by Matthew Cody
Daniel wondered how long Mollie could keep up the fight. She had to be getting tired, and though she could fly to safety at any time, he knew she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t abandon Rohan. She would go down fighting. And so would Daniel.
There were two Shades stalking him, moving in to strike. Besides being smaller than the Shroud, these Shades possessed another, perhaps significant, difference. Daniel had noticed that the first Shade, in Herman’s study, lacked the green glowing heart of the Witch Fire meteor. Plunkett’s power came from the meteorite pendant he wore, which in his Shroud form burned brightly at his chest. Daniel had defeated him last time because he’d aimed for that heart and torn the pendant from the Shroud’s throat. But these Shades were solid black shadow; there were no hearts to target, at least nothing he could see. Whatever they were, Daniel didn’t think he’d be able to beat them the way he’d defeated Herman.
But maybe he wouldn’t have to. Daniel wasn’t the same ordinary boy he’d been the last time. For better or for worse, Daniel had changed.
The first Shade swiped at Daniel with a long, thin arm, its fingers searching for Daniel’s throat. Even with Eric’s powers Daniel wasn’t a natural fighter, and he didn’t manage to dodge in time. Cold fingers of shadow wrapped around his neck, and where they touched his bare skin, he burned from the unnatural cold. These things might be made of shadow, but they were real enough to squeeze the life out of him. He grabbed the creature’s arm around the wrist, thankful at least that there was something solid under there to get a grip on. He tried to tear the creature’s hand away from his throat, but it was like trying to bend iron. Spots began forming on the edges of his vision as he struggled for breath that just wasn’t there.
The Shade leaned in close, like it was mocking him. It watched Daniel claw uselessly at the iron fingers as it squeezed even harder. Daniel Corrigan could never bend iron, but Eric could.
The power answered his call. It flowed over his muscles like a hot bath, tingling his skin with warmth, beating back the thing’s frigid touch. He felt so strong. This was what it was like to feel strong. Daniel tightened his own grip on the Shade’s hand, plucking the creature’s fingers from his throat one by one. The Shade’s iron grip had seemingly turned to rubber. Daniel inhaled a few lungfuls of air to clear the spots away from his eyes, then pulled.
The Shade’s hand came away easily, but Daniel didn’t stop there. He lifted the creature over his head and flung the Shade into a nearby bench, causing it to explode into splinters as the two collided. The Shade picked itself up but seemed dazed, unsteady. Drips of shadow ran along the ground in rivulets, like blood trickling from a wound. These things could be hurt, at least, and that was something new.
Unfortunately, the fight had drawn the attention of Mollie’s opponents too. They left off their futile attempt to capture her and stalked toward Daniel, their hungry arms clutching and grasping at the air as if they were rehearsing Daniel’s death scene.
But there wasn’t time to worry about them yet. Daniel still had another Shade of his own to deal with. The second creature was nearly on him. A mouth formed where its face should be, opened in a silent scream of rage. Daniel raised his arms to protect himself as he was tackled backward. As the two of them wrestled on the ground, Daniel tried to free himself. But like vines, the blackness grew out of the creature’s own body and wrapped around Daniel’s arms and his legs. Despite his struggles, the freezing strands crept along his body, inching toward his throat.
Again Daniel felt the heat, the surge of borrowed strength, but this time it took all his effort to break away. Tentacles snapped off like rotten sticks as Daniel wrenched himself free, and the Shade reared back in pain but let out no sound. The ground around them was dotted with drops of black.
Daniel pulled himself to standing as the Shade retreated to join its companion. Behind him the others were hovering—preparing to strike, but hesitating. They were clever, and they’d given up on attacking Daniel one on one. Like a pack of predators, they were waiting to rush him all at once, and Daniel knew he couldn’t fend off four of them at the same time, no matter how strong he was.
He heard Mollie’s voice, but he didn’t look for her. He didn’t dare take his eyes off the Shades.
“Daniel! What’s going on? How are you …?”
“Stay back!” he shouted. “Don’t come near me!” He didn’t know how close was too close, but he couldn’t risk accidentally stealing Mollie’s powers too. “Get Rohan out of here!”
