"Yes, but you still told her things. Things a human shouldn't know."
Now I was shaking. The Ophi were very secretive. What would they do to Mom to keep her from telling our secret? "What did Mr. Quimby do?" My voice cracked.
"He wouldn't hurt her, Jodi. I promise. He had to convince her that you really were talking crazy."
"Crazy as in, ‘Gee, that Jodi has a really weird sense of humor,' or crazy as in ‘Jodi needs to be locked up in a padded cell'?"
He didn't answer, but he didn't need to. Things were getting frighteningly clear.
"That's the real reason why you didn't want me calling my mom. You knew Mr. Quimby was going to talk to her. To tell her that her only daughter was crazy. Now, not only does she think I ran away, she thinks I did it because I'm a complete mental case!" A knock at the door interrupted me. "What?" I yelled, not wanting to deal with anyone else right now.
The door opened, and one of the servants came into the room with a covered dish. "Your food." He brought the dish to me, and our hands touched for a second. I jerked my hand away from his, spilling the contents of the dish all over my blanket. The servant immediately began wiping the spaghetti and meatballs off the blanket with his hand. Bits of flesh peeled off his palm and stuck to the blanket.
"Stop!" I shrieked. "Just stop!"
"Only trying to help," he said.
"Yeah, everyone here is trying to help. Only I don't want help. Besides, you're the one who needs the help." My heart raced, and I could feel the blood in my veins. It simmered as I stared at the servant. "You're not supposed to be here. This is all wrong. You're supposed to be in your grave. That's where you belong."
Alex grabbed my shoulder, but he pulled away and winced. "Jodi, you're on fire. You need to calm down. Our power is rooted in our emotions. If you don't get a hold of yourself-"
"Don't tell me what to do." I shot a look at Alex before turning back to the servant. "I'm sorry you were brought back and forced to wait on people. I really am. I'm sorry you're decaying and dropping pieces of flesh on my bed. I'm sorry you're forced to stay here when you should be six feet under the ground." I wasn't trying to be mean. I really hated seeing the servants forced to exist like this. My blood boiled under my skin, making me shake. "You need to go back to your grave because that's where you belong."
"Jodi, no!" Alex yelled. I turned to him, not sure why he was so upset.
The servant nodded to me. "As you wish." He turned and left the room.
"We have to stop him," Alex said, throwing the pasta-covered blanket off me.
"What? Why?"
Alex was breathing heavily and shaking his head. "You used your power on him."
"No, I didn't. I didn't bleed on him or cry on him. I just told him where he belonged."
"He isn't human anymore. He's a spirit that's been shoved back into a decaying body. A body controlled by-"
"Your family. You did this to them."
"The servants are controlled by the adults. I told you, they only listen to the rest of us as far as giving us what we want to eat and other little things Victoria and Troy told them to do for us. But underage Ophi don't know how to control a soul raised by someone else." He glared at me. "Except you." I didn't know how to control any of my powers. He was talking crazy. "Something happened to you just now. You changed. You got scalding hot to the touch, and you commanded that servant to go back to his grave."
"No. I didn't command him to do anything. I told him where he was supposed to be."
"Which is as good as a command if you're tapping into that power. And you definitely were."
I was speechless. Once again, I'd used my powers without meaning to. "What do we do?"
"We have to go after him. You have to tell him to stop."
"But if he goes back to his grave, he'll be at rest. He should be at rest, not working here."
"Think, Jodi. He's going to dig up the ground and crawl back into his grave. Get the mental image because you need to be prepared for what you're going to see out there. And once he digs his way to his grave and crawls inside, he'll stay there. But not at peace. He's not dead, Jodi. He's a soul stuck in a dead body. And you sentenced him to stay that way for all eternity."
Oh, God! I had no idea. If that poor soul got stuck in a grave-well, that would be worse than what Alex's family had done to him in the first place. "What do we do?"
