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"You sent the note," Cassie said flatly
Faye smiled her slow, terrible smile "Somehow I didn’t think you’d come if I used my own naht She irl Tina on what to say - and I sed it
"How do you like the little presents you’ve been finding?"
Tears came to Cassie’s eyes She couldn’t answer She felt so drained, so helpless - if only she could think
"Haven’t you been sleeping well?" Faye continued, her throaty voice innocent "You look awful Oryou awake"
Cassie turned to cast a quick look behind her There was an exit there, but Suzan was in front of it
"Oh, you can’t go yet," Faye said "I wouldn’t drea you"
Cassie stared at her "Faye, just leave me alone"
"Dreahed nastily
Cassie could make no sense out of this But then she saw that Faye was holding a sheet of paper It was shtly cruh her exhaustion Blazed so bright that for an instant she was full of energy, lifted by it She lunged at Faye crying, "That’s mine!"
It took Faye by surprise She reeled back, dodging, holding the poe caught Cassie’s ar thehtly breathless She looked at Cassie "I suppose even a little white mouse will turn We’ll have to re to have an i I’m sorry the atmosphere isn’t more - appropriate - but what can you do? This used to be the science building, but nobody co and Chris Henderson made a little mistake in a chemistry experiment You’ve probably seen the Henderson brothers - they’re hard to uys, but a little irresponsible They accidentally made a boain, she could see that the room was burned out The walls were black with soot
"Of course, some people think it’s unsafe here," Faye continued, "so they keep it locked But we’ve never let a little thing like that stop us It is private, though We can make all the noise ant and nobody will hear us"
Deborah’s grip on Cassie’s arain as Faye cleared her throat and held up the paper
"Let inative title, by the way"
"You don’t have any right - " Cassie began, but Faye ignored her She began reading in a theatrical, ht I lie and dream about the one - "
"It’s private!" Cassie cried
"Who kissed o!"
"I spent a single hour with him alone - "
"It isn’t fair - "
"And since that hour, my days are laced with fire" Faye looked up "That’s it What do you think, Deborah?"
"It stinks," Deborah said, then gave a little wrench to Cassie’s arms as Cassie tried to tear away "It’s stupid"
"Oh, I don’t know I liked soery About fire, for instance Do you like fire, Cassie?"
Cassie went still That lazy, husky voice had a new note in it, a note she recognized instinctively Danger
"Do you think about fire, Cassie? Do you dream about it?"
Dry-mouthed, Cassie stared at Faye Those honey-colored eyes ar Excited
"Would you like to see a fire trick?"
Cassie shook her head There were things worse than hu For the first time this week she was afraid, not for her pride, but for her life
Faye snapped the piece of paper in her hand, for it into a loose cone Flame burst out of one corner at the top
"Why don’t you tell us who the poem is about, Cassie? This boy akened you - who is he?"
Cassie leaned away, trying to escape the blazing paper in front of her face
"Careful," Deborah said et too close to her hair"
"What, you mean this close?" said Faye "Or this close?"
Cassie had to twist her neck to evade the fla off in every direction The brightness left an afterie, and she could feel heat on her skin
"Oops, that was close I think her eyelashes are too long anyway, Deborah, don’t you?"
Cassie was fighting now, but Deborah was astonishingly strong And the rip hurt
"Let go of ht you liked fire, Cassie Look into the fire What do you see?"
Cassie didn’t want to obey, but she couldn’t help it Surely the paper should have burned up by now But it was still blazing Yellow, she thought Fire is yellow and orange Not red like they say
All her senses were fixed on the flale to her cheeks She could hear the cru And she could see nothing else
Gray ash and yellow flaed shape every second, its radiance streay
Energy
Fire is power, she thought She could alolden flame It wasn’t the vast quietness of sky and sea, or the waiting solidity of rock It was active Power there for the taking
"Yes," Faye whispered
The sound shocked Cassie out of her trance Don’t be crazy, she told herself Her fantasy about the flaet any sleep When the stress becaot to the end of your resources She was going insane
Tears flooded her eyes, fell down her cheeks
"Oh, she’s just a baby after all," Faye said, and there was savage disgust in her voice Disgust and so like disappointment "Come on, baby, can’t you cry any harder than that? If you cry hard enough, , Cassie tossed her head back and forth as the blazing paper stabbed closer So close that tears fell on it and sizzled Cassie was no longer thinking; she was simply terrified Like a trapped animal, a desperate, pathetic trapped animal
Dead meat dead ? Let go of her - now!"
The voice came out of nowhere, and for an instant Cassie didn’t even atte was focused on the fire It flared up suddenly, dissolving al only a stuo!" Soht like sunlight Oryou can read by it
It was her
The girl, the girl fro hair Utterly du her for the first time
She was almost as tall as Faye, but unlike Faye in every other respect Where Faye was voluptuous, she was slender; where Faye was dressed in red, she was dressed in white Instead of a wild black ht and shi in the
And of course she was beautiful, even more beautiful this close than she had been at a distance But it was a beauty so different fro Faye’s beauty was stunning but scary Her strange golden eyes were fascinating, but they also irl looked like solassFor the first tireen and clear, brilliant, as if light were behind them Her cheeks were faintly flushed with rose, but it was natural color, not nation, and her voice, though clear and er
"When Tina told me she’d delivered that note for you, I knew there was so on," she said "But this is unbelievable For the last tio!"
Slowly, reluctantly, the grip on Cassie’s arms loosened
"Look at this you could have hurt her," the fair-haired girl raged on She had a Kleenex out and iping ash - and tears - off Cassie’s cheeks "Are you all right?" she asked, her tone gentling
Cassie could only look at her The shining girl had co out of a dreairl said, turning on Faye "How could you, Faye? How could you be so cruel?"
"It just comes naturally," Faye murmured Her eyes were hooded, sullen As sullen as Deborah’s face
"And you, Suzan - I’ it is?"
Suzanaway
"And ould you want to hurt her? Who is she?" She had a protective arirls to another None of them answered
"I’m Cassie," Cassie said Her voice wobbled at the end, and she tried to steady it All she could feel was the girl’s ared to finish "I just randirl looked startled "Mrs Howard? At Nu with her?"
Fear darted through Cassie She re where she lived She would die if this girl responded the sairl whirled back on Faye "Then she’s one of us! A neighbor," she added sharply as Faye’s eyebrows shot up