Four

Mel sprang into action and dragged me over to the cart, pushing me in first. By the time she got in and closed the door, things were a little cramped. I had to swallow my shyness down as I realised my leg was touching Jamie's. He gave me a little wink before starting the engine up.

"This is cosy."

I giggled.

"You would think as all these worlds are so magic, they would have made a bigger cart."

His hands rested lightly on the steering wheel as he looked out of the front window.

"They probably didn't bargain on me using the blood cart to help a Sapphire and her friend escape their chosen generation."

I nodded glumly, the realisation of what we were about to do hitting me all over again. Jamie sat up straighter and revved the engine harder, as if convincing himself this were the right thing to do.

"Right ladies, we need a plan before I just transport us all somewhere else. First of all, Mel...you need to deactivate the necklaces like you said. It will buy us some time."

She nodded, then turned to me.

"Cassie, this is going to hurt you. Your ruby will burn up but you have to just copy what I do OK? It won't affect me as much because I belong in the Rubies, but it's going to be painful for you."

I took a deep breath and gave a slight nod. I watched as she very carefully tapped the top of her pendant three times, then twisted it quickly to the left before blowing on it. Her ruby darkened instantly and she smoothly took it off, a satisfied grin on her face.

As soon as I even touched my ruby, it started burning. It felt as though I were holding a naked flame in my hand. It was better to hold it away from my neck though, the pain was better on my hand than on my chest. I copied all of what Mel had just done, biting on my lip to stop the pain searing through my hand. After what felt like an hour of solidly holding my hand in a burning fire, I managed to take it off. Mine took a lot longer to go dark than Mel's had, but it was off and hopefully deactivated.

I sat back in my seat, breathless with pain. I flinched slightly as Jamie lifted my right hand, the one that had taken all the pain, and examined it. I saw him wince. I chanced a quick look, noting that some of my skin had actually burned off from my palm. It was red and angry. I had to look away. The sight was making me feel nauseous.

"You coped really well. It was hard to watch. Here, let's fix you up."

I sat in silence as he pulled a wand out of a little compartment in the cart. A grey wand embellished with a W. The same wand that all The Emeralds had. It reminded me that a Sapphire had powers from all three worlds. A soothing balm sprinkled out of the wand and on to my sore hand. Then with one more flick, a bandage. Jamie wrapped it around my hand gently, making sure all the sore bits were covered. He smiled at me apologetically.

"I wish there were a way I could make your hand better instantly, but we need to try and lay low for a little while. If I start doing complex healing spells, the authorities will catch on straight away and come even sooner than we expect."

I noticed that he was still holding my bandaged hand as he spoke. I shrugged lightly, my hand felt much better now it was wrapped up.

"It's OK. And thank you." He let go now, flashing me with a smile so dazzling it made my insides flutter. "Anyway, now the necklaces are deactivated, I have a plan. What if we go to the other worlds before we go to The Sapphire Generation?"

Mel scoffed.

"That's a ridiculous idea. It's one thing busting out of The Rubies world to go The Sapphires. You are a Sapphire and I don't mind helping you get there. But going to the other worlds...the only people that get to go between the three are the authorities and the few Sapphires left and that's only because they work for them. The Pearl Eds authorities will work with the Mayors and have us killed instantly if we go marching off to other gens. My guaranteed year on the Rubies will count for nothing if we break the law."

"But that's just the point Mel. We are breaking the law anyway. Listen, if they get the idea I'm a Sapphire, where are they going to look first?"

Jamie shuffled next to me, he somehow seemed even closer than he had before.

"The Sapphire Generation." He mumbled.

"Exactly. So why don't we go check out the other worlds first and maybe, by the time we reach the Sapphire world, they will start hunting us down in the worlds we have just been in. It buys us more time. They would never expect someone running scared to be strolling through the other generations like it's no big deal."

Jamie nodded.

"You have a point. It might just work and it gives us a little longer to come up with something."

Mel squeezed her eyes shut and pursed her lips, deep in thought for a minute.

