I look around, not really sure what I should be doing. Pretty much everyone seems to be sharing that feeling. Everyone has crowded into the room or is standing in the doorway, everyone sharing a look of uncertainty.

“This has never happened before?” I ask Marina.

“You were here for the worst one, when she was screaming,” she answers. “She’s always woken up before.”

“I don’t like this,” grumbles Nine from the doorway. Bernie Kosar seems to agree; he stands at the foot of the bed, sniffing the air like a guard dog catching a bad scent.

“She’s sweating so much,” says Marina.

“Some kind of fever?” John asks.

“It was never like this during my visions,” Eight says. “You guys?”

John and Nine both shake their heads.

Marina grabs a towel from a nightstand drawer and begins to dab at Ella’s forehead. Her hands are shaking so badly that Sarah eases the towel away from her. “Here,” she says, “let me do it.”

Eight puts his arm around Marina as she steps back from the bed, rubbing her back. Marina leans against him gratefully.

“Should we try healing her?” Six asks. “Or using one of the healing stones?”

“There’s nothing to heal,” John replies. “Not that we can see, anyway. And using the stone . . . who knows what might happen, what with it doubling the pain and all.”

“Did you try just prying her eyes open?” suggests Five. Everyone gives him a strange look, like it’s a callous suggestion, but it actually doesn’t seem much worse than letting Ella suffer through whatever nightmare she’s having. “What? You guys have better ideas?”

Gently, my father peels back one of Ella’s eyelids. Her eye is completely rolled back in her head; we can only see the whites. I remember the time I got knocked off the rope in gym class by Mark James and had to get a concussion test. They shined a flashlight in my eyes.

“John, maybe you could use your Lumen?” I suggest. “It’s bright, it might wake her up.”

John reaches over, lighting up his hand like a flashlight and shining it into Ella’s eye. For a moment, her body stops its constant twitching and she seems to relax.

“Something’s happening,” I breathe.

“Ella, wake up,” urges Marina.

Ella’s hand snaps upwards, grabbing John’s wrist with a force that startles him. It reminds me of one of those scary movies where the little girl is possessed by a demon. Her hand glows red where it touches John’s skin.

“What’s she doing?” Sarah gasps.