The Secret Circle: The Initiation (7 page)

Touch my skin and your fingers will stick
—

You'll blacken like a cinder.

But you'll die smiling;

Then you'll be part of the fire too.

As the entire class watched, riveted, Faye produced a match and somehow—Cassie didn't quite see how—managed to light it. She touched it to the paper and the paper caught fire. Then, walking slowly, she moved to stand directly in front of Jeffrey Lovejoy, waving the burning paper gently before his eyes. Howls, whistles, and desk banging from the audience. Many of them looked scared, but most of the guys looked excited, too. Some of the girls looked as if they wished
they
dared to do something like that. Voices called out, "See, Jeffrey, that's what you get for being so cute!" "Go for it, man!" "Watch out, Jeff, Sally's gonna hear about this!"

Jeffrey just sat there, the back of his neck slowly flushing dull red.

As the paper was about to burn her fingers, Faye sashayed away from Jeffrey again and dropped it in the metal wastebasket by the teacher's desk. Mr. Humphries didn't flinch when something in the wastebasket flared up, and Cassie admired him for that.

"Thank you, Faye," he said evenly. "Class, I think we can call what we've just seen an example of…

concrete poetry. Tomorrow we'll study some more traditional methods. Class dismissed." Faye walked out the door. There was an instant's pause; then, as if everyone had been released by a spring, a sudden mass exodus. Jeffrey grabbed his notebook and was gone.

Cassie looked at her own poem. Fire. She and Faye had both written about the same thing…

Suddenly she tore the sheet out and, crumpling it into a ball, thrust it into her backpack. So much for her dreams of being romantic and mysterious. With a girl like
that
around, who was ever going to notice Cassie?

And yet they all seemed almost afraid of her, she thought. Even the teacher. Why didn't he give her a detention or something? Or is lighting fires in trash cans normal in New Salem?

And why did Jeffrey let her hit on him that way? And why did he care where I
live
, for God's sake?

In the hall, she nerved herself to stop someone and ask where room C310 was.

"It's on the third floor," the girl said. "All the math classes are. Go up that stairway—"

"Yo! Look out! Heads up, everybody!" a shouting voice interrupted. Something was whizzing down the hall, scattering students right and left from its path. Two somethings. Dumbfounded, Cassie saw that it was two guys on roller blades, laughing and bellowing as they tore through the crowd. Cassie had a glimpse of disheveled shoulder-length blond hair and almond-shaped, slightly tilted blue-green eyes as one passed—and then she saw it all again as the second one streaked by. The boys were identical, except that one was wearing a Megadeth T-shirt and the other's said Motley Crüe. They were creating chaos as they went, knocking books out of people's arms and grabbing at girls'

clothes. As they reached the end of the hallway, one of them caught a pretty redhead's miniskirt and deftly flipped it up to waist level. The girl shrieked and dropped her backpack to push it down.

"Why doesn't somebody
do
something?" Cassie blurted out. Was everybody in this school crazy? "Why doesn't somebody stop them—or report them—or
something
. …"

"Are you kidding? Those are the Henderson brothers," the girl said, and she walked away, joining another girl. Cassie heard a fragment of a sentence float back: "… doesn't even know about the Club…" and both girls glanced back at her, then walked on.

What Club? That girl had said it as if it had capital letters. What did a club have to do with breaking school rules? What kind of place
was
this?

Another bell rang, and Cassie realized that she was now late for class. She slung her backpack over her shoulder and ran for the stairs.

By lunchtime, she still hadn't exchanged more than a "hi" or "hello" with anyone, no matter how she tried. And she hadn't seen the girl with the shining hair anywhere—not that that was really surprising, considering the many floors and corridors of this school. In her present state of insecurity, Cassie wouldn't have dared to approach the girl if she
had
seen her. A leaden, miserable feeling had settled in her stomach.

And one glance at the glass-walled cafeteria teeming with laughing students made her knees go weak. She couldn't face it. She just didn't have the nerve.

Arms wrapped around herself, she walked away and kept walking. She walked right through the main entrance and out the door. She didn't know where she was going—maybe she was going home. But then she saw the lush green grass of the hill.

