Search Worlds Without End

By both society's measure and her own, fifteen-year-old Zoe Mahar is pretty much a loser. Then one day she ducks into Spencerport Savings and Loan simply to get out of the rain--and witnesses a bank robbery gone horrifyingly wrong.

The good news is that Zoe has a unique ability: she can play back time and repeat events. But it's not an unlimited deal--she can only jump 23 minutes, and her first playback creates an even more disastrous outcome. Zoe has only ten tries to get it right before this particular 23 minutes becomes irreversible. But in the process of trying to become the heroine she doesn't believe she can be, Zoe will learn about herself--and realize that there is more to who she is than she thought.

A boy is trapped in a possessed car that stalled in the path of and oncoming train. A girl is dragged into a crypt during a field trip to an eighteenth-century cemetery. A group of friends meet their fate after an unsettling visit with a backwood psychic. And thats just the beginning.

Celebrated author Vivian Vande Velde is her spine-tingling best in this collection of thirteen scary stories, all of which take place on Halloween night. With tales that range from the disturbing to the downright gruesome, this is one collection that teens will want to read with the lights on...and the doors locked.

When Kerry's little brother forgets his stuffed bear at the laundry, Kerry ventures out at 11th p.m. to retrieve it for him. The laundry is deserted and kind of spooky, and while she's there three men burst in, dragging a bound and bloodied young man they insist is a vampire. Kerry helps him escape, only to be caught up in a desperate game between vampire hunters and their prey.

A spell that gets you land, money, long golden hair, or a date to the prom can't be a curse, can it? A curse just gets you dead. Or does it?... In these ten stunning short stories, boys and girls learn firsthand just what magic spells, enchantments, and curses really can do.

Table of Contents:

• ix - Introduction: About That Title ...
• 1 - Curses, Inc.
• 45 - Skin Deep
• 63 - Past Sunset
• 82 - To Converse with the Dumb Beasts
• 91 - Boy Witch
• 105 - Lost Soul
• 126 - Remember Me
• 144 - Witch-Hunt
• 154 - Cypress Swamp Granny
• 180 - The Witch's Son
• 219 - Afterword: Where Do Ideas Come From?

Fifteen-year-old Alys is not a witch. But that doesn't matter--the villagers think she is and have staked her out on a hillside as a sacrifice to the local dragon.

It's late, it's cold, and it's raining, and Alys can think of only one thing--revenge. But first she's got to escape, and even if she does, how can one girl possibly take on an entire town alone?

Then the dragon arrives--a dragon that could quite possibly be the perfect ally....

Nola's not much of a witch--she can work only a few useless spells, like the one that lets her spy on people. But there's no spell for keeping her crazy mother--who hears voices and is a magnet for witch-hunters--out of trouble. The two flee from town to town until the day Nola witnesses a murder. Which is bad enough, but worse is that the murderer may frame Nola and her mother for the crime. And then no amount of magic will save her.

And you think your teenage years are tough....

When Selwyn, a farmer, is accused of murdering his rival, Farold, he is sealed in the village burial cave with Farold's moldering corpse to await starvation--or worse. Worse comes along quickly in the form of a witch who raises Farold from the dead.

Selwyn thought he disliked Farold when he was alive, but that was nothing compared to working by the dead man's side as they search for the real killer.

Dark forces are taking hold in the kingdom of Camelot: King Arthur struggles to keep his knights in line as they steadily divide themselves into factions; the great Merlin has vanished at the hands of his lover and pupil, Nimue; wizards all over the countryside battle for whatever measures of power they can find. At the center of the maelstrom stands Keira, an innocent girl who possesses the ability to foretell the fate of her world. When Keira is kidnapped from her village home, her mother, Alayna, flees to Camelot and finds Mordred, an enigmatic knight who will ultimately become Keira's greatest champion, Alayna's greatest love, and King Arthur's greatest enemy.

Welland was less than a slave. Slaves are human, and he was wolf, allowed to assume human form only when it suited the sorceress Daria.

Daria kept an army of changelings - mostly wolf but some lynx or weasel, a bear or two, and at least one rat. She used them to hunt and kill. And sometimes to pretend to be human, so she could pretend to be a lady.

Weiland hated the lie almost as much as he hated the truth. Then he met a burglar, a thief named Shile, who offered to help him steal what he had never owned. His own troubled soul...

It's the most advanced computer role-playing game ever: When you play you're really there--in a dark dream teeming with evil creatures, danger-filled fortresses, and malevolent sorceries.

The game plugs directly into your brain--no keyboard, no modem, no monitor. And for game hacker Arvin Rizalli and his friends, no cash up front, no questions asked... and no hope of rescue when the game goes horribly, deathly wrong.

In the virtual reality game Heir Apparent, there are way too many ways to get killed--and Giannine seems to be finding them all. Which is a darn shame, because unless she can get the magic ring, locate the stolen treasure, answer the dwarf's dumb riddles, impress the head-chopping statue, charm the army of ghosts, fend off the barbarians, and defeat the man-eating dragon, she'll never win.

And she has to, because losing means she'll die--for real this time.

Grace Pizzelli is the average one, nothing like her brilliant older sister, Emily, who works for Rasmussem, creators of the world's best virtual reality games. The games aren't real, though--or at least they weren't. Now Emily has hidden herself inside a pink and sparkly game meant for little girls. No one knows why, or how to convince her to come back out, and the technology can't keep her safe for much longer. Grace may consider herself average, but she's the only one who can save Emily. So Grace enters the game, hoping to talk her sister out of virtual suicide before time runs out. Otherwise Emily will die--for real.