Date: 2023-03-30 10:59:20+00:00
Keywords: supernatural horror; gothic fantasy; dark fantasy; flame tree press; creepy stories; undead; fiction without frontiers
Description: If you enjoyed Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix or Authority by Jeff Vandermeer, then you'll love this latest horror novel from the Bram Stoker award-winning author Tim Waggoner. A sinister being called Night and her panther-like Harriers stalk their quarry, a man known only as Arron. Arron seeks refuge within an office building, a place Night cannot go, for it's part of the civilized world, and she's a creature of the Wild. To flush Arron out, she creates Blight, a reality-warping field that slowly transforms the building and its occupants in horrible and deadly ways. But unknown to Night, while s
Publisher: Flame Tree Publishing

Tim Waggoner

A Hunter Called Night

FLAME TREE PRESS

London & New York

*

This one’s for Josh Malerman, creative force of nature and positive voice in the horror community. The genre is so much better because you’re part of it.

Chapter One

Collier, Ohio. Now.

Arron ran through the woods, early morning air cold on sweat-covered skin, sky above a crisp light blue. It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day, and Arron wondered if he’d live long enough to enjoy it. At the moment, the odds were not in his favor.

There was no path here, and he was forced to run with leaping strides as he crashed through undergrowth, thin branches slapping his face and hands. It was the first week of May, plants and leaves a fresh bright green, air smelling of new life. Anyone else would’ve found the scent pleasant, even soothing, but Arron could smell the decay hidden within, already gnawing at the greenery. Everything that lived carried death within it – except for him. His death was behind him, and closing fast. He could hear the Harriers thrashing through the undergrowth as they pursued him. They could be silent as midnight shadows when they wished, but they wanted him to know they were coming for him, wanted him to be afraid. And he was. Very.

He saw flashes of darkness in his peripheral vision, and he knew at least two of the Harriers had pulled even with him. The other two most likely followed behind, and when the four deemed the time was right, the two on his flanks would rush ahead, whirl around, and come at him, while the pair at his back would race forward and attack from the rear, trapping him. It was exactly what he would’ve done in their place.

He didn’t know how long he’d been running. He’d sensed the Harriers on his trail just after sunrise, and they’d picked up his scent not long after that. He’d been running ever since, and his leg muscles burned, heavy like molten lead, each new step more of an effort than the one before. Pain pierced his lungs with each breath, and his heart beat hummingbird fast. His chest felt tight, constricted, and he wondered if he were on the verge of a heart attack.

He saw a break in the trees ahead, beyond it a small office building – gray, squat, three stories, sunlight glinting off windows, parking lot filled with vehicles. The building was a bland, anonymous structure, bereft of any personality whatsoever, but right then it was the most beautiful thing Arron had ever seen. He laughed with relief and ran faster, legs no longer heavy, chest no longer tight. Civilization called to him, and if he could reach it, he would be safe from the Harriers – and their mistress. For a time, at least.

The Harriers plunged through the undergrowth with increased speed, their movements almost frantic now, and Arron knew they’d spotted the office building and intended to bring him down before he could escape them. He had no weapons with which to fight, possessed no special skills. All he could do was keep running and pray he was fast enough. Moments later, he burst out of the woods and onto a neatly trimmed lawn, so surprised to still be alive that he almost stopped running and stood in shocked amazement. He might have, too, if a Harrier hadn’t emerged from the woods then and come bounding toward him, large paws thudding against the ground. The creature resembled a black panther, but it was bigger and so dark it seemed to be formed from living shadow. The white of its sharp teeth was a stark contrast to its black face, and its feral-yellow eyes shone with a cruel, cunning intelligence. The only thing that saved Arron was the lawn. As vegetation, the grass belonged to the Wild, but since it had been cultivated and cared for by humans, it was also part of the civilized world. As such, while the Harrier could still tread upon it, its speed was greatly diminished, forcing it to walk instead of run. Arron’s human form had no such limitation, and he continued on toward the parking lot.

He knew he shouldn’t waste time glancing over his shoulder, but he couldn’t stop himself. He saw the Harrier chasing him at a walk, head down and leaning forward as if pressing against a strong wind, growling in frustration. The three others emerged from the trees soon after, and they too were forced to slow their pace once their paws touched the lawn. Arron saw no sign of their mistress, but he knew she was coming. She was never far behind her Harriers. He looked forward once more and kept running, unwilling to slow down even for an instant until he had reached safety. The space between the woods and the parking lot wasn’t large, no more than fifty feet, but crossing it seemed to take a lifetime. Even though Arron knew there was no way the Harriers could catch up to him now, he still imagined that any moment he would feel the weight of a feline body slamming into him, bearing him to the ground….

A metallic-blue SUV was the closest vehicle, and when Arron reached it, he slumped onto its hood and gulped air. He remained like that for several moments, too exhausted to feel any sense of victory or relief. He heard growling then, and he forced himself to stand upright and turn to look at his pursuers. The four Harriers sat shoulder to shoulder at the edge of the grass, inches from where the parking lot’s asphalt began. There was no obvious barrier between Arron and the big cats, but the Harriers could no more enter the parking lot than if a three-foot thick steel wall lay between them.

Arron gave the cats a shaky smile.

“Too late – again.”

The Harriers’ growls grew deeper, and their yellow eyes blazed with frustration. Then she stepped forth from the woods and began walking toward her cats, movements slow and languid, as if she were part feline herself. Night was a tall, thin woman with long blond hair and sharp features. She wore a black leather jacket, black shirt, black leather jeans, and black boots. There were five small nubs on her left hand where fingers should be, and her expression was one of barely repressed fury. She stopped when she reached the Harriers and stood just behind them, stroking the head of the nearest with her right hand, which was fully intact.

“You’ve given me a great deal of trouble these last few years, Arron. Aren’t you tired of running?”

Despite the anger in her face, Night’s voice was cool and calm, like a nighttime radio DJ’s, honey-smooth, almost hypnotic.

Arron’s throat was dry from breathing so harshly during his run, and when he spoke, his voice was a rasping croak.

“I’ll never stop.”

Night’s eyes were as yellow as her cats’, and they flashed with irritation.

“Wherever you go in this world, I can track you, and whatever hole you manage to find to hide in, eventually I’ll be able to reach in and pull you out. You can’t win, Arron. It’s simply not possible.”

Up to this point, Arron had avoided meeting Night’s gaze, but he forced himself to look directly into her eyes now, although he couldn’t stop himself from trembling as he did.

“Seems to me I’ve been winning for years,” he said.

Night clenched her jaw but said nothing.

Arron imagined what he must look like to her – a too-lean man with matted shoulder-length black hair and a thick unkempt beard, eyes sunken, cheekbones prominent, white long-sleeved linen shirt and light brown pants covered with stains, mud and grass, mostly, but there was some blood there too. Yes, there was. His leather sandals were scuffed and worn, the straps barely holding together. It had been a while since he’d seen himself in a mirror, but he knew he looked like he could be anywhere from forty to seventy, a walking, breathing scarecrow, tired, spent, weak. And there was nothing Night had more contempt for than weakness.

Night stepped forward, the Harriers moving aside to make room for her. Arron knew she could not reach him as long as he remained off the grass, but his body still tensed as if anticipating an attack. When she reached the edge of the parking lot, she stopped and looked down, as if contemplating the unseen barrier between them. Then she crouched, fixed her gaze on Arron, and pressed her right hand to the ground. Arron felt her summoning power from deep within, and the air became heavy and charged, like the last moments before the eruption of a violent thunderstorm. The grass around her hand dried, turned black, and Arron saw the leading edge of the dead spot begin edging toward the parking lot, moving slowly, torturously, a fraction of an inch at a time, but moving nevertheless. The Blight spread sideways as well, right and left, moving much faster as it began to trace the lot’s outline, and Arron realized Night was attempting to box him in.

She stood.

“Are we really going to play this game again?” she asked.

In answer, Arron turned and began running toward the building, Night’s laughter following him.

Chapter Two

“Good morning, Ms. Morgan. The usual?”

Bethany smiled. “Yes, please.”

Salvador Tran returned her smile then looked over his shoulder at a petite woman in her early twenties, her short hair dyed a dark maroon. “One large latte, Yvette.”

The woman stood at the back counter, refilling a coffee urn with grounds. She didn’t turn around to look at Salvador, her only reply an inarticulate grunt that could’ve meant anything – or nothing. Salvador frowned, faced Bethany once more, and gave her an apologetic look. She broadened her smile and paid for her drink.

“How is your fiancée?” Salvador asked. “Is she feeling any better?”

Elissa had been off work for the last week, fighting a really bad cold. Salvador was always inquiring about people’s health, and while he’d never said anything to indicate it, Bethany had the impression that he was still worried about COVID-19, even though there had been a vaccine for a while now. Maybe he’d had it, or a friend or loved one had. She hoped he hadn’t lost anyone to the disease.

“She’s on the road to recovery,” Bethany said. That didn’t tell the whole story, of course. Elissa suffered from frequent migraines, and they became worse whenever she got sick. Right now she was home in bed, lights out, taking NSAIDs, and managing as best she could. Bethany had offered to stay home and care for her, but Elissa had insisted she go to work.

You can’t let Nate be alone in the office all day. Imagine how many things he’ll fuck up if you aren’t there to stop him.

Salvador beamed. “Good, good. Give her my best.”

“I will.”

Bethany was in her early thirties, medium height, with short curly brown hair, cute rather than beautiful. She wore a white long-sleeved blouse, black slacks, a pair of comfortable black flats, brown purse slung over her left shoulder. Sometimes she had the impression that Salvador was flirting with her, even though he knew she was gay. Some men were turned on by the idea of ‘converting’ a gay woman, saw it as a challenge. She told herself that Salvador just enjoyed people, and what she viewed as flirting was likely nothing more than his natural warm demeanor toward his customers. Still, sometimes she wondered….

She stepped off to the side so the next person in line could order.

Grinders was the only place to get coffee, pastries, and snacks in the Delgado Building, and as such, it did steady business throughout the workday. Customers came in off the street as well, and it never ceased to impress Bethany how Salvador seemed to know almost everyone’s name. She wished she could get him to call her by her first name, though. Ms. Morgan sounded too formal and stuffy, a name for an older woman. Much older. But Salvador Tran, while warm and genial, had respectfully declined when she’d asked him to use her first name. It’s important for a businessman to show respect for his customers, he’d explained. He was middle-aged, stocky, and clean-shaven, and wore a black t-shirt with the Grinders logo on it, along with black pants. He also wore a green apron to protect his clothing from spills – a common hazard in his line of work. Yvette wore the same outfit, although her clothes were rumpled and in obvious need of washing. Grinders wasn’t very large: a brewing area, front counter with register, display case for pastries and muffins, three small tables with wooden chairs. People usually got their coffee and snacks to go, so the tables went unused much of the time. Grinders was located on the ground floor of the building, facing the street to attract outside business, and every day Salvador put a chalk signboard on the sidewalk outside announcing special deals. Today espresso shots were fifty per cent off, and Bethany had been tempted to take advantage of the offer. She’d slept on the couch last night so Elissa could have the bedroom to herself, but she’d drifted in and out, periodically getting up to see if Elissa needed anything, and now she felt like a goddamned zombie. She needed some serious caffeine if she was going to make it through the day in even a semi-somnambulant state, but she thought it would be better to pace herself. A few shots of espresso might get her going, but she’d crash before lunchtime. Better to take it slow and steady. It was Monday, just after nine a.m., and five o’clock was a long way off.

A handful of other people stood around waiting for their drinks, each keeping a fair amount of distance from the others. COVID-19 might not be a major concern anymore, but some of the social-distancing habits that people had developed during the pandemic still lingered.

“You seem lost in thought this morning.”

Bethany turned to see Soo Cockrell smiling at her. Soo was a psychologist who had a practice called Healthy Minds on the second floor. Bethany had gone to see her a couple times – at Elissa’s insistence – to talk about her issues with codependence, not that she thought she had a real problem with it. She’d gone primarily to make Elissa happy, which, now that she thought about it, was codependent in itself, wasn’t it? Soo was a short woman in her late fifties, possessed of what some might call a matronly figure. Her white hair was almost a buzz cut, and she wore autumn colors today – a brown knit sweater that was too big for her over a tan blouse, with a brown skirt and boots. She’d always struck Bethany as something of an earth mother type, and her outfit reinforced that impression.

Bethany smiled. “No deep thoughts. Just trying to wake up.”

Soo smiled. “Aren’t we all? So how are things going between you and Elissa? Well, I hope.”

Bethany’s brow furrowed slightly. It felt like Soo was probing, and Bethany wanted to tell her that she wasn’t her therapist anymore, but then again, she supposed the woman’s question was benign enough. Don’t be so suspicious, she told herself. She’s just taking an interest to be polite.

“They are. We’re getting married in August.”

“How wonderful! Are you planning a small ceremony or are you going to do it up big?”

“We haven’t decided yet. Elissa wants the whole thing – a church wedding, lots of guests, limo ride to the reception, a formal dinner, the cake cutting, throwing the garter, all of it.”

“And you’d prefer something more intimate.”

“Yeah. A short ceremony in front of a judge would be enough for me.”

This had become a sore spot between them. Bethany wanted to give Elissa the kind of wedding she desired – Of course you do. You’re codependent, remember? – but she’d never been comfortable being the center of attention, especially when it came to a large group. All those eyes watching her…. Just the thought made her feel queasy. They’d last argued about it several days ago, right before Elissa came down with her cold.

Don’t you want to celebrate our love in front of the whole world? Or are you ashamed of it…ashamed of me?

It wasn’t that. Elissa had been raised by very liberal, progressive parents, but Bethany’s family were evangelical Christians who took a dim view of homosexuality, to put it mildly. Her parents hadn’t cut off all ties with her after she’d come out, thankfully, but they’d made it clear that the topic of her love life was decidedly off limits in their household. Don’t ask, don’t tell. She seriously doubted anyone in her family would attend her wedding, and she didn’t want to look out at the church as she and Elissa stood at the altar and not see her parents, her brother, or her sister in attendance. She wanted her wedding day to be a joyous occasion, unmarred by even a hint of sadness. She’d tried explaining this to Elissa, but she simply couldn’t understand. Her parents were loving and supportive, and she believed Bethany’s would be too, if she only gave them a chance.

“I’m sure the two of you will work things out,” Soo said. “Just make sure to keep the lines of communication open.”

Yvette approached the side counter, cup in hand. “Black tea!” she called out. She set the cup down and went off to make the next drink.

“That’s me,” Soo said. She went over to pick up her tea, took it to the condiment station, and added cream and sugar. She took a sip, nodded in satisfaction, then replaced the plastic lid and returned to Bethany.

“I hope you have a good day,” Soo said.

“You too,” Bethany replied, and Soo left.

Bethany stifled a yawn as she continued waiting on her latte, regretting that she hadn’t asked for a couple shots of espresso to go with it.

Gonna be a long day, she thought.

* * *

The Delgado Building had a single elevator located in the center of the ground floor. Since the building was only three stories, Bethany usually took the stairs whenever she wished to move from one floor to the next. She thought of it as a way to get a bit of a workout in during business hours. She also went for a short walk during lunch, assuming the weather co-operated. But today she was too wiped out for the stairs, so she walked to the elevator and pressed the button to summon it. It was old and slow – Aren’t we all? she thought – and its machinery came to life with a low, shuddering hum.

The Delgado Building’s ground floor plan was simple: main hallway running from east to west, various offices located behind tan wooden doors, small wall signs indicating business names, no windows in the corridor. Bisecting the main hallway was a shorter one that connected the front and rear entrances – both glass doors with vertical metal handles – and which housed the elevator, a drinking fountain, and the men’s and women’s restrooms. The floor was white tile, although it had grown dingy over the years and was more than ready to be replaced. The design was straight out of the 1960s, dull and utilitarian, bereft of even a hint of charm. Bethany would’ve preferred to work in a place where there was more space and light, art on the walls, plants by the elevator, somewhere that didn’t feel so much like a prison. At least the restrooms were always clean.

The elevator car was on the third floor, and while she waited for it to descend, the door to the parking lot flew open and a man rushed in – long brown hair, full beard, dressed like he worked at a Renaissance fair. His face was flushed and he was breathing heavily, as if he’d made a mad dash from his car to the building. Had it started to rain outside? The forecast didn’t call for it, but that meant nothing as the weather in Ohio could change at a moment’s notice. The man didn’t look wet, though, and a quick glance at the parking lot showed Bethany that it was dry outside. He stopped abruptly and turned back to the door, as if he expected someone to be following him. He stared out at the parking lot for several seconds before turning away, breathing easier now but looking far from relaxed. That’s when he noticed Bethany. He regarded her for a moment, and she thought he might say something, but instead he rushed past her and hurried to the building’s front entrance. He started to open the door, but then he looked down at the sidewalk outside, and hesitated. She had no idea what he saw, but whatever it was, it caused him to close the door and step back.

Weird.

An odor hit her then, a musky, loamy scent, like that of a thick dark forest where creatures of fur and claw glided unseen through shadows, a smell both repellent and intriguing, so strong it was almost dizzying. She swayed on her feet for a second, and in her mind, she saw a mountainous form on four gigantic legs moving ponderously through dim mists lit by coruscating lightning. She had trouble making out the thing’s features, except for its glittering yellow eyes, which sliced through the darkness like lasers.

The elevator finally reached the ground floor with a less-than-comforting chunk, and Bethany abruptly returned to herself, the vision forgotten. A loud ding, and the door slid open slowly, as if in no hurry to go about its work. Bethany glanced at the strange man one last time. The building didn’t have a security office, so there was no one she could contact to check on him. She could always call the police, she supposed, but the man – while acting strange – hadn’t actually done anything threatening. If he had behaved the same way but had a haircut and shave and been dressed in a suit and tie, would she have felt so uneasy about him? Probably not. She didn’t want to be one of those middle-class white women who called 911 every time they saw someone ‘suspicious’, which was usually code for ‘Black’ or ‘poor’. The man was likely here for some appointment – maybe to see Soo – and was confused. He’d soon orient himself, and if he was unsure where to go, he’d consult the building directory attached to the wall next to the elevator. You don’t have to help everyone in the world, she reminded herself.

She looked away from the man and stepped into the elevator. She pressed the button for the second floor, and the door slid shut with torturous slowness. Feeling guilty for not at least asking the man if he needed assistance – and feeling irritated at herself for feeling that guilt – she sighed, and the elevator began to carry her upward.

“Gotta toughen up, kid,” she said to herself.

In her subconscious, she smelled the Wild, saw those gigantic inhuman amber eyes, and without realizing why she did so, she shuddered.

* * *

Arron was about to step out of the building when he saw the black line of Blight on the sidewalk. The demarcation was thin, not yet strong enough to affect a human – although it soon would be – but he was bound by certain rules, and stepping over the line was impossible. He had no doubt the line of Blight encircled the entire building, and despite himself, he was impressed. Night might be diminished in power after their last encounter, but she’d learned from it too, had gotten craftier.

He was trapped.

Regardless of how this day’s events played out, he was determined to make things as difficult for Night as possible. He glanced at the elevator just in time to see the woman he’d run past get on. He debated whether to approach her, but by the time he decided to do so, the elevator door closed. He hurried over and tapped the button three times in rapid succession, but he was too late. The door remained closed and the elevator began to rise. Above the door was a small rectangular plastic panel divided into three squares, one for each of the floors. The number one was currently lit up, and as he watched, it dimmed and the number two became illuminated. He waited to see if the elevator would go all the way to the third floor, but it remained where it was. The woman, it seemed, worked on the second floor. Good to know, in case he had need of her later. He’d been running all night, and right now what he needed most was a good strong cup of coffee. This building had a café of some kind; he could smell it. He was safe – for the moment, at least – and he could use some time to rest, gather his thoughts, and plan his next move.

He turned away from the elevator and began following the scent of brewing coffee.

* * *

Harvey Logue sat at a table in Grinders, sipping a black coffee and reading the morning news on his phone. The MedTek office opened at eight, but they’d been swamped yesterday, and he’d stayed late last night finishing a series of blood tests. Because of this, Jinny had told him that he didn’t need to come in until 9:30 this morning – which he’d deeply appreciated. He’d planned to use the extra two hours to sleep in, but he was one of those people whose bodies run on a strict biological clock, and despite setting his phone alarm for 8:45, he’d woken at six as usual. He’d tried going back to sleep, but it had been no use, and by 6:20 he gave up and got out of bed. He had breakfast, went for a run, came home, showered, and – with nothing better to do – left for the Delgado Building.

You badly need to get a life, my friend, he thought.

Harvey was a short, stout man in his late thirties with thinning brown hair and face that a former girlfriend had once described as resembling a ‘happy bulldog’. He wore blue medical scrubs with the MedTek logo over the left breast and a pair of comfortable sneakers. He was on his feet much of the day, and as far as he was concerned, his shoes were just as important to his work as needles, blood collection tubes, and medical exam gloves. Maybe more. He was currently ‘unencumbered’, as he described it to his friends, which was a fancy way of saying that he slept alone each night. While he was not by any stretch of the imagination handsome, he had a boyish charm that, along with his so-ugly-you’re-cute looks, attracted plenty of women. He never had any trouble finding someone to date. His problem was keeping them around for more than a few months. His longest relationship had lasted barely over a year, and they’d even begun to talk marriage when she lost interest and drifted away. The problem is you’re all surface, she’d said. You don’t have any depth, you know? You go to work, you make like Count Dracula all day, then you come home and sit in front of the TV all night watching shows or playing video games. You don’t want to go out anywhere or do anything. You just veg.

He hadn’t bothered trying to argue with her. How could he? Everything she’d said was true. But what did she expect, that he would be working on a cure for cancer in his spare time or trying to figure out how to achieve world peace? He had a steady job and he made a decent salary. He might live in a modest apartment and drive a pre-owned vehicle, but he wasn’t in debt and had money in savings. So he liked to relax at the end of the day. What was so bad about that? Not a damn thing, as far as he was concerned. Unfortunately, he had yet to meet a woman who saw it like that. They wanted a guy who was ambitious, who was going somewhere, who wanted to make something of himself. Whenever he challenged this, asked them, Make what exactly? they’d just look at him, shrug, and say, Anything.

As usual, Grinders had a steady stream of customers this morning, most of whom Harvey had ignored, but when a weird-smelling guy with a beard walked in, he took notice. The man stood at the rear of the café, squinting as he tried to read the menu posted on the wall behind the counter. Evidently, he found a drink that sounded good to him because he stepped to the rear of the line. There were three customers ahead of him, and they glanced back at the newcomer with varying degrees of interest. One woman wrinkled her nose in disgust and quickly faced forward once more. The other two customers continued staring at the man, and they both got a faraway look in their eyes, as if their minds had suddenly been drawn elsewhere. They swayed on their feet, moving in rhythm with a sound that only they could hear. They remained like this for several seconds until their gazes cleared; they blinked in confusion, then turned around to face the counter, clearly discomfited. Harvey found this more than a little odd. The guy smelled funky, yeah, but it wasn’t like he exuded some kind of psychotropic gas, as if he was the Amazing Peyote Man or something.

Harvey continued to watch the bearded man until it was his turn to be served. Salvador greeted him warmly enough, but his smile quickly faltered. Probably got his first good whiff of the guy, Harvey thought. Salvador blinked several times, gave his head a quick shake, then his smile returned full force and he took the man’s order.

“A small coffee, please.”

“That’ll be a dollar fifty.”

The bearded man reached into his pants pocket and withdrew a crumpled wad of bills. He peeled off a couple ones and held them out. Salvador hesitated, but then he took the money, put it in the register, and gave the man his change. The man pocketed it and stood there a moment, as if uncertain what to do next.

“Yvette will have your drink for you at the end of the counter when it’s ready,” Salvador said.

The man nodded slowly, turned, and walked over to wait. Two of the three customers who had been in line ahead of him were also waiting, and they stepped back to put some room between them and the man. If he noticed – or cared – he gave no indication.

Harvey watched as Yvette made drinks for the other customers, handed them over, and they departed, giving the man uneasy backward glances as they left. She then poured the man’s coffee, put a plastic lid on it, and held it out to him.

“Small coffee,” she said, lip curling upward in an almost-sneer.

Harvey liked watching Yvette work. She was too young for him, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t appreciate her beauty or her I-don’t-give-a-fuck-about-anything attitude.

“Thank you.”

The man reached out to take his drink, and Yvette wrinkled her nose at his odor. Once he’d taken his coffee, she hurriedly moved away to fulfill the next order. Harvey thought the man might go to the condiment station and doctor his coffee, but instead he walked straight to his table.

“Do you mind if I join you?” he asked.

“Why?” Harvey said without thinking. “Am I coming apart?”

The man looked at him blankly, and Harvey didn’t blame him. It was a lousy joke.

“Sure, have a seat.”

The man pulled out the chair opposite from Harvey, sat down, and placed his coffee on the table. He made no move to take a sip. Probably still too hot for him, Harvey thought.

Now that the man was close, his odor hit Harvey much stronger than before. It was strange – a combination of growing green things, rich earth, and decay – but not altogether unpleasant. He wondered why the man smelled like he did. Was he a landscaper who’d come in for a coffee break?

“I am Arron. What is your name?”

“I’m Harvey. Harvey Logue.”

The man nodded. “I do not have a surname myself. Do you like yours?”

The question took Harvey aback. “It’s okay, I suppose.”

