GHOST CROWN: THE TRACKS TRILOGY - Book Two

by J. Gabriel Gates

  Maggie was aware of the other cheerleaders jumping up and down ecstatically, but she stood frozen, staring at the boy lying on the grass and the orange aura that drifted slowly upward, away from his body.

  “No,” she whispered, still finding it difficult to believe what she was seeing. If that light left him, she knew it would mean only one thing. She watched in horror as the ball of light drifted upward, into the night sky. A fissure opened above, incredibly high up, a tear in the blackness that revealed, just for a moment, a world of pure illumination waiting behind it. A shaft of blazing white light shone down, catching the aura in its rays. The aura moved up, following the light.

  And Maggie knew the boy was dead.

  “No!” she whispered, focusing her energy on the aura. “Go back! Go back down! Don’t leave!”

  Several trainers gathered around the kid, trying to revive him. As Maggie watched, the aura slowed its ascent. It drifted downward, then up again, as if undecided about which way to go. After a moment, the tear in the sky slowly closed, healing like a wound before her eyes, and the ray of light disappeared. The aura pulsed for a second and then shot back downward, into the body of the injured player, and Maggie saw his leg twitch. A moment later the coaches had him on his feet, helping him to the sideline.

  Maggie looked around to find the whole cheerleading squad staring at her. It was only then she realized she had tears running down her face. She wiped her cheeks quickly and forced a smile.

  “Are you okay?” Lisa Marie asked.

  “Yeah. Sure. Of course,” Maggie said, snapping into full bitch mode. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  She gave Lisa Marie a look, daring her to say another word. She only gave Maggie a conciliatory smile.

  The next play, Middleburg scored a touchdown with the twenty-seven-yard pass Rick completed to Michael Ponder in the back of the end zone. The pass was a bullet. Rick’s throwing arm was stronger than ever. Maggie stared at her boyfriend as he exchanged a chest bump with Bran and then trotted off the field. She remembered the way he’d looked on her porch the other day—a twisted beast with one arm made of steel—and a sour taste suddenly invaded her mouth as if she was about to throw up. Maybe everyone else in town would hail Rick’s amazing recovery as some kind of football miracle, but not her. Something was going on with Rick—and whatever it was, it was most definitely evil.

  

  While the rest of Middleburg was at the high school worshipping Rick and his Topper cohorts, Raphael was doing what he did most Fridays—working at Rack ’Em Billiards Hall. As hard as his job was—bussing tables, washing dishes, taking out trash, hauling in new kegs and cases of beer and buckets of ice—he was grateful for it. His friends were all gathered around the two pool tables in the back—Beet, Emory, Josh, Benji, Dalton, Myka and Beth. Nass was doing his gig at Little Geno’s (Raph could only guess where Clarisse was—either riding shotgun with Nass in Geno’s delivery vehicle, or maybe she’d gone to the football game), and Natalie was cheerleading. Beet looked a little forlorn without her, but the game was over by now, and it wouldn’t be long before customers started pouring into Rack ’Em to celebrate or commiserate.

  “Hey, you missed a spot,” Benji joked, pointing at the table Raph was wiping down. Raphael flicked the cloth at him, sending a spray of table disinfectant his way. Everyone laughed as Benji made a show of spitting out the drops.

  “Uck. Tastes like cat pee,” he said.

  “Yeah? How do you know what cat pee tastes like?” Josh asked.

  “Your mama told me,” Benji retorted.

  “Hey, Raph!” Raphael turned to see his boss, Rudy, standing behind the bar holding up the phone receiver. “Phone call.”

  Raphael’s first thought was that it could be his mom—something to do with the baby, maybe. He abandoned his bus tub and hurried over.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, there. How’s your night going?” The voice was sweet, sultry, and familiar—but it wasn’t Aimee’s.

  “Who is this?”

  “Meet me out back, okay?” said the voice. “Right now.” The phone line went dead, and Raphael handed the receiver back to Rudy.