No, she decided; I'll just eat here. Partway down the hill there were several craggy outcrops of natural rock, and she found she could sit comfortably in a little hollow below one, shaded by a tree. She was shielded by the rock from the school; it was almost as if the school didn't exist. She could look down a flight of meandering steps to the bottom of the hill and the road beyond, but no one from above could see her.

As she sat, looking at the dandelions dotting the grass, the tension gradually drained out of her. So what if the morning hadn't been the greatest? Things would be better this afternoon. The clear blue sky seemed to tell her that.

And the rock at her back—the famous red granite of New England—gave her a feeling of security. It was strange, but she almost felt she could hear a buzzing in the rock, like a heartbeat tremendously speeded up. A buzzing of
life
. If I put my cheek to it, I wonder what would hap-pen? she thought with a curious excitement.

Voices distracted her. Dismayed, Cassie knelt up to look over the top of the rock—and tensed. It was that girl, Faye. There were two other girls with her, and one of them was the biker who'd nearly run Cassie over that morning. The other was a strawberry blond with a tiny waist and the most well-developed chest Cassie had ever seen on a teenager. They were laughing and sauntering down the steps—right toward Cassie.

I'll just stand up and say hi, Cassie thought, but she didn't. The memory of those disturbing honey-colored eyes was still with her. She kept quiet and hoped they'd pass her by, go all the way down the hill and off campus.

Instead they stopped on the landing just above Cassie, sitting with their feet on the steps below and pulling out paper lunch bags.

They were so close that Cassie could see the red stone blazing at Faye's throat. Although she was in shadow now, if she moved they wouldn't be able to miss her. She was trapped.

"Did anybody follow us, Deborah?" Faye asked lazily as she rummaged through her backpack. The biker girl snorted. "Nobody's stupid enough to try."

"Good. Because this is top secret. I don't want you-know-who to hear anything about it," Faye said. She took out a stenographer's notebook with a red cover and laid it on her knee. "Now let me see, what shall we do to start this year off? I feel like something really wicked."

Six

"Well, there's Jeffrey…" the strawberry blond said.

"Already begun," Faye said, smiling. "I work fast, Suzan." Suzan laughed. When she did, her extraordinary chest jiggled in a way that made Cassie certain she wasn't wearing anything underneath her apricot-colored sweater.

"I still don't see the point of Jeffrey Lovejoy," the biker girl said, scowling.

"You don't see the point of any guy, Deborah; that's your problem," said Suzan.

"And your problem is that you can't see the point of anything else," Deborah retorted. "But Jeffrey's worse than most. He's got more teeth than brain cells."

"It isn't his teeth I'm interested in," said Faye thoughtfully. "Who are you going to start with, Suzan?"

"Oh, I don't know. It's so hard to decide. There's Mark Flemming and Brant Hegerwood and David Downey—he's in my remedial English class, and he's developed this killer body over the summer. And then there's always Nick…"

Deborah hooted. "Our Nick? The only way he'd look at you is if you had four wheels and a clutch."

"And besides, he's taken," Faye said, and her smile reminded Cassie of a crouching jungle cat.

"You just said you wanted Jeffrey—"

"They both have their uses. Get this straight, Suzan. Nick and I have an… arrangement. So you just back off and pick yourself a nice outsider, all right?"

There was a moment of tension, and then the strawberry blond shrugged. "Okay, I'll take David Downey. I didn't really want Nick anyway. He's an iguana."

Deborah looked up. "He's my cousin!"

"He's still an iguana. He kissed me at the junior prom, and it was like kissing a reptile."

"Can we get back to business?" Faye said. "Who's on the hate list?"

"Sally Waltman," Suzan said immediately.

"She already thinks because she's class president she can stand up to us, and if you take Jeffrey, she's going to be really mad."

"Sally…" Fay mused. "Yes, we'll have to come up with something truly special for dear old Sally…

What's wrong, Deborah?"

Deborah had stiffened, looking up the hill toward the school entrance. "Intruder alert," she said. "In fact, it looks like a whole delegation."

Cassie had seen it too, a group of guys and girls coming through the main entrance down the hill. She felt a surge of hope. Maybe while Faye and the other two were occupied with them, she herself could slip away unnoticed. Heart beating quickly, she watched the new group approach. A broad-shouldered boy in front, who seemed to be the leader, spoke up.

