-PART SEVEN-

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They climbed in silence down the shaft, Kathy going through everything in her mind. She was a reincarnation, but how was she linked? How was Stone linked? Why was it only them remaining? She hadn't told Stone, but she'd noticed Laurence as she'd realised it had been her who had caused the deaths of the other students. The lock on the door was broken, and though the attackers hadn't got past, they'd driven so much force into it that Laurence had fallen from where he had sat with the almighty behind the door. His head had cracked on the cobbled floor where the rug hadn't fallen. Or so she presumed. If not, he was dead anyway. The ghost seemed to have known what the outcome was going to be and hadn't included Laurence. 

It was halfway down the long ladder that she realised it was a well. Water still dripped down the walls, and when they reached the coved out base they were knee-deep in water. Stone whimpered as above they heard smashes and yells above and Kathy shivered, glad she'd covered the trapdoor when they'd gone down. They still had problems, though. The Professor had mentioned a ghost, but Katherine saw no one. Heard no one. For a long pause they stood in the cold water in silence. Stone's small voice echoed round as he took her hand and made her jump.

"Kim, what are we going to do? This whole night has been mad and...I'm scared. Very scared." He was trembling as he said it, and now she was preoccupied, Kathy leant down to hug the boy. She could feel him shaking and marvelled at his difference as his reincarnation. Because that's what she what she was assuming. That both of them were reincarnated because of something they did that night.

As she was hugging him, they heard the dripping of water and both broke out suddenly to see a ghost. A woman, slowly walking forward, soaked to the skin. Kathy gasped as the woman drew closer, realising that the ghost must have had a long and slow death of drowning - the whole of her body was wrinkled and bloated from soaking in the water and her eyes bulging from misshapen skin. She looked almost bald as dark, lank hair clung to her head. Her clothes were strangely torn and drained of all colour, and her one of her front teeth gone as she opened her mouth to speak.

"You have come, then." Was her simple words. Kathy found herself strangely scared. The ghost was familiar in some way. Somehow.

"Yes." Was her quiet answer. "The Professor - the professor said you could help us."

"Of course." The ghost smiled the smallest of smiles. "I am the only one."

Slwoly, the figure moved through the water to raise her hand to the wall. Kathy watched with bewideement as the ghost put her hand through a hole and groped for something.

"What are you-" She paused. The ghost had turned and in her hand lay on object. A knife. Pearl-Handled and ornately shaped with a cruel blade. Slowly, the ghost advanced, though how she could hold the object Kathy did not know. The look on the spirit's face was strange...sorrowful, as she handed the object to Kathy.

"That should do it." The ghost spoke, smiling as she regarded the knife lying against Kathy's hand. She looked up at Katherine and laughed eerily as she searched her eyes and Katherine felt an uncomfortable coldness spread through her body. Something about the ghost wasn't quite right. Didn't quite fit.

"What do we do with it?" Stone asked the question for her and for the first time Kathy felt some gratitude towards the boy.

The ghost looked to him in sadness. "First you must wash it in the water. It must be clean." Kathy noticed the knife was covered in dust and dirt, and slowly, nodding, lay the knife in the water and began to clean in gently. When she took it out, the light from the ghost's ectoplasm showed that it was shining silver, no longer dull. The spirit turned to Kathy and moved her hand to point at her palm.

"Now, you have to draw your blood."

Kathy stared at the spirit with disbelief. "What? I can't - it could give us blood poisoning and-" She paused and eyed the ghost. "And why? Why do you need our blood?"

"It is not me. It is you who needs it." The ghost answered in sad tones. "The knife is enchanted - it is an object of the afterlife given to me by my father for this day, the day he knew would come. That cursed object did not just find it's way into the castle - he knew it would come. He had to have you two here at the right time, to make sacrifices. The cursed box is a thing of hell, sent here by the devil himself to destroy the greedy humans that long for Christmas." She looked closely at Katherine. "The Knife, however, is a thing of heaven. To give you a chance. By drawing your blood, you two will come back as reincarnations to fulfil this day in modern life." The ghost smiled at Kathy. "And you, you understand."

Kathy, feeling coldness in her body, did understand, and Stone was silent, as if working it out, though Kahyw was not watching him. She was looking at the ghost. "Who are you?" In her curiosity, she did not feel the knife be gently lifted off her palms.

The ghost looked sadly at her. "You'll soon find out."

Katherine felt irritation. "That's what the Professor said." She told the ghost. "Just tell me. How can it hurt me."

"In more ways than one." The ghost answered infuriatingly. Kathy felt a slight temper work it's way up in her throat.

"Just tell me! If I'm going to do this, I would at least like to know who you a-"

She broke off as suddenly there was gasp from Stone and she spun round to see him holding the knife, blood running down his hand. "Stone! How-"

Once again she broke off as the boy became a man. In a matter of seconds.

The ghost smiled as Kathy reviewed the Stone she had known a week before. She gazed at him in wonder, then with resolution, took up the knife and slashed her own skin. As the blood ran down her arm, she felt herself change to. For a second, they were themselves, two adults facing a ghost in wonder. The next minute, the ghost took the knife off them and began to wash it again. In their blood.

"What are you doing?" Kathy demanded, confused. "Why are you-"

And again Kathy did not finish her sentence as the ghost plunged the dainty, pearl-handled knife into her chest.