Betrayal (7 page)

I'm not surprised.

Why not? I was.

I suspect that you are … not reborn, precisely. I think that a ghostkeeper of exceptional ability
—
and your face
—
arrives at the great turning points. Like right now, fighting for control of the Beyond.

I flopped onto the piano bench.
But no pressure, right?

A great deal of pressure
, he said, ignoring my sarcasm.
And you're losing focus. You're better than that.

I'm tired. And now Bennett's gone …
I bit my lip, trying not to cry.
Do you think there was another Bennett, too? Before you? Did the Emma in the tapestry love another one of you? Were they doomed, as well?

He moved to lay a hand on mine, then stopped, knowing he'd burn me.
You have to put that aside, Emma. Neos grows more powerful every day. You must learn to protect yourself.

I sighed. He was right. I stood and held my sword at the ready.
Yeah, my aunt told me I need a weapon to focus my powers. I'm not sure how I'm going to get around with a sword, but it's the only thing I've got.

To focus?
he said.
What do you mean?

So I told him the whole story about Rachel and the wraiths, plinking absently at the piano as he paced and listened.

When I finished, he shook his head.
You're quick and agile, but you don't have the build for swordfighting. You're too small. A man will overpower you every time.

I wanted to argue. To sit him down and make him watch old episodes of
Xena
. But I wasn't exactly a warrior princess, and he was right, I hadn't been able to overpower Neos, because he was too strong in Coby's body.

The Rake put his boot on the bench beside me and reached inside for a hidden knife.
What you need is a dagger
.
It'll allow you to move close and fast, strengths not available to wraiths or Neos.

I reached for his knife, but he pulled it away.
Not just any dagger
—
you need
her
dagger
.

Emma's? Where is it?

He hesitated, and his eyes grew distant.
The men who wanted to kill Emma hid her dagger in an unconsecrated cemetery, a mass grave for criminals and heathens.

So I need to … dig it up? Gross.

That's not the problem. The dagger is bait for a trap. The men wanted to lure Emma there so the ghasts would kill her.

Great. Sounds like good times
, I said.
Where is it?

In my day, it was called the Crossing.

The Crossing?
I'd seen that name before, on one of my endless walks through the village.
You mean, like, that playground?

He gave me directions, and sure enough, they'd built a playground over an unconsecrated cemetery. First a ducking chair as a tourist attraction, and now a kids' playground over dead bodies. You had to love Echo Point.

Don't go alone
, he said.
The ghasts will be hungry.

7

I found Natalie in her room upstairs, changing after her run.

“I need a favor,” I said.

“You won't fit in my jeans,” she said, pulling on a pale blue wool sweater. “And your feet are way too big for my shoes.”

“Okay,” I said. “First, I would so fit in your jeans. And second—”

“Your butt's bigger,” she said, zipping her pants with attitude.

Maybe a little bigger, but she didn't need to rub it in. “What is up with you?” I said.

“What? I didn't say it was
too
big.”

“Natalie. What's wrong?”

She refused to tell me—for about ten seconds. Then she said, “I like it here. I like my room, I like that Nicholas lays fires and Celeste does the laundry, and that Anatole tries to woo me with his fatty foods. I like Echo Point and Thatcher, even if everyone hates you at the moment. I guess I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop. This is the closest I've been to home in a long time.”

“Well, you're staying. The Knell said you could be on my team.”

“I know, but Bennett's gone. They're not going to let us live here without him. Two minors living alone in a museum?”

“We're not alone. There are—”

“Ghosts.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

I didn't want to think about Bennett being gone and whether that meant Natalie and I could no longer stay in the house. I liked it here, too, and didn't want to leave. And I really didn't want to agonize over how a guy who says he loves you isn't supposed to desert you. I was trying to put Bennett out of my mind.

So I said, “Want to go mess around with some ghasts?”

Natalie perked up. “Can we?”

“You're not scared?”

“Why would I be scared? I've got you around to dispel them. This'll be fun.”

I wasn't sure how other ghostkeepers traveled to fight a couple of ancient ghasts, but Natalie and I walked, and by the time we got there it was dusk.

“In the playground?” Natalie asked. “Are you sure there are ghasts here? How come nobody's felt them before?”

I nodded. “That's what, um, Edmund told me.”