“Do you recommend I get one?”

What the hell kind of question was that? “Uh…. Sure, if you want.”

“Maybe I’ll adopt yours. Arron Logue has a nice sound, doesn’t it?”

Harvey didn’t know what to say to this, so he said nothing. Instead, he took a sip of his coffee. The man – Arron – watched him drink, then took a sip of his own.

“Like yours black too, huh?” Harvey said. “Not too many people do these days. Coffee shops make their java really strong so it tastes good when they add stuff to it. I read that somewhere. Maybe on Twitter.”

Harvey felt as if he was rambling, but Arron listened with rapt attention, as if he found Harvey’s words fascinating.

“What is your work?” Arron asked.

“I’m a vampire.”

Arron cocked his head to the side. “Truly? I’ve never met one before.”

Man, did this guy need to get a sense of humor. “I work at MedTek, here on the first floor. I draw blood from people and do whatever tests on it that their doctors order.”

Arron nodded, but there was no understanding in his eyes.

“Would you say this building is a safe place?”

The change of subject was so abrupt it took Harvey a moment to shift gears.

“I guess so. I mean, people come and go all the time, but we never have any trouble here.”

“Not counting the café door that leads to the street, there are only the two entrances, front and back?”

Harvey frowned. “Why are you asking this stuff? Are you planning on robbing one of the offices or something?”

Arron surprised Harvey by bursting into loud laughter. He saw that the man’s teeth were unnaturally white – almost gleaming – and for an instant they looked long and sharp. But then Harvey blinked and the man’s teeth were normal again. An illusion of some kind, a trick of the light, but he shivered nevertheless.

“There is no object in this place that I could possibly want,” Arron said. “I am here for the building itself.”

At first, Harvey didn’t understand what Arron meant, but then it came to him.

“You’re thinking of leasing space in the building, is that it?”

Arron smiled. “In a manner of speaking.”

Harvey took a sip of his coffee before continuing. “There are emergency exits at either end of the building. Aside from the front and back entrances – and Grinders’ door – those are the only ways in and out that I know of.”

Arron nodded, as if satisfied with Harvey’s answer. He expected the man to ask him more questions about the building – how good was the heating and cooling, was maintenance ever an issue, were the offices cleaned regularly – but he changed topics once more.

“Tell me, do you know the woman I saw by the elevator? She had dark curly hair, and I believe she works on the second floor.”

Just because Harvey worked in the Delgado Building didn’t mean he knew everyone else who did. But in this case, he thought he did know who Arron was talking about.

“Sounds like it might be Bethany….” He searched for her last name, but it wouldn’t come to him. “She works at UR Money. Your as in U-R.”

Arron looked at him blankly, so he went on.

“She’s a financial advisor. I made an appointment with her to talk about investment stuff. MedTek’s a good place to work and all, but their retirement package is kind of shitty. Why do you ask? Are you attracted to her or something? You going to head upstairs and ask her for a date?”

“No. I sensed she was kind. She might be of help to me.”

Harvey shrugged. “She was nice enough, I guess, and she gave me good advice. I’d recommend her.”

Arron smiled. “Thank you for sharing your perspective.”

“Sure. No problem.”

Arron raised his coffee cup to his mouth. He began drinking and didn’t stop until the cup was empty. He put the cup back down and thrust his hand across the table for Harvey to shake. The nails were a little too long, and the hair on the back of the hand was thick and black. Harvey didn’t want to shake, but he didn’t want to be rude either, so he took the man’s hand. The instant their flesh made contact, the man’s strange body odor became overwhelming and Harvey’s vision blurred. He saw a pair of huge yellow eyes burning through white mist, heard a growl so deep and powerful it shook the world. Then as quickly as the vision came upon him, it vanished. Harvey’s heart pounded and sweat coated his brow, but he could see normally again.

Arron released his hand and stood.

“We shall meet again.”

He picked up his empty cup, walked over to a plastic trash receptacle next to Grinders’ entrance, tossed it inside, and left.

Harvey continued sitting, breath coming in short gasps, as he struggled to make sense out of what he’d experienced. His fingertips began to itch, but he barely noticed.

Chapter Three

Darla Fisher crouched at the edge of the woods, hand on the Glock holstered at her hip. The feel of its polymer surface was a comfort, reminding her that she could deal death at any moment, should she need to. She wasn’t alone. Three others crouched next to her, two on her left, one on her right. She couldn’t see them – couldn’t see anything – but that didn’t matter. She could hear their lungs taking in oxygen, hearts pumping blood, stomachs and intestines gurgling, cells being born, growing old, dying…. The combined sounds half symphony, half cacophony, so loud that she could barely hear Jordan whisper to her.

“Anything?”

She gave her head a slight shake, wincing again at the sound of bone and muscle moving. She could feel the sun on her face, heard distant soft pings that she thought might be photons dancing through the air, but she wasn’t certain. Whatever it was, it was a pleasant, ethereal sound.

She was a short woman in her late thirties, thin, though she’d been on the plump side back when she’d been a cop. But that had been five years ago, and in the time since she’d lost weight. Too much, probably, but she didn’t give a damn. It didn’t matter what her body looked like. It only mattered what it could do. Her black hair was cut close to her scalp, so it wouldn’t get in her way, and she wore no makeup or jewelry. Both were unnecessary vanities as far as she was concerned. She wore an old blue sweatshirt with faded white letters that spelled Bullock PD, a blue windbreaker, jeans, and sneakers. Aside from her pistol, she was armed with a KA-BAR military knife, which she carried sheathed at her left hip. She wore sunglasses, not to protect her eyes but rather to conceal the smooth, gently pulsating patches of skin where her eyes had once been.

While she couldn’t see the scene beyond the woods, she could picture it well enough. A simple three-story office building, parking lot filled with vehicles, and standing just at the edge of it, Night and her four Harriers. Neither the hunter nor her cats produced any sound – no breathing, no heartbeats – but this did not surprise her. Night and her monstrous servants came from a place that had its own rules. This didn’t mean Darla couldn’t detect them, however. Everything sounded like something, but they sounded like nothing. It was their absence that Darla heard, the empty spaces they made in the fabric of reality.

Darla’s reply to Jordan was little more than exhaled breath and still her words sounded like thunder in her ears.

“She’s watching the building and waiting for the Blight to spread. The Harriers are with her.”

The four of them were positioned several yards from the tree line. The trees – oak, elm, pine – were close together here, the undergrowth thick, and there was little chance of their being detected by Night or her big cats as long as they remained quiet. They had been here when Arron had run through the woods, desperate to escape the Harriers. He had been far enough away that they were confident the cats – their attention focused entirely on their prey – would not notice them, and while it had been a pretty tense few minutes, their gamble paid off as Arron made it out of the woods, the cats close behind. The true test had come a few moments later, when Night followed in the wake of her pets. Darla and the others had learned much in the last five years, but they were still uncertain what abilities the woman possessed. Would she be able to sense their presence as she passed, even if there was significant distance between them? They had no reason to believe she would, but they had held their breath as Night glided through the woods, moving so silently that even Darla almost couldn’t hear her. But Night continued on without slowing, and soon she too had exited the woods, and they remained safe – for the moment. She’d listened as Night and Arron spoke, relayed the content of their conversation to her companions, and then Arron had fled into the building. As a creature of the Wild, Night could not follow, but she could use her power to create a Blight, a slowly encroaching zone of Wildness that would, in time, transform the building into a place suitable for her to enter. How long this process would take, they weren’t certain. A few hours at most was their best guess, which meant they had no time to waste. They needed to get to work.

It had been half a decade since Darla had last seen the others with her eyes, and she wondered what changes the years had wrought on them. Lucius had been sixteen then, and he was a man now. Jordan had possessed a beautiful head of silver hair back then. From what she understood, only a few wisps of it remained. Krista’s hair had been dyed a striking magenta when they’d met, but the color had surely long grown out by now. Darla didn’t know what the woman’s natural hair color was. It was funny, but it was not being able to see small things like this that she most missed about not having eyes. Little details that kept her connected to the world around her in a way that sound by itself couldn’t.

Like Darla, Jordan was armed with a 9 mm Glock and a KA-BAR knife, and he also held a pump-action shotgun. Neither Lucius nor Krista carried any weapons. Time may have changed each of the four companions, but five years ago, they all had been transformed far more severely by another force, and now neither Lucius nor Krista could effectively wield a gun or knife. But that was all right. They had other means of attacking and defending themselves. The companions had planned out a number of different strategies for what they would do when they finally caught up to Night, each of them contingent on what the woman and her Harriers were doing at the time. Darla, due to her police training, had become the group’s de facto commander, and that meant the next move was her call. She’d never asked for the responsibility, and the thought of putting any of her friends in danger made her feel ill, but this day was what they’d worked toward for five long years, and now that it was here, she didn’t intend to let them down.

“Jordan, Krista – you’re up. Draw them in and make them hurt.”

She heard Krista’s lips stretch into a cold smile. “Here, kitty kitty,” she said.

Jordan let out a soft laugh, and together they rose and moved off, going as quietly as they could. They didn’t want to attract the Harriers’ attention until they were ready. When they were gone, Lucius said, “It’s happening. It’s really happening, isn’t it?”

His words hurt her ears, but she smiled.

“Yes.”

Time for the hunter to become the prey.

* * *

“You’re doing it again.”

Hope Fleming stood in line at Grinders with her husband, Dan. There were three customers ahead of them – a bald man in a white lab coat who Hope recognized as the orthodontist who had a practice on the third floor, and two women in their forties who Hope knew, but not well.

Dan answered without looking at her. “Doing what?”

Hope kept her voice low. “Staring. At them.”

Them was Kellie Thornton and Miranda Walton, sisters and owners of Feels and Meals, a Weight Watchers knockoff with its office on the third floor, directly above the Flemings’ own office, as a matter of fact. The sisters were a study in contrasts. Kellie was tall, with long blond hair, and thin to the point of looking unhealthy. She wore expensive blouses and slacks, stylish but uncomfortable-looking shoes, too much makeup, and an overabundance of jewelry. Miranda, on the other hand, was short, heavy-ish, and wore her brown hair in an unflattering pageboy cut. She dressed in large, loose clothes (to de-emphasize her body, Hope guessed), and today she had on a large light blue men’s button shirt which she wore untucked along with a pair of black yoga pants and comfortable flats. Her makeup was minimal and she wore no accessories of any kind.

“I am not,” Dan said, still not taking his eyes off the sisters.

Hope sighed. Dan had been a cop for close to twenty years (same as her), before he retired and opened Sentinel Security. One of the things that made him good at his job was that he could zero in on difference like he was some kind of fucking supercomputer. He could walk across a lawn, glance down, and pick out a four-leaf clover every time. He could turn the pieces of a puzzle facedown and still put them together with ease. He could detect the tiniest flaw, the most miniscule mistake, the least obvious drawback in anything. It made him a pain in the ass to live with sometimes (okay, a lot of times), but the same talent that had made him a great cop and an equally great businessman sometimes manifested in ways that were – as far as Hope was concerned – less than healthy. Exhibit A: Kellie and Miranda.

Their business is supposed to be about helping people maintain healthy eating habits, Dan had once told her. But it’s obvious that neither of them practices what they preach. How do they maintain any credibility with their clients? Aren’t they aware of their own hypocrisy?

She’d tried to explain to him that the sisters’ clients trusted them because they struggled with the same issues. They knew what it was like. They understood. But while Dan had said he got the message, it was clear that he hadn’t, not really. The sisters remained an unreconcilable mystery to him, and there was nothing that he hated more than a mystery he couldn’t solve. She was determined to at least get him to stop staring at the women – especially when he saw them together. Her success in this endeavor had been limited so far, however, as illustrated by the fact that Dan continued staring at the sisters as they moved to the end of the counter to wait for their drinks.

“You’re hopeless, you know that?” she said.

When the sisters were out of sight, he finally turned to look at her.

“What are you talking about?”

She shook her head. He could see the flaws in anything – except, of course, himself, and as exasperating as that was sometimes, it was also a comfort. He might have superhuman powers of observation, but that didn’t make him a Sherlock Holmes-level genius. In the end he was no different than anyone else.

Both Hope and Dan wore blue polo shirts with the Sentinel Security logo on them, navy slacks, and black shoes. The outfits had been Dan’s idea. They’ll remind customers of cop uniforms, even if only subconsciously, and they’ll want to hire us even more. Hope hadn’t been too sure of that. Not everyone was fond of the police, and the uniforms might lose them as much business as they brought in (assuming they brought in any at all). Physically, Dan still looked like a cop too. Short, neatly trimmed brown hair, face freshly shaved, broad shoulders, lean waist, body fit but not overly muscled. It was his face that most made him look like a cop, though. Whenever he was out in public, he wore what Hope thought of as his game face. Brow wrinkled in a perpetual scowl, eyes alert for trouble, mouth set in a straight humorless line. He was six foot three and stood ramrod straight, as if he were a military man always anticipating a surprise inspection by a superior. The game face had been a useful tool when Dan had been on the force, but now it only intimidated customers. She’d talked to him about it, tried to get him to loosen up some and drop the game face. He promised he’d try, and he did, god love him, but he’d failed spectacularly. Some habits were too deeply ingrained to break, she supposed.

Hope was by far the softer-looking of the two, although she could be just as tough as her husband when the situation called for it. She was five feet five inches tall – a completely nonthreatening height to both men and women – and possessed a round, pleasant face. A kind face, people had told her. Her shoulder-length hair was strawberry-blond. She’d always thought the color made her look childish, so she’d dyed it black when she was on the force. But when she and Dan stopped working as cops so they could go into business for themselves, she’d decided to let her natural color return. The combination of her face and hair (and likely her gender as well) led people to trust her more easily than they did Dan. Because of this, she took care of customer service while he primarily confined himself to installing security systems. This division of labor suited them, and for the most part they stuck to it.

Salvador served the orthodontist (whose name Hope couldn’t remember), and after he stepped aside, it was their turn. About time, she thought. She was one of those people who needed regular infusions of caffeine to make it through the workday, and she was in dire need of a fix. Salvador greeted them as they stepped up to the counter.

“What will you have this fine morning, my friends?”

The words were pure Salvador, but the way they were spoken was anything but. Normally the café owner was loud and friendly, but today his voice was soft and subdued, his words lacking conviction. Rough night? she wondered, or something worse?

“I’ll just have a black coffee,” Dan said.

Salvador turned his gaze to Hope. “And you, my fine lady?”

Ordinarily, Hope wouldn’t put up with that paternalistic fine lady shit, but Salvador had an old-world charm that she enjoyed, so she was willing to cut him a little slack. There was no evidence of that charm now, though. He seemed preoccupied, as if most of his attention was elsewhere.

“Iced latte with two pumps of sugar-free vanilla syrup, and two shots of espresso,” she said.

Dan grimaced. He hated cold coffee drinks of any kind.

“Coming up,” Salvador said in his listless voice. He glanced over his shoulder to relay the order to Yvette, who was busy making some kind of drink that seemed to be comprised primarily of whipped cream and chocolate drizzle. Before Salvador could speak, she snapped, “I got it!”

Salvador frowned – the first sign of real life he’d shown since they’d arrived – then turned back to Hope and Dan. As Dan paid with his debit card, Hope felt a sudden rush of weariness come over her. Her eyelids felt heavy, and it took everything she had to keep them open. She felt as if she could curl up right there on the floor and sleep for a week. Then, as quickly as it had come upon her, the weariness vanished, and she felt fine again. What the hell had that been? She’d slept well last night, and she had two more weeks until her period was due. Christ, she hoped she wasn’t pregnant. She and Dan were childless by choice, and they liked it like that. She told herself not to worry about it, but she’d buy a pregnancy test on the way home, just in case.

After Dan finished paying, they walked over to the end of the counter to wait for their drinks. Miranda and Kellie had already gotten their orders and departed. Yvette brought the orthodontist his chocolate and whipped cream monstrosity, and he snatched it off the counter like a junkie desperate for his fix. He took a straw from a metal holder on the counter, removed it from its packaging, jammed it into the drink, and sucked greedily. He closed his eyes as he savored the taste and then sighed in satisfaction. He opened his eyes, saw Hope looking at him, and gave her an embarrassed smile before hurrying out of the café.

Hope wondered if he was a chocolate addict. Maybe he ought to visit Feels and Meals, she thought.

Nearby, a little troll doll of a man in a blue medical smock sat at one of the tables, scrolling on his phone. He glanced up at Hope, gave her a smile that bordered on lascivious, then went back to looking at whatever was on his screen. She noticed his fingertips were slightly red, as if they’d all been burned. Weird.

She was about to point out the man’s fingers to Dan when he said, “Does the place smell funny to you?”

She shrugged. “It smells like it always does. Like coffee.” But the instant she said this, she realized there was another smell, a faint odor like a forest-scented air freshener that had been dipped in raw sewage. Now that she was aware of it, her stomach turned and she no longer wanted her iced coffee; just the thought of drinking it made her gorge rise. She felt lightheaded, off-balance, as if the floor was slowly tilting and any moment she’d fall and begin sliding toward an edge beyond which was only an endless black void. She reached for Dan, hoping to grab hold of his arm and steady herself, but he was swaying back and forth (why was he doing that?), and she missed. She thought she was going to fall, but then, as if a switch had been flipped somewhere inside her, she felt normal once more. No dizziness, no nausea. She was shaky and weak, but that was more a result of panic than anything else (she hoped). She turned to Dan. His eyes were wide with fear, and his face was pale, but he was no longer swaying.

“What the hell…” he murmured.

Before Hope could respond, Yvette forcefully put their drinks on the counter, almost slamming them down.

“Double espresso and iced coffee with two pumps sugar-free vanilla!” she shouted.

“You don’t have to yell,” Hope said. “We’re right here.”

Yvette glared at her. “And you don’t have to be so annoying.”

Hope stood there for a moment in stunned silence, unable to believe what she’d heard. Yvette had never struck her as particularly enjoying her job, especially when it came to interacting with customers, but she’d never known the young woman to act like such a bitch before.

Salvador had heard the exchange between Hope and Yvette and hurried over. He put his hands on Yvette’s shoulders (clamping down harder than he should, Hope thought), and pulled her back from the counter. He then stepped forward to address the Flemings, interposing himself between them and Yvette.

“I most sincerely apologize,” he said, displaying the first sign of real energy since they’d entered the café. “I’m afraid it’s been busier than usual today, and the morning rush has been a lot for Yvette and me to handle by ourselves. My other employee, Teddy, called in sick this morning, and I didn’t have time to bring anyone else in. The stress is getting to Yvette, that’s all. Not that that’s a valid excuse,” he hurried to add, “but I hope you can overlook her behavior, just this once.”

It might have been a few years since Hope had worn an actual cop’s uniform, but she still had the badge-takes-no-shit attitude. She was about to tell Yvette exactly how she felt about her lack of courtesy, but then Dan lightly touched her elbow.

“We should get to work, hon.”

She turned, angry at his interruption and ready to snap at him, but then she saw the concerned look in his eyes and her anger faded. She had a temper, and Dan knew when she was nearing her boiling point. He was only trying to keep her from saying things that she might later regret.

She forced a smile and nodded.

They picked up their drinks and said goodbye to Salvador. Yvette was looking at them sullenly, but she said nothing, which was good, because if she had spoken, Hope would’ve given it to her with both barrels.

Next time, bitch, she thought.

* * *

Yvette Caldwell continued making drinks as Salvador relayed orders to her, mind drifting as her body worked on autopilot.

My. Life. Sucks.

She hated her job, but then, she pretty much hated everything about her life. She lived in a crappy one-bedroom apartment that she paid too much for in rent each month, her car was a piece of junk that barely ran, and her boyfriend, Austin, was a lazy asshole who sat on the couch all day playing video games while she was at work. Whenever she confronted him about his lack of drive, he’d say bullshit like, I’m in a transition period, you know? and I’m going to make my move soon. Truth was, the bastard was a fucking parasite, and the only move he ever made was when he was sitting on the toilet stinking up the bathroom. If he hadn’t been decent in bed, she’d have kicked him to the curb long ago.

She had drive. She didn’t plan to work as a goddamn barista the rest of her life, no fucking way. She had goals. She’d been taking classes at Kingsborough Community College in preparation for entering their nursing program, but when she realized she’d end up cleaning patients’ piss, shit, and puke most of the time – not to mention blood – she dropped out. She had a thing about bodily fluids, almost a phobia really, and in retrospect she wondered what had ever made her think she wanted to be a nurse in the first place. Sometimes she could be a fucking idiot.

Her current plan was to become a real estate agent. That’s what her mom did, and it seemed like an okay job. Better than mixing overpriced coffee drinks for annoying customers anyway. Next semester she’d re-enroll at KCC and start taking real estate classes in preparation for getting her license. She’d be done a lot faster than if she continued in the nursing program, and she wouldn’t have to deal with anything disgusting. Another year or two, and she could tell Salvador to go fuck himself and quit. The thought put a rare smile on her face.

To make her morning even more miserable, she was having a hell of a time staying awake. She’d had trouble sleeping last night – Austin snored like a motherfucker – and she’d tossed and turned before finally getting up and going out into the living room to collapse on the couch. It was old, lumpy, and smelled like corn chips and body odor, and it had taken her forever to fall asleep. But she didn’t think that was the reason why she felt so exhausted now. At least, not the only reason. She thought it had something to do with Salvador – and that weird guy with the ratty-ass beard who’d come in earlier. Before that guy had shown up, smelling like he’d just gotten back from a camping trip or something, Salvador had been his usual annoying high-energy self. But after the beardo left, Salvador’s energy level had gone way down, and whenever Yvette got too close to him, a deep weariness came over her. It lessened when she put some distance between them, although it didn’t go away entirely, and this disturbed her. She wasn’t the type to deny what her instincts told her. She didn’t try to convince herself that it was all in her mind, the result of too little sleep and too much imagination. She knew something was wrong, she just didn’t know what.

Maybe that was why she’d been so shitty to the Flemings when she’d given their drinks to them. The husband was kind of hot for an old guy, and she regretted being nasty to him, but she didn’t regret being a bitch to the wife. Once, Yvette had accidentally put regular vanilla syrup into the woman’s drink instead of sugar-free, and when she tasted it, she went ballistic. She started going on about how unprofessional and incompetent millennials were, how if someone of her generation displayed the same casual disregard toward their work, they’d be fired on the spot, no excuses, no second chances. Yvette had been about to tell the woman that she could jam her latte into her cunt when Salvador intervened. Yvette kept her mouth shut, remade the drink, and Mrs. Tight-Ass made a show of tasting it to make sure it met her approval this time. It did, and she left, walking with a fuck-you swagger that had made Yvette furious. Thinking of the incident now brought that anger back full force, as if Yvette were experiencing it anew. The emotion energized her, drove away the lethargy, and she felt wide awake for the first time since the beardo had left the café. Whatever was happening, anger seemed to counter it. Good to know. This would work in her favor. After all, she had a lot of things to be angry about.

* * *

When Bethany walked into UR Money, Nate was in his office on the phone, presumably speaking with a client. His door was open – they only closed their office doors whenever they had a face-to-face appointment with a client – and he waved when he saw her enter. Nathan Porter was a heavyset man, bald on top with short brown hair on the sides and back of his head. He had a pair of saggy jowls that reminded Bethany of a droopy-faced hound dog, an impression reinforced by his predilection for brown suits, white shirts, and brown ties. They’d been coworkers for four years, ever since Bethany had started working for UR Money, and she considered him a friend.

The outer office was decorated in what Bethany thought of as business-bland: couches and chairs arranged in a square around a coffee table with financial magazines spread neatly on top, a receptionist’s desk that was rarely used since they had no receptionist, fake ferns in all four corners, inoffensive and forgettable landscape paintings hung on the walls, carpeted floor, fluorescent lights overhead. There were three smaller offices inside – one for Nate, one for her, and one for Elissa. She’d met Elissa when she came to work for UR Money – Elissa had been the one to conduct her interview, in fact – and while workplace romances were frowned upon by the company, they weren’t strictly forbidden, and the two of them had begun dating within a couple weeks of Bethany’s hire date, and they’d been together ever since. Spending all day and all night with your girlfriend could be weird at times, but they managed to make it work. She was sorry that Elissa was sick today, felt guilty for not staying home and taking care of her, but she had to admit that it would be nice to have just her and Nate in the office today. No matter how much you loved someone, it was good to have a little break from them now and again. Everyone needed space sometimes, and Bethany was no exception.

She walked into her office, flipped on the light, and put her purse on one of the two chairs in front of her desk. She walked around the desk, put her coffee down, sat, booted up her computer, and checked her voicemail while she waited for the machine to come to life. She had a window on her left that provided a view of the street in front of the building, and she watched the tail end of the morning rush hour as she jotted down notes on a legal pad. The view wasn’t much – similar anonymous buildings across the street, beyond them the rounded white tops of two water towers. Not exactly her idea of picturesque. Not that her office had much more personality. UR Money had strict regulations for how its branch sites were supposed to look, and individual décor was to be kept to a minimum. Financial planning was a sober, serious matter, and UR Money’s offices were expected to reflect this ethos. Per company policy, Bethany’s personal touches were limited to one framed photo on her desk, two corporate-approved pictures on the walls, and a single desk lamp. The choices of approved pictures displayed on the company’s HR website had been limited, and Bethany had selected an image of a forest waterfall and a grassy field covered with black-eyed Susans. The choices of lamps were similarly limited, and she’d eventually decided on a small rounded lamp with an off-white shade. It didn’t provide much light, so most of the time she left it off. When Bethany had first started working here, her one photo had been of her brother, his wife, and their young son, but when she and Elissa had started dating, Elissa began saying that it would make her really happy if Bethany kept a photo of her on her desk. Bethany resisted at first. After all, Elissa worked in the office literally next door to hers. If Bethany wanted to look at her face, all she had to do was go over and pay a visit. But Elissa had kept up her campaign until finally Bethany had given in, and now Elissa – long red hair, freckles, dazzling smile – looked out at her from the confines of a chrome frame and a thin layer of glass. Bethany had never said anything to Elissa, but she found the picture to be a bit creepy. It was like Elissa was constantly keeping tabs on her, like she couldn’t stand to let her out of her sight.