The two Shades he’d wounded seemed to have recovered. The four of them had taken to the air, circling him like vultures around a dying animal. They were getting ready to move in for the kill.
“Daniel, you can’t fight them all alone!”
She was right, of course. He had Eric’s strength, but he didn’t know how to use it the way Eric did. He could try to fly away, but they would probably catch him. Even with all these powers, he just didn’t have any experience being super.
Then it hit him. All these powers! Eric hadn’t been the only one whose powers had failed him this night.
He looked up at the four circling shadows and smiled at them. All he had to do was remember not to giggle.
“Come and get me!” he said. Then he willed himself to not be there. To disappear, just like Rose.
It worked. Daniel looked at his own feet and they weren’t there. He held up a hand in front of his face. Nothing. The Shades were already looking around frantically for him, flying here and there. Daniel sidestepped the first one as it passed, then grabbed it as it sailed by. He yanked the creature out of the air and slammed it as hard as he could into the solid pavement. Once, twice. This time it didn’t get back up. It quivered a bit before dissolving into a pool of blackness, an oily stain on the road.
The other three rushed into the fight, but they didn’t know what they should be attacking. Swinging blindly, they missed Daniel entirely. Invisible, he began hitting first, then sidestepping away before they could counterattack.
It didn’t take long for the three remaining Shades to begin their retreat. Back into the shadows they melted, one by one, until Daniel was left on a suddenly quiet street, his blood still pounding in his ears. His arms and legs had gone wobbly, and so he put his hands on his knees and stood there, panting. After a few minutes he thought to make himself visible again but realized he already was. The borrowed invisibility was gone, and so was the strength. He was lucky that the Shades had chosen to run away when they had—a few more minutes and he would have been totally vulnerable. Like last time, as the power faded he was left exhausted.
“Daniel?”
Mollie was watching him. Rohan was awake and standing next to her too. Thankfully, neither appeared physically hurt.
“Rohan, are you all right?” Daniel asked.
“He’s fine,” said Mollie. “The Shrouds didn’t get him. He just …”
“I fainted,” said Rohan. “I’m not ashamed. That Shroud was very scary, and when it jumped out of the dark, I had a perfectly normal, albeit ineffective, response.”
“It’s a Shade,” said Daniel. “These things, whatever they are, aren’t Shrouds.… I don’t know what they are exactly, but it’s safe to say Herman can’t divide himself into fours. So I’m calling them Shades.”
“Shades, then,” said Rohan, nodding. “Fits.”
“And I’m glad you’re okay,” said Daniel.
“Thanks to Mollie, I am,” said Rohan. “I owe her one.”
“Whatever. No big deal,” said Mollie.
“Yes, it was,” answered Rohan. And Mollie let it go, but she looked pleased.
“But you, Daniel,” she said. “I saw what you did. You … you have powers.”
Daniel looked at his friends standing in front of him and he felt his heart break all over again. They had such expectant, hopeful faces. Joyful, even. Despite all that had just happened, they were happy for him. Even after the attack, they had room in their hearts to feel something good and positive.
They hadn’t yet guessed the truth about Daniel’s new abilities. But they would sooner or later.
It was time to stop fighting it. Daniel gave in and sank down to the ground, his head on his knees. “They weren’t my powers,” he said. “I stole the strength from Eric and the invisibility from Rose.”
There. The truth was out at last.
“What are you talking about?” asked Mollie. “What do you mean, ‘stole’?”
“I do have one power,” he said, looking up at her. “It happened the first time, I think, at the Tangle Creek Bridge, the day of the accident. It happened again later when I was alone with Eric, but we promised each other not to tell you guys. It happened recently when I had a run-in with Clay and Bud. And it happened with Louisa, on the day she was attacked.”
“What? What happened, Daniel?” Mollie looked confused, and because she was confused, she was getting angry. Rohan wasn’t saying anything.
