I thought about how he’d fought the old guy to stop him from Marking me.
“Well?”
Reluctantly I made the decision. “Alright, but be alert and let me know if you see one of the dead. This kind of place attracts them.”
His grin widened. “You trust me.”
“Just look for the ghosts,” I hissed and strode up the steps into the church, eyes straight ahead for the first time in five years.
It was a Catholic church, I knew that much. It was called Saint Benedict’s and the sign on the door said the Priest was Father Harding and the Deacon, Don Lomas. I paused to savour the sound of those titles: Father, Deacon.
I looked up. It was a modern building, but even from the outside I could see that the windows were stained glass.
The door was ajar. I pushed it all the way open and stepped inside.
There was a bowl of water by the door and a notice-board that was full of newsletters, notes about the parish and information about charities. A letter from the Bishop was the centrepiece. A group of children were being confirmed in two weeks time and the choir practised on Tuesdays. Mrs Christophers was winner of the one hundred club this month.
To my left a wooden bookcase contained hymnbooks. I imagined a line of people trailing past, each taking a book before going through the glass doors in front of them. I blinked and looked away. I was spending too much time taking in sights that I normally skipped over in my search for the dead.
There was another door, a wooden door, to my right. I assumed I would have to go that way, but first… I wanted to see.
I moved towards the glass doors. The early evening sun was catching the windows just right and rainbows painted the pale wooden pews and spilled on the floor like oil on water.
A statue of the Virgin Mary opened her hands to me above a vase of lilies. My shoulders started to loosen and I allowed my eyes to skim lazily towards the altar. It was covered with a gold edged cloth that would have been white, but the light made it so many colours I couldn’t even tell what picture the window was supposed to be casting. I let my gaze follow the fractured image to the crucified man hanging above the altar.
Like the mummy in the museum this was one of the dead that couldn’t bother me. He should have been in agony, I’d heard crucifixion was a horrible death, but whoever had carved the image had given him a loving smile. My hand was suddenly hot inside the glove and I rubbed it on my trousers.
For the first time I wondered what would happen to Justin when he passed over.
“What’re you doing here?” The drawl could only belong to one person. My eye twitched and I turned. All thoughts of kindness fled.
But I needed someone to second me. “I’m here for the V club, Tamsin. Pete’s proposing me. He didn’t tell you?”
“Harley said he was proposing someone.” She snorted. “What a waste of my time. I had to come all the way over town to get here and now I’ll just have to turn around and head home again.” She tapped her nails thoughtfully on the glass. They made a snick-snick sound, like claws. “Maybe we’ll go out for a Chinky or something, when you’ve been sent on your way.” She tossed her blonde waves. “Oh sorry, was that offensive?” she sneered. “What was Pete thinking?”
The dry scent of lilies tickled the back of my throat as I inhaled. “He has his reasons.” I forced my fists to remain open. “I know a little bit about your club. I’d like to have the chance to be in it. Tell you what, if you second me you can set my initiation dare, that's a thing, right?”
Tamsin hesitated and her eyes filled with calculation. “James sets the initiation dares.”
What had Justin seen in this girl? I glanced to the entrance where I knew he lingered. Instead of watching for ghosts, Justin’s eyes were trained on Tamsin’s red cross-over top.
My heart thudded and I resisted rolling my eyes. The dead would easily get past him and I’d have an early trip into the Darkness because his girlfriend was wearing a tight shirt.
I pasted a smile on my face and forced down the instinct to guard the entrance myself. “So what do you think, Tamsin? If you second me I’ll do whatever dare you set.”
“No double dares at an initiation.” She dragged her nails along the door handle, apparently relishing the feel of her manicure on metal.
“Pete told me.”
“He told you all the rules?”
“Just what I needed to know for tonight.” I didn’t tell her that Justin had filled me in on the rest. And he was right, it was a creepy and dangerous club they had going here.
Her smile was predatory now. “He told you what happens when you don’t complete your dare?”
I nodded, nonchalant. “Social death.”
She licked her lips. “People have hurt themselves, changed schools. Derek was the last.”
I blinked. Justin hadn’t mentioned that Derek had been in the club.
A frown creased my forehead. “I thought Derek was mates with you lot.”
She shrugged. “Rules are rules.”
I caught sight of Justin. At Tamsin’s tectonic shrug his eyes had glazed over. I shook my head. “To be honest, I’m not sure how failure would change things for me.” I grimaced. “I’m already at the bottom of the social scale.”
Outside the church a dog yipped, but Tamsin never took her eyes off me. They were pale blue and slightly slanted. I’d never noticed the slant before. She reached up with her claws but stopped before she touched my skin.
“Oh, you have no idea. Right now, you’re pond scum. We don’t like you. Sure, we’re mean. But we haven’t been trying. You can’t even imagine how much worse things could get for you.”
She was wearing Poison. The perfume filled my lungs and my stomach gave a flip like it wanted to hurl my dinner. I made myself ignore the desire to see her covered in half-digested hamburger.
“Sounds like you’d enjoy that,” I murmured.
She tilted her head and regarded me balefully. “Maybe I will second you. It’ll be a lot of fun when you fail and I’ve been saving an excellent dare for a special occasion.”
I had what I wanted. But the skin on my neck prickled. She turned to go through the open door.
“By the way,” I said through clenched teeth. “I heard they found Justin. I’m sorry.”
She stopped with her back to me. Her bare legs trembled slightly; then she carried on walking as if I’d said nothing at all. As she disappeared through the other wooden door Justin met my eyes sheepishly. I gave him a single glower, but had to remain silent; it was time to go in.
The room was pretty basic. A couple of religious paintings decorated the walls. I didn’t know what they showed exactly. One was an angel, I knew that much; he held a spear through some sort of writhing monster. Another was a saint-like figure, haloed and dressed in white, floating up to heaven on a cloud.
James was busy tacking a photo-shopped poster over the image. It showed an image of Icarus flying too close to the sun and underneath it read:
The V Club
Qui Audet Vincit
I was frowning at the poster when James turned around. “What’s the problem, Oh?” His muscles bulged under his shirt; I’d heard he’d been drinking protein shakes to bulk up. Most of the girls thought he was hot, but to me he looked deformed, like someone had stuck a film star’s head onto a wrestler’s body. He pushed his sleeves up to his elbows and I finally got to see his full tattoo: “Veritas”.
I fought a lip curl. “I just don’t get the connection between Icarus and the club.”
James laughed. “Icarus took a risk and dared to fly. We’re all winners here, risk-takers.” He pumped his fist and I jumped as all the other kids in the room made a matching gesture.