I get to my feet and rush over to Hector.
But it’s too late. I can tell as soon as I reach him that he’s not breathing. He’s also bleeding from several puncture wounds in his face and neck and body. I grab him and shake him, trying to get some response, anything . . . but there’s nothing. He’s like a giant homely broken doll. There is a smudge of blue paint on one of his cheeks. His eyes are still open, and they stare glassily up at nothing.
He’s dead.
I sit beside him for a few minutes, even though I know I should be getting out of there. It just seems wrong to leave him. Yeah, I know we weren’t best friends or anything, and I found his creepy loitering a little, well, creepy . . . but he was devoted to Peter, and apparently he just sacrificed himself to save me. He was one of the good guys.
I wish I were strong enough to carry him back to camp proper, but I guess that would raise a lot of questions that might be better going unaddressed. A dead camper would surely mean that they’d close down the camp and send everyone home, wouldn’t it? I mean, at least this kind of dead camper, one murdered in the woods by an unknown assailant and sporting unidentifiable-weapon wounds. And getting sent home would only delay the inevitable, not to mention separate the team.
What team? Old Cyn whispers.
Shut up, I tell her. Anyway, it’s not like Mr. Gabriel would give up just because we go back home. He’d follow us. And then he’d probably kill our friends and families like he threatened to do in the fall, and he’d still get Annie.
No, it’s better that we take care of things here and now.
Whatever taking care of things might mean, given that we are clearly outmatched in every possible way.
I need to find Peter. Right now. And tell him what’s happened.
I reach over and close Hector’s eyes. Then I lean over and kiss him on his paint-smudged cheek.
“Thank you,” I whisper. I hope he can hear me somehow.
Then I head slowly back toward the main campus.
Poor Peter. He’s going to be really, really sad.
I’m crossing the main intersection near the dining hall when Ryan and Jules step out right in front of me.
Ryan sees me, starts to look away, then looks back. His face looks alarmed. He comes toward me, Jules following just behind him.
“Cyn? What happened?”
I look down. My jeans are covered in dirt and leaves, and there are smears of blood across my T-shirt.
“It’s not my blood,” I say dully, attempting to push past him.
He grabs my arm. “What happened?”
I don’t have any sad left inside me for Ryan things right now. I just feel empty and annoyed. “The usual,” I tell him. “Demons, people dying, you know, my stuff. Don’t worry about it.”
“Who — who died?”
“Hector. It was almost Michael. I should have just let Michael die. If I’d known Hector would die in his place . . .” I have to stop and close my eyes for a second. “I have to find Peter and tell him.” I try again to push past Ryan. He hasn’t let go of my arm.
“Cyn . . .”
I sigh in exasperation. “Look, Ryan. I don’t have time for this right now. I know you’re still mad at me, and you probably have a right to be. But there are bigger things going on here. If you want to be pissed at me, fine. I still think you should help, though, because people are dying, and you are one of the very few who understand the situation and can help to do something about it. But I’m certainly not going to beg you. If you want to stand by and watch, that’s your choice. But if you want to maybe put our personal issues aside and help to save some people, you can come with me. But we’re not going to stand here and talk it out. Come or don’t come. Up to you.”
This time when I try to pull away, he lets me. I resume my travels. After a second, I become aware of Ryan falling into step behind me. And Jules, too.
There is hurried whispering, and then Ryan comes up next to me. “Are you okay?” he asks. His voice is soft and gentle, the kind of voice you’d use to soothe a wild animal.
I am in no mood for that.
“Nope.” I don’t stop walking. I don’t even look at him. “Not okay. Mr. Gabriel isn’t dead. He’s the mystery demon that used Peter’s tether to get here in spirit form. That horrible spider monster is his brother. They’re going to kill us and take Annie. Oh, who is conveniently coming up for our shows, according to her latest letter.”
Ryan grabs me again and spins me toward him. “Wait, what? Stop. Go back. What?”
