Super (16 page)

Soon Mollie became visible beneath the glow of a streetlamp. She was kneeling over Rohan, who was lying on the ground unmoving.

“Help me!” she cried.

Daniel had just begun to run toward them when Eric put his hand on Daniel’s chest.

“Look,” he said, pointing at the streetlamp.

The shadows around the lamp
moved
. They peeled off from the darkness like a spreading ink stain and formed into a manlike shape. A shadow as tall as Mollie, and it was reaching out for her.

But Mollie was faster than an eyeblink as she veered away from the creature. The shadow brought itself up to its full height and stalked toward Rohan, claiming its prize.

“No!” shouted Mollie. “You can’t have him!” Then Mollie
was fighting back—flying and punching at super-speed. She was a blur, and the shadow fell back away from her blows.

Only Daniel knew what this creature was capable of. He knew what she was up against. Not even Mollie Lee could hold out for long against it. They had to get her and Rohan away.

But then another shadow formed out of the darkness. There were two of them now.

“Mollie! Get out of there!”

“Daniel!” Louisa was shouting his name. “Daniel!”

He turned and saw what Louisa was pointing at. Behind them was a new figure all in black. Another man of shadow. Another Shroud, and it was coming for them.

“Eric, do something!” said Daniel. He could feel the panic rising up in him, could hear his own heart beating in his ears. “Rose, disappear!”

“I can’t!” shouted Rose, crying and hysterical. “I’m trying but I can’t!”

“What do you mean?” asked Daniel.

“She can’t use her powers,” said Eric. “And neither can I.”

Daniel stared at his friend, at first not comprehending. Then his heart broke inside him as he understood.

“Oh no, Eric!” Daniel said, his voice a whisper.

“No time!” said Eric. “You know what you have to do!”

Daniel nodded. He did know.

“Then go! I’ll get Georgie and the girls out of here!”

“Daniel?” Georgie was crying as Daniel put his little brother into Eric’s arms.

“It’ll be all right, Georgie,” Daniel said, then turned to Eric. “Head for the first house with a light on. Don’t stop and don’t look back. No matter what!”

The four of them—Eric with Georgie, and Louisa with Rose—ran into the dark. A shadow drifted toward them like it was going to follow, but Daniel got there first, putting himself between it and his retreating friends.

The thing turned its eyeless head toward Daniel but said nothing. For a moment it quivered, seemed to stretch and expand, until it tore in two and another was standing next to it.

Daniel stood his ground, took a deep breath, and balled his hands up into fists.

Four. There were four Shrouds.

T
he powers came to him just like before—he didn’t feel any different at first. If anything, he felt worse, sick and weak at the knees, but that was from sheer terror. Yet as Daniel reached within himself, he found something just below that fear, something
powerful
. It was his if he focused on it. Strength. Flight. Eric’s powers, now Daniel’s own.

He’d stolen them from Eric again without meaning to, without even knowing how he did it. But there wasn’t time to feel guilty now. He was facing down four of these shadow creatures, and his friends were in trouble.

The last attempt at flight had nearly ended in disaster, so this time he resolved to keep his feet firmly planted on the
ground. With his friends depending on him, he couldn’t afford to get lost in the clouds.

Mollie was managing to keep just out of reach of her pair of creatures, weaving and ducking their attacks while keeping them from the unconscious Rohan. These things were slower than the Shroud. Slower and smaller, but still dangerous, like shadows of the old villain.
Shades
. In his mind, that was the name he gave them.

Daniel wondered how long Mollie could keep up the fight. She had to be getting tired, and though she could fly to safety at any time, he knew she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t abandon Rohan. She would go down fighting. And so would Daniel.

There were two Shades stalking him, moving in to strike. Besides being smaller than the Shroud, these Shades possessed another, perhaps significant, difference. Daniel had noticed that the first Shade, in Herman’s study, lacked the green glowing heart of the Witch Fire meteor. Plunkett’s power came from the meteorite pendant he wore, which in his Shroud form burned brightly at his chest. Daniel had defeated him last time because he’d aimed for that heart and torn the pendant from the Shroud’s throat. But these Shades were solid black shadow; there were no hearts to target, at least nothing he could see. Whatever they were, Daniel didn’t think he’d be able to beat them the way he’d defeated Herman.