The back of her left hand itched, and without thinking she scratched it with her right. The skin felt thick and rough beneath her fingers. She held up her hand to examine it, and saw a dry raised area the size of a penny. The skin was slightly gray there. When she probed it with her index finger, she found it calloused, hard, desensitized, almost numb. She sometimes had trouble with sore, chapped hands in winter, but she’d never had any problems in spring before. Maybe she had an allergic response to something? Or maybe it was merely a sign of aging. She’d prefer the former, but feared it was more likely the latter.

She rose, walked over to her purse, removed a vial of skin cream, and applied a generous amount to the dry patch. She then took an antihistamine from one of the numerous pill bottles she carried in her purse – what she thought of as her traveling pharmacy – returned to her desk, popped it in her mouth, and swallowed it with a swig of coffee. If the dry patch didn’t improve by the end of the day, she’d consider making an appointment with her doctor to take a look at it. She then turned her attention to the list of calls she’d received overnight. There were four. Two were random sales calls. One was from a UR Money office in Michigan. A client of Bethany’s had moved to the state several months ago and transferred his account to a branch there. His new advisor had called because some of his records hadn’t come over, and she was hoping Bethany could look into the situation and see what had happened. The last call was from one of her current clients, Wade Harmon, a retiree in his seventies who made changes to his financial plan whenever the markets fluctuated the tiniest bit, which meant he made changes a lot. He was the most insecure client she’d ever worked with, a nice enough guy, but a total pain in the ass. He’d read about some new investment opportunity on Facebook last night, and he wanted to make an appointment to come in and talk to her about it as soon as possible.

Yeah, I’ll get right on that, she thought.

She logged onto the UR Money employee website and checked her email. Most of it was junk, but there were a few messages that she needed to respond to. She was in the process of doing so when Nate appeared in her doorway.

“Where’s your better half?” he said.

“Spring cold,” Bethany said.

“Bad one?”

“She’s practically at death’s door.”

He grinned. “Let’s hope she pulls through.”

Normally Elissa took illnesses and injuries in stride, as long as they weren’t too severe. But when it came to colds, she turned into a complete baby. She hated them, the congestion, the muzzy-headedness, the aches and pains…. She moaned and complained and asked Bethany to press a gun to her head, pull the trigger, and put her out of her misery. Bethany knew she’d get a number of texts and phone calls throughout the day in which Elissa would give her updates on how awful she felt. She hadn’t received any yet, and she hoped that meant Elissa was sleeping. The more rest she got, the faster she’d get better.

She didn’t resent Elissa’s reaction to colds. Quite the opposite. She felt terrible that she couldn’t do more for her, experienced a pang with every sneeze, cough, and wheezing breath. She felt pressure to sit by her side the entire time and fuss over her until she was better – getting her water, making her soup, fluffing her pillow, getting her an extra blanket, bringing in a fresh box of tissues…. Maybe she should send a text to check on how Elissa was doing.

No, she told herself. Remember what Soo said in therapy. Don’t give in to your natural tendency toward codependence.

With an effort, she turned her thoughts away from Elissa.

“How are you doing this morning?” Bethany asked Nate.

He answered how he always did. “Can’t complain. Looking forward to another day of playing with other people’s money. How about you?”

“I’m all right.” She took a sip of coffee. “Something weird happened downstairs while I was waiting for the elevator, though.”

“How weird? Like weird with a lowercase w or Weird with a capital W?”

“Somewhere in between, I guess. This guy—”

She broke off as the office’s outer door opened and the bearded man stuck his face in. He looked around, and when he saw Bethany, he smiled.

“Actually, that guy,” she said.

Nate turned to look as the man entered. He closed the door behind him and examined the office for a moment, as if he were surveying it, taking its measure. Then he looked at Bethany, smiled once more, and started toward her office. Nate stepped to the side so he wasn’t blocking the doorway, but he didn’t head back to his own office, and Bethany was grateful. The bearded man had done nothing to make her think he might be dangerous, but then he hadn’t done anything to make her think he wasn’t dangerous either.

As the man drew near, she detected that strange scent of his, only this time it didn’t strike her as odd. She actually found it somewhat pleasant. Not Nate, though. He pursed his lips in distaste and brought a hand up to cover his nose and mouth. She thought his reaction was overly dramatic, but then people reacted differently to smells.

The man stopped when he reached Bethany’s office and stood outside the doorway and looked at her. For all the attention he paid to Nate, her coworker might as well have been invisible.

“Hello,” the man said. “My name is Arron. You are Bethany, yes? I met a man named Harvey in the coffee shop downstairs. He recommended you quite highly.”

At first Bethany didn’t know who Arron was referring to, but then it came to her. Harvey Logue, the guy who worked at MedTek downstairs. He’d come to her for investing advice a while back. He’d flirted with her a bit – not so much that it had become awkward, but enough for her to casually drop Elissa’s name into the conversation. It’s never too late to set up a 401K. My girlfriend Elissa didn’t start hers until…. After that, Harvey backed off and the rest of their conversation proceeded in a professional manner. The fact that this man – Arron – had been referred to her by a previous client made him seem a lot less stalkerish, and she rose from her desk and came to the doorway to greet him with a smile.

“Why don’t you come in and have a seat, Arron?”

The man smiled. “I would like that. I have run quite a distance this morning, and my legs are tired.”

Nate gave her a look that carried an unspoken message: Want me to stick around?

She gave her head a slight shake. While her initial impression of Arron might have been less than favorable, he didn’t seem threatening now. He came across as tentative and unsure, as if he was lost and didn’t know what to do next. She imagined what Soo might say if she was here.

Be careful. Don’t start feeling like you have to take care of him.

Duly noted, Bethany thought.

Nate looked doubtful, but he nodded and headed back to his office. She knew he’d be listening closely in case she needed him, and she appreciated it. She gestured toward the chairs in front of her desk, and Arron stepped inside her office, chose one, and sat. She left the door open as she returned to her desk. She didn’t close her door unless she knew a client well, and while she was less suspicious of Arron than when he’d first entered, she was far from being that comfortable in his presence yet.

“Thank you for choosing UR Money, Mister…?”

Instead of supplying his last name, Arron looked out her window.

“I see no trees,” he said.

“The best view is on the other side of the building,” Bethany said. “They get to look out at the woods. We’re stuck with looking at other buildings that are just as ugly as this one. I tell myself I’m lucky to have a window in my office at all, but some days I’m not so sure.”

“You can see the sun, the sky, and the clouds,” Arron said. “So it’s not all bad.”

“True.” The dry patch of skin on the back of her hand started itching worse then, and she had to force herself not to scratch it. She put on her most professional smile and said, “So what brings you in today? Are you interested in investments, retirement planning, both?”

Arron continued gazing out the window as he answered.

“Someone is hunting me and I need your help.”

Chapter Four

Shotgun in hand, barrel pointed toward the ground, Jordan Wisniewski moved through the woods slowly, careful to make as little noise as possible. He didn’t want to draw Night’s attention until Krista and he were in position and ready. Krista, however, was not as inclined to patience.

“Step it up, old man,” she said. “We don’t have all day.”

She spoke these words softly, for which he was grateful, but he would’ve much rather she remain silent. But in the five years since he’d met her – since that night – he’d never known her to stay quiet for more than a few minutes at a time, and even that was a struggle for her.

“We’ve waited half a decade,” he said back, just as softly. “You can wait a few more minutes.”

She hrumpfed but said no more.

They made a strange-looking pair. Jordan was a tall, gaunt man in his early sixties, almost bald. He wore an old bomber jacket, the leather worn and cracked, over a dark blue mock turtleneck. Jeans and hiking boots completed his ensemble, along with the weapons sheathed on his waist – Glock on his right hip, KA-BAR knife on his left. His skin was covered with mottled brown patches, some light, some dark, that resembled melanomas, but which were far, far worse.

Krista Herrera was dressed in a ratty t-shirt with the faded words Cut & Curl on the front. Her long black hair was matted and tangled, in desperate need of shampooing. The fingers on both of her hands terminated in sharp scissorlike blades, and she tapped the metallic digits together as they walked, an unconscious habit she did whenever she was nervous. Jordan didn’t bother telling her to stop. Not only wasn’t the sound very loud, he knew from experience that she’d quit tapping for several minutes only to start up again. Asking her to stop was only a waste of breath.

They continued on for several more minutes until they came to a section of the woods where the trees were farther apart and the undergrowth sparser. There was room to maneuver here, but not so much that it would be to the Harriers’ advantage.

“This should do,” he said.

Krista stopped in the middle of the small clearing, and Jordan took up a position behind a large oak tree only a few yards away from her.

“Ready?” he asked.

She swept her right arm toward a small bush close to her side. Her scissor-fingers sliced through the thin branches as if they were no more substantial than tissue paper, and a shower of leaves sprayed the air.

“What do you think?” she said.

Jordan smiled grimly. He jacked a shell into his shotgun’s chamber, aimed the weapon toward the sky, and squeezed the trigger.

* * *

Night stood at the edge of the Delgado Building’s parking lot, monitoring the progress of the Blight. It now extended a few inches onto the asphalt, rendering its surface gray and cracked. The tires of those vehicles resting on the affected surface had begun to change too, rubber drying and flaking. When the Blight moved far enough upward, the vehicles’ metal bodies would begin to rust, their window glass becoming brittle and spiderwebbed with fissures. Right now, the Blight proceeded slowly, as it always did after a perimeter was established, but it would pick up speed as it advanced. If she had managed to trap Arron within the building – and she thought there was an excellent chance she had – the circle of Blight would close in upon him quickly enough, having only a relatively small amount of ground to cover.

There had been a time when she could’ve created a Blight powerful enough to encompass the building within mere moments, but she wasn’t at her full strength now, hadn’t been for years, not since Bullock. But even diminished as she was, she remained a formidable being, and she was confident that today she would succeed.

You’re mine, Arron.

Her four Harriers flanked her, two on each side, sitting on their haunches, amber eyes fixed on the leading edge of the Blight just as hers were. The big cats were silent and motionless, obsidian statues, but she could feel the impatience burning within them. They were made to run and chase, catch and kill, to rend flesh with tooth and claw, glut themselves on meat and blood. Waiting was absolute torture for them, and if the ancient laws that bound their kind hadn’t been in place, they’d have already raced across the parking lot, forced their way into the building, and captured Arron.

She knew exactly how they felt. She’d strode the Wild regions of this world for five years in search of Arron, and now that she’d finally found him, she had no intention of allowing him to escape again. One way or another, the chase ended here, today.

Her attention was fixed on a dark thread of Blight that was making its way across the hubcap of a silver Mercedes-Benz – she found the progress of its slow decay mesmerizingly beautiful – when a shotgun blast cut through the air. She turned toward the woods, instantly alert for danger, the Harriers jumping to their feet and spinning around to face the same direction. She was certain the gunshot had come from somewhere within the woods, and not very far away either. She listened for a second blast, but none came. She knew she hadn’t been mistaken about what she’d heard. She was a hunter, and she knew the sound of a weapon discharging as well as she knew the sound of her own voice. It wasn’t hunting season in Ohio, but laws meant nothing to those whose spirits sang in harmony with the Wild, whether they were human or beings like her. It was likely nothing to be concerned about, but she’d lived for millennia, and she hadn’t survived to reach her advanced age by being careless.

If this had been another day, she would’ve run to investigate the source of the noise herself, but creating and sustaining a Blight – along with her Harriers being separated from her body – took a significant toll on her power, and right now she wasn’t much stronger or faster than an ordinary human. She reached down and laid a hand on the back of the Harrier directly to her right.

“Go investigate,” she said.

All four Harriers had been trembling with excitement since hearing the first shot, eager to dash toward the trees, but unable to do so until their mistress gave them leave. Now the Harrier Night touched streaked across the field, its massive paws making no sound on the grass as it went. It picked up speed, becoming a black blur, and then it slipped into the woods and was gone.

The three remaining Harriers crept forward, as if intending to follow their sibling, but Night made a sharp, hissing sound, and they froze.

“Wait,” she said.

The four creatures of the Wild stood there, unmoving, and listened.

* * *

The Harrier flowed between trees like ebon liquid, its body more flexible than that of a true cat, and even at this speed, it made almost no noise as it passed through the woods, ears listening for any suspicious sounds, nose searching for scents that didn’t belong, eyes scanning for the slightest movement. The creature and its siblings had been entirely focused on pursuing Arron when they had first passed through these woods, and despite their enhanced senses, it was quite possible they had failed to detect the presence of anyone else here. But now the Harrier was consciously searching, and if there were people in these woods, they would be found, and if they were a threat, they would be dealt with – swiftly and savagely. The Harrier had been honored to be selected by Night for this mission, and it would die before failing her.

The Harrier detected the acrid odor of burned gunpowder, only faint traces, but enough to hone in on. It increased its speed as it followed the scent, large paws barely touching the ground as it surged onward, almost flying now, caught up in the fevered excitement of drawing near a kill. It knew what guns were – and more importantly understood the damage the human-forged weapons could inflict on flesh – but it had no fear of them. While by no means invulnerable, the Harrier was resistant to most injuries, and even then it was hard as hell to hit, given its speed. So it did not slow as the scent of gunpowder grew stronger, continued accelerating instead, and if it had possessed a human voice, it would have laughed in delight.

It burst into a small clearing, and came to a sudden halt when it saw a human female standing in the middle of the area. She was crouched in a fighting position, prepared for battle. Her fingers terminated in metallic claws, and she kept opening and closing her hands, the blades making loud shikt-shikt-shikt sounds as they slid against one another. The female was not afraid, which confused the Harrier. It was accustomed to provoking fear in its prey, but not only wasn’t the woman scared, her face shone with near-lunatic joy, eyes wide and gleaming, mouth stretched into a grin so wide her lips cracked and bled. She smelled wrong, profoundly so. She was human, yes, but she also carried the scent of Blight on her, which made no sense. Night had only created the Blight a short time ago, and it had not had time to build the strength and speed necessary to suffuse the Delgado Building and begin transforming its occupants. So where had this woman…?

The Harrier recognized the female’s scent then. They had met and fought before, five years earlier, in a different town. The woman had escaped, along with several other humans, and Night had been keeping an eye out for them the entire time she’d searched for Arron. They’d gotten hints and rumors of their location, but they’d all proven to be false leads. Now, after all this time, the female was here, and close enough that the Harrier could reach her in a single leap. The Harrier wanted to attack, wanted it more than anything the creature had in its very long life, but it hesitated, unsure what Night would wish it to do. Removing a potential threat to the mistress was among the Harriers’ prime duties, but this female was one of the few beings to ever escape Night. Might the mistress wish to destroy the woman herself? Making decisions like this was not something the Harrier was practiced at, and thus it stood where it was, confused and uncertain.

The woman moved her metal fingers more forcefully now, the sound much louder than before.

Shikt-shikt-shikt….

She kept her wild-eyed gaze locked on the Harrier, as if challenging the big cat to make the first move. No, not challenging. Taunting.

“What’s wrong, kitty? Afraid of getting your fur trimmed? Don’t worry, I’m a professional. I won’t cut you – much.”

She let out a cackling mad laugh that filled the clearing, drowning out all other sound. The Harrier growled deep in its throat, mouth parted to display its sharp, white teeth. Enough of this foolishness. It would kill this woman and, if the mistress was displeased, it would accept whatever punishment she deemed fitting. It coiled its muscles, preparing to leap, when it heard the soft rustle of leaves, followed by the crack of a small fallen branch being stepped on. The Harrier knew in an instant that it had been tricked: the woman had been working to hold its attention while one of her companions approached from the rear. Furious at having been deceived so easily, the Harrier spun around, intending to attack, but before it could do so, it felt a human hand slap down onto its shoulder and press tight. It caught a glimpse of the human – an older male whose scent it also recognized – but then its vision blurred as an overwhelming sensation of cold rushed through its body. It felt suddenly weak, barely able to stand, and it stumbled away from the human, instinctively putting distance between them now that it was vulnerable, although it had no idea why this had happened.

The Harrier shook its head in an attempt to clear its vision, but this only made things worse. It became dizzy, and the cold that racked its body was replaced by blazing heat. Not once in its long life had the creature been ill, so it did not recognize the sensations it was experiencing as symptoms of sickness. All it knew was that something was seriously wrong, and if it couldn’t get its body back under control swiftly—

Sharp pain pierced the Harrier’s abdomen, once, twice, three times, and it cried out in agony. The woman had taken advantage of the big cat’s weakness to rush in and attack, jamming her scissor-fingers into the soft meat of its belly over and over. The Harrier smelled its own blood, heard it pattering to the ground like thick crimson rain. It tried to give a defiant roar, to turn and swipe out with one of its massive paws, claws extended, ready to answer the violation that had been visited upon its body with savagery of its own. But it was too weak to do more than make a pathetic mew and flick its paw uselessly at the air. It slumped to the ground, and the woman continued ravaging its flesh, repeatedly plunging both of her hands into its body and laughing with maniacal delight.

The Harrier knew death well, but only as something it dealt to others. The idea that it too might one day experience the end of its life was a completely foreign concept, but lying there on the grass, life’s blood pouring from dozens of wounds, it realized that while it might not die as easily as other creatures, it was not beyond death’s reach – far from it.

Its vision cleared then, only a little, but enough for it to make out the human male striding toward it. The man’s skin was covered with dark lesions and his body exuded a foul odor of corruption that the Harrier smelled on itself. This human was sick and had somehow transferred the illness to the Harrier, but he appeared to be unaffected by the disease himself. The human carried a gun, a long one, and when he reached the Harrier, he jacked a round into the chamber, raised the weapon to his shoulder, then leaned down to press the twin barrels between the Harrier’s eyes.

“I don’t know if there’s a hell for your kind,” the man said, tone ice-cold, “but if there is, I hope you burn there for eternity.”

The Harrier did not care that it was about to die. It only cared that it had failed its mistress, and it wished it could look upon Night’s beloved face one last time as it groveled before her, begging for forgiveness it knew it did not deserve.

Then the man squeezed the shotgun’s trigger, and the Harrier was gone.

* * *

Jordan gazed down at the Harrier’s corpse. The shotgun blast had destroyed most of the creature’s head, virtually decapitating it. Krista knelt next to the beast, continuing to plunge her sharp metallic fingers into its belly with fast, violent jabs. Intestines bulged from several of the wounds, the organs looking no different than those of any earthly creature. Same for its blood.

A good amount of that blood now covered Krista. It coated her hands and forearms, soaked her shirt, covered her face, wetted her hair. It was a grotesque scene, yes, but not one without a certain twisted beauty. Jordan might base a painting on it, assuming he survived this day’s events to pick up a brush again.

“You can stop anytime now,” he said.

Krista stabbed the Harrier’s carcass twice more before letting out a deep, satisfied sigh and rising to her feet. Blood dripped from her scissor-fingers and she grinned at Jordan, her teeth a slash of white in a mask of crimson.

“That was fun,” she said.

Jordan’s answering smile was more restrained, but no less enthusiastic for it.

“Yes, it was.”

Then, without another word, they began making their way back to the others, leaving the Harrier’s body to rot where it lay.

* * *

Night was continuing to watch the threads of Blight work their way up the Mercedes’ hubcaps when she felt a tearing sensation deep inside, as if a portion of her soul had been forcefully torn away. She gasped, staggered, fell to her hands and knees, fought to hold on to consciousness. She had known pain in her long life, of course, but nothing that even came close to this. The three Harriers that had remained with her felt it too, and they fell to the ground, writhed in agony, yowled in despair, for their sibling was dead.

It wasn’t, couldn’t, be possible, yet Night knew it had happened. She sensed the loss as keenly as the Harriers, if not more so, although she could not account for it. Mere humans couldn’t have possibly harmed one of her Harriers, not seriously at any rate, and certainly not so severely as to cause its death. But that, it seemed, was precisely what had occurred.

She remained on her hands and knees until the pain had receded enough for her to stand once more. She was unsteady on her feet, but she did not fall. The Harriers began to recover as well, and they came to her for reassurance, rubbing against her hips and legs like insecure housecats. She petted them with both of her hands, the one that was fully intact and the one without fingers, and struggled to make sense of what had happened. Somehow, one of her Harriers was dead, evidently slain by a human. No, a group of humans. She could not conceive of an individual, no matter how strong or well-armed, being able to kill a Harrier on their own. The killers were not beings of power like herself, for she would’ve sensed the presence of such creatures. But ordinary humans did not possess the skill and strength to dispatch one of her servants, which meant these particular humans had to be far from ordinary. Her initial shock began to subside, and fury rose in its place. Such an insult could not be borne! She would send her remaining Harriers into the woods to track down their sibling’s murderers – surely, they could not withstand an attack by all three of her servants – and tear them into bloody gobbets which she would personally feast upon. She almost gave the order, but she stopped herself. What if that was precisely what the humans wanted? The initial gunshot they’d heard had almost certainly been designed to trick her into sending one of her servants into the woods to investigate. Might the humans now wish to use the murder of her Harrier to lure the others?

There was an additional factor to consider. Creating a Blight – even one with a limited range such as the Delgado Building – took a great deal of her power. While she was far from helpless, she was not at her full strength, and if the humans in the woods were capable of slaying a Harrier, they might be capable of injuring her in her current state. She could reabsorb the Blight, reclaim her full power, then stride into the woods with her remaining Harriers to exact vengeance for their fallen comrade. But doing so would mean allowing Arron to escape. He would sense the lifting of the Blight and flee the building, and once he was gone, it might be years before she managed to track him down again.

She decided to maintain her current plan of action. She would allow the Blight to continue to do its work, slowly but surely closing in on Arron, but if the humans – whoever they were – attacked, she would reclaim the Blight’s power and defend herself, and if Arron escaped in the process, so be it.

“Patrol the edge of the woods,” she commanded her Harriers. “If you sense anyone approaching, alert me, but do not engage unless I give you an explicit order to do so. Do you understand?”

All three of the big cats purred their assent and trotted toward the tree line. Night watched them go, then turned back toward the parking lot to resume monitoring the Blight’s progress. She still felt the ache over the Harrier’s loss, and she knew she always would. One more thing to lay at Arron’s feet – when she finally got her hands on him, she’d make him pay for everything he’d done, and pay dearly.

* * *

At first, Bethany thought Arron was playing some kind of joke, but when he continued looking at her with a mix of hope and desperation, she began to have doubts.

“When you say that someone is hunting you, are you speaking metaphorically, or….” She allowed the sentence to trail off, uncertain how to complete it.

“I mean it quite literally.”

Bethany nodded. “I see.” She wasn’t sure where this was going, whether he was attempting some sort of joke or was mentally ill, but she decided to play along for a couple minutes and find out. If it was a joke, she’d ask him to leave. But if he needed psychiatric help, she’d do what she could to make sure he received it. She heard Soo’s voice again. Co-de-pen-dent.

Shut up. Aloud, she said, “Have you contacted the police?”

“No. I doubt they would believe my story.”

“And you think I will?”

“Perhaps. You have an aura of kindness around you.”

She almost laughed. If they’d been in a bar, she might’ve thought this sounded like a pick-up line. “I guess there’s only one way to find out if I believe you. Why don’t you—”

She broke off as her phone rang within her purse. Normally she silenced it when she was working, but she’d left the ringer on today in case Elissa needed to get hold of her. For an instant she felt torn between two equally strong impulses: answer the phone and talk to her ill fiancée or continue devoting her attention to this strange man sitting in her office, a man who might very well be in need of serious mental help. Which one needed her more – Elissa or Arron? Where did her responsibility lie at this exact moment? Anxiety paralyzed her, and she sat frozen behind her desk, unable to move, or even think.

Her phone continued to ring, and then Arron surprised her by leaning forward, reaching into her purse, removing her phone, and answering it. It was a relatively new phone, and she hadn’t set up a password yet, so a single swipe of his finger was all it took, and then he was talking with whoever was on the other end.

“Hello. Who is this? Elissa? Are you a friend of Bethany’s? I’m talking on her phone because right now she’s sitting at her desk staring at me. I can’t say as I blame her since I just told her someone is hunting me. That’s hardly an everyday pronouncement, is it?”

He listened for several moments, brow deeply furrowed. Bethany could hear Elissa yelling on the other end, but she couldn’t make out any of the words. It didn’t matter since her tone told the story. She was royally pissed, and if there had been any way for her to thrust a hand through the phone screen, she would’ve done so and gleefully strangled Arron.

Bethany threw off her paralysis, reached over her desk, and snatched the phone from Arron’s hand. He blinked in surprise, but otherwise didn’t react.

“Elissa? Oh god, I’m so sorry!”

