Chapter 1

the seeing stone

Chapter One IN WHICH More Than a Cat Goes Missing The late bus dropped Jared Grace at the bottom of his street. From there it was an uphill climb to the dilapidated old house where his family was staying until his mother found something better or his crazy old aunt wanted it back. The red and gold leaves of the low-hanging trees around the gate made the gray shingles look forlorn. The place looked as bad as Jared felt.

He couldn't believe he'd had to stay after school already. It wasn't like he didn't try to get along with the other kids. He just wasn't good at it. Take today, for example. Sure, he'd been drawing a brownie while the teacher was talking, but he was still paying attention. More or less. And she didn't have to hold up his drawing in front of the whole class. After that, the kids wouldn't stop bothering him. Before he knew it, he was ripping some boy's notebook in half. He'd hoped things would be better at this school. But since his parents' divorce, things had gone from bad to worse. Jared walked into the kitchen. His twin, Simon, sat at the old farmhouse table with an untouched saucer of milk in front of him. Simon looked up. "Have you seen Tibbs?" "I just got home." Jared went to the fridge and took a swig of apple juice. It was so cold that it made his head hurt.

"Well, did you see him outside?" Simon asked. "I've looked everywhere." Jared shook his head. He didn't care about the stupid cat. She was just the newest member of Simon's menagerie. One more animal wanting to be petted or fed, or jumping on his lap when he was busy. Jared didn't know why he and Simon were so different. In movies, identical twins got cool powers like reading each other's minds with a look.

It figured that the most real-life twins could do was wear the same-size pants. Their sister, Mallory, thundered down the stairs, lugging a large bag. The hilts of fencing swords stuck out from one end. "Hey, good job getting detention, nutcase." Mallory slung the bag over her shoulder and walked toward the back door. "At least this time, no one's nose got broken." "Don't tell Mom, okay, Mal?" Jared pleaded. "Whatever. She's going to find out sooner or later." Mallory shrugged and headed out onto the lawn. Clearly this new fencing team was even more competitive than the last. Mallory had taken to practicing at every spare moment. It bordered on obsessive.

"Hey, good job getting detention, nutcase."