by L. J. Smith
Nick returned her gaze. He seemed to understand exactly what she was thinking and he smiled reassuringly for her. It was just then that Cassie saw something glisten on the sleeve of his leather jacket. It was dim at first, but once she noticed it, it appeared to shine more clearly. It was the hunter symbol.
“Nick,” she said, but that was the only word she could get out.
He registered Cassie’s expression and then watched everyone else’s face fall into the same shock.
“What?” he asked. “Why do you all look like you’ve seen a ghost?”
“Your sleeve,” Diana said. “You’ve been marked.”
Cassie went to him, but Nick shook her off. He searched his jacket and located the mark. He concentrated hard on it, squinting as if trying to understand it, but had no other reaction.
“So I have,” he said, in a voice as still and cold as stone.
Adam barely said a word the whole car ride home to Cassie’s. Cassie didn’t take it personally; she didn’t feel much like making conversation either. What was there to say after an evening like this? But when Adam parked in front of her house, he cut the engine and turned to her like he had something to get off his chest.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to stay on your couch for the night?” he asked. “Scarlett might still be coming after you.”
There was a chill in the air that made Cassie shiver. “Thank you,” she said. “But I’ll be okay. Faye and Laurel are there, and Faye wouldn’t miss the chance to act on some of her anger if Scarlett showed up.”
“That’s true, I guess.” Adam tapped his fingers on the steering wheel.
Cassie was wearing his suit jacket draped over her shoulders to keep warm. She went to take it off and give it back to him, but he stopped her.
“Keep it on a little longer,” he said. He made no motion to restart the car’s engine. Something else was obviously on his mind.
Cassie feared she knew what it was. Adam was concerned that Nick being marked would mean he’d have to start spending the night in Cassie’s basement. The two of them would be sleeping under the same roof.
She decided to help him along. “Adam,” she said. “About Nick staying here …”
Adam stared straight ahead. “It’s not that,” he said. “Can I ask you one more time what happened when the lights went out in the school?”
“I told you,” Cassie said. “Nothing happened with Nick while you were gone that you need to worry about.”
“I just need to hear it again.”
Cassie had already given Adam a detailed account of her and Nick’s every move from the moment they spotted Scarlett to their escape. But she repeated the story anyway.
“It’s just so strange,” he said, unable to look at her.
“Adam, what are you freaking out about? I know if you had been there when Scarlett showed up, you would have protected me, just like Nick did. I don’t doubt that for a second.”
Finally Adam turned to Cassie, allowing her to see his tearful eyes. “I felt something,” he said. “An arm brushed up against mine in the chaos.”
“What?” Cassie was confused.
“When the lights went out. I had just come out of Boylan’s office and everyone started running. I was making my way toward the gym when someone grabbed my hand, and it felt like … I don’t even know.” Adam could barely continue, and Cassie began to understand just how upset he was.
“It’s okay,” she said, trying to coax the full truth out of him. “What did you feel?”
“I thought it was you leading me to safety, but then we got separated. I could have sworn it was you. Because of the sparks I felt.”
“But I was already out of the gym and in the parking lot by that point,” Cassie said. “It wasn’t me.”
There was a moment of silence as it all sank in.
“Oh,” Cassie said, finally comprehending what this meant. Neither of them wanted to say it out loud, but it was obvious. It was Scarlett who’d grabbed Adam’s hand. The sparks he felt were for her.
“It’s you that I love, Cassie. I swear it.” Adam’s voice rose. “This doesn’t mean anything.”
“It means the cord between you and Scarlett must be real after all,” Cassie said. “That’s the only explanation.”
“I shouldn’t even have told you.”
“Of course you should have told me!”
“This doesn’t change anything.” Adam persisted. But the more he swore and pleaded, the more obvious it was to Cassie that he was just as shaken by this as she was, if not more.
“My hand just got confused,” he said. “That’s all.”
