May Bird Among the Stars (25 page)

Ah, ha, ha, Stayin' alive, stayin' alive

May and the others watched with wide eyes, and then May looked up at the faces of the Dark Spirits. They were nudging one another curiously and pointing to the graceful creature on the floor, who was not only a cat, but a
dancing
cat.

“He's trying to confuse them,” she whispered. And it looked to be working. At least for the moment.

The Dark Spirits started cheering. May and the others fake smiled at one another. They all began to move awkwardly. Fabbio thrust one finger into the air and rocked his hips stiffly. Beatrice swayed elegantly. Pumpkin executed “the worm,” a break-dance move he'd seen on TV while haunting White Moss Manor. Together, they all danced backward toward the double doors.

Ding, ding, ding, ding!

As the great clock struck midnight, lightning bolts snaked their way across the dark ceiling of the room, smoke billowing out above them. The music stopped. All eyes turned to the uppermost balcony, where a dark silhouette had emerged. The figure wore a wide-brimmed hat pulled down over his eyes and an old, worn jacket.

The hall shook, as if with an earthquake, sending spirits toppling all over the place and the small knot of dancers on the floor sprawling.

Pumpkin scrambled behind May. Fabbio reached for Beatrice. Somber Kitty leaped in front of them all and growled.

“Hello.” The dark figure's voice echoed against the walls and reverberated loudly around the hall. Though he was far, far above, May could feel his eyes resting on her. “May Bird, is it?” Bo Cleevil shook his head carelessly. “You look very familiar, little speck.”

With a wave of his hand, a great wind gusted through the hall, blowing May's death shroud back so that it clung to her neck by its strap just barely. She clasped the neck strap with both hands and held on tight.

“Let's see … Here's a fact I heard recently … ‘Known far and wide as the girl who destroyed evil Bo Cleevil's reign of terror. Resides in Briery Swamp, West Virginia,'” Bo Cleevil quoted from
The Book of the Dead.

The Bogey let out a raspy whimper, and the Dark Spirits shifted and murmured.

“I was told you'd been made into nothing.” Bo Cleevil tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Let me think. Who told me that? Ah, yes.”

He thrust out a finger and pointed at the Bogey. “Bogey, you've been bad.”

Before the Bogey could so much as tremble, a shaft of light shot from Bo Cleevil's finger.

The smoke cleared a moment later—and all that was left of the Bogey was a top hat and a pile of ash.

You could have heard a pin drop in the great hall.

Bo Cleevil went on, sounding perfectly relaxed. “I'm glad you could make it to our party, May. You see, this is where the Ever After as we all know it ends.”

He swept the crowd with his eyes. “As you know, I have an announcement. After tonight there will be no more South Place.”

The Dark Spirits whispered and jabbered.

“No more realm under the sea for you. It's dark. It's messy. Forget it. Tonight we're leaving it behind. We're moving upstairs. Permanently.”

The spirits in the balconies let out dreadful cheers as Bo Cleevil turned his attention back to May and, with a gesture, indicated they should quiet down.

“I'm curious to hear how you've found your way this far, little speck. But more lazy, really, than curious.”

He thrust out a finger again, and the air beneath May's feet began to vibrate and change. Suddenly, May was being lifted into the air.

She soared up, up, up, until she was a hundred feet or more
above the dance floor, looking down on her friends and level with Bo Cleevil.

Desperately, she fumbled behind her back and pulled out her bow, slipping an arrow into the notch. She took aim.

Bo Cleevil laughed and waggled one finger, sending the arrow plummeting to the ground with a tidy
plunk.
May was pulled through the air toward him until she was hovering right above the rail of his tier, just inches from him, still clutching her bow.

Bo Cleevil studied her. His eyes gleamed like coals from underneath the shadow of his hat, and in them May saw everything she feared: coldness, hatred. And something else: emptiness.

Even more than being scared. May felt the loneliest she had ever felt. She tried to squirm, but she could not move her arms or legs an inch. She looked down at her friends. And then she thought of what the note under the Bogey's bed had said:
Home is behind you now.
It was coming true.

She couldn't believe it. She didn't want to believe it. And then …

“Oh,” May groaned.

