Mr. Davenport’s accident takes the form of another fall—a misstep that has him slipping as he enters the class with the English tests clutched in his hands. He hit his head so hard against the tiles, Rachel’s certain she hears the back of his skull crack. The test papers fly into the air as a flurry of activity commences. Students either panic or take action to help the most despised teacher at Ridge Crest High.
Faculty members arrive in droves, trying and failing to regain order.
The class is eventually dismissed, the English test postponed until a later date, and the ambulance is called.
Rachel passes Mr. Davenport’s desk and sees a figurine lying in the open top drawer.
“Yup,” she pops the ‘p’, her theory proven right. This time, Rachel doesn’t pick up the totem, simply exits the classroom along with the rest of the students.
Cam stands across the hallway, seemingly waiting for her.
“Was that your doing?” She eyes him suspiciously.
“Sorry?” Cam looks genuinely surprised by the question, but that’s not saying much.
Rachel stares at him, not sure if she believes him or not. She takes her place beside him, watching the EMTs rolling the gurney out of the classroom with Mr. Davenport strapped in tight.
“It’s surprising how easily our peers are traumatized. There wasn’t even a drop of blood and look at them.” He juts his chin in Bianca Novak’s direction, who’s bawling her eyes out on Ronald Steven’s shoulder.
There are others in a similar state of despair, either crying or in complete shock. Best friends, Tammy Richards and Valeska Howes—for example—are several shades paler than they had been when they’d first entered the classroom. Tammy is crying in a pretty kind of way, a single teardrop trickling down her cheek. Her response is very subdued, almost ladylike. Valeska, on the other hand, catches flies with her ‘O’-shaped mouth, gaping as she looks between the gurney and the classroom.
“I’ve always said they don’t watch enough horror movies,” Rachel says.
Cam snorts, but manages to suppress his laughter before he can draw attention from the others.
As Rachel takes a step forward, ready to follow the EMTs out of the building, he says, “You don’t really think I’m responsible for Mr. Davenport’s fall, do you?”
Rachel studies him for a long moment, before she says, “Weirder things have happened.”
Instead of arguing with her, Cam simply shrugs and walks down the hallway.
Eight
Bones Don’t Scry
Should I get Ziggy, just in case things get out of control?
Rachel immediately dismisses the idea. She wouldn’t put the Fae light in harm’s way, regardless of the fact that it’s nothing more than a ball of energy with a personality.
Maybe I need to notify Dougal?
Again, she instantly decides against it. He has enough to deal with, and there’s no telling if Mercia’s part of the bargain will pan out.
This is my problem to handle.
“This will do,” Mercia says, setting a large wooden chest on the basement floor in front of the bare north-facing wall. She opens it and takes out several flat, rounded objects, covered in red velvet fabric. “I wouldn’t normally do this outside of a protection barrier, but desperate times call for—” She fumbles one of the objects, catching it before it falls. “Whoa. That was close.”
“Do you need help?” Rachel steps closer.
“Thanks, but if I break one, I just get grounded. If you break one, you literally die.” Mercia carefully places the last rounded object on the floor before reaching back into the wooden chest.
Rachel perches on an upturned crate, whatever it had once held long since gone.
Mercia lifts a large, oddly shaped object from the chest with both hands.
“Okay, let’s see if I remember how this works.” Mercia rights herself and squares her shoulders, staring at the wall. She says a weird word, and the object flies out of her hands and fixes against the wall. Mercia grins as she steps closer and pulls the velvet fabric off from the object, revealing an obsidian disk in an ornate, black frame. Eight crescents are carved into it, just large enough to hold whatever else Mercia’s unpacked from the crate. She returns to the stack of velvet-covered objects and picks one up. She closes her eyes as she unwraps a smaller one, whispering something Rachel can’t hear before the disk flies to the large black mirror and slips into a crescent bracket.
“You’re going to have to tell me what we’re doing,” Rachel says. She crosses her legs. “I can’t figure it out.”
“I’m putting together an interdimensional scrying mirror,” Mercia answers, eyes still closed as she reaches for the second disk.
“Oh.”
Mercia whispers to the object in her hands, which follows its brother into another empty crescent in the mainframe. One after another, the disks fly to the wall, until all eight smaller obsidian mirrors are in place. Mercia opens her eyes and smiles at her handiwork, pushing the empty chest aside with her foot.
“There.”
“Now what?” Rachel asks.
“Now,” Mercia begins, glancing over her shoulder to Rachel, “I need something personal of Orion’s to focus on. Something he’s touched or—” Her gaze falls to Rachel’s neck. “That’ll do.”
Rachel reaches up to the umbrella pendant and holds it firmly.
“I’m not going to break it.”
“See that you don’t.” Rachel reluctantly takes off the Ronamy Stone. She crosses the basement and hands the necklace over.
Mercia takes the necklace in both hands as she steps up to the black mirror, closing her eyes again. Her words are mere breaths, spoken so.
As Mercia opens her eyes, the pendant glows in purples and blues, with hues of green sometimes flashing intermittently. She raises her hand. The golden chain swings forward and backward, the umbrella pendant almost touching the mirror. Her blonde hair blows wildly around her face as the enchantment becomes louder, more insistent.
An impossible wind rushes through the basement, blowing around loose paper and dust.
Rachel pushes her hair out of her face, staring at the strange frame as it turns counterclockwise. Faster and faster, the frame moves, the
