Chapter One
I lie back and stretch out my fingers, letting the reeds of grass caress my skin. The sun is overhead, warming my eyelids. From somewhere nearby comes the buzzing of a fly or a bee, but I don’t open my eyes to find out. I’m so motionless that they won’t bother me. The breeze moves a little of my hair over my face in a gentle susurration. I settle against the ground, thinking that this is where I am my calmest. This is where my mind rests: on the grave of a ghost I sent to the otherworld. Or maybe to nothingness. I don’t know where the spirits are sent, but I know she had to go. She had to leave here. And I have to open my eyes and sit up. I have to climb to my feet and face reality. And as I do so, the thoughts come flooding back, except now, I vocalise them.
“This world is dark.” My voice is a whisper, but with each word I find my confidence growing. I’ve needed to say this. “I can’t remember ever not knowing how dark it really is. Perhaps there is some time deep in my childhood where the world was only plaiting daisies and dancing in puddles, but I can’t remember it. I never believed in destiny before, but what else could have pulled me into the murky depths of this world? If it isn’t destiny then it’s me. Something defective deep inside me.” I run a wet rag along the edge of the stone. “There. You’re all fixed up. Wait, one last touch.” I place a jam jar filled with wildflowers on the ledge of the gravestone. Then I rub the cloth over the chiselled letters. Elizabeth Langton. ?-1897. RIP. “I should’ve asked you your birthday before I stabbed you with the Athamé. I could have had it amended for you.
“Did you believe me when I said I would visit your grave? Did you think I was full of shit?” I sigh and step back, admiring my handiwork. Elizabeth’s grave is clean and tidy, with fresh flowers. She has been honoured. “Mum is out of hospital now. Dad goes back to school in a week and I start at Ashforth Comp at the same time. Life is going back to normal.” I scratch at a small piece of moss on the gravestone. “Normal. What a stupid word. What’s normal? What’s weird?” I shake my head. I try to laugh it all away. “I guess I’m out of sorts or something. Ravenswood has taken its toll on me. It took something from me when I pushed the Athamé through the walls. When I rid the house of spirits, I lost a little part of my heart, I’m sure of it. I’m eaten up, hollowed out. I don’t know what to do to make myself better.”
I pack up my rag and bottled water in an old Marks and Spencer carrier bag. It feels good to say the things that have been on my mind for weeks. I can’t even tell Lacey. It’s hard to tell people that you’re losing hope for the world. That you’re losing yourself.
“Until next time, Elizabeth. I enjoyed talking to you,” I say, trying to force cheer into my voice.
The graveyard is quiet now that Elizabeth’s ghost has left. I thought there might be someone else here, which is why I came at midday. Even though I’m used to the sight of spirits now, it doesn’t mean that they don’t startle me, frighten me even. And why shouldn’t it? I thought that this strange life of ghost hunting—or busting, or whatever—might harden me. Toughen me up. But it hasn’t. Ghosts aren’t monsters. They’re people stuck in a loop. A leftover.
I shake my head. I can’t think of Lacey as a leftover. She still feels. She still thinks. She’s still a person. I miss the days when ghosts were the villains in movies, not complicated beings who have to be treated individually.
It’s the end of August and the end of summer, of warm weather and sunshine. Forecasts talk of a blustery September bringing in wind and rain.
When you’re a kid, the summer stretches out almost impossibly long, with endless possibilities. The day you walk back through the school doors you look around you and see how your friends walk taller, hold themselves with more poise, how their skin is a little darker, their features more defined. We rarely talk about the summer with the kids we didn’t share it with. It’s like a club or a clique. What happens in summer stays in summer, as though it’s a real location. Or maybe a treasure chest that stays locked until next year.
I am not taller this time. My shoulders are heavier. My eyes have lost the restlessness of naïve youth. I noticed that this morning in the bathroom mirror. It took me five minutes of pure staring to understand the change. My experiences are etched down my skin as though the fingernails of death caught me by the throat and I wrenched myself free. I am Mary Hades. I am the girl who can talk to the dead. Last year I was Mary, a girl with above average grades and friends who giggle more than they talk, talk more than they speak, and listen even less. I’ve learned how to listen, and how to speak. But somewhere along the way I lost hope, and now it’s my memories that keep me awake at night. The nightmares come in the morning, when the first hint of sunlight creeps in through the curtains.
This last year has taught me that no one is safe from suffering. Not even my parents. And now, as I am about to repeat year twelve, I can’t help but wonder how I’m going to fit into school when I’ve stopped believing in good. No one wants to be friends with a weird-ass depressive like me. And wait until the day I tell my new best friend I can see ghosts… Yup, this year is going to be a long one.
