Black Moon Rising

by D. J. MacHale

  “Uh…what was that?” Lu asked.

  “That was bad news,” I said. “The spell over Ainsley might be broken, but the coven is still in business.”

  I grabbed Theo by the shoulders and said, “Stay with Ainsley and Kayla. Don’t let Ainsley leave. Sit on her if you have to. Just keep her here.”

  I pointed to Lu and said, “Come with me.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “On a witch hunt,” I said, and sprinted for the exit with Lu right behind me.

  We fought our way out of there along with the hundreds of other kids.

  “Witch hunt?” Lu called to me over the din of the multitude of people we were swimming along with.

  “The coven’s been building up to this for years,” I said. “No way the witches are done. I think they’ll come after Ainsley again.”

  “So how can we stop it?” she asked.

  “We do what the books said and crush the core of their power.”

  “Uh, you know how to do that?” Lu asked suspiciously.

  “I have a pretty good idea,” I said.

  We finally made it outside to see a bunch of fire trucks screaming up. There wasn’t any fire, but the gym was a wreck. No way it was safe. The fire department would make sure everybody got out and then seal it off.

  We heard people shouting to the firefighters that the school had been hit by an intense earthquake. Nobody thought there was anything mystical going on or that Ainsley had anything to do with it. Just as well. It was way easier for people to believe a natural disaster like an earthquake had struck rather than that they had been targeted by a centuries-old supernatural force.

  We jumped out of the flow of fleeing kids and I scanned the parking lot.

  “What are you looking for?” Lu asked.

  “Our last best hope.”

  I spotted him sitting on his bike, watching the chaos with wide eyes.

  “Nate Christmas?” Lu asked, incredulous. “The delinquent is our last best hope?”

  “Hey, some of my best friends are delinquents.”

  “Yeah, mine too,” she said, staring right at me.

  We ran for him.

  “What the hell?” Nate asked, totally amped up.

  “Earthquake,” I said. “It’s over.”

  “It’s a mess,” he said. “I know I’m going to get blamed for this.”

  “You want me to bail you out?” I said. “If you help us I’ll make sure everybody knows you had nothing to do with this or any of the other disasters at school. I can even make you a hero.”

  “Yeah?” he said skeptically. “What do I have to do?”

  “Just cause a little mayhem,” I replied.

  Nate looked me square in the eyes as if trying to decide whether he believed me.

  “You know, I don’t really care what people think about me,” he said, then smiled slyly. “But I like mayhem.”

  We were in business.

  “Look out below!” Nate called.

  He had climbed up onto the balcony over the front entrance of the school to cut down the FRIGHT NIGHT banner. The huge vinyl sign hit the ground and I quickly grabbed it, separating it from the strong climbing ropes that had been used to tie it up.

  “Coil the other rope,” I called to Lu.

  She swept up the second rope and began to coil it.

  “What’s the point?” she asked.

  “It’s all about the altar,” I said. “It’s the center of the coven’s power. That’s what Everett read in all the other books. If we destroy it, it’ll end their powers.”

  “We can do that with rope?” Lu asked, incredulous.

  “I sure hope so.”

  I took the coiled rope from Lu and lashed it together with the other coil to create one superlong length of rope.

  “Now what?” Nate asked as he rejoined us.

  “We go to the woods,” I said. “Back to where you were lighting off M-80s.”

  Nate’s eyes grew wide. “How’d you know about that?”

  “I was there. You saved my butt. Now you’re going to do the same for the rest of humanity.”

  Nate scowled. “You are one very strange dude.”

  “You have no idea.”

  Nate jumped onto the ATV.

  “Sweet ride,” Lu said, admiring the three-wheeled bike. “You a rich kid?”

  “Nah, I’m a kid with parents who feel guilty about never being around. So they buy me stuff.”

  Once again I felt bad for Nate Christmas. The guy had issues. But it wasn’t the time for anybody to bare their soul. Besides, at that moment I was kind of happy his parents had gotten him an ATV, whatever the reason.

  Lu sat on the seat behind Nate, and I squeezed on behind her. It was a tight fit, but we had to make it work. It was especially tricky because I had a heavy coil of climbing rope around my shoulder.

  “Don’t take your time,” I said.

  “Don’t worry,” Nate replied, and hit the throttle.

  If I hadn’t grabbed on to Lu I would have been thrown off the back. She had Nate in a bear hug and I had my arms wrapped around both of them. We sped around the corner of the gym, shot across the back parking lot, and bounced over the curb onto the grass, heading for the woods.

  Again.

  I kept looking down at the grass, fearing it would magically grow tall and try to tangle us up, but we blasted across with no problem. Once we got into the woods, Nate had to make a couple of sharp turns to avoid the trees that had fallen when the witches tried to take me out.

  “What the hell happened here?” Nate called over the whine of the engine.

  “Another earthquake!” I shouted back. I didn’t think it would be smart to answer “witchcraft”; he might have turned the bike around and killed my plan.

  The fallen trees were proof that what had happened wasn’t a dream or a Boggin-like illusion, but they gave me serious doubts about what we were headed toward. The witches weren’t kidding around. I could be leading us straight into disaster. But I didn’t know what else to do.

