HELPIN . . .
The ring stalled on the N for a long while, and Jenn looked at Nick and Kirstin, wondering what to do. It seemed as if her aunt was losing the power to answer.
Finally, the ring shivered and slipped to the G.
“Aunt Meredith, what can I do to stop him?”
The ring moved again. Painfully slow. But it spelled out two more words: LEARN PERENAIS.
“Learn Perenais?” Jenn repeated. “I don’t know what you mean, Aunt Meredith. Study the family history?”
The planchette seemed to struggle. It jerked as it moved between letters, darting forward an inch and then stopping completely. But slowly it moved, and its movements spelled out:
B
E
W
A
R
Suddenly, the candles on either side of the table flared, rising from half-inch tongues to foot-high flames. Heat washed across them, and the planchette suddenly darted beneath their fingers, moving with demonic speed between letters. Nick called them out.
“Y O U,” he said, softly reading out each word in turn.
“WILL”
“DIE”
“LIKE”
“YOUR”
“FATHER”
The candles extinguished.
“Aunt Meredith?” Jenn called. “Aunt Meredith, are you here?”
“Jesus Christ,” Nick said.
Jenn stared at the board, barely visible in the shadows. The only light came from outside the room. She could see Kirstin’s face silhouetted with faint blue. Her friend shook her head back and forth, as if denying what had just happened.
“Aunt Meredith?” Jenn called again, but the ring remained still.
“She’s gone,” Kirstin said. Her voice shook. “Can we turn the lights on now?”
Jenn looked at the darkened board for a moment. Their fingers all remained on the planchette, but it did not move.
“Yeah,” she said at last, pulling her hand back from the ring.
Nick withdrew his hand from hers and reached out for a table lamp. “Well, I know
“What happened there?” Kirstin whispered.
“I think my aunt was here,” Jenn said. “But it was like she was struggling. I think whoever she was struggling with won out.”
“I hate to say I told you so—” Nick began.
Jenn cut him off. “I know, I know.”
“Do you think something is loose in my apartment now? What was it?”
Jenn shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe it was the Pumpkin Man himself. But I think he’s gone.”
“I wish we hadn’t done that,” Kirstin said. She had both arms wrapped around her shoulders in a self-hug as she rocked back and forth on the floor. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this scared.”
Jennica broke from Nick’s embrace to hug her. “I know, hon. I’m not feeling really good right now myself.” She choked back a sob and fought to get her emotions under control. Her chest was tight and her legs begged to run. Her entire body wanted to just flee, now, without any more questions or seances or thoughts about death. But that wouldn’t solve anything, she knew. The Pumpkin Man could be anywhere. “Before she left, she at least gave us a clue,” she reminded them.
“What,” Kirstin asked. “Research your family tree?”
“Sort of. Remember, the police said the Perenais family has been in River’s End since the beginning. That house is old. Really old. My aunt came out here and married into the family . . . I know from her journal that she learned her magic from studying things she found in the house. I don’t know that anybody really taught her, because she wrote that my uncle didn’t really want her to get involved in the things the rest of his family had been into. But somehow she found out how to do it. Maybe in those old books, maybe in other things.”
“And how are we going to find out?” Kirstin said. “Your uncle’s family seems to be gone.”
Jenn shrugged. “I still have my aunt Meredith’s journal. There may be more clues in there. And there’s the house itself.”
“I don’t want to go back there,” Kirstin said. “I am never sleeping in that bed again.”
Jenn nodded. The idea of going back didn’t exactly sit well with her either.
“I know,” she said. “But I can’t run away from this. It will follow us—or at least me—wherever I go. I need to act before it’s too late. It all began in that house. Maybe the only way it can be ended is there, too. I don’t know.”
Nick gave Jenn a hug and then looked her in the eyes. “I don’t want to go back there either,” he said, “but I’ll do whatever I can to help you. That thing killed my best friend. And I want you to be safe again.”
Jenn felt tears welling up in her eyes and she struggled not to cry. “Thanks,” she whispered. A tear slipped down her cheek.
Kirstin joined in the hug and whispered, “I’ll help, too. You know I will.”
That’s when she lost it. Jenn pictured the board spelling out YOU WILL DIE LIKE YOUR FATHER again, and then she saw Brian’s body in the bed from that morning and Kirstin’s incoherent terror. She remembered her dad’s funeral, which just reminded her how much Nick must hurt right now.
“Thank you, guys,” she said. “I’m so sorry about all of this.”
The sobs took over, and she began to cry harder, her breath hitching as the emotions of the past three months were finally released. Once she started, she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t catch her breath, but still the sadness streamed out. Nick pulled her gently to the couch and sat with her. He held her as she sobbed in a ball against his chest.
Kirstin sat with them for a while and stroked Jenn’s hair. When Jenn’s tears began to slow, she got up and gave Jenn’s shoulder a squeeze. “I’m going to bed,” she said. “I’m falling over.”
Jenn gave her a soggy smile. “Thanks for everything today,” she said. “Good night. See you in the morning.”
Kirstin smiled grimly and went down the hall. She’d left her things in Brian’s room. She supposed that’s where she’d sleep.
He could feel it coming again. His first response was to moan inwardly, and then came fleeting thoughts of tying himself to the kitchen table, which would stop his body from leaving home. But he’d had that thought a hundred times and knew it wouldn’t help. If his hands could tie him up, they could untie him as well.
The first time the madness had overtaken him, there had been no warning. One minute, he’d been cooking dinner and the next, he’d awoken on his couch the following morning covered in blood, still holding a sticky knife blade. God, the fear he’d felt that morning as he stared with bloodshot eyes into the bathroom mirror, asking himself over and over again, “What did you do?” And he simply couldn’t remember.
He’d found the passel of knives lying on the front room floor, equally bloody but tucked into a leather case. He took them all to the bathroom and rinsed the blood away, exploring each weathered knife with his fingers. While it was the first time he remembered seeing them, they felt strangely comfortable in his grasp. Familiar. Each handle fit snugly against the sore spot he felt on his palm below the thumb.
