CLANG!
Jacob shoves both hands into the bell at Mr. Blanc’s side.
It tips and falls, ringing through the narrow room and tearing the Spiritist from his trance. He sits, bolt upright, looking as shocked as I feel. He blinks rapidly, and clears his throat. The fog has faded. The draft is back. The black stone is empty. The presence is gone. And for a long moment, no one speaks.
And then Jenna claps her hands. “That was awesome!” she squeals.
But I can’t breathe.
The fear that was pinning me down is gone, the weight lifted, and I violently shove myself up to my feet, knocking my chair against the wall.
“Cassidy?” asks Mom, but I’m already rushing toward the velvet curtain.
I can’t get out of there fast enough.
I push aside the velvet curtain—or I try, but I pick the wrong one, and find only a wall beyond.
Panic works its way through me, and I can hear Jacob telling me to calm down, can hear Dad asking if I’m all right. But my heart is a wall of noise in my ears, and I just have to get out.
I finally find the right curtain and shove it aside, stumbling back down the hall and into the lobby.
We have seen you.
I pull the necklace from beneath my collar, gripping the mirror tight.
And we will find you.
I run across the lobby, past Adan, who’s lounging with his legs up on the equipment, and out through the doors into the night.
The air is warm, and the street is full. Not just with a crush of tourists, but with a river of strangers in brightly colored masks, a parade of people playing music and painted up like a sea of skeletons.
They’re everywhere. I can’t get away. So I race back into the hotel. My shoes squeak on the lobby’s marble floor as Mom and Dad appear, Jacob and the film crew just behind.
“Bit over the top,” Dad’s saying.
But Mom pulls me into a hug. I try to laugh it off, apologize for getting overwhelmed, as if it was just a scary séance. As if I’m just a girl afraid of ghosts.
We will find you and return you to the dark.
Lucas polishes his glasses and says, “I think that’s enough for tonight.”
He doesn’t look at me when he says it, but the words still feel like they’re directed at me. I want to say no, say I’m fine, but my head’s too full of fear and questions. I’m relieved when Mom yawns and Dad agrees, saying tomorrow is a fresh start.
We say good night and go upstairs.
The hall to our room suddenly feels menacing, the light unsteady. The bronze hands reaching out from the walls all seem to be reaching for me.
Back in our room, Mom and Dad make small talk about the day, and I retreat to my bed and busy my hands with my camera. Jacob sits down beside me.
“Was that … ” he asks, trailing off.
I let out a small, unsteady breath, and nod. I think so.
“What is that thing, Cass?”
“I don’t know!” I hiss. I shake my head, and think it again, softer. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t—
“Okay,” Jacob says. “But we both know someone who will.”
I reach for my cell, before remembering the time. It’s the middle of the night in Scotland. Lara’s asleep.
“I’m pretty sure this is one of those ‘in case of emergency, break glass’ situations,” says Jacob. “Call her. Wake her up.”
I shake my head and send her a text instead. I don’t write, I think there’s some kind of grim reaper stalking me. I don’t write, Apparently I stole something and it’s coming to take it. I don’t say, I’m scared. Though all of those things are true. But they don’t feel like the kind of thing you send over text, so instead, I just write:
Me:
SOS
I toss the phone aside and get off the bed, and I’m halfway to the bathroom when the cell rings with an incoming video call. I scoop it up, relief flooding me at the sight of Lara’s name on the screen.
I hit answer, and Lara Chowdhury appears, her black hair braided into a crown around her head.
“Did you know,” she says in that prim, proper way, “that some people think SOS stands for Save Our Ship, or Save Our Souls, but really it’s something called a bacronym. The abbreviation came first, and the phrase came next. Anyway, what’s wrong?”
But I’m still distracted by the fact she’s up. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?”
“It’s only nine forty-five.”
I look at the clock on the bedside table. “But it’s nine forty-five here, too.”
“Yes,” she says dryly, “that is how time zones work.”
“Is that Lara?” calls Mom, brushing her teeth. “Hi, Lara!”
“Lara says hi,” I call back, before carrying the phone out into the hall, careful to shut the door behind me—the last thing I need is Grim getting loose.
“Where are you?” I ask softly, peering at the screen.
“I’m in Chicago,” answers Lara, gesturing to the pale marble steps behind her, as if that’s an indicator. “I did tell you I was getting on a plane. Mum and Dad gave a lecture tonight at a museum, and they invited me to come.” She lets out a soft, almost-inaudible sigh. Lara’s parents are archaeologists, but I’ve never seen them. It sounds like Lara doesn’t see much of them, either. “We were supposed to stay on for a few more days, see the sights together, but I guess they got an opportunity they couldn’t pass up. One that doesn’t involve their daughter. They’re leaving first thing tomorrow for Peru. And I guess I’ll be going back to Scotland.”
“By yourself?”
Lara bristles. “I’m more than capable of navigating an airplane, Cassidy.”
She swallows, looks away for a second. Lara’s the kind of girl who holds all her feelings right against her chest, like a book she doesn’t want to share. But I can hear the sadness in her voice.
“I’m sorry,” I say, and I’m afraid it’s the wrong thing, because I hear a hitch in her breath.
“It doesn’t matter.” She clears her throat. “A stamp in the passport, right?” she adds, sounding like she’s trying to convince herself more than me. “Now. How’s New Orleans? Have you found any clues about the Society?”
I’m about to tell her about the black cat I saw when Jacob cuts in. “Something is hunting Cassidy.”
I shoot him a look. I was about to tell her.
Lara blinks. “You mean a ghost? Like the Raven in Red?” she asks, referring to the hungry spirit that tried to steal my life in Scotland.
I shake my head. “Not … exactly.”
She gives me a look that says explain and so I do, the best I can.
Jacob leans against the wall as I pace, and I tell Lara about what I saw back in Paris: the man who wasn’t a man, the skull mask that wasn’t a face, and the eyeless dark beyond. I tell her how I fainted, how it felt like I was being emptied out. I tell her about the voice I heard in the archway, and then the one that interrupted the séance: what it said to me, about stealing, and fleeing, and being found, and returned to the dark. I tell her everything, and Lara listens, her face going first slack, and then tight, but she doesn’t say anything. Her expression isn’t chiding or stern. If anything, Lara Chowdhury looks scared. I’ve never seen her scared before.