  After a breakneck ride through the woods, aided by light from the skyful of brilliant stars, we arrived at the clearing. Nate rolled to a stop several yards from the pile of boulders that marked the entrance to the underground cavern.

  “I don’t get it,” he said. “There was a big wall of bushes here. We must be in the wrong spot.”

  “It’s the right spot,” I said as I got off the bike. “The bushes are gone.”

  “How can they just be gone?” Nate asked, sounding a little shaken.

  “Let it go,” I replied. “It’s the least impossible thing you’re going to see. You sure you’re up for this?”

  “Yeah, yeah, sure,” he said defensively. “But—”

  “Kill the engine,” I commanded.

  Nate turned off the ATV’s engine and the forest became deathly silent.

  “Now what?” Lu asked. She sounded even more nervous than Nate.

  “Let’s push the bike close to those rocks,” I said.

  Nate put the vehicle into neutral, and the three of us pushed it into the clearing.

  “I don’t know who you are or what we’re doing here,” Nate whispered, “but I like it.”

  I put my finger to my lips to tell him to keep quiet.

  We pushed the bike up to the rocks so that its back end was close to the first giant boulder. Without a word, I pulled the coiled rope off my shoulder and tied one end around the bike frame toward the rear.

  “There’s a cavern down below,” I whispered. “The ceiling is held up by rotten wooden pillars. I’m going to go down there and tie the other end of the rope to the columns. Lu, you stay by the opening and make sure the rope doesn’t get caught on anything. Nate, you stay with the bike. Lu, when the rope is set, I’ll signal you to signal Nate. Nate, you fire up the engine and gun it out of here.”

  “So we yank out the pillars?” Nate asked with a devilish gleam in his eyes.

  “Exactly. I’m thinking the who
le cavern will collapse.”

  “And destroy the altar,” Lu whispered with a sly smile. “Awesome.”

  “Let’s hope it works,” I said. “Because if it doesn’t…”

  I didn’t finish the sentence.

  “This better not wreck my bike,” Nate said.

  “Your bike’ll be fine. The wood is so rotten it would fall down if you sneezed on it.”

  “This is what’s gonna make me a hero?” Nate asked.

  “Absolutely,” I answered with confidence. “They’ll probably erect a statue of you.”

  Nate beamed. “I’d be good with that.”

  I quickly moved toward the rock pile, paying out the rope. Lu stayed right with me.

  “A statue?” she asked quietly.

  “It’s all I could think of.”

  We climbed up onto the massive, moss-covered boulders, making sure the rope didn’t get caught on anything. Then we slipped down the other side, where we stood near the opening at the top of the rock stairs.

  “Stay right here,” I whispered.

  “I want to come.”

  “No, you’ve got to be out here to make sure the rope doesn’t catch on anything once it goes taut.”

  Truth was, as much as I wanted Lu with me in case something went wrong, I also didn’t want her going down into the witches’ hollow. There was no sense in both of us risking our necks.

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  “Yes. Be ready in case I call for you to get Nate moving.”

  “With you still down there?”

  “I’ll be out a few seconds later, don’t worry. But every second may count.”

  “Okay,” she said, though I knew she’d rather be going down with me. “Be careful.”

  I cautiously made my way down the stairs, letting out the rope as I went. I descended through pitch darkness for a few seconds, moving from starlight above to candlelight below. I had no idea what to expect. My hope was that the witches were still caught up in their trance and wouldn’t notice me creeping around.

  On the other hand, my fear was that they were standing around, pissed off, knowing their plan had failed and looking for somebody to take their anger out on.

  I reached the bottom and cautiously poked my head around the corner to see…nothing. The cavern was empty. The candles on the altar were still lit, but there wasn’t a witch in sight. My hopes skyrocketed. The coven had lost. They thought they had total control of Ainsley, but they didn’t count on her conscience being stronger than their magic.

  All it took was for Kayla to speak.

  Ainsley would never be their high priestess or their sacrifice.

  But it still wasn’t over. The witches were patient. They had been trying to get their revenge for more than a couple hundred years. I had no doubt that they would set their sights on another Ainsley in the future and once again try to rain terror down on the people of Coppell.

  But that wouldn’t happen if I destroyed the altar for good.

  I still had several yards of rope left and went to work quickly. I wound the rope once around the nearest pillar, then moved to the next one. By the time I ran out of rope, I had looped it around six of the columns. Most important, the last one was next to the altar. If this worked and the cavern caved in, the altar would be buried under tons of rock.

  That was a big if. I had to hope that the wooden pillars were as rotten as the one I had sawn through.

  I was ready to get the heck out of there, when I realized I was standing right next to the altar. I couldn’t help but stare at the ancient artifacts on it. The candles and plates and brass holders were hundreds of years old. And they were magic. I’d seen it. I believed. It was incredible to think that the witches could use chants and incantations to control nature. And people. They really were some kind of higher beings. But their power was corrupt. They used it to manipulate and destroy. They may have been able to control the natural world, but there was nothing natural about what they were doing. It was evil. There was no other word for it. They were evil and had to be stopped.

