Kelly knew without being told that the fight had been about her; she could sense it in the way Michael’s gaze suddenly shifted away. She waited for him to go on, but he didn’t elaborate, merely turning the boat around to go back the way he’d come.
They cruised slowly along the canal, the darkness gathering steadily about them. And yet, despite the coming of the night, Kelly felt no fear. Ahead, a narrow channel veered off to the left, and even before they came to it, Kelly knew Michael would steer the boat into it. A few seconds later, as they passed through the narrows and the overhanging trees closed around them, Kelly felt a subtle change come over her.
She felt safe, as if the swamp itself were somehow nestling her in its arms. The feeling she’d always had in Atlanta — the strange sensation of never quite belonging — was gone. Here, in the swamp, she felt as if she’d come home.
The channel, only a few feet wider than the boat itself, snaked between two islands, then branched.
Again Kelly knew before they arrived at the fork which way Michael would go.
It was, she realized, as if some unseen force, some sentinel neither of them could see, was guiding them.
The boat moved slowly and steadily. As they coursed deeper into the tangled bayous of the marshland, Kelly became aware once more of the nearly inaudible siren song she’d heard last night. She turned, looking at Michael, and found that despite the gloom within the swamp, she could see him clearly.
His eyes, expressionless, were fixed on her, but then she realized that he wasn’t looking at her at all. Rather, he seemed to be gazing beyond her, as if seeing right through her. Saying nothing, he cut the engine and lifted oars from the bottom of the boat. Except for the music of the swamp, they moved forward in silence now.
The eerie strains of the subliminal aria reached deep into her mind, and she responded to its call, letting herself drift with the unearthly music, letting it imbue her with the sense of peace its notes brought.
• • •
They were no longer alone.
Other boats were around them now, shadowy forms drifting around the edges of Kelly’s vision. She had no idea how many there were, nor did it matter, for each of the boats contained someone else like herself, someone else whose mind was obeying the gentle summons of the music.
Slowly, barely visible at first, Kelly saw a glow of light flickering in the darkness ahead. Like a beacon, it pierced the darkness, and even though it was still far away, Kelly imagined she could feel its heat on her face. She felt drawn to it, as a moth to a flame, and as the boat moved steadily toward it, a sense of anticipation grew within her.
Tonight, something special was going to happen.
Tonight, she was certain, she was finally going to find out who she was, and why she had always known she was different from anyone else.
At last the boat touched the shore. Without needing any instruction at all, Kelly stepped out of the bow and fastened the line to a low-hanging cypress branch.
Other boats were already there. In the darkness beyond the island on which she stood, Kelly could sense the presence of still others, each of them homing in on the glowing signal.
The music was more compelling than ever: a low drumbeat pulsed in the air, and above it a high voice keened a melody.
With Michael beside her, and other shapes drawing closer in the night, Kelly moved toward the beckoning light.
• • •
Clarey Lambert felt the children drawing near. Shortly after dusk she had journeyed to the island hidden deep in the wilds of the swamp, and begun the preparations for the ceremony that was to come.
Last night George Coulton had died.
Tonight, a new child would join the Circle.
Now, on the island from which the Circle had begun its spread so many years ago, the preparations were all but complete. The altar was ready, the candles waited to be lit.
The Dark Man was nearby.
Clarey’s mind concentrated now on the call she had sent out an hour ago, the call only the children could hear, the call that would draw them to the Circle.
Someday, she supposed, she, too, would die. What would the Dark Man do then? Without her, would it all end, as he had always said?
She doubted it.
No, he would simply find someone else to take her place, someone else to don the robes and summon the children.
But it wouldn’t be someone like her, who loved the children, who felt a small piece of herself die each time a new child was taken into the Circle.
Still, despite all the tiny fragments that had died within her over the years, she still lived, still clung to the hope of destroying the Circle. Still searched for a way to destroy the Dark Man and release the children from the living death to which he had condemned them.
She stiffened, sensing something different in the clearing where the children were gathering.
Long ago she had tuned her mind to sense each of them, so that always she knew where they were, what they were doing.
Except for the two.
The two the Dark Man had released from the swamp sixteen years ago.
Those two had been experiments. The Dark Man had wanted to watch them, wanted to see what would happen to them if they grew up beyond the Circle.
One of them he had sent far away, but the other one he had kept close by.
And Clarey Lambert knew why.
He wanted to watch Michael Sheffield, wanted to see how far the summons could reach.
On each of the nights when there had been a ceremony, she had watched the Dark Man scanning the faces of the children, searching for Michael.
Until tonight, Michael had never been there.
She’d felt him sometimes, felt him in the swamp, searching for the island where they were gathered. But he’d never found them, for she had never reached out and guided him.
But now the girl had come back. Today, the two of them had met, and tonight, together, they had heard the summons clearly, and responded.
From the shelter of the trees that concealed her, Clarey saw them in the clearing, waiting with the others. Saw them and felt a terrible dread.
The fire in the center of the clearing was not big, but it blazed brightly, its flames licking at the darkness, illuminating the altar in front of which it had been built, its damp wood spitting embers outward toward the semicircle of children who stood in motionless silence around it. There were twenty-five of them, ranging in age from four to nearly twenty. They wore tattered clothes, clothes that had been worn by other children before them, and there was a sameness to their faces.
The narrow faces of the swamp rats, framed by scraggly, ill-kempt hair.
They were thin children, their bony frames a product of the poverty in which they lived, and though their eyes reflected the light of the fire, still there was a dullness to them, as if the inner light of their youth had long since gone out.
They looked old, not so much in the tiredness of their stance, for many of them stood straight and tall, but old in spirit, as if their lives were already over.
Kelly and Michael, standing close together toward one end of the semicircle, were unaware of the stark contrast they made to the others in the group, for already they had been mesmerized by the hypnotic call emanating from Clarey Lambert’s mind. All they were aware of was that somehow they belonged here, that somehow they shared a kinship with these children they’d never seen before.
With the others, they waited.
Something was about to happen, and though neither of them was aware of what it might be, they both knew they would be a part of it.
There was a movement in the trees beyond the altar, and a figure stepped out of the shadowed darkness. A figure clad in flowing robes of scarlet velvet, embroidered in gold and silver. The figure paused, staring out at the children, and then its arms rose, spreading wide.