“I stole their powers. That’s what I do now. I steal powers and use them for myself. Like I stole Eric’s and Rose’s. I can’t help it—I don’t even realize that I’m doing it. But that’s why I’ve been avoiding you. I can’t be trusted.”
Daniel looked down at the dark stain on the road. It had a grimy sheen to it, like spilled gasoline. So that’s what it looks like when a Shade dies, he thought.
“When Eric needed his powers the most, I took them away,” said Daniel. “And poor Rose was so scared.…” He closed his eyes. “I don’t know what those creatures are,” he said, “but I’m the real Shroud.”
Chapter Seventeen
Recriminations. Confessions.
Eric got Georgie home safely, and it was just dumb luck that Daniel’s little brother hadn’t gotten a good look at the Shades. Convincing him that the shadow creatures were really just kids in Halloween costumes felt wrong in a way, but how do you explain the truth of such things to anyone, much less a three-year-old? And it was a simple lie for Daniel’s parents to believe. They had no problem believing that masked bullies had stolen their sons’ candy. It was an easy thing for a parent to buy into the casual cruelty of childhood.
Georgie woke up several times that night with nightmares, but his mother always rocked him back to sleep with a lullaby. Little Georgie was a true child of Noble’s Green now—his dreams were haunted by real-life monsters.
Daniel’s father wanted to call Sheriff Simmons and complain about the local “bullies,” but Daniel was able to talk him out of it. Next year, his father promised, they wouldn’t be allowed to go out on Halloween night alone. Dad would keep the bad kids away. He would keep them all safe.
Safe. Daniel had seen four Shades tonight. No one was safe anymore.
Like Georgie, Daniel was scared to close his eyes. He was afraid of what he might see. But in time exhaustion overcame him and he fell into a deep, and thankfully dreamless, sleep.
Early the next morning his friends showed up at his door, looking only slightly better than they had the night before. They managed a bit of small talk before retreating to Daniel’s room to talk in private.
“I touched Rose last night when she hugged me,” said Daniel. “And then she couldn’t turn invisible.”
“And I put my hand on your chest when I spotted the Shrouds,” said Eric. “But we’ve tried out touch before and it didn’t work.…”
“It must not be all the time,” said Daniel. “But until I figure out the trigger, we’d better have a hands-off policy whenever I’m around.”
Rohan and Mollie weren’t saying much of anything. And Daniel noticed they kept their distance as well. Probably smart.
“Well, I’m back to normal this morning,” said Eric. “So part of our theory is true—you don’t steal powers, you borrow them.”
“What about Louisa?” asked Rohan. “Her powers haven’t come back.”
“Do you have them?” asked Eric. “I mean, can you walk through walls and stuff now, Daniel?”
“No,” said Daniel. “I could during the fight with that Shade in Herman Plunkett’s study, but it faded fast.”
Rohan wiped his glasses on his shirt. “So Louisa’s an outlier.”
“A who?” asked Eric.
“An outlier,” said Rohan. “It means she’s something that breaks the statistical trend.”
Daniel walked over to his bookcase and pulled down the copy of The Final Problem.
“There’s one last thing,” said Daniel. “Something I never told you. When we fought Herman last year, he gave me something. A ring made of the same meteorite that he used to make his pendant. I haven’t worn it.… I don’t know why I kept it. To make sure it stays safe, I guess. I meant to tell you all, but … I didn’t.
“This black ring,” Daniel said. “I’ve had it hidden here since the night we beat the Shroud.”
They didn’t say anything right away, but they didn’t have to. Daniel could imagine the feelings of shock and betrayal that they must be going through. He’d hidden more than a ring—he’d hidden a piece of the Shroud. It was a symbol of all the years of terror that they’d lived through, and here it was in Daniel’s safekeeping. Secret. Still, it felt better to say the words, to get it all in the open at last. It had been sitting on his heart like a stone for so long now.
“Have you touched it since you started developing this … power?” Rohan asked.
“No,” said Daniel. “I’m afraid of what would happen. A power thief touching a power-stealing ring.”
“Maybe you’d become superpowerful,” said Eric. “Like a double-negative-makes-a-positive type of thing.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works,” said Rohan. “It could be bad. Really bad.”
