The Devil's Labyrinth

wouldn’t have—”

“Bill’s not here,” Tom said gently, touching his forefinger to her lips. “You have to make the decisions now, and this one was for Ryan’s safety. Remember? Remember what happened to him at Dickinson?” Teri took a deep breath, exhaled. Of course she remembered. How could she ever forget what had happened? “There’s no way you could have kept him at Dickinson.”

She nodded — he was right, of course.

“Nothing bad is going to happen to Ryan at St. Isaac’s.” Tom soothed her. “He’s not—” He hesitated, searching for Kip Adamson’s name, then decided it didn’t matter. “He’s not that other boy, and what happened to that other boy isn’t going to happen to Ryan.” Once again Tom put his arms around her, and this time she didn’t resist, falling against his strong body, feeling his fingers gently stroking her hair.

She wasn’t sure if he was helping her or only making her life more complicated right now, but it didn’t matter.

Bill was gone forever, and now Ryan was away, too, and she suddenly felt terribly alone.

Alone, and uncertain, and wishing Ryan were back home where he belonged. It will be all right, she told herself. It will be, because it has to be.

† † †

Sofia Capelli sat on her bed, propped against the wall with all her pillows, the open history text on her lap completely ignored, even though she needed to study for tomorrow’s test. But how was she supposed to concentrate with Sister Mary David in the room, talking with her roommate as if there weren’t anyone else within a hundred miles, let alone ten feet away?

As far as Sofia was concerned, Melody Hunt had been going on about Kip Adamson’s death for at least a day too long, and she was pretty sure that even Sister Mary David thought it was time that she got at least a little bit past it. After all, it wasn’t as if Kip had been her boyfriend, or even close. In fact, Melody hadn’t even liked Kip. Why couldn’t she just get on with her life like Sofia and all the rest of the girls were doing? But Melody just kept asking “Why?”

As if someone was going to find an answer, which Sofia was pretty sure wasn’t going to happen.

Sofia had been just as shocked about what had happened to Kip, and had even talked with Sister Mary David about it herself. But then she’d decided there wasn’t anything she could do to change what had happened. Even more important to her than what Sister Mary David had said were a few simple words her grandmother had spoken when Sofia was only five: “No sense crying over spilt milk!” And while what had happened to Kip on Friday night was a lot worse than spilt milk — a whole lot worse — the point was still the same.

There was nothing she, or anybody else, could do about it. They all, including Melody, just had to accept it.

“I have to see to the rest of the girls,” Sister Mary David finally said in a tone that even Melody Hunt couldn’t argue with. “Talk this over with God tonight, and perhaps He will have answers for you that I just can’t provide.” Melody sniffed and blew her nose, nodding uncertainly. “And don’t you have a history test in the morning?” Sister Mary David added pointedly.

Melody nodded again, sniffed one last time, and put her handkerchief back in her pocket. Sofia held up her textbook as if to tell the nun that she had been trying to study for the past hour and that they’d been distracting her.

Just then, Sofia’s cell phone vibrated under her thigh, and she silently thanked whoever might be the patron saint of cell phones for her having had the presence of mind to turn the ringer off.

“Then I’ll leave you both to your studying,” Sister Mary David said. “Good night and God bless.”

“Good night, Sister,” the two girls said in unison.

When the nun was gone, Melody went into the bathroom to wash her face, giving Sofia just enough time to check her cell phone.

A text message from Darren Bender asking if he could see her. She slipped the phone back under her leg just as Melody came back out of the bathroom.

“I’m going to the library,” Melody said. “I’ll be back in an hour.”

Though Sofia was just a little bit jealous of Melody’s grades, she certainly wasn’t interested in spending the time required to achieve them. While Melody went to the library to study alone for at least an hour every night, in addition to doing the homework assignments in their room, Sofia had much more interesting things planned for the same hour.

Melody packed her book bag and left.

Sofia waited until she was sure Melody wasn’t coming back for anything, then dug out her cell phone.

Smiling to herself, she sent Darren a quick message: We’ve got an hour.

CHAPTER 15

HE AWOKE AS the energy around him began to change. He could feel it, almost smell it in the air.

Someone was coming.

He sat up in the corner, and rubbed his hands over his eyes, oblivious to both the grit on his palms and the slime of broken pimples that coated his face. The important thing was to erase the last vestiges of the indolent sleep that had stolen so many hours of his time.

Time that could be far better spent than in allowing this useless body to rest.

He searched the darkness around him, but saw no more of his prison than a pinhole of light at the door.

They thought the darkness would terrify him, but they were wrong. The darkness was his friend.

The darkness gave him shelter.

The darkness made him invisible.

He knew far more than they thought; saw everything despite the darkness. He needed no eyes, no ears, nor any other senses. Merely by being still and feeling the rise and fall of energies around him, he understood his surroundings.

Now he tingled with the rising energy, as happened every day.

Or was it night?

It didn’t matter.

All that mattered was that someone was coming.

Someone was coming, and bringing an opportunity for escape. If he was smart. If he did the right thing.

But so far, he had failed.

The first failure had surprised him. It should have been simple; nothing more then manipulating his own energy, focusing it on the pinhole of light that would lead to freedom. Yet when he’d made the attempt to ooze through the tiny hole like so much smoke, he’d failed.

Failed!

The human body, apparently, was a far more formidable prison than the chamber in which it dwelt.

The answer, of course, was obvious: he would simply take the human body with him.

But he had failed to manipulate the machinery of the lock on the door as miserably as he had failed to escape the human body.

Thus, he must manipulate the approaching personality.

He felt the rise in energy again, then heard footsteps through the ears of the body he