I didn't know how to explain the Rake to Natalie. Yeah, she'd understand that he was a ghost, but she'd want to summon him all the time, which he'd hate. Plus, I kind of liked having him to myself.

The playground was in the corner of a town park, and we crossed the street and followed a gravel path past the oak trees where people tossed tennis balls for their dogs during the day.

I shivered in my peacoat. “I don't like the weather here.”

“You Californians are wusses.” She eyed the slides and swings.

“I never noticed how creepy playgrounds look after dark.” I looked around. “Maybe we should come back.”

“No way, man. It only makes it more fun.” Natalie was the girl who goes naked in the Jacuzzi and takes the dare instead fibbing about the truth. Ghasts at dusk were not going to intimidate her. “Here goes,” she said.

Natalie closed her eyes, and I felt their spirits before she even finished, like needles on my skin. I'd never dealt with ghasts before. They weren't as dangerous as wraiths, but I still felt their twistedness.

“Wait,” I blurted. “I'm not ready.”

“Too late,” Natalie said, opening her eyes. “They're here.”

They rose from the ground beside the drinking fountain, as if awakened from a deep slumber. Their heads swayed as they scanned and sniffed for the reason they'd been summoned. They didn't look like wraiths, with tattered skin and hollow eyes, but like regular ghosts, in bad costumes, except gray, like they'd stepped out of an old black-and-white film.

“They look harmless,” I said, but the Rake had mentioned a trap.

“Looks are deceiving,” Natalie said.

There were two of them, both male, both dressed like the Rake, only less tailored and elegant. They swiveled toward Natalie and me, bared their teeth, and flew at us.

“Okay,” Natalie said. “Your turn.”

“What?”

“I can only summon them, Emma. You have to dispel them.”

I panicked. “I don't know how!”

“What are you talking about? You're Emma frickin' Vaile—you know everything!”

“Run!” I yelled. “Natalie, run!”

Too late—the burly ghast knocked her to the ground.

“Emma!” she screamed. “Do something!”

But I couldn't think; I couldn't remember how to gather my power. I just stood there with an odd humming in my mind.

Natalie screamed and turned her head as the ghast drooled over her. The drool fell into the sandbox and sizzled.

Sizzling drool that would burn straight through Natalie's flesh. That cleared my mind.

I reached out to the ghast.
Stop! She is nothing to you. She is no threat. Leave her!

He hesitated, and Natalie rolled away. I started to compel him further, when the lankier ghast hit me like a wrecking ball, smashing me into the side of the seesaw. As I struggled to catch my breath, the lanky ghast screeched so piercingly that I was surprised my ears didn't bleed.

The ghast bent me backward over the metal seesaw, which bounced up and down. I couldn't touch the ground as he pressed his hands into my throat, trying to burn me. The sudden shock of pain woke my power, and I centered his spectral gray head between my palms and loosed a blast of energy that scrambled whatever was left of his brain. He lurched away from me, hardly able to stay on his feet.

“Emma!” Natalie called out. “A little help!”

I turned and saw her struggling beneath the burly ghast. With a flicker of thought, I compelled him to leave Natalie alone and join the other ghast, now whimpering inside a spiderweb climbing structure made of rope. He jerkily walked away, like an animated scarecrow, and stepped into the web.

I pulled Natalie to her feet. “Are you all right?” My back was to the ghasts, but my mind was still engaged, feeling their energy, compelling them to stay where they were.

Natalie examined the holes in her parka where the ghast's drool had made contact. “Fantastic. What happened to you?”

“I don't know. Nerves? I froze, I guess.”

“Well, as long as you snapped out of it.” She glanced toward the ghasts and taunted them. “Not so tough now, are you?”

“Natalie. I think there's more.” Another presence tugged at the edge of my mind.

“Oh God!” Natalie said, her voice sharp with fear. “Look!”

The ground beneath the tire swing bulged, and a mound of dirt erupted from the wood chips. A billow of black smoke emerged and twined into a ghast, twice as big as the other two, with oversized hands and feet, long gray hair, and a beard. His mouth opened unnaturally wide, like a snake with unhinged jaws, as he wafted toward us.

“Looks like we sprang the trap,” Natalie said.

The humming returned to my mind, and with a jolt of fear I realized that this was too much for me. “I can't control that thing and compel the others at the same time.”

“So, run again?” she asked.

“
Yeah,” I squeaked.

