Where Monsters Lie (The Monster Within 2)

“Avery, what—oh!” Erin screams as she comes to stand next to me. “What—what could’ve done this?”

“SILENCE!” Novac comes striding down the hallway. He stops and looks down at Mason’s body, his eyes roaming over it, and then he looks up at the double doors heading out of the school. The students shuffle behind him as he heads over to the doors and peers out of them.

There are tracks in the snow leading away from the doors. Tracks made by huge feet with claws.

Novac’s face turns pale and Bennett’s parents push through the crowd of students to stand near him. Their smiles from earlier are nowhere to be seen.

“We were wrong,” Novac tells them. I’m close enough to hear. “We didn’t exorcise the incubus. It jumped hosts.” He turns to look at the crowd of students behind him, all of them

carefully avoiding the bloody mess that is all that remains of Mason Dagher. “Back into the dining hall, all of you!” he shouts, his voice booming in the small space. Behind us, people rush back in, but I don’t move. I’m rooted to the spot.

“Headmaster,” Piers says. He’s still holding his hands out in front of him as he walks up. The blood drips to the tiled floor. “The infirmary—my dad—”

“Go to the bathroom, son, and wash your hands,” Novac says gently. He gives a meaningful look to Mr. Little, who puts an arm around Piers’ shoulder and starts guiding him away. “No one is to go to the infirmary,” Novac adds, his gaze falling on me. “There’s likely to be more bodies. The incubus had to get its strength somehow. We need to alert the village. That’s where it’s headed.”

“Isn’t this village usually very careful?” Mrs. Little asks. She tilts her head. “They will probably respond quickly. They will get their people to the safe houses we have set up.”

“Not today,” Owen says quietly, and we all turn to look at him. I didn’t even realize the boys had followed us, but he, Bennett, and Sawyer are all here, with Luiza behind them. “Today’s their Valentine’s Day celebration. Florin—the bartender at the tavern—says that all the teenagers go out to the woods today.”

“It’ll be impossible to get them all in time,” Novac mutters.

“What happened to Mr. Dagher, though?” I ask, finding my voice. “Why is he dead?”

“Mr. Dagher is not as strong as Helsing is,” Mrs. Little says, glancing behind us to make sure Piers isn’t within earshot. “The incubus had to fight Helsing. Had to drain his strength over a long period of time. With Mr. Dagher, it was able to gain control almost immediately. And now it’s manifested its own form and killed Mr. Dagher in the process.”

“An incubus with enough strength to maintain its own form is an absolute emergency,” Novac says. “We’ll have to evacuate the students to safe houses. I’ll—”

I turn and rush down the hallway before he’s finished. I know what needs to be done, and I need to do it before he orders me to go to a safe house.

The safe houses are in the student handbook. There are several littered throughout the village below. It specifies in the handbook that the safe houses are only for extreme emergency situations, when huge amounts of human lives are at stake. The menagerie incident last year probably would have qualified, but there wasn’t enough time to start the evacuation. Ultimately, the safe houses are for lucky people to hide while the unlucky people die in the calamity.

A calamity that could be avoided.

Where do I find who I’m looking for? I head for the headmaster’s office. That’s where I’ve always seen him—it’s most likely that he’s there. Luckily, I don’t have to head toward the infirmary on my way to the headmaster’s office. I don’t know if I can stomach seeing any more bodies.

I burst through the door to the office, and there he is—Roland Skinner, sitting behind the headmaster’s desk, pen in hand.

“Come with me,” I say.

“Miss Black?” He looks at me with an expression of puzzlement. I walk over to him and grab his arm.

“There’s been an emergency. They didn’t exorcise the incubus. It jumped hosts. It’s killed Mason Dagher, and now it’s got its own form. Headmaster Novac is about to order everyone to evacuate to the safe houses.”

Skinner’s face pales as he stands up, and he lets me lead him out of the office and down a different corridor. “I don’t understand, Miss Black. Where are you taking me? And what do you think I can do?”

“There’s only one thing that can stop this spirit, Mr. Lawyer Man,” I tell him, dragging him determinedly behind me. I know the way. I could walk there in my sleep.

“I still don’t understand. How am I supposed to help, Miss Black?”

I drag him down the hallway with only one door and stop just outside it. Skinner sees where we are. He looks through the little glass window at the phylactery that sits on its pedestal inside. The eye engraved on the urn is closed—but it won’t be that way for long.

I turn to him and look him straight in the eye. “Mr. Skinner,” I say to him, snapping my fingers. His eyes slide from the window to my face. Good—I want him to look at me.

“It’s time to write a new contract, and after that …” I glance back inside through the thick paneled glass. “We’re going to release the Djinn.”