shut, earning more than a few turned heads from passing students.
“Do you want to tell me what you saw?”
There’re people everywhere, bundled up in puffy jackets and coats, their necks lost to thick scarves, their hands to gloves. All this extra fabric makes the hallways look smaller, more closed in, like we’re all a bunch of jumpers packed tightly into one drawer.
“Here?” I ask dubiously.
Caden shoots a look at the passing crowds and says, “You’re right. After school.”
We let ourselves get swept up in the masses and eventually make it across the campus. The hallways are sparsely populated at the last corridor, heading up the final set of stairs on the way to English class. Over the lip of the stairs, we see a girl with her back at us, head down, standing dead still in the middle of the walkway.
We step up onto the landing and stop. She turns around. Her face is pale as ash, her blonde hair is falling into her eyes: eyes wide, frightened and shiny with unshed tears. She’s a startled deer all too aware that it’s being hunted. Her nose is bleeding, the scarlet trail glittering over her lip.
“It’s here,” Sara gasps.
Then she collapses to the floor.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
There are two main responses in an emergency. Some people see the danger falling like a shadow and rush towards it, the fear waking up their hearts, pumping their bones with adrenaline. In the moment, all thought ceases to exist—they’re ruled by motion, by instincts, by the deep desire to stop the danger in its tracks.
This is Caden. Before Sara even hits the floor, he’s running, legs devouring the space between them. He barely knows her. All he’s heard are the stories—the rumours in school, the things I’ve said about her character, the word of the Ring informing him she’s in my body and I’m in hers. But he doesn’t hesitate. He races for the shadow of danger, hanging over Sara like a cloak.
Then there’s the second response: the people who see the shadow and wait, frozen, for it to swallow them whole.
This is me, stuck at the end of the hallway. My life seizing up and crashing down on top of me. Fear enters my heart and shuts it down, turns my bones to lead and my skin to ash. I may not like Sara, but I don’t hate her. We’re connected. We’ll be tied together until the day we return to our original skins or until death. If one of us goes, she’ll drag the other down with her. I may not like Sara, but I definitely don’t want her to get hurt.
Or to be bloody-nosed and collapsing in the middle of a hallway, a breathy warning escaping from her throat.
Caden reaches her side, says her name. She doesn’t respond. He wraps two fingers in the sleeve of his shirt and places them to her neck, just below her jaw. I hold my breath.
A moment later, all the tension visibly leaves him, his shoulders slumping, his hand sliding away. He looks back at me. “She’s alive.”
I let out a loud, shaky breath. My heart is a drum beating in my ears as I approach, unable to look away from the girl on the floor, a slender crimson stain dragged by gravity down her cheek.
“We can’t leave her here.”
I nod, my head bobbing up and down way longer than necessary. It’s still bobbing as I say, “I can—I can grab a teacher, or—”
“No,” Caden interjects, “we need to get her to Rand. He’ll know what to do.” He meets my eyes. “or who to contact.”
I swallow. “Kathryn.” I still haven’t told him about yesterday afternoon. He doesn’t know anything about the blood Sara coughed up in class or my encounter wit
h Kathryn as she drove Sara from school.
I’m about to tell him when there’s a sharp intake of breath beside Caden, followed by a bout of rough coughing. I stare, immobile, as Sara reawakens as if resurrected from the dead.
“Sara?” Caden asks. Her eyes have sprung wide open but they remain fixed on the ceiling. When he waves a finger back and forth in front of them, her pupils are unresponsive.
I kneel next to her. “Sara, can you hear us? Are you okay?”
She’s stopped coughing. Still, there’s no reply. Not even a hint of awareness. She’s like a shell of a person. A body without a soul.
Caden shakes his head, the skin puckering between his dark brows. “We have to get her up. Rand needs to see this.”
“This? She’s a person, Caden, not a supernatural anomaly.”
“She’s also wearing your body. And I don’t like how she’s looking right now. For all we know, if we don’t get her to someone with the right skill set, she could die.”
I sigh. He’s right. We can’t let anything happen to her. “I’ll take this side, then.”