But the black ghast slammed his massive feet to the ground, shaking the earth as he closed in on us. We stumbled, and his huge hand grabbed Natalie around the waist and started crushing her.

She stared at me, eyes bulging in terror.

I found myself hesitating again. I knew she needed help, but I felt heavy and sluggish. I reached inside for a spark of dispelling energy, to sear the black ghast—but instead, I found myself only compelling him to drop Natalie.

He loosened his grip, tossed her aside, and turned his attention to me.

“Emma!” Natalie said, sprawled on the ground. “Stop screwing around and dispel him!”

The ghast roared, and his scalding breath whipped across the playground. I spun away as his spectral fingers plucked at my coat. I held my hands in front of me and fed dispelling energy into them, until in an instant it was crackling between my palms, and I shot the ghast in the side.

He howled and thumped to the ground and started to fade.

That's when the other two ghasts tackled me. I'd stopped compelling them to stay inside the spiderweb.

I yelled at them,
No! Get away from me!
but my panic weakened my compelling. With one on top of me and the other pressing my head into the frozen ground, I watched helplessly as the black ghast stalked toward Natalie. He grabbed her around the waist and flung her into the sandbox.

“No!” I screamed. I dug deep inside for my power, but all I found was that weird humming sound.

Then I heard a voice. “Mind if I cut in?”

I turned and saw two guys stroll onto the playground. The one who spoke was probably my age, dark haired and athletic, wearing a black parka and jeans, and the other was skinny and slightly older, wearing wide-rimmed tortoiseshell glasses and a long camel coat.

The ghasts suffocating me swiveled toward them, their eye sockets burning with predatory intensity. I'd never seen either of these men before in my life, but I was sure of one thing: they were ghostkeepers. And the ghasts felt it, too.

The ghasts' shrieks of fear shook away all my hesitation. I blasted them off me with a burst of force. They hit the ground, scrambled onto all fours like dogs ready to pounce, and rushed at the two newcomers.

The younger guy stepped forward, his arms spread, an eager grin on his face. The ghasts loped closer and closer, then sprang. The young guy used the ghasts' weight and speed against them—he compelled them into the air, over his head, then slammed them onto their backs on top of the slide. Cool trick. As they half skidded down the cold slide, moaning in pain, the older guy shot quick bursts of dispelling energy into them, and they started shimmering into nonexistence.

Martha had taught me basic concepts of ghostkeeping, but no two ghostkeepers were the same. I'd had to figure out myself what worked for me—and it looked nothing like what the ghostkeeper in the glasses had done. Or the other one, for that matter. I'd never realized you could hurl ghosts through the air.

All of that happened in a fraction of a second, while I turned toward the huge black ghast. I drilled through the sluggishness I'd been feeling, to tap my power. He stomped toward me, his face an unearthly mask of fury.

The light inside me grew brighter and hotter until, with the black ghast's unhinged mouth three feet from me, I unleashed a beam of pure white directly into his face. He writhed and shrieked and uncoiled into smoke, which shrank and withered until nothing remained but a smudge of black tar on the wood chips.

The younger guy said, “If this is what you two do at playgrounds, I'd hate to see you in a cemetery.”

“Ow,” Natalie said, struggling in the sandbox.

“Are you okay?” I asked, jogging over to her.

She took my hand and stood, showing me the ghast-acid holes in her sleeves. “Yeah, but this jacket will never be the same.” She looked at the two men. “Who
are
you guys?”

“We're your new team,” the one in glasses said, with some kind of accent, maybe English or Irish.

“Looks like we got here just in time,” the younger one said. Then he blew on his fingertips and shoved his hands in his pockets, as if he were blowing smoke off the barrels of guns and holstering them.

I knew if I caught Natalie's eye, we'd both burst out giggling. So I just said, “Yeah. Thanks. I'm Emma. The moth-eaten one is Natalie.”

“I'm Simon,” the older guy said, as he collected the black tar into what looked like a ziplock. “That's Lukas. We'll save the complete introductions until later. Let's get back to the museum.”

“One sec,” I said. I knelt beside the mound of freshly erupted earth under the tire swing and started digging through the loose dirt.

“If you're looking for the sandbox,” Lukas said, “you're like thirty feet off.”

“You're desecrating a grave,” Simon said. “We don't do that, even if they were ghasts.”