Daniel set the book on his desk and reached for the cover.
“Don’t,” said Mollie. “I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to even look at it.”
“Huh?” asked Daniel.
“Never mind that you two jerks didn’t tell us about these powers, why did you hide this ring, Daniel? Honestly.”
“I don’t know. I thought I was keeping it safe, and keeping you guys safe, but …”
“You kept it around as a weapon in case any of us got out of line, is that it?”
“No!” said Daniel. “Not you guys! But Herman Plunkett said that comet—the Witch Fire Comet that started all this—was coming back. I just … Could you imagine what could happen if there was a whole town of Supers?”
“So you kept it to keep the town safe,” said Mollie. “Just like Herman?”
“No!”
“Well, you don’t need to worry about it now,” she said. “You don’t need the ring—you’re a Shroud already!”
There was a gust of wind and, like that, she was gone. The window was open and the curtains were blowing in the sudden breeze, but there was no Mollie.
“I’ll find her and calm her down,” said Rohan, going to the door. He paused there for a second and looked at Daniel.
“She didn’t mean it, you know,” he said. “But you still should have told us. It was wrong not to.”
Then Rohan jogged down the steps, chasing after Mollie. Once they were alone, Eric let out a long whistle.
“Boy,” he said. “You really screwed up this time.”
“I thought it would be like tearing off a Band-Aid,” Daniel said. “Hurt less if I did it quick.”
“And?”
“That was a heck of a Band-Aid. Still, I’m glad it’s over with.”
Eric nodded. “So lemme get a look at that big bad ring of yours.”
Daniel opened the cover. “Don’t get too close, though. I don’t really know what it can do.…”
Daniel’s words trailed away as Eric looked down at the book and then back up at Daniel.
“This a joke?” asked Eric.
Daniel shook his head as he felt around in the book’s hidden compartment. In the perfectly hollowed-out, empty space. This was no joke. This was a disaster.
The ring was gone.
In the following days D
aniel saw Rohan and Mollie only at school, and while they didn’t exactly avoid him, they didn’t really talk to him either. As a rule, the Supers didn’t speak of anything “super” on school grounds. There were too many ears in the hallways, and so it was understood that powers talk was off-limits. But now Daniel was lucky if his friends complained to him about the cafeteria food. No one besides Eric was saying much of anything at all, at least not to him. A chill had descended over their little group of friends, and Daniel was to blame.
Eric broke the news to the others about the missing ring, and of course Theo was immediately his prime suspect. Everything that had happened thus far—Daniel’s powers, the black ring, the Shroud attacks—was just a part of Theo Plunkett’s master plan to replace his uncle. Never mind that Eric couldn’t explain how these things connected, or what Theo would gain out of all of it, or how he’d managed to split himself into four Shrouds, or that there wasn’t a single piece of solid evidence that pointed to Theo other than his name. Eric wasn’t about the details, and he felt it in his gut that Theo was their man.
That was theory number one, and Eric practically shouted it in Daniel’s ear whenever he had the chance. Theory number two, however, Daniel caught only in whispers. It was spoken of when Rohan and Mollie thought he wasn’t around, and it went like this: What if there never had been a ring? What if Daniel was having some kind of breakdown? Herman’s power had driven the old man at least slightly mad. At the very least he’d been seriously delusional. What toll might all this be having on Daniel?
It was that theory that worried Daniel the most. Even more than the missing ring. The dreams, the sleepwalking. Ever since that morning at Tangle Creek Bridge, Daniel hadn’t felt himself. And it was deeper than just the powers. It was like he’d forgotten something important. He walked around feeling as if he’d tied a string around his finger and couldn’t remember why. There was this itch in the back of his brain.…
This went on for about another week, until one day Daniel, Rohan, and Mollie got off the school bus at their home stop and found Eric waiting there for them. Daniel had spotted him through the window as the bus pulled up. Eric was smiling up at the bus driver and stepped aside as Mollie and Rohan walked right past him, as if he wasn’t even there. Daniel, at least, stopped to say hi.
