The Haunting (28 page)

“Death,” Joel said finally.

I nodded. “Maybe Death will be in our next Challenge.”

Phoebe snorted. “Honey, Death has been stalking us through most of these Challenges.”

I knew she was making light of her situation, but I could see it stung her as much as it did me.

“What makes you say that?” Claire asked, blissfully changing the subject.

I pointed to the door. “The only black door in the entire Challenge.”

Read smirked. “You’re right.”

“The only downside,” I said, “is that we didn’t get a ring this round.”

“Robin did,” Joel said.

I glanced at Robin as she clucked her tongue. “My name isn’t Robin,” she seethed. “I’ve said this before. I’m Elizabeth Frankenstein.”

Not wanting to argue with her, I looked to her hand.

On her left hand, I saw the silver ring. “Wedding band?”

“Yup,” Joel answered.

That left just Read and me.

“If this is death, this could be the last Challenge,” I said uneasily.

Two rings were never given out in one Challenge before.

We fell silent, our little group, staring at the double black doors and hesitating.

This was it. The deciding moment for the rest of us who’d survived.

Phoebe threw on her authoritative voice, straightening her posture as she said firmly, “We stick together. Don’t separate from the group, even if it’s to check out something. We keep close enough to smell B.O. Don’t leave anyone behind.” She glanced at Aidan. “‘Some of us are injured so we need to work double to keep them with us. Read and I will hold Aidan up if he can’t walk.”

Read moved closer to the wolf at my side.

“Joel,” Phoebe turned to him, “watch out for Claire and Robin.”

He nodded dutifully.

“Fuller,” she tilted her chin towards me, “if we need you to use some of that magic, can you?”

“No.” Seeing Phoebe’s eyes narrow, I said, “I’ll see if I can.” It was strange to have something called “magic.” It had fizzled out, but maybe I’d had enough time to recharge. If I used it, though, there’d be hell to pay.

“Alright.” Phoebe squared her shoulders, facing the door. “Everyone ready?”

“For?” Robin demanded in her accent, her eyebrows furrowed. “Unhand me. I can walk,” she snapped at Joel.

“Yes,” Joel answered for Robin, ignoring her completely as he held on tight.

“Ready,” Claire, Read, and I echoed. I stepped up beside the door, gathering up Aidan’s tattered pants.

Phoebe stepped up to the door first.

I wish I could say I was brave and ready for anything at this point. But I wasn’t. I was scared as hell when Phoebe opened that black door, the door that hinted at death.

Facing off against Death? Or more death to come?

I thought of Cody and Cooper. Was it fair that they should be dead? No, but there wasn’t anyone to blame. I hated that there wasn’t anyone to focus the hatred on, other than Damien, of course. But this was his life. What if it were about to become my life? Damien didn’t stab Cody; Gretchen did. Damien didn’t drown Cooper;
I did
. I shook my head. It was an accident, I reminded myself.

What about Neive? I felt the edge of bitterness with the question. She was practically raised by Damien until who-knows-when she escaped. And if she could get out, why keep coming back if she didn’t want to stay here? She saw me as a rival, I knew that, but she was still my sister. I had to bring her home somehow. I picked up Aidan’s tattered clothes that I’d left by the door and struggled to keep my mind from drifting away.

Why would she
want
to be here? I could only imagine how lonely it could be. I didn’t want that for my sister, no matter how much we had grown apart. She was my twin, my earliest friend.

Taking a deep breath to tangle the rising emotions, I stepped through the threshold after Joel, Claire, and Robin. Aidan limped behind me.

The moment Robin was through the door, I heard her gasp in a meek breath. “Oh my God,” she whispered. “OH MY—”

Joel slapped a hand over her mouth, muffling her shout.

At least she didn’t have an accent this time.

I glanced back to see Aidan twisting on the floor. His body arched, and he whimpered as our eyes met.

I quickly looked away, embarrassed.

His spine tried to curve, bend, and twist. The sound of snapping echoed through the vaulted stone ceiling.

It was as if we had stepped back in time to a grand European church.

The ceiling was huge and reached maybe a hundred feet over our heads. Pews lined the floor, rows upon rows of wooden glossy benches. Centered at the front, on a shortened stage, was an elaborate wooden podium. Angels were carved into the sides, holding up the table where a fat, weathered book laid open.

Holy statues stood behind it. One was of the Virgin Mary holding an infant Jesus, and the other was of the cross. The crucifix stood taller than Mary, maybe at least twelve feet high, solid and thick.

“Wow,” Phoebe breathed, her voice carrying through the hallowed walls, echoing softly.