I give him the quickest possible summary of the day’s events. Jules has, of course, stopped with us, and is staring at me like she doesn’t understand any of the words coming out of my mouth. I am in no mood for her, either.
“Why is she here?” I ask Ryan when I’m done. “I don’t remember inviting her.”
“I’m here because Ryan promised to finish telling me what the hell is going on,” she says.
“It’s none of your business what’s going on,” I say.
“If Ryan’s in trouble, it’s absolutely my business!” she says.
“Stop it, you guys,” Ryan says. “Cyn, Jules is involved now, like it or not.”
“Why? Why is she involved now?”
“Because she was there yesterday, remember? And I told her a lot of it already.”
“Not enough, though,” Jules says. “I still don’t really believe any of it.”
Now it’s my turn to stare at her. “Did you have something in your eye last night when I fell out of a hole in the air with a giant spider-bull monster attacking me? What do you think that thing was? Someone’s really good stage makeup?
“Cyn,” Ryan growls. “Sarcasm is not going to help.”
“Sarcasm almost always helps,” I mutter.
Ryan takes a deep breath. “Okay. First, Jules, all that stuff I told you about demons is true. Peter is . . . a good demon. Mostly. He’s on our side. Or at least we think he is. Or . . . Cyn thinks he is.”
“I know he is.”
“Fine. Whatever. There are two other demons here at camp with us. One of them is mostly here in spirit form, and he’s the one who killed Jeremy.”
Jules looks confused. “I thought Jeremy left because of a family emergency.”
“That was a cover story.”
“Made up by who? Who’s trying to cover this up? Does Steven know?”
“No,” Ryan tells her. “Made up by the demons. They can . . . influence people. Make them believe things that aren’t true, or not see things that are right in front of them, or lots of other things. But since we were already suspicious from our past experiences with demons, we pretty much knew right away that something bad had happened to Jeremy.”
“Your previous experiences . . . last year at school. With the librarian demon who wanted to marry Cyn’s friend.”
“He wanted to do a lot more than marry her,” I say.
“Right,” Ryan says. “I’m not as easily fooled by them anymore, because I know about them. And Cyn . . . has a special resistance. I’m still vulnerable to their powers when they direct them at me. Cyn is immune.”
“Why is Cyn immune?”
“I’m just special,” I say, not really wanting Ryan to tell her what the demons call my special resistant nature. “Born that way.”
“But they can still hurt her physically. Especially when they’re in their real demon forms. Which brings us to the third demon, the one who came back through the portal with Cyn last night.”
Jules holds up a hand. “You guys keep talking about this portal like I should know what that means. Portal from where?”
“The demon world,” I tell her. “It’s a long story.”
Ryan gives me an exasperated look. “Cyn made a deal with a demoness when we were trying to stop Mr. Gabriel. The demoness helped us in exchange for getting to borrow Cyn’s special resistance three times. The first time happened last year, in the battle with Mr. Gabriel and the other demons, and led to the demon
ess becoming queen of the demons. The second time happened last night.”
Okay, so it’s not that long a story. I still don’t see why she needs to know all the details.
“Demon world,” Jules says, looking back and forth between us. “Like . . . hell? You went to hell?”
“Basically,” I say, not really wanting to talk about it. “It’s certainly not heaven, anyway.”
“So,” Ryan goes on, “somehow this other demon got into the portal with Cyn, and is now here. At camp. In demon form. As you saw, he is very big and scary.”
“And strong,” I add. “Very strong, according to Peter. Too strong for Peter to fight him physically.”
Ryan looks at me. “Crap. That’s not good.”
“No kidding.”
“But . . . but what do they want?” Jules asks, seeming to be struggling (understandably) to keep up. “Why did they come here?”
“So . . . the second demon, the one without a real body . . . he’s apparently the same demon we fought last year,” Ryan explains.
“The librarian.”
“Correct.”
“Who you said was dead.”
“Yeah. We really thought he was.”