“Who the fuck was that? Is Nate playing another of his lame-ass practical jokes? If it was him, I have to give the asshole credit. He did a great job disguising his voice.”

“No, it was a…a client.”

Bethany didn’t want to go into any more detail than necessary right now – especially since she didn’t know what the hell was going on. But she did have a way to at least give Elissa the gist of the situation.

“A special client,” she added.

When Bethany had first started working at UR Money, Elissa explained that she and Nate had developed a number of code phrases to use when they were having problems with clients. One of these phrases was I could really use another opinion on this. This was useful when a client – usually a man – was reluctant to take the advice of a woman on financial matters. Elissa would call Nate in for a ‘consultation’, Nate would agree with whatever she said, and then he’d return to his office. The client, reassured, would then stop questioning Elissa after that. Another good phrase was Could you excuse me for a moment? They used this whenever a potential client – clearly attempting to finagle some free financial advice – asked questions for a long time without committing to hiring them. They’d get up, go to one of the coworkers’ offices, explain they needed to visit the restroom, then head on down to Grinders for a coffee. After ordering, they’d take a seat and wait until one of their coworkers texted them that the faux client had gotten tired of waiting and left. A special client meant someone who was being problematic in some way, and who you might need help escaping from.

“Are you okay? Do you need help?”

“I’m fine.” In truth, Bethany had no idea if she was or not, but the last thing she wanted to do was worry Elissa while she was home sick. “Really.”

“Okay.” She did not sound convinced, but instead of saying so, she asked, “Call me back when you get a chance?”

Elissa sounded pouty. She had doubtless called to talk because she was bored and feeling icky, but she knew she couldn’t expect Bethany to ignore a client – especially a special client – for her.

“Of course. I—” She was in the process of saying I love you, when Elissa disconnected.

She sighed, turned off the ringer, placed the phone in her top righthand desk drawer, closed it, then looked up at Arron and did her best to smile.

“Sorry about that. My fiancée is home sick today and she decided to check in. She didn’t realize I was with a….” She almost said client, but she was certain by this point that whatever Arron was doing here, it had nothing to do with building his financial portfolio. “With someone,” she finished.

Someone is hunting me and I need your help.

“How can I help you, Arron?”

“I need you to toughen up so you can protect me.”

Bethany had no idea what he was talking about, but then she caught a glimpse of the back of her left hand. The discolored spot there had grown larger – higher and wider – than the last time she’d looked at it. The lesion was almost completely gray now, the skin dry and cracked, and seeing it sent a bolt of fear shooting through her.

“Perhaps it would help if I started at the beginning,” he said.

Bethany forced herself to look away from her hand and meet Arron’s gaze.

“That’s as good a place as any and better than most.”

He nodded. “Very well. In the beginning, the Omniverse was dark and formless, and then the Gyre opened its great mouth and vomited forth all realities….”

* * *

Joshua Cox was late for work – again.

When he’d first started at Excursions, he’d thought working at a travel agency would be fun. Learning about different destinations around the globe and helping people escape the tedium of their everyday lives by having an adventure, however temporary it might be. In reality, it was just another customer service job, making phone calls, sending emails, filling in online forms, organizing schedules, tending to a thousand niggling little details that he’d have to rework at a customer’s slightest whim. As an employee, he got good discounts on travel packages, and in the beginning he’d made use of them, traveling to places like Barbados and Cancun. But he’d quickly realized that he hated traveling. Overcrowded airports, cramped and uncomfortable plane rides, lackluster hotels, and tacky tourist attractions that were never worth the effort it took to reach them. It had been almost three years since the last trip he’d taken – an Alaskan cruise that had turned out to be so deadly dull he’d spent most of it sleeping in his cabin – and he had no intention of going on another anytime soon.

He had a bachelor’s degree in business, and when he’d been in college, he’d made fun of students who studied what he viewed as useless fields, such as music or art. Once, when he’d been taking a dump in a campus restroom, he’d used a marker to write Business Majors: Use these Liberal Arts diplomas to wipe your ass on the stall above the roll of toilet paper. Now he wondered if he wouldn’t have been better off if he had entered a ‘useless’ field, something more fulfilling like journalism or sociology. He certainly wouldn’t have been any worse off than he was now.

Every morning before he went into the office, he parked behind the building and walked across the street to get coffee at Grinders. He could’ve made coffee at home or picked some up at a drive-thru on his way in, but he preferred going to Grinders. Not because their coffee was anything special, but because it allowed him to put off starting his job for a few more minutes each day. But the last couple weeks he’d been oversleeping his alarm and getting to work late, probably because his fucking subconscious was trying to get him fired. He should’ve been in the office forty minutes ago, so he really didn’t have time to stop in at Grinders. But the prospect of starting his workday without the aid of caffeine was too awful to contemplate, so after parking, he crossed the street to the Delgado Building, and approached Grinders’ entrance. As he drew near the glass door, he noticed a strange discoloration resembling greenish-black mold running around the base of the building. It began on the sidewalk, an inch or so from the building, and stretched half a foot up the stone façade, the leading edge uneven and ragged, looking like thin threads or veins. Was it a fungus of some sort? Whatever it was, it was ugly, and he hoped it would stay on this side of the street.

As he reached for the metal door handle, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up, as if sounding a warning, and he hesitated. Maybe he should forget about Grinders for today and make do with the watery excuse for coffee available in Excursions’ break room. Wasn’t he late enough as it was? Why make himself any later by waiting in line to order and then waiting some more while his drink was prepared? He almost turned and headed back to the crosswalk, but he couldn’t stand the thought of going into the office one second earlier than he absolutely had to, so he ignored his instincts, pulled the door open, and stepped across the threshold.

As he passed from outside to inside, cold spread through his body, starting at his feet and swiftly working its way upward, causing him to shake. Along with this came a wave of dizziness and a roil of nausea in his gut. What the fuck? Was he coming down with the flu or something? Did people even get flu in the spring? The sensation passed as quickly as it came, though, and by the time the door swung closed behind him, he felt normal once again. Maybe he was allergic to that weird mold outside, in which case, the more distance he put between himself and the door, the better. He stepped toward the counter and got in line, still a trifle lightheaded, but nothing like he’d felt a moment ago.

While he waited to order, he noticed a man in a blue medical uniform sitting at a table. His hands rested on the table’s wooden surface, palms up, and the fingertips were red and swollen. The man leaned over the table, his face only inches from his hands, as if he was closely examining them. Joshua thought he saw thin needle tips protruding from the man’s fingers – not far, only a fraction of an inch, but he couldn’t make himself believe it. Who stuck needles into their flesh in a public place like this? He told himself that he was imagining things, and looked away.

As usual in the morning, Salvador Tran stood behind the counter taking orders while Yvette made drinks. Joshua thought Yvette was hot, and while he judged that she was younger than him, it wasn’t by much. She looked to be in her early twenties, while he was pushing thirty. Hardly an insurmountable age gap. He thought he was pretty decent-looking – tall, lean-bodied, neatly trimmed hair, freshly shaved face, and relatively new gray suit and blue tie that looked more expensive than they’d actually been. The suit was off the rack, but it fit almost as good as if it had been tailored for him. All in all, he made an acceptable package, one he thought (hoped) that Yvette approved of. Whenever he came to Grinders, she snuck glances at him and when their gazes met, he smiled. Sometimes she turned away hurriedly, as if embarrassed to be caught looking at him, but sometimes she smiled back. Adolescent flirting? Sure, but it was harmless fun, and it wasn’t like he was going to do anything about it. He didn’t date baristas. He had standards.

Mondays always sucked, but today seemed to be especially hard for the people in line ahead of him. Everyone who ordered looked listless and sleepy, and when they finished ordering, they shuffled away from the counter like leaden-limbed zombies. They livened up a bit then, almost as if the prospect of getting their caffeine was enough to give them a jolt of energy. As a coffee addict himself, Joshua sympathized. Salvador was his usual upbeat self, if a bit low-key. Normally Joshua appreciated his positive attitude and chatted with him for a moment or two, but like the customers before him, he felt suddenly weary, could barely keep his eyes open, and he responded to Salvador’s cheerful, “And how are you today, sir?” with a barely articulate mumble.

“’Kay.”

After he paid and headed toward the end of the counter to wait for his drink, he felt a bit better. It seemed the caffeine-anticipation effect worked on him too. He looked over at the guy in the medical uniform. The man was flexing his hands, as if they were stiff and needed loosening up. There was no sign of the needlelike protrusions extending from his fingertips anymore, and why would there be? Something like that wasn’t possible. It had been a misperception caused by Joshua’s caffeine-deprived brain, nothing more. The man rose from the table, tossed his empty coffee cup in the trash, and headed down the hallway that led into the Delgado Building, presumably to get back to work. He seemed a bit dazed, and Joshua thought the man should’ve ordered another cup of pick-me-up juice before leaving.

Find him.

A woman’s voice whispered in his ear.

Startled, he looked around, expecting to see the speaker standing next to him, but the closest person was several feet away, nowhere near enough to have spoken directly into his ear. Great. First he was hallucinating a guy with needle-fingers, now he was imagining whispering women. Maybe he should’ve ordered an extra shot of espresso in his drink.

Find him.

The voice was more insistent this time, and now it seemed to be coming from inside his head. He became aware of a faint odor then, a funky smell unlike anything he’d experienced before. He couldn’t describe it, but he knew it was wrong somehow. More than that, it was bad.

Follow the trail. Track him down. Bring him to me.

Joshua didn’t know who the him was, or for that matter, who me was. But those details didn’t matter. He had to do what the voice said, couldn’t have resisted its command if he wanted to. But that was okay. More than okay, it was fan-fucking-tastic. This was the higher purpose that his life had been missing all these years. No longer was he just some loser who spent his working hours helping other people go places. He was important. He had a mission.

He was a Surrogate.

He forgot about his coffee and how late he was for work, forgot about everything except following the scent trail to his quarry.

Bring him to me.

“You got it, boss,” he said.

He inhaled deeply then started walking down the hallway, moving deeper into the Delgado Building.

Chapter Five

Bullock, Illinois. Then.

“I’m just saying that sometimes a couple needs to give each other their space, you know?”

Darla gave her partner a withering look.

“I don’t think your husband running off with your motherfucking sister counts as ‘space’.”

Darla and Ernie alternated driving the cruiser, and today was Ernie’s turn behind the wheel. Darla would’ve preferred to do all the driving, though. Driving kept her mind occupied, gave her less time to think. And these days, all she could think about was her cheating bastard of a husband and her fucking slut of a sister. It had been almost two weeks since Rick and Tiffany had taken her out to a bar, got her drunk, and then told her that they were in love and were moving in together. At first, she’d thought it was a joke and had laughed her ass off. When she realized they were serious, she’d grabbed a beer bottle and tried to smash it over Rick’s head. It had been a damn good thing she hadn’t been carrying her gun that night.

Ernie was in his mid-thirties with curly red hair and freckles. A tall beefy guy, he looked as if someone had transplanted a boy’s head onto a man’s body. Some women found the combination irresistible, but Darla wasn’t one of them. She loved Ernie, although he could be a pain in the ass more often than not, but she considered him kind of goofy-looking – not that she’d ever say this to him. He was self-conscious about his looks. A cop was expected to project an image of authority, and it was hard to do that when you had the face of a twelve-year-old.

Ernie had married his high school sweetheart soon after graduation, and they’d been together ever since. They’d been deliriously happy with each other all these years, as if they were on a perpetual honeymoon, and while she didn’t know if she could stand to be so lovey-dovey with a spouse all the time, she was envious of Ernie’s relationship with his wife. They were completely devoted to one another and their marriage was rock-solid, which was a hell of a lot more than she could say. Still, Ernie had never been with anyone else except his wife, which meant that he lacked the breadth of experience to be giving relationship advice. Not that it stopped him.

“He’s confused,” Ernie said. “So’s your sister. They’ll come to their senses, though. Just give them some time. You all love each other, right? That’s what really matters in the end.”

She sighed. “With that kind of sap oozing out of you, you ought to be writing fucking greeting cards.”

He grinned. “Just trying to stay positive.”

“How about we try to stay off the subject of my marriage for a while, all right?”

His face turned a bright red. He was definitely a man who wore his emotions on his face.

“Yeah, sure. No problem.”

Darla turned away and looked out the cruiser’s passenger window. It was late September, one of her favorite times of the year, when the leaves on trees were in transition, some still summer-green, others the soft reds, browns, and yellows of autumn. It was like the world was poised between two different realities, that which was and that which was to come. Now that she thought about it, that was kind of where she was too. As angry and hurt as she was now, she didn’t want to have anything to do with Rick or Tiffany ever again, but she also wasn’t ready to let either of them go yet. Would time heal the pain, help her get past the profound sense of betrayal from the two people she loved more than anyone? Or would she eventually find the courage to move on with her life and leave the two of them in the past where they belonged?

Transitions could be a bitch sometimes.

All this month, Darla and Ernie had been working second shift. It was 7:12 p.m., and the shadowy gloom of dusk had descended on Bullock, granting everything a gauzy, dreamlike quality. Another transition time, she thought. She hated when she got like this, all poetic and shit. It was too easy for her to get lost in her thoughts when she should be paying attention to the world outside the cruiser. Bullock wasn’t a particularly large town, but it still had its fair share of crime, along with speeders, reckless drivers, and the resulting traffic accidents they often caused. She was supposed to be working, and she needed to straighten the hell up and start earning her pay.

Their patrol route took them by the high school, and they approached it now. This was their second time driving past since they’d come on duty, and everything looked as quiet as it had the last time, which was just the way she liked it. There were fewer cars in the staff parking lot, and she wondered what their owners were still doing at the school this late. Some of the vehicles might belong to custodial staff, but some had to belong to teachers. Were they staying late in their classrooms to get grading done or make preparations for tomorrow? Light showed from a handful of windows in the main building, but she couldn’t see inside well enough to tell what was going on in individual rooms. She imagined teachers hunched over their desks, reading essays or marking tests with red pens. You’re showing your age, girl, she thought. These days, they’re probably sitting in front of computer screens entering grades.

Even though the cruiser’s windows were rolled up, she could hear music – brass and drums, mostly – and she knew the marching band was practicing in the student parking lot behind the school. She’d played flute in the band when she was in high school, which was another reason she liked fall so much. It reminded her of football season, and being in the stands with her bandmates, cheering the team on and waiting to play the fight song when they scored. Good times. Too bad kids have to grow up, she thought.

The high school was located on the north side of Bullock, on the edge of the town limit. Past it were farmhouses and cornfields, and while it was technically not part of Bullock PD’s jurisdiction, the cops who patrolled this part of town usually drove a half mile or so past the school before turning around, just to keep an eye on things. Nothing wrong with being neighborly, she thought.

They passed a young man on the sidewalk, walking away from the school and headed toward the center of town. He wore a red sweatshirt with a white cartoonish image of the high school mascot, a red hawk, on the front, as well as a backpack, and he carried a large instrument case – a trombone case, from the look of it. He stared at the ground as he walked, clearly unhappy about something, but he didn’t seem to be in any actual distress. He was a teenager, which meant that any number of things could be wrong. Bad test grade, girl (or boy) trouble, or just the generic life-is-shit feeling that all teens got from time to time, and which plenty of adults did too. Maybe he got into some kind of trouble during band practice, she thought. Or maybe he’s not feeling well. There had to be some reason he was leaving practice early. She felt an immediate sense of kinship with the boy. Both of them were feeling lousy tonight.

Cheer up, kid, she thought. Whatever it is, it’ll get better soon.

She knew there was no guarantee of that, but it made her feel a little better to think it. If it could be true for him, maybe it could be true for her too.

As they crossed the town limit, Darla wondered if she could convince Ernie to pull over and let her drive for a while. Usually, they didn’t switch off driving during the course of a shift, but she thought that being behind the wheel for a time might help keep her mind occupied so she wouldn’t obsess over Rick and Tiffany. She was about to ask him when she saw a flash of movement off to the left as something burst out of a cornfield and ran into the road in front of the cruiser.

“Stop!”

She practically screamed the word, and Ernie stomped on the brake and yanked the steering wheel to the left. The cruiser’s tires squealed, the rear end started to fishtail, and Darla slapped a hand to the dashboard to steady herself. A man stood in the middle of the road, illuminated by the cruiser’s headlights – bearded, long-haired, wearing strange clothes, mouth open wide in shock. He thrust his hands toward the cruiser, palms up, as if he was attempting to ward off the vehicle, and Darla thought for certain that they were going to hit him. She gritted her teeth and braced for the impact….

But it never came.

The cruiser stopped mere inches from the man. He jumped back a couple steps and fell forward to press his hands on the hood, as if to prevent the vehicle from moving any farther.

“Goddamn it!”

Ernie put the cruiser in park, undid his seat belt, and was out of the vehicle before Darla had time to react. Normally, Ernie was an even-tempered man, but when he got scared, he got angry, and she knew he’d been plenty scared by what had almost happened. She quickly undid her belt and got out of the car, hoping to head him off before he said or did something he’d later regret.

The bearded man didn’t wait for Ernie to come to him. He rushed forward and Ernie, alarmed, dropped his hand to his gun.

“Stay back!” Ernie shouted.

The man’s gaze dropped to Ernie’s hand, and he raised his own hands palms up in an echo of the warding gesture he’d made a moment ago.

“We have to get out of here,” the man said. “They’re coming!”

The terror in the man’s voice convinced Darla that something was wrong – maybe very wrong – and she dropped her hand to her weapon. She stepped around the front of the cruiser until she and Ernie flanked the man, both of them careful to remain out of his reach.

“Calm down, sir,” she said. “What’s going on?”

“Why the fuck did you run out into the road like that?” Ernie demanded. “We could’ve killed you!”

The man looked to Darla then back to Ernie. His face dripped with sweat, and his voice was strained, almost frantic.

“I told you – they’re coming. We need to cross into the town before they—”

He was interrupted by the sound of thrashing dry cornstalks, as if something large and fast was approaching. A dark form leaped from between the rows and bounded toward them – a low, sleek black body, four powerful legs, yellow glowing eyes, teeth a startling white, a long thin tail that whipped the air as it came. Is that a fucking panther? Darla thought. In Illinois? It sure as shit looked like it. The big cat stopped when it saw the three of them, released a roar that was part fury, part challenge. Fuck with me. C’mon, I dare you.

Ernie gaped at the animal for several seconds, and then he drew his Glock, raised it, aimed at the cat, and fired. The animal jerked to the side as the bullet struck it in the shoulder, but it remained standing. It didn’t look scared or hurt, though – it looked pissed – and it certainly showed no sign that it intended to run. Instead, it fixed its feral gaze on Ernie, crouched down, muscles coiling tight, and then it launched itself at its attacker.

Ernie fired again, but his shot went wild this time, and the panther, or whatever the hell it was, slammed into his chest and knocked him to the ground. The back of Ernie’s head cracked against the road surface, the sound almost as loud as his last gunshot, and the cat began clawing his chest with its front paws, legs moving so fast they were little more than blurs, shredding his uniform shirt and digging into the flesh beneath. The shriek that tore loose from Ernie’s throat didn’t sound human. It was a primal thing, a cry of pure, unadulterated agony. The animal had moved so swiftly that Darla hadn’t been able to react, but now she yanked her gun from its holster, raised it, and fell into a firing stance. But before she could shoot, the bearded man rushed toward her. He grabbed her right arm and tried to pull her away.

“It’s too late for him. We have to leave – now!”

This close, she could smell the man’s body odor, strange and pungent, like a field of rotting grass covered with large tumescent mushrooms. The scent was so intense at first that it was dizzying, and she gave her head a quick shake to clear it.

“Let go of me!”

Darla yanked free of the man’s grip and fired at the cat savaging her partner. She couldn’t tell if she hit it or not, for the animal continued ripping Ernie apart without so much as a second’s pause. There was so much blood, more than Darla had ever seen before. The cat’s mouth and legs were covered in crimson, and the ground around Ernie was a widening pool of red. He was no longer screaming. All that came out of his mouth was a horrible wet gurgling, and his arms and legs thrashed like his nervous system was on overload. She knew then that he was dead, or as good as, but she couldn’t bring herself to abandon him. She started forward, intending to get close enough to the cat so she could jam the barrel of her gun against its head and empty the rest of the clip into its motherfucking skull. But then she saw someone walking down the road toward them, a blond white woman dressed in black, accompanied by three more big black cats. The woman moved like she was one of them, muscles sliding liquid-smooth beneath her skin, eyes blazing the same feral yellow. Darla sensed a profound wrongness about the woman, as if she was a violation, an affront to reality itself.

Darla took a step backward. “The car…” she said.

“No time,” the bearded man said. “We’re close to the town limit. If we can cross it before they reach us, we’ll be safe. Come on!”

He grabbed her arm again and started running, pulling her along with him. She didn’t understand what he was talking about – why the hell would going into Bullock help them? – but by this point she was too stunned by everything that had happened to question him. She followed, running as hard as she could, expecting to hear the thud of large paws on asphalt, to feel the heavy impact of a big cat slamming into her back, to hit the ground as teeth and claws tore the meat from her bones…. But then she saw the large rectangular sign rising on the righthand side of the road: Welcome to Bullock, Illinois. Pop. 4,795. A Great Place to Live! And despite how insane her situation was – or perhaps because of it – seeing the sign filled her with hope.

Just a little bit farther, she thought. Come on, come on….

She ran parallel to the bearded man now, and as there was no longer any need for him to pull her along, he let go of her arm. He shot a quick glance over his shoulder, and his eyes widened in terror. Not good, Darla thought. Without looking at her, he said, “When I say jump, jump as far forward as you can. Understand?”

Darla didn’t have the breath to speak, so she simply nodded.

They ran several more steps. Her lungs felt like they were on fire, and she was getting tunnel vision. Need to put more time in at the gym. She felt dizzy, thought she might faint, but then the man said, “Jump!” and she did so, putting all her remaining strength into it. The next thing she knew she was lying on her side on the road, right elbow and both knees screaming in pain. She had no memory of hitting the asphalt, but she must have done so or otherwise she wouldn’t be here, right? Her thoughts were muzzy and sluggish, and a moment later she understood why when her forehead began to throb. She must’ve struck her head against the ground when she landed. Hopefully she didn’t have a cracked skull or a concussion or something. She still needed to be able to fight if she and the bearded man were to have any hope of getting out of this insanity alive.

She rolled over on her back as a prelude to standing, but before she could, she saw that the woman in black’s four panthers were closing in on her and the bearded man. The cat in the forefront was the one who’d killed Ernie, and its face and front legs were soaked in her partner’s blood. The other three animals were closing in fast, determined to catch up to their companion so they wouldn’t miss out on shedding their share of blood. She raised her hand to fire her gun at them. She didn’t know if she had enough ammo to put all three down, but if she was going to die this night, she intended to put up one hell of a fight first.

But when the cats came within five feet of them, the creatures stopped. Their amber eyes flashed with frustration, and they began to pace back and forth, like restless zoo animals in a cage. The woman in black continued coming, not hurrying, and when she reached the same place as her cats – Darla had no doubt the things belonged to her – she stopped. It was as if there was some kind of invisible barrier preventing the woman and her vicious pets from going any farther. The cats stopped pacing and gathered around their mistress.

“You’ve led us on a merry chase, Arron,” the woman said, “but you know you can’t hope to evade me much longer. You’re only postponing the inevitable. Give yourself to me now, and we can dispense with this foolishness.”

Now that Darla got a close-up view of the woman, she could see she had no fingers on her left hand. The nubs were smooth, the skin unmarked by scarring, as if she’d been born this way, rather than having lost her fingers as the result of an injury.

The bearded man – Arron – rose to his feet on shaky legs, and he reached down and helped Darla to stand as well. Her knees protested at this poor treatment but didn’t buckle.

“I’ll never stop running.” Arron’s words were defiant, but his voice quavered.

The woman in black’s smile was a terrible thing to behold – cold, cruel, and mocking.

“Yes, you will. And when you do, I’ll be there, and I’ll make you regret ever taking a single step away from me.”

She went down on one knee then and, gaze fixed on them the entire time, wicked smile still in place, she pressed her right hand flat against the surface of the road. The asphalt around her hand turned a lifeless gray, and began to slide toward them like a thin layer of liquid. The grayness grew swiftly, rushing to the right and left, extending into the cornfields on both sides of the road, and presumably continuing onward. The woman stood once more, movements stiff and awkward, her smile gone. Whatever she’d done, it had taken a toll on her.

She looked at Arron, the yellow glow in her eyes dulled.

“Nowhere to go now,” she said, voice weaker than before. “You’re trapped.”

Arron looked at her for several seconds, as if he intended to say something, but then he turned around and started running away from the encroaching grayness. After a moment’s hesitation, Darla followed.

The woman in black laughed as they fled.

* * *

Lucius Squires walked down the sidewalk, heading away from the high school, trying to figure out how he was going to tell his parents that he’d quit marching band tonight. To make matters worse, he wasn’t certain himself why he’d quit. He’d started playing trombone in the sixth grade, and he’d been in concert band ever since. He’d started marching band his freshman year in high school and had fallen in love with it immediately. He loved being part of something bigger than himself, loved learning the music and intricate choreography of a show, loved performing before an audience…. He loved it all so much that he’d been giving serious thought to majoring in music when he got to college, maybe even becoming a high school band director himself one day. But during tonight’s practice, everything had fallen apart when the band started the third song of their competition show, and Ms. Palmer had yelled for everyone to stop. My god, it sounds like half of you haven’t memorized the damn music yet! She continued like that, criticizing their marching, their attitude, their lack of energy…. Lucius had done his best to listen without having an emotional reaction. All of them – band director and students alike – had been up for over twelve hours by that point, and they were all tired. Ms. Palmer was simply frustrated and weary, that was all.

