by Cady Vance
I turned to look behind us. The shamans were racing into the backyard, glancing around. They didn’t see us. Yet.
Only two more houses to go, but the shamans were headed our way. They’d figure out fast where we’d gone.
We both moved slowly, weaving through the thick supporting beams. The guys didn’t hear us even though my heavy breathing was as loud as thunder to me.
When we got to the edge of the porch, Laura and I glanced at each other. For a moment, I wondered if this was the last time I’d see her. All the shamans had to do was shoot us in the back when we started running toward the fence separating this yard from the next.
Laura took a deep breath, turned and ran. I threw myself forward, hands reaching out for the fence only a few feet away.
“Stop! We know what you did in there!”
Blood rushed into my ears, and a cry of fear lodged in my throat.
Run, run, run!
Heavy pounding sounded behind me.
I cursed, reached up and grabbed the edge of the fence. The wood dug into my palms when I pulled myself up and over. I dropped down on the other side, and one of my toenails jammed into my toe. I swallowed my scream and kept going, Laura only two steps ahead. Twigs on the ground stung my bare feet, but I didn’t let it slow me down.
Just one more house.
I risked a glance behind me and saw a shaman pulling himself over the fence. He was staring right at me, his features curled up into an expression of murderous rage.
Holy shit!
We raced toward the road. The harbor was so close.
It was all I could focus on, my eyes blurring, my feet burning and my lungs aching inside.
Ahead of me, Laura threw herself up the stairs and down the wooden planks of the dock. I followed her, and two steps up, my foot caught on the edge. I stumbled, knees slamming into the boardwalk. Splinters of wood dug into my skin.
“You okay?” a guy’s voice asked, just as a firm hand grabbed my arm to help me up.
I stood and looked into Nathan’s wide eyes. Thank god he was working today.
“We need a boat, Nathan,” I said, jogging backward toward the lines of yachts and runabouts. “I don’t have time to explain. We just need to get out of here.”
He glanced over his shoulder and saw the two shamans hurtling toward us. Nodding once to me, he pointed at a tiny runabout at the end of the dock. “That one is mine. Go now.” His voice sounded alarmed, and his feet clapped on the boardwalk behind me.
I curved around the corner and rushed past two surprised-looking men—Mr. McLean and Mr. Sanders. They both docked their boats here, too. They said something to me, but my head was too full of static to hear.
I spotted Laura at the end of the dock. She was already inside the white runabout gripping the wheel. I leapt inside. I put my hands on my knees, leaning over and gulping air. I grabbed the side of the boat to steady myself and screamed when someone hurtled in next to me.
“Relax, it’s just me,” Nathan said, moving to the wheel. He turned the ignition, slammed the gas and backed the boat away from the boardwalk.
I glanced at the dock where Mr. McLean stood near the entrance with his arms crossed. One of the shamans was staring at us, but the other was shaking his head and backing away, and their guns were nowhere to be seen. I let out a sigh of relief. For whatever reason, they were turning away from the dock. They couldn’t catch up to us now.
I collapsed on the floor of the boat.
“Holly, what’s going on?” Nathan asked over the purr of the boat’s engine.
“Nothing is going on.” I leaned against the side and closed my eyes. “Everything’s fine.”
Somehow, I doubted he’d believe that. I didn’t even believe it myself.
CHAPTER 6
Fifteen minutes later, we chugged through the waves just outside Seaport’s main harbor, the signature red barn casting eerie shadows on the boardwalk. Nathan slowed the runabout as we cruised by, and all three of us stared at the dozens of boats anchored in the calmer water.
“I don’t think we should dock here,” I said, hanging my hand over the side of the boat and feeling the cool spray of the water on my fingers. “Honestly, I don’t think they’ll be there, but just in case they’re trying to find us, this is where they’d go looking.”
“Who is ‘they’, Holly?” Nathan cranked the engine to pull away from the harbor. “What’s going on? Shouldn’t we call the police?”
