Possess

vaguely disturbing like the rest of the church. The golden blade was two feet long, thin with patches of tarnish, and marred as if it had actually been used at some point. The hilt was also gold and ornately carved with symbols and swirls she couldn’t decipher.
    Beneath the sword was perhaps the most disturbing thing of all—a plaque that read:
Sword of St. Michael, Archangel
Replica
Donated by the Darlington Family at the dedication
of the Church of St. Michael, 1922
“To Destroy the Evil That Lies Within”
    “Too bad you can’t destroy this evil,” Bridget said, nodding her head toward the choir as she leaned against the smooth stone of the church wall.
    “Does she not think so?” a voice whispered.
    Bridget spun around. Was someone else in the church?
    Behind her lay an empty expanse of uniform wooden pews.
    “The humans are fools. This we know, Koras.”
    No, not here. There couldn’t be demons here. This was a church.
    “You are wise, Mecadriel.” The second voice was right on top of her, clearly discernible above the music.
    “But have you heard?” the second voice continued. “There is a Watcher now.”
    Bridget froze. A Watcher? That’s what the dolls had called her: a Watcher and a traitor.
    “Hallelujah! Hallelujah!”
    “The Master’s servants will take care of the Watcher, as they have done for centuries.”
    “Yes, Mecadriel. Yes. There will be much enjoyment.”
    Bridget ran down the aisle, scanning pews to the very back of the church to make sure there was no one hiding. Then she threw open the doors of the rear confessional—first the two penitents’ doors, then she cracked the priest’s door, just to make sure it was empty. There had to be someone here messing with her. Had to.
    “Bridget Liu!”
    She slammed the confessional door. From the altar, Mr. Vincent, Ms. Templeton, and the entire show choir were staring at her.
    “What are you doing?”
    “Um, nothing?”
    “Well, if you’ve finished exploring back there, could you please take your place for the carols medley?”
    Bridget felt the heat rise from her chest as she trotted back up to the piano. Ms. Templeton had already packed away her binders, leaving Bridget’s sheet music on the piano.
    Maybe she was imagining it. Maybe she was sleep deprived. She pushed the invisible voices from her mind and flipped through her pages, making sure they were all in order, then prepped and looked expectantly at Mr. Vincent.
    At his downbeat Bridget launched into the relatively simple accompaniment for “Angels We Have Heard on High.” She focused on the music. This was a church, after all, a place of God. They couldn’t be here. They couldn’t, they couldn’t, they couldn’t.
    The whispers exploded overhead, singing along to the carol in a cacophony of shrieks.
    “Gloria in excelsis Luciferi.”
    “No!” Bridget pushed away from the keyboard, toppled off the bench, and cracked her head against the hard marble of the altar floor.
    The voices stopped.
    Hector’s hand was on her shoulder, helping her to her feet. “Bridget? What’s wrong?”
    “I’m sorry. I—I have to . . .” She stumbled backward, her eyes darting about the altar. They were here. How could they be here?
    “You have to what?” Mr. Vincent said.
    Everyone stared at her, of course, like she’d just grown a second head. But she didn’t care. There was something evil in the church, something that shouldn’t, by the laws of Heaven and Hell, be there.
    The dark interior of the sanctuary began to spin before her, the walls skewing and stretching from vertical. As she staggered away from the piano, the angels in the stained glass windows above the altar turned to her with cold grins.
    “Bridge?” Hector’s voice broke through her malaise, bringing the choir back into focus. His face was pale, his eyes lacked their usual sparkle. “Are you okay?”
    Her hands were clammy, and she could feel droplets of sweat cascade down her back. “I’m not . . . I don’t . . .”
    “You look pale. Maybe you should go to the nurse’s office?”
    A flick of dense auburn curls from the back row of the choir caught Bridget’s attention, and she found a pair of deep green eyes, narrow as a cat’s, fixed on her. Then Alexa tilted her head ever so slightly, her lovely fringe of lashes obscuring her eyes altogether.
    “Heard us. Heard us. The dark one heard us.”
    “Impossible, the Master says he knows all who hear.”
    “Look at her! She knows. She