What came next was not a verbal shout-if it had been, Jenny would have thought it was Tom. It wasn't even a word exactly, more a wave of energy. And the energy was sheer negation, opposition. No! No!
Stop.
The mist uncoiled. Jenny's vision unblurred. She was standing, gasping, a little closer to one of the cave entrances. Tom and Dee were shaking their heads, wiping their faces, as if to get rid of some blinding haze. They were panting, too. Everyone seemed on the verge of hysteria. But the shout had come from Julian.
He was standing in the middle of the room. Desperate hope leaped inside Jenny-maybe there was something he could do. But the next moment the hope folded and collapsed.
"You know the law," the tall Shadow Man repeated blandly.
And Julian's eyes fell.
They're playing with us, Jenny realized dimly. With Julian, too; they like to see anybody suffer. They didn't stop because he yelled at them, they stopped so they could draw it out a little longer.
Another Shadow Man spoke. This one had liver-colored skin, with splotches here and there as if he'd been burned by acid. The white of one of his eyes wasn't white at all, it was red, red as rubies, red as blood.
"Nothing can stop us from taking her-unless someone else is willing to go in her place."
It took Jenny several heartbeats to get her mind around that. She wasn't thinking properly anymore. Then she remembered-her grandfather. They'd said exactly the same thing to him. A life for a life. Someone must go in her place. And her grandfather had, and now Jenny had rescued him and broken the bargain, and brought everything back to the starting place.
And meanwhile the terrible silence went on and on and on.
Then she heard a voice, a voice that was quite calm and devil-may-care-and human.
"I'll go."
Tom had stepped forward. His dark brown hair was neat and short and his smile was rakish. He said it as if he were offering to go out and get pizza for the baseball team.
And he looked wonderful. Somehow he managed to make his rumpled and frost-touched clothes look like the latest fashion. He stood casually, and there wasn't a trace of fear in his expression.
For a moment, without thinking of anything else, Jenny was simply proud of him. Fiercely, passionately proud that a human, a seventeen-year-old who hadn't even heard of the Shadow Men until a month ago, could stand up to them like this. Could conceal his terror and smile that way and offer to die.
That's how I want to die, Jenny thought, and a strange serenity came over her. I want to do it well-since it has to be done. And I hope I have the courage, and I think-I really do think-that I just might. We'll see.
Because of course there was no possibility of letting them take Tom. She would never allow that.
Before she could say so, though, there was a short, wild laugh. Dee was beside Tom, her head thrown back, her eyes flashing like a jaguar's. She was as beautiful as some goddess of the night-some warrior goddess who'd just sprung up to defend her people. And she was grinning, the old barbaric grin that contrasted so oddly with her delicate features. The grin that Jenny hadn't seen since Audrey had gotten hurt.
"No," she said to Tom. "You won't go. I will." She was breathing very quickly, and laughing-she seemed almost exuberant. "Jenny needs you, you jerk. She'd never let you do it. I'll go."
"Just back off, Dee," Tom said softly. His eyes were oddly tranquil, even dreamy, but there was something frightening in his voice. At any other time, Jenny thought, Dee would have backed off.
Now she just laughed. She looked like Dee-reckless, warlike, and unconditionally loyal-but she looked like more than herself, too. A greater Dee.
"It's my choice," she said. "I know what I'm getting into."
And then, as Jenny listened in disbelief, other voices joined in.
"She's my cousin," Zach said. His face was sharp as a blade, and there was an intense, clear light in his gray eyes. He moved to stand sword-straight beside Dee. "I'm her blood relative. If anyone goes, it should be me."
Audrey and Michael had been whispering hastily together; now they stepped forward. Audrey's burnished copper hair was loose on her shoulders, and with her white clothing she looked like some kind of virgin sacrifice. Not elegant but exquisite, and holding herself with pride. Her skin was camellia-pale, and her voice was cool and steady.
"If everybody else is going to be a hero, then we can, too," she said. "The truth is that Jenny's worth more than any of us, and we all know it. So, now. You can take your pick." She looked at the Shadow Men. She very nearly, Jenny thought, tossed her head.