Laura and I exchanged a look. The binding spell was wearing off, but I knew we were on the same wavelength anyway. Tell him as little as possible.
“Listen, Nathan.” Laura leaned back in the boat chair. “Thanks for leaving work to get us out of there, but everything is fine. We just had a little…argument with those two. No need to call the police.”
“They had guns,” he said. The wind ruffled his wavy brown hair as he stared hard at the shore. “I saw them before they put them away, right when you fell.”
I opened my mouth and closed it. I could see we weren’t going to get away with not telling him anything.
“Alright,” I said. “But don’t tell anyone else, okay?”
He looked back and forth from me to Laura before nodding his head. But he didn’t look very happy about it.
“Those two guys are like me,” I told him. “People who can interact with spirits. Laura and I kind of pissed them off.”
“Pissed them off enough to want to shoot you?” He held the wheel and looked over his shoulder at me, skepticism clearly displayed on his face.
“I don’t think they were really going to shoot us,” Laura said.
“They were probably just trying to scare us. And it worked,” I said. “But who knows, maybe they just wanted to talk or something.”
Nathan raised his eyebrows. “Talk.”
“Once we saw the guns,” Laura said, “we were outta there.”
“What did you do to make two guys mad enough to chase you with guns?”
I narrowed my eyes. “I told you more than I wanted to. It’s spirit stuff. I don’t want to go into the details.”
“This sounds nothing like the spirit stuff you helped me with.”
“Right.” I turned away to stare out at the deep blue ocean touching the edge of the pink sky. His spirit hadn’t been summoned. It was just a regular attack, some spirit who had wandered in from Lower World on the scent of fear. “You thought you were being haunted, and I did a quick spell to get rid of your problem. Not all spirit stuff is that simple. Some of it is more complicated.”
“Thought?” He frowned. “Just be careful, okay? This complicated spirit stuff seems really dangerous.”
“Nathan, it’s none of your business,” I said, snapping my gaze back to him. I hated being rude, but I also really hated when people stuck their noses in where they didn’t belong.
His eyes showed hints of sadness before he turned away, clenching his jaw. “No, I guess it isn’t.”
My head dropped into my hands, and I wished I could take back my words. He’d helped us, and this was my response?
A few minutes later, Nathan powered the boat into a smaller harbor. We shut it off, tied it up and hopped out onto the deserted boardwalk. The wooden planks creaked as we walked toward the gravel parking lot.
“So, now what?” Laura stuffed her hands into her pockets. “It’s a little far to walk.”
“Let me make a call,” Nathan said, swiping his phone. Laura and I stood there silent while he spoke low to someone on the other end. I think we were both still kind of shell-shocked.
“Parker is on the way,” Nathan said when he pocketed his cell.
“Parker?” I asked.
“Yeah, Parker Sanderson,” he said. “He moved here a couple of years ago.”
“Oh, that’s right,” I said, remembering who he was. A preppy guy like Nathan. Being so focused on my mom, I hadn’t been keeping up with real life. Plus, I’d never really hung out with that crowd. Laura lived in their neighborhood
, but she’d never fallen in with them either.
I glanced down at my watch and cringed at the time. I was way late getting home. Mom was there alone and waiting, maybe even worried about me. I hadn’t been late for dinner in a long time. Ever since the attack.
“I wasn’t trying to pry, you know,” Nathan said. He was doing a clenching and unclenching thing with his jaw, making the angles of his face stand out. The wind had battered his hair, leaving a couple of strands falling into his eyes. I had the sudden urge to brush them off his eyelashes, but instead, I cleared my throat and stared down at my bare feet.
“It’s okay. Thanks for what you did. I’m sure all of this seems a little crazy.”
“A little bit, yeah. Of course, not much crazier than that time you fainted in my bedroom. That was pretty wild.”
I snorted. “You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?”
“It’s not every day a girl just falls into my arms,” he said, elbowing me in the side. “So, will you tell me what’s going on?”
