Kris didn't understand why suspension was considered a punishment. Three days without school, without having to deal with the bullies and teachers — that was heaven. Granted, having to stay inside at home and do all the chores wasn't fun…but compared to what it could've been, if it'd been Papa — the Joneses — no, Kris wasn't going to complain.

Not being able to help Frank and Joe with Bell Book and Candle, though — that wasn't fair. Even Charlie had agreed with that. No matter what, Kris was going to help her big brothers, even if she had to sneak out of the house on Friday night to do it.

Kris heard Charlie's voice, cracked open her door to make sure no one in the hallway, then slipped out, intending to eavesdrop from the staircase, only to stop dead. Charlie was in the entrance-way, and Sharon stood next to him.

"We've got a couple stories to tell you, Mama," Charlie said. "I'm going to talk to Fenton first, though. Sharon…" Charlie crouched down to look Sharon in the eye, "…tell Mama here exactly what you saw with the lockers. I'll be back in thirty." With that, he pushed himself up and headed back out.

Kris came down the stairs. Sharon had seen something? For that matter, it'd taken Charlie a long time to get back; he was just supposed to have picked up Frank. Something else had happened?

Mar handed Sharon's coat and backpack to Kris, then put her arm around Sharon's shoulders. "Come on, dear, back to the kitchen. I'll get milk on for hot chocolate. You, too, squirrel."

"Mom said I could stay for dinner, too. I mean, just in case, but I told her I didn't know how long I was staying because of Kris being suspended. Charlie told me and Frank about it," Sharon added, looking at Kris.

The rumor mill at school wasn't going to be quiet; Kris knew that. Better for Charlie to tell Sharon than any one else, probably. Kris ran back to her room to drop Sharon's coat on the bed, then clumped back downstairs. Sharon was in the middle of telling Mar all about the lockers as Mar steered her towards the kitchen.

"…and Frank got to stay after school and he was doing detective stuff on the lockers — all those stains were blood. Real blood." Sharon's eyes somehow got wider. "Mr. Mack did some kind of test and said that's what it was. Not human, though."

"It's easy enough to get blood at the butcher's," Mar said. "It's used in a lot of old recipes."

"It is?"

Hearing that tone in Sharon's voice, Kris decided it wouldn't be a good idea to tell Sharon about the venison stew currently in the crock pot for dinner.

Mar smiled. "Yes, dear. Sit." She pushed Sharon gently towards one of the kitchen chairs, then Mar went about pouring milk and chocolate syrup into a saucepan to heat on the stove. "Kris, get the marshmallows out, please. Now…Charlie said you saw something, Sharon."

"You won't believe me." Sharon stared at the table. "You'll just think I'm crazy."

"Um," Kris said. "Shimá can do all that stuff, too, Sharon. She does it lots better than me."

"Kris…" Mar said, gentle warning. "You don't sound crazy, Sharon. Confused and upset, yes. That happens when someone sees something that everyone else says doesn't exist. But there's a lot of real stuff out there that we don't know about yet."

"I told you about the elves," Kris said to Sharon. "Shimá saw 'em, too. Her and Mr. Hardy and Corporal Wilson all did. Frank and Joe just can't remember 'em because of Click."

"Kris," Mar said again. "Now. You saw something."

"The lockers," Sharon mumbled. "They were bad."

Well, that'd been obvious to everyone. But somehow Kris didn't think Sharon meant that way.

"Bad how?" Mar said.

"They…" Sharon fell silent, staring at the table, biting her lip. "They were…weird. Like…lights." Her voice trembled. "It was all…glowing."

"Glowing," Mar said. "Did you see a color?"

Still not looking up, Sharon nodded. "Kinda red. A real ugly red."

"Okay." Mar poured the hot chocolate into mugs. "How many marshmallows, dear?"

"Um…" Sharon peeked up. "Two?"

"Make it three," Kris advised her. "We've got lots of the big ones. And Charlie got tons more candy canes last night — those little ones that you can't hang on anything unless you unwrap them, but then they'd get all the pine gunk on them."