In a flash she could see it: standing in the Bogey's room, reading the note. She remembered just where she'd been standing when she'd read it.

Home
is behind
you now.

The Lady
was
tricky.

The Bogey's portal wasn't under his bed.

When she had read the Lady's note, May had been standing with her back to the Bogey's closet.

W
ith a simple flick of his index finger, Bo Cleevil sent May whipping around in the air until she was upside down, just above his head.

He laughed and flicked his finger again. May shook like a leaf. The rest of her arrows clattered to the ground, leaving only her bow, which she just managed to strap to her back. Other things fell out of her pockets: a Ghouly Gum wrapper Pumpkin had stuffed in there; a rubber band from the Colony of the Undead; a feather from the night they had dressed up at Risk Falls.

Bo Cleevil shook her again, for good measure. As May tilted this way and that, the Sack-o'-Stardust in her pocket, which she hadn't closed, shook out its contents.

The last speck of dust fluttered out of the sack. It trickled through the air, crossing the distance between May's pocket and Bo Cleevil's face. It drifted, quietly and unseen, into his left eye.

As May watched in confusion, Bo Cleevil winced, and his eye began to water. And then he wrinkled his nose and sneezed.

May went plummeting downward.

She was just a few feet above the ground when Cleevil recovered himself and thrust out his arm, drawing her back up. But May felt a sudden new weight on her feet.

Fabbio was hanging on to her ankles for dear life.

May slipped an inch downward. At the same time the pull from above got stronger, and she began to rise again, Fabbio still dangling beneath her.

“No!”

Below, Beatrice leaped at Fabbio's feet, tripping over her dress but managing to grab on. Again, May sank … and rose. Beatrice's feet left the ground.

Lucius jumped next, tackling Bea around the knees. Down and then up they went. Down on the ground, Pumpkin looked back at Somber Kitty, bit his fingers, and lunged for Lucius. Somber Kitty came last of all. He hurled himself at Pumpkin's toes and dug his front claws into the bottom of Pumpkin's trousers. His back claws dug into the floor.

It was as if Bo Cleevil and Somber Kitty were having a great tug-of-war. While Cleevil pulled with a force no one could see, Somber Kitty pulled with his toes, and all of May's friends pulled with him.

As if they were all in an immense vacuum, things started flying about all over the dance hall—tiaras, pitchforks, whips, chains, pocketbooks. May's shroud pulled upward on her neck, sucked by the wind Bo Cleevil had created. With one hand, she untied it, and it went flying into Bo Cleevil's face.

Amid the din, the Dark Spirits gabbled in awe. May was resplendent, wildly alive. The supernovas on her bathing suit continued to explode, and her dark hair flew behind her. Her
eyes searched the room for a way to escape. And then she saw it, beneath her.

“I need that arrow!” she hollered to Fabbio, pointing with her chin to the place on the floor where the first fallen one had landed, now near Kitty's feet.

“May needs a that arrow,” Fabbio called into the whirlwind, to Beatrice, who called to Lucius, who called to Pumpkin. Pumpkin, still desperately holding on to Lucius's ankle with one hand, swooped the other long arm down around Kitty, who was still dug in on Pumpkin's pants, and managed to grab the arrow and pass it upward.

A moment later May had it in her hands.

May pulled her bow from her back and took aim. She took a deep breath, focused her eye on the spot she intended to hit, and let the arrow fly.

The shot went straight into the palm of Bo Cleevil's hand. The hand trembled for an instant, then went silver. A shriek shook the walls of the hall as he stumbled backward.

May and the others fell again, this time all the way to the floor below, landing in a smushy heap.

As they yanked one another upright, Lucius gushed, “Not
bad!
” His blue eyes were wide and admiring. All around them, the Dark Spirits stared, flabbergasted.

May retrieved her death shroud from where it had fluttered to the floor and retied it around her neck.

Then, right as she looked up, the Dark Spirits let out howls of rage and started clambering down from the balconies.

T
he entire hall shook as Bo Cleevil continued to howl. A balcony above buckled. A gaggle of snarling goblins blocked the doors.