I rolled my eyes. “Won’t give up, will you?”
“Listen,” he said. “I’m just worried, that’s all. Guys chasing you with guns isn’t anything to joke around about. I don’t want you guys to get hurt. If there’s anything I can do to help you with this…Don’t forget my offer to be your sidekick.”
A smile tickled the corners of my mouth. “I appreciate the concern, but I can handle it,” I said, even though I didn’t really believe that myself.
“I still owe you from when you helped me out before,” he said. “With the spirits.”
“Yeah, and you paid. We’re even.”
***
After Nathan and Parker dropped us off at Laura’s house, I headed home on my bike. Once alone, my mind began whirring, and with my adrenaline on empty, exhaustion was really taking its toll. My head felt like it’d been hit with a baseball bat, and every muscle in my body screamed as I pedaled my way home. It took all my concentration to keep my eyes open and my legs moving, especially since my mind wanted to analyze every possible explanation for what had just happened.
Shamans in town. With guns. There was no doubt they’d been behind the spirit summoned into Kylie’s room. And even though we’d gotten away, I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that whatever they were doing here wasn’t over.
I parked my bike against the house and gave Kylie a call to make sure she was okay. She picked up after about fifteen rings, voice croaking as she tried telling me everything was fine. She sounded beat up and tired. But alive. I told her to call me if anything weird happened. No matter what.
Inside the house, I dropped my backpack off in my room and peered at my reflection in the mirror hanging over my dresser. I looked normal enough, other than my ghostly white face and red scratches on my arms. After pulling a long-sleeved tee over my head and making sure there were no other signs that I’d just been chased by gun-wielding shamans, I hurried into the living room.
“I’m so sorry I’m late,” I said to Mom where she still sat in her chair. “I’ll whip up something quick for dinner.”
She blinked a few times, and then smiled. “You don’t need to apologize. You’re sixteen years old, and you never do anything besides hang around this house. It’s good for you to be with your friends sometimes.”
Guilt flooded through me like a tidal wave.
“Stop standing there all mopey, Holly. I’m glad you spent time away from here,” she said.
For a moment, I thought about telling her everything. Thought about telling her the real reason I was late. Come clean. She’d be upset, but she’d know what to do about the shamans in town.
But once that second was gone, so was the plan.
Mom couldn’t do anything about this. She’d told me over and over again that she trusted zero shamans, and that was why she hadn’t contacted any of them to take care of things. She’d never told me exactly what had happened when she’d been attacked, but it had been bad enough that she’d completely severed all shaman ties.
And if I told her, she’d want me stop conning people from school. And if I stopped, I couldn’t take care of us anymore. She had no idea money was so tight, and I didn’t have the heart to tell her. She thought only a few months had gone by since her attack. Not an entire year. She thought there was enough in her account to last a little while longer. Plus, if I stopped, I would have nothing to do with the shaman world ever again, and that meant I wouldn’t be able to find the guy who did this to her…and that meant I’d never be able to fix her.
I smiled and met her gaze. “Okay.”
Dinner consisted of a little concoction I’d come up with all by myself. Egg noodles mixed with a can of condensed potato soup. Not a fancy dish, but it was easy and cheap. Two of my favorite things.
Once the noodles and soup were mixed together, I helped my mom get to our little kitchen table and set a steaming bowl of pasta in front of her.
“Okay, dinner is ready,” I said and watched her blink her eyes and come back into herself. I grabbed my own bowl and started eating before I even sat down.
“So, how is Laura?” she asked in between bites of thick pasta. A little dribbled down her chin. I wiped her mouth with a napkin and tried not to think about the time she’d banished spirits from a nursing home free of charge.
“She’s okay,” I said, like nothing was wrong. “Her dad asked about you again. Said to tell you he misses having you as a friend. Wanted to know when you’d be back in town.”
She nodded absently.
“You really should call him, Mom,” I said, pausing to take a huge gulp of water.
