“So,” said Max. “We need to prepare, I guess.”
Jax nodded. “There are some things we need. We need salt, for example. It should be sea salt, ideally.”
“I think there’s some in the kitchen,” said Cara.
“Then we each need something of Mom’s. It could be even hair, from her hairbrush. I got the feeling it should basically be something that has her DNA. Or something a dog would use to track her scent, you know? Though I couldn’t exactly swear to that.”
“Creepy,” said Max. “Eye of newt, or whatever.”
“Huh?” asked Jax.
“Wow, something you don’t know,” Max marveled. “We had to read it in English this year. Macbeth. The play by Shakespeare? There’s witches in it, and they have this recipe for a potion, I think: eye of newt, toe of frog. Then something else I forget. Wait, maybe the hair of the dog … ?”
“The point of the whole deal,” said Jax, “is it’s a warding spell, basically. When we do the ritual, we make her safe from him. At least, for a while. More than that, I don’t know.”
“So what else?” asked Cara.
“There are a couple of herbs I think we have in the kitchen. Apparently they’re ancient. People have used them for centuries even though you can pick them up for $1.99 at Stop & Shop.”
“Who knew,” said Max, deadpan.
The sprinkler started up in front of them, going back and forth in the humid, dusky air. Its movement was hypnotic and oddly calming.
“No, really,” said Jax. “The selkie told me there are things all around with these properties. These properties that seem to defy physics, defy chemistry. And some of the things with extraordinary properties are totally basic-seeming—even trivial. You’d never think they were anything more than that. Unless you knew. Unless you had this secret, ancient knowledge. It used to be passed down by word of mouth, between generations of—shamans, I guess she called them? But now that tradition has died out. It’s all, I don’t know, TV and advertising and selling things and the old secrets have been lost.”
“To all but the seal people,” said Max, a bit mockingly.
Max could mock, but Cara didn’t mind. She knew with perfect certainty about the world that was hidden—knew it was there, though she didn’t understand it. So Max could mock, but she didn’t mind. The mockery had no teeth.
“Not seal people, exactly,” said Jax, and was going to explain, but Cara stopped him.
“We should focus,” she said. “We don’t have that long for the gathering. Tell us what else we’ll need.”
The sprinkler, which had started low, had gotten taller until the lines of spray were falling down on the roof of the porch as it passed them.
“Dad,” called out Max, craning his neck around the corner of the house, “you made the sprinkler too big. Can you cut it down? We’re about to get wet here.”
“But I didn’t turn the sprinkler on,” their dad called back. He was clearly still in the kitchen.
Cara looked at Jax. In that second of recognition—Cara thinking Oh, not again. How stupid can I be?—the lines of water coming out of the sprinkler shot up into the sky suddenly, as though the water pressure had hit infinity.
At the same time the water turned color—turned dark red, red as blood. Then it was pouring down on the roof, hitting the roof of the porch so hard it leaked through the cracks above them, flowing down over the sides in thin curtains of red.
“Inside!” Cara screamed, and all three of them piled through the front door. She slammed it behind them, and they stood there breathing hard.
From the kitchen, Lolly called out a question—what was going on, or something. Before they could answer, or even pay attention, Max said: “Rufus.”
He had been beside them on the porch, curled up on the wooden slats as they swung.
“Oh no,” said Cara.
How could they have left him behind?
“I’ll get him!” said Max, and before they could stop him he had opened the door and was through it.
“Don’t bring him in!” yelled Jax, but it was too late: there was Rufus, Max holding him by the collar with his good hand, the arm in the cast hanging limp; the dog was soaked, soaked in the blood-red water.
“Oh. No,” said Cara again.
“Max, you don’t get it,” urged Jax. “You have to get him out of the house! Now!”
Rufus growled.
And Cara knew it, she knew it instantly.
He wasn’t their Rufus anymore. He was inhabited.
“Max invited him,” said Jax. “Now he’s in.”
And then Rufus smiled.
It was far worse than the growling. It was one of the most frightening things Cara had ever seen.
It was like his lips were being formed into a grin by some force beyond him—a manipulation, a form of cold, ugly puppetry.
“Jesus!” said Max as the dog swiveled its head and looked at him. He snatched his hand off the collar as though it was hot to the touch.
“Get him out!” cried Jax.
Cara grabbed a coat and threw it over the dog’s head, his teeth snapping, head thrusting up and down. She backed him up toward the door as Max wrenched it open, and then they had him out again and the door slammed behind him.
“What were you doing to that poor dog, for Chrissake?” asked their dad, sounding angry. He stood in the doorway to the kitchen, holding a dishtowel.
He’d never been able to stand it when people mistreated animals.
“He was—” began Jax.
“We think he got skunked,” rushed Max. “Maybe right in the face? He was bringing it in.”
“I don’t smell anything,” said their dad.
“That’s because of Cara’s quick thinking, then,” said Max.
“Huh,” said their dad. “Well, if he was really skunked you’ll need the special soap. It’s still under the basement sink from last time. I’ll let the three of you deal with it.”
“Will do,” said Max.
“And don’t bring him inside, whatever you do,” he added before retreating again.
“He’s right about that part,” whispered Jax. “When the water dries off Roof, or isn’t in him anymore, he