*
On the way back to Ashforth I get stuck in a downpour. The windscreen wipers squeak against the glass as I negotiate the tight bends in the countryside roads. The car fills with the scent of wet dog, and the sky turns to a steel grey as the angry clouds gather. I slow down a little, apprehensive about the slippery roads and muddy verges. My heart quickens. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s driving in crappy weather when you can’t see properly, and passing cars spray you with water.
I dig deep through a tight bend, hitting a little of the grass and swearing as the tyre sinks into the mud. I accelerate, forcing my little Clio out of the wet grass and back onto the road, at a slightly wrong angle, and going faster than I usually care to. As I’m straightening up, a blue Volvo comes swerving around the bend too fast. I slam my foot against the brake pedal and turn away from the oncoming vehicle, hitting the grass verge with my bumper. The Volvo slows down as it passes, and I’m able to get a good look at the driver. He’s young, about my age, with light brown skin and a shaved head. On the passenger’s side sits a pale girl approximately the same age with long, strawberry blonde hair. She leans forward in her seat and watches me as the car passes on, turning her dark red lips and kohl-rimmed eyes towards the glass. With the rain on the window, the two of them look like a mirage in the middle of the road.
Ignoring the stare of the girl, I restart my stalled car and reverse out of the verge with shaking hands. If that guy hadn’t been going so fast, I wouldn’t have had to perform an emergency stop, and my heart wouldn’t be pounding against my rib cage like it is now. I imagine his face as I drive on, the curl of his lip, and even the leather jacket he was wearing. What a cocky idiot. He almost got us all killed.
It’s only when I finally pull into the drive at Ravenswood that my heart begins to calm. Mum waves from the kitchen window. I blink away a memory of her a month ago, watching me from the window with the shadow of a ghost behind her. I force away the memory of her dark, possessed eyes, and the things she said to me. None of it was her. The problem is, every time I look at her, I see the ghost who possessed her. Nothing seems to wash it away. And none of it is her fault, which makes it even worse.
As I put my key in the door, I try to wipe the look of horror from my face and force a smile. The door creaks behind me. A familiar voice calls out yoohoo.
“Emmaline?” I ask. I kick off my Converses and hang up my now sodden jacket.
There are three people in the kitchen when I walk in. One of them is dead.
“All right, Mares?” Lacey asks.
I nod at her and sit down at the table.
“Cup of tea, love?” Mum asks. “You’re soaked. Where’ve you been?”
I hesitate before I answer, but then remember the new pact I have with my mum. “I went to visit the grave of a ghost I sent to the otherworld. I cleaned up her gravestone and took flowers.”
“That’s nice,” Lacey says with a smile.
“Well, I…” Mum’s face freezes. “I think that’s very generous of you.” She adds a little milk to my tea and passes it across the table.
Emmaline sips from her cup and addresses me with raised eyebrows. She’s a frightening woman to look at, but I’m so used to her scars now that I hardly see them. Years ago, Emmaline was hurt in a fire set by her brother. Since then she has lived almost in seclusion because of her appearance. Whenever I think of what she has been through, I remember my own brush with fire and wince. “So you’re settled on ghost hunting, then?”
“Yes, I suppose so.” Although I hate to call it a hunt. I want to help them, not kill them.
Lacey watches me with calm blue eyes. She’s sitting cross-legged on the table completely invisible to everyone in the room but me. Her blonde hair hangs down around her face, straight and messy.
Mum lets out a long exhale. “Mary.” She pauses. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing? After I was injured when that ghost…” As Mum trails off, Emmaline grips her hand. “When that ghost possessed me. I don’t want you to get hurt, too.”
“Emmaline is helping me,” I say. “She’s teaching me about ghosts and what they can do.”
It’s true. Emmaline’s little house in the woods has become a haven for me to escape the memories held by the walls at Ravenswood. I’ve spent a few hours a week there learning about different haunting cases, how the ghosts gained power and what made them grow. I’m almost an expert on the paranormal now.
“She’s a committed student,” Emmaline says.
“She’s a child,” Mum replies. “With her whole future ahead of her. When that horrible spirit took hold of me twenty years ago I knew there was something wrong with me. I never wanted it to happen to my little girl.” Her hand flies to her mouth. I look away as she wipes away a tear.
“Well, it is my life,” I say. “There’s no escaping it. Truth be told, it’s not what I always wanted. It isn’t what I would have chosen for myself. But I can’t turn my back on people being hurt because of the spirits left here. I can’t.” I turn and meet Lacey’s gaze, offering her a small smile.
“You’re right,” Lacey says. “We have to help them.”
