"So how's it going?" Summer asked as Mia sat down for history class. Mia could tell from her tone that it wasn't a social question.

"We're doing fine." Mia replied noncommittally.

"Fine?" Summer asked, and the skepticism was obvious. "I heard crying when I was out last night."

"Sometimes people - regular people - cry. Even at night."

"Is that the best you can do?"

Mia didn't say anything else. She was already helping against her will and spending much more time on this problem than she really thought was fair; Summer should be grateful. Mia had a lot of things going on lately, and to be honest, Summer's little banshee problem was pretty low on the list. She was working on it, sure. But it wasn't exactly a top priority. Mia understood why Summer might be annoyed, but she couldn't help but wonder why Summer wasn't doing anything about it, if she was so concerned. Still, Mia wisely decided not to say any of this to Summer. But when she didn't answer, Summer's eyes became cold.

"I don't like your attitude. I don't think you're really trying." There was more than a hint of threat in Summer's words.

"It's difficult to catch someone when they disappear as soon as they see you." Mia retorted.

"Yeah, they can be shy. They don't really like us - they probably don't like you either."

"And why wouldn't they like us? What did we do?" Mia had a pretty good idea why a banshee wouldn't like Summer; she didn't even bother to ask.

"It's not that you did anything." Summer told her. "You probably just remind them too much of us. You are trying to catch them, after all."

"So what does that mean? That they'll just disappear as soon as anyone gets near them? This doesn't even sound possible - why would you send us out to do something if it can't be done?"

"I didn't say it couldn't be done, did I? But if it were easy, we'd have already done it ourselves." Summer snapped. "It's taken you three an awfully long time to do this."

"It's hard. You just said so yourself." Mia pointed out. She was really getting tired of this.

"I did. But you've had months, and it doesn't seem like you're actually getting anywhere. I think we'll give you until the end of the year. After that, we'll have to start making other plans."

Mia didn't like the way Summer had emphasized "other plans," but she tried not to let it bother her. If they had until the end of the school year, there was plenty of time. It was only December, and Mia was sure they'd be able to figure something out. Even if their plan for this weekend failed, they'd still have five more months once they got back from winter break. But when Mia told Summer how they'd have it done in plenty of time, Summer just laughed.

"I didn't mean the end of the school year." she said. "I meant the end of the year. As in, three weeks from now."

Mia's eyes widened. It looked like whatever plan they had for this weekend had better work.

"What happens if we don't do it?" Mia said it as a challenge, trying to hide the fact that she really needed the answer. Summer just shrugged.

"We'll just have to see. I can tell you this though - you won't like it."

Mia swallowed. She clenched her jaw but didn't say anything. What could she say? She could bluff all she wanted, but when it came down to it, Mia knew that Summer would be able to do almost anything she felt like.

Summer got up to go sit in her usual seat and have a quiet conversation with Heather. Mia didn't bother to listen to it much, but pieces kept drifting over to her. Suddenly, both girls got real quiet. The lack of noise coming from their direction caught Mia's attention; something was going on. She listened carefully and heard Heather mutter something.

"I just hope they do it before the Dullahan comes."

Mia stiffened. What did that mean? Miss Millburn still wasn't there yet, so Mia decided to sneak into the seat behind Summer for a quick chat.

"What's a Dullahan?" Mia whispered over their shoulders, causing both girls to nearly jump out of their seats. Summer recovered first, and she turned around and glared pointedly at Mia. Mia wasn't sure if it was because she'd scared them or because she'd overheard their conversation, but she didn't care; it was worth it to see them shaken like that.

"The Dullahan." Summer corrected. "It's kind of like a banshee. I mean, it's related - they both have to do with death." Summer seemed hesitant to explain, making Mia all the more suspicious.

"What does it have to do with us?" Mia asked.

Summer and Heather exchanged looks with each other, and Mia knew they were trying to figure out how much information they should give her. Mia smiled; she knew something was going on. And whatever it was, she was going to make the most of it.

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want." Mia said flippantly. "And you can even tell anyone you want about how we got rid of two dangerous vampires last year. I'll just make sure that when this Dullahan comes around, everyone in school knows it was you that brought it here. Then who will they think the dangerous ones are?"

Mia got up to leave. She didn't know what a Dullahan was, but it was obviously something both of these girls were worried about. So if she could threaten them with it, that was fine with her. She didn't even get two steps away before Heather grabbed her arm.

"Wait." Heather said. "Go grab you backpack. There's a couple things you need to know."

Summer still looked like she didn't want to tell Mia anything, but Heather gave her a look that clearly said they had no choice. Mia walked the few feet to where she usually sat. She grabbed the handle of her backpack and walked it back over to the seat behind Summer.

One of the nicest things about Miss Millburn's class was that there was no seating chart. People tended to sit in the same seats every day, but they didn't actually have to. So the fact that Mia was moving seats for the day wasn't actually going to cause any problems. And this way, even when Miss Millburn did show up, Mia could continue asking Summer and Heather all the questions she wanted.

"So tell me about this Dullahan." Mia said, making herself comfortable.

"It's a kind of ghost - or demon, I guess." Heather said. "It rides around on a horse at night, looking for people."

"Looking for people?" Mia asked. "Looking how? Does it cry over people like the banshees do?"

"No. Actually, it's looking for people to take."