But maybe he wouldn’t have to. Daniel wasn’t the same ordinary boy he’d been the last time. For better or for worse, Daniel had changed.

The first Shade swiped at Daniel with a long, thin arm, its fingers searching for Daniel’s throat. Even with Eric’s powers Daniel wasn’t a natural fighter, and he didn’t manage to dodge in time. Cold fingers of shadow wrapped around his neck, and where they touched his bare skin, he burned from the unnatural cold. These things might be made of shadow, but they were real enough to squeeze the life out of him. He grabbed the creature’s arm around the wrist, thankful at least that there was something solid under there to get a grip on. He tried to tear the creature’s hand away from his throat, but it was like trying to bend iron. Spots began forming on the edges of his vision as he struggled for breath that just wasn’t there.

The Shade leaned in close, like it was mocking him. It watched Daniel claw uselessly at the iron fingers as it squeezed even harder. Daniel Corrigan could never bend iron, but Eric could.

The power answered his call. It flowed over his muscles like a hot bath, tingling his skin with warmth, beating back the thing’s frigid touch. He felt so strong. This was what it was like to feel strong. Daniel tightened his own grip on the Shade’s hand, plucking the creature’s fingers from his throat one by one. The Shade’s iron grip had seemingly turned to rubber. Daniel inhaled a few lungfuls of air to clear the spots away from his eyes, then pulled.

The Shade’s hand came away easily, but Daniel didn’t stop there. He lifted the creature over his head and flung the Shade into a nearby bench, causing it to explode into splinters
as the two collided. The Shade picked itself up but seemed dazed, unsteady. Drips of shadow ran along the ground in rivulets, like blood trickling from a wound. These things could be hurt, at least, and that was something new.

Unfortunately, the fight had drawn the attention of Mollie’s opponents too. They left off their futile attempt to capture her and stalked toward Daniel, their hungry arms clutching and grasping at the air as if they were rehearsing Daniel’s death scene.

But there wasn’t time to worry about them yet. Daniel still had another Shade of his own to deal with. The second creature was nearly on him. A mouth formed where its face should be, opened in a silent scream of rage. Daniel raised his arms to protect himself as he was tackled backward. As the two of them wrestled on the ground, Daniel tried to free himself. But like vines, the blackness grew out of the creature’s own body and wrapped around Daniel’s arms and his legs. Despite his struggles, the freezing strands crept along his body, inching toward his throat.

Again Daniel felt the heat, the surge of borrowed strength, but this time it took all his effort to break away. Tentacles snapped off like rotten sticks as Daniel wrenched himself free, and the Shade reared back in pain but let out no sound. The ground around them was dotted with drops of black.

Daniel pulled himself to standing as the Shade retreated to join its companion. Behind him the others were hovering—preparing to strike, but hesitating. They were
clever, and they’d given up on attacking Daniel one on one. Like a pack of predators, they were waiting to rush him all at once, and Daniel knew he couldn’t fend off four of them at the same time, no matter how strong he was.

He heard Mollie’s voice, but he didn’t look for her. He didn’t dare take his eyes off the Shades.

“Daniel! What’s going on? How are you …?”

“Stay back!” he shouted. “Don’t come near me!” He didn’t know how close was too close, but he couldn’t risk accidentally stealing Mollie’s powers too. “Get Rohan out of here!”

The two Shades he’d wounded seemed to have recovered. The four of them had taken to the air, circling him like vultures around a dying animal. They were getting ready to move in for the kill.

“Daniel, you can’t fight them all alone!”

She was right, of course. He had Eric’s strength, but he didn’t know how to use it the way Eric did. He could try to fly away, but they would probably catch him. Even with all these powers, he just didn’t have any experience being super.

Then it hit him.
All
these powers! Eric hadn’t been the only one whose powers had failed him this night.

He looked up at the four circling shadows and smiled at them. All he had to do was remember not to giggle.

“Come and get me!” he said. Then he willed himself to not be there. To disappear, just like Rose.

