Blood Moon (Book Three - The Ravenscliff Series) by Geoffrey Huntington Page B

some help …”
    Her eyes reacted, darting up to meet his. The madness was there again, shining through. “I won’t be put in that room again!”
    “No, not that one,” Devon said, “a nice one …”
    “No!”
    “Calm down, please,” Devon said kindly, reaching out for her. “I want to be your friend.”
    She eyed him cagily. “My friend?”
    “Yes. You know my name, so why don’t you tell me yours?”
    Crazy Lady glared at him for several seconds, then suddenly leapt backward, onto the windowsill behind her. She crouched there like a bird.
    “I’ve learned how to fly,” she told him, turning the latch on the window. “Do you know how to fly, Devon?”
    “Please, don’t try it,” he begged her. “We’re at the top of the tower. It’s a long way to the ground.”
    “But I told you,” she said calmly. “I’ve learned how to fly.”
    She turned, thrusting her head and shoulder out the window.
    Devon made a lunge for her, but she was prepared for him. He was suddenly repelled backward, falling onto his butt.
    “Oh, and Devon,” she said, looking back one last time, “my name is Clarissa.”
    With that, she flew off into the morning sky.

    “Are you sure?” Rolfe asked him after Devon had told him the story. “Are you absolutely sure that’s what she said?”
    “She told me her name was Clarissa,” Devon said once again.
    Rolfe sat down in a state of stunned silence.
    “That was the name of the girl in your car,” Devon said. “The one you thought drowned, who has a gravestone in the cemetery on Eagle Hill.”
    “It can’t be,” Rolfe muttered.
    Devon took the seat next to him. They were in the office of Rolfe’s restaurant, one of several he owned in the area. Devon had come to see him right away, as soon as Crazy Lady had disappeared into the air. He’d just closed his eyes in the tower and reappeared at Rolfe’s. He loved it when his powers worked.
    “It can’t be Clarissa,” Rolfe said again.
    “You told me her body was never recovered.”
    The older man’s eyes grew dark. “I went to prison for her death. Amanda testified—all the while she was keeping the girl hidden away at Ravenscliff! That’s why she kept her imprisoned! So she could convince the police that Clarissa was dead and make sure I was locked up in jail!”
    Devon held a lot of things against Mrs. Crandall, but this seemed too much even for her. Utterly destroy a girl’s life merely for revenge? Have a gravestone made for her just so it would keep up the illusion of her death and keep Rolfe in jail? Was she really capable of such hatred and viciousness?
    “Look,” Devon argued, “Crazy Lady—whatever her real name is—has powers, powers that need to be controlled. Did Clarissa have powers when you knew her?”
    “No, of course not. She was just a girl. A servant girl …”
    “Who you were fooling around with …”
    Rolfe nodded. “It was a stupid thing.” He sighed. “When Amanda discovered what was going on, she was furious. And rightly so. I apologized and promised never to see Clarissa again. I did everything I could to make it up to her. But she was so stubborn, so strong-willed, so determined to hold a grudge …”
    “It runs in the family,” Devon said, thinking of Cecily.
    “But to do this ,” Rolfe said, standing up now, slamming his fist into his palm. “It staggers the imagination! She sent me to jail for a death she knew didn’t occur!”
    Devon decided against bringing up the fact that there was another person in the car that night—a boy—who, for all they knew, really did drown. But everything now seemed open to question, including Clarissa’s identity.
    “If this is the same person,” Devon reasoned, “why didn’t she have powers then? Why does she have them now? And when did she go insane?”
    “Clarissa Jones was no sorceress. She was not Nightwing. She was just a village girl.” Rolfe looked at Devon intently. “Only Amanda will have the answers to those