But the thing was, Lucius was frustrated and weary too. He was in the beginning of his junior year, and he was taking a lot of challenging college prep courses. Plus, on weekends, he worked at Food Saver, and he volunteered at an animal shelter a few hours each week in order to gain community service experience and make his application for college stronger. All he did was work, one way or another. He didn’t have time to see his friends, didn’t get more than five hours of sleep at night – sometimes less – because of all the homework he had, didn’t play video games or spend time messing around on the internet, and he didn’t have time to meet girls, let alone go out with any of them. He’d told himself that all this work would pay off by the time he got to college, but this night, standing in the school parking lot beneath the fluorescent lights while Ms. Palmer yelled at them for being the worst group of students she’d had in her career as a music educator, he’d had enough. When Ms. Palmer was done yelling, she gave everyone a five-minute water break. Lucius took the opportunity to pack up his trombone, tell his section leader that he was leaving early because he had a bad headache, and then got the hell out of there. He hadn’t made a conscious decision to quit band, had never really thought about it before, but as he walked away from the parking lot, he knew he’d never play in the marching band again. When Ms. Palmer found out, she’d give him a lecture about the commitment he’d made to the band at the start of the season, as well as his responsibility to his fellow bandmates. He’d hear a variation of the same speech from his parents, and he was looking forward to neither.

Maybe he wasn’t cut out to be a music teacher. But he had no idea what other kind of career he might be suited for, and your junior year of high school was when you were supposed to be looking into colleges and figuring out where to apply. But how could you pick a school if you didn’t know what you wanted to major in? Maybe he’d been too hasty in his decision to quit marching band. He hadn’t told anyone of his intention, so it wasn’t like he’d officially quit yet. Maybe he could stick it out for the rest of the season and then not join next fall. He could always claim that since it was his senior year, he wanted to concentrate on his academics in preparation for transitioning to college. Ms. Palmer wouldn’t be happy, but he thought she’d understand. His parents would too, especially if he avoided talking about how much he’d come to dislike marching band and emphasized wanting to focus on academics. That decided, he felt his stress melt away, and he began whistling the tune from the contest show’s opening number, a medley of music from West Side Story.

A police cruiser drove past then, and Lucius watched as it went by. He wasn’t especially worried. The cops in Bullock weren’t that bad, but he was a kid walking alone, and it was starting to get dark. He was carrying a trombone case, so that made him seem less threatening – he hoped – but it was always a good idea to keep an eye on police. Don’t assume they’re the enemy, his dad had once told him. But don’t assume they’re your friend either. Once the cruiser was past, he resisted the urge to glance back over his shoulder at it. No need to make himself look more suspicious than he might already. Best to just keep walking at a normal pace, not too fast, not too slow, and hope the cops ignored him.

The sound of brakes squealing yanked him out of his thoughts, and despite his earlier determination not to turn around, he did so now and saw the cruiser’s brake lights flare red as it came to a sudden stop just outside the town limit. Had an animal run out in front of them, a dog or a cat, or maybe even a coyote? Coyotes were common enough in Illinois, especially in the lower part of the state where Bullock was located. There wasn’t much light left, and the cruiser was too far away from him to get a clear view of it so he couldn’t see what was going on. He heard car doors open, heard people talking, voices strained. This was followed by a pair of gunshots, and then the air was split by a scream unlike anything Lucius had ever heard before. The sound hit him like a cold punch to the gut.

What the fuck?

And then he heard people running.

* * *

Jordan Wisniewski walked out of Bullock High’s East Building and into the teachers’ parking lot. The goddamn band was practicing tonight, but thankfully they were taking a break right now and blessed silence filled the air. He was not a fan of marching band music, thought it sounded like the caterwauling of brass and woodwind demons from hell. He much preferred the soothing sounds of smooth jazz. It was the kind of music he liked to listen to as he painted – not that he’d done much of that in the last year. Not since Stuart’s death.

He wore a brown jacket, white shirt, yellow tie, jeans, and brown shoes. His outfit screamed I am a high school teacher, as did the leather satchel slung over his shoulder. What his clothes didn’t do, however, was say art teacher. He might have been a creative person, but he had a penchant for formality, plus he didn’t like to be predictable or clichéd. No turtlenecks or shirts worn open-collar and jacketless, no colorful ties with patterns inspired by Van Gogh’s Starry Night or Dali’s Persistence of Memory, no thin scarves draped around the neck. One of his professors in grad school had once said, Artists should dress and act like everyone else and save all their creativity for their work, and Jordan had taken that to heart.

His Prius was one of the few cars left in the teachers’ back lot. It wasn’t full night yet, but the lot’s fluorescent lights had come on, painting his car in a wash of blue-white luminance. He hated fluorescent light, had always found it cold and unflattering, but as he approached his vehicle, he was struck by the sudden urge to capture the image in a painting. It was the first time he had felt any impulse to make art in over a year, and although it wasn’t all that strong, was more of a fleeting fancy really, the fact that he felt it at all nearly brought him to tears. He hadn’t produced so much as a quick pencil sketch since Stuart had been diagnosed with stage two prostate cancer. Stuart had undergone surgery right away and then follow-up radiation treatment, but that compromised his immune system and he contracted pneumonia. Less than a week later, he was dead. Jordan and Stuart had been together since he’d started teaching at Bullock High nearly twenty-five years ago, and to lose him like that, so suddenly, and not even to the cancer but to stupid fucking pneumonia…. It was as infuriating as it was bewildering. Jordan had contemplated suicide in the first couple months after Stuart’s death, but not seriously enough to attempt it. He’d thought about retiring early from teaching and devoting himself entirely to his painting, but teaching gave him a reason to get up every morning, gave him somewhere to go and something to do to occupy a large portion of his day. Otherwise, he feared he would sit at home, stare out the front window, think about Stuart, and get nothing done.

That was the reason he was leaving work so late tonight. He’d been grading student self-portraits in his classroom after school, and he’d taken his time, stretched out the process as long as he could to avoid having to go home to an empty house filled with memories of his lost love. Who the hell would want to go home to that? Sometimes, when he couldn’t bring himself to walk through the front door, he’d drive to a motel near the highway and book a room for the night. At least he’d be able to get some sleep there, no matter how fitful. He might do that tonight, although he’d need to stop home to get a change of clothes for tomorrow. He should pack a bag with a set of work clothes and toiletries and keep it in the car for times like these. That way, he wouldn’t have to go home at all if he didn’t want to.

He reached his Prius, got in, slung the satchel off his shoulder, and tossed it on the passenger seat. The vehicle’s lights came on when he started the car, and he pulled out of his space, hoping he’d be able to get the hell out of there before the band started playing again.

* * *

“Who is that woman? What are those things? Why aren’t they chasing us?”

The questions tumbled out of Darla’s mouth so fast that the words were almost unintelligible. Arron seemed to understand them well enough, though.

“Night and her Harriers are creatures of the Wild,” he said. “They can’t set foot in civilized places.”

Darla tried to make sense out of this as they ran – or in her case, hobbled along on injured knees. Night was the woman. The panthers were Harriers. The rest, she didn’t understand.

“So we’re safe from them?” she asked.

“Not for long. She’s created a Blight. It will corrupt your town, transform it into a Wild place, allowing Night and the Harriers to enter. The Blight will spread swiftly, and once it’s claimed all of Bullock, there will be nowhere for us to go that Night cannot follow.”

The rational part of Darla’s mind wanted to call bullshit on Arron’s story, but there was a part of her that accepted his words at face value. She might not understand all the details, but she got the gist of it. Night was some kind of unnatural being – a witch or a demon, maybe, or something even worse – and she couldn’t cross into Bullock until her magic made it safe for her and her pets.

“When you say it will spread swiftly, exactly how fast are you talking about?”

Before Arron could answer, Darla heard the Harriers roar. They sounded close – too close – and when she glanced back, she saw that they were padding forward, heads low, eyes burning with yellow fire. Night followed behind, a cold smile on her face, eyes just as yellow as her cats’. Darla wasn’t sure, but it looked like they’d crossed the town limit and were continuing on.

“Fast,” Arron said. “The precise rate of speed depends entirely on how much of her power Night invested in the Blight. She’s determined to capture me, and this is the first time she’s been so close, so….”

“So she’s used a shit-ton of power,” Darla said. “Got it.”

She’d made no conscious decision to stick with Arron, but the man was in trouble – deep trouble – and she was a cop. She wasn’t going to abandon him, even if it meant she ended up like poor Ernie. An image of her partner’s bloodied, mangled body flashed through her mind, and she thought, How am I going to tell his wife that he’s dead? A near-crippling wave of grief came over her, but she shoved it deep inside her. She could grieve later. Right now, she had to do her best to make sure Arron and she survived the next several minutes. They needed to get out of here before the Blight could overtake them, but they couldn’t use the cruiser since Night and the Harriers were now past it. They needed a set of wheels, but where—

They’d reached Bullock High and were just about even with the school’s exit when a pair of headlights swung around from behind one of the buildings and started heading toward them. As the car – a Prius, Darla noted – approached, she stepped in front of it and raised her hands into the air. She’d forgotten she still held her Glock in her right hand, and she hoped the sight of the weapon didn’t spook the driver. Then again, if the Prius’s owner was reluctant to stop, she’d aim the gun at him for a little extra persuasion to get him to do so. Luckily, that wasn’t necessary. The driver stopped, rolled down his window, and leaned out to speak.

“What’s wrong, Officer?” he said. He’d addressed her, but his gaze focused on Arron, as if he was trying to determine whether or not he was a threat. Darla herself wasn’t certain which category the man fell into.

She lowered her arms and hurried to the driver’s side window. She looked at the man behind the wheel, her mouth open, ready to speak, but his face was blurred, and she couldn’t make out his features. What the hell? Was she so stressed that she was on the verge of hysterical blindness? Her vision cleared then, and she saw the driver was in his sixties, white-haired, with a neatly trimmed goatee. She didn’t know what had happened, and she didn’t have time to worry about it.

“This is an emergency,” she said. “We need a ride. Now.”

The driver looked back and forth between Darla and Arron, obviously torn about what he should do. In other circumstances, Darla would’ve understood his reluctance, would even have lauded it. When a pair of strangers ran up to you out of nowhere and asked for a ride, especially if one of them held a gun, it only made sense to be cautious, even if one of them was wearing a police uniform. But she didn’t have time to explain, and even if she did, she knew she wouldn’t be able to. Hell, she didn’t fully understand what was going on herself.

“Unlock the passenger door,” she said. “We’re getting in.”

Without waiting for the driver to respond, she took hold of Arron’s elbow and escorted him around the front of the Prius to the vehicle’s passenger-side door. Once they were no longer blocking the car, she thought the driver might hit the gas and zoom off before they could get inside. But he didn’t. He unlocked the passenger door, grabbed the leather satchel resting on the passenger seat, and tossed it in the back. Darla practically shoved Arron inside, then climbed in after him. She pulled the door closed, and turned to look at the driver.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

“Jordan Wisniewski. I’m an art teacher.”

Despite the weirdness of the situation, his voice was steady, and Darla took that as a good sign.

“All right, Jordan. I need you to pull out onto the road and head into town. Can you do that for me?”

Jordan was looking at Arron, his mouth pursed in distaste. Darla guessed he’d gotten a whiff of Arron’s weird body odor, and was no fonder of it than she was. Then he looked past Arron at her.

“No problem.” He removed his foot from the brake, pressed down on the gas, and the Prius began to move forward. “Do you mind telling me what this is about?”

“Later. For now, just drive.”

Jordan did so, moving to the end of the exit and absurdly hitting his left turn signal before pulling onto the road. Darla looked right and saw that the Harriers and Night were much closer now, only a few yards away. The road beneath the big cats had turned gray and was shot through with cracks, a result of the Blight Arron had spoken of. The Harriers leaned forward as they walked, as if pushing against a strong wind, and Darla realized they were trying to force the Blight to move faster. As the Prius accelerated, Darla saw the boy Ernie and she had passed earlier, the one carrying the trombone case. He stood on the sidewalk in front of the high school, gaping at the approaching Harriers. Darla knew they couldn’t just leave him here. She figured the band kids practicing in the parking lot behind the school were safe enough. Night wanted Arron, not them. But trombone boy was directly in the big cats’ path, and she doubted they’d simply walk by and leave him unharmed. She’d seen what the cats had done to Ernie, and she wasn’t going to allow them to do the same to anyone else, not if she could help it.

“Pull over,” she told Jordan. “We need to pick up that kid.”

“I’m not a goddamned cabdriver,” Jordan muttered, but he did as Darla asked.

Jordan’s driver’s side window was still down, and she leaned past Arron to call out to the kid.

“Hey! I’m a police officer – you need to get in the car before those cats reach you!”

The boy continued staring at the Harriers for several more seconds before he turned to look at Darla. When he did, his brow furrowed.

“Mr. Wisniewski, is that you?” he said.

“I don’t entirely understand what’s happening, Lucius, but I think you’d better do as the officer asks. I don’t think it’s safe out there right now.”

Arron let out a bark of a laugh.

“That’s putting it mildly.”

Darla ignored him. “Come on, Lucius. It’ll be okay. We’ll make sure you get home safely.”

Lucius hesitated, but then he took one more look at the Harriers and saw how much forward progress they’d made since Jordan had pulled over. He then ran to the Prius, opened the rear driver’s side door, and hopped in. Once the boy was inside, Jordan punched the gas, and the car began to move again, not as fast as Darla would’ve liked, but at least they were heading away from Night and the Harriers.

“So,” Jordan said. “Where to?”

Darla remembered something Arron had told her. The Blight will spread swiftly, and once it’s claimed all of Bullock, there will be nowhere for us to go that Night cannot follow.

“I honestly don’t know,” she said.

Chapter Six

Collier, Ohio. Now.

Bethany wanted to give Arron the benefit of the doubt, but the story he told her sounded like the ravings of a madman. He spoke of things she’d never heard of before – the Omniverse, the Gyre, the Wild – and of a hunter called Night and her four Harriers, which she guessed were some kind of animals, although she wasn’t clear on exactly what they were. He spoke of the Blight, a negative energy field that Night could create that could transform a place of civilization into part of the Wild for a short time. Night and her Harriers could then enter it and run their prey to ground.

“And that’s who’s hunting you,” Bethany said. “Night and her Harriers.”

“Yes,” Arron said. “She’s created a Blight that has surrounded this building. It’s slowly moving inward, like a snare closing.”

Bethany didn’t have any experience or training in how to handle someone who was mentally ill, and she had no idea whether she should try to convince him his delusions weren’t real or play along with them for the time being. She wasn’t afraid of him. She had a cousin who’d been affected with mild schizophrenia since she was fourteen, and thanks to a combination of mental therapy and drug treatments, she’d been able to deal with her condition. Because of this, Bethany understood that just because someone suffered from mental illness didn’t mean they were dangerous to anyone other than themselves. Of course, just because the odds were in favor of Arron being harmless didn’t necessarily make it so, and she wanted to be careful to avoid saying anything that might upset him.

It was hard to think, though. Her skin was itching like mad all over her body, and she was beginning to think she was having an allergic reaction to something, maybe whatever it was that gave Arron that strong funky odor he put off.

“Couldn’t you just leave the building before Night enters?” she asked.

Arron shook his head. “I cannot cross the demarcation line once it’s established. Humans can enter a zone of Blight, but once inside, they cannot leave.”

She didn’t like the way he said humans, like he didn’t consider himself to be one.

He continued. “When humans do cross the demarcation line, they are…changed. They become Surrogates – servants of Night. Their strength and senses are heightened, and they act as her agents within a Blight, seeking out whatever she is hunting. Surrogates are not permitted to kill a quarry. Their task is solely to capture it and bring it to Night outside of the Blight.”

Her cell phone buzzed, indicating she’d received a text. She removed it from the desk drawer to check it, expecting it to be from Elissa. But it was from Nate.

You need me to rescue you from that nutjob?

She smiled as she replied. Not yet. I’ll keep you posted.

“Why does Night need Surrogates?” she asked Arron. “Why doesn’t she just wait for the Blight to be complete so she and her Harriers can enter?”

“The Blight is created from Night’s power. If she can obtain her quarry before a Blight reaches completion, she can dispel it and save her strength.”

Despite how crazy the situation was, Brittany couldn’t help but be impressed. Arron had either planned out his story remarkably well, or his psychologically unhealthy brain was genius-level when it came to creating detailed and consistent delusions.

“How can you tell a Surrogate from a regular human?” she asked. “What do they look like?”

The office’s outer door burst open then and a man rushed in.

“Like that,” Arron said.

The man was in his early thirties, Bethany judged, tall, dark-haired, clean-shaven, wearing a gray suit and blue tie. He looked like any other office drone, except for the cold, calculating expression on his face and his amber-tinted eyes. Those eyes almost seemed to glow as they fixed on Arron, and the man sniffed the air, as if taking in Arron’s scent, and he smiled.

“Found you,” he said.

Before she could react, Nate rose from his desk and stepped into the outer office to confront the man.

“Can I help you?” Nate asked, his words as much a warning as they were a question, his tone saying, I don’t know what your problem is, but we don’t want any trouble.

The man regarded Nate for a moment, amber eyes flashing with anger, lips drawn back from his teeth in a half smile, half snarl.

“You can help me by staying out of my goddamned way.”

He swung his right arm with a swift, vicious motion and backhanded Nate across the face. The impact sounded loud as a gunshot and Nate staggered to the side. He might’ve fallen to the floor if he hadn’t bumped into one of the chairs in the small reception area. He was able to grab hold of its back and steady himself. Bethany rose from her chair, more out of reflex than any conscious decision to go to Nate’s aid, but Arron got up and placed himself between her and the doorway.

“You’re not quite ready yet,” he told her.

She had no idea what he was talking about, but she didn’t care. She wanted to step forward, shove him aside, and go out to help her friend. Adrenaline surged through her body, heightening her senses. Time seemed to slow, and everything came into sharp focus. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a dark blotch on her office window, and she turned to see a blackish-green patch resembling mold covering the bottom quarter of the glass. The Blight, she thought. It’s spreading. It might have been an illusion, but it looked as though the Blight was somehow seeping through the glass, and she remembered how Arron had described it. It’s slowly moving inward, like a snare closing.

The strange itching she’d been experiencing had intensified to the point where it felt as if her skin was on fire. She looked away from the window, forgot about the Blight, ignored the itching. She had more important things to worry about right now.

The yellow-eyed man started toward her office.

“You’re Arron,” he said. “You need to come with me.”

The man only made it a few steps before Nate – moving with a speed Bethany wouldn’t have thought possible – spun around. He threw himself at the intruder, slammed into the man’s side, and together they went down to the floor. Nate climbed on top of the man, fastened his hands around his neck, and began squeezing. The man grabbed Nate’s wrists and tried to pull his hands off his throat, but he couldn’t break Nate’s grip. Bethany was stunned. Nate had always struck her as a gentle man, and she’d never imagined him capable of any sort of violence, let alone strangling an attacker. But there he was, attempting to throttle the life out of another human being, his face a mask of savage rage. He’d changed too. Tufts of coarse black-brown hair – no, fur – sprouted from his hands, face, and neck. His fingers ended in sharp black nails, and his teeth had become pointed. An animalistic growl rumbled deep in his throat as he attempted to choke Night’s Surrogate, and Bethany gawked, unable to believe what her eyes were showing her. Nate had always put her in mind of a good-natured dog, and now it seemed he’d actually become a canine, at least partially – albeit one stronger and more aggressive than she’d ever imagined, more like a wolf.

This can’t be real, she thought. She’d gotten in an accident on her way to work this morning and was lying in a hospital bed, in a coma, her damaged brain concocting wild fantasies as it sparked and sputtered. Or her mind had snapped, and she was in a mental institution, bound in a straightjacket and kneeling on the floor, head pressed hard against a padded wall while she hallucinated wildly.

Arron spoke, startling her out of her thoughts. “We should go while they’re occupied,” he said.

The Delgado Building didn’t have a security office, so there was no one on-site for Bethany to summon for help. She snatched her phone off the desk, intending to call 911, but Arron grabbed her wrist to stop her before she could start inputting numbers.

“Anyone who enters the building will become a Surrogate,” he reminded her, “including the police – and they’ll be carrying weapons.”

She hesitated a moment, then nodded. She didn’t exactly believe what Arron had told her but given what was happening in the office at the moment, she didn’t exactly disbelieve either. The thought of yellow-eyed cops running around the building, searching for Arron, guns drawn and ready to fire at anyone who got in their way, was terrifying. But she didn’t want to abandon Nate. Whatever had happened to change him, however strong he might be now, she couldn’t leave him to deal with the yellow-eyed man alone. And what if Nate ended up killing him? When he returned to his senses, he’d be horrified at what he’d done, and he’d have to live with it for the rest of his life. Plus, he could end up in prison because of it. It wasn’t as if he’d be able to mount a convincing legal defense. Your Honor, members of the jury, I am innocent because I turned into a wolf man and was therefore not responsible for my actions.

She pulled her arm free from Arron’s grip and shoved past him. He didn’t try to stop her as she left her office and headed toward Nate and the yellow-eyed man. Her skin still felt as if it might burst into flame any moment, but she focused past the sensation. Nate needed her help.

The two men’s struggle had intensified. Nate was growling louder now, and his arms trembled from the effort of trying to choke the yellow-eyed man. And was his fur thicker, his teeth sharper? She thought they might be. For his part, the yellow-eyed man had given up trying to pull Nate’s hands from his neck, and was now pounding his fists against Nate’s chest and arms while thrashing his body back and forth in an attempt to dislodge his would-be murderer. She wondered how the yellow-eyed man could still be conscious. His face was turning a dark purple, and his eyes bulged so far from their sockets she wouldn’t have been surprised if they popped right out of his skull.

She went to Nate, put a hand on his shoulder.

“Nate, you don’t need to—”

That’s as far as she got before Nate snarled, whipped his head around, and fastened his sharp teeth on her wrist. She felt pressure, but no pain, and she thought, He’s severed nerves, and I can’t feel anything. She tried to pull her wrist free out of reflex, the rational part of her mind warning her not to do it, that she’d only damage herself further, but she couldn’t stop herself. At first, she couldn’t budge her wrist, but then she put more effort into it, and she tore away from him. She stepped back, raised her wrist so she could examine it, expected to see blood gushing from a newly created wound, but there was none. What’s more, while the skin had a number of small indentations, it was unbroken. Her skin didn’t look right, though. It was gray, rough, and pebbly, like rhinoceros hide. She realized then that the itching had stopped. Horrified, she reached up to touch her face. The tips of her fingers were less sensitive now, but she could still feel how rough her lips, cheeks, and chin were.

You’ve been telling yourself for years that you need to grow a thicker skin, she thought. Now you have.

Hysterical laughter threatened to bubble up inside her, and she feared if she let it out, she’d start laughing and wouldn’t be able to stop. She bit her lower lip to distract herself, but the flesh was too tough and she felt nothing.

The yellow-eyed man took advantage of Nate’s momentary distraction. He rolled hard to the left, and Nate slammed against the floor. The impact caused Nate’s grip on the man’s neck to loosen, and he was finally able to pull himself free. He sprung to his feet and kicked Nate in the gut. Nate moaned and curled up in a ball to protect his middle, but it didn’t help. The man kicked him a second time, a third…. Aside from the mild pushing and shoving that kids sometimes did to one another on playgrounds, Bethany had never committed an act of violence in her life. But now she rushed toward the yellow-eyed man and thought, Let’s see how tough this new skin of mine really is. She grabbed the yellow-eyed man’s shoulder, intending to pull him off Nate, but whatever force had transformed her hadn’t made her any stronger, and the man continued kicking Nate’s midsection. If this went on much longer, she feared he’d kill Nate.

She looked to her office, hoping that Arron would come out to help, but he merely stood in the doorway, watching the yellow-eyed man kick Nate, an unreadable expression on his face. She felt sudden fury toward the strange man who’d entered UR Money’s office to disrupt the morning. Whatever the hell was happening here, he was the cause of it, at least partially, and the least he could do was help deal with the trouble he’d brought. But all he did was stand and watch, as if Nate and the yellow-eyed man were putting on a show for his entertainment. She was tempted to go to Arron, grab his wrist, and drag him to the yellow-eyed man and say, You want him? He’s all yours. Take him and get the fuck out of here. But she couldn’t do that. It simply wasn’t in her nature, much as she might’ve wished otherwise.

She turned toward the small client waiting area and gripped the back of one of the chairs. It wasn’t all that substantial – wooden frame, padding covered with blue vinyl – but it was still too heavy for her to lift. She pulled the chair back, turned it around, and then slid it across the tiled floor toward the yellow-eyed man, pushing as hard as she could. The man was already balanced on one leg as he used the other to kick Nate, so when the chair struck the back of his knee, he fell into it. Bethany used the man’s momentum to help her as she yanked the chair backward, and it fell, taking the man with it. He flailed his arms, as if by doing so he could stop the chair from falling, but it was no help, and he hit the floor hard.

