Elegy - Tara Hudson

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science credit. The slight chip on her right canine, from a rock-hard jelly bean we found in her mom’s couch that I’d dared her to eat. The heart she’d drawn around Doug Davidson’s name in bright-red ink, right on the front cover of her Government book, our first day of public school.

      Our friendship had been the lifelong kind . . . for as long as I’d lived, anyway. Now, neither of us had a “lifelong” existence. Not anymore.

      It was the thought of her, lost and alone and probably tormented in the netherworld, that ultimately made me stop crying. I swallowed back the last of my sobs and wiped furiously at my eyes, smearing the tears away haphazardly across my cheeks. As my vision cleared, I could see that Joshua had pulled his truck to the shoulder of the road, and he now waited patiently for me to work through this outburst of misery.

      Yet another reason why I loved him; yet another reason why he deserved so much more from me than self-indulgent misery. He deserved my action, as did Serena, and Gaby, and my father, and every other wrongfully imprisoned soul. I wasn’t exactly sure how, but I knew that I wouldn’t go into the darkness without freeing the people I loved from the demons.

      And I wouldn’t go without one hell of a fight.

      I kept silent until the force of tears and sickness and loss no longer controlled me. Then, when I felt like my body would better obey my mind, I finally turned to Joshua.

      “Please take me back to your house.”

      Joshua began moving fast, as if he was dealing with an unstable situation—or person.

      “That’s a good idea,” he said hurriedly. “We’ll get you back there so you can rest for a while, have some of my dad’s cooking, and then maybe—”

      “No.”

      My interruption wasn’t cruel, but it didn’t leave any room for argument, either.

      “I’m done resting,” I continued, a touch more gently. “I’ve been resting since Christmas—since Gaby—and look what that’s accomplished. First, you and I love each other, more than ever, but our relationship is stalled. It will be, until something about me changes. Then, the demons are obviously a bigger threat than they were the day we met. And now, another one of my friends is dead.”

      “None of that is your fault, Amelia—”

      “I know,” I interrupted again. “Really, I do. Like you said: I didn’t create hell. I didn’t invite this evil into our lives. But I’m tired of my loved ones hurting because of the darkness. I’m tired of being its victim too. And I’m ready to do something about it. Now.”

      Once I’d finished that pronouncement, I leaned back against my seat and did a quick self-assessment. I felt . . . good, actually. Surprisingly good. Galvanized, even.

      But Joshua clearly didn’t know how to respond. As he drove, he opened and shut his mouth several times without saying anything. Finally, after taking more than a few miles to collect his thoughts, he nodded.

      “Okay, then. What do we do next?”

      Joshua’s question sounded just as fierce, just as determined as his earlier declaration of love. Which meant that both came from the same, good place inside of him. The place I loved most.

      Despite everything that we’d gone through, despite everything to come, I couldn’t help but give him a wide, bright smile.

      “I think it’s time to gather a coven of Seers.”

      It was a good plan. Not to mention, it was the only plan I could come up with on short notice. But that didn’t make it any easier to implement. First, sheer numbers were not on our side, as Jillian wasted no time in telling me.

      “It’s just math, Amelia,” she mumbled through an enormous bite of cold fried chicken. “One, two, three.”

      To illustrate, she used her cleaned drumstick to point at Scott, then Joshua, then herself. She swallowed her huge bite and added, “Three versus—what?—thousands of demons and their ghost slaves? No offense to anyone at this table, but I don’t like our odds.”

      I groaned and let my forkful of potato salad clatter to my plate. Math, I laughed to myself. How quickly Jillian forgot that I’d helped Joshua to an A in Calculus last semester, while she almost failed basic algebra.

      Aloud, I said, “That’s why we’re going to get a lot more Seers, Jillian. Because the larger our circle, the greater power we have to open the netherworld. And that’s the most important part.”

      “Aside from the killings?” she asked drily.

      “That’s not going to happen again.”

      I answered so sharply that Jillian actually sank back in her chair, temporarily chastened. She should consider herself lucky that I hadn’t followed my first impulse and thrown my fork at her.

      For the second time today, the four of us were gathered around the Mayhews’ breakfast table—this time, with a Southern-fried lunch of the weekend’s leftovers. When Joshua and I had arrived back at the house, Rebecca and Jeremiah were already awake; this necessitated a flurry of explanations about why the two couples were together so early in the morning, instead of sleeping safely apart. Jillian and I crafted some impromptu slumber-party lies that, although thin (nail painting! gossip! chocolate!), convinced the older Mayhews to leave us alone with a few plastic containers of leftovers and an entire afternoon to plan our attack.

      “Personally, I think we should talk to Ruth’s and my gran’s old Seer group,” Scott offered.

      Joshua and I replied simultaneously: “No chance,” on his part, and “That’s a fantastic idea,” on mine.

      Joshua turned to me, blinking rapidly. “What? You can’t be serious, Amelia.”

      “I’m very serious. We need them. As your little sister so sweetly pointed out, there’s strength in numbers. And in the old coven’s case, experience. Two newbie Seers and one who hasn’t technically been triggered yet aren’t going to keep the netherworld open for very long.”

      “Hey,” Scott protested. “I could, like, hold my breath for a really long time, or something. You know: get ‘triggered’ or whatever.”

      I smiled at him gently. “Scott, in a weird way, that’s very sweet. But I don’t think an intentionally failed suicide attempt is what we’re really going for.”

      When he grinned back at me sheepishly, I noted, “A-plus for enthusiasm, though.”

      “I think it’s a mistake,” Joshua insisted, running one nervous hand through his hair and then resting it on his neck. “We can’t forget that the Wilburton coven wanted to exorcize Amelia. Just a few months ago, actually. I’d bet none of them have forgotten that fact.”

      To my surprise, Jillian actually took my side and began to argue with her big brother.

      “So what?” she challenged him. “I doubt that would matter, if they knew we were all after the same thing. Besides, they’re probably leaderless without Grandma Ruth, anyway. If we ask them really nicely, maybe bring them a few extra cases of Ensure as a peace offering . . .”

      Although Jillian kept talking, I stopped listening. Not because she offended me with her disrespect, but because of something she’d just said. Something that gave me an interesting, if dangerous, idea. I turned it over in my mind, treating the idea as carefully as I would a delicate seashell with sharp edges. Razor sharp, if past experience served.

      But worth it, I ultimately decided. Maybe even necessary to our mission. I mentally rejoined the conversation as Jillian continued to poke fun at her Seer elders.

      “. . . you know, throw in some denture cream. Ask them if we can see pictures of their great-grandchildren—”

      She stopped short when she caught my determined stare.

      “What?” she demanded. “Why are you looking at me like I’m

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