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Mystic Hollow Community Page
New post from Anonymous: Anyone got the details on the silent rave happening at Mystic Hollow cemetery? Lots of people wearing glow-in-the-dark costumes. But no music?
Smoke rises from the hole in the floor, obscuring my view, but I don’t need to see to know what’s down there.
“What in the blazes is that?” Eleanor panics. “You don’t think . . . it can’t be . . . is it . . . ?”
“The Headless Horseman’s grave opening?” I whisper, my heart pounding hard. “Yeah, I think it is.” Because I cast a spell to close it.
And magic is still backward. I’ve just unearthed the monster who wants to end my town.
“What about the rituals?” Eleanor exclaims, her eyes wide as saucers. “Your sister—you must try again!”
“I know! I know!” I say, standing at the edge. “How did Beatrice send him to the grave the first time?”
“She beheaded him!” Eleanor snaps. “But something tells me that won’t work this time!”
“Thanks for the reminder,” I say, starting to sweat.
I need to do something. Normally I have all the answers.
To calculus. AP Language essay questions.
But right now, faced with an undead Headless Horseman rising and wreaking havoc on Mystic Hollow, I have no clue what to do.
I’m in a full-blown panic. And then my phone starts to ring.
I pick up without looking. “Harry?” I say, hoping.
“Kat?” Aunt Diane’s voice is on the line.
“Oh, Aunt Diane! Thank the stars,” I blurt out, my panic obvious. “You have no idea what just happened. The house started shaking and then a hole appeared in the office and—”
“Katherine,” Aunt Viv cuts in. “What just happened? Something is really wrong with the family magic. Your aunt and I can feel it all the way across the ocean. My knee has been killing me so much I lost at shuffleboard. Explain!”
“I think Harry and I accidentally opened the tomb of the Headless Horseman,” I say fast, and wait for her to start yelling. “Or I did. I’m not sure.”
“What?!” Aunt Viv squawks.
“We broke Mystic Hollow’s magic, because Harry cast a curse on me, and I wouldn’t apologize—”
“Katherine,” Aunt Diane says, her voice low and deadly. “You need to finish the ritual with Peter. Right now.”
“I know,” I whisper, my stomach tightening. “But who builds a house over an ancient cemetery where the Horseman is buried?”
“Witches!” Aunt Viv says defiantly. “Who better to keep him down where he belongs than the coven that put him there?”
“I guess you’ve got a point,” I agree.
“Listen to us, Kat,” Aunt Viv finally says, her voice eerily calm. “You have to close the grave at once.”
“I lied about having a boyfriend. I don’t have anyone to do the rest of the ritual with me. The handfasting, the apple biting . . . how am I going to do it on my own?”
Aunt Diane swears under her breath.
“I just wish the rest of you were here to help us,” I say, my voice going whiny and pathetic.
“I shouldn’t have sent you away.” The music in the other room grows louder.
“I shouldn’t have cared about some stupid boy and having a party.
I wanted to do it on my own, with some boy, but what really matters is family. ”
“What’s done is done. Focus on the now,” Aunt Diane says sternly. “We’re going to open a portal and come help you. Stand back.”
I watch, fascinated, as my aunts begin chanting a spell I’ve never heard. My phone heats up slowly, and then all at once, until it’s almost too hot to hold. But I grip it tightly, hope even more painful. They’re using my phone to make a portal.
But as quickly as the warming begins, the phone grows cold again.
“The Bermuda Triangle!” Aunt Viv cries in frustration.
“It’s not that, Vivy,” Aunt Diane says. “Kat told us. The magic is broken. It’s too dangerous for us to portal.
We don’t know where we could end up.” She turns back to the phone.
“We will try another way, but you can’t wait for us.
You need to redo the ritual. Start over!
Remember: love that burns, love that binds, love that finds.
You need the flowers, the rope, and the apple.
You have to stop the Horseman before he raises his undead army—”
“His what?”
“The Horseman. He controls the dead. When he rises, he will raise every soul in Mystic Hollow, and they will join him as his army to kill every—”
The line goes dead. I look at Eleanor in a panic.
There are lots of things in Mystic Hollow in my direct path that want to eat, bite, and maim me and the citizens of Mystic Hollow, but I need to get to Harry.
I don’t care about the rituals. The Headless Horseman has risen and is about to raise all the dead.
And my sister is alone in the cemetery. “I have to get to Harry but someone has to watch the house.”
“You can’t,” Eleanor says. “That’s foolishness. You need to complete the wards—”
“I need to get to my sister,” I yell as I race out the door. One step, and my feet go sliding out from under me. I’ve stepped in green slime. I scream as I start to fall. Hands reach out to grab me.
“I’ve got you!”
I look up in surprise. Colton cradles me in his arms while looking down at me adoringly. “Hey, you. Cute hat.”
I touch my head and remember that I’ve gone fully witch. “Yeah. Hey,” I say, confused when I look around and see the party is still in full swing. “Didn’t you feel the earthquake?”
“The only earthquake I felt was the beating of our two hearts as one,” Colton coos, smiling goofily. “You can’t believe I’m saying this to you right now, right?” Colton goes on. “I get it. Average Kat Hadley going out with Colton Croft? It sounds impossible, but here I am.”
I brush him off. I can’t stand the idea of him touching me another second. “I’m flattered, but, um, could we talk about this later? I have to find my sister.”
“You don’t need your sister. You have me.” He grabs my hand and leads me through the foyer, pushing past people to get outside to the porch, not stopping till we reach the side of the house where it’s quieter.
Almost too quiet. All my senses heighten.
Twinkle lights dance in the wind, except I didn’t put up any decorations—those are will-o’-the-wisps in the lake, trying to draw people to their death.
Nearby, the greenhouse is glowing with a strange pulsing green light.
It would be super-romantic, except I’m pretty sure the world is ending, and I’m with a boy I don’t even like. “Colton, I really have to go.”
“Whoa. What’s your rush? The party is a hit thanks to me. I kind of told everyone I was your cohost tonight. Everyone wants to go to a party with Colton Croft, you know?”
And now he’s talking about himself in the third person. A few days ago, the thrill of being this close to Colton would have made my stomach flutter, but now all I can think about is my sister. I see a flash of light and look up at a window.
Our house looks like it’s having a fit. The lights are flashing yellow and green.
A group of gremlins clamber down the drainpipe.
Garden gnomes shatter the windows and scuttle their way inside.
The window to the kitchen has iced over.
The wind shifts again, and leaves blow in our direction, bringing along with it an icy cold that reminds me of the one rising from the hole in the office.
Something is happening. We’re being watched.
I pull on Colton’s hand. “We aren’t safe out here, Colton. We need to get you inside.”
“You’re with me,” he says, puffing out his chest. “Where could you be safer?”
That’s when a horse’s whinny cuts through the air.
I look around wildly and pull on Colton’s hand again.
“Kat—”
“Shhh!” I hush Colton, but he doesn’t listen. He just keeps talking about himself and how happy I should be that he noticed me and how I don’t need my sister or anyone else, and that’s when I see a tall figure emerge from the shadows behind Colton.
I’m too late. The Headless Horseman has risen from his grave.
I’m so petrified, I can’t even speak. I tug on Colton’s arm to pull him away, but I’m too late. The Horseman kicks his horse into a gallop, and they’re looming closer and closer. He raises his gloved hand, and I watch in stunned disbelief as his axe falls.