"Fine. I guess we are going to the other generations then."

I squealed with excitement, giving her a quick hug as a thank you.

The engine had been running for a while now. Jamie pushed a button on the dashboard and off we went with a a loud roar. Travelling in the cart was a bizarre experience. It felt like we were going in slow motion, but we were actually going so fast that Jamie couldn't even put a reasonable guess on it. The cart was noisy and groaned at the effort of it all. I couldn't tell if it had been a few minutes or a few hours before we came screeching to a halt.

We stepped out of the cart. It seemed dark but not quite. The darkness level was that of a foggy evening. I shivered as I looked around me. Jamie shuffled on his feet.

"I thought we would get The Diamond Generation out of the way first. This place gives me the creeps."

So that was why I felt so cold.

"Me too."

I made a face, looking for any sudden movement or rather...any sudden ghosts appearing next to me. Mel barged past us and rolled her eyes.

"Yes, lovely. You two have SO much in common. You are both wimps when it comes to The Diamond Generation. Congratulations. Now if you don't mind, I want to explore. You two can work on your little love situation later."

I sighed. If Mel was going to keep on making digs about me and Jamie, then I would have to have a word with her later. Jamie just wanted to help us, that's all. There was nothing in it for me and him.

We trailed behind Mel. I walked close to Jamie, not wanting to be left behind in such an eerie world.

"So when do we see the ghosts then?"

Jamie chuckled slightly and put his hands in his trouser pockets as he walked along.

"You'll know as soon as you see them. It's just down this little road here. This is only the entrance to their world, my cart isn't allowed inside. "

I shuddered, wondering if my plan to visit the other worlds had been a good idea after all.

"There are some rules with the Diamonds though Cassie. You mustn't walk through any of the afterlife."

Mel had fallen back in step with us now, listening to every word.

"Not that we would want to walk through another person anyway, but why? What's the big deal?"

"You will be fine walking through them" He answered Mel's question. "It's Cassie and I that will be in trouble. You see, because we are Sapphires and still feel emotions and are very 'human' like if you will, us walking through the afterlife ghosts saps some of the life out of us. Ghosts aren't allowed to smile or express emotion, add the fact that they are dead, it makes them pretty sad and sombre. Every time we walk through a ghost, a bit of our alive-ness disappears until eventually, we end up nearly as dead as them. I hate coming here to pick up the blood supplies."

I was about to ask more, but Mel had come to a complete stop, looking ahead of her in shock.

"Yikes." She spoke so quietly, I could barely hear her. I looked ahead, and when I saw what she was seeing, I had to dig my heels in to the ground to stop running away.

Back in the human world, there were these things called forests. Hundreds of thousands of tall trees loomed in these forests, towering over everything. I had seen pictures of forests and woods at Pearl Eds and although I admired the beauty, they freaked me out a little with how looming and yet...lonely they were. There was something very lonely about a forest full of trees.

As I took in the scene, my brain told me that this was a forest. But instead of trees, there were ghosts. I remembered Mel saying that The Diamonds was the most popular generation, and you could tell it was true. In front of me were lines and lines of ghosts. They all hovered above me, probably at a height that made them as tall as a large tree. All ages and faces looked at us, sorrow etched on every single one. Their bodies were see through and their skin glistened slightly with a deathly pale white glow. None of them were talking. They were all just looking at us. Looming and silent. Scary.

I moved closer to Jamie so that our arms were touching. He noted my discomfort and reassuringly took my hand. Even Mel, who had been so eager to explore this world at first, came to the other side of me and linked my arm. She might have been a vampire, but she was trembling.

"Why are they all just....doing that? Staring at us like that? Why aren't they moving or anything?"

Mels voice was a hushed whisper.

"They may be ghosts, but they can hear everything. You don't need to whisper. And this is what they do. They haunt. They are supposed to be haunting, they are ghosts."

I gripped Jamies hand tight as he spoke, the forest of ghosts started swaying in unison.

