No. Felix felt sick. It couldn’t be true. She couldn’t possibly have two powers.
“Prove it,” Leah said, voice tense. “Show us your powers.”
Harriet held out one hand to Rima, palm upwards. “Can I?”
Rima looked from the hand to Felix, tilting her head questioningly. He nodded once. He had to know for sure whether Harriet could do this. Surely she wouldn’t risk doing anything to hurt Rima, not while the four of them were here to stop her? Well, three of them. Judging by Kasper’s still vacant expression, he wouldn’t be much use in a fight.
Rima swallowed tightly and took Harriet’s hand. Her brow furrowed as she focused on where they touched. Almost immediately, tears welled in the corners of Rima’s eyes. She wrenched her hand away.
“Stop!” she gasped, as tears flooded her cheeks. “Oh, make it stop, plea—”
Rima clutched at her stomach, bent double, then shivered and transformed into a silvery grey wolf. It tipped its head back and howled, the sound as painfully mournful as anything Felix had ever heard.
Kasper watched from the corner, looking queasy and confused. Harriet looked astonished, mouth half open.
“Harriet!” Felix yelled, horrified. “Stop it!”
Jolted into action, Harriet touched the tip of the wolf’s ear. It stopped mid-howl, throat billowing.
The wolf tilted its head to one side, curious and confused. Then it twisted around and began happily licking its rear end as if nothing had happened.
This is actually the first time I saw Rima. This moment, a flash of the future – Rima twisting into a wolf, while Harriet watches. I saw it during the Jacobite risings. Just like this.
For me, Harriet was there from the very start. I assumed she would arrive along with Rima and the others. That’s why it was such a surprise that Harriet came later. There was always an empty space waiting for her. Her shadow was standing among us, and only I could see it.
Then, one night, I was sleeping in the corner of Rima’s room while she watched VHS tapes of The X-Files. A bright flash woke me up, but before I realized what was happening, it was already over. There was no time to react. Something had happened, and Rima was dead.
I still don’t know what caused it.
FELIX
“Well. That worked.” Felix licked his suddenly dry lips. It had worked. It had worked.
“Can you turn back, Rima?” Leah asked, stroking one hand down the wolf’s back. The wolf twisted back into Rima, who sat on her haunches and glared at Harriet.
“You couldn’t have picked joy instead of sorrow? That was the most depressing thing I’ve ever felt in my entire life!”
Harriet shrugged. “You’re a very cheerful person. I had to make you do something out of character.”
“It was still shitty. And how have you got two powers?”
Felix swallowed. “Did you accidentally take some energy from the police officer while Kasper was inside?”
Kasper made a pained, cut-off noise, and buried his head in his hands.
“Er, no. I don’t think I took anything from her. Can you even take powers from living people? Is that a thing?” Harriet asked.
“I have no idea. But how else could you have two powers?”
“Right,” Harriet said. “About that…”
Felix jerked his head up. She knew why this was happening. “Harriet?”
She folded her arms, already on the defensive. “I wanted a power. I couldn’t wait. So … I sped up the process a bit.”
“What did you do, Harriet?” Leah asked. She hadn’t seemed bothered by Harriet’s drama until Rima had been hurt. Now she was watching Harriet with a wary, preparatory expression. Felix was pleased that someone else finally saw what he did in Harriet – danger.
Leah continued, “Your hair is white, which means you must have got a whole lot of energy from somewhere. What have you been playing at?”
Eyes on the ceiling, Harriet said, “I went to see the Tricksters.”
Rima swore, short and fast. “What did they do? Did they hurt you?”
“Not as such. They explained to me how I could take, um, leftover powers.”
Felix frowned. He’d never heard of any powers being leftover. “What does that mean?”
“You know, where they aren’t being used. Going to waste. Like … with the Shells.”
Rima gasped. “They made you steal a power from a Shell? Oh, Harriet, you poor thing. You should never have gone near the Tricksters. They can’t be trusted.”
Kasper looked wide awake now. Rufus and Vini had been trying to persuade Kasper to possess humans for them for years, ever since they’d found out what his unused power did. They would probably be delighted when they heard that he’d finally used his power. If they’d got to Harriet, too, who knows what terrible things she could have learnt?
“How did you do it?” Felix asked. There was something about the set of her shoulders that made him think she was hiding something.
Harriet froze. She looked between them and swallowed hard. “I… It wasn’t that bad, I promise.” She was pleading with them now. Whatever she’d done, she clearly really wanted them to forgive her for it.
Immediately, Felix understood. If it was possible to take someone’s power, then there was only one way that could be done. “You took their energy, didn’t you?”
Harriet looked trapped. “No!” She paused. “OK. Yes. I did.”
Taking another ghost’s energy was forbidden. It was the absolute most important rule – the unthinkable thing that would get you sent straight down to the basement. Even the thought of doing it made Felix want to throw up. It was cannibalism, pure and simple.
“How much? A little bit of energy, a taste? Or – or all of it?”
She didn’t want to answer. Her denial was clear from her expression.
“Did they disintegrate?” he pressed. “Harriet?”
Every muscle in her neck was tensed when she nodded.
“No,” Rima said, the word cracking down the middle.
“How many?” Leah’s voice was hard as stone.
Felix’s mouth was dry. Too dry to speak. Felix had been a Shell just days ago. It was only luck that meant he’d absorbed some of Harriet’s stray energy when she died. He could easily have been up on the fifth floor instead, still a Shell even now. He could have been the person Harriet had killed.
Harriet couldn’t meet their gazes. “Two. A girl and a boy. The others disintegrated on their own.”
Rima had turned pale. She looked like she was about to faint. Kasper had gone green, wrapping his hands around his knees as he hugged himself.
This was worse than anything Felix had imagined Harriet was capable of. She had done this more than once. She hadn’t just tried it and found it repulsive and sickening. She’d gone back for more.
Now all of the fifth-floorers were gone? For ever? Felix cursed himself for not doing something to help bring them back from being Shells. He’d been too distracted to think about them and now they were gone for ever.
Felix thought vaguely that they would have to send Harriet to the basement now, but he didn’t know how to make that happen. Usually, when someone was sent to the basement, there was shouting and violence and anger. They were marched downstairs by Qi, who would imprison them inside with lightning. But Harriet was still looking at them like she’d made a terrible mistake. Like this was all a trick that the Tricksters had played on her. Was she a victim here?