It was already dark out, and cold, but running helped me quickly break a sweat. The great thing about running is that it clears my head and helps me think. I’ve solved many problems while running along the sidewalks of Stony Brook. It’s my own little bit of magic that always seems to work. My normal route takes me by my school. I usually do one loop around the football field, then head for home.
When I got to the school, I was surprised to see that it was lit up and busy. There was some kind of event going on. I’d forgotten that it was the night of the fall chorus and band show. I wasn’t in either, so no way I was going. I had to slow down as I got closer, because there was a lot of activity. Cars were driving up and parking, and dozens of people converged on foot from every direction, all headed for the auditorium.
I stopped across from the main entrance and watched as people flooded into the building. There were parents and kids of all ages excited about the concert or performing for their friends and families. I saw nothing but smiles and happy faces.
I, on the other hand, wasn’t smiling or happy.
I imagined what it would be like if disaster struck during the concert and the joyous show suddenly became a terror-filled nightmare. I pictured those same people fleeing from the building, running for their lives. How many would make it out? How many would survive, only to be haunted by the horrible memories of those who didn’t?
The thought made my stomach twist. I didn’t feel much like running anymore, or thinking, so I turned around and headed home.
Back in my room, the only thing that put me out of my misery was sleep. I conked out and didn’t wake up until the next morning when there was a knock on my bedroom door. I shot up, fearing the door would be broken down by a flock of white ravens.
“What?” I called out, dazed.
My mother poked her head in. When she saw me, her face fell.
“Did you sleep in your dirty sweats?” she asked.
“My sweats aren’t dirty,” I said groggily. “They’re just…sweaty.”
“Well, get up. You have company.”
Theo and Lu entered the room.
“Dad and I are leaving for work,” Mom said. “Don’t be late for school. Any of you.”
“We won’t, Mrs. O’Mara,” Lu said politely. “I’ll make sure we get to school on time.”
“Good,” Mom said. “Bye, kids.”
She closed the door.
Lu smiled slyly. “Of course, I didn’t say which school we were going to. Mwahahahaha.”
“Where’s your head today?” Theo asked me.
I sat on the edge of my bed and ran my hands through my hair, willing myself to wake up and focus.
“I didn’t ask for this responsibility,” I said. “My father planned for me to get the Paradox key when I was a baby. What if I grew up to be some kind of loser?”
“But you didn’t,” Lu said.
“At least not so far,” Theo added.
Lu gave him a shot in the arm for that.
“Ow!”
“She’ll see me coming,” I said. “I might be totally worthless.”
“That’s why you need us,” Lu said.
“Does that mean we’re going?” Theo asked eagerly.
As much as I tried to deny it and find another way out, I knew there was only one answer. I’d always known. Seeing all those happy people flooding into our school the night before only confirmed it.
I stood up and stretched.
“Did you really think we weren’t?” I asked.
“All righty!” Theo exclaimed.
“Just one thing,” Lu said to me.
“What’s that?”
“I don’t care if you wear those sweats, but you gotta use some deodorant.”
“Seriously,” Theo added.
I couldn’t help but laugh. My friends had priorities.
I went into the bathroom, changed into jeans and a T-shirt, put on a clean hoodie, and swiped some deodorant on my pits. I then grabbed the Paradox key, went to my bedroom door, and inserted it into the keyhole.
“You guys sure about this?” I asked.
“I wish we had a choice,” Lu said with a rare dose of sincerity. “We don’t.”
“We really don’t,” Theo added.
“Then okay,” I said as I opened the door and stepped aside for the two of them to go through.
“Happy Halloween.”
Everett was standing inside the library door, waiting for us.
He knew I’d be back.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
“Feeling like I hope I’m not making a big mistake,” I answered brusquely.
I walked right past him and headed for the far side of the library, with Theo and Lu right behind me. Everett joined the parade that would end at the door that would send us back into the story of Ainsley Murcer…and the witches of the Black Moon Circle.
“Anything new show up in the book?” Lu asked.
“Not a word,” Everett replied. “I believe this is what you would call the calm before the storm.”
“I hope we’re not too late,” Theo said.
“You won’t be,” Everett said. “My guess is you’ll arrive at Coppell at the same time of day as when you left home.”
“I don’t understand that,” Theo said. “You said time has no meaning here.”
“It doesn’t,” Everett said. “The Library exists whenever the story needs it to. Right now we need to exist on the morning of Samhain.”
“How does it know that?” Lu asked.
Everett held up the red book and said, “Because Marcus has the book checked out.”
“That’s like…magic,” Lu said.
Everett gave her a wink. “That’s the Library.”
I reached the far door and stopped, turning to face Everett.
“That’s a little too loose for me,” I said. “How much time do we have before things get nasty?”
“If Lu is correct, and I believe she is, nothing will happen until the evening festivities.”
“When all those kids are together in one place at the dance,” Theo said somberly. “What a nightmare.”
“Find the altar and destroy it,” Everett said. “That’ll stop the ascent of the high priestess and break the hex the coven has put on you.”