  “Everything okay?” Rudy asked.

  “Yeah,” Raphael said distractedly. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

  His muscles tensing, Raphael hurried through the kitchen. Automatically, he took a cleansing breath, preparing himself for whatever was to come. Opening the back door a crack, he peered out to make sure there was no ambush waiting for him before he slipped out into the parking lot. A single car was idling there, its bright, blinding headlights trained on the door. Raphael squinted in the glare and they shut off. He recognized the red Mercedes immediately.

  Maggie Anderson.

  She was waving him over to the car. He glanced around the parking lot once more to make sure he wasn’t walking into a trap, but he saw no one else. It was just him and Maggie.

  He went to the passenger side and the window came sliding down.

  “Get in,” she said.

  Settling warily into the seat beside her, he looked at her inquisitively and braced himself for trouble. But her smile seemed innocent enough—like she was relieved to see him. Raphael thought once again that she was probably the most baffling person he’d ever met.

  “So, how’s work going?” she asked, as if they were best friends. She looked like a model, sitting there with her fur-trimmed coat over her short, cheerleading skirt.

  “Uh, fine,” he said, knowing she didn’t give a damn about his job. He decided to play along. “How was the game?”

  “Brutal, as usual. But we won.” There was a brief, comfortable silence, and then she asked, “Do you get off soon? Maybe we could take a drive—”

  He cut her off. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I’d rather not take the chance of being burned alive, if you don’t mind.”

  “I’m sorry about that, Raphael. Really.”

  Either she was a really good actor (and he had seen her in the school production of Grease so he knew that wasn’t the case) or she was truly sorry.

  “Rick made me do that train car thing,” she went on. “He’s a monster.”

  “So break up with him,” Raphael said, a little irritably.

  A flicker of what looked like hope lit Maggie’s eyes at his words, but it quickly faded. “I wish I could,” she said.

  “Then why don’t you?

  Maggie was silent for a moment, staring at the steering wheel in front of her. At last, she looked at him.

  “I’m afraid of him,” she said. “Because he’s really a monster. I mean, for real.”

  Her eyes locked onto his, and he could see genuine terror in them. “You saw him change, didn’t you?” he asked. “When?”

  “Halloween night,” she said. “I was hiding in the woods when you guys were fighting. He threw his head back and howled and he turned into something—wait. You saw it too?”

  “Yeah. I saw it.”

  “Well, that’s what scares me,” she went on. “Not so much what he’s done, but who he is. What he is.”

  And Raphael saw it again—for a lightning-flash moment—Rick transforming from a muscle-bound high-school jock into a twisted, howling demon.

  “What is he?” Raphael responded quietly, surprised to see that her big, brown eyes looked different now than they had in the past. They seemed to stare right into him—through him.

  “I was hoping you could tell me,” she whispered. “Raphael, I don’t know what the hell is going on in this stupid town. All I know is I’m leaving as soon as I’m out of high school. In the meantime, I’ve got to figure out how to stay away from Rick. If he knows I’ve seen what he really is, I don’t know what he might do.”

  “Why me?” Raphael asked. “Why are you telling me, Maggie?”

  Her gaze faltered. “Because you’re st
rong. Because you weren’t afraid of those samurai warrior things, or going down into the basement to bring me back up. And . . .” Choked with emotion she finished softly, “And I don’t have anyone else.”

  Her words struck Raphael almost as much as her vulnerability. He’d always thought popular Toppers like Maggie were awash in a sea of friends and generous, doting parents. Was it possible she felt just as tortured and lonely as he sometimes did?

  “Well, you can’t stay with him,” he said at last. “Not knowing what you know. It’s too dangerous.”

  “So what do I do? He’ll freak if I break up with him. Unless . . .” she hesitated.

  “Unless what?”

  “Maybe . . . if I had some kind of backup.”