Now Mar laughed. "Those are supposed to be for his stash to take back. But we can swipe a few, I think. Three marshmallows, two candy canes each. Sound good?"

Sharon nodded.

Mar set the mugs down — the candy canes hung inside the mugs so they'd melt into the hot chocolate. "So, the lockers looked red. Did you see anything else? Or feel anything? Hot, cold…or maybe angry, or slimy, or anything like that?"

"It was…I mean, it felt like…like when Preacher Bob was yelling about Santa Claus last week in the square. It felt like what he sounded like."

"Hypocritical, you mean," Mar said dryly.

But Sharon shook her head. "Mom called it something. Outrageous…no. Rage…right…um…like he's patting himself on the back for being holy when no one else is."

"Self-righteous," Mar said, and Sharon nodded. "That and hypocritical usually go hand in hand."

"I didn't get close to it," Sharon said, wide-eyed. "I mean…the…the…cops did't let anyone, and when I got back from lunch, Mr. Mack was cleaning it all up. And after school, I was going to get closer, but Mr. Mack had Frank and Phil working on it."

Mar sat down, frowning as if thinking. "Kris, dear, go get one of the crystals Clay had you working on last week, and a couple of your plain ones. I want to test something."

"You believe me?" Sharon said, but Kris didn't hear the rest. She ran back upstairs and grabbed a couple of the Arizona quartzes from her window sill, then another that felt warm to her skin — Clay had been working with her on her tiny touch of mage-Gift, and the crystals had been a lesson in infusing energy.

"…we've already told you about the 'path Gifts, dear," Mar was saying to Sharon, as Kris clumped back into the kitchen. "There's others, and it sounds like you have a bit of the Sight. That's being able to see things that other people don't."

"Like Abby and Mr. Bell," Kris said. "And fairies and stuff, but those elves last year, anyone could see them if they bothered looking. I mean, Frank saw them —"

"Kris," Mar said. "Just set them down, right there. Sharon, I'd like you to look at those crystals, just like you looked at the lockers — no, don't tense up like that." Mar tapped Sharon's hands; they'd been clenched, and Sharon's face had been scrunched up, "Just relax. Tell me what you see."

"That one." Sharon tapped the quartz on the right. "It's kinda blue-ish." Eyes wide again, she looked from Kris to Mar. "What's it do?"

"Um…it sits there and looks pretty," Kris mumbled. She hadn't gotten very far with those particular lessons.

Mar laughed. "That's a pass, I think. Sharon —"

At that point, the front door creaked, and male voices echoed down the hallway: Charlie and Mr. Hardy.

"We'll talk more later," Mar said softly. "Don't say anything about that to Mr. Hardy, dear, all right?" Louder, "We're in the kitchen."

"If Gert didn't already have the house smelling like lasagna," Fenton said as he and Charlie came back, "I'd be coming over here for dinner." He looked from Sharon to Kris. "I grounded Joe for the fight, just so you know."

"Kris is grounded, too," Mar said. "But she'd already invited Sharon to dinner, and it didn't seem polite to cancel that on Sharon, especially since I'd made extra." Mar looked at the girls. "Kris, go upstairs and let Sharon fill you in on your homework. Us adults need to have a private talk, I think."

"Sounds to me like you've heard the news already," Fenton said.

Kris scooped up the crystals and her hot chocolate and dragged Sharon with her upstairs. "Something else happened?" Kris whispered.

Sharon nodded. "There was someone watching the school. He was way out on the edge of the parking lot, but he looked a little like the lockers did. And Charlie called him a cockroach, and him and Frank were acting weird about it."

She was calling Charlie and Frank weird…? Kris let Sharon into her room, then went over to the window. No Joe, no Frank. Their aunt must be keeping them busy.

"Something wrong?" Sharon set her mug down on the desk, then plopped down on the bed.

Kris pointed. "That's their window. Me and Joe were talking. Joe keeps wanting to use flashlights with Morse code, but I keep pretending I lost my flashlight so we can just write notes." She showed Sharon the notebook. "So the guy in the parking lot had magic, you mean?"