Bethany knew the yellow-eyed man wouldn’t stay down long, so she turned to Nate, intending to help him to his feet and get him out of the office before the man could recover and attack again. But Nate was already on his feet, hate-filled gaze fixed on the yellow-eyed man. He bared his sharp teeth, snarled, raised his clawed hands, and leaped. Bethany stepped back quickly to get out of Nate’s way as he flew through the air toward the yellow-eyed man. The man was already in the process of trying to get up, but Nate crashed into him and knocked him back down. Then, before the yellow-eyed man could react, Nate swiped his right hand across the man’s throat, his claws tearing out a large chunk of meat and cartilage. Blood sprayed the air, and the yellow-eyed man’s body began spasming as if he was being electrocuted. Nate howled in triumph and lowered his head to the red ruin of the man’s neck and began to feed with happy wet snuffling sounds.

Bethany thought she was going to be sick.

She jumped when she felt Arron’s hand on her shoulder.

“We must go,” he said. “Your friend is more animal than human now, and he’s acquired a taste for human blood. He’s now a danger to anyone he comes in contact with.”

She wanted to punch the sonofabitch for hanging back while she and Nate had fought to protect him, but now wasn’t the time. She gave him a stiff nod, and they started toward the office’s outer door, careful to give Nate – whose face was now a mask of crimson – a wide berth.

* * *

Nate felt fantastic.

He was strong, his senses alive in a way they never had been before. His teeth and claws tore through his opponent’s body as if it were made of soggy cardboard, and he swallowed wet gobbets of meat, one after the other, taste buds exploding with ecstasy at the flavors of raw human meat and fresh hot blood. Nate had ripped open the man’s abdomen, and the air was filled with the heady odor of exposed organs. Despite having been raised Lutheran, he was not a religious man and only attended church on major holidays. But if there was a heaven and he could choose how he spent his afterlife, he would remain frozen in this moment for all eternity.

It doesn’t get any better than this, he thought as he lowered his face to the dead man’s open belly and began gnawing on a length of intestine.

Part of him was aware that he’d undergone a terrible transformation, that he was no longer strictly human, had become some kind of awful thing. But the rest of him was too intoxicated by ravaging the corpse of his fallen enemy to care. His belly felt full to bursting, but still he ate, driven by overpowering new instincts, and he would continue eating until he was literally unable to force another chunk of meat down his throat. And when he was finished with this meal, he’d go off in search of another. The building was filled with people after all. It would be a goddamned buffet for a monster like him.

He grinned, displaying blood-slick teeth, and resumed his grisly feast.

* * *

Night now stood three yards deep into the Delgado Building’s parking lot, while her three remaining Harriers continued patrolling the edge of the woods, hyper-vigilant for any threats. The Blight was beginning to pick up speed, which pleased her, and she could sense that it had already begun to penetrate the front of the building, which pleased her even more. Extending the Blight onto the sidewalk outside the building, which was a civilized area, and maintaining it was taking a great deal of her power. At the time, it had seemed an effective strategy, but she was beginning to have doubts. Creating a Blight drained her of energy, made her vulnerable and open to attack. Look what had happened in Bullock five years ago. Back then, she’d been strong enough to create a Blight that encompassed an entire town. Now it was an effort to cast one intended for a single small building.

She smiled bitterly. “How far the mighty have fallen,” she said.

She gazed upon the Delgado Building. Where was Arron at this moment? Was he hiding in one of the offices, door locked and barricaded, or was he staying on the move, going from one place to another in search of the most secure area he could find? One thing was certain: by now he’d latched on to one or more of the humans in the building and drawn them in to helping him. It was what he did.

Then, for the first time since she’d begun hunting Arron, so many years ago now, she wondered if all this effort – the time she’d spent, the power she’d expended – was really worth it. She could break off the hunt now, reabsorb the energy she’d used to create the Blight, recall her surviving Harriers, and depart, leaving Arron to make his way in this world the best he could. Without him, she would never be truly complete, but so what? She’d existed in this state for years, and she’d gotten along well enough. Plus, someone or something had killed one of her Harriers, and she doubted that whoever or whatever it was would be content with bringing down just one of them. They would attack again, and she didn’t know if she was strong enough right now to defend her pets. She didn’t know if she was strong enough to defend herself if it came to that. The idea of withdrawing from the hunt galled her, but the more she contemplated it, the more it seemed like the right move.

She crouched down and stretched her right hand toward the parking lot’s asphalt surface, intending to draw the Blight back into her, when her vision blurred. The world seemed to lurch violently back and forth, and when it settled her vision cleared, and she found herself surrounded by thick white mists illuminated by jagged streaks of lightning in the distance. These were the primordial energies from which the Omniverse had been formed, the surging, roiling chaos known as the Wild.

She stood and looked around, but it was the same everywhere she looked, nothing but mist. She closed her eyes, stretched out her senses, tried to reach her Harriers, but she felt nothing. Either her powers no longer functioned, or her pets had not been brought here with her. She was not afraid, for she did not experience fear in the same manner that humans did, but she was…unsettled. It had been millennia since she had been in this realm, and she had no idea why she was here. She did, however, know who had brought her here, and she did not wish to look upon his countenance once more, but she knew that she was not going to be given a choice in the matter.

The Great King of the Wild was coming.

She sensed his vast presence somewhere in the mists ahead of her, heard his deep bellows-like breath, felt the ground shake with each tread of his unimaginably massive feet, smelled the dense musk of fur combined with the fresh green of growing vegetation. She felt like a terrified small animal in the presence of a very large and extremely dangerous predator. She wanted to turn and run as fast as she could, almost did so, but she knew there was no point. There was nowhere she could go in this realm where the King couldn’t find her. So she stood and waited for her god to find her. It didn’t take long.

She saw his dark silhouette shambling toward her, his gigantic form parting the mists as he came, providing Night with her first good look at him. The King of the Wild appeared as a great bear, thick body and powerful limbs covered with dense brown fur in which numerous bare patches of skin appeared. Some of these areas were red and raw, others black and oozing pus, while still others hosted tumescent growths of flesh that jiggled as he lumbered toward Night. Upon his back was a vast forest filled with every kind of tree that grew on Earth. Massive flocks of birds circled above it, their cries faint and distant. Half of the trees were lush and healthy, while the others were afflicted by various diseases or were old, leafless, and near death. The King’s eyes blazed with yellow fire so intense that it hurt to look upon his countenance, and Night had to squint her own eyes so she could continue gazing at him. It was impossible to gauge his size given the lack of any objects in the vicinity to compare him to, but she guessed he was as large as a continent, perhaps much larger. His breathing was as loud as hurricane-force winds, and his exhalations rushed over her like a fetid gale, bearing the stink of rotted meat and decaying plant matter. Unrestrained growth and unstoppable decay – these were the prime forces of the Wild, inextricably linked, a never-ending cycle where birth and death became one, and of which the King was the ultimate embodiment.

Night fell to her knees and bowed her head.

“My lord,” she said, the words a greeting, a pledge of fealty, and a plea for mercy all at once.

The King continued coming toward her, and she wondered if he was aware of her at all, or if one of his great paws would come down upon her as he passed, destroying her without his ever knowing. But he stopped, so close that he seemed to fill the world, still far enough away that it would take her days to reach him on foot. Although she hadn’t been given leave to do so, she raised her head to look up at him. A predator only respected you if you met its gaze directly.

Time passed as the King breathed slowly in and out, though how much, she couldn’t say. She could feel heat coming off the King’s body, as intense as if she was standing in front of an open blast furnace, but she would not move away, even if the heat eventually burned her to death. She was surrounded by the King’s scent, a heavy miasma of life and death combined to create something that was more than either could ever be alone. It was overwhelming, even intoxicating in its own way, and she thought she could kneel like this and keep breathing the scent in for all eternity.

Then the King spoke, his voice loud as thunder in her mind.

I made you to go forth into the world of humans and expand the reach of the Wild. I named you Night for you are a hunter and bring the gift of final darkness to your prey. But you are much diminished in power now, and because of this, one of your Harriers is dead, and you find yourself hunted by those you should’ve slain five years ago. And now you are about to do the unthinkable – break off a hunt before its completion. There is no greater sin you could commit.

Shame burned hot inside her, and it took everything she had not to throw herself to the ground, abase herself before her master, and beg his forgiveness. Such a display would only anger him and most likely result in her immediate death.

“Yes, my lord.”

One good thing: she now knew the identities of the ones who had killed her Harrier, and when she got the chance, she would make them pay dearly for what they had done. Assuming, of course, the King allowed her to return to Earth.

Go back and finish what you started, and if you so much as consider abandoning a hunt in the future, I will destroy you without a second’s hesitation. Do you understand?

“Yes.” She was relieved. As much as it hurt to be rebuked by her lord, she now knew she would not die this day. She realized then that she had an opportunity here, if only she was bold enough to take advantage of it.

“My lord,” she said, “as you pointed out, I am not at my full strength. If you were gracious enough to restore my power, I could—”

The King’s roar filled the universe and Night clapped her hands to her ears in a vain attempt to block the sound. Hot pain drilled into her head, and blood gushed from her nostrils.

After all your failures, you have the temerity to ask me for a favor? Arrogant mite!

The King’s head came rushing down toward her, and his gigantic maw opened, displaying sharp teeth – some white, some yellow, some black with advanced decay. Beyond the teeth lay a darkness thicker and deeper than anything she had ever seen before. She screamed as her god’s mouth snapped closed around her.

* * *

Light flooded her eyes, and when her vision cleared, she found herself looking at the back of the Delgado Building. She was still crouched in the parking lot, her hand outstretched to pull the energy of the Blight back into herself, just as she had been before the King of the Wild had appeared to her. Blood ran from her nose, dripped onto the asphalt beneath her. She drew the back of her fingerless left hand across her face to wipe away the worst of the blood, then rose to her feet, shaking, but grateful to still be alive, and more determined than ever to capture Arron. She would see this hunt through to the end, no matter what it took or what it cost her.

She glared at the building, knowing Arron was in there somewhere.

“You won’t escape me this time,” she said. “I swear it.”

“Excuse me, but I have something for you.”

The voice – a man’s – startled her, and she spun around to see who had spoken. A silver-haired man with a mustache and goatee stood with three other humans – two women and a younger male. She recognized them as the ones she’d encountered in Bullock, during her last attempt to capture Arron. The silver-haired man held a shotgun, and he was pointing the barrel directly at her face.

“Got you, you goddamned bitch,” he said.

Before she could react, the man squeezed the trigger. There was a boom loud as the roar of the King of the Wild, her head jerked from the round’s impact, and the darkness that she had avoided only a few moments earlier rushed in to claim her.

Chapter Seven

“How did that make you feel?”

Soo watched her client carefully as she considered her answer. Shawna McCormick squirmed in her chair and looked down at the tiled floor, obviously uncomfortable. Shawna was a twelve-year-old girl with curly red hair, and she sat opposite Soo, who sat at her desk, chair turned so that she could face Shawna. Soo might’ve been a psychologist, but she didn’t go for the cliché of having a couch for clients to lie on. She didn’t like the power dynamics of it, the client prone and positioned lower than the therapist, who sat in a chair, literally above the client. When both client and therapist sat like this, they were on equal terms, face-to-face, and neither had any place to hide.

“I don’t know,” Shawna said. “Bad, I guess. I didn’t do it, so I felt….” She paused as she searched for the right words. “Falsely accused.” She looked up then and smiled, pleased with what she’d said. She was an intelligent girl, and Soo knew that she prided herself on sounding grown-up and sophisticated.

Soo sat cross-legged, a legal pad on her lap, pen in her right hand, and she wrote a quick note.

Client continues denying setting any fires, despite having been caught in the act several times. Is she lying or is she delusional?

She read over the note then underlined lying several times.

Shawna dressed as if she was an adult – nice crème-colored blouse and black slacks, comfortable-looking but still stylish flats. She wore earrings and just a touch of makeup, enough to accentuate her looks without being too obvious. Soo admired the girl’s skill with makeup. She’d never learned to master the stuff and rarely wore it as a result. Maybe she should ask the girl how she’d learned. Trial and error? Watching online makeup tutorials? It might be an effective way for Soo to acknowledge that Shawna was, if not actually an adult, on the cusp of adolescence, and that Soo respected her and took her seriously. Such a conversation might be too personal, though. She’d have to think about it.

Soo had furnished her office with an eye toward making it both professional and cozy. Her desk was tidy, no haphazard stacks of papers on top. She kept all her records on her computer. She had a framed eight-by-ten photo of her younger sister, her husband, and their two sons. The boys had been in high school then, but they’d since graduated college and gotten married. Neither had children yet, but Soo figured it was only a matter of time. She’d been married for thirteen years before she and her husband divorced. He was a therapist too, and they’d spent too much time trying to psychoanalyze one another, a dynamic that had proved unsustainable in the long run. They hadn’t had children, and while in general Soo was happy enough with her life, she sometimes wondered what it would’ve been like to have kids of her own. She often worked with children and young adults, though, and as much as she loved what she did, she had to admit that it was nice to go home at the end of the day and not have to deal with any kids, so maybe things had worked out for the best overall.

Next to her desk was a bookcase filled with various scholarly tomes on psychology interspersed with more popular self-help books. On the other side of that was a floor lamp, which provided soft yellow light – fluorescents created a harsh, cold atmosphere that made clients less likely to open up during sessions. The clients’ chair was high-backed and soft, and next to it was a side table with a box of tissues resting on top. Clients did cry fairly often during sessions, and the tissues were as vital a part of Soo’s office equipment as her computer. She had two framed prints on the walls, both featuring old-fashioned covered bridges, images that she linked to psychological growth and recovery, crossing from here to there, from unwellness to wellness. She hoped they’d send clients a subconscious message: progress is possible; all you have to do is take the first step and keep walking.

Soo had been seeing Shawna every week for a month, but so far her progress had been minimal. Shawna had demonstrated firesetting behavior on multiple occasions, each more serious than the last. This last time she’d set fire to her bedroom curtains, resulting in her mother’s frantic 911 call and a visit from the fire department. Child and adolescent firesetting caused hundreds of deaths each year and cost millions of dollars’ worth of property damage. There was a difference between firesetting and fireplay, though. Fireplay was when children experimented with fire out of curiosity, and while damage or injury might result, there was no malice intended in the act. Firesetting was a far more serious threat. It was done with the intent to cause harm, to varying degrees, and was likely an expression of psychopathology or unresolved trauma. Soo needed to know whether Shawna was a fireplayer or a firesetter, and if she was a burgeoning psychopath or the victim of trauma, in order to treat her effectively – and to hopefully prevent her from harming herself and others, perhaps becoming a full-fledged arsonist when (if) she grew up.

Shawna’s mother was sitting in the outer office in the waiting area. She’d pulled Shawna out of school today for her session, and the woman was so filled with anxiety over her daughter’s condition that she could use some therapy herself. Soo’s personal office door was closed, of course, to give her and Shawna privacy, but she’d invite the mother to come in toward the end of Shawna’s session so she could speak to them both at the same time.

“Right now, let’s forget about how the fires started,” Soo said. “Do you like fire?”

Shawna looked up and met her gaze for the first time since the session had started.

“Yes.”

“What is it about fire that you specifically like?”

“It’s pretty,” Shawna said. “The colors, the way it moves…. It’s almost like it’s alive.”

“It seems that way sometimes, doesn’t it? And fire does exhibit some qualities of a living thing. It consumes fuel, needs oxygen, grows, and moves through its environment. It even reproduces after a fashion, because you can use one fire to make another. But it doesn’t have cells or organs, and it cannot make choices for itself, so it isn’t truly alive.”

Shawna had listened raptly to Soo’s words, until she came to this last part about fire not being alive. Shawna scowled then.

“It’s like magic,” she said. “It’s power.”

Soo nodded. “It is. But power is a tool, and it’s up to the user to choose what they do with it. What do you think fire’s purpose is?”

Soo detected a trace of a strange odor then, a cloying earthy-green scent that seemed to be coming out of the floor vent. A warm flush passed through her body, and an image came into her mind: the entire planet engulfed in flame, billions of people screaming as they burned. The image was so overwhelming that Soo almost cried out in shock, but then just as swiftly as it came, it departed, taking the smell with it.

“To make people happy,” Shawna said and smiled.

Soo’s heart pounded triphammer-fast, and she felt hot and feverish, as if she was sitting too close to an open flame. Shawna had sounded sincere when she’d answered Soo’s question, but there was a cruel edge to her smile, and her eyes shone with dark merriment. It was then that Soo understood the vision she’d had of a burning Earth hadn’t come from her mind, but rather Shawna’s. She didn’t understand how it had happened, but she had somehow read the girl’s thoughts. She knew she had, with the same certainty as she knew her own name.

“You’re lying to me,” Soo said.

Shawna’s eyes widened in surprise at that. Soo was equally surprised. Normally she wasn’t this confrontational with a client, but she found herself unable to stop.

“You did set those fires, and you know it. And as far as you’re concerned, fire’s only purpose is to hurt other people. You like it when people hurt; it makes you feel alive in a way that nothing else does. There’s no trauma in your past that caused you to take an interest in fire. You’re just a little psychopath in the making, a baby monster taking its first unsteady steps toward a lifetime of causing others pain and suffering.”

Shawna had listened without expression as Soo went on, but now she smiled again, only this time her smile was disturbingly adult.

“So? What do you think you can do about it? My parents are never going to believe you. They think I’m sick, and they want you to make me better. And if you won’t keep seeing me, they’ll just take me to someone else. They’ll never admit that their little girl is a monster.”

Soo knew that Shawna was likely correct. Most parents didn’t want to face the truth about their children’s mental problems, especially when they were as severe as Shawna’s. They feared it reflected badly on them as parents, that they’d somehow done something that had broken their children so completely that the pieces could never be put together again.

What can I do about it, you little bitch? Soo thought. I can give you a taste of your own fucking medicine.

Instinctively, Soo reached out with her mind and connected to Shawna’s, and then she let the girl know what it would be like to burn.

Soo could see, hear, and smell what Shawna experienced. The upholstery of the high-backed chair burst into flame, but when the girl tried to leap out, the arms of the chair came to life, wrapped around her, and held her tight. The flames spread quickly, and Shawna screamed and thrashed, but she was unable to free herself. Smoke rose to the ceiling as Shawna burned, skin blackening and splitting open to release bubbling fat. Through it all, Shawna shrieked in absolute terror and agony. “I won’t do it anymore! I promise! I promise!” The girl’s words meant nothing to Soo, though. She could see into Shawna’s soul, and she knew her promise was bullshit, that she wasn’t sorry in the slightest for setting those fires, and that given the opportunity, she’d set many more – some small, some large, all dangerous.

Maybe if she let Shawna cook for a while, she’d start to see things differently.

Soo inhaled the aroma of burning human flesh and, while entirely illusory, it was surprisingly pleasant.

There was a pounding on the door then, and Shawna’s mother shouted, “What’s happening? God, why is she screaming like that?”

The doorknob rattled violently as the mother tried to open the door, but Soo always kept it locked when she was talking with a child so that a parent couldn’t barge in whenever they wanted.

“Let me in, goddamnit! Let me in!”

The mother’s cries combined with Shawna’s screams in way that Soo found rather soothing. She closed her eyes and let the sounds wash over her. Helping people was so satisfying.

* * *

“What’s an orthodontist’s favorite day of the week? Toothsday!”

Lionel Moody smiled down at the boy in the exam chair. He was reclining nearly prone, hands gripping the armrests so tight his knuckles were white. When Lionel had especially nervous patients, he liked to tell them corny jokes to relax them. Sometimes his jokes elicited a chuckle, more often groans and a shake of the head, but they served to make him seem less like a dental Torquemada and more like a harmless, goofy uncle. Patients were then more inclined to let him poke around in their mouths and adjust the miniature torture devices encasing their teeth. Unfortunately, his jokes weren’t working today, not with this boy. Eric Barber – an overweight fourteen-year-old with a scattering of acne on his forehead – looked at Lionel as if he was stark raving mad. Lionel sighed. He would never understand why some patients found him frightening. His appearance was completely nonthreatening. He was in his mid-fifties, partially bald, with brown hair and a thin brown mustache. He wore a white lab coat over a light blue shirt and navy blue tie, along with jeans and black shoes. He was soft-spoken, his voice gentle, his manner mild. But for patients like Eric, none of that mattered. He might as well have been a fiend from the deepest depths of hell the way they reacted to him.

He had an idea what might help take Eric’s mind off his fear.

There were four exam stations in the treatment area, each with its own computer and monitor, and three of the chairs were occupied by patients. Aside from Eric, there was a sixteen-year-old girl and a woman in her thirties, both of whom were being tended to by one of his assistants. He was the sole orthodontist in his practice, Smiles for Miles, and all of his employees – whether orthodontic or office staff – were women. This wasn’t by design, had just worked out that way, but it sometimes came in handy when dealing with adolescent male clients. Sheri Lee was over at the unoccupied station, cleaning it with disinfecting wipes to get it ready for the next patient. Her back was to him, so he looked down at Eric and smiled.

“I’ll be right back.”

The expression of relief on the boy’s face at this temporary reprieve was almost comical, and Lionel told himself not to take it personally. He rose from the stool he’d been sitting on and walked over to the station Sheri was cleaning. She must’ve heard him coming, for she turned around as he approached her.

“Yes, Doctor?” she said. “Do you need something?”

“How many times have I told you it’s okay to call me by my first name?” he said, smiling to make sure she didn’t take this as a rebuke of any kind. Despite his intention, her cheeks reddened.

“Sorry…Lionel.”

Sheri was in her late twenties, a pretty brunette who wore her hair pulled back in a ponytail. She was tall, close to six feet, and curvy in all the right places. The blue medical smock and pants that she wore did nothing to conceal her figure, which was the reason Lionel needed her right now. He was fond of looking at Sheri, and he was fairly confident that Eric would feel the same way. He supposed this was sexist. After all, being a pleasant-looking distraction for a nervous adolescent wasn’t in her job description, but Lionel would do whatever it took to make a patient comfortable. And if it meant he got to spend a little more time working closely with Sheri, what was the harm in that?

“Would you mind coming over to help me with a patient for a bit? I can’t seem to get him to relax, and you have such a calming presence.”

A wariness flickered in Sheri’s eyes, as if she understood exactly why he was requesting her assistance, but then it was gone and she smiled.

“Of course,” she said.

Lionel loved that smile. He sometimes imagined her smiling at him like that while she was stroking him off, and sometimes he imagined those full lips of hers sealed around his cock while she sucked the semen out of him like an industrial-strength vacuum. Although to be honest, he imagined this kind of thing about all his staff, and a fair number of his female patients – those who weren’t too young, that is. He would never do or say anything to make them feel uncomfortable, though. He was one of the good guys. He was single, so he had no wife to cheat on, and when he felt especially horny after being around women all day at work, he paid professionals to relieve his sexual tension. The best thing about prostitutes was that they did whatever he wanted, without question, as long as he paid them enough. He loved having that control over them, loved not having to be good for a change. Not coincidently, his current favorite was a girl who looked a lot like Sheri.

“Thanks,” Lionel said. He then turned and headed back toward the exam chair where Eric reclined, Sheri following. On the way, Lionel noticed an odd odor in the air. He was used to the exam area smelling a certain way – a combination of mouthwash, disinfectant, and metal – but this was something different, something…. Then he remembered. He’d smelled this odor before, when he’d gotten coffee at Grinders earlier. At the time he’d wondered if it was due to some new type of product they’d been trying out, an exotic coffee from some small country no one had ever heard of. What was the smell doing up here? His practice was located on the third floor, on the opposite side of the building from where Grinders was located. That was some damn pungent stuff if it was filtering throughout the entire building. Later, if he could manage to get away, he’d go downstairs and have a talk with Salvador about it. If the smell got any worse, it might start driving customers away.

When Eric saw Sheri approaching, his eyes widened, and from what Lionel recalled of his own adolescence, he wouldn’t have been surprised if the kid was already getting an erection. Boys that age got hard every time the wind changed direction. That was probably the only thing Lionel missed about being a teenager. He’d never gotten as hard as he had during those years. He could still get it up, no problem, but not like that.

“This is Sheri,” Lionel said to Eric. “She’s one of my very best assistants, and she’s going to take some notes while I look at your teeth. Is that all right?”

Eric nodded without taking his eyes off Sheri.

“Good!”

Lionel sat on the stool once more, and Sheri moved to stand in front of the exam station’s computer. Lionel usually typed notes himself after an examination, although when things were really busy and he’d gotten behind, he sometimes asked one of the girls to do it so he could make up a little time. Sheri knew that they weren’t that busy today, though, but he knew she wouldn’t say anything to him about it. She was the compliant type. It was one of the things he liked best about her.

He removed a penlight from his shirt pocket and clicked it on.

“Open, please,” he said, and Eric – head slightly tilted to the side so he could keep his eyes on Sheri – did as he asked. Lionel leaned forward, shined the light inside Eric’s mouth, and pursed his lips in distaste at what he saw. The boy’s teeth and braces were absolutely disgusting, and his breath could stun a charging bull. Clearly, the boy rarely brushed, if at all, and he doubted if he’d ever been within twenty feet of an antiseptic rinse. Good Christ, why would parents pay thousands of dollars for their children’s orthodontia and not make sure the little fuckers were keeping their mouths clean? It happened all the time, and he would never understand it.