  “What—you want me to go with you to break up with your boyfriend?”

  “Would you? I mean, just to be nearby when I tell him. If he tries to hurt me, I think you’re the only person in Middleburg who could stop him.”

  Raphael hesitated briefly and then said, “All right. Any excuse to kick Rick’s ass is good in my book. You can count on me.”

  “Thank you.” And before he knew what she intended, she slid closer to him and threw herself against his chest. He put one arm around her, meaning it as a comforting move. She looked up at him, her lips slightly parted. He knew she expected him to kiss her—and he would have a month or two ago. But now he had Aimee in his life, and he wouldn’t risk losing that for anything. After a moment, Maggie sighed softly and kissed him on the cheek.

  “I’d better get back inside,” Raphael mumbled. “My boss . . .”

  “Sure,” Maggie said. “No problem.”

  Raphael opened the car door and started to get out, but Maggie caught his sleeve.

  “So—are we friends now?” she asked. He knew she caught his look of astonishment because she quickly added, “Oh, I know what you’re thinking. But I don’t really—have many friends. Not friends I can talk to—not about all this stuff.”

  He could see she was sincere. He didn’t have many people he could talk to about all this stuff either. And she was part of it, just like the basement in her house was part of it.

  “Okay,” he said and gave her a little grin. “As long as you keep the handcuffs away from me and we stay out of boxcars.”

  She laughed and her relief was genuine. “You got it,” she promised but her smile was sad. He had to admit she looked more beautiful than he’d ever seen her, painted with the pale hues the moonlight cast on her through the windshield.

  Before he got out of the car, he gave her his cell number in case Rick gave her any more trouble. As he hurried across the parking lot and back into Rack ’Em, he wondered what he’d gotten himself into.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Aimee spent Saturday morning in the library with Miss Pembrook, poring over musty old books. It was just the two of them, since Dalton’s grandma had roped her into helping set up a church bake sale. It was kind of tragic, Aimee thought, that she was giving up her Saturday morning sleeping-in time, but at least the teacher had brought in some delicious cinnamon rolls for breakfast. And Aimee was meeting Raphael afterward, though just for a few minutes. That made it all worthwhile.

  She and Miss Pembrook sat in a quiet corner of the big, terrazzo-floored, high-ceilinged library, flipping through the books. She hadn’t expected to, but Aimee found herself enjoying the work. It was like being a detective, sifting through page after page hoping to find some important clue. She wondered if she could be a historian when she finished college. The idea would have been laughable only a few weeks ago. She thought of historians as stoop-shouldered, balding old men with reading glasses perched on the ends of their noses and hair growing out of their ears, but Miss Pembrook, with her beautiful blouse, tailored slacks, expensive shoes, and a chic, cute hairstyle made history seem almost glamorous.

  Aimee finished writing on her note card, flipped forward to scan the last few pages, and then closed the book with an authoritative thump. Miss Pembrook looked up and smiled.

  “Anything good in that one?”

  “A few descriptions of the railroad being built,” Aimee said and then picked up one of the index cards. “But this was kind of crazy. Did you know the tunnels through the mountain were already there when the first railroad crews came through? All they had to do was shore them up. Weird, huh?”

  “One more Middleburg mystery,” Miss Pembrook said cheerfully. “It looks like you might have a knack for this.”

  Aimee shrugged. “It’s kind of interesting.”

  Miss Pembrook grew serious. “Aimee,” she said quietly, “Can I trust you with a secret?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I guess so.”

  The teacher glanced around to make sure no one was looking at them—which was silly, Aimee thought. There was no one at any of the tables within earshot, and the huge bookshelves all around them created a concealing screen. Besides, at nine-thirty on a Saturday morning, the reference section of the library was totally devoid of people. Still, she leaned close to Aimee and whispered.

  “You have to swear you’ll never tell a soul.”

  “I swear,” Aimee agreed.