"But why are they up there? What are they doing?"

Jamie started walking, leading us through the forest. Because they were all hovering in mid air, we could walk through easy, I didn't have to worry about walking through any of them at the moment.

"Thousands of them gather at the entrance to haunt newcomers. They wait there all year for the four graduations, just to look haunting. And they can fly, so they choose to just sort of...hover and make everyone uncomfortable. Most of the ones here don't have families. They came to this world, wanting to be reunited with their family, only to find out the longed for relatives had chosen other generations and all they could do was watch over them. So they spend their time doing what they do best. being creepy and haunting all at an un-natural height. Come on, let's get out of this bit. There's a road about a mile ahead. Although it will take us about three hours to get there and clear all these ghosts because in the afterlife, everything is slower."

I nodded, wishing desperately that I was back in The Rubies where everything was faster.

"The vampire world is covered in rubies. Where are the diamonds?" Mel still sounded pretty spooked, but she spoke louder now.

Jamie gestured to the ghosts.

"They themselves are the diamonds. They basically sparkle."

We carried on walking for what felt like forever. Jamie told us a few bits about the Diamond Generation. The afterlife that had managed to find their families had made a home for themselves away from the entrance. Quite a lot of them lived in huge burned out castles or spooky old 'human' prisons. It seemed like the Diamonds loved all the human myths about them and tried to live that way. Because time was slow in this world, they could fly around their generation but it would take them two years to circle it just once. The world was very vast. The Diamonds that had families probably lived a happy life, but Jamie couldn't be sure. It was hard knowing if anyone could be truly fulfilled never being able to sleep, eat or do anything again. There were also a lot of old people in the generation. As we walked underneath them, I tried to silently guess at some of their ages. Some looked so old that even two hundred years old would have been a complimenting guess. Jamie explained that it was because being a ghost was more effective if you were ancient and scary. Of course, some of them liked to rewind and become a little girl ghost or a little boy ghost, but they had their own section of the world quite a way from here. I was glad about that. I thought those sorts of ghosts were the scariest of them all.

We finally came to the road we wanted to get to and it was a relief to walk without seeing a thousand eerie ghosts above our heads. We were only a little way down the road, on our way to check out what they called the 'happy family castles' when a ghost blocked our way. I was surprised to see him walking instead of flying. I thought he looked somewhat worried but it was so hard to tell. He studied Jamie and I, before freezing at Mel. Jamie muttered something about not walking near him in case I walked through him, but as I looked at this ghost more, realisation hit me. He had light blue eyes. He had freckles on his nose. He was about the same height as Mel. And if I wasn't mistaken, he was around our age.

"Mel."

The ghost echoed as he spoke. Mel huddled in closer to me.

"Who's asking?"

The ghosts eyes smiled. I knew that if he could actually smile, he would.

"I'm not asking. I'm stating the facts. You are Mel. You're my sister."

I had realised this about a minute before he had spoken. Mel gasped and Jamie gave an exclamation of surprise.

"We are twins. I'm Drew. I've been watching over you."

Mel shook her head in disbelief. I pushed her forward slightly, so she could talk to him properly. Witnessing this moment was quite something, I could even sort of see why so many picked the afterlife.

"Why should I believe you?"

I groaned inside at Mels question. Being a vampire, this chance of meeting her family was never meant to happen for her. She needed to believe him and spend precious time with him while we were in this world.

"Because we are family. And I chose this life to either reunite or watch over my family. Our Dad is Matthew Perkins, the Mayor of the Rubies. And he already knows you are missing. He knows that you are his daughter because the Mayors are an exception, they get to have extra powers including knowing their families. He's always known about you Mel. But it doesn't matter. Because as we speak, he is hatching a plan to find you. And he will."

Jamie shrugged, trying to act as if he wasn't bothered.

"And if he finds us? Then what?"

Drew looked at each of us in turn, then at the floor.

"It doesn't matter that Mel gets a year guaranteed or that she's his daughter. If he finds you, he will kill you. He will kill you all."