Deception

by Lee Nichols

  “What’s she going as?” Coby asked, as he opened the door of his dad’s Lexus SUV for me. “You?”

  “Why do you say that?” I asked.

  “Because you’re dressed like her, so I thought maybe …”

  I laughed. “I think she’s going as herself, too, so there’ll be two Saras tonight. I don’t know how you’ll tell us apart.”

  He smiled a secret smile, as he started the car. “Oh, I’ll know.”

  Hmm. Maybe I liked him more than I realized.

  Harry’s house was insane. It made Sara’s house look like the servants’ quarters. It was like one of those spreads in Architectural Digest that makes you think, people can’t possibly live like that. All Roman columns and marble floors, perched atop a jutting cliff.

  “What’s Harry’s dad do again?” I asked Coby as we wandered through the ornately decorated rooms.

  “His mom invented recyclable plastic bags.”

  “Oh. Sweet!”

  “Yeah. I keep telling my mom to get on the ball.”

  I smiled. “What does she do?”

  “Social worker.”

  I giggled.

  The whole school had been invited, even the geeks, which was cool. They were the only ones willing to wear silly costumes.

  “What are you?” I asked a guy from Trig, wrapped in a mass of pink foam speckled with little dots.

  “An amoeba.”

  “Excellent.”

  “Wanna pet my pseudopod?” he asked. Then he blushed and giggled and oozed away.

  I glanced at Coby.

  He shrugged. “You’re irresistible to the single celled.”

  We chatted with a few kids, and I noticed a number of evil looks from girls, probably because I came with Coby. And not one, but three of them asked me if I was wearing Sara’s top and shoes. Coby finally dragged me away, saying we needed to find Harry.

  We found him in the kitchen, wearing a plaid cape and smoking a pipe. Sherlock Holmes was the perfect costume for his eccentric brilliance and his lanky build. Instead of manning the pump of one of the kegs, he was operating a gigantic red espresso machine.

  Perched atop the counter next to him was a slutty white snow bunny. She wore ski goggles, skintight ski pants and a top that revealed a complete lack of body fat. Yet she still had all the right curves and cleavage.

  Natalie.

  “Emma!” she said. “You look beautiful.”

  “She does,” Harry agreed, after eyeing me critically. “She’s a FILF. I thought she was Sara for a moment.”

  “The highest compliment,” Natalie said, with an edge in her voice.

  “A second-rate Sara’s better than a first-rate anything else,” Harry said seriously.

  Okay, the Sara comments were getting old. I just hoped I didn’t run into Britta. I wasn’t in the mood for her sneers.

  “I need a beer,” I told Coby, and he led me across the kitchen. “How come Harry’s doing shots of espresso?”

  “He doesn’t drink.”

  “Really? I pegged him as a gin-martini man.”

  “Close. Vodka martinis. But not anymore.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Rehab, last year.”

  “Whoa. At fifteen?”

  “Yeah. He was a mess.”

  I remembered Harry’s venomous comments about some “blackout drunk.” He must’ve been talking about himself. “And now he …”

  “Only gets jacked up on espresso.” Coby nodded back toward the espresso maker. “There’s Sara. She does it with him.”

  Sara looked spectacular in a formfitting shiny gunmetal dress and the bright blue mask.

  “Hmm. Maybe I should try that.”

  “You really want to hang out with Harry after six espressos?”

  I snickered. “He must get wild.”

  “And Sara’s voice gets all high,” he said.

  “No way!”

  “It starts to crack like a pubescent boy’s.”

  I laughed and helped Coby fill a couple of cups. We drank and danced—Coby a little stiffly, which made me like him even more. All that grace and power on the football field, yet he was still slightly self-conscious while dancing. Gangly Harry, on the other hand, danced like a dream—to the obvious lust of half the girls, even though he only had eyes for Natalie.

  When Coby and I returned to the kitchen to catch our breath, we found Harry and Sara at the espresso machine again. With Natalie.

  “You know,” I said. “I think I’m going to just look at the view.”

  “I’ll come with,” Natalie said.

  “Great,” I murmured.