I loop her arm over my shoulders and Caden does the same on her left. We pull her up to a stand and her feet and legs remain slack, dragging along behind her as we move forward, the rubber toes of her shoes making an uncomfortable squeaking on the polished vinyl flooring.
Halfway to the car park, she starts mumbling. It’s mostly indiscernible babbling, save the occasional, “It’s here,” repeating over and over again like her speech has malfunctioned.
We reach the final hallway, a straight shoot to the exit. “God, she’s burning hot,” Caden says, and I notice a line of sweat at his hairline. “Her skin must be on fire; it’s heating up her clothes.”
“I didn’t notice.”
He lets out a laugh of self-pity. “Of course not.”
Outside the sun has shot through the clouds. I pretend like I can feel the heat of it on my skin. I try to imagine its warm caress but mostly I just squint. My eyes unfamiliar with the glare after months of dull light smothering the town like a grey fog.
We’re almost at the parking lot when Caden says, his voice urgent, “Melissa, whatever you do, don’t stop moving.”
I flash him a look of confusion. “Why do you say that?”
“Do you remember what I said earlier? About the underwalkers on school grounds?”
My stomach drops. “There’s one here, isn’t there?” I frantically sweep my gaze around us, eyes skipping over the tops of the cars, peering through the gaps in the school fence, scanning down the paths and roads. But I don’t see anyone.
“Just keep walking.”
My grip on Sara’s wrist slips momentarily and she sags against Caden, causing both our steps to falter. My heart launches into a fit as we come to a halt. Hands shaking, palms sweating, I hastily sling her arm back over my shoulders, ensuring I get a better hold this time. I still don’t see anyone around, but I’m almost positive I can feel eyes burning holes into my head, and they seem to come from all directions.
We make it to Caden’s car and he lies Sara down along the back seat. Then we’re off, speeding eagerly away from the school, putting distance between us and whoever was watching us.
We haven’t gone far when there’s a rustling in the back seat. Sara groans, pulling herself up, blinking hard. “What . . . what the hell?” her head turns from side to side, up and down, eyes taking in every patch of the scene before her. “What am I doing here?”
“You don’t remember anything?” I ask, half turned in my seat.
“No.” The word is curt, angry and confused. There’s an accusation in there somewhere, I swear it. “What happened?”
“You collapsed in the middle of school,” Caden says, eyes on the road. “Your nose was bleeding and you were burning with a fever. You kept mumbling, ‘It’s here,’ over and over. We had to practically drag you out of the building.”
“Why would you do that? Where are you taking me?”
“To someone who can help.”
Her eyes widen, her features adopting the expression of a panicked animal. “Are you kidding me? Let me out.”
“I can’t do that.”
She goes for the door handle but Caden already has it locked. She pulls on it, back and forth, back and forth, jiggling it and pounding against the door, ramming it with her shoulder. “Let me out now. This is kidnapping. I’ll call the police.”
“On what?” Caden slips a phone out of his pocket and holds it up like a trophy. It’s got a red case that says Bite me in white text. Sara makes a move for it but Caden swiftly pockets it, leaving her to claw at air. I stare incredulously. I didn’t even see him take it. “You’re not going anywhere until we know what’s wrong with you.”
“Nothing’s wrong with me! Jesus Christ, I’m fine!”
“No, you’re not. You’re unwell. And since Melissa’s life depends on your survival, you have no choice but to come with us.”
“You don’t understand. I’m not unwell!”
“Then what? Because something’s clearly going on with you.”
A growl of frustration tears from her throat. “It’s my equivalent of a heat surge, okay?!”
This silences us.
“The fever, the bloody nose, the collapsing? It happens once a month. It’s how this body copes with a foreign soul.”
Caden is shaking his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. There’s only one reaction to being swapped and that’s heat surges. It doesn’t happen any other way.”
“It does if the process has been altered.”
“That’s unheard of.”
“Not anymore.”
Caden looks at her through the rearview mirror, frowning and deeply curious. “How?”
