Holly Black by Geektastic (v5) Read Free Book Online Page A

confused.
    “
Thirty years ago
, maybe,” Ellen snorted, rolling her eyes. “Here, this is from me. For all of the thousands of bad guys in your life.” She gave a meaningful look to Ezra. Then she smugly held up a case.
    Montgomery popped the catches and opened the top.
    “Oh, my gosh,” she said.
    Inside was a single piece of sharpened wood.
    “MR. POINTY!” she screamed in delight.
    “You gave Buffy’s weapon…her stake…to the
cheerleader
,” David said with a whistle. “Sheer genius.”
    “Ohhhhh, sweet,” Mica said with admiration.
    “Nice,” Ezra said grudgingly.
    “I win,” Ellen said happily.
    “Thanks, you guys, all of you,” Montgomery said, clutching the stake to her heart. She felt an actual tear forming. “I thought this was going to be horrible. But it wasn’t. Much. Sort of. You guys made it a lot of fun. I’m going to miss you. You most of all, Scarecrow,” she sniffed loudly, pointing at Ellen.
    But her eyes darted over to Mica.
    He smiled quietly back.
    THE CON
    “Where is she? Do you see her yet?” David whispered. He was crouched down behind Mica and Ezra, who were sharing a pair of binoculars. All three were hiding behind a shelf of books at The Neverending Story’s booth. Mica wore a pith helmet.
    “No—wait, there’s Ryan and Reese…there she is!” Ezra said excitedly.
    “What’s she doing?” David whined.
    “They’re by the Knight’s Arms. She’s…she’s picking up a d’k tahg.”
    “Let me see!” Mica grabbed the glasses. “No, it’s too small, you moron. That’s totally a Klingon throwing knife, or maybe B’Etor’s….”
    “Oh, come on, look at the blood gutter….”
    David tapped them on the shoulders. “Guys, where’d she go?”

    “Hey, Montgomery.”
    “Oh my gosh,
Ellen
!”
    The cheerleader’s eyes popped out of her head. So did Ryan’s.
    The geek girl was in a yellow and black iridescent catsuit, holding a mask with what looked like giant pointy ears. An iridescent red-black cape hung from her shoulders, matching her boots.
    She looked, in a word, great.
    “Ellen Epstein?” Ryan said, backing up to get a better look. He was grinning in shock. “Really? You look
hot
.”
    Montgomery gave him a quick frown.
    “Ellen, you really do look great,” she said honestly. “You should…”
    “What, wear this more often?” Ellen said with a giggle. “Have you seen the guys around? They promised to escort me to the masquerade.”
    “Oh, yes. Dumb, dumber, and dumbest are ‘hiding’ over there,” Montgomery said dryly, pointing at the bookseller’s stall. Three awkward shadows ducked down. “Who are you supposed to be, anyway?”
    “Who cares?” Ryan said.
    “Um, Kathy Kane? Batwoman? From the sixties? I’d better put the mask back on before Kim sees me without it. She spent
weeks
working on it. She’ll kill me,” Ellen said, fitting the unwieldy thing on. Ryan kept staring.
    It should have been a little triumph for the geek. The quarterback was obviously drooling over
her
, and ignoring his pretty little cheerleading girlfriend.
    But Batwoman hopped nervously from one foot to the other, obviously looking for an escape.
    “You should
totally
do spandex more often,” Ryan said, circling around her to get a better look.
    “RYAN!” Montgomery growled.
    “Hey, guys!” a perky voice said. A
completely
inappropriately cheery and busty vampire skipped up to them, tossing her raven-black hair and cheap capelet over her shoulders.
    “Susan?!” Montgomery demanded.
    The other cheerleader gave her a pouty smile that was not at all impeded by fangs. “My idiot brother loves this stuff. I told Mom and Dad I’d chaperone.”
    She batted glittery eyelashes at Ryan, whose eyeballs couldn’t decide which costumed girl to look at.
    THE INEVITABLE CLIMAX
    When you’re a cheerleader, even an unusual cheerleader who seeks knowledge beyond her normal ken, you’re still bound by cheerleader laws. One of which is that everyone in the