AllFreeNovel
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She followed a suddenly chatty Mrs. Olson into the kitchen.
“Lands’ sakes!” Mrs. Olson exclaimed, stopping
short in the doorway. “How did this mess get all over the floor? I just swept it right after lunch!”
“If it’s mud, I blame Sam. He’s an absolute slob,” Evie said, coming up behind her.
“Not mud,” Mrs. Olson said, reaching for the broom. “Daisies, of all things! Bunches and bunches of rotted daisies.”
ALL OF US TOGETHER
“It’s time. We can’t put it off any longer,” Evie announced the following day over Sam’s objections. It was Sunday afternoon. Their chores were finished. Mr. and Mrs. Olson had gone to a neighbor’s farm a few miles away for the men to play horseshoes while the women quilted. The Diviners had the farm to themselves. “Marlowe and the King of Crows are already steps ahead of us. We can’t afford to wait.”
“All right. But what do we do?” Henry asked. “All we’ve learned how to do is destroy ghosts.”
“What if we feel them, the dead, inside us again?” Ling asked. To think there’d been a time when she hadn’t feared spirits at all. But after Gideon, she was terribly afraid.
“Now we’re all together, it’ll be different,” Sarah Beth said. “Isaiah and I’ve already been working on our powers. Isn’t that right, Isaiah?”
“Isaiah? Is that true?” Memphis asked. He did not sound happy.
Isaiah shrugged and avoided Memphis’s gaze.
“You’re all scared on account of what happened in Gideon,” Sarah Beth said. “That’s what he wants, is to get you good and scared. So you’ll doubt your gifts. So you won’t fight back. You can’t trust what he says.”
“The last few times we used our powers, we weren’t thinking; we were reacting, out of fear,” Ling agreed.
“How do you know all of this?” Jericho said to Sarah Beth.
“Because I used to talk to him,” Sarah Beth answered. “I know how he thinks. I know how he tricks and lies. We have to get our powers good and strong so we can take him out. If he goes, the dead go with him.”
“You’re sure about that?” Jericho said.
Sarah Beth stared him down. “Yes.”
“All is connected.…” Sam said.
“What’s that?” Evie asked.
“Something I heard when I was in Marlowe’s Eye. All is connected. Us. Them. The dead and the living. All of it.”
“And we’re connected to the dead and the King of Crows,” Ling said. “So how will we defeat them without also destroying ourselves?”
No one had an answer for that. They were, they knew, flying blind.
“I keep telling you,” Sarah Beth said, exasperated, “if we share our moon glow—”
“Our what?” Sam said.
“It’s what we call our gifts,” Isaiah explained, registering the dirty look Memphis was throwing his way.
“Sounds like a perfumed soap,” Sam said.
Evie elbowed him. “Behave.”
“Well. It does,” Sam muttered.
“What were you saying, Sarah Beth, before you were so rudely interrupted?” Evie asked.
