The Divide Page 0,49

places come unbound

They stared into the goblet as Diana called out, "Let the water show the location of Scarlett."

At first there was nothing, just some ordinary water pooled in a fancy glass. The crowd above their heads cheered and rose to their feet, and the water stirred. It took a few seconds for it to go still again, but when it did, Cassie noticed her own reflection in the water becoming more pronounced. The shape of her own face, her round eyes and pouting mouth, sharpened to a pristine clarity. How frightened she looked to herself, how desperate. But soon that faded away and a new image emerged, with equal clarity. It was a broken-down house - the same house as the one in her dream, except now she could really see it, not just sense it.

It was a rickety beach cottage, in what Cassie recognized as the classic Cape Cod style. It sat near the end of a long, desolate, sandy lane, with a large body of water on one side and tidal marshes on the other.

I know this place, Cassie thought, but in the next moment, the image transformed into something else.

What was it?

The image was forming slowly, but she could swear it was a loaf of bread. Then the loaf separated into slices.

Maybe she was just hungry, because as quickly as that image formed, it re-shaped into something else: It was the face of a man who appeared to be from the 1800s. He had bushy eyebrows and a thick moustache and wore a high collar. Cassie was sure she recognized this man, too, but from where?

And then, finally, the image changed one last time - to a number. It flashed for only a second, almost too quickly to catch, but it was 48. It appeared to Cassie like a numbered white ball plucked from a lottery. Then the water blackened and became still.

"I think Scarlett's in Cape Cod," Cassie said, looking to the others for confirmation.

"Yes," Adam agreed. "In the town of Sandwich. It's in the northwest corner of the Cape."

Cassie laughed to herself. Of course. Why hadn't she figured that out? "But who was that man?" she asked.

"I know I've seen him before," Diana said.

And then it was Melanie's turn to have a laugh. "I just read The Scarlet Letter," she said. "That was Nathaniel Hawthorne."

"It was probably a clue to a street name," Laurel suggested. "Lots of the streets are named after old authors around there."

"Forty-eight," Adam said, typing it into his phone. "Forty-eight Hawthorne Street, that's where she is."

"Well, what are we standing around for?" Nick said.

"Let's go get her."

"We can't," Diana said firmly. "Cape Cod is outside the realm of the protective spell. It's too dangerous." Melanie, sensing that Cassie was about to explode, backed Diana up. "We'll need all the power we can get if we have a chance at defeating the hunters," she said. "We should wait to battle them here in New Salem, under the guard of the protection spell."

"I'm done waiting," Cassie said. "We can't count on the hunters sparing Scarlett for long."

Before anyone had the chance to respond, there was a spine-chilling scream from the bleachers overhead. It immediately registered that this was not the right kind of scream to hear at a track meet. It was a grisly sound, pain and shock and horror all wrapped into one. It sounded like death.

death.

Cassie and the others hurried out to see what happened, but it was complete havoc when they emerged. They strived to see over the mad crowd of panic-stricken students and frantic teachers and parents.

"There's a student down, on the bleachers," Adam said.

Cassie caught sight of a head of straw-colored hair and instantly knew who it was. It was Portia Bainbridge. And she was lying right above where the Circle did their spell.

"She collapsed," someone from the track team said.

Laurel elbowed through the crowd to see if Portia was still alive. She kneeled over her body, calling her name, and checked for a pulse. But it was no use.

Portia was gone - as lifelessly stiff as Constance had been on the ground the night of the spring festival. And what was worse, what Cassie wished more than anything she hadn't seen, was the faint glimmer of the hunter symbol on Portia's shirt, just over the place where her heart would have been beating.

Cassie didn't need to ask the others if they could also see it this time. She knew by their fright-stricken faces that they could.

"We