"Where have youbeen?" Hazel asked.
"Did you slash the tires?"Theodore demanded.
Lucy continued to stare at herhands, brows pushing toward the middle of her face as though she didn'trecognize the palms and dirty fingers. "It's her," she said again,dazed.
"Who?"Elysium asked. "Mother?"
Tears gathered in her darkeyes, making them shimmer when she shook her head.
"Where were you?"Benedict tried. It seemed that asking questions was the thing to do.
Lucy let out a wobblingbreath. "I don't remember going to the graveyard… I don't remember diggingher up but…"
"You dug up yourmother?" Hazel almost shrieked.
Elysium gestured his cousinaway and cautiously stepped up to his sister's side, taking her by the wristwith one hand while the other braced her back. "Let's get you cleanedup."
Lucy took a couple of steps,lulled into his care before jumping to life and twisting from his hold. Sheshook her head. "No! We have to get out of here!"
"You kind of made thatimpossible…" Hazel muttered. It seemed she had decided to lay the blamefor the slashed tires and cut phone line on Lucy. She was probably right. Itseemed Lucy had lost herself for a while and ended up in the graveyard. Therewas no knowing for certain what she had or hadn't done. But Benedict shot Hazela glare anyway. She was being particularly heartless, and none of them deservedit.
"She's coming for us.It's her!" Lucy continued to wail.
Theodore made shushing soundsand gently took her arms, replacing Elysium. "We know. We know your motheris—"
"No!" Lucy wailed,body shaking so hard that she had to lean into Theodore to keep from crumblingto the floor. "Not Mother." Her gaze slashed to Benedict, sending achill down his spine. She repeated, "Her."
Elysium and Theodore exchangedlooks, as though this meant something to them. Her.Not Mother. But her.
"She's lost hermind," Hazel whispered, but the fire had gone from her words.
"Get her upstairs,"Elysium told Theodore hurriedly. "She needs to rest. We'll figure out whatto do."
"No! No. She's coming forus!" Lucy continued to cry as Theodore all but carried her up the stairs."We have to pay! She's going to make us pay!"
The three of them stood in thefoyer until it fell quiet again, as quiet as it could be with the roar of astorm still pouring in.
"Who?"Benedict demanded before anyone could say anything else.
"Noone." Hazel found her voice. "Your motherobviously possessed Lucy to keep us in this house."
"Convenient foryou," Elysium added.
"Why does Lucy thinkshe's guilty? Guilty of what?" Benedict pressed,not letting them change the subject.
"Nothing!" Hazelshouted. "I didn't do anything wrong, and I don't deserve this. I haveonly ever protected this family and—"
"Now who's the onepossessed by Mother?" Benedict interrupted. "You're practicallyquoting her."
"Benny..." Elysium tried,his voice back to that careful, even tone, but when Benedict turned toward him,he saw uncertainty in those eyes. It hadn't been there before last night.
"What is she talkingabout? Who is she talking about?"
For one thrilling second,Benedict actually thought Elysium would tell him whatever the great secretwas—that he would come clean and lay everything bare. And then Elysium pressedhis lips shut and shook his head once, looking away like a king dismissing asubject.
Benedict almost stayed, just tobe willful. Almost took a big step forward and shoved Elysium back.
But he didn't. He rememberedthe mud all over Lucy and her rambling about the graveyard. She had woken upout there from whatever trance possessed her. Mother's ghost had released herafter she dug up her grave. Why? No one was going to answer him,that was painfully clear. So, Benedict turned and stomped down thehallway.
He wanted to call forEmmeline. He wanted her to tell him all the secrets of his home the way she hadtold him the secrets in other haunted houses. She had been his eyes everywherethey went. Why wasn't she that way here? The few days since they arrived feltlike weeks. She had been distant and strange the whole time. Maybe he got itwrong? Maybe it wasn't Emmeline infecting the house—maybe the house wasinfecting Emmeline?
He passed the dining room andturned down the narrow hallway to the back of the house. The floor was muddyhere, too, Lucy's wet footprints leading in from the storm. She had left thebackdoor open, swinging on its hinges, caught in a warm breeze that bounced iton the wall.
"Benedict!" Elysiumcalled after him, voice echoing down the hall just before he stepped out intothe storm.
The fury of the warm rainmuffled his brother's voice. The sopping ground sank under his steps, soakinginto his boots. He was drenched before he had gone a dozen steps from thehouse, but he kept walking even when the rain rolled freely down his face inconstant rivulets, spilling off his chin.
If he weren't soaked from therain, he would have been soaked from sweat by the time he reached thegraveyard, the oppressive heat of the rising morning made brutally muggy by thestorm. Each breath he sucked was wet heat sticking in his lungs.
Elysium stopped calling him.He didn't follow. Why would he? What could he do now? Drag Benedict back intothe house? Keep him captive? To what end?
Benedict used his whole handto scrub the rain from his face, trying to clear his vision long enough to geta look at the muddy yard. He stood in front of the fresh mound of his mother'sgrave. The rain had made it flat, puddling on top of it where even this softground wasn't fast enough to drink up the downpour. No one had dug her up.Nothing was out of place.
He glanced around at theothers, old stones and trimmed grass patches—just as they had been before.
His stomach knotted and themuscles in his legs ached, threatening to give out on him. He turned toward thewoods, toward that spot where Emmeline had sat during the funeral—staring atthe ground.
He forced himself to takethose last steps, legs shaking and breaths coming in heaving gasps.
The little hole in the groundwas full of rainwater. It wasn't cleanly shaped by a shovel or a spade. No. Lucy had clawed up the grass and flowers and used her arms to scoopaway the mud