He tugged on my arm, and we ran from the room. I wasn't quite at full strength yet, but that wasn't going to stop me. I had created this problem, and now I had to fix it. I stumbled a few times, but Alex stopped me from completely wiping out. I could tell he was holding back, not running at full speed so he could keep an eye on me. After how quickly he had gotten to me after lunch, I knew the guy had some major leg turnover. Luckily, dead people don't. Even with the head start, the servant had only made it to the cemetery when we caught up with him.
Without thinking, I reached for the guy's arm. "No, don't!" Alex said, yanking me back. "He's dead, and his body is barely holding itself together. If you pull on his arm, it'll come right off."
I gagged. "Oh, this keeps getting better and better." Alex flicked on a flashlight that he must have grabbed on the way out of the house. He really was like a Boy Scout-always prepared. He shone the light on the servant, who was completely ignoring us and zigzagging through the headstones. "What do we do then? How do we stop him?"
"You have to control him. Like you did in your room."
"Why me?" My voice was high and squeaky. "I haven't even had any training yet."
"Because I don't have enough power to do it. Only the adults can control the dead once they're brought back to life. I started to learn how to do it, but my powers aren't strong enough yet." He took my shoulders and turned me so I was forced to look at him and nothing else. "Somehow, you have enough power for this. You're not like the rest of us. You're stronger. You need to concentrate. Do whatever you did upstairs."
"But I don't know what I did." For the past week, things had just been happening to me. I didn't understand any of it, and I didn't have control over it.
Alex lowered his hands and turned to see how far the servant had gotten. I followed his gaze. The guy was at his grave, shoveling dirt aside with his hands. Even from a distance, I could see his flesh falling off his hands in the process. There was going to be nothing left of him by the time he dug his own grave. I couldn't let this happen. "Tell me what to do."
"Okay, you have to concentrate and draw from your emotions."
"What does that mean?" This wasn't the time to be cryptic.
"You were angry in your room. It was that anger that fueled your power. You need a strong emotion."
My emotions were definitely running on high. "All right, what else?"
"Let the emotion wash over you. It has to take over your body. When it does, you'll feel your blood. Literally feel it from head to toe. That's when you'll know you're ready."
I put my hand up to stop him. "Let me work on that part before you tell me anymore. I don't want to get confused by too many details at once. I'm new at this."
He nodded. "We should move closer. It will help you focus on him." We ran over to the grave and stopped just far enough away that we weren't going to get pelted with dirt and bits of flesh. "You can do this," Alex said, giving my arm a quick squeeze.
I inhaled deeply, which was a mistake since the air smelled like a combination of rotting flesh and dirt. I let images of all the awful things that had happened to me fill my mind. I started small. The deer. The deer terrorizing the farm and killing the sheep. The squirrel biting into Jake's neck. Nurse Steingall and Dr. Alvarez. Matt. Matt ripping into the bunny. My blood started rippling in my veins. By the time I got to Mom, I was ready. "What's next?"
"Think about what you want this guy to do. Get firm instructions in your head, and then tell him. You need to be forceful. He has to know you are in charge."
I thought about what I wanted him to do. I wanted him to stop digging his grave. I wanted him to forget the command I'd given him before. No. That wasn't what I wanted. I wanted him to find peace. I wanted his soul to return to wherever it had been before Alex's family forced it into its decaying body. I wanted him to be free.
"Jodi, come on," Alex urged.
I opened my eyes, locking them on the servant. "Stop!" I wasn't sure if yelling was necessary, but Alex had said I needed to be forceful. The servant hesitated for a moment but then started digging again. "I command you to stop!" This time he listened. He stayed kneeling, but he stopped digging. I knew Alex wasn't going to be happy about what I was going to do next, but I'd made up my mind. "I command your soul to return to the place it was before it was put back in this body. Go now! I command you to leave your body and return to where you belong!" I was concentrating so hard, my body shook. My blood boiled under my skin. Sweat dripped down my forehead.