Super (11 page)

Daniel walked over to the cabinet on the far wall and swung it open, revealing a small mounted safe. If Daniel had been half the detective he dreamed of being, he would have memorized the combination when he’d watched
Herman open it all those months ago. But Daniel was bad at numbers.

Luckily, he had the best safecracker in the world—one who didn’t even have to open the door.

“Well, there it is,” he said. “What do you think?”

Louisa studied the safe’s dimensions. It was maybe two feet wide. “Well, I could poke my head in there and look, but I wouldn’t be able to see anything,” she said. “Could be tricky, but I suppose I could just reach in and pull out whatever’s in there.”

Louisa could extend her intangibility power to other people or objects that she touched. It would be simple for her to reach inside, but Daniel understood her hesitation: without being able to see in first, she’d have no idea what she was actually grabbing. Daniel imagined Louisa’s hand reaching toward a viper, coiled in the dark and waiting to strike.

But that, of course, was ridiculous. They had more cause to worry about tripping some kind of silent alarm. They would have a hard time explaining that to the police.

“If you don’t want to try it, I’ll understand,” said Daniel. “We could always try to sneak in when Theo’s not home and let Eric just pull the door off.”

Louisa shook her head. “No. I can do this. If Eric opens that safe, it’s going to be
obvious
Eric opened that safe. He’s not exactly subtle.”

She looked at Daniel and smiled. “I want to help you guys out. I’m part of the team, even if I sometimes don’t act
like it. I just don’t get the same … thrill out of all this that you do.”

“I don’t get a thrill out it,” Daniel answered. “But it’s important.”

“Of course it is. It’s important and you are trying to help us all. Your heart’s always in the right place. But don’t fool yourself that you don’t love it, Daniel. You love the mystery, the adventure. Admit it. So does Eric. The detective and the superhero; you guys are the world’s finest partners.”

Daniel opened his mouth to protest but stopped himself. She was right. Daniel didn’t enjoy the danger his friends were in, but he craved the excitement of a new mystery to solve. He hadn’t realized just how bored he had been, especially these last few months of worry-free summer. And especially now, he felt like he needed this focus, he needed something to occupy his thoughts other than the memory of flying. This, at least, kept his mind off it.

“Stand back,” said Louisa, “and let me at that safe!”

Daniel positioned himself in the door to act as lookout while Louisa placed her thin brown fingers on the safe’s door. There was no outward sign that she was activating her power, no flash of light or whoosh of sound. Her hand just slipped inside. As easily as one might dip their hand in a tub of water, Louisa had reached in through the solid steel door until it was nearly up to her elbow.

“Now’s the tricky part,” she said. “I have to let my hand go solid again so I can feel around, but still keep the rest of
my arm intangible. This always freaks me out a bit, to be honest.”

A gruesome thought occurred to Daniel: he wondered what would happen if she allowed her whole arm to become solid again while it was still inside the safe. Best not to think about that, he decided.

Daniel didn’t think it was a good idea to talk to Louisa while she was concentrating. After a minute of silence she let out a frustrated sigh. “Hmm, there doesn’t seem to be anything in there. It’s empty.… Wait, I found something.”

Louisa’s arm came out of the safe holding a piece of paper. It was a single sheet, folded over once.

“Is that all?” Daniel asked, trying to keep the disappointment out of his voice. “No folders or cases or anything—”

“Daniel,” Louisa said, staring at the paper, “it’s for you.”

“What do you mean?”

Louisa held it out, and written on the front in big cursive script was his name—Daniel Corrigan.

“Looks like someone was expecting you,” said Louisa.

Daniel reached out to take the paper from Louisa and realized that his hand was shaking. He’d just seen a ghost, and now he was going to hear what that ghost had to say.

He unfolded the paper and read the note aloud.

“He’s crazy,” said Louisa after Daniel had finished. “Even after he’s dead, he’s still crazy.”

Daniel nodded, but he didn’t answer right away. He was too busy looking at the postscript beneath Herman’s signature. At the only words he hadn’t read aloud:

“Daniel. Daniel!” Louisa reached out and put her hand on his arm. Reflexively, he folded the paper back in half, hiding the words from her.

“Whatever it is you’re thinking about—he’s dead, Daniel. This was just his last, stupid attempt to get inside your head.”

Daniel managed a halfhearted smile for Louisa’s benefit. He did not actually feel reassured in the slightest.

“C’mon,” he said. “We’d better get back. There’s nothing here but trash.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah. You’re right—he’s just messing with my head is all. I’m fine.”

Louisa leaned forward then and surprised him with a kiss. It wasn’t a long kiss, but it was more than friendly. It was soft and nice, but it was also unexpected. And it was still a kiss. Daniel’s first.

When it was over, Louisa blinked at him. She had the prettiest eyes. Flecks of green within the brown.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “You look a little pale.”

Daniel nodded. Words weren’t working so well right now.

“Why don’t you go back first, then,” she said. “I’ll follow in a minute or two.”

He nodded again. Perhaps a bit too emphatically.

“And, Daniel? Take a few breaths before you go back down there. You’re blushing like crazy.”

The grandfather’s snores sounded like a hacksaw at work, and Daniel felt suddenly silly tiptoeing down the hallway. He stopped sneaking and tried to think of what he was going to say to Eric and the others about Herman’s note, but he couldn’t form a plan. His thoughts were still tangled up in the kissing. Or being kissed. Louisa had kissed him, but had Daniel kissed her back? He suspected that he had. And badly, at that.

Why had she kissed him? Did she think they were more than friends? Did she want that? Did he? Suddenly Daniel was filled with an irrational terror that his friends would find out what he and Louisa had done, or more accurately that Mollie would find out. She’d never let him live it down; she’d tease him mercilessly forever, and Daniel couldn’t live with that. Mollie could never know. Not Mollie. Not ever.