“Your hand got confused?” Cassie took an immediate breath to recalibrate her emotions. If she wasn’t careful, her hurt and anger would blow up right in Adam’s face.
“You don’t have to feel guilty,” she said, trying to sound sympathetic. “It’s not your fault. It just is.”
Adam got quiet then. “But I don’t want this.”
Cassie reached over to give Adam a kiss good night. She needed to get out of his car as quickly as possible. “I know,” she said. “Don’t worry too much about it. We’ll be okay.”
“That’s it? Don’t you think we should talk about this?” Adam asked.
Cassie slipped Adam’s suit jacket from her shoulders. It smelled like him, like autumn leaves and ocean wind. She gently folded it and placed it on his lap. Then she put her hand on the door handle.
“It’s going to be okay,” she said, knowing she had to appear strong for Adam in this moment. Adam could always be relied on to reassure Cassie. Now it was her turn.
“Cassie, please don’t go.”
“Let’s sleep on it,” she said, as sweetly as she could. And then borrowing a favorite phrase of her mother’s, she added, “Everything will look brighter tomorrow.”
She got out of the car and almost made it to the front door before tears filled her eyes and began running down her face. But Adam couldn’t see them, and that was all that mattered.
Chapter 9
After her encounter with Scarlett at the dance, Cassie’s sleep was fitful—nightmare after nightmare plagued her mind. As she woke up, she knew what she had to do to make it stop. She pulled the gunmetal chest out from under her bed and unlocked its clasp. She’d wanted to wait for Adam to be with her before she tried to open the book again, but time was running out, and things with Adam had just gotten a whole lot more complicated. She couldn’t allow a potential love triangle to trip up her search for answers.
Plus, she had an idea. In the jewelry box where she kept all her precious stones, Cassie had an obsidian crystal. It was the same crystal she’d once used to disable a guarding spell Faye had placed on one of the Master Tools. Cassie squeezed the sharp-edged black rock in her hand now. It was known to purify dark matter. Why not give it a try?
She glided the crystal over and around her father’s Book of Shadows while whispering the chant that had been successful last time:
Darkness be gone, no shields are needed, purity enters and leaves here unhindered.
Then she pulled on the book’s leather string and fanned its cover open. She touched the first page hopefully, but it immediately grew hot, singeing the tip of her pointer finger.
Cassie drew back, but before the book flapped closed she thrust the obsidian crystal between its pages. At first the book struggled against the stone, rattling and thrashing, and the crystal shook over its pages like a kernel of corn in hot oil. But then the book seemed to tire. Slowly, each page grew calm and quiet beneath the crystal until they were still. The book’s darkness had been tamed just enough to allow the rock to hold it open like a simple paperweight.
The words scrawled upon the first two pages still looked like an ancient language of lines and symbols. Viewing them this closely made Cassie’s eyes feel strange and off kilter, like staring at an optical illusion. But at least now she could get to researching and translating. And if she maneuvered the obsidian just so, she
could even use it to turn the book’s pages. Wait till Adam saw this.
Just then her doorbell rang and Cassie realized what time it was. The Circle meeting to go over the events of the night before was set to begin in a few minutes. Cassie removed the obsidian and the book flapped closed. She quickly locked it back in its hiding place before running down to answer the door.
On her front porch was Nick, carrying a duffel bag over his shoulder. He didn’t look happy, for obvious reasons, but Cassie was glad to have a moment with him before the rest of the Circle arrived.
She led him inside and asked him to have a seat on the living room sofa. “I’ll show you downstairs in just a minute,” she said. “But first I was hoping we could talk.”
Nick dropped his bag on the floor and sat down. “Okay.”
Cassie sat beside him. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I feel like it’s my fault you got marked.”
“Scarlett was trying to kill you. You weren’t exactly asking for it,” Nick said.
“I know, I just … you saved my life. And I can’t bear to think what might happen to yours now.”
