Luke Roberts wasn't quite sure what was happening, but on the other hand, he didn't really care, either. At least he was out of his house-away from the sound of his mother's voice. Did she even know he was gone? Probably not. He'd left his door locked, then gone out the window, cutting through the backyards of the two houses between theirs and the corner. His mom might have knocked on his door, but when he didn't answer, she'd figure he was either asleep or pissed at her-which he was-and call Father MacNeill. But at least she wouldn't go around and try to look in the window to see if he was there. "You're thirteen now," she'd told him on his birthday two years ago. "You're growing up, and Father MacNeill says you should have some privacy."

Father MacNeill!

For as long as Luke could remember, his mom had acted as if the priest was his real father-in fact, when he was real little, he'd actually thought Father Mack was his real dad, until someone told him that the priest wasn't really anyone's father at all. Sometimes late at night, Luke still tried to picture what his father looked like, but no matter how hard he tried, the only image he could conjure was that of Father MacNeill. Which sort of figured, he decided, since his mother used to start almost every sentence with "Father says…" So even when she'd given him the "gift of privacy," as she'd called it-when all he'd really wanted was a dirt bike-she took half the gift away right off the bat by adding that "Father says you mustn't abuse the privilege." After taking a deep breath, her face turned beet red and she blurted the other thing Father MacNeill had said: "And you mustn't use the privilege to abuse yourself, either. That would be a mortal sin." He'd considered pretending that he didn't know what she was talking about, just to see how she'd explain it, but finally decided not to, figuring if she ever walked in and caught him, he could at least claim ignorance that he was committing a sin. Of course, then he'd have to go confess to Father MacNeill, since she'd be bound to fell him what she caught him doing. But at least she'd stuck by her promise not to come into his room unless he said it was okay. Father Mack had probably told her she'd go to Hell if she broke the promise. So after their fight tonight, he'd just gone out the window to hang out with Jared for a while. His mom would probably be on the phone with the priest for at least an hour anyway, and by the time he got home, she'd have either gone to bed or fallen asleep in front of the TV. Either way, she'd never even know he was gone.

When Luke arrived, Jared was taking a bunch of candles out of the big wooden cabinet they'd dragged down from the attic last week and setting them up on the workbench. Luke flopped down on one of the mattresses, dug into his pants for a joint, but only found a roach. He and Jared each took a hit or two while Luke told Jared about the fight he'd had with his mom, then they threw the butt through the grate that covered the sump in the middle of the floor. After that, Jared lit the candles-and some incense to cover the smell of the joint, just in case. He turned on some music and started fiddling with the lights, then the strobe came on, and Luke began to see strange patterns emerging from the blackness of the walls.

"Cool, man," he murmured. "How'd you do that?"

"Do what?" Jared countered.

"That stuff on the walls."

Jared looked at him. "What are you talking about? What stuff?"

Luke frowned, confused. Was Jared putting him on, or was he actually starting to see things?

"Tell me what you see," Jared said. Though his voice was barely audible above the pounding music, the words resonated in Luke's head with the authority of a command. "Tell me what you see," Jared repeated. "And tell me what you want."

Luke concentrated on the strange patterns that seemed to be floating in nothingness in front of the black wall. Fluorescent paint, he thought. He glanced around for the source of the black light that made the designs seem to glow with a luminescence of their own, but Jared had hidden it so well he couldn't see it at all.

Cool.

The patterns began moving, their colors-hot pinks and brilliant greens-transmuting before his eyes into a rainbow of hues in evershifting shapes. The fumes of the incense filled his nostrils, and he sucked them in, imagining that it was another joint.

The candles flared brighter, and the floating patterns took on a blinding brilliance.

"What's going on, man?" he asked. "Jeez, I can hardly see!"

"Watch," Jared commanded. "Keep watching, and think about what you want. Anything you want. Anything at all."

The patterns of color began to pulsate, swelling to fill the entire room with swirling light that now seemed to come from everywhere. A golden cross appeared above the workbench. It was blurry at first, as if out of focus, and as Luke concentrated on it, he realized it was spinning.

Spinning, and upside down.

And there was something on it-some figure he couldn't quite make out. He wished the cross were spinning slower so he could see more clearly.

Even as the thought formed in his mind, the spinning began to slow…

As he had almost every night since Ted Conway moved his family into the house where his mother had died, Jake Cumberland lurked in the protective shadows of the carriage house, blending so perfectly into the night that even someone passing within a few feet of him would not have sensed his presence.

The magic he had attempted with the cat-the magic he'd learned by watching his mama-had failed. The Conways were still here, and every night he could feel their evil growing and spreading-spreading like the kudzu that crept across the countryside so quickly you hardly knew it was there until one morning you woke up and the shrubs were covered with it, and the trees were choked with it, and it was too late to do anything about it.

And if the Conways stayed-

But they wouldn't stay, for he was there every night, working his mama's magic.

Now, as he sensed midnight coming on, he spread out his amulets and herbs and began muttering the incantations he'd heard from his mama's lips before she'd died…

Weird, Jared thought. "Where's it all coming from?

It wasn't the grass-there'd only been enough left of the joint for a couple of quick hits, and he hadn't sucked it in the way you were supposed to. In fact, he didn't really like the drug much, since all it had done the couple of times he actually tried it was make him feel like he was going to throw up. He hadn't actually done it, but had to spend a couple of hours concentrating on keeping peristalsis working in the right direction. Then he'd wondered if the rest of his autonomic systems-his breathing, heartbeat, and everything else-was going to have to be consciously controlled, too. That put him into a panic for a minute, and he actually felt himself stop breathing. Once he'd gotten the panic under control, though, everything was okay. But he hadn't been tempted to try it a third time.

So if it wasn't the grass, where was it all coming from?

The light.

The sounds.

The voices.

None of it was real-it couldn't be. There wasn't anyplace in the room the light could be coming from, since the one bulb hanging from the ceiling wasn't even on. And there was no way the candles could be making the room look the way it did. Still, when he set up the candles, taking them out of the armoire and arranging them on the workbench, he'd kept changing them around. It was almost like there'd been something inside his head, some pattern, telling him exactly how to set them up, and he kept adjusting them, moving one and then another, until he knew-just somehow knew-that they were right. Then he lit them and dropped down onto the mattress. And it had all begun.