Page 16 of With the Key in the Office

“Want to scream?” I asked under my breath.

“Later,” she said, smiling without humor. “For now I’ll grade participation and pretend my palms didn’t sweat all morning.” She shook her hands as if she could throw the nerves to the floor and grind them into the grout. “Thank you for not rescuing me.”

“You didn’t need it,” I said. “You were solid.”

“Clarke was worse than usual,” Jaylyn added. “He kept aiming past me and talking to the authority hovering in the doorframe of his imagination.”

Robbie snorted. “I’ve met that authority. He wears ironed socks.”

Jessie laughed for real then, a quick break in the cloud. She gathered her folders and slid them into her bag. “I have twenty minutes before a planning meeting with Vanderflit,” she said. “Walk with me. If I sit, I’ll turn into a puddle.”

We followed her into the hall. The corridor had filled with the usual stream of students between periods, and for a second the ordinary movement washed the last of the tension away. Robbie and Jaylyn peeled toward the commons to corral study partners. I headed for my room to drop my bag and tell the cats that the world still turned.

9

CENDI

Dinner ran long.By the time we pushed our trays away, the dining hall had thinned to pockets of conversation and the clink of spoons against the last bowls of soup. After putting our trays away, Jessie walked down the corridor between Robbie and me, her shoulders looser than they’d been all day, the faculty pin tucked under her collar. I smiled looking at her, proud of my friend for how gracefully she’d been handling all of these new changes in her life.

“What?” she asked, noticing my stare.

My smile only widened. “I’m just really proud of you.”

“I’m really proud of me too,” she joked, and we all laughed.

We were halfway to the stairwell when a blue flare rippled across the stone ahead and turned the air into water. Instantly, we froze, not breathing. A figure stood at the far end of the hall, pale and wavering, hair and cardigan and stride so familiar my stomach clenched before my mind could catch up.

She moved without weight, drifting. Her head tipped toward us, and her jaw set in that determined way my daughter always teased me about.

“Stop,” Jessie called, lifting her wand. “We just want to talk.”

The figure flicked a glance over one shoulder and rounded the corner into the gallery, disappearing from view. I released the breath I didn’t even know I was holding, glanced at the others, and knew what we needed to do.

We ran after her.

My ghostly doppelgänger cut through the light, turned transparent at the edges and then sharpened again. Jessie murmured a restraint spell and sent a net of amber threads ahead of it, hoping to catch my ghost. The threads grazed her sleeve and then slid off as if oil slicked the air.

“Slippery,” she said, and changed tactics. A small circle flicked from her wand and burst into a lattice on the floor. The figure reached the edge of that circle and stepped through the gap between two lines, never slowing or pausing.

“Left,” Robbie said, already angling around a case of antique teacups. We spilled into the corridor behind the greenhouse. Condensation bubbled on the glass. Night pressed its face to the panes and fogged the view of the herb beds. Blue flared again at the far door and reflected down the stairwell toward the kitchens.

“Hunters,” Jessie said, breath steady, stride strong. “Text them.”

I pulled out my phone and thumbed a quick message to Drew.

South corridor, behind the greenhouse. Apparition wearing me. Fast and slippery. We’re following.

His reply came before we reached the first landing.

On our way. Don’t corner it. If it interacts with objects, mark the spot.

The next turn took us past the laundry chutes. The apparition never paused. She surged down the main hall toward the courtyard doors. Students jumped back with curses and half laughs when the blue shape cut through their clusters. One had the sense to shove the door open before it reached the handle. The figure flowed through the frame and into the night.

The courtyard stones wore a shine where mist had settled. Moonlight laid a pale road across the lawn. My double skimmed along that road and then veered toward the arch that led to the east grounds. Jessie fired a blast that turned into a net again. The light spread beautifully and did exactly nothing.

“It’s a projection or a glamour,” Robbie said. “That’s why it’s not working.”

Could it be? That didn’t seem possible. Why would anyone make a projection of me as a ghost? What would be the purpose?