“What about Ainsley?” Lu asked.
“If the power of the coven is taken away, there’s a good chance that bond will be severed as well.”
“Only ‘a good chance’?” Lu asked.
“Witchcraft isn’t an exact science, lass. All we can do is stop the disruption and hope for the best.”
“So where do we look for this altar?” I asked.
“It must be near the school,” Everett said. “That’s where all the activity has been centered. Look for a place large enough for the coven to gather but also hidden so an innocent wouldn’t accidently stumble upon it.”
“The school building is ancient,” Theo said. “And huge. It could be hidden in some remote, dark wing that isn’t used anymore.”
The four of us looked at each other. There was nothing more to add.
“Lots of unfinished books in this library,” I said to Everett. “Are they all this dangerous?”
“Not all,” Everett said.
“That’s a relief,” Theo said.
“Just most of ’em,” Everett added.
I gave him a sharp look. He shrugged innocently.
I opened the door that led into the boys’ bathroom at Coppell Middle School.
“Empty,” Theo said. “That’s good. I don’t know how we’d explain being in the bathroom closet.”
“That’s the least of our worries,” I said. “Let’s go hunt us some witches.”
I stepped into the bathroom, with Lu and Theo right behind me.
We were back in the story.
“What time is it?” I asked, leading them quickly out of the bathroom.
The corridor was full of kids between classes. The three of us froze fo
r an instant, confused. The school had turned into a twisted fun house. There were hoboes and zombies, princesses and giant cats walking on two legs. And, yes, there were even a few witches with green faces and tall pointed hats.
Lu put it together first.
“It’s Halloween,” she said. “Trick or treat.”
The realization made me relax. Slightly.
“It’s eleven-thirty,” Theo announced, pointing to a wall clock. “Lunchtime.”
“Find Ainsley,” I said to Lu. “Stay close to her. If we don’t find that altar, it may come down to us keeping her from going to the dance.”
“What about me?” Theo asked.
“You and I are going to search the school for that altar. Let’s all meet out front at the end of the school day.”
“Got it,” Lu said, and took off without another word.
I looked to Theo and said, “If anything happens to me, you keep searching.”
Theo seemed a lot more nervous than he had been the night before. Maybe he was having second thoughts about this adventure. Or third thoughts. Or fourth. Theo was a thinker.
We walked quickly through the sea of costumed kids until we found a set of swinging doors that led to a stairwell.
“All righty,” Theo said nervously. “Up or down?”
“Basement,” I answered with authority. “We’ll start low and work our way up.”
Theo took a deep, nervous breath and the two of us started down. When we hit the bottom of the stairs, we were only on the ground floor. We had to hunt for another way to the basement. The corridor was empty, since most of the kids were eating lunch, but there were enough stragglers around that Theo and I didn’t stand out. We hurried along, passing the school office, the nurse’s station, and, finally, the library. I glanced in through a window to see a bunch of kids hanging out. Like at our school, Coppell’s library was a social center.
Kayla was there. I’d almost forgotten about the shy, silent girl. She was at the circulation desk with a book. She dropped it on the counter in front of the librarian…and I nearly screamed. I grabbed Theo’s shirt like it was a lifeline to reality.
“What?” he asked with surprise.
My heart raced and my head spun. I pushed Theo back so neither of us could be seen through the library window.
“You getting dizzy again?” he asked.
I opened my mouth but could barely form words.
“It’s her,” I said. “The librarian.”
Theo took a cautious peek through the window.
“What about her?” he asked.
“The witch from the forest.”
Theo instantly flung himself backward and pressed himself against the wall next to me.
“You sure?” he asked, his voice rising two octaves.
I risked taking another cautious look.
The woman smiled at Kayla, took her book, and scanned it to check it out. It was all so normal. She looked nothing like a witch but it was definitely her. She wore a plaid skirt and a navy-blue sweater instead of the long, old-fashioned white dress, but I recognized her jet-black hair and golden eyes.
When she finished with Kayla, the librarian waved to another lady behind the counter.
“I’m going to grab some lunch in the cafeteria,” she said. “Can I get you anything?”
“Thanks, no, Ms. Tomac,” the lady replied.
“Okay, back soon.”
Ms. Tomac. That was her name. I wondered if it was made up or if she’d used it since the seventeenth century. She rounded the counter, headed for the door, which was only a few yards away from Theo and me.
“She’s coming,” I said, and pushed Theo back a few steps.
There was nowhere to hide. If the witch came our way, she’d see me for sure.
Theo stopped at a water fountain.
“Drink,” he said, and pushed my head down toward the fountain and blocked me from Tomac’s view with his body.
The witch came out of the library, turned the other way, and hurried away from us.
“It’s okay,” Theo whispered.
I took a chance and straightened up to watch her.
“I thought she was getting lunch,” I said. “Cafeteria’s the other way.”
I moved to follow her, but Theo stopped me.
“Whoa. If she sees you, she’ll twist your head around again.”
“Yeah, but we gotta see where she’s going,” I said, and kept moving.
Theo followed reluctantly.