Nick shook his head. “It’s not your fault, Cassie. I knew the chance I was taking, and I chose to risk it. Besides, I can handle this.”
Cassie reached for Nick’s hand. It was a bold move, but she felt like under the circumstances it was worth the try.
For once he didn’t pull away from her. Cassie opened her mouth to assure him that she would be there for him the way he was for her—but then a loud, pounding noise rattled the floor beneath them.
Nick jumped with alarm.
“It’s okay,” Cassie said. “It’s only Faye and a broom handle. She finds the use of it ironic.”
Nick tried to play it cool, but Cassie knew he was embarrassed about being so easily startled, that the cracks beneath his cool exterior were starting to show.
“It’s Faye’s special signal,” she said casually. “When she bangs on the ceiling with the broom, it means she’s in dire need of attention.”
“When doesn’t Faye need attention?” Nick ran his fingers through his hair and allowed himself to laugh. “So where is this secret room anyway?”
Cassie smiled. “Follow me.”
She led Nick downstairs to the old bookshelves and cast the spell to reveal the hidden door. Faye and Laurel were waiting expectantly inside. They’d microwaved popcorn, baked cupcakes, and had music playing.
“I’ve been marked,” Nick said, surveying the scene. “It’s not my birthday.” But he still reached for a pink-frosted cupcake and took a hearty bite.
The room had changed quite a bit since Cassie had last seen it. Faye and Laurel each infused it with their own character. Laurel’s side of the room was draped with green plants, herbs, and flowers. Piles of thick books were stacked as high as the eye could see, many of them for the research she was doing on the hunters. Faye’s side was adorned with red tapestries and velvety pillows. She’d also created a small altar that housed candles and incense and various concoctions.
“You’ll have to carve out a space of your own,” Cassie said to Nick. “At your own risk.”
“I’ll be just fine.” Nick tossed his duffel bag down and shoved the last bite of cupcake into his mouth. “I don’t need much.”
“We’ve got an air mattress for you to sleep on,” Faye said. “But if you get lonely, there’s lots of extra room in my bed.”
“Gross,” Laurel shouted. “Not with me here there isn’t.”
“That’s my cue to leave.” Cassie let Nick get settled in and went upstairs to wait for the rest of the Circle to arrive for their meeting. As everyone trickled in, Cassie directed them downstairs. It was Adam she was really waiting for, but he was last to arrive, which was rare.
When he finally rambled up the walk, he appeared more disheveled than normal. His clothes were wrinkled and his hair was uncombed. There were dark circles beneath his eyes that made it look like he hadn’t slept all night. Cassie hoped it wasn’t yesterday’s conversation about the cord weighing him down.
“Before we go downstairs,” Adam said, “I want to show you something.” He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and retrieved a squeezable pink plastic tube.
“My lip gloss?” Cassie asked.
Adam nodded. “Not just any lip gloss. This fell out of your pocket the night of our first kiss. And this …”
Adam pulled a tiny square of paper from the same pocket. “This is the movie ticket stub from our official first date.”
Next Adam held up his cell phone. “Saved on here,” he said, “is the first time you said I love you to me on my voice mail. And these are only the beginning, Cassie. Do you understand what I’m getting at?”
“You’re in great danger of becoming a hoarder?” Cassie grinned.
Adam laughed. “Maybe, but it’s because everything and anything that reminds me of you, I have to save forever. If that doesn’t prove that I’m head-over-heels in love with you, I don’t know what will.”
All the tension and fear Cassie built up overnight about their relationship had just floated up and away. She wanted to jump into Adam’s arms and lose the afternoon in his embrace. But there was no time for that now. Their friends were waiting. All Cassie could do at the moment was kiss Adam with her whole being, and hope her love for him shined through, that their connection was palpable, before leading him downstairs to join the others.
“The hunters and Scarlett are way too close for comfort,” Melanie was saying when Adam and Cassie entered the secret room.
