I was going to bust them myself, but I was curious enough about the ritual to let it run for another few minutes.
“Close your eyes,” the tallest girl said. “Put the phones away and hold hands. Tyler, are you ready?”
“I guess so, Nia.” Tyler’s voice was a barely audible whisper.
The tallest and the shortest were running the show. They bowed to each other, then the tall one intoned, “Carmilla, bless Arielle so that her hand is guided right, and help me, so the ritual is chanted right. Amen.”
“Amen!” The other girls tried to sound solemn, as if in church, but two were so excited that they giggled instead.
The tall girl pulled something from her pocket, an object too small for me to make out, and gave it to Arielle with another bow. Arielle took Tyler’s hand and led her to the middle of the clearing, where the two knelt. The other five gathered around them in a tight circle, blocking my view.
The tall girl began a chant, which the rest of them joined. “Under the full moon, we call on Carmilla. Carmilla, give us power, and let us send your power into Tyler! Carmilla, give us wisdom, and let us send your wisdom into Tyler! Carmilla, give us immortality, and let us share it with Tyler!”
Tyler screamed. I broke through the circle of girls and pulled the sprite away from Tyler.
My abrupt arrival terrified all the girls. They shrieked and backed away from me, huddling in a frightened group at the edge of the clearing, clutching one another’s hands—except for Tyler, the sacrifice in the middle of the circle, who cried, “I hate you, I hate all of you and your stupid club, I don’t care if you don’t speak to me for the next five years.” She ran away from them, up the shallow steps of the miniature temple.
“Just what’s going on here?” I demanded.
“Who are you?” the tall girl gasped. Her voice shook, but she was brave enough to step forward to look at me.
“I’m a detective, and, incidentally, Petra Warshawski’s cousin. She called me to find you. All of you are in violation of curfew. Time for this party to break up. I’m going to take you home.”
Like many U.S. cities, Chicago has a curfew for kids under seventeen. A group of shrieking twelve-year-olds would get police attention, maybe not a bad thing for this group’s ringleaders, but not so good for any of the immigrant girls whose families might be here illegally.
Petra’s name reassured them; they let go of one another’s hands, their shoulders relaxing.
Arielle said, “This isn’t a party, this is serious.”
“I know it’s serious: your friend Tyler didn’t like it one bit.”
“We told her it would hurt, but she wanted to do it anyway,” Arielle said. “Everyone else did it, including me and Nia; we did it first to each other, so it’s not like we were attacking her!”
The tall girl, Nia, apparently, nodded agreement. “She begged us to let—”
Tyler screamed again before Nia could finish her explanation, a cry of terror so horrible that everyone, even Arielle and Nia, shrank into silence and clustered near me. I ran back to the temple and joined Tyler at the top of the shallow set of steps. Her mouth was opening and shutting in a mime of horror. She didn’t move, just pointed at the figure on the slab.
It wasn’t a statue, as I’d idly thought when I’d glanced inside earlier, but a man. He was laid on the slab in a parody of a crucifixion, arms wide at his sides, feet together. In the dim light from my cell phone I saw something sticking out of his chest.
I stepped between Tyler and the figure and knelt to feel his neck. His skin was cool and the carotid pulses were still, but when I stuck a gingerly hand underneath his windbreaker, I could feel the wet flood of fresh blood. We must have arrived on the scene right after he died.
While I was kneeling I squinted at the stick in his chest. I couldn’t tell much, but it looked like a metal rod, perhaps a foot long. Behind me I could hear Tyler starting to give way to sobs. I got up and guided her down the stairs. She was trembling and she clung to me convulsively.
The man had died a terrible death, but I had learned from years of experience with violence to suction off my feelings, to keep the outer shell of my self smooth and dry. A twelve-year-old didn’t need this experience, and shouldn’t have to acquire my patina.
The other girls were huddled at the foot of the steps. “What happened?” “What’s up there?”
I started to say, “There’s a dead man in that tomb,” but that sounded ludicrous. “A man has been murdered up there. And not very long ago. I have to call the police. I’d like to protect you ladies from a police investigation, at least until you’ve gone home and talked to your parents about what you were doing here tonight. However, before I can let you go, you need to answer a few questions. You claimed that you saw someone right before you began your ritual. I believe it was Tyler who said there was a vampire nearby?”