He looked over at Sheri. Instead of telling her what to write in Eric’s file, he said, “Could you take him over to the sink and have him swish some mouthwash around for a couple minutes?”

Sheri smiled without enthusiasm.

“Sure. C’mon, Eric.”

Lionel put the penlight back in his pocket and worked the chair’s control so it moved into an upright position. Eric glanced nervously between Lionel and Sheri before getting out of the chair and following Sheri to the sink in the corner of the treatment area. Lionel watched them go. Ordinarily he would’ve enjoyed seeing Sheri’s perfect ass sway as she walked, but now he barely noticed. One of the most frustrating things about his job was when patients – or in the case of kids, their parents – didn’t do what they were supposed to. Successful orthodontia was all about control. You assessed a particular patient’s needs, designed an individual treatment plan, and then carried it out, making adjustments as you went, until the final goal was reached: a mouth full of beautiful, straight teeth. Every step of the way was important and needed to be followed precisely, but regardless of how much time and effort he put into helping his patients, all his efforts were for nothing if the assholes didn’t do as they were told. And they never did what they were told, not completely. It made him so angry sometimes. And as if that wasn’t frustrating enough, he was getting tired of having to constantly suppress his natural male libido around his staff. How could he concentrate and do his best work when he was surrounded by women who flaunted their bodies around him all the time? The way they did their hair and makeup, the way their medical uniform failed to conceal their shapes…. It was like they were purposely taunting him, getting off on his helplessness to do anything about it because he was their boss, and if he did or said anything, they would start claiming harassment, maybe go as far as seeking out a lawyer, and laughing about it the entire time.

He felt warm and dizzy then. There was a disquieting sensation in his hands, as if thin, hard tendrils of some sort were moving beneath the skin, searching for a way out. It didn’t hurt much – there was more tightness than pain – but it was far from comfortable. Then the sensation faded entirely, and he was once more able to think clearly.

Thoughts of dark resentment weren’t like him. Sure, there were things about his job that irritated him, but all jobs were like that. Not a single one of them was perfect, but that was no reason not to comport yourself as a professional, even in the privacy of your own mind, and maybe especially there. Maybe he’d had too much caffeine this morning. He’d had two cups at home before coming into work and getting a drink at Grinders. He made a mental note to cut back on his coffee consumption.

He flexed his hands, examined the palms then the backs. Could excess caffeine account for why his hands had felt so weird for a moment? Maybe he should make an appointment to see his physician. He wasn’t a young man anymore, and there was a history of heart disease and stroke in his family. There was no need to panic, though. The weird feeling had gone away, hadn’t it? Still, best to get checked out, just to be on the safe side.

Sheri returned then, Eric following, his gaze firmly fixed on her ass. The sight of the boy openly admiring his assistant – his – caused all the dark thoughts to come rushing back. Once more, he felt something sliding around beneath the skin of his hands, but the sensation no longer disturbed him. It felt natural now, felt right. Careful to keep his expression neutral, he got the boy seated in the examination chair again, and Sheri took up her position in front of the station’s computer.

He looked at Eric and smiled.

“Let’s try this again, shall we?” Lionel put the seat into a reclining position. “Open, please.”

The boy did as he asked, and Lionel was relieved that his breath no longer stank like a slaughterhouse. It didn’t exactly smell good, even after a liberal application of mouthwash, but it was tolerable. Lionel didn’t take his penlight out of his pocket this time. He wasn’t going to need it for the treatment he planned to administer. He leaned forward and pretended to examine the boy’s teeth and braces.

“I have to be honest, Eric. You haven’t been doing a good job keeping your mouth clean. In fact, things have gotten so bad in there that I think we’re going to have to start over – from the beginning.”

The tips of his fingers bulged, and ten lengths of thin silver wire pierced the skin. It didn’t hurt, felt good, actually, like an itch that’s finally been scratched. The wires extended several inches into the air and began whipping about wildly, as if searching for something to grab hold of. Lionel moved his hands in front of Eric’s face, and both the boy and Sheri watched in horror as the silver tendrils shot forward into his mouth, wrapped around his teeth and braces, and pulled – hard. Eric’s scream became a gurgled choke as blood filled his mouth. Sheri paled and took a step back from the computer, shaking her head, as if denying the reality of the awful scene playing out in front of her eyes. The tendril-wires yanked the braces free, both uppers and lowers, and cast them aside. Then Lionel’s finger-wires went to work on the teeth themselves, pulling them out rapidly, one after the other, tossing them right and left, then going back for more. Eric tried to jump off the examination chair, but before he could, additional wires burst forth from Lionel’s palms. They shot forward and wrapped round Eric’s midsection and wrists, binding him to the chair. Once their task was accomplished, the ends of the wires protruding from Lionel’s palms broke off, and he resumed extracting Eric’s remaining teeth. Within seconds, he’d finished, and the boy’s gums held only empty sockets, and blood dribbled down his chin as he sobbed.

“There now,” Lionel said, displaying his own straight teeth. “Isn’t that better?”

Sheri screamed and turned to run, but Lionel thrust his right hand toward her, and a length of wire shot forth from his palm, flew toward her legs, and wrapped around her ankles. She pitched forward, hit the floor face-first, and lay still. The others in the treatment area – both his assistants and the patients they’d been tending to – began shouting in horrified panic as they realized that something very, very wrong was happening. Like Sheri, they started to flee, and Lionel knew it was only a matter of moments before his entire practice was engulfed in chaos. Workers, patients, and parents would become hysterical, fight each other to be the first to get out the door, and how long would it be before one or more of them thought to call 911 as they raced to leave the building? He didn’t need the hassle.

He raised both his hands and a multitude of wires emerged from his flesh, long strands that flashed outward in different directions, lengthening as they went. One of the wires pierced Eric’s left eye, plunged into his brain, and then began whipping around like the cord of a Weedwacker. Eric’s body spasmed, his right eye rolled white – his left pinned in place by the wire and unable to move – and then he fell still. He was the first to go this way, but not the last. Lionel’s wires streaked through his practice, seeking out people wherever they were, stabbing into their eyes and reducing their brains to slurry. Within moments, Lionel and Sheri were the only two living people remaining in the practice. Lionel summoned his silver servants to return, and they retracted rapidly, moving through the practice toward him, until finally sliding back into his flesh without a sound.

Lionel didn’t question where the wires had come from or how he knew to control them. It felt like he’d always been this way, and commanding the wires came as naturally to him as breathing. He was the wires, and they were him.

Lionel walked over to Sheri, picked her up, and carried her to the empty examination chair that she’d been cleaning. He placed her upon it then took a look at her. Her nose was swollen and bleeding from her fall, and although she was unconscious, she appeared to be unharmed for the most part. He commanded the wire around her ankles to loosen, and it did so. He then ordered it to rearrange itself, and – with the addition of some more wire – he soon had Sheri spread-eagled, her legs hanging over the sides of the chair, her arms stretched over her head, ankles and wrists bound to the chair so she couldn’t move.

Perfect.

He used his finger-wires to tear away her clothes, then tossed the tatters to the floor. He admired her body for several moments, his finger-wires waving slowly in the air, waiting for their master’s next command. He then gave his wires their next order, and they removed his clothes, this time working carefully so as not to damage them. When they were finished, his clothes lay in a neatly folded stack on the floor, and he looked down at his erect penis. His cock was thin and smaller than average, and while he’d long ago reconciled himself to its size, he thought that he could do better now.

Wires snaked forth from his groin, slithered along the length of his penis, and began intertwining, forming a thickening, lengthening layer over his flesh. When the process was finished, Lionel’s cock was three times as long as it had been, and as thick as his forearm.

Nice.

Sheri remained unconscious, which was a pity. He’d have preferred she be awake for this. They were going to have plenty of time to have fun together, though, and she was bound to regain consciousness eventually. This first time, he’d have to content himself with enjoying her as she was.

As he climbed onto the chair, his metallic penis wobbling as he moved, he noticed a thin horizontal line of puckered flesh across Sheri’s abdomen. A surgical scar? He was unaware that she’d had any major surgery, but that wasn’t the sort of thing a person normally discussed with their employer, was it? He’d never seen a caesarean scar before, but that’s what he assumed it was. Sheri didn’t have any children, though. She was a newlywed, married less than a year, and she was always talking about her husband to the other women in the office. Of course, she could’ve gotten pregnant before she met her husband, had the baby, and given it up for adoption. But what did he care if she’d had a caesarean? It meant that her vaginal canal wouldn’t have been stretched all to hell when her child was born. She would be nice and tight – although considerably less so once he was done with her.

“Open wide, my dear.”

He positioned himself above her, and held himself up with one arm while he gripped his metal cock with his free hand, preparing to guide it into her. He couldn’t see it from his current vantage point, but the line of flesh on her abdomen rippled, parted bloodlessly, and a glistening pear-shaped organ emerged. It swelled rapidly once exposed to the air, opened to reveal twin rows of daggerlike teeth, and then clamped down on Lionel’s paunch with vicious force. Lionel screamed as the mouth tore away a chunk of flesh and swallowed without chewing it. It continued tearing at him, working like a machine, biting and biting and biting…. Blood poured over the sides of the examining chair like crimson waterfalls, and as darkness came for Lionel, he thought, It wasn’t supposed to go like this.

And then he was gone.

* * *

Sheri came awake to pain radiating from the center of her face. She felt her bare skin against the vinyl surface of the examination chair, felt something wet and sticky coating her body. Snatches of memory returned to her – silver wires emerging from Lionel’s fingertips, those wires reaching into Eric Barber’s mouth, Eric screaming as those wires forcibly extracted his teeth, tossing them to the floor where they landed on the tile with tiny clik-clik-clik sounds. She remembered screaming, running, something grabbing hold of her by the ankles, falling, and then…nothing.

She opened her eyes and sat up.

Blood smeared her stomach and legs, and she felt a stab of horror. She felt no pain, though, so whatever had happened, she didn’t think this blood was hers. She felt relieved, but it was short-lived. Beneath the blood, she saw a line crossing her lower abdomen from left to right. It looked like a scar, but it hadn’t been there before. What the hell was it, and how did it— Her thought broke off as she saw Lionel lying on the floor not far from the chair. He was naked, and his chest and stomach had been ripped open. He was empty inside, all his organs gone, and she could see down to his spine. His face was frozen into a grimace of pain, and there was blood splattered all over the floor around him. And for some bizarre reason, his cock was encased in a sheath of silver wire, as if he was wearing some kind of ultra-kinky strap-on. She didn’t know what had happened to him, but given how she was laid out on the chair and bound with wire, she suspected what he’d wanted to do to her – what maybe he had done – and she wasn’t too broken up to see he’d been gutted like a motherfucking fish.

Her wrists were wrapped with wire, as were her ankles. She couldn’t see, but she suspected the ankle wires were anchored to the base of the chair to hold her legs spread wide. Her arms were stretched over her head, but it didn’t feel as if they were connected to the chair.

“Help!” she shouted. “Someone please help me!”

She listened, but no one responded. She turned her head to look to see if anyone was coming, and she saw bodies lying on the ground or on examining chairs, coworkers and patients, all horribly still.

She fought to keep panic from overwhelming her. Maybe if she started wriggling, she could loosen the wires around her wrists and ankles and free herself. A fool’s hope, maybe, but right now it was the only hope she had. She started to move, but as she did, the wires around her wrists and ankles parted as easily as if they were made from cotton candy. Maybe now that Lionel was dead the wire was decaying? She didn’t know and didn’t care. She was just glad to be free. She climbed off the chair and stood, careful not to slip on the blood covering the floor. She reached down and gingerly touched her vagina. She didn’t feel sore, so whatever had happened to kill Lionel, it had occurred before he’d been able to rape her. Good.

“Fuck you, you fucking piece of shit,” she said, then spit on his corpse for good measure.

She made her way through the treatment area, moving carefully around the bodies. She stopped to touch a couple, try to find a pulse, give them a shake to see if they were only unconscious, but of course none of them were. She continued moving through the practice, checking each room and office to see if anyone had survived whatever had taken place here, but all she found was more corpses. She felt numb, detached, and she wondered if she was in shock. She supposed she was.

She checked the outer office last, and found more bodies scattered around the waiting area. She walked behind the reception counter and stepped past the body of the woman who’d been working the front desk this morning – Samantha Horton, matronly, middle-aged, lying on the floor and staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. She picked up the office phone’s receiver, dialed 911, and wondered how in the hell she was going to explain this to whoever answered.

Chapter Eight

Kellie Thornton looked around at the ten women – and one man – seated cross-legged on the carpeted floor of Feels and Meals. All of them were overweight, some grotesquely so, and Kellie fought to keep the disgust she felt from showing on her face. Together they formed a circle, with Kellie and her sister Miranda on opposite sides. The Circle of Openness and Trust, Miranda called it. The name wanted to make Kellie gag, but their clients seemed to like it, but then again, most of their clients were morons. Everyone had taken off their shoes and placed them in a neat row along one of the walls, and they were smiling nervously, eager to begin but at the same time apprehensive about how things might go. They made Kellie think of small children on the first day of kindergarten, and given the group’s obvious inability to rein in their eating habits on their own, she thought the comparison apt. They were like little kids who, if left unsupervised, would continue to cram their faces full of junk food until they puked. Revolting.

The office walls were covered with framed posters. Half were bland motivational messages – You CAN do this and A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step – while the other half were informational charts providing advice about health, nutrition, and exercise. Soft ambient music played from external speakers connected to a computer on the front desk, tuneless tones that were meant to be relaxing. On the same desk, a quartet of burning scented candles also added to what Miranda called the room’s sensory ambience. Kellie found the so-called music grating and the candles’ mingled scents cloying. Miranda was the feels part of Feels and Meals, while Kellie – a registered dietician – was the meals. Miranda believed that over- or under-eating was primarily a psychological issue, while Kellie believed it was purely a matter of science, of understanding one’s individual nutritional needs and learning how to make good food choices. Kellie thought Miranda’s approach was unadulterated horseshit, but if her touchy-feely New Age crap brought clients in, Kellie could then introduce them to concepts that could actually help them, like calorie-counting and portion control. So she’d learned to put up with things like The Circle of Trust and Openness, the music, and the candles, even if they were – as far as she was concerned – the worst part of her job.

The room smelled odd today, and she wondered if Miranda had chosen a different combination of candles than usual, but a quick glance told her she hadn’t. What was the cause of the change in scent, and why was it familiar to her? Then she remembered: it was the same smell that had suffused the air in Grinders this morning, a fusty sour-green odor that was strange but not altogether unpleasant.

“Everyone lie back and close your eyes,” Miranda began, and everyone in the circle obeyed, except Kellie. She always continued sitting and kept her eyes open during guided meditation. Pointless acts of defiance, she supposed, but ones that felt good.

“Imagine you’re lying naked on a tropical beach.” A couple women giggled, and Miranda added, “It’s okay. You’re totally alone. There’s no one around to see you. It’s early morning, and the sun is in the process of rising. The first rays touch your feet and fill them with warmth. The sensation is wonderful…calming and relaxing.”

A couple people sighed in contentment, as if they really felt the sun on their feet. Kellie was always surprised when clients reacted this way. They knew what was happening wasn’t real, and yet they responded as if it was. It was like they were suffering from some form of mental illness, she supposed. No one’s imagination could be that good.

“Now slowly, inch by inch, the sun rises up your legs, filling them with warmth as it goes.”

Kellie’s eyes drooped and she stifled a yawn. Miranda’s voice was almost preternaturally soothing, she had to give her sister that. Perfect for lulling listeners to sleep. She wished she had the coffee she’d purchased at Grinders with her right now, but she’d left it on the desk in her personal office. She could use a caffeine boost to help keep her alert while Miranda ran through her meditation routine.

“Now the sunlight is moving into your pelvic area….”

This caused a couple more giggles, but this time Miranda ignored them and continued.

To take her mind off her sister’s soporific voice, Kellie more closely examined the clients in the circle. Some of them were so fat, she didn’t know how they could carry all that weight without their legs snapping beneath the pressure. And how could they have sex, especially if their partner was as heavy as they were? She imagined mounds of jiggling flesh slapping against one another, and the thought made her queasy. She remembered a joke she’d heard in middle school. How do you fuck a fat girl? Roll her in flour and go for the wet spot.

She recognized the joke as sexist and sizeist, but she didn’t care. Here, in the privacy of her own mind, she could be as big of an asshole as she wanted, without anyone knowing or caring.

She also recognized that more than a few people found her own physical appearance to be less than optimal, to put it kindly. She was so thin that people often thought she was ill. Their own mother had once told her, Honey, you look like a stage-four cancer victim. Kellie knew she had body dysmorphia. She’d had the diagnosis confirmed by several therapists, including Soo down on the second floor. As thin as she was, she could never be thin enough to make her feel not-fat, so becoming a dietician had been an act of self-preservation for her. She used her training to keep from starving herself and to maintain a healthy weight. Well…healthy-ish.

She didn’t know where her fixation with weight had come from. She’d grown up female in America, and that was more than enough to do it, but she thought it was more than that. Their mother had been heavy, but she never seemed to have any problem with how she felt about her weight. She was the kind of person who was completely comfortable in their own skin, a quality that Kellie envied. But as long as she could remember, she’d been fascinated with their mother’s weight, almost to the point of fixation. When she was little, she’d crawl onto her mother’s voluminous lap, marveling at the way the rolls of fat beneath her felt soft and solid at the same time. She’d reach up to stroke the bulge of flesh beneath her mother’s chin, press the tip of her index finger into it gently, depressing the fat, then pull it away quickly and watch as it sprung out again, as if her mother was a flesh sack filled with jelly. Why her mother allowed her to do this, to treat her as a grotesque plaything, Kellie didn’t know. Maybe her mother found Kellie poking and prodding her fat to be strangely intimate, a parent indulging a child’s curiosity. What her mother didn’t know was that Kellie was revolted by the soft, doughy feel of fat, that she would sometimes dream of Mother falling on top of her and smothering her, or picking her up, shoving her in her suddenly too-wide mouth, and swallowing her whole. Kellie experienced intense shame for how she felt about her mother’s body, but she couldn’t help herself.

Miranda, on the other hand, seemed to be perfectly okay with their mother being fat. And whether it was genetic or merely a child patterning herself after a parent, she followed in their mother’s pudgy footsteps, gaining weight year after year until she was equally as fat. Kellie began to loathe her sister, just as she did their mother, and her shame and guilt increased exponentially. She’d tried talking with her sister about her weight several times over the years, but all she managed to do was make Miranda feel bad and drive a wedge between them. Feels and Meals had been Kellie’s idea, a way to bridge the gap between them and, hopefully, provide an opportunity for Miranda to finally get down to a healthy weight. After all, if Miranda was helping to counsel other women about their weight five days a week, maybe she’d start doing something about her own. It hadn’t happened yet, though. Five years after starting their business, Miranda was just as heavy as ever. Kellie had confronted her about this once. Wouldn’t their clients question taking weight-loss advice from someone who was overweight?

It’s good that I’m heavy, Miranda had said. It makes our clients feel more comfortable to know that I understand what they’re going through.

Maybe that was true, but Kellie thought it was an excuse for Miranda not to take better care of herself, and she’d come to realize that there was nothing she could do to help her sister. Like their mother, Miranda was happy with who she was, and while she made half-hearted attempts at eating right and exercising from time to time, she would never be as fanatical about it as her sister was, and Kellie would just have to accept it. So she sat through the guided meditations, put up with the ambient music and the scented candles, her skin crawling all the while at being surrounded by fat people. She had inadvertently created her own personal hell, and she was trapped in it.

“Breathe in,” Miranda said in her soothing voice. “Hold it for a count of five. One, two, three, four, five…. Now let it out slowly.”

Sometimes during these sessions, Kellie would imagine that she worked at a liposuction clinic instead. She pictured herself going from one person to another, ramming the sharp end of a suction hose into the mounds of their abdomens, and watching as globs of yellow-white fat were sucked out of their bodies. She supposed, in a way, it was her form of meditation. She closed her eyes and gave herself over to the fantasy, but as she did, she felt a sudden flush of warmth spread through her body, accompanied by a rush of vertigo. The sensations passed as quickly as they came, and then she heard the first person scream.

Her eyes snapped open, and she turned to look at the person on her right – a curly-haired brunette wearing a blue sweatshirt and gray sweatpants. Like the others, she’d been lying prone on the carpet, but now she’d sat up, holding her hands out in front of her and gazing at them with an expression of horror. Pearls of yellow-white were oozing from her pudgy flesh and growing larger with each passing second. The rest of the clients began shouting and screaming as fat began extruding from their bodies as well, some sitting up like the brunette woman, others rising to their feet and running around in panic. Miranda sat and watched the chaos with a blank expression, as if she couldn’t comprehend what she was seeing.

That makes two of us, sis, Kellie thought.

Like the others, Miranda’s skin was covered with expanding fat globules. The shit was even leaking from the corners of her eyes, making it look as if she was weeping thick yellow-white tears. Kellie didn’t know what was happening – it was almost like her liposuction fantasy had come true – but she knew her sister was in pain, and that was all that mattered. She jumped to her feet and hurried across the carpet to kneel at Miranda’s side. She reached out to touch her sister, intending to comfort her, but she couldn’t bring herself to make physical contact, not with all that fat leaking out of her.

“Are you…? Can I…?”

She had no idea what to say, no idea what to do. Miranda looked at her, clumps of fat sliding down her cheeks like spoiled cottage cheese. She must have seen the disgust on Kellie’s face, for she said, “Please don’t hate me.”

And then her body burst like a gigantic pimple.

Her skin ripped down the middle from crown to crotch, and a mass of yellow-white gushed forth and splattered onto the carpet. Miranda’s body, now nothing more than a sack of empty flesh, flopped over like a deflated balloon onto Kellie. With a high-pitched squeal of alarm, Kellie batted her sister’s skin to the side and jumped to her feet. She stared at the mound of fat that exploded out of Miranda’s body and was alarmed to see it quivering, as if it was alive. And then it began moving, lurching across the carpet inch by inch.

Toward her.

She skipped backward several steps, keeping her eyes on the yellow-white glob, wondering if she’d gone insane. She imagined her mother speaking.

See? This is what happens when you refuse to eat. You starve your brain, and it shrinks to the size of a walnut. Honestly, you’re so malnourished, I’m surprised it took you this long to go crazy.

She heard a series of shrieks then, accompanied by the tearing of flesh. She looked at the women – and one man – who up until a few moments ago had been serenely meditating. The same thing that had happened to Miranda was happening to them. Their bodies ripped open and vast quantities of fat spilled out and splattered onto the carpet. Once the bodies were empty, they sagged and fell to the floor, ridiculous costumes that were no longer necessary. Slowly, the mounds began to move, edging toward one another until they finally touched and merged into a single gigantic mass.

Kellie heard words in her mind, spoken in her sister’s voice.

You’re too thin, Kel. You need fattening up. Let us in and we’ll fill you up. You’ll never feel empty again….

A pseudopod extruded from the main body of the fat mass and stretched toward her like a beckoning hand.

Kellie screamed, turned, and ran for the door.

* * *

Harvey was running tests on a urine sample – always a joy – when Jinny Milliken walked into the lab.

“Could you do something for me, Harv?”

Ordinarily, he might’ve fired back by waggling his eyebrows and saying, What do you have in mind? Jinny was cool when it came to office banter like that, and he didn’t have to worry that she’d report him to MedTek’s HR department. But there was something about her tone that made him forget about joking.

“Sure, what is it?”

Jinny was a short woman in her mid-thirties with straight brown hair that ended just above her shoulders. Like Harvey, she wore a blue medical smock with the MedTek logo on the front. She was so short that his nickname for her was Jinny Munchkin, but that was one joke of his that she wasn’t particularly fond of – which of course was why he made it so often. She didn’t look to be in the mood to play around right now, though. She was frowning, and her expression was worried.

“Leon’s out in front.”

Harvey knew Leon Garner well. They occasionally went out for a beer together, and last year they’d played in the same bowling league. Leon worked as a courier for MedTek, driving around to various doctors’ offices, collecting whatever samples they wanted to be tested, and bringing them to the office for Harvey and Jinny to process. Leon made the rounds of Collier several times a day, and Harvey envied the fact that the man wasn’t stuck working inside like he was. Running tests on blood and urine could become pretty mind-numbing after a while, but then he supposed driving the same route through town over and over could become pretty dull as well.

“So? Does he need something?”

Jinny shook her head. “No. I just want you to come take a look at him. He’s…different than usual.”

Harvey was intrigued. “Different how?”

“It’s hard to explain. You’ll see.”

Now Harvey’s interest was piqued. He liked having a little mystery to break up the morning’s routine. He got up from the table where he’d been sitting, stripped off his rubber gloves, and tossed them into a waste receptacle over by the door. The tips of his fingers itched, and he remembered sitting in Grinders and feeling this same sensation and seeing small needlelike protrusions extended from his fingertips. In the time since, he’d managed to convince himself that he’d been seeing things. Not full-blown hallucinations, more like a misperception caused by the dim lighting in the place. He put it out of his mind as he followed Jinny out of the lab, down a small hallway to a door that led into the lobby.

MedTek didn’t get walk-ins. All their customers were referred by physicians and came by appointment, so they didn’t need a very large waiting area, just a small room with a rectangular window, a few chairs, and a counter with sliding glass window behind which their office manager, Marcella, sat. Harvey could see cars driving past on the road outside, people passing by on the sidewalk. The window glass was streaked with threads of greenish-black gook, and Harvey wondered when the cheap-ass bastards who owned the Delgado Building would pay someone to come clean the damn windows. It was hard to present a professional image to clients when your office window looked like shit.