"That's what I told Frank — that it was all magic — but he didn't believe me." Sharon glanced towards the door. "Um…your mom…and Charlie…I mean, they won't tell Mom and Dad about…um…all that…?"

"Only if you want them to," Kris said. So there'd been magic on her and Joe's lockers. That explained some things, but not everything…

Sharon toyed with the math textbook. "They wouldn't believe 'em. They'd call them crazy, too."

…like whose magic was it? Papa — the Joneses — called all that kind of stuff Satanic and evil. Well, a lot of things were evil and wicked, according to them, for that matter. They'd even called eating evil, because it took your mind off God…not that it stopped them from eating. Not that they didn't try, anyway. So Papa had called it a test of faith so him and Mama could eat anyway, though Kris managed to filch enough for a peanut butter sandwich after they'd drunk themselves stupid, and they'd completely forgotten about it the next day.

"Kris?"

Kris blinked — Sharon was waving a hand in front of her face.

"Your brain went fuzzy there," Sharon said. "Like you weren't really here."

"Just thinking," Kris said. "If it was magic, I mean. Because then it couldn't be Papa, because he wouldn't use that stuff. But that means it has to be someone else and I don't know who. Unless Angie or them have magic, too. They could, I guess. But then you're saying someone was out there and I can't see Angie sticking around that long after school."

"Papa…?" Sharon sounded confused. "You mean…um…Mar's husband? Or…"

"The other one." Kris looked at the floor. She hadn't told Sharon about that. "Shimá's husband is dead. He died in Korea when Charlie was little, like Mr. Bell."

"But you're adopted. That means you had to be an orphan."

No way out of this. Kris shook her head.

Sharon was silent for a moment. "Is it the stuff they wouldn't believe you about?"

Kris really didn't want to talk about it, but somehow, Sharon deserved to know. Kris had told Frank and Joe last year, after all, but they didn't remember because of Click. Best to just get it over with. She took a deep breath and pulled the top of her sweatshirt down, just enough so Sharon could see part of the old scar, the brand that spelled out "Jesus" in backwards letters.

Sharon's eyes went wide.

"They did that." Her voice choked. Kris swallowed, and swallowed again, somehow got the rest of the words out. "And lots of other bad stuff, too. Mama and Papa, I mean, because I asked about Santa Claus. So I ran away, and Mar found me, but Papa kept scaring all the kids where Mar lived, so Mar moved us out here. And Mr. Hardy did something to get Mama and…I mean, the Joneses, them…to sign a paper so they weren't my parents anymore, and Mar adopted me so she's my real mom now."

Sharon's mouth had dropped open, an "O" of horror. "Is that why…um…they've got you in the trailer…?"

Kris nodded. "The Joneses didn't believe in school. They said it was sinful."

"Wow," Sharon breathed, and Kris had to admit, it was kind of satisfying to see Sharon look so horrified and impressed all at once. "And Frank and Joe know…?"

"I told 'em. But they don't remember. Click made 'em forget. But that's why they adopted me." Kris pulled the construction-paper certificate off the wall and handed it to Sharon; Mar had framed it for her last year. "They said I needed a couple big brothers to help me, so that's what they did."

Sharon stared at the notarized Official Legally Binding Certificate of Brother and Sister. Her expression was really odd.

"Kris? Sharon?" Mar's voice floated up the stairs. "Dinner."

As they clumped down the stairs, Sharon finally spoke. "You're lucky, with Frank and Joe. I mean, you wouldn't want me as a sister. That means you'd have to deal with Mom and Dad. I mean…they're not bad, and I really do love them, but…" Her voice trailed off.

No kidding — Kris had too much trouble with parents as it was. But she also heard something under Sharon's voice, something longing and sad and hopeful and all kinds of things all mixed up. Kris didn't want to drag anyone else into the whole mess with the Joneses, though — maybe that was why whoever it was had targeted Joe. If it was Papa, anyway. Clay had said something about that in his Gift lessons, about ties and connections and how magic could work through them. Still…

"I wouldn't mind a sister," Kris said. "I mean, I've got Frank and Joe and now Charlie, and Joshua's still over in Vietnam, but they're all boys. They act really weird a lot of times. Weirder, I mean."

