Hide and Seek: The Mad Girl Sees All novel Chapter 25

Chapter 25

Lyra pulled the card out of her shirt and ran her thumb across

“Transform Card. Activate.”

The words had barely left her lips when red light bled out of the card, ran up her arm, and washed over her body.

She looked down at her hand.

The skin had gone ashen gray. Her nails were long and pointed. The veins on the back of her hand stood up dark and swollen.

She touched her face.

Where her eyes should have been, the skin was smooth.

Her ears were twitching, absurdly large. Wind from every direction, the friction of leaves, the distant Wraiths hacking at stone, all of it poured in.

“Whoa.”

She looked herself over. Red robe. Hook-scythe. Hands stretched out longer than before.

‘Pretty cool.”

She swung off the corridor roof, landed barefoot, and let the scythe drag behind her.

Two steps in, something felt off.

The scythe was too heavy. Dragging it threw her whole stride off, so she just hauled it up onto her shoulder and strolled forward like she owned the place.

She rounded the moon gate and almost walked straight into two Wraiths. Her feet hitched for a

beat.

The two Wraiths’ ears swung toward her, paused on her for two seconds, then swung back. They drifted past her, hook-scythes scraping the ground, not even tilting their heads.

Lyra stood there and watched their backs disappear.

She chuckled, bounced the scythe higher on her shoulder, and kept walking.

“Really can’t tell, huh?” She picked up her pace, heading deeper into the garden.

Around the next corridor, three more Wraiths came toward her.

This time she didn’t step aside. She walked straight between them.

15

9:36 am

Chiast

Lone reacted One of their scythes even grazed her arm. It just twitched an ear and kept walking

Okay Confirmed. After transforming, the Wraiths think I’m one of them.”

The garden had taken a beating. Broken wood and shattered stone everywhere, several corridor columns gone, every potted plant smashed, a pine tree chopped in half lying across the path.

Lyra walked and picked through the debris as she went.

She needed flammable material, and a setup that would keep making noise on its own.

She stopped at the bamboo grove. The ground was littered with bamboo the Wraiths had hacked down, scattered in all different lengths.

She crouched and picked out a few of roughly the same thickness. Bamboo was hollow. Wind blowing through it would whistle.

And if you lit it, the air trapped inside the joints would heat up, expand, and burst with a sharp crack, like firecrackers.

Bamboo joints. Torn cloth banners. Reeds. Bits of dry straw…

Lyra worked like a busy little bee, gathering bit by bit. Soon all four piles were in place, one in each direction.

She stood up, brushed the dust off her hands, and looked around at the four points. “East, south. west, north. All set. Just need the people.”

She hoisted the hook-scythe onto her shoulder and turned back toward the lotus pond.

Lina was hiding in the wreckage of that hacked-up pond. She should still be alive.

Lyra reached the edge and crouched, peering into the water. It was churned up and murky. She couldn’t see a thing.

“Lina,” she whispered.

No response from the surface.

Lyra tried again. “Lina. It’s me. Lyra.”

A head broke the surface, reed stem still clamped between her teeth.

Lina saw the red-robed Wraith crouching on the bank and her eyes went huge She sank straight back down and nearly choked on a mouthful of water.

“Don’t freak out. It’s me!”

Lyra stuck out a hand and waved it in front of Lina’s face.

25

1:36 am

16 spac

Eina froze tortwo seconds, staring at the ashen gray hand, then at the eyeless face above it

“… Lyra?”

Yep.”

“You-how did you-”

“Transform Card. I turned into a Wraith. They think I’m one of them now.”

Lina’s mouth hung open.

“Come up. I need your help with something.”

Lina bit her lip and climbed out of the water, soaked through, hair plastered to her face, shaking like a leaf.

Lyra ran through the plan fast. Four points, four piles of flammable stuff, all lit at the same time. Use the fire and the noise to pull every Wraith in.

“The sound of the fire going up. It might be enough to send all the Wraiths into a frenzy.”

Lina blinked twice.

‘You willing to light one of them?”

Lina looked around, then back at Lyra’s eyeless face.

‘Yeah. I’m in.”

‘Come on.”

Lyra led Lina along the narrow path skirting the pond, ducking around two Wraiths on the way.

Lina walked half-crouched the whole time, every step careful. Her hands were trembling, but her feet kept moving.

Lyra led Lina up the pine beside the loft, then they hopped along the branches onto the roof.

Lydia was still flat on the right slope of the hipped gable roof, back pressed to the tiles. She heard them coming and her whole body tensed.

She turned her head and saw a Wraith stepping across the tiles toward her, a soaked blonde wonin trailing behind it.

Red robe.

Wraith.

35

1:36 am

Fydia’s pupils shrank to pinpoints. She jerked back.

“Easy. It’s me.” Lyra’s voice came out from inside the red robe.

“Lydia, it’s us!” Lina blurted, afraid Lydia would lose it the way she had.

Lydia’s fist hesitated. She squinted for two seconds. Couldn’t read it.

“Chto takoye?” (What’s going on?)

Lyra crouched in front of her and drew a circle on the tile with her finger, marked four dots inside it, then pointed at the four cardinal directions.

Then she made a fire gesture. Rubbed her palms together, flicked them upward.

Lydia watched the gestures and tilted her head, face full of confusion.

Lina leaned in and rattled off a quick translation in Ursarian.

Lydia’s eyes lit up.

She fired back a fast reply.

Lina turned to Lyra. “She says she gets it. She’s in.”

Lydia added something more.

Lina translated. “She says she can do it. She’s got the speed, so she’ll cover whichever spot is most dangerous.”

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