Mum stands, raising her arms up in a frustrated flap. “If you’re in trouble, you come to me. And you never, ever lie.”
“Listen to your mother.” Emmaline points at me with a scarred finger.
“I will.”
The front door slams shut and the four of us jump at the sudden break in silence.
“What happened to the car?” Dad’s voice calls from the hallway.
“There’s something wrong with it?” I call back.
His head pops into the doorway of the kitchen. “I’ll say. There’s a bloody great dint on the bumper. Oh, hello, Emmaline. I didn’t know you were here.”
Emmaline lifts her teacup in salute. “Simon.”
“I went onto the verge a bit, that’s all,” I say. “It seemed fine.”
“I’ll take it for a spin later and check it out. What happened?”
“A car came round the bend on Splinter Hill too fast. I had to do an emergency stop. Then it stalled.” I shrug.
Dad frowns. “Look, I think you should just do short journeys for now—”
“Dad—”
“I mean it. There’s some curse or something hanging over our family at the moment. I want you to stay safe.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re a scientist. You don’t believe in curses.”
He walks over and kisses me on the top of my head. “That was before this last year happened. Now I’m not so sure. What is it with you three women? You look like you know something.”
Mum bites her lip and shakes her head. “Cup of tea, love?”
“But how am I going to get to school next week?” I ask.
“The bus stops at the end of the drive, love. It’s not hard,” he says.
“Have you any idea how embarrassing it is to ride the bus as a sixth former? No way.”
“You’re getting the bus,” Dad says.
“I’m not.”
*
A week later, the old Victorian school building comes into view from the bus window. It stands tall and imposing in the middle of green playing fields, with a front porch held up with stone columns, neat windows spread evenly across its rectangular expanse, and a set of steep steps leading up to the entrance. I shrink down into my seat, hoping no one sees me as the bus pulls into the car park, but my eye is caught by the blue sign reading ‘Ashforth Secondary School’ in large, formal type.
“Fancy,” Lacey says. “My school was a concrete slab surrounded by old Johnnies and skanky needles. You’ve got actual stone columns and posh windows. It looks like Downton Abbey.”
Lacey’s words are a muffle as I get off the bus. Jangling nerves refuse to allow me to listen with my full attention. Instead, I’m worrying about the scars on my neck, and whether my hair covers them, or if I’m wearing too much make-up, or the wrong outfit. Most of the time, my scars don’t bother me. I want people to take me as I am. But I know what schools are like. They find one weakness and press on it until they wear you down. At my last school, word got around that I thought I could see things that weren’t real and my old friends turned on me, calling me Scary Mary. I don’t want that to happen again.
“It’s going to be all right, you know,” Lacey says. “You’re seventeen, nearly eighteen. Most of these kids are going to look up to you, not tear you down. You’re the cool new girl. They’ll like you.”
I flash her an ‘are you kidding’ look.
“I mean it,” she continues. “This is sixth form. I never even made it this far. All the bad kids will have dropped out by now, and I mean, look at this place. It looks like a fucking spa retreat. You’re going to be fine.”
I let out a small sigh as I set my first foot onto the tarmac of the school car park. The morning is crisp and calm. I decided to wear mid-heel court shoes and a pencil skirt—as sixth formers have no uniform—and I wasn’t sure if this place was formal or casual. My heels click as I walk along. I glance at my feet almost every step to check the ground for potential tripping hazards. I make my way up the steps towards the school building, following the sea of students heading into the main entrance. As I adjust the strap on my shoulder bag, I notice how my hand trembles. I was stupid to think that I could start a new term without thinking about what happened at my last school. The laughter swells around me, and I twist my neck, sure that they must be laughing at me. But it’s just a group of younger girls pushing and shoving each other up the steps.
Get a grip, Mary.
I pull in a deep breath and square my shoulders. No one here knows my story. I am just a girl, a boring teenage girl. With burn scars and a ghostly best friend. No. I shake the thoughts away and I’m preparing myself to enter through the main entrance when a familiar sensation makes me stop. My blood runs cold. I feel a prickle at the back of my neck. I turn, slowly, sensing that something isn’t right.
On the left side of the car park is a pretty lawn with a tall oak tree rising high up to the sky. On the lowest branch swings a rope. My stomach lurches. A body is hanging from the rope. Young teens run around the tree as the rotten body swings back and forth. My heart sinks. I should have known.
“What is it?” Lacey asks.
I whisper quietly to her. “Thing.”
“Shit,” Lacey replies. Her head whips around as a sudden gust of cold breeze rushes down the steps. The last of the kids make their way into the school, leaving us standing alone. “This place is haunted. Big time.”
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