  I walked up to the altar, feeling the warmth on my face that came from the multitude of candles. It was sort of hypnotic. I gazed at the flames, looking over the extensive array, and saw something that made me gasp with surprise. I had to blink to make sure I wasn’t seeing things as I leaned in close to get a better look.

  There was no mistake. Small faces were gazing back at me from inside each of the individual flames. I guess I should have been scared, but after all I’d seen, nothing freaked me out anymore. But it sure as heck was eerie. I could make out enough detail in each face to see that there were men and women of all ages. Some men had beards; some wore glasses. My eye caught movement in one of the shiny brass plates. I focused on it and saw a woman’s face looking back at me as if her image was being reflected in the metal surface. I whipped around, expecting to see somebody behind me, but nobody was there. The witch wasn’t in the cavern—she was in the plate.

  I saw more faces in the other brass plates, just like with the flames. Every shiny surface held a spirit. Or witch. It was like the items were charged with the magic of witchcraft.

  The long silver dagger that Tomac had used to cut Ainsley rested in the center of the altar. I looked into its shiny surface but didn’t see a face. What was different about this one thing? It was the one unique item on the table. Tomac had used it in the witches’ horrible ceremony. Why wasn’t there a face in it?

  “Did you really think this was over?” came an all-too-familiar voice.

  I spun toward the tunnel that led back to the school to see Tomac standing there.

  She wasn’t alone.

  Ainsley was with her.

  * * *

  “WHAT’S TAKING HIM?” NATE called to Lu.

  Lu didn’t answer. She was too busy staring down into the dark cave and wondering the exact same thing.

  Nate was getting antsy.

  “This is starting to feel stupid,” he said. “I can’t believe I went along with you idiots.”

  He got off his bike and walked to the rear.

  “I’m done,” he said, and knelt down to untie the rope. “Tell O’Mara I don’t care if he helps me out or—”

  He was cut off by the sound of a howling wolf.

  Lu stood up straight. “Uh-oh,” she whispered.

  Another howl joined the first, followed by another, and another.

  Lu jumped up onto a boulder where she could see into the woods.

  “No way,” Nate said nervously. “There aren’t any wolves around here. Are there?”

  “Uh,” Lu stammered, “n-n-no. I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “Forget this,” Nate said, and started to release the rope.

  Lu saw what he was doing and bounded down off the rocks. “Don’t! This is our only hope of stopping—”

  “Christmas!” bellowed a man’s voice.

  Lu and Nate froze. Busted. But by who?

  They both slowly looked to where the wall of bushes used to be to see…

  “Mr. Martin?” Nate called out, confused.

  The teacher slowly stalked toward them.

  “And the new girl,” Martin added with disdain. “I thought I took care of you.”

  “I am in such trouble,” Nate said.

  “You have no idea,” Lu replied.

  “Look, Martin, uh, Mr. Martin,” Nate said. “I don’t know anything about what’s going on here. I just followed these clowns because they said we were going to have some fun. None of this was my idea.”

  “Clowns?” Martin said as he drew closer. “Who else is here?”

  “Shut up, Nate,” Lu said under her breath.

  “I don’t want any trouble,” Nate said as he edged toward the seat of his bike. “I’m gonna take off before something bad happens.”

  Martin chuckled. “I’m afraid it’s too late for that.”

  There was movement in the deep moon shadows beneath the trees.

  “What…the hell…is t
hat?” Nate whined.

  “I think that’s the trouble he was talking about,” Lu replied.

  Appearing from out of the shadows was a line of wolves. Their fur glowed in the moonlight, along with their eyes…eyes that were focused on Lu and Nate. Dozens appeared from every direction. The animals formed a circle that slowly tightened as they stalked closer.

  “This isn’t happening,” Nate said with growing panic.

  “The ascension didn’t go as planned,” Martin said calmly. “But it doesn’t matter. The coven will not be denied. There are hundreds of confused children in the parking lot. One way or another, there will be a sacrifice tonight…beginning right here.”

  * * *

  Tomac pulled Ainsley closer to the altar.

  “Ainsley, are you okay?” I called out.

  “What is going on, Marcus?” she cried. “Ms. Tomac said she was taking me somewhere safe.”

  Ainsley wasn’t under the witch’s spell. There was still hope.

  “Don’t listen to her,” I said. “She’s not who you think she is.”

  “And who am I, Marcus?” Tomac said. “Explain it to her.”

  “She’s a witch,” I said. “There’s no other way to say it. She got in your head. None of what happened is your fault. It’s all her and her coven.”

  “I—I don’t understand,” Ainsley stammered.

  “Nothing has changed,” Tomac said to me while keeping a firm grip on Ainsley’s arm. “The ascension will continue.”

  “What is she talking about?” Ainsley begged.

  “She wants revenge,” I said. “For something that happened hundreds of years ago. She thinks her coven is all-powerful but it isn’t.”

  “Keep telling yourself that,” Tomac scoffed.

  “It’s true,” I said. “You were stopped. Not by magic or supernatural power. You were beaten by a couple of girls who cared about each other. Simple as that. No matter what happens tonight, you’re always going to be fighting human nature. That’s a fight you’ll never win.”