It worked. Daniel looked at his own feet and they weren’t there. He held up a hand in front of his face. Nothing. The
Shades were already looking around frantically for him, flying here and there. Daniel sidestepped the first one as it passed, then grabbed it as it sailed by. He yanked the creature out of the air and slammed it as hard as he could into the solid pavement. Once, twice. This time it didn’t get back up. It quivered a bit before dissolving into a pool of blackness, an oily stain on the road.

The other three rushed into the fight, but they didn’t know what they should be attacking. Swinging blindly, they missed Daniel entirely. Invisible, he began hitting first, then sidestepping away before they could counterattack.

It didn’t take long for the three remaining Shades to begin their retreat. Back into the shadows they melted, one by one, until Daniel was left on a suddenly quiet street, his blood still pounding in his ears. His arms and legs had gone wobbly, and so he put his hands on his knees and stood there, panting. After a few minutes he thought to make himself visible again but realized he already was. The borrowed invisibility was gone, and so was the strength. He was lucky that the Shades had chosen to run away when they had—a few more minutes and he would have been totally vulnerable. Like last time, as the power faded he was left exhausted.

“Daniel?”

Mollie was watching him. Rohan was awake and standing next to her too. Thankfully, neither appeared physically hurt.

“Rohan, are you all right?” Daniel asked.

“He’s fine,” said Mollie. “The Shrouds didn’t get him. He just …”

“I fainted,” said Rohan. “I’m not ashamed. That Shroud was very scary, and when it jumped out of the dark, I had a perfectly normal, albeit ineffective, response.”

“It’s a Shade,” said Daniel. “These things, whatever they are, aren’t Shrouds.… I don’t know what they are exactly, but it’s safe to say Herman can’t divide himself into fours. So I’m calling them Shades.”

“Shades, then,” said Rohan, nodding. “Fits.”

“And I’m glad you’re okay,” said Daniel.

“Thanks to Mollie, I am,” said Rohan. “I owe her one.”

“Whatever. No big deal,” said Mollie.

“Yes, it was,” answered Rohan. And Mollie let it go, but she looked pleased.

“But you, Daniel,” she said. “I saw what you did. You … you have powers.”

Daniel looked at his friends standing in front of him and he felt his heart break all over again. They had such expectant, hopeful faces. Joyful, even. Despite all that had just happened, they were happy for him. Even after the attack, they had room in their hearts to feel something good and positive. They hadn’t yet guessed the truth about Daniel’s new abilities. But they would sooner or later.

It was time to stop fighting it. Daniel gave in and sank down to the ground, his head on his knees. “They weren’t my powers,” he said. “I stole the strength from Eric and the invisibility from Rose.”

There. The truth was out at last.

“What are you talking about?” asked Mollie. “What do you mean, ‘stole’?”

“I do have one power,” he said, looking up at her. “It happened the first time, I think, at the Tangle Creek Bridge, the day of the accident. It happened again later when I was alone with Eric, but we promised each other not to tell you guys. It happened recently when I had a run-in with Clay and Bud. And it happened with Louisa, on the day she was attacked.”

“What? What happened, Daniel?” Mollie looked confused, and because she was confused, she was getting angry. Rohan wasn’t saying anything.

“I stole their powers. That’s what I do now. I steal powers and use them for myself. Like I stole Eric’s and Rose’s. I can’t help it—I don’t even realize that I’m doing it. But that’s why I’ve been avoiding you. I can’t be trusted.”

Daniel looked down at the dark stain on the road. It had a grimy sheen to it, like spilled gasoline. So that’s what it looks like when a Shade dies, he thought.

“When Eric needed his powers the most, I took them away,” said Daniel. “And poor Rose was so scared.…” He closed his eyes. “I don’t know what those creatures are,” he said, “but I’m the real Shroud.”

E
ric got Georgie home safely, and it was just dumb luck that Daniel’s little brother hadn’t gotten a good look at the Shades. Convincing him that the shadow creatures were really just kids in Halloween costumes felt wrong in a way, but how do you explain the truth of such things to anyone, much less a three-year-old? And it was a simple lie for Daniel’s parents to believe. They had no problem believing that masked bullies had stolen their sons’ candy. It was an easy thing for a parent to buy into the casual cruelty of childhood.