Tall tinted windows, too high for anyone to peek out of, allowed very little light through. It must be night outside.

Torches lined the walls, the light from them casting toward the ceiling.

To our right, I saw a confessional with carvings of cherubs lining the top. A birdbath type of structure sat near it. I could only assume it was for holy water, yet it was empty.

Aidan grunted behind me, but this time it was
his
voice, not a wolfish one.

Spinning, I immediately wished I hadn’t.

I expected him to be naked, and I admit in a small shameless way I was curious. In another way, I really wasn’t.

Coated in a sheen of sweat, he curled up, panting, his pale eyes wide as he began to shiver.

I put one hand to the ground to support my squat and handed him his pants. I tried to catch his eyes, but they kept wavering, flickering from object to person to wall and repeating.

“Aidan,” I whispered and pushed the pants near his good arm.

The touch made him jolt and wince at the same time. He looked to the pants, staring at them as if they were foreign.

His arm lay on the cobblestone floor at an unnatural angle, making my stomach churn.

“Aidan.” I whispered his name, seeing recognition the moment his feral gaze found me.

I wanted to touch him but thought it might be overstepping my bounds considering the shock he was in.

“Aidan,” I whispered again. “We’re in the new Challenge. You just changed back from being a wolf.”

He twitched his head in a nod.

He shivered violently, and I wanted to give him something to warm up, a blanket, extra shirt, anything that would stop it.

His teeth chattered as his fingers curled around the edge of the folded, torn pants.

Standing, I turned away to give him some privacy; I had to wave at Claire to turn around too. She blushed and quickly focused on the podium ahead.

This would be a somewhat fitting place for death to visit. I tried to hide my levity by tugging my bloodied shirt and chewing on my cheeks to squash the smile.

This was insane. We were all going to be insane after this.

I pulled on my shirt harder. There was no use losing it now, not when we were so close to being out.

The idea of getting everyone away from this place sobered me instantly. The weight of the task ahead dropped down on me like bricks.

Read was good enough to help Aidan. With one broken arm, I doubted it was an easy task to put on clothes. I heard Read mutter, “Don’t mention it,” before moving toward Phoebe.

Aidan came up beside me, wearing his ripped jeans, his jaw clenched to stifle the chattering.

I wrapped an arm around his clammy, chilled body and rubbed his shoulder lightly to warm him but not jostle the broken arm.

He leaned into me and nodded towards the front of the church. In a low voice, he asked, “Should we go to the door?” He held his broken arm tight to his stomach, grimacing with each word.

I hadn’t noticed it before, but a door stood behind the podium, half hidden behind scarlet curtains.

“This place is going to be huge, isn’t it?” Phoebe whispered.

Joel nodded.

I motioned us forward. “Well, we have to start this someday.”

Claire cringed and slid closer to Joel and Robin.

With tears reddening her cheeks, Robin came closer to Aidan and me. Wiping at her eyes, she sniffled, looking lost. In that instant, I felt sorry for her. Reaching over, I took her hand, initiating a glare from Phoebe, but she otherwise stayed silent.

Robin squeezed my hand painfully hard. She was strong for someone so petite. She turned her eyes to me, glassy and shockingly green from the tears. “I felt everything,” she whispered as we started moving. “Everything Elizabeth felt. It was like I was actually watching my best friend die.”

Read and Phoebe exchanged a glance.

After a long pause, I saw her mulling something over. She hesitated before asking. I was certain it had been bugging her the moment she regained her own memories. It was the question I’d hoped she never ask.

“Where’s Cody?”

Phoebe opened her mouth, but I hissed, silencing everyone. “Stay quiet,” I warned. “We don’t know what can hear us.”

Mostly I wanted to avoid the question. Seeing her slackened, hopeful gaze, I could see she was tired and emotionally wrought. Learning about Cody could put her over the edge. We needed as many people working together as possible.

Shuffling between the pews on a dark red carpet, we kept our eyes wide and alert. Every sound we inspected, every wavering shadow we stared at, and every pew we checked. In fact, Read ducked several times to check under the pews to ensure nothing crept up on us from under the wooden benches.

Though it was a slow process, it was thorough and slightly unnerving. Each time Read crawled down on his hands and knees to inspect under the pews, I half expected something to jump out at him. Luckily, nothing did.

Our footsteps were light and inaudible along the carpet. Only four out of seven of us wore shoes, and they were sneakers, which was to our advantage.

Moving collectively up the narrow steps, past the podium, we aimed for the door. It was half hidden behind a curtain.