  Coby offered to come, but I could tell he wanted to hang with Sara and Harry, so I let Natalie follow me outside alone.

  I wore my peacoat and Natalie slipped into a white puffer shrug that matched her costume. The air was cool and the full moon glistened on the waves. And on the pool. And hot tub. And cabanas. And the manicured gardens leading to the cliff’s edge. The mansion glowed behind us, like a swanky resort.

  “Nice house, huh?” Natalie said.

  “Can you believe he lives here?” I said.

  She shook her head in amazement. “I can’t believe anyone lives here.”

  “C’mon—tell me you weren’t raised like this.”

  “Not quite,” she said. “Our helipad’s bigger.”

  I didn’t answer, not entirely sure if she was joking, and we followed a stone path toward the cliff. I hadn’t forgiven her, but we’d been friends, and I found it all too easy to be comfortable around her again.

  We stopped and looked over the harbor. “I wonder which yacht is his?” I asked.

  “That biggest one,” Natalie said. “He made a point of telling me.”

  “So Harry does have some insecurities,” I said.

  “Mmm. Still, a nice boat,” she said. “So, Coby’s cute. Have you slept with him yet?”

  “What? No!”

  “Oh my God. You’ve never—” She giggled and bit her lip. “Sorry! Want to hear about my first time?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “How about my other first time?” she asked. “The first time I summoned a ghost.” There was a wicked glint in her eyes. “Can you feel them?”

  Yes, I could feel them. The area was rife with ghosts; my spine tingled and silent echoes sounded in my mind. But I was happy to ignore them.

  Not Natalie. She closed her eyes and I could tell she was getting ready to summon.

  “Natalie, don’t,” I protested. “Not here. Not now.”

  “Relax. It’ll be fun,” she said, her eyes still shut. She stood rigidly and quietly and I felt her calling forth a spiritual presence. I expected an old sailor or maybe a long-dead gardener, but that’s not what appeared before us. This was something entirely different.

  I smelled and felt the cold salt wind as it rose from the ocean and heard the waves rippling against the rocks below. The soft glow of the house fell into the darkness over the cliffs, as a thread of spectral fog thickened in the air and crept toward us. This was what Natalie had summoned. I’d never seen anything like it before and judging from Natalie’s expression, neither had she.

  As we watched, the fog morphed into a shape that looked nothing like other ghosts I’d seen. It had a skeletal, malformed body and wore tattered clothing. Except that it wasn’t clothing. It was skin. Its bones were joined in the wrong places somehow, making it look more insect than human.

  We watched it drift past us, trailing an inky fog behind it. It slunk toward the house, closer to the kids hanging under the cabana.

  I shivered at the malicious chill. “What is that?” I whispered.

  “I—I don’t know.”

  “Is it a ghast?”

  “No.” Her eyes shone with panic. “At least, I’ve never seen one like that.”

  “Well, make it go away!”

  “I can’t! I’m a summoner, not a dispeller. I can’t make it go away.”

  The thing had two bl
ack holes instead of eyes and the dark sockets honed in on the kids at the cabana.

  “Oh God,” Natalie breathed. “Do something, Emma, please.”

  “Me? I don’t even know—”

  And I stopped, hearing a discordant voice: Food—flesh. Crack the skin and feed. Feed.

  “It’s going to eat them,” I told her.

  “Ghosts don’t eat people,” she said desperately. “Wraiths, though. Wraiths might eat people. But there’s no way I summoned a wraith. I couldn’t even begin to—”

  “Get ready,” I said, because I had to do something.

  She swallowed. “For what?”

  Hey! I yelled at it. Yeah, over here, you black death freak show.

  It paused and pivoted toward us. Feed, feed. Taste the marrow.

  Yeah, I said. I’m talking to you, Bernice.

  “What are you telling it?” Natalie asked. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m calling it Bernice.”

  “What? Why?”

  “No idea.” It creaked toward us, away from the other kids. “But it worked.”

  “What’s the plan?” She grabbed my hand. “What’s the plan, Emma?”

  Crack the bones. Feed the flesh. It drifted closer. Drink the soul. Feed.