Sharon giggled. "They're boys. They're supposed to be weird."

Thinking about it, the seventh graders' lockers were on the second floor, so maybe since Joe's was right next to Kris's, that was why he'd gotten bad stuff and not Frank — the person might not know where Frank's locker was, and Joe's would've been easy to tell.

Kris kept quiet through most of dinner, letting Mar and Charlie talk with Sharon about the Gifts and how her parents reacted to such things. It didn't sound good…well, not bad, not like how the Joneses had been whenever they caught Kris doing anything, but it was obvious that Sharon's parents were bigger skeptics than Frank, and since Sharon's dad was a doctor…

"You're not crazy, dear," Mar said. "You're not that, no matter what your father says. I shouldn't be telling you to keep secrets from your parents, but…"

"I know." Sharon toyed with her spoon and the stew. "But it's like I can't keep quiet. When…when I see stuff, I mean."

Charlie nodded. "It can hit like that. But you're gonna have to, kiddo. It's one thing to have a rep for being a bit weird, but when that rep starts getting you visits to the shrink, that can turn real bad, real fast. Believe me, you do not want it to get that far."

"Gifts as what you have are the hardest to prove to those who don't have them, no matter what you do," Mar said. "Kris found that out with Frank and Joe. They're so sure it's all stage magic tricks that they don't see anything else."

"But you could," Sharon said. "I mean…you could prove it to them, if you wanted."

Kris shook her head; her Gifts were all so small, she couldn't give her big brothers the smack-in-the-face proof they needed. "It just causes trouble."

"But it's true! It's real!"

"Yes, dear, it is," Mar said. "But just because it's real doesn't mean people are ready for it. Once you know it, you can't un-know it. Anything outside a certain level of real makes people extremely nervous and scared, especially if they themselves can't perceive it."

Sharon looked rebellious and sullen.

"Like ghosts," Charlie said to Sharon. "You say you can see them, and little sis there can, but a lot of people can't. When I was a kid, it made me really, really scared that someone could be standing right here —" Charlie waved his hand through the space next to him, "— watching me and everything I do, and I couldn't do anything about it. It took me a long while to get over that."

"Some of that's just white man's culture," Mar said. "It doesn't quite work that way."

"Well, yeah," Charlie said. "But that's what we live in. You can't escape it. And then you start thinking that ghosts are just people…and how bad a lot of people can get…"

Kris and Sharon looked at each other.

"Exactly," Charlie said.

"That's what Frank and Joe are like, I think," Kris said. "Because of their mom."

"And, too," Mar went on, "the Gifts are rare — so you're like a seeing person in the land of the blind…and no one believes what you're telling them. When you've got a culture where people tend to call you crazy and lock you away if you see things they don't…well…you learn to keep your mouth shut."

"There's that guy offering that million dollars for proof," Sharon said. "Folks would have to believe it then."

"I haven't heard this one," Charlie said.

Mar sighed. "A stage magician who's taken up Houdini's debunking."

"Frank's got his book," Kris said. "It's really good."

Mar nodded. "It is. But Sharon, dear, think about it. You take his challenge, you get the money…and then you also get saddled with everything that'll come with it. People will come after you constantly — everyone from loonies to sincerely desperate people, hundreds, thousands of them, all begging for help, advice, lottery numbers, you name it. Worse, scientists will want to study you and your 'anomaly'…and the federal government will be right there, behind them. You're a child. They can swoop in and take you from your parents, 'for your own protection' is how they'll phrase it…"

"I've seen them do it," Charlie said. "Believe me, kiddo, I keep real quiet about my own stuff. I didn't become a fighter pilot to get dissected."

"And that's assuming that the man accepts the results of his own test, and doesn't claim you somehow cheated or got around his protocols," Mar said.

"That's assuming his protocols don't squash the Gifts, period," Charlie said. "I've seen tests do that. They completely fail to take into account that the Gifts rely on human connections, and have different levels and variations for everyone."

