The Captive Page 0,63

heedless of danger, was lunging forward, and there was no time to scream a warning or make her stop. Cassie's heart failed her and her legs went weak in the middle of the rush toward the black thing.

It would kill them-one touch of those burned, hardened hands could kill-but it was giving way before them. Cassie couldn't believe they were still alive, still moving, but they were. The thing was backing away, it was crouching, it was running. It turned and went through what had been the old front door, searing the handle black as it went. It went out into the darkness and then it was gone.

The door hung open, rattling in the wind. The red light died. Through the doorway Cassie could see the cool silver-blue of moonlight.

She dragged in a deep breath, grateful just to be able to breathe without hurting.

"We did it!" Deborah was laughing. She pounded Nick on the arm and back. "We did it! All right! The bastard ran!"

It left, Cassie thought. It left, deliberately. We didn't win anything.

Then she turned sharply to Nick. "My mother! And Laurel and Melanie-they're out there-"

"I'll go check them. I think it's gone for now, though," he said.

For now. Nick knew the same thing she did. It wasn't defeated; it had withdrawn.

On trembling legs, Cassie went and knelt by her grandmother on the floor.

"Grandma?" she said. She was afraid the old woman was dead. But no, her grandmother was breathing heavily. Then Cassie was afraid that if the wrinkled eyelids opened, the eyes underneath would stare blankly like a doll's- but they were opening now, and they saw her, they knew her. Her grandmother's eyes were dark with pain, but they were rational.

"Cassie," she whispered. "Little Cassie."

"Grandma, you're going to be all right. Don't move." Cassie tried to think of anything else she'd heard about injured people. What to do? Keep them warm? Keep their feet elevated? "Just hang on," she told her grandmother, and to Deborah she said, "Call an ambulance, fast!"

"No," her grandmother said. She tried to sit up and her face contracted with pain. One knobby-knuckled hand clutched at the thin robe over her nightgown. Over her heart.

"Grandma, don't move," Cassie said frantically. "It's going to be all right, everything's going to be all right. . ."

"No, Cassie," her grandmother said. She was still breathing in that tortured way, but her voice was surprisingly strong. "No ambulance.

There's no time. You need to listen to me; I have something to tell you."

"You can tell me later." Cassie was crying now, but she tried to keep her voice steady.

"There won't be a later," her grandmother gasped, and then she settled back, her breathing careful and slow. She spoke distinctly, kneading Cassie's hand in her own. Her eyes were so dark, so anguished-and so kind. "Cassie, I don't have much time left, and you need to listen. This is important. Go to the fireplace and look on the right-hand side for a loose brick. It's just about the level of the mantel. Pull it out and bring me what's inside the hole."

Cassie stumbled to the hearth. A loose brick-she couldn't see; she was crying too hard. She felt with her fingers, scraping them on the roughness of mortar, and something shifted under them.

This brick. She dug her fingernails into the crumbled mortar around it and worked it back and forth until it came out. She dropped it and reached into the cool dark hollow now exposed.

Her fingertips found something smooth. She eased it closer with her nails, then grasped it and pulled it out.

It was a Book of Shadows.

The one from her dream, the one with the red leather cover. Cassie took it back to her grandmother and knelt again.

"He couldn't make me tell where it was. He couldn't make me tell anything," her grandmother said, and smiled. "My own grandmother showed me that was a good place to hide it." She stroked the book, then her age-spotted hand tightened on Cassie's. "It's yours, Cassie. From my grandmother to me to you. You have the sight and the power, as I did, as your mother does. But you can't run away like she did. You have to stay here and face him."

She stopped and coughed. Cassie looked at Deborah, who was listening intently, and then back at her grandmother. "Grandma, please. Please let us call the ambulance. You can't just give up-"

"I'm not giving anything up! I'm giving it all to you. To you, Cassie, so you can