LOCKWOOD & CO.: THE HOLLOW BOY

14: The Final Kill

I blinked in the sudden light of golden torchlight. I touched the hilt of my rapier to assure myself that it was still there, and then I wobbly stood up.

The room was a heptagon, and the entire, smooth concrete floor was marred by brilliant white chalk outlining a heptagon and circles at various points at each vertex. A small circle stood alone at the heptagon's center, and the dark objects I'd seen in Casper's bedroom were line up at each vertex of the heptagon, in each circle drawn by chalk.

Coffins, I realized.

That's not good.

We all sensed the moment when the spirits of the 6 wives arrived. The cold rose in a freezing blizzard, a wind blasting through the wind. The girls arose with a psychic howl that nearly blew away the physical barrier between Listeners and agents who didn't have the talent.

But 2 circles were empty. The seventh and the circle which would've held the host.

Someone fell on top of me.

Casper grasped at me, trying to tie me down. We rolled and punched, and suddenly his weight lifted and I found myself facedown on the ground. I turned my head, my cheek painfully cold where it cam in contact with the unforgiving cement, and spotted a thin book, open.

The Necromancer.

"That's it!" I cried. I ignored the battle in the background, good against evil, and knew.

There must be an incantation in there that would free the spirits trapped in the spell. I dragged the book towards me, and then something stepped on my wrist.

I tried twisting, but Casper simply reached down, while I writhed in pain. As soon as he was within reach, I grabbed his hair and slammed his face into the ground. I hastily his the Necromancer underneath me, and then Casper attacked me. I tried to get my legs underneath me, but he dragged me down with him over and over and over again. One arm wrapped around my waist, entrapping my arms, and one around my throat, Casper's dry lips brushed against my ear as he hissed, "Where is it?"

I gasped and tried to squirm free. Casper held me down. My hand snuck down and I tossed my paper packet filled with drawings at Casper. He let go of me with one arm and snatched it. In the split second it took him to realize he'd been tricked, I freed my arms, grabbed Casper's head, and smashed my hard forehead against Casper's. Blood cascaded down onto me like an ill blessing, but the main object had been reached—Casper was out cold.

I reached behind me and slipped on the blood-covered floor. I grasped the Necromancer and began flipping through it frantically, my desperation growing every second. I would never find it! There were too many words, too many pages!

Suddenly, a frigid wind blew through and the book's pages flipped until it stuck on a page:

To Free A Trapped Spirit

I looked up in awe and a certain spirit hovering over a coffin in a chalk circle caught my eye. Lockwood's sister looked at me solemnly. I got the message. Time was running out.

I looked at the words. Sword clashes, yells, and psychic howls blended together as film before my eyes.

I read haltingly, acutely aware of the coming danger. Everything was at stake.

"Secneuqesnoc/neesnu/ot/rednerrus/erofereht/dna/lleps/siht/ni/depart/sluos—"

I heard Lockwood's desperate cry over the din of everyone's rowdy fighting.

"LUCY!"

I didn't notice at first. There was numbness. And then I heard, despite the noise, drip. Drip. Drip.

I looked down. Red coated the floor.

And it was my blood.

My breath wouldn't come. The tip of the knife poked through my chest. Holly stood behind me, breathing heavily. On my knees, I turned to her incredulously, slightly in shock.

"He's mine," Holly hissed. She grabbed my collar, her face inches from mine. Her pretty features were contorted in rage and craze. "He's mine!"

I weakly tried to reach behind me to pull out the knife, but it was no use. The pain came as a hurricane. The only thing that kept me up was Holly's shaking hands.

Then there was a whoosh only audible to my ears, and I suddenly had an acute sense of all senses.

I was dying.

Something rose out of the floor. Casper's sister. Even in the dim light, she was a beauty, but had a cold cruelness about her. I realized that I was considered Casper's seventh "wife." The final kill.

And now Casper's sister was going to look for a host.

Holly stared over her shoulder. She whipped back to me with fury and terror in her brilliant green eyes.

"What have you done?!" Holly cried.

I smiled tiredly. My strength was draining away. "What have you done?"

The ghost girl dove at Lockwood, who had been trying to desperately maneuver through the warring crowd to reach me. Lockwood ducked and the ghost girl glowed fiercely and shrieked, with violent revenge contorting her features.

Casper began stirring.

Holly screamed.

The ghost boy from Lover's Lane had come, right on schedule—and sealing our deal in cement.

The Type Three ghost boy clashed with Casper's ghost girl. Plasm flew and sparked. Wind whipped through, throwing the light sideways and unbalancing the power in the room.

As I turned back to the Necromancer, my actions reaching through a thick layer of sludge as if I were already drowning, Holly tried to stop me. Grabbing me by the hair, she dragged me back. Then she crumpled, a hit from Kipps's hilt knocking her out cold. Kipps turned to me but was set upon by Sybil from behind. I wished that I could help, especially, after glancing around the room, for Lockwood, who was fighting Winkman himself alone.

But even though I was dying, I was still the center of the action. All I had were three more words.

And as I crawled towards the Necromancer, its pages open and serene among the blood and chaos around it, the sluggish yet loud beats of my heart echoed through my ears in the rhythm of a death toll.

Thump-thump.

I reached the book and it took all my effort not to go sprawling all over it in an exhaustion that would lead to fast but merciful death.

Thump-thump.

I tried to make sense of the words. Where had I stopped?

Thump-thump.

For strength, I looked up. Lockwood's eyes locked onto mine from across the room. And electric jolt went through my chest.

Thump-thump.

Lockwood overthrew Winkman. I looked back down. If Lockwood could be strong, so could I.

Thump-thump.

In death united.

My lips were hard to move, yet I shoved past the fatigue, and as I slumped over, the wisps of faint words escaped past a narrow gap.

"Eht…eerf…" I gasped. Blood trickled down my lip and I exhaled, "I."

The spirits trapped in the spell howled. Windows exploded in a shattering noise above. I felt a brush of wind on my cheek as I lay there, and I wearily opened on eye to see Lockwood's sister hovering next to me.

Her blue eyes spoke sympathy, and then she smiled and disappeared softly like a forgotten memory.

Casper's spirit was forcibly yanked from this world by means unknown, and I felt the ghost boy's watchful stare at me as he made his escape.

I flopped on my back, the ceiling incredibly far away. I was dying, and the only thing that held me back was a voice. A sob.

"Lucy! Oh, Lucy!"

Someone lifted me up, one hand cradling my head, the other under my knees, and I think I saw Lockwood.

And he was crying.

Our lips seemed so far away, and then I felt the brush of Lockwood's hair as he bent his head near mine.

I floated away on a wave of dreams, and the one that stuck in my mind had only one name.

Lockwood.

End of Chapter 14

Notice something when Lucy said the incantation? Switch the words backwards. Review!