"Like my squirrel, there," Mar said, smiling fondly at Kris. "She's got some 'path, but has to be really close to the person to hear them."

"Touching helps," Kris said.

"Well, in that test, you wouldn't be able to touch them," Mar said. "They'd likely have you off in a room, out of sight of everyone, and trying to read someone's mind from a picture of them."

Kris shook her head. She'd definitely fail that one, then.

"Still," Mar said, "he does good. There's too many frauds out there, and he keep us honest. It never hurts to be skeptical — even Frank and Joe," Mar said, smiling at Kris again. "They'll do a lot more good with that skepticism than hardcore believers."

Sharon didn't look convinced, but said nothing.

After dinner, after Sharon had left, Kris sat up in her room — no TV, no stereo, but at least she had her books. She kept checking for Frank or Joe in their window, but even after Mar and Charlie went to bed, Kris only saw the brothers passing by the window, and then their shade was dropped, to her frustration.

She wanted to hear what Frank had found!

Going over and knocking on the Hardys' door was out, since Joe was grounded, too, and their dad and aunt would escort Kris home with a stern lecture about behaving. But maybe…

Decision made.

Her coat was still damp; Mar had run it through the wash three times with bleach, then hung it up in the bathroom to dry, but it still showed the faint outline of the bloodstains. Forget it — Kris's skin crawled at the thought. Instead, Kris layered up with her new thermals, three sweatshirts, a sweater, hat, and her mittens, then squirmed her boots on — that should work. Then she cracked her door open and listened: silence.

So far, so good. She slipped out of her room and down the stairs, taking care to not sneak — something she'd learned from Papa and Mama. Anyone sounding like they were sneaking usually brought Papa out and on a rampage; walking normally didn't register. Carefully, Kris opened the front door, nearly tripped over the snow shovel on the porch, stomped through the snow until she was under the brothers' window, and spent a few minutes stockpiling snowballs.

Then she started throwing.

Her aim had improved a lot from last year, so she was able to score Frank's and Joe's window at least half the time, solid, crunchy thumps that splattered their window and the ivy trellis. Frank's bed was right under the window, so he should hear the noise. After about ten snowballs smacked into their screen, Kris saw their light come on, the shade lift, then Frank opened the window just as she threw another snowball, which hit dead-center of the screen and splattered.

"Kris!" Frank's yelp squelched off, then both he and Joe were staring down at her. "What are you doing?"

Arms crossed, Kris pointed down at her feet — an emphatic get down here now. She was not going to stand here and chat by yelling back and forth. That was a sure way to get Mar, Fenton, and Gertrude on the warpath, when they heard it.

She heard a heated, whispered conversation, then Joe waved his hand in the window — one moment — then their window slid closed. After a few minutes, she heard the Hardys' front door squeak open, then both Frank and Joe came around the side, Frank in his usual blue coat, Joe wrapped in sweaters and shivering.

"Are you nuts?" Frank demanded in a strangled whisper. "You're gonna get us all in trouble!"

"I want to hear what you found," Kris whispered furiously, the moment they got near. "Everything. Sharon said you were getting fingerprints and all that stuff."

Frank rolled his eyes. "I don't have anything yet. All that stuff takes time, Tag, you know that!"

"Mr. Mack's gonna have a fingerprint class," Joe said, arms crossed, jigging a little in the snow to keep warm. "He's working with us, and he's gonna let us compare the prints he gets to what Frank found on the locker. I mean, he'll let Frank do it, since I can't. And Frank brought that note home, too — that stuff was blood, Tag!"

Kris nodded. "Sharon said that."

"We also saw someone," Frank said. "Out in the parking lot. Charlie said he looked like what Mar told him about your dad."

Charlie and Mar hadn't said anything about that. Kris stared at Frank.

"It's freezing out here," Joe said. "My coat's still in the wash, and it's all wet."

"Was it really Papa?" Kris demanded.

"I don't know," Frank said. "It was some big man, that was all I could see."

"You'll see a lot more, brat," said a growling, awful voice, and all three gasped, rounded —

— as Papa lunged.