Daniel turned around and headed back to the study. He needed to explain to Louisa that they were just friends. That the kiss was nice and all, but that was that.

But when Daniel reached the study doorway, he saw … something. Louisa was lying on the floor, unmoving, and standing over her was some kind of dark shape. It lacked depth and weight—as if someone’s own shadow had peeled itself off the wall and was floating in midair. But it felt threatening, malicious. Daniel could practically taste the spite in the air as the creature sucked the light and warmth out of the room, stretching its long fingers toward Louisa’s unmoving form.

Daniel’s first thought, the only one that made any sense, was that the Shroud had returned. But even as Daniel’s stunned brain struggled to come to terms with what he was seeing, he recognized that this was not the same Shroud that he’d fought just months before. This thing was smaller—there was hardly any real mass to the creature at all. And gone was the burning heart of fire that had marked the Shroud’s Witch Fire pendant. This thing was solid darkness. A Shade.

The creature lifted its featureless face toward Daniel as it caressed Louisa’s head. She was alive but unconscious. She stirred as if she was fighting something in her sleep, as if she was in the grip of a terrible dream.

Daniel looked around for a weapon, but there was nothing in here but books. He reached for the sturdiest one he could find, thinking he could at least lob it at the creature’s head, but when he grabbed for it, nothing happened. He couldn’t pick up the book! Why couldn’t he get a grip on it?

The Shade had abandoned Louisa and was coming for Daniel. It reached for him, its fingers looking more like claws now as they raked at his face … and passed harmlessly through him. It didn’t miss—it just couldn’t touch him. Daniel had become as intangible as a ghost. As Louisa.

Reeling back in fury, the creature came after Daniel with attack after attack, unable to connect. It might as well have been trying to strangle the very air. Then all at once the assault stopped and the Shade cocked its head, as if listening for something.

And like that, it was gone. It blew out of the room like a chill wind, moving so fast that Daniel didn’t even have time to see what direction it headed in. It flew past, or through, Daniel and out the doorway in an eyeblink.

Footsteps were coming up the stairs. Someone was running.

Daniel knelt by Louisa’s side. She didn’t appear hurt, but she was still unconscious. Daniel reached out and watched as his hand passed right through her. He couldn’t touch her. He couldn’t touch anything.

“Daniel?” a voice called.

Theo was standing in the doorway, out of breath.

“She’s unconscious,” answered Daniel. Theo knelt down too and gave her shoulder a gentle shake. Her eyelids fluttered open, and she looked at the two of them.

“Hi,” she said groggily. “What’s everyone looking at?”

The rest of the kids appeared in the hall, Mollie in the front. “What’s going on? You guys were gone so long, we got worried!”

With Theo’s help, Louisa sat up. Daniel wanted to give her a hand, but he dared not touch her.

“I’m fine, I think,” said Louisa.

“You’re in my granduncle’s study,” said Theo, looking around. “Do you know how you got here?”

“Uh, no,” she answered, glancing quickly at Daniel.

Theo looked questioningly at Daniel.

“I … was on my way back from the bathroom when I
passed by,” said Daniel. “I saw Louisa lying there on the floor.”

Theo kept his eyes on Daniel for a minute. Daniel knew that look, and he didn’t like it. He felt like he was under an interrogation lamp.

“Yeah,” said Theo. “I heard something in here. Decided to check it out.”

“You weren’t with the rest of them?” Daniel asked.

“He was supposed to be getting more soda from the kitchen,” said Eric. “We told him we weren’t thirsty, but he’s too good a host.” Daniel understood the unspoken warning beneath Eric’s words: Theo had left soon after Louisa, and they hadn’t been able to stop him. Eventually the rest of his friends had gotten suspicious and come looking for them.

“I guess I got turned around,” said Louisa.

“Well, obviously I’m not that good a host,” said Theo. “My guests getting lost, fainting. Daniel here is the real hero. He was already on the scene.”

Before Daniel could react, Theo reached out and clapped him on the shoulder. It was a solid, reassuring pat that Daniel could feel.

Daniel breathed a sigh of relief.

“Little jumpy?” Theo asked.

“Just worried about Louisa,” Daniel answered.

“I’m fine,” Louisa said. “Really. Must’ve gotten lightheaded or something.”

They helped her to her feet and one by one filed out of
the study. Theo was the last to leave. As they exited, Daniel noticed Theo’s eyes searching the room.

“Strange that she’d end up here,” he was saying. “Bathroom’s at the other end of the house.”

“It’s a big old house,” said Daniel. “Easy to get lost.”

“Yeah, well, we should get back. Dad says this room’s off-limits. This was Herman’s private space. The old guy sure was a reader.”

Daniel nodded, but as he turned to go, he glanced back at the cabinet and saw the door slightly ajar, exposing the wall safe inside. They’d forgotten to close it. If Theo had seen it, then he probably knew that someone had been snooping around in there. Today’s strange events would only make Theo more suspicious, not less. Daniel’s hand went instinctively to the letter in his pocket.

“After you,” said Theo, giving Daniel room to pass. “Heroes first.”

Daniel nodded and walked past Theo Plunkett. The situation had changed, and frankly, Daniel couldn’t care less about Theo’s suspicions. They had bigger problems now.

The Shroud had returned.

W
hen Daniel told the others about what he’d seen in the study, about what he’d
really
seen, the reaction was silence. He’d expected as much from Rohan, who was thoughtful about everything, but the others were quite honestly freaking him out. He’d just told them that the Shroud had returned, and they greeted the news with open stares.