  Miss Pembrook hesitated. “I haven’t told anyone else about this. But have you ever had a secret that just burned inside you, so much you felt like you’d die if you didn’t tell someone?”

  Aimee nodded. Miss Pembrook had her full attention now.

  “Besides,” the teacher continued. “For some reason I feel like I can trust you.” She took a deep breath, glanced around the room once more, and then reached into her book bag and pulled out a long, lacquered box with an inlaid symbol on top that looked like it was made of jade. Next, she took out a yellow legal pad. She placed the box on the table in front of Aimee unopened. When she spoke, it was little more than a whisper.

  “The man who was overseeing my doctoral candidacy—professor Donovan—was a great man, a genius. He was digging around in the state archives a few years ago, and he discovered this box. What was inside was so obscure that when he took it, no one even noticed it was missing.”

  She undid the clasp and slowly opened the box, and Aimee leaned forward to look inside. It held what appeared to be an ancient scroll, all rolled up, with writing on it that looked like Chinese characters.

  “When he started examining it, Donovan initially thought it was an heirloom brought over by one of the rail workers,” the teacher continued. She grabbed one of the big books and opened it to a page she had marked. It was a black-and-white picture of several men wearing wide straw hats shaped like the cymbals on a drum set. They had shovels and pickaxes resting on their shoulders. “Most of the railroads across the Western U.S. were built by thousands of low-wage Chinese laborers,” Miss Pembrook continued. “Little more than slaves, really. When Donovan started researching the text on the scroll, he found it was written in an ancient, obscure Chinese dialect. It took him years, and three trips to China, but he finally managed to translate it. It goes on and on, but here’s a little bit of it.” She looked down at the legal pad and read:

  “From the place at the heart of the eagle,

  Within the mountain where the steel roads cross,

  There ascends the hope of man,

  Jacob’s ladder, Babylon’s loss.

  There will the blood of ages rise as a tide,

  As the souls of brothers contend,

  The making of the end of an age,

  Or the start of an age without end.

  In the town at the heart of the eagle

  Seek you there treasure most grand.

  More gold than the leaves of an autumn day,

  More silver than moonlight expends,

  More diamonds than the dew of the morning,

  More sapphires than all of the seas,

  More rubies than all the blood spilt in man’s wars,
<
br />   More emeralds than the grass of the spring.

  He that brings forth from black depths of the earth

  That joy which each soul desires,

  No longer shackled by age shall he be,

  Nor from walking of miles shall he tire,

  But he shall travel o’er nations on the wings of the wind,

  And through history as quick as he please.

  The terrible Wheel will stop spinning for him,

  And the ending of every disease.

  This is the treasure that wise men have sought,

  Since the day that the earth came to be.

  With this treasure alone are you rich beyond words.

  With this treasure alone are you free.”

  Miss Pembrook snapped the box shut again and slipped it back into her bag.

  “Wow,” Aimee said, her voice hushed with awe. “Town at the heart of the eagle? What does that mean?”

  “Middleburg. Our national symbol is the eagle, and Middleburg is at the center of the contiguous United States.”

  “So you think there’s some kind of crazy treasure buried here?”

  “That’s what Professor Donovan thought. He was planning to come here and do more research, maybe start some excavations. But at the end of last semester . . .” Her words choked off with emotion. She closed her eyes for a second, collected herself, and then continued, “He was murdered.”

  “What?” Aimee was horrified, but somehow not surprised.

  “Someone broke into his house and went through all his stuff. And . . . he was tortured. The week before, he’d made some vague comments to me about how someone in China was trying to persuade him to sell the scroll to them. When he refused, they threatened him. When I found out he was dead, I knew exactly what had happened. Whoever broke in was trying to find the scroll. What they didn’t know was that I had it.” Her voice changed and her grief was evident. “Professor Donovan chose to die rather than tell them that I was working on translating the rest of the text. That’s why I left my last job and came to Middleburg.”