  “Um,” I said. “How fast can you run?”

  “Watch me.” She pulled me with her. “Come on!”

  “I’m staying here.” If I ran, it’d only turn back to those kids. “You go.”

  She started to say something, but I couldn’t hear her as the ghost—or whatever—was upon us. It engulfed me. Whiplash welts rose on my skin under my clothes, but the raw emotion of that thing beating in my brain felt even worse. I sensed its endless craving, an insatiable need to feed. Its desperate hunger and pitiless hatred resolved into one thought: Neos … Neos … Neos.

  That word sparked me into action. It was what I’d heard curling in smoke from the urns outside my father’s office and when the shadows had haunted me in the village—somehow this was all connected.

  Instead of trying to dispel it, I lashed out with my thoughts: There’s nothing for you here. Go back. Now!

  In response, I felt my breath crushed from me. A terrible constriction, and I opened my mouth to scream but couldn’t make a sound.

  Go! I shouted in my mind.

  Neossss. Feed.

  It was going to kill me. And when it was done with me, it’d move on to Natalie and the other kids. If I didn’t stop it, no one would.

  I focused, despite the ghost howling for my blood. I wrapped myself around that vile thing, like diving into a sewer, and drew whatever bleak spark animated my ghostkeeping ability deep into my heart. The power radiated within me and I realized I could control it. The ghost thrashed and tore at me, smoky tendrils leaving frozen white stripes on my skin, as I refused to release it.

  Go, I said again. And this time, I showed the thing a glimpse of my power.

  The ghost faltered.

  And I struck again. I shoved with all my might, battering at it with the light that flowed through my veins and out my fingertips. At least, that’s what it felt like. Martha said it was different for all ghostkeepers, but my dispelling power felt like lightning coursing through my body and out of my hands, even if the bolts weren’t actually visible.

  But at the height of my attack, I shifted. I couldn’t dispel it. Not even this abomination; it felt too much like murder. Instead I compelled it. Go. Touch nothing. Harm nobody. Go.

  I lost myself in the struggle, my will against the ghost’s, until my world shrank to a tiny point and my awareness vanished into a single command: Go.

  Then a new sensation came: warmth and light and softness. I jerked in surprise and found Natalie holding me upright, saying my name.

  I blinked at her. We were alone. It had gone. The kids still hung around the fire at the cabana. Only seconds had passed.

  “Emma!” She rubbed my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

  “Barely,” I exhaled. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m … oddly fine.”

  “You didn’t look fine. You were white as a—” She stopped, about to say “ghost,” and we both laughed, shakily.

  “Why did you stay?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t about to leave you again,” she said. “Besides, you were all waving your arms around.”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t want the other kids to talk.”

  “I was not waving my arms around!”

  “Occupational hazard,” she said.

  We both fell silent, looking out at the ocean. What else was out there, lurking in the realm between life and death? How had Natalie summoned such a horror?

  “Okay, we’ve gotta figure out what that was,” she said. “And where it came from. I’ll warn the Knell, and maybe you can … um, tell me where you got your hair cut?”

  “Huh?” I said.

  “Hey.” Coby was suddenly behind me. “You still out here?”

  “Girl talk,” Natalie said.

  “I saw you from the house.” He looked at me. “What were you doing with your hands?”

  “Told you,” Natalie said.

  “I was pretending to shove Natalie off the cliff.”

  She snorted. “I kind of deserved it.”

  “Harry’s looking for you,” Coby told her.

  She grinned with slow satisfaction. “Yeah, he wants me to teach him all the dirty phrases I know in Latin. You know a few, don’t you, Emma?”

  “What? No!”

  Her laughter didn’t sound at all diabolical as she slunk back toward the house, flipping open her cell.

  I sighed. “She is my nemesis.”

  “When your nemesis is a ski bunny,” Coby said, “you need to get out more.”

  I laughed. “Yeah, my life is so boring.” If only he knew.

  “Do you want to get out of here?” he said gently in my ear.

  My body shimmered from his breath. “Yes, please.”

  “We’ll walk to Echo Point.”