“And tell him what?” She looked up at me, eyes clear. I saw a flash of intelligence and wished it was there all the time. She always used to look at me as if she knew exactly what I was thinking. It made me feel like I could never get away with anything. Now I could probably get away with everything without her having even the slightest clue.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Make something up.”
She sighed and put her fork in her bowl. “Brian and I used to be close, Holly. I can’t lie to him.”
I shook my head and stared at the curly noodles in my bowl. “But I think it would be better for everyone if you just called him.”
“No, it wouldn’t. Not when I’m like this.”
“Mom, what happened the day you were attacked?” I stopped eating and held my breath. I hadn’t asked in a long time, and I had no illusions she’d answer. But I had to ask. I needed to know what had happened to her.
“Holly,” she said with a sigh. “Please don’t bring this up anymore. I’ve told you everything I’m going to. There is a political struggle going on in the shaman world right now, and I got in the middle of it.”
What? She’d never told me this before. A political struggle? My heart panged, though, at the fact she’d thought she’d told me this already. She didn’t know she hadn’t. The Mom from Before never would have let something like this slip. She might have kept files on all her cases, but she didn’t need to. She kept all the details up in her head.
“What do you mean, Mom? What political struggle?”
When she didn’t answer, I looked up. Her eyes were clouded over by a milky haze. They stared straight at me, and I met them unblinking, trying to see my mom behind the screen that was there. I remembered that for a few months after the attack, she’d been able to make it through an entire dinner with me, even if it had meant storing up her energy the rest of the day.
It wasn’t like that anymore. I didn’t know what that meant.
I ate by myself, the ticking antique clock on the wall the only sound other than my fork scraping the bowl. I spoon-fed my mom the rest of her food, and then walked her back over to her chair, her limp hand in mine.
***
In my room, I sat on the floor, my back against the wall. My favorite spot. My history book sat open on my crossed legs, but I ignored it, staring straight ahead at the blank white canv
as.
I couldn’t concentrate on my homework. My mind kept drifting back to the faces of the shamans. To their guns. I kept trying to figure out what they were doing here and what I would do if they showed back up again.
Trying to figure out if I’d done the right thing. What if they hadn’t actually been trying to shoot us?
I flipped through my history book, and the words blurred as my mind raced.
At least one of them would have connections to the shaman world, and they could have pointed me in the direction of someone to talk to about my mother. Okay, so they’d had guns, but maybe we’d misunderstood. A thought had been niggling at me since we’d hopped into the boat. What if they thought Laura and I were the ones who had summoned the spirit, and they were trying to stop us? They’d said they knew what we’d done. They could have meant summoning the spirit.
I could have been totally wrong about everything.
I sighed and slammed the door on that train of thought when Astral climbed into my lap, right on top of my history book. He snuggled into the crook of my knee and purred, the familiar sound easing some of the tension coiled in my shoulders. As much as I wanted to think I was badass, Laura and I weren’t a threat to those guys. And even if I could have held my own, I doubted they would have thought so themselves.
But then again…
For Kylie’s sake, I hoped they wouldn’t show again, but another part of me wished they would.
CHAPTER 7
I was up before the sun peeked over the hazy morning clouds. My socked feet shuffled down the short hall from my room to Mom’s. On the peeling wallpaper hung framed photos of Mom from Before. Through the dusty glass, she smiled from the bottom of the Spanish Steps and from the top of the Empire State Building.
I knocked and opened her door. It creaked from where the hinges long ago needed oil. “Time to get up, Mom.”
I helped her out of bed, into the jeans and sweater she insisted on wearing and held her hand as she hobbled past the photos holding ghosts of her past. A photo of the two of us in Disneyworld, the only time she’d let me go with her on a case. Me giving the camera a dimpled smile, my pale skin almost florescent under the Floridian sun. Mom laughing at the Mickey Mouse hovering nearby. She’d banished spirits from Space Mountain. It had taken a long time for anyone to realize that spirits were there in the first place—screams of fright being the definition of normal on a scary theme park ride.