Phoebe reached the door first. She glanced over her shoulder and mouthed, “Ready?”

We all nodded even if we weren’t ready. I knew my stomach wasn’t. I didn’t want to know what was on the other side of that door. I wanted it to be boring. More than anything, I wanted boredom.

Gripping the handle, Phoebe twisted and shouldered it in. She crouched as she peered into the darkness.

I felt my heart beginning to beat harder. Darker meant more hiding places for our enemy.

I realized I had been holding onto Aidan harder, my fingers digging into his opposite arm, when I felt him move away. He still shivered, though not nearly as violent.

I tilted my chin up. Our eyes met, and for the briefest moment, I saw a twinge of hope. “We’ll figure out a sling for you,” I whispered.

He nodded, gripping his swelling arm hard as if to try and hold the two pieces together. His face was a mask of contorted pain.

Phoebe slipped into the darkness and reached back blindly. She got Joel, who grabbed Claire, who then had Robin, myself, Read, and then Aidan. Read had Aidan’s shoulder so he could cradle his broken arm. We were holding onto each other as we had during the witch’s Challenge.

Dim lights pointed to the floor, much like that in theaters, leaving large shadows on either side of us.

If I stared too long, the shadows appeared like vapor, moving only out of the corners of my eyes.

We were in a short hallway. I could see the end, which was still dimly lit and appeared to be a large open room, though not as large as the church behind us.

Steadying my footsteps, I tried to ignore the fact that Read’s longer stride kept hitting my heels with his sneakers. He apologized over and over in whispers but, despite my annoyance, seemed unable to stop himself.

Phoebe led us out into a large room.

It was square with a tall ceiling that came to a point. Glossy wooden support beams edged the walls, separate from it. Arched doorways shrouded in darkness were all around us. There were six doors within the archways’ darkness, including ours.

As far as I could tell, there was no source to the light in this room. No windows, torches, or tiny lights were on the floor. It was as if the room held a glow that was all its own.

Phoebe’s sharp intake of breath alerted us all. To our right, a young boy no older than ten years stepped from the shadows of one of the archways.

His eyes seemed to glow an aqua green as he surveyed us calmly. He had pale, flawless skin with full pink lips and a small nose that suited his petite, fragile face. Long auburn curls tumbled down his shoulders, making him look like a girl. No kid’s hair should ever look so perfected. It was too…adult of them. It was unnerving. He appeared as a child, yet he held himself like an adult. Even his clothes, a suit with a long tailcoat and a high collar, fitted to his slender frame, were that of an adult male.

I watched him lick his pink lips slowly before raising a hand to us.

Could this be Death? This little boy?

At first I thought it was a greeting. Instead, I saw that it was a signal.

Out of each of the holes, excluding our doorway, someone stepped through. Each person was as beautiful as the previous. None of them were more or less stunning, yet all were distinctly different.

Two grown women, three men. No other children.

Each wore old-fashioned clothing from different centuries. One of the men actually wore a purple toga embroidered with gold thread. He wore a ring that looked iron and had a symbol on it, but I couldn’t make it out. He looked as if he had just stepped out of ancient Rome.

Another man looked like he’d just stepped out of the Victorian Era. He wore a high-collared white shirt beneath a vibrant red vest and black coat. If that wasn’t enough, he wore a tall top hat.

The last man was disguised behind a long dark cloak and brimmed hat that was so large it shadowed his face.

The women were both in dresses. The first, a dark-skinned woman, wore something out of 1700’s France. It was all ruffles, dark silken colors beneath a corset lined with red bows. The back of the dress fell like a cape behind her. The second wore a simpler dress that looked like she wrapped a colorful red, blue, and white quilt around her waist. Her top was a baggy white shirt, and her dark hair was a simple ponytail tied with a scarf.

Each of them was devastatingly pale, even the French woman whose once nightly shade was dulled and smoothed to perfection.

The Roman stared at Phoebe, eyes never wavering. He appeared to be a statue. If I hadn’t seen him step from the darkness earlier, I’d have thought he was.

Phoebe stared straight back at him and cracked each individual knuckle.

Both of the grown women seemed quite infatuated with Joel. They stared hungrily. The French woman kept sucking on her bottom lip. The simpler dressed woman just appeared curious, hypnotized.

Joel spoke first, sounding cautious. “Who are you?”

The little boy raised his hands, palms up. “What do we seem to be?”

“Creepy,” Phoebe muttered.

The Roman cracked an amused smile. His eyes wrinkled, though they never left Phoebe’s slender frame.

I think she realized how naked she was for the first time. The tube top and shorts hardly covered enough anymore.