“This way!” Beatrice said, leading the group in the other direction. Suddenly, a troop of zombies leaped from the first tier and landed in front of them.

May and the others stood poised in the middle. The two groups of Dark Spirits closed in toward each other. May and her friends gathered into a tight knot, backing up.

The goblins directed at the zombies a collective
“Grrrrr”
which was goblin for “Have you ever seen anything more tacky?”

The zombies directed at the goblins a collective “
Eeeuuughhhh
” which of course meant only “Eeeuuughhhh.”

And then, all the years of animosity between the two groups finally exploding, the zombies and the goblins hurled themselves at each other, ignoring the fugitives completely.

May looked at Beatrice, and Beatrice gave her the same bewildered look back. Then they all zipped toward the doors, and this time passed safely through them. Bo Cleevil let out another, hall-shaking howl of rage, and behind them the frame of the door came tumbling down.

As they sprinted into the corridor, the walls around them shook, as if South Place was undergoing an earthquake.

“Ohhhhh,” Pumpkin moaned.

As they turned the corner, a voice resounded through the hallway, and the force of it blew them like a wind. It was Bo Cleevil's voice, and it seemed to come from each and every particle of air around them. “MAY BIRD!” it screamed.

“Let's go, let's go!” Lucius ushered everyone forward. May brought up the rear, carrying Somber Kitty against her ribs. They zipped down the hall that led to the Bogey's bedroom, scurrying in the direction of the entrance to the Lazy Way Ladder that Lucius had pointed out earlier. But at the top of the Bogey's stairs, May paused.

Pumpkin, zipping up ahead, turned back to look for her, then stopped short. The others did the same. Everybody was wondering the same thing: Why had May stopped?

“The way out for me is down there,” she said, staring at them earnestly. “I think.” She glanced down a flight of stairs that would take her to the Bogey's bedroom. She didn't just think. “I
know.
”

Behind them, something enormous slammed, and they heard the grunts of hundreds of Dark Spirits in pursuit. But none of the friends moved. Pumpkin looked stricken.

“Well, what are you waiting for!” Beatrice cried.

May shook her head unsurely. “I don't know if I can leave you.”

“This your wish,” Fabbio said. “This why you come so far, little May. You must go.”

“Meow.” Somber Kitty twisted around and gave her a serious look. Their mother needed them too.

Jabbers and growls and snarls were coming from all directions now as the Dark Spirits wound their way along various routes.

May scanned her friends. “But how will you get out?”

“It's not a problem,” Lucius said. “Trust me.”

Bea's eyes filled with tears. “We'll be fine.” She wrapped her arms around May's neck and gave her a tight hug. “We won't give you a choice. There's no time for long good-byes. Go!”

Fabbio hugged May next and then kissed Somber Kitty on the top of the head. Then Lucius gave May an awkward embrace and rubbed Kitty's ears. When he pulled back, May stood hesitating on the brink of the stairs. Only Pumpkin was left. He was leaning against the opposite wall, pretending not to see her.

“Pumpkin?”

“You gotta go,” he said, looking down at his fingers. “I know. I always knew you would.”

Finally, he looked at her, his big black eyes wide and sorrowful.

“Oh, Pumpkin—”

Just as May took a step toward him, there was a crash. A gang of ghouls filled the end of the hall behind them.

May and her friends took one last look at each other as Fabbio grabbed Pumpkin's shirt, and Lucius spirited the group forward in the direction of the ladder. One by one, they disappeared, Pumpkin last of all.

The last sight May had of him was his sad face under his
waving tuft of hair and then his long fingers, reaching out toward her for a hug that would never happen now, before they disappeared around the bend.

May took in a shuddering breath. And then, with Kitty in her arms, she turned and zoomed down the stairs.

Within minutes, May was standing in front of the Bogey's closet. She sent up a silent wish to a million stars before grabbing the door handle and yanking it open. She and Kitty stood there, looking in, wide-eyed and stunned.

Amid the boxes of shoes and row upon row of black suits was a puddle in the middle of the floor. But it wasn't like any puddle May had ever seen. It made an enormous sucking sound and gaped at her. Small lights, like tiny stars, twinkled in its depths.