"Take?" Mia's concern was growing. She didn't like the sound of that at all and hoped she was just misunderstanding. "Take where?"

"You know...take. Like, they die."

Mia had never been so disappointed to learn that she hadn't misunderstood someone.

"So, what does that have to do with the banshees?"

"Well...the Dullahan is connected to the banshees. They cry when someone's about to die, yes. But that also attracts the Dullahan. And trust me, that's something we all really need to avoid."

Mia thought for a minute, trying to take in what they'd said. She really wanted to still be mad at them, but it was getting harder.

"You could have told us." Mia said grudgingly, not quite ready to give up her annoyance.

"We thought about that." Heather admitted. She exchanged a quick glance with Summer that let Mia know they'd been on opposite sides of that disagreement. "But some of us were worried that you wouldn't want to help if you knew about the Dullahan being involved. And we really need the help."

Mia wanted to ask Summer and Heather more about what a Dullahan actually was, and why they would need help dealing with it. But unfortunately, Miss Millburn chose that exact moment to walk into class. Apparently, there'd been a problem with the copy machine in the staff room. Mia didn't care what the problem was; she just wished it had lasted just a few minutes longer.

She'd been planning on dragging the information out of Summer anyway during class, but Summer knew a good excuse when she saw one. As soon as the teacher walked through the doors, she and Heather had turned around, and Mia couldn't get another word out of them.

***

Since she hadn't been able to get the information out of Summer, Mia decided to ask the one person in the school who would know. At the mere mention of the word, Carmine's eyes got real wide and her mouth dropped open.

"A what?" Carmine almost yelled. "Did you say a Dullahan?"

"Why? What is it?" Mia asked. Summer and Heather had been a little hesitant to give a lot of details, and now that Carmine was looking more worried than either of them, Mia was really starting to get nervous.

"A Dullahan is a headless ghost who rides around at night on his horse. And if you see him and he calls out your name, it means you're going to die."

"A headless ghost? Who rides around?" Anna asked.

"Yeah. And kills people." Carmine repeated.

"So...he's like the headless horseman?" Anna asked. Mia was glad to see that Anna was focusing on the same no-head part of the story as she was.

"Actually, some people think that's where that story came from. But that's not the point. The point is: I'm not doing this." Carmine pressed her lips together in a thin line. "I'm serious."

"Is it really that bad?" Mia asked. She knew everyone was really worried, and she could definitely understand how a headless ghost wouldn't exactly be a good thing. But it seemed possible that everyone was overreacting just a little.

"It really is." Carmine told her. "It's a hideous, frightening creature who does nothing but kill people."

"So was Fredrick." Anna said.

"No, not like Fredrick - not at all. This is way, way worse."

"So what are we supposed to do?" Mia asked. "Just give up?"

Normally, Mia would have been ok with giving up. This wasn't some evil she had decided to take on herself - she had been forced into it by people she still didn't like. But she'd seen how scared they were, and they'd asked for Mia and her friends to help. Sure, they hadn't asked until they'd been forced to, and she could still say that it wasn't her problem. But Mia could see how it might be bad to let this thing run loose.

"I know. I don't want to give up either." Carmine said, correctly interpreting Mia's tone. "And you know that normally I'd be the first person to try to track down and see anything supernatural. But this is way different. It's not just that the Dullahan kills - it's that it only kills. That's all it does. And I don't know about you guys, but I'm not actually interested in dying."

There was a silence while each of them took what they knew into consideration. Mia hadn't really thought about dying during all this. She'd just thought of the Dullahan as being about as dangerous as the banshees. After all, Summer had made the two sound so closely related; Mia had just assumed it would be almost as wimpy.

"I can't believe Summer didn't tell us about the Dullahan before." Anna said wistfully.

"Really?" Carmine asked in disbelief.

"Yeah. I mean, it seems like something she should have mentioned."

"Of course she should have mentioned it. But that doesn't mean she would." Carmine said, laughing bitterly. "Aren't you like three hundred years old? I would have thought you, of all people, would know more about fae."

"What do you mean?" Mia cut in. "What about them?"

"They're actually not that nice." Carmine explained. "I mean, now we make them out to be these little cute things that dance around with flowers and are nothing but sweet. But that's not what the older stories say."

"What do older stories say?" Mia asked with hesitation. So far, the more information she got about what was going on around her, the worse everything looked.

"Originally, fae were tricksters. They fooled people and did really mean things to them. If Summer and her group are anything like the older stories, I'm not surprised that their first plan was to trick us into helping."

"They could still be tricking us." Mia said slowly. She thought back, trying to remember if either Summer or Heather had done anything suspicious. Nothing came to mind, but that didn't necessarily mean they were telling the truth. She'd been fooled a lot lately - maybe this was just another one of those times.

"It doesn't sound like a trick." Carmine said quietly. "I mean, what would be the point? The only thing this information could possibly do is convince us not to help them. Why would they do that?"

"So what should we do?" Anna asked. "Do we just ignore it and hope everything will get better on its own?"

"It won't get better though." Carmine said after a brief hesitation. "Not if there really is a Dullahan around." She looked really pale, and Mia wondered if she was going to throw up.

"So what do we do?" Mia asked her.

"I'm not sure." Carmine answered. "For now, let's not worry too much about it, ok? We're going after the banshees this week. Next week, we can worry about everything else."