Betrayal - By Lee Nichols Page 0,64

the habit—if they stop soon enough. Before they …” He trailed off.

“Before they what?”

“Gain too much power. Which Bennett already has. He’s turning himself into something terrible, Emma. We thought he was Neos.”

“But he wasn’t,” Natalie said. “Let’s think about this a minute.” She tapped a fingernail against the steps a few times, then asked me, “What did Bennett say about that disk that led us here?”

I shook my head. “I didn’t ask.”

“So are we sure that was him, standing outside the fence, watching your room?”

“Nicholas would’ve recognized him,” I said.

“And Emma said she felt Neos on the disk,” Lukas posed. “And where’d the fog come from?”

We sat in a stupefied silence for a minute, then Simon said, “The timing is odd. Finding that disk the morning we planned to head to the Knell.”

“And the fact that Bennett—or whoever—just dropped it there is pretty convenient,” Natalie said. “What if … what if it was a distraction?”

“To get us away from the museum,” Simon mused.

“What would Neos want with the museum?” Lukas asked.

“The Knell thinks he needs some final rite. Could it have something to do with that?” I wondered.

“Or maybe he’s after my books?” Simon said.

“Yeah, that’s Neos’s big secret.” Lukas lowered his voice. “He doesn’t have a library card.”

“Some of those books are extremely rare,” Simon said stiffly.

“What else is at the museum that he can use against Emma?” Natalie asked.

“Hostages,” I said, suddenly realizing. “Nicholas and Celeste and Anatole.”

We all stood abruptly and ran toward the car. This time, none of us complained about Simon’s driving.

We spent an hour stuck in traffic, even though I urged Simon to drive in the breakdown lane. Then I barely waited for the wheels to stop in the gravel drive before sprinting into the museum. I stood in the foyer calling for each of them. When nobody answered, I closed my eyes and summoned them. Celeste shimmered into existence first, quickly followed by Anatole, both of them looking terrified.

Natalie entered behind me. “Where’s Nicholas?” she asked.

Celeste’s eyes were wide, having understood Natalie. He’s gone.

Where? I asked. How?

We do not know. We felt a … a rip in the Beyond.

He took him, Anatole said. He took him from ze house. I thought we were bound to stay inside ze gate, but he took him. He reached and poof. No more Nicholas.

Celeste wrung her hands. Ze poor boy.

Who took him? Neos?

Oui, Celeste said. Nobody else haz this much power.

There was nothing we could do, Anatole added. We didn’t want him to take us, too—to use us against you. We fled.

I’m glad you did, I said, then turned to the others. “Neos grabbed him. He’s gone.”

“How long ago?” Simon asked. “Can you summon him?”

“I don’t know.” I asked the ghosts if they thought there was time to find Nicholas before Neos took him too far into the Beyond.

Perhapz, if you press on the mushroom, Celeste said.

What?

It iz expression français, Anatole said. She means hurry.

Natalie and I decided to hold hands, to see if we could combine our strength, but it was clear we approached summoning completely differently. When I pushed, she pulled, and when I listened, she spoke. We looked at each other oddly, then I dropped her hand and said, “I’ll be over there,” before moving to the other side of the room.

“Yeah,” she said, then got back to work.

I closed my eyes and tuned my energy toward summoning. It didn’t feel like lightning, the way compelling and dispelling did, more like listening to the hum of the world, focusing on a familiar voice in a crowd.

I threw myself further into the power than ever, but didn’t hear a whisper of Nicholas. I did feel a comfortable presence, though, and Coby materialized beside me.

Hey, Coby said, give a ghost a break. I was just haunting a DVD in Sara’s history class.

You can do that? Celeste said. Haunt ze television?

We cannot, Anatole said sadly, like all he ever wanted was to appear in an episode of Law & Order.

Well, I’m an Emma Vaile production, Coby explained. What you do is, you focus on the—

Coby! I interrupted. Neos kidnapped Nicholas.

The little waif guy?

Yeah—can you help us find him?

Gimme a second. He vanished, and I explained to Simon and the others that he was searching. He reappeared a moment later.

Nicholas isn’t in the Beyond, he said. And I can’t even feel Neos. I can always feel Neos, because he’s so powerful, but suddenly he’s just … gone.

“Okay,” I said. “Nicholas isn’t in the Beyond, and he’s not