"Look, Faye, the cafeteria's crowded. So we're going to eat out here—okay?" His voice started out belligerent, but it wavered toward the end, becoming more of a question than a statement. Faye looked up at him without haste, then smiled her slow, beautiful smile. "No," she said, briefly and sweetly. "It isn't okay." Then she turned back to her lunch.

"How come?" the boy burst out, still trying to sound tough. "You didn't stop us last year."

"Last year," Faye said, "we were only
juniors
. This year we're seniors—and we're wicked. As wicked as we wanna be."

Deborah and Suzan smiled.

Frustrated, Cassie shifted her weight. So far there had never been a moment when all three of the girls were looking away. Come on, turn
around
, she thought pleadingly.

The group of guys and girls went on standing there for a minute or two, exchanging angry glances. But finally they turned and walked back toward the school building—all except one.

"Uh, Faye? Did you mean I had to go too?" she said. She was a pretty, flushed girl, and young. Probably a sophomore, Cassie guessed. Cassie expected her to get packed off like the others, but to her surprise Faye raised her eyebrows and then patted the landing invitingly.

"Why, Kori," she said, "of course you can stay. We just imagined you'd be eating in the cafeteria with the Princess of Purity and the rest of the goody-goodies."

Kori sat down. "Too much goodness can get boring," she said.

Faye tilted her head and smiled. "And there I thought you were a namby-pamby little Puritan. Silly me," she said. "Well, you know you're always welcome here. You're almost one of us, aren't you?" Kori ducked her head. "I'll be fifteen in two weeks."

"There, you see," Faye said to the others. "She's almost eligible. Now what
were
we talking about? That new slasher movie, wasn't it?"

"That's right," Deborah said, showing her teeth. "The one where the guy chops people up and makes them into condiments at his salad bar."

Suzan was unwrapping a Twinkie. "Oh, Deborah, don't. You're making me sick."

"Well, you make
me
sick with those things," Deborah said. "You never stop eating them. That's what those are, you know," she told Kori, pointing at Suzan's chest. "Two giant Twinkies. If Hostess went out of business, she'd be wearing a double A."

Faye laughed her sleepy, throaty laugh, and even Suzan giggled. Kori was smiling too, but looking uncomfortable.

"Kori! We're not
embarrassing
you, are we?" Faye exclaimed, opening her golden eyes wide.

"Don't be silly. I don't embarrass easily," Kori said.

"Well, with brothers like yours, I should think not. Still," Faye went on, "you seem so young, you know; almost… virginal. But that's probably just a false impression, right?" Kori was blushing now. All three senior girls were looking at her with insinuating smiles.

"Well, sure—I mean, it is a false impression—I'm not all
that
young—" Kori swallowed, looking confused. "I went out with Jimmy Clark all last summer," she ended defensively.

"Why don't you tell us all about it?" Faye murmured. Kori looked more confused.

"I—well—I think I'd better get going. I've got gym next period, and I have to get all the way over to E-wing. I'll see you guys." She got up quickly and disappeared.

"Strange, she left her lunch," Faye mused, frowning gently. "Oh, well." She extracted a package of cupcakes from Kori's lunch sack and tossed them to Suzan, who giggled.

Deborah, though, was frowning. "That was stupid, Faye. We're going to need her later—like in two weeks. One empty space, one candidate, you know?"

"True," Faye said. "Oh, well, I'll make it up to her. Don't worry; when the time comes, she'll be on our side."

"I suppose
we'd
better get moving too," Suzan said, and behind her rock, Cassie shut her eyes in relief.

"I've got to climb all the way to the third floor for algebra."

"Which could take hours," Deborah said maliciously. "But don't strain yourself just yet. There's more company coming."

Faye sighed in exasperation, without turning. "Who
now
?. What do we have to do to get a little peace around here?"

"It's Madame Class President herself. Sally. And there's
steam
coming out of her ears." Faye's expression of annoyance vanished, dissolving into something more beautiful and infinitely more dangerous. Still sitting with her back to the school, she smiled and worked her long, red-tipped fingers like a cat exercising its claws. "And I thought today was going to be boring," she murmured, clucking her tongue. "It just shows you can never tell. Well,
hetto
, Sally," she said aloud, standing and turning in one smooth motion. "What a lovely surprise. How was your summer?"