There’s a man on the side of the road, dressed in a dark jacket and jeans. As I watch, he calmly steps out in front of the car. “Caden,” I warn. “Caden, watch out!” He slams on the breaks. Sara yells. I squeeze my eyes shut.
The car jerks to a stop, throwing all of us forward. I feel a thump behind me as Sara crashes into the back of my seat. Then silence. We’ve come to a stop a few metres before the man, and now the world is filled with a before-and-after kind of silence. Our breathing loud, our hearts throbbing like painful wounds, our eyes latches onto the dark man before us.
A bird chirps in the distance and the breeze is blowing gently. He raises his arms. His large hand caressing or smothering the world. Caden’s squeezing the steering wheel, knuckles white as bone. I’m trying hard to get myself moving. Every animal instinct I possess urging me to run. But like time, I’m frozen, trapped in this endless moment as the man’s arm rises, his hand unfurling like a blooming flower to reveal his outward palm, and the bad feeling inside of me grows, pushing at my instincts, nudging me closer and closer towards an edge—an edge that borders this quiet, timeless world of shaky breaths and frozen muscles, and that, if I tip over, will launch me into the realm of chaos.
A light starts to form on the man’s palm, like the orange centre of a flower, like a bright bleeding eye in his hand. I’m conscious of Sara saying, “What is that?” but only barely. I can sense the gears turning in Caden’s mind, but only barely. And then suddenly, Caden’s shouting, “Everyone, get out! Get out!” and he’s jumped over that edge. He throws open the driver’s side door and chaos takes hold. My instincts taking over. I yank off my seatbelt and burst out the door. I don’t have time to make sure Sara escapes. I don’t have time to see how far Caden gets away from the car. I don’t even have time to think. I leap.
And then the world seems to explode around me. There’s a pressure at my back, a burning light in my eyes. The sound of a hundred bombs detonating fills my ears. It’s raining, and the rain cuts into my skin, digging to the bone. I slam into the wet road, the concrete tearing my clothes, biting my body, finding available skin and slashing at it with razor-sharp teeth. I hit my head hard. My arm igniting in something akin to pain, and tumble across the tarmac.
&
nbsp; When I finally come to a stop, there’s a ringing in my ears and I can’t feel my arm. Breathing hard, I push myself up on my left hand, my right arm hanging limply by my side. Everything is blurry and hazy. My sight is full of fog. My eyes zoom in and out of focus. The ground is covered with fragments of glass and metal. Some of which are still on fire, tiny flames poking out of the asphalt like burning patches of grass. The car has been swallowed by flames: windows burst, paint blackened and peeling, metal burning red-hot. It hurts to look at it. It’s like staring at the sun.
I squint, searching the ground for signs of Caden, but I can’t see him anywhere. I can’t see anything except fire and metal and a burning, burning, burning car, and—
It’s then that I spot the dark shadowy figure approaching a pale lump on the floor. I strain my eyes until, through the smoke, I can make out a blonde hair, a singed and torn jacket, and a wide-eyed look of terror. Sara crawls backward as the stranger pursues her. Her back collides with the fence bordering a silent, empty house. She’s trapped, and they both know it. The man raises his arm once again, his flaming third eye lighting up her skin. His other eyes are dull and vacant; disinterested and distant. They’re glass orbs embedded in his dark, slender face. And I can’t be certain that there’s not anything behind them.
The light in his hand burns brighter, transforming into an orb of flame and smoke. Something deep inside me wakes, a part of my soul long forgotten. Without even thinking about it, I draw my left arm back and push forward, palm out. It’s all instinct. The air seems to explode; I feel it against my skin. The way it builds, drawing tight. The way it pops and shoots forward like a fired canon. It becomes a violent living thing, an invisible beast, a wild ghost. It launches at the man, fast as a bullet.
He’s flung forcefully to the ground, his body skidding down the rocky tarmac. I blink. My mind hurdles to keep up with my eyes. Did that just happen? I blink again. He’s still there, sprawled crookedly like a rag doll. He isn’t getting up.