“So he’s still trying to kill you guys? And steal away Cyn’s friend?”
“Yes.”
Jules stands there, taking all of this in.
“This is a lot to take in,” she says after a moment.
“Feel free to leave at any time,” I tell her. “You do not need to be a part of this.”
“Cyn,” Ryan says, “maybe she can help. You have to admit we could use all the help we can get right now.”
Oh, so now it’s we again? I know I should be happy about that, but I’m having trouble feeling it. I hate that it ever stopped being we in the first place.
“How can she help? Is she going to fight Mr. Gabriel’s brother?”
“I don’t know! But if she wants to help, then we’re going to let her. If I can get along with Peter, you can get along with Jules.”
“Hey!” Jules says, offended. “You’re putting me in the same category as a disguised demon that you’re only kind of sure is not a bad guy?”
Personally I think the comparison is insulting to Peter, but I manage not to say this out loud. Ryan is right, I suppose. We do need all the help we can get. Although I can’t imagine how Jules can possibly help. Unless we can use her as bait or something.
That idea cheers me up just a little.
“Okay, fine. But does she want to help? Have you explained that she might, you know, die if she tries to help?”
“Hey,” she says. “Standing right here.”
I turn to face her. “Okay. Are you sure you really want to get involved with this? People died last time when they got involved. I know you and Ryan have been summer besties since the dawn of time, but this really isn’t your fight. If you stay out of it, you’ll probably be fine.”
“Like Jeremy was fine?”
She has a point there, I have to admit.
“Ryan,” she says, turning away from me, “I can’t just sit by while someone — something — tries to kill you. I mean, could you? If it were the other way around?”
“No,” he says. “Of course not. But I would never forgive myself if something happened to you because I got you involved in this crazy mess.”
This is getting way more touchy-feely than I am comfortable with.
“Okay, fine,” I say. “Jules is in. Great. Welcome to the team. Now we just have to figure out what to do. Which is why we’re going to meet up with Peter and ask him to summon Aaron, so we can ask the demoness for help again.” I turn at Ryan’s sharp intake of breath. “I do not want to hear it,” I say, pointing right at his lovely, angry face. “We don’t have any other options.”
“But —”
“I know you hate that idea. I get it. But as much as I want you to help me, as much as I want desperately not to have to face this without you, I am not going to reject our best chance just to try to make you happy. This isn’t me ignoring your advice. This is me just knowing what the right course is.”
I wait while he decides how he’s going to respond. Finally he just closes his mouth and nods once, resignedly.
We go to the loading-dock area of Blake, which is where Peter and I had agreed to meet up. Then we wait in silence, everyone thinking their own separate thoughts. I hope Ryan is thinking about how he should have been with me today, but I’m afraid he’s thinking about Jules instead and how bad he feels for dragging her into this.
I don’t know or care what Jules is thinking.
I’m thinking about how I’m going to tell Peter about Hector. But as soon as he arrives, it’s clear he already knows.
“How did it happen?” he asks, standing in the doorway.
“I am so sorry, Peter,” I say, getting up and going over to him. “Hector attacked Mr. Gabriel’s brother when he came at me after I stopped him from killing Michael. I don’t even know what Hector was doing there.”
“I sent him,” Peter says. “To watch over you, in case either of the demons tried anything. He wasn’t supposed to try to take them on by himself, though. He never was very smart about making good judgment calls in the moment.”
“He probably saved my life.”
Peter half smiles. “See what I mean?” Then the smile fades. “Poor Hector. He was just starting to like working backstage, too.”
I think about the paint smudge on his face and I want to cry.
“I’m so sorry,” I say again. “I . . . I left him there. I wasn’t sure what else to do.”
Peter nods. “I’ll take care of it. Tonight.” He suddenly seems to realize what I said earlier. “Mr. Gabriel’s brother tried to kill Michael?”
“Just a coincidence, I think. Mr. Gabriel arranged it — he was there, too — but he didn’t seem to know I had any connection to Michael until I referred to him by name.” I feel my fists clenching. “I should have let them have him. He wasn’t worth Hector.”