"Yeah," Michael said. "The only thing is, we figure we'll go together, her and me. You know, for company, right?" He gave a No Big Deal shrug, and then his mouth trembled violently, and he grabbed for Audrey's hand. He looked for a moment as if he were going to be sick, but then he wiped his mouth and stood facing the Shadow Men squarely. There was a curious dignity about his stocky little figure.
Jenny's throat was so swollen that she could barely breathe. She was opening her mouth, though, when something like a small blue thunderbolt shot into the clear space in the middle of the room.
"Oh, please don't take Jenny," Summer gasped. She was looking utterly terrified and as fragile as spun glass, and there was a wild blankness in her eyes. Her words came in an incoherent rush. "Please -please-you can't take her. I'm not brave or smart-I should have been dead in the paper house, j__"
That was as far as she got. She collapsed like a bird shot out of the sky, and lay in a pool of blue until Zach picked her up. He held her-Zach, who never paid attention to any girl.
The Shadow Men were pleased. Jenny could tell. This was probably turning out to be a much better game than they ever could have hoped-much better sport. They had seven mice to play with, and they were clearly loving it.
"Are you sure you know what you're offering?" the one with the crocodile eyes asked gravely.
"We could explain to them," the one with the bloodred eye suggested.
"Tell them exactly what they're in for."
"How we mean to enjoy them." Other voices joined in, and the Shadow Men moved in closer. A wave of revulsion went through Jenny at the sight of them, as if she were seeing them for the first time. They were old as spiders, old as stone. They were-abominations. And the thought of them touching any of her friends was insufferable.
It was time somebody put a stop to this.
"That's enough," she said in a voice as sharp and dictatorial as Audrey's. "You've had your fun, but the game's over. I'm the one you want, the one that cheated you. So forget everybody else. Let's go."
That was good, she thought, and a little wave of serenity came back. She was glad she could be as brave as the others. She was going to do this well, and that was all that counted now.
The Shadow Men seemed to know it was over, too. The red-eyed one held out a hand to her almost gently. It had ringers like a gorilla's-black, padded, thick as sausages and coming to a point at the ends.
Jenny put her hand in his.
The Shadow Man lifted his lips to show long, blunt teeth like tusks.
Something knocked them apart.
Jenny was knocked breathless, too, startled and confused. She thought it was some sort of attack.
It was Julian.
His hair was shining like lightning, like quicksilver. His whole being seemed full of elemental energy -of frightening intensity. And his eyes were the unbelievable, luminous blue of the precise moment before dawn.
He looked at Jenny for just one second, and then he turned and she could only see the clean purity of his profile.
"Go through the door!" he said. "That's your way home. They won't come after you."
He was between her and the Shadow Men. And apparently, unlike Dee, he could interact with them physically. At any rate, they were keeping back.
"Go on!" he shouted.
"We must have blood," the crocodile-eyed Shadow Man said. "We will have blood."
"Hurry!" Julian shouted.
Through the open door Jenny could see her grandfather's hallway.
"We have a right to a kill," the crocodile-eyed Shadow Man said. From the air he snatched up something long and flat and incredibly ancient-looking. His fingers were covered in scaly skin like a dinosaur's, Jenny saw. Then she realized what the long, flat branch must be.
A runestave. Like the picture in her grandfather's journal, except that this one was real-was more real than any object Jenny had ever seen. It was like some of the island worlds-the ones that were brighter and more substantial-looking than Earth. This stave was so real that it looked alive, throbbing with raw power.
There were not just single runes carved on it, but lines and lines of them, tall and needle-thin. Even though they were delicately inscribed, each stroke stood out clearly. It was as if the cuts were filled with liquid diamond that shone against the background of wood.
Jenny couldn't keep looking at the runes. It was like trying to read in a dream-first the details were sharp, and then the whole stave seemed to be swarming with changes. The runes seemed to move before she could identify them.
That's the stave of life. If anything ever was, that's the stave of life, she thought. The voice like faraway ice bells said, "Give her to us.
"No," Julian said.
Jenny felt movement behind her. Tom. And Dee, and Zach supporting Summer, and Audrey and Michael together. They were all gathering near her, and their way was clear to the door. But nobody started for it.
"What's happening?" Audrey whispered.
"You know what we can do," the tall Shadow Man with the crocodile eyes said to Julian, and he held the runestave higher.
"Go through the door," Julian said, without turning.