  “The Neck’s not in Echo Point?”

  “No, I mean the actual point—the place the town’s named after.”

  He put an arm around me and I snuggled closer. Coby was real. Coby was safe.

  Was he going to try and kiss me when we got up to the point? Would I let him? Yes. Because what kind of girl turns down kisses from a guy like Coby?

  Plus he had nothing to do with ghosts and I loved that about him.

  And I liked his guyliner.

  We strolled through the grounds to a cliffside path that wound from Harry’s property past his neighbors’ mansions toward Echo Point. The sky was clear and the moon full. It was a perfect night for kissing under the stars—even if you were still shaken from dealing with a supposed wraith.

  The path suddenly jutted out to a point and there was a bench for taking in the remarkable view. A set of rickety wooden steps led to a small beach below.

  “Want to walk on the beach?” Coby asked.

  A sudden suspicion hit me. “Did Harry tell you I like long walks on the beach?”

  He laughed. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  “Oh. No, I’m happy here.”

  And I was. Forget about Bennett, Natalie, and hungry ghosts. Standing here I could just be myself, Emma, with a cute guy who looked like he wanted to kiss me.

  He leaned closer and touched one of the silver hoops Sara lent me. “You don’t usually wear jewelry.”

  I thought about the amulet I tucked away beneath my shirt. Maybe I’d let him see that later. “Not much.”

  “And I like your hair this way,” he said. “And your mask is … sexy.”

  I placed my palm on his chest, feeling that tingly moment when you want a guy to kiss you, but aren’t sure what it’s going to be like. His chest was warm and hard under his jacket and I tingled some more.

  Tingled too much.

  Something was wrong.

  There was a ghost nearby. I glanced past Coby, dread forming in my stomach. I recognized this ma
licious tingling. Not just a ghost, but that soul-sucking wraith that Natalie had summoned.

  “What?” Coby asked, seeing my expression.

  “I don’t know. I think—” I glanced down at the beach. “I think someone’s down there.” I looked closer, and caught a blur of motion in the evening gloom.

  Coby leaned back into me. “Don’t worry, he can’t see us.”

  “No,” I said, pulling away. “I think he’s in trouble.”

  “He’s fine. Just practicing tai chi or something.”

  My breath caught. “It’s Bennett!” He was alone on the beach, trying to fight off that wraith. “Stay here. Please?”

  I didn’t wait for him to answer. Instead, I kicked off my heels and ran.

  Down the stairs, across the sand. I heard Coby calling my name from the cliffs, but didn’t stop. I kept my eyes on Bennett and the writhing mass of shadow he was trying to dispel. Before I reached him, the ghost curled into a roiling ball and rushed him, a mist of supernatural darkness spreading like a bat’s wings around him.

  “Bennett!” I called.

  “Emma—” He didn’t turn toward me; he focused on keeping the thing from his throat. “What are you doing here?”

  Oh, just hanging out on the cliffs, about to make out with a guy.

  “Go!” he said. “You can’t be here—”

  The thing drove him to one knee, reeking a cold malevolence. I stood behind Bennett and pushed with him. The wraith turned into a vortex and sucked my attack into itself. Okay, what the hell? I got that this wasn’t a normal ghost. Your average ghost was a slacker, standing around, looking semi-normal (though a little pale), and maybe moving stuff now and then. They didn’t have flesh hanging from their bones and curl themselves into death balls of ghostly essence.

  “It’s a wraith, isn’t it?” I tried to communicate with it, but couldn’t penetrate its nebulous shell. “That’s what Natalie thought—”

  Bennett growled. “Emma, now isn’t the time. I need you to help me.”

  “I compelled it earlier, maybe—”

  “That’s why it came back stronger.” He fought to his feet, forcing the thing toward the ocean. “Stop playing, Emma, and dispel the thing.”

  “I can’t!”

  “Then leave,” he said through clenched teeth.

  The ghost hovered a moment over the sea, then curled into itself, an ever-shifting mass, blasting toward Bennett. He sidestepped, but the thing veered impossibly fast and a storm of plasma erupted through his torso.