The Color of Fear (26 page)

“Why did you try to kill me?”

A zombie bumped into Caitlin. The ghoul tilted his head and sniffed her like a dog. Caitlin growled and slogged off in another direction, Rapunzel in tow.

Rapunzel whispered, “Sorry. But you were getting too cocky. Some bats were glaring in your direction. If they sense you, you’re dead meat. Literally. Your fear protects you—at least for the time being.”

Rapunzel had just saved her life. Caitlin wanted to stop and hug her, but that would of course be too dangerous.

They had to locate Natalie and the queen quickly.

A commotion erupted on the dance floor between two Blood-Eyeds. Tin Woodman had picked a fight with the Scarecrow. He had him down on the floor, and was pulling straw from Scarecrow’s torso with his rusty tin teeth.

The fight quickly escalated and grew more violent. An arrow of swirling, purple light suddenly pulsed from the direction of the stage. It struck Tin Woodman in the chest. He convulsed as the bolt of electricity shot through his metal frame. A faint electrical smell accompanied a white trickle of smoke that rose from the Woodman’s head. When his convulsions stopped, the Tin Woodman was still. After a moment, he rose to his feet and held out his arm to assist Scarecrow, who was still on the floor, half-stuffed. They both turned toward the stage.

A shrill voice rang out and hushed the crowd. “Insolence will not be tolerated!”

Rapunzel and the princesses exchanged grim looks.

“Oh. My. Goodness,” said Snow in a tense whisper. “I know that voice. It’s
her
.”

Caitlin suddenly felt grossly unprepared for whatever was going to happen next.

Her eyes reluctantly searched in the direction from which the beam of light had been fired. There, standing in front of a bejeweled throne on a stage in front of the dance floor, was the Queen of Hearts. Torches blazed like hellfire on the walls of stone behind her.

The first thing that caught Caitlin’s eye was the queen’s bouffant, heart-shaped hairdo; it was extravagantly opulent and the color was a striking neon pink-red. Her lips were smeared with rose-colored lipstick, and her large, festooned, heart-shaped glasses reminded Caitlin of a mask worn at a masquerade ball.

And sure enough, tightly gripped in her left hand …

The scepter!

The glass dome on top of the royal staff enthralled Caitlin. It looked alive because it swirled with incandescent violets, blues, and purples. The whirling forces had an almost hypnotic effect on her. She felt drawn to it like a magnet. Caitlin struggled to avert her gaze.

The Queen of Hearts cackled. “The midnight hour is near! Prepare yourselves for the raising of the scepter!”

The ballroom of ghouls grunted and applauded.

Caitlin shook her head.

Cheering?

These creatures might’ve displayed intelligence when it came to hunting for food. However, they lacked any semblance of self-awareness. They had no idea what had happened to them. In that regard they were mindless—mere chattels of the queen, slaves to the primal cravings of the Red Spectrum.

“Soon all the kingdoms will become united as one!” the queen declared.

They cheered louder.

“She means ‘witless as one,’” Rapunzel whispered, not holding back the sarcasm.

Something compelled Caitlin to look to her left.

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw her.

My baby sister! Natalie!

She was dancing, far too seductively for a little girl, on one of the elevated platforms. Another one of those big, bad-looking zombie wolves was watching her with hungry eyes.

Caitlin felt steam rise off her chest. Her nostrils flared and her fists clenched. When Natalie started twerking, she lost it.

“Not gonna happen!”

Caitlin jolted forward, ready to pounce, her face flushed with anger. Rapunzel hooked her by the collar and held her back. “Not yet. You’ll blow our cover. Stick to the plan.”

Caitlin motioned toward her almost-undead sister. “What about her? She’s an important part of the plan! And my life!”

“We’ll take care of Natalie,” Rapunzel said. Her eyes shone with assurance. “I promise.”

Rapunzel turned to her friends. “Ready, girls?”

Cindy cracked her knuckles and said. “Ready. I’ll meet you
upstairs
.”

Caitlin shot a reluctant glance at the lengthy dance floor spread out in front of the stage. The zombies were partying hard, dancing in sensuous rhythm to the music.

She knew what was coming. To get close to the throne, Caitlin needed to make her way through that long and crowded dance floor.

Rapunzel nudged in beside Caitlin. She wrapped her arm around her, squeezing her gently and drawing her close.

“You’ll have to blend in,” Rapunzel said in a forthright manner.

Caitlin didn’t answer. Didn’t respond. She just listened.

“Your fear will render you invisible to the crows, bats, and ghouls. But if you
walk
across that dance floor toward the queen, you’ll stand out like a hummingbird flying north for the winter. The bats’ sonar will detect your irregular movement. The zombies will close in, quick. You won’t stand a chance.”

Caitlin remained wordless.

“Last thing,” Rapunzel said as she placed two fingers under Caitlin’s chin. “If those bats above the dance floor
do
attack, make two fists. Lock them tight and press them hard against your eyes.” Rapunzel lifted Caitlin’s chin and looked at her square on.

“They’ll try to eat your eyeballs first. So you can’t see where to run.”

Caitlin’s face twisted in disgust. She looked up to the ceiling, where the Blood-Eyed bats hung topsy-turvy from the rafters. Rapunzel wasn’t trying to spook her, she knew. Those were just the facts. Caitlin, like it or not, had to deal with them.

She gazed silently at the grinding ghouls. The last time she had stood on a dance floor was last year. At her old school. When she bolted the dance, leaving Dillon Slater standing alone and dumbfounded. Thinking back to that horrid event, a new perspective surfaced.

Had Dillon Slater been, like, totally embarrassed when I ditched him?
Practically the whole school witnessed the drama.