Everyone was gathered in a circle except for Chris and Doug, who were stirring around in the kitchen like hyperactive children. Deborah agreed with Melanie. “We need to get closer to the hunters, to have full surveillance on them, since they’re obviously watching us.”
“I can get us closer to Max,” Diana said.
Faye snickered and whispered something under her breath to Deborah and Suzan.
Diana turned to her. “I’m the only one who can easily do it,” she said. “We all know that.”
“But you could be putting yourself in danger,” Faye said mockingly. Then her face took on a spiteful weightiness. “If given the chance, Max will mark you just like he did me.”
Diana shrugged. “I’m not going to do any magic around him. Besides if I can get into his bedroom, I might be able to find out where he keeps his relic.”
“You’re not going anywhere near his bedroom,” Faye shot back.
Laurel cleared her throat. “I’ve made some progress digging up information about the relics,” she said. With a nod from Cassie, she took the center of the floor and explained to the Circle that the relics originated around 1320, shortly after Pope John XVII authorized the Inquisition to persecute witchcraft as a type of heresy.
“An accused witch created and spelled the relics in return for her life,” Laurel said. “She christened the owners of these magical stones and taught them the killing curse.”
“Of course they needed a witch to do their dirty work for them,” Sean called out. “Wimps.”
Laurel pursed her lips at the interruption. “Soon the Inquisition led to a wave of witch-hunting,” she continued, “during which the relics were sighted throughout France, Italy, and Germany. But many of them were destroyed during the peak of the hunts, which occurred in the late 1500s till around 1630. And by the time the hunt reached Salem in the 1690s, only a dozen or so relics—and even fewer hunter families—had survived.”
Laurel focused her eyes on Diana specifically. “It’s now believed there are only six relics still active.”
Diana was looking straight down at the floor. In almost a whisper she said, “That’s all?”
Laurel glanced at Faye. “So it may be worth it for Diana to search Max’s bedroom if it means we can bring that number down to five.”
“Five, six, seven hundred, what difference does it make?” Nick called out. “We still don’t have a way to beat them. Can we talk for a moment
about Scarlett? She wants to kill Cassie, to get her spot in the Circle, and she has our Master Tools. She almost got the best of us last night, and she’ll come back again. If we can’t use magic on her, then we need to be ready to destroy her with our bare hands.”
Deborah patted Nick on the shoulder. “Well, it goes without saying that my cousin can use some anger management right about now.”
Until this point, everyone had been so engrossed in the discussion that no one had noticed Chris trying to squeeze his six-foot-tall body into the tiny confines of the dumbwaiter carved into the kitchen wall. But the racket he was creating finally captured the group’s attention.
“I can do it,” he said. “Doug, push my feet in for me. And then launch me upstairs.”
Doug did as he was told, laughing. He shoved Chris’s feet deeper into the box with one hand. His other hand hovered over the wooden lever that would send the dumbwaiter flying up the chute that led to the kitchen above them.
“Chris,” Cassie yelled. “That’ll never hold you. It’s not an elevator. Get out before you break it.”
“Don’t mess with that thing,” Faye called out to him. “It’s our favorite way to have Cassie wait on us from upstairs.”
“But I can do it,” Chris said again. “I’m not as big as I look.”
Cassie’s patience had worn thin and a peculiar anger surged through her. Her face and hands grew hot with rage. “I said, get out of there!”
Before she could get control of herself, she marched over to Doug and forcefully shoved him away from the lever. Her strength caught him by surprise, causing him to stumble backward.
Chris, in his struggle to climb out of the dumbwaiter before Cassie could reach him, slipped out headfirst and hit the floor with a thump.
A few silent seconds passed before he screamed out in pain, clutching his left arm.
“Now you’ve done it,” Doug said. “You broke my brother.”
“Seriously, Cassie,” Sean said. “You didn’t have to humiliate him like that.”