There was nothing remotely witchy about the woman. She looked every bit like a normal person. I began to wonder if I was mistaken.
She reached a fire door at the end of the corridor and blasted through with no hesitation.
“Come on,” I said, and we sprinted to catch up.
When we got to the door, I opened it cautiously, fearing she’d be waiting for us on the other side.
“Uh-oh,” Theo said.
Beyond the door was a stairwell that led down.
“I guess we found out how to get to the basement,” Theo said with dread.
Tomac had already gone down. Without stopping to think, I hurried after her. Theo closed the door gently and caught right up with me. As we descended, the air grew cooler. We were definitely going deep into the bowels of the school. The floor on the next level down was cement, not linoleum. We had hit bottom. There was only one way to go and that was through another set of heavy fire doors. I opened one of the doors cautiously and peeked in.
On the other side was a large room filled with stacks of supplies. There was everything from toilet paper to cleaning fluid to fluorescent lightbulbs. This was where the janitors stored the stuff that kept the school running. It was a labyrinth of cardboard boxes piled to the ceiling.
I took a tentative step forward, but Theo grabbed my shoulder to stop me. He shook his head. Can’t say that I blamed him. It was a dark basement, and there was no way to know if a witch lurked around the next turn.
I gently took his hand off my arm and gestured for him to stay put. He shook his head again. I guess being alone freaked him out more than coming with me, so the two of us moved on.
The only light came from old, bare lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling that were spaced so far apart there were more stretches of shadow than patches of light. I listened, hoping to hear footsteps that would tell us how far ahead the witch had gone, but I heard nothing.
Was this a trap? Did she know we were following her the whole time? Was she hiding in the shadows waiting for us to stumble by so she could throw another spell at us?
I walked forward slowly, with Theo right on my tail. Neither of us said anything for fear the witch would hear. Though the basement was cold, I was sweating like it were a sauna. We made a few turns past stacks of boxes. Each time I poked my head around a corner, I feared Tomac would be standing directly in our path.
Theo heard something and pulled on my shirt to stop me. He pointed to his ear as if to say, Listen. I heard it too. The sound was faint but distinct. It was a crunching sound, like the kind you make when you crack your knuckles. It kept going, the longest knuckle crack in history. I heard a whimper, as if the knuckle cracker was in pain. Theo and I took the chance and moved closer, creeping around a few more corners. The sound grew steadily louder and more intense. So did the pained whimpers. I had no idea what was happening, but it didn’t sound good.
Worse, it sounded gruesome.
I rounded yet another stack of boxes and stopped so suddenly that Theo ran into me from behind. The space ahead widened out into a workshop. There were long tables strewn with wrenches, hammers, saws, and screwdrivers. It was probably where the school’s maintenance staff worked. It looked nothing like a witch’s altar…
…but what we saw next to it was definitely straight-up witchlike.
The librarian stood in the center of the space with her back to us. At first I thought she was dancing, because she was moving in a slow rhythm, rolling her shoulders and swiveling her head. But th
ere was no music and it was like no dance I had ever seen. With every movement, loud crunching sounds echoed through the room. It was both fascinating and gross.
Theo’s eyes were as big as headlights as we watched the woman squirm and twist, painfully contorting her body, letting out small sighs with each new pop and crack. It lasted for several seconds before we realized what was happening.
Tomac’s body was changing. It started slowly, but once under way, the transformation took only a few seconds. She crouched down near the floor and tucked her chin into her chest. With one last pained gasp, this human-looking witch turned into something completely different. Any hint of human shape was gone. The cracking grew frantic; her body writhed as if small animals were trying to poke out from beneath her skin; her dark clothing faded to white, and in seconds the librarian was gone.
In her place was the white wolf with the black blaze between its eyes.
Theo let out a small whine of shock.
I slapped my hand over his mouth. The last thing we needed was to be trapped in that basement with a vicious wolf-witch.
The beast shook like a dog that had just come out of the water, then scampered off, trotting deeper into the dark basement.
I looked to Theo, my hand still over his mouth. His eyes were comically wide and scared, but his body relaxed. He nodded as if to say, I’m okay, so I lowered my hand.
“We gotta follow it,” I whispered. “It could lead us to the altar.”
Theo looked into the darkness ahead as if debating whether to step into the unknown. He took a deep breath, exhaled, and nodded.
We hurried after the wolf without another word. It was critical for us to be quiet. If the witch had wolf hearing, there was an even greater chance of being discovered. I didn’t even want to think about whether or not she could smell us.
Theo and I moved quickly through the workshop and found ourselves walking past large steel tanks with lots of valves and gauges. They had to be the boilers that heated the school. They looked ancient, as if they’d been there for fifty years. The metal tanks cracked and pinged as steam moved through the overhead pipes on the way to the building above.
Running through the basement was like traveling back in time. We moved past the active boilers and found ourselves next to much older tanks that were no longer in use. Brown rust ran along every seam and dust caked the flat surfaces. These things hadn’t been used in years. It was probably more trouble to get them out than to leave them to rust.