“Don’t go there. You couldn’t have just let him die. And you didn’t know Hector was watching.” He looks toward the stage area. “Is Michael here? I should find him and make sure he doesn’t remember what happened. I’m guessing he’s already managed to not-remember on his own, but just in case . . .”
He seems to notice Ryan and Jules for the first time. “Huh. Everyone all friendly again?”
“Not really,” I say before either of them can respond. “But they’re going to help us if they can.”
“Okay. Let’s . . . let’s go over to my bunk. Bunk three. Everyone will be at rehearsal or afternoon activities, so we should have the place to ourselves. I’ll meet you there.”
“I’ll wait for you,” I say quickly. I don’t really want any more alone time with Ryan and Jules right now.
Ryan takes the hint. “Fine. We’ll see you there.” He and Jules head out through the loading-dock doors. I sit back down to wait, not watching them go.
Peter comes back in just a few minutes.
“All okay?” I ask.
“Yeah. He repressed that memory so fast I doubt it will even show up in his dreams. But I gave him a substitute memory to make sure. He thinks he just took a nice walk this afternoon and ran into a camper who talked his ear off about what a great director he is, but he can’t quite remember who it was.” He jerks his head toward the door. “Ready to go?
I nod and we head out.
“Are you going to be okay?” I ask him.
He sighs. “Yeah. I’ll miss the big lug, though.” His face hardens. “And bug-boy is sure as hell going to pay for what he did.”
“How did you get hooked up with Hector in the first place? He doesn’t . . . didn’t really seem the musical-theater type.”
Peter surprises me by laughing. “No, he certainly was not. He learned about demons from someone he met in the comics world. That was his thing — comics, graphic novels, superhero memorabilia. He summoned me the first time b
ecause he wanted some rare first edition.”
“Really? That hardly seems worth making a deal with a demon.”
He glances at me. “Hey, everyone has their passions, theater nerd. Don’t judge.”
“Sorry.”
“Anyway, something about him kind of endeared him to me. I offered him an ongoing arrangement, keeping him in Comic Con passes and whatever else he wanted in exchange for him becoming my musical-theater source. It actually took some convincing; his only real experience with musical theater was Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. But I explained that there’s a lot of good musical theater out there, too, and anyway, he didn’t have to like it, he just had to be my supplier. He came around, although he never truly got into enjoying it for himself. But we had a really good thing going there for a while.”
We walk in silence for a few minutes. Then Peter asks, “So Ryan’s still mad at you but helping us anyway?”
I don’t really want to talk about it, but maybe Peter wants to be distracted from thinking about Hector.
“Yeah. He saw me coming back from my encounter with the evil demon brothers and came over to ask what happened. I suggested that maybe our personal issues were less important than people getting killed and stuff. He saw my point, apparently.”
“What about Jules?”
“They seem to be a package deal at the moment,” I say darkly. “Ryan pointed out that she was there when Little Brother came through the portal, and so he had to tell her what was happening, and he made the pretty valid argument that we could probably use all the help we can get. It’s not like there was any chance of getting her unglued from his side, anyway.”
“True,” Peter says. He looks at me for a moment. “You’re hoping we get the chance to use her as bait, aren’t you?”
I stare at him. “Can you read my mind? Is that a thing? That had better not be a thing, Peter. If you could read my mind all this time and didn’t tell me . . .”
He laughs. “No. I swear. I can’t read your mind. But it’s pretty obvious how you feel about her.”
I shrug angrily. “They have this whole history I know nothing about. And she loves to point out how much longer she’s known him than I have. And since the fight, she’s gotten ridiculously protective, like it’s her job to make sure I never hurt him again. But I’m his girlfriend. Or I think I still am, anyway. And so in theory, at least, I’m the closest one to him now, and she must hate that a lot.”
Revenge of the Evil Librarian Page 16
