Dime Store Magic (Otherworld 3)

I turned to brush my assailant off, then saw her face and stopped cold. Lacey Cary stared down at me with eyes rimmed in red grief and black mascara. Around us, the crowd went silent.

"How dare you?" she hissed. "Is this some kind of sick joke?"

"I'm so, so sorry," I said. "I didn't mean--it was a mistake--I needed my file."

"Your file?" Lacey's face twisted. "You--you interrupted my husband's visitation to come and ask me about your file?"

"No, I was told to pick it--" I stopped, realizing this wasn't the time to correct her. I glanced down the hall for Savannah, but didn't see her. "I'm so sorry. I'll just leave--"

Someone pushed through the crowd behind me. The ripples of movement caught my attention and I saw Shaw move into an open gap a dozen feet down the hall.

As I turned away, Shaw took something from the folds of her dress. A doll. The sight was so unexpected that I paused, just long enough to see her lips move ... and to see that the doll wasn't a doll at all.

"A poppet," I whispered. "Oh, God--"

I whirled to run, but not before I saw Leah step up behind Shaw. She lifted a hand and finger-waved at me.

"Savannah!" I shouted, wrenching free from Lacey and throwing myself against the crowd that blocked my path.

Something popped overhead. A small explosion. Then another and another. Glass flew everywhere, tiny razor-sharp shards of glass. Lightbulb glass. Even the sconces on the walls exploded, sinking the hallway into twilight, lit only by the curtained exit at the end. I scrambled for the front door, clawing at everything in my path. An interior door slammed, blocking the way into the front vestibule and plunging the hallway into darkness. Other doors slammed. People screamed.

Someone hit me. No, not just someone, the whole crowd. Everyone around me seemed to fly off their feet, and we shot in a screaming, seething, kicking mass through a doorway. The huge double doors slammed shut behind us, deadening the shouts and cries of those trapped in the hallway.

As I struggled up from the carpet, I looked around. We were in a large room festooned with hanging curtains. Scattered pockets of mourners stared at us. Someone ran to help Lacey to her feet.

"What's going--"

"Has someone called--"

"Goddamn it--"

With the confused shouts, my own senses returned and I leaped to my feet. I heard a small pop. A now-familiar sound. I glanced up to see a chandelier over my head and dove to the ground, covering my head just as the tiny bulbs began to explode.

Only when the shards stopped falling did I peek out, expecting pitch dark. Instead, I found that I could see, a little. Light flickered from one single unbroken chandelier bulb, giving just enough illumination to allow me to make out my surroundings.

Again I sprang to my feet, searching for an exit. People were shouting, screaming, sobbing. They banged at the sealed door and yelled into cell phones. I noticed little of it. My brain was filled with a single refrain. Savannah. I had to find Savannah.

I stood, oddly clearheaded amidst the confusion, and took inventory of my situation. Main door blocked or sealed shut. No windows. No auxiliary doors. The room was roughly twenty feet square, ringed with chairs. Against the far wall was ... a coffin.

In that moment, I realized where I was. In the viewing room. Thankfully, as Savannah had guessed, there was no actual viewing. The coffin was closed. Still, my gut twisted at being so close to Cary's body.

I forced myself to be calm. Around me, everyone else seemed to be calming as well, shouts turning to quiet sobbing and whispered reassurances that help was on the way.

I returned to surveying my surroundings. No windows ... Through the muffling cushion of whispers and sobs came a low moaning. A moaning and a scratching. I hardly dared pinpoint the source. I didn't need to. I knew without turning, without looking, that the noise came from the far wall. From the coffin.

In my mind, I saw Shaw again, holding the poppet and reciting her incantation. I saw her and I knew what she was: a necromancer.

The scratching changed to a thumping. As the noise grew, the room went silent. Every eye turned to the coffin. A man stepped forward, grasping the edge of it.

"No!" I shouted. I dove forward, throwing myself at him. "Don't--"

He undid the latch just as my body struck his, knocking him sideways. I tried to scramble up, but our legs entwined and I tripped, falling against the casket. As I fought free, the lid creaked open.

I froze, heart hammering, then closed my eyes, squeezed them as tight as I could, as tight as I had when I was four years old and mistook the creaking of the pipes for a monster in my closet. The room went quiet, so quiet I could hear the breathing of those closest to me. I opened one eye and saw ... nothing. From my vantage point on the floor, I saw only an open coffin lid.

"Close it," someone whispered. "For God's sake, close it!"

I exhaled in relief. Shaw wasn't a necromancer. Leah had probably simulated the noise in the coffin by moving something within it, hoping to trick a mourner into opening it and displaying Cary's broken remains. Another grotesque prank, designed to slow me down, to stop me from getting to Savannah.