Could that be why he shouted out the callous comment about the disappearing Fletchers?

All of a sudden the music in the ballroom ended. The spotlights illuminating the stage abruptly died, and the dancing ceased.

Yes!

The wave of relief that swept over Caitlin almost made her fist pump the air. No music meant no dancing.

But her relief didn’t last long. Across the ballroom, another spotlight shone on another stage, and a new rock band appeared.

This band called themselves … The Zombies?

This can’t be!

Their guitars unleashed melodic, up-tempo chords intimately familiar to Caitlin. She pressed both her palms against her forehead, fingers apart.

It’s the song! “She’s Not There!”

That sixties oldie her mom played for her almost every day as they danced around the house; the same song that had brought on that first heaving wave of panic with Dillon Slater. This was madly surreal.

It’s beyond fluky.

Caitlin’s chest heaved as she drew in oxygen. She pushed it out boldly, determined to tackle the precarious situation with poise. She had to. For Natalie.

“Well no one told me about her, the way she lied.

Well no one told me about her, how many people cried.

But it’s too late to say you’re sorry.

How would I know, why should I care?

Please don’t bother tryin’ to find her.

She’s not there.”

As the ghoul band jammed, Caitlin slid onto the dance floor, pushing her fear out of her mind. After all, she was caked in clay, masked in zombie makeup, and she was sporting a new, cropped bob.

Which meant she was unrecognizable.

And no one here knew her anyway.

Caitlin was anonymous. Inconspicuous. Practically invisible. And technically, they weren’t even human beings.

Hmmm
.

Something somewhere inside of her let go. She found herself bending her knees up and down, up and down, over and over, swiveling right and swiveling left. Her hips began to bounce. Arms moved in a crawl stroke, backstroke, breaststroke, and suddenly, she was dancing the Swim and dancing it well. She segued into the Monkey and the Jerk as the music and memories erupted inside of her with volcanic force, and when that old familiar song hit the upbeat, catchy chorus, Caitlin Fletcher was dancing a perfect Mashed Potato …

“Well let me tell you ’bout the way she looked,

The way she’d act and the color of her hair.

Her voice was soft and cool,

Her eyes were clear and bright,

But she’s not there!”

Her feet swiveled inward, outward, inward, outward as she melted into the melody. She spun around and around and leaped, pumping her fists and jumping higher, until she was dancing on air—free, happy, and high as a kite can fly. Her troubles had vanished, for now.

And the whole time, she was shrewdly moving and bopping in the direction of the evil Queen of Hearts!

Caitlin grooved smoothly toward the stage where the loathsome queen stood wielding the scepter in all her treacherous glory. Monstrous beings jumped and bopped and danced the rumba all around her. Caitlin’s stomach wrenched as the reality of what was about to take place struck her in the gut like a gong. She was going to confront, face-to-face, the depraved monarch of Wonderland.

Suddenly, for the first time in her life, Caitlin was not afraid of being afraid. The fluttering in her chest no longer bothered her. Instead, she used it. She welcomed her fear, full-on, as a way to avoid the crows and the ghouls all around her.

Caitlin reached the edge of the stage. She gulped. A strange, untimely thought struck her.

If I’m no longer afraid of being afraid, that would mean
…
I’m not afraid!

A flock of black crows landed around the queen.

Beady, red eyes and tar-black beaks homed in on her.

The crows cawed. And squawked. And they thrashed their black wings maniacally, outing Caitlin to the queen.

What the—

The queen’s head swiveled. It tilted as she squarely fixed her gaze on Caitlin.

“It’s her!” the monarch shrieked, pointing frantically.

Caitlin freaked. The crows scrambled. The queen sneered.

Then the unthinkable.

A bell clanged.

The clock was striking midnight!

Midnight
?

No!

No!!

The queen’s herald appeared
at center stage, his black-and-blue jaw wired shut. He rolled out a big brass gong.

Then he picked up a mallet.

God, no!

The herald took a mighty swing and hammered it.

Caitlin sobbed as the gong rang out, the booming sound reverberating right through her body and across the kingdom. She wailed, “Natalie!”

The queen laughed. She paid no further attention to Caitlin, for the midnight hour had arrived. All that was left for the Queen of Hearts was to raise her royal scepter high enough to transmit the final wave.

Caitlin clenched her teeth. Both hands tightened into fists. Nails dug into palms.

No
.
Freaking
.
Way.

Caitlin leaped onto the stage and dove toward the queen just as the malevolent monarch started to raise her scepter.

Caitlin sailed across the stage. Her fingers latched on to the scepter’s shaft, but the queen shook her off and she tumbled to the floor.

The queen maintained her grip as Caitlin bounced back up, primed for battle.

Both clutched the scepter.

It swung back and forth, back and forth, in a ferocious tug-of-war.

The queen used her weight and height to overpower Caitlin. She lifted the scepter into the air to launch the final wave.

A few more inches, and we’re all done for.

Caitlin pulled downward with all her might.

The scepter inched higher.

Caitlin’s arm muscles strained as she cleaved on to the shaft. Both her legs dangled off the ground. She used every ounce of her body weight to push that wicked rod back down.

The scepter rose a few millimeters more.

Caitlin cupped her hand over the queen’s pale hand. She dug in between the queen’s knuckles, trying to pry her fingers from the shaft.

The scepter rose a tad higher.

The queen took her other hand and cupped it over Caitlin’s, trying to wring her fingers off her own.

The queen hissed like a snake. Then a strange, high-pitched sound seeped out from her mouth.

At once, a vampire bat took flight.

It nosedived toward Caitlin.

She ducked, squeezing her eyes tightly shut, and all the while clinging to the shaft with both hands.

Caitlin felt a strange stinging sensation on her forehead.