Marcella sat at her desk, reception window open, and she shot a grateful look at Jinny and Harvey when they walked through the door that led to the lab. She appeared worried. No, more than that – scared. And when Harvey saw Leon, he understood why.

At six foot five, the man was already imposing, and he was strong as hell. Harvey knew that from watching the man bowl. His ball hit the pins with such force that he knocked almost all of them down the first time. Too bad he was shit at picking up spares. Leon wore a blue short-sleeved shirt with the MedTek logo, navy pants, and black shoes. Harvey sometimes teased him that he looked like a UPS man whose brown uniform had been dyed blue. His head was shaved smooth, and he had a thick mustache and goatee which, along with his build, made him look like a badass. But he was one of the most mild-tempered people that Harvey had ever met. Except he didn’t look so mild-tempered right now. His features were contorted in a scowl, his face was red with anger, and his eyes were a strange yellow color. Resting next to his feet was the metal case he collected med samples in. It was lying on its side, as if he’d dropped it after entering the office.

“Hey man,” Harvey said. “What’s up?”

Leon’s head whipped toward Harvey and he bared his teeth. Harvey wanted to believe he was trying to smile, but he knew he wasn’t.

“Where is he?”

Leon’s tone was uncharacteristically aggressive, and Harvey took a step backward. He raised his hands in a placating gesture.

“Take it easy, man. Who are you talking about? Who’s he?”

Leon’s hands became fists and he stepped toward Harvey. Harvey’s instincts urged him to turn and run for the lab, but he forced himself to hold his ground. He didn’t want to do anything that would rile up Leon any more than he already was.

“You know damn well who,” Leon said. “The man! The one that she wants! He’s in the building somewhere. She said so!”

Harvey didn’t know what drug Leon was on, but he had to have taken one hell of a dose of it. The man was tripping some serious balls.

“Whoever this guy is, he’s not here,” Harvey said. “Right now, we’re the only ones here.”

This wasn’t true. A couple other techs were still in the back working, but Harvey didn’t want to get them involved if he could avoid it. Leon was speaking so loudly he was practically yelling, and Harvey hoped one of the other techs would hear him, realize something was wrong, and call the cops. Until then, he needed to keep the man talking, see if he could calm him down some.

“Tell you what. Why don’t you and me take a walk and see if we can’t figure this thing out? It’s beautiful outside, and you know how much I hate being cooped up in here all day.”

He wanted to get Leon out of the office so Jinny and Marcella would be safe, and also because he hoped some fresh air might help sober Leon up a little.

Leon hesitated, and for a moment Harvey thought he was going to take him up on his offer. But then a sly look came into his eyes.

“I’ll tell you what. You tell me what I want to know, and I won’t rip your goddamned head off.”

Leon stepped closer, and Harvey knew the man was going to attack him. He could feel it way down deep in the animal part of his brain, a part that recognized a predator and knew when it meant business. His fingertips itched like mad, and then he felt sharp stabs of pain in all ten of his fingers. As Leon came toward him, he moved without conscious thought, jamming one hand against Leon’s left wrist, and another against the right side of his neck. Leon grunted in pain and his body stiffened, and someone screamed, although Harvey couldn’t tell if it was Jinny or Marcella. Maybe it was both. His fingers flexed rhythmically and a warm sensation began spreading through his hands and moving slowly along his forearms. It felt good…damn good. He looked at the place where his hand connected with Leon’s neck, and he saw that thin slivers of some kind had emerged from his fingers and were embedded in Leon’s flesh. The same for his wrist. Needles, Harvey thought, just as he’d seen in Grinders. He hadn’t been imagining it – it had been real, was real. Blood trickled from the wounds in Leon’s neck and wrist, but not much. The majority of his blood was being drained into Harvey’s finger-needles and stored…where? Inside Harvey’s body somewhere? Did that mean that he was now a vampire? The thought was a crazy one and should’ve alarmed him, but the idea was actually kind of cool. He needed an awesome vampire name, something impressive and intimidating, like Harvey Logue: Bloodmaster – or maybe Count Needles, Lord of the Phlebotomists. Neither really appealed to him. He’d have to work on it.

Leon tried to pull away from Harvey, but he was rapidly weakening. He tried to grab Harvey’s hands and yank them away from his flesh, but he wasn’t able to get a firm grip. Harvey, however, was feeling stronger by the second, filled to the brim with energy, an overcharged battery on the verge of exploding, nerves aflame and jangling with power. He’d done his fair share of drugs in his time, but he’d never experienced anything like this. It was, no bullshitting, the ultimate high.

The yellow in Leon’s eyes faded and gave way to his normal brown. The man let out a soft moan, his eyes rolled white, and then he collapsed to the floor, slipping off Harvey’s finger-needles as he fell. Harvey heard a faint, fluttery sound that he couldn’t place at first, and then he realized he was hearing Leon’s dying heartbeat. One flutter, two, and then it stilled forever.

Harvey gazed upon Leon’s corpse.

That wasn’t so hard, he thought.

He turned toward Jinny and Marcella, intending to tell them that everything was okay, that he’d handled the threat and they were safe. But they both regarded him with horror and he realized that in their eyes, he’d become a monster. That was gratitude for you. Fucking bitches.

He heard their hearts pounding rapidly, like a pair of frightened baby birds, and he felt…not thirsty and not hungry. He didn’t have a word for the sensation he was experiencing, but then one came to him: empty. He was empty, and he needed to be filled. So very much.

He raised his hands and wiggled his needle-fingers.

“Who’s next?”

Marcella shrieked and slammed the sliding glass window closed so hard it shattered. Pieces tumbled to the floor as she fled farther into the back office, not that it would do her any good. He’d get her, just as he’d get the other two techs in the back. But first….

He looked at Jinny.

“Care to make a donation to the cause?”

Before she could respond, he rushed toward her, shoved his needles into her neck, and smiled in bliss as he chased the ultimate high once more. And as he filled his tank, he thought, Best. Monday. Ever!

* * *

Dan and Hope had an appointment with a potential client – a big one – at ten thirty, and the last thing he wanted to do was stop at Grinders for another coffee before leaving. But Hope was an unrepentant caffeine addict, and he knew how crabby she got when her latest caffeine fix started to wear off, so he tolerated the delay. Not that he had any choice in the matter. Hope did what she wanted, when she wanted, and if someone didn’t like it, including him, they could eat shit and die. Her obstinance and independence drove him crazy sometimes, but it was also a big part of why he loved her. She knew what she wanted, and she wasn’t afraid to go out and get it. It made her a strong partner, both in love and in business, and to be honest, he could be more than a little strong-willed himself.

He was on edge because their appointment was with Stronghold Self-Storage, the largest facility of its kind in Collier, and if they landed the account, it would be a major coup. It could lead to more large accounts, which meant their business would expand, and if that happened, they’d have to start seriously considering hiring some employees besides themselves, maybe even moving to a bigger office. The possibilities were exciting to think about, but stressful too.

Don’t get ahead of yourself, he thought. Get this gig first, and you can worry about the other stuff – if it happens – later.

As they walked down the small corridor toward Grinders, they passed a woman heading in the opposite direction. She was in her sixties and wore a gray cardigan that looked too large for her. She had an angry expression on her face, and her eyes seemed to be an odd yellowish color, but before Dan could get a closer look at those eyes, she was past them. He glanced over his shoulder at her, then looked at Hope. His wife only shrugged. As they drew close to Grinders, they heard the buzz of people all speaking at once. There was an edge to their voices, as if they were upset, and Dan’s instincts told him something was wrong. Hope sensed it too, and she exchanged a glance with him that said, Stay alert, and he nodded.

Grinders was packed wall to wall with people, and all of them were talking at the same time. Well, almost all of them. A few stood at the door or in front of the window, gazing outside, looking lost and confused. No one was in line to order coffee, so Dan and Hope shoved their way through the crowd to the counter so they could talk with Salvador. He and Yvette stood by the back counter, as if they’d wanted to put as much distance between themselves and the crowd as they could. But when Salvador saw the Flemings approach, the relief on his face was palpable. Salvador hurried to the front counter to meet them. Yvette remained where she was, arms folded across her chest as she nervously watched the crowd.

“I am so glad to see you, my friends,” Salvador said.

“What’s going on?” Dan asked. He might have been retired, but he fell into cop mode without conscious thought. There was a problem here, and he needed to ascertain its nature so he could deal with it in the quickest, most efficient way possible.

“People are upset because they cannot leave,” Salvador said.

Dan looked at Hope and she raised an eyebrow. He turned back to Salvador.

“What do you mean they can’t leave?” he asked.

“When they go to the door, they can’t open it.”

“Is it broken?” Hope asked.

“I don’t believe so. Try it for yourself.”

Dan looked at Yvette, and she nodded, as if confirming what Salvador had told him.

“Okay,” Dan said, and he and Hope turned and made their way through the crowd toward the door. He caught snatches of conversation as they went.

“– have to get back to work before –”

“– doesn’t make any damn sense –”

“– some kind of mass hypnosis –”

When Dan and Hope reached the door, he saw that there were streaks of some kind of green-black moldy-looking shit all over it. Same for the window. He didn’t remember seeing this crap when he and Hope had gotten coffee when they’d first arrived at the Delgado Building this morning. It was weird, but he put it out of his mind for right now. He had a door to test.

He stretched out his hand, intending to push the door open. But before he could touch the handle, his hand stopped. He didn’t tell it to do so. It just did.

“What’s wrong?” Hope asked.

Dan didn’t answer her. This was ridiculous. All he wanted to do was open the goddamned door. How hard could it be?

He reached again, concentrating harder this time, putting some muscle into it. His entire arm trembled, but he was unable to make his hand move the last several inches to the door handle. It was like there was some kind of invisible wall there, a barrier that he was unable to force his way through. He lowered his arm to his side and stepped back.

“That’s not funny,” Hope said.

“I’m not trying to be funny. You give it a go.”

Frowning, Hope stepped forward and reached toward the door, but she had no more success than Dan had. She kept it up longer than he did, jaw clenched, entire body shaking, but in the end she gave up as well.

“What the actual fuck?” she said.

“Couldn’t have put it better myself.”

“Maybe if we got a running start, we’d be able to throw ourselves against the door, open it that way?” she asked. “Use momentum to do the work for us.”

“Maybe.”

He pictured one of them running toward the door only to stop abruptly, unable to take the last couple steps no matter how hard they tried to make themselves. Hope’s idea was worth a shot, though. First, they were going to have to get people to move aside and make a path so they had enough room to—

The sound of approaching sirens interrupted his thought, and he and Hope watched as a pair of cruisers roared up to the curb outside Grinders, lights flashing. The vehicles came to a stop with a screech of tires, and an instant later, officers were out and running toward the door. Dan and Hope reflexively stepped back to give them room to enter, Dan wondering if they’d be able to open the door from the outside. The crowd, who’d continued talking animatedly since Dan and Hope had arrived, suddenly fell silent and watched the cops run toward the door. Dan figured they were all waiting to learn the same thing he was. Could they open it?

A moment later, they had their answer. Four officers – three men, one woman – entered Grinders, the door swinging open easily for them. It had only been a couple years since Dan and Hope had left the force, and he recognized all four officers, although he only knew one of them well, Terry Curtis, a broad-shouldered guy in his forties who’d been on the football team when Dan had been in high school. They hadn’t been best buddies or anything, but they knew each other well enough to say hi and shoot the shit now and again.

Terry saw Dan right away.

“Dan Fleming. What are you doing here?”

“Hey, Terry. Our office is in this building. What’s going on? Must be pretty serious from the way you guys came racing up like that.”

“We got a 911 call from an orthodontist’s, a report of multiple fatalities.”

“No shit? My god, that’s—”

Dan broke off as Terry and the three other officers began to shake, as if all stricken with seizures at the same time. Then, as quickly as the spell had come over them, it passed, and as Dan watched, a yellow cast came into their eyes.

Terry’s expression darkened.

“Where is he?”

Dan was taken aback by Terry’s sudden shift in mood, not to mention the physical change that had occurred to his eyes. What the fuck could cause that?

“Where’s who?” he asked.

Terry pulled his weapon from its holster, flicked off the safety, and pointed it at Dan’s head, directly between the eyes.

“Don’t give me that shit. I said, where is he?”

Terry shouted these last three words, and Dan couldn’t help wincing. He didn’t move otherwise, though. Moving when you had a gun trained on you was a good way to get shot.

“Terry,” Hope said, keeping her tone calm, “you know us. Why don’t you lower your weapon and we can talk?”

Terry didn’t acknowledge her words. He kept his gaze fixed on Dan. The other three cops, however, now drew their guns. One of them joined Terry in pointing his weapon at Dan, while the other two trained their guns on Hope.

A bead of sweat trickled down the left side of Dan’s face. Whatever the fuck was happening here, one thing was for sure. They were going to miss their ten-thirty appointment.

Chapter Nine

Bullock, Illinois. Then.

Charley Hodges was tired.

He worked as a chaplain at Safe Haven Hospice in Arborville, about twenty miles from Bullock. He found the work challenging and fulfilling, but by no means easy, and by the end of a shift, he often felt as if he’d been completely drained of energy. All he wanted to do now was get back to his apartment in Bullock, eat some dinner – he had some leftover spaghetti he’d made last night in the fridge that he could heat up – veg out in front of the TV for a couple hours, and then crawl into bed, and get what sleep he could before he had to get up tomorrow and do it all over again.

He drove his red Ford Taurus down County Road 34A, heading toward Bullock. He had the driver’s side window lowered halfway so the breeze would help him stay awake and alert, and the radio tuned to a classic rock station that was currently playing a song by Metallica, volume cranked. He steered with his left hand, and in his right, he held a Marlboro cigarette. He took a puff every minute or so, and turned his head to blow the smoke out the window. If Safe Haven’s staff could see him now, they’d be surprised, if not outright shocked. Most people regarded clergy as if they were a low order of divine being, immune to the same everyday vices and pleasures that they themselves indulged in. And while Charley eschewed hard drugs and pornography, he found listening to metal and smoking to be effective in maintaining his sanity – not to mention that the noise and nicotine helped him stay awake on the drive home after a hard day at work.

This morning, Grace Wilcox, one of Haven’s best-loved residents, had taken a turn for the worst. She’d slipped in and out of consciousness all day, and Charley had sat at her bedside, talking to her whenever she woke, praying and keeping watch over her when she slept. At 4:02 p.m. the last breath left her body, and she was gone. Charley hadn’t cried. He’d been chaplain at Safe Haven for over three years, and if he hadn’t exactly gotten used to death, it didn’t hit him as hard as it had when he’d first started there. Back then, he’d always cried when a resident died in his presence. Now he just smoked more, had a few beers, and felt like shit for several days. Part of his duties – the task he liked least of all, in fact – was notifying the deceased’s family members about their loved one’s passing, assuming they weren’t present at the time. After Grace’s family had parked her in Safe Haven, they’d rarely come to visit, and even a phone call from the head nurse that Grace was in active dying hadn’t prompted anyone to show up. Once Grace was gone, Charley had made the calls but only managed to reach one of her daughters. The woman had listened silently to his news, then thanked him for calling her, and disconnected. He’d heard no grief in her voice, detected no sorrow. He might as well have been telling her about the weather instead of her mother’s death. He couldn’t think of anything sadder. Not only had Grace died without any of her family present, he knew none of them would give much of a damn that she was dead.

As he drew near the Welcome to Bullock sign, he let out a weary sigh. Maybe he’d skip TV tonight and go straight to bed after dinner. Surrendering to the oblivion of sleep sounded wonderful. The quiet, the darkness, the freedom from his thoughts and feelings…. He thanked God for inventing sleep. How could anyone make it through life without the daily break from their cares and woes? We’d all be crazy or suicidal, he thought.

As he drove across the town border into Bullock, he felt a surge of cold, as if the AC had kicked on at full blast. He felt dizzy, sick to his stomach, and he took his foot off the accelerator, intending to pull over, but the sensations faded as quickly as they’d come, and although he was shaken, he felt well enough to keep driving. What the hell had that been? A stress reaction? Maybe he’d forego dinner and hit the sack as soon as he got home, sleep off whatever it was. The last thing he needed was to get sick. As emotionally trying as his work was, it was important, and he didn’t want to take time off if he could avoid it.

As he passed the high school, he saw someone walking in the middle of the street ahead of him – a woman flanked by what appeared to be four large panthers. At first, he thought he was hallucinating, that the stress of his job had taken a much greater toll on him that he’d realized. But as he came closer, the woman and her cats looked even more real than they had a moment ago, and he slowed down so that he wouldn’t hit them. He was surprisingly unalarmed to see the big black cats, animals that should’ve been in a zoo somewhere instead of wandering free on the streets of Bullock. There was something about them that felt right, as if, appearances to the contrary, they belonged here.

As the Taurus’s headlights washed over them, the woman stopped and turned to look at Charley. The cats did the same, and he saw the same yellow fire burning in all their eyes. He braked to a stop and, without making a conscious decision to do so, lowered his window. The woman smiled and walked toward him, and as she came, he saw she had no fingers on her left hand. Her cats accompanied her, silent as shadows, gazes locked on him, a warning in those amber eyes. We’re watching you.

He felt power emanating from the woman as she approached, an almost physical force. Part of him wanted to cower in fear, but the rest of him only stared in awe.

When she reached his window, he said, “Are you an angel?”

She laughed, the sound loud and high, like the cry of some wild bird.

“Hardly. Look in your rearview mirror.”

He did so and saw yellow eyes looking back at him from the glass. He turned back to the woman.

“You belong to me now,” she said. “There’s a man who’s running from me. I want you to find him and bring him to me. Will you do this?”

He knew then that he had devoted his life to a false god. This woman was his deity now, and he would do anything for her, without question.

“Yes.”

“Good. He has found people to aid him….” She sneered. “He always does. They drove off in a car, heading that direction.” She gestured to the road in front of him. “Now that you are one of my Surrogates, you are able to track his scent. Go.”

Charley did not question any of this. One does not question God. One obeys. He did, however, need one thing clarified before he could go forth and do his new lord’s bidding.

“How will I recognize his scent?”

The woman smiled. “He smells like me.”

She reached out with her right hand – this one had all its fingers – and held it beneath his nose. He inhaled deeply, and for an instant he saw a gigantic bear with a forest on its back lumbering through a world of mist. Then the image faded, but the woman’s scent lingered.

She withdrew her hand.

“Now go,” she said. “And be quick about it.”

Charley obeyed. He removed his foot from the brake, jammed it down onto the accelerator, and his Taurus leaped forward. He left his window down, and as he sped away from his god and her four companions, he continued inhaling deeply, following the scent trail of his quarry. Anger began to build inside him at the pathetic excuse for a man who’d had the temerity to defy his god’s will. Charley would find him, subdue him, and bring him back to their mistress. And woe betide anyone who got in his way.

* * *

Darla rode in the passenger seat of Jordan’s car. Jordan drove, while Lucius and Arron sat in the back. They were headed away from the high school toward the center of town, an area of strip mall businesses and fast-food restaurants, and wasn’t it a sad commentary on modern life that people formed communities around such empty places?

She periodically glanced back to see if Night and her Harriers were following, although she felt foolish for doing so. What was the woman going to do, come running after them at superspeed, like some cartoon character? Then again, who knew what a being like her was capable of? There was no sign of the woman or her pets, though, and Darla hoped it stayed that way. If what Arron had told her was true – crazy as it might sound – Night couldn’t approach them as long as they were in a part of Bullock that remained ‘civilized’, whatever exactly that meant. But the Blight the woman had created would catch up to them eventually, and then nothing could prevent Night and her Harriers from attacking them. Darla and the others were like rats caught in a shrinking trap, and it was only a matter of time before they would have to stand and fight.

Not necessarily, she thought. You could always kick Arron to the curb and let Night have him. Ernie had died because he’d gotten caught between Night and Arron. How many more people might get hurt the longer their chase went on? But she’d been the one to pull Jordan and Lucius into this mess. Jordan because she and Arron had needed to get the fuck away from Night as fast as possible, and Lucius because she hadn’t wanted to leave him to the teeth and claws of the Harriers. But the two of them were in direct danger now. She hadn’t been thinking straight before, had been forced to act on instinct to survive. But now that they’d managed to gain a little breathing room, she realized she couldn’t continue putting Jordan’s and Lucius’s lives at risk. She wouldn’t abandon Arron – it went against the whole serve-and-protect thing – but that didn’t mean Jordan and Lucius had to stay with them.

“Okay, Jordan. I think you’ve taken us far enough. Why don’t you pull over so Arron and I can get out? I’d appreciate it if you could give Lucius a ride home, make sure he gets there safe.”

She winced at the sound of her voice. Why was she speaking so damn loud? Nerves? If so, she wasn’t the only one on edge, for the others spoke just as loudly.

“It’s too late,” Arron said. “My scent is all over the three of you. None of you is safe as long as Night pursues me. We’re better off remaining together.”

“None of this makes any goddamned sense,” Jordan said. “A magic hunter woman and her four monster kitty cats are ready to tear the town apart so they can get their hands on this guy?” He glanced at the rearview mirror to look at Arron’s reflection. “No offense.”

Arron didn’t respond.

“We should find somewhere we can defend ourselves,” Lucius said. “Somewhere it would be hard for Night to break into.”

“This is a small town,” Jordan said. “It’s not like we have impenetrable fortresses on every block.”

“Maybe we could go to the police station,” Lucius said. “Lots of cops with guns there. Maybe it won’t be impenetrable, but it would be a hell of a lot better than driving around town all night, hoping those big-ass cats don’t find us.”

Darla felt like a fool. She might not have access to the cruiser’s radio, but she had her phone with her. She could call the station and request backup. If she hadn’t been so shaken by Ernie’s death and the appearance of Night and the Harriers, she’d have thought of it sooner.

But as she reached for her phone, a pair of headlights appeared in the rearview mirror.

Nothing especially concerning about that. Bullock might not have been a bustling metropolis, but it was hardly deserted. Road traffic was steady throughout the day and didn’t start to let up until nine p.m. or so. But her instincts sounded a warning, and she turned to look through the back window at the approaching vehicle. At first the lights blurred in and out, as if her eyes had trouble focusing on them. But then her vision stabilized, and she saw the car clearly. What’s more, she could hear it. The engine roared, as if the driver had the accelerator pressed all the way to the floor, and the tires made high-pitched cries as they rolled over the surface of the road. Whoever it was, they were coming up fast on their ass, and it didn’t look like they had any intention of slowing down.

Darla didn’t have time to warn Jordan. She turned around in her seat, reached over, took hold of the steering wheel, and yanked it hard to the right. The Prius skidded, began to spin, but Darla hadn’t acted fast enough, and the pursuing car struck their rear quarter panel. The impact spun the Prius around faster, and it broadsided the other car. Jordan, Lucius, and Arron cried out, and their voices – along with the sounds of screaming tires and crumpling metal – were deafening to Darla. The world became a vertiginous swirl of images, and then suddenly everything went black. For an instant, Darla thought she’d been knocked unconscious in the crash, maybe even died, but then she felt the Prius come to a stop, and light began to creep back into her vision. Everything was dim, as if a dark film covered her eyes, but she could see…more or less.

And what she saw was a neon sign that said Cut & Curl. At first the words didn’t make any sense to her, but then she remembered: Cut & Curl was a hair salon located a couple miles from the high school. She’d never gone there, but she had some friends that did and who recommended it highly. They treat you right, and the owner is hilarious! The Prius’s engine had died, and the vehicle sat in the middle of the street, the passenger-side window facing Cut & Curl. She heard Jordan moan, and the sound snapped her back to her senses.

“Is everyone all right?” she asked.

She looked from Jordan to Lucius to Arron and was relieved to see that none of them appeared injured.

“I am unharmed,” Arron said.

“I’m okay too,” Lucius said.

Jordan rubbed the side of his head. “I hit the side window, but I’ll live.”

“Good,” Darla said. “Everyone get out, but take it slow.”

The passenger-side doors had been damaged during the collision with the other car, but they opened easily enough. Darla and the others disembarked, and she drew her Glock before scanning the immediate area. Streetlights provided sufficient illumination, and she saw no sign of the Harriers, which was a relief. Her biggest fear was that the great cats would catch up to them now that Jordan’s car was out of commission, but evidently the Blight wasn’t spreading that fast. She had no doubt they were coming, but at the moment they weren’t an immediate threat.

“You all stay here,” she said. “I’m going to check on the other driver.”

She started toward the car that had hit them – a Ford Taurus, she now saw – without waiting to see if Arron and the others obeyed her. She raised her weapon in a two-handed grip as she approached the vehicle. The Ford and the Prius had stopped several yards apart and sat perpendicular to each other. Both cars’ engines had died, and aside from the tick-tick sounds as they cooled, everything was quiet. Darla came around the front of the Taurus and saw the driver sitting behind the wheel, eyes closed, head tilted to the left. He was male, in his thirties or maybe forties, with short black hair and a slightly pudgy face. He looked harmless, but Darla knew better than to judge someone based on appearance, especially given everything that had happened since Arron had come running out of that cornfield.

When she reached the driver’s side door, she spoke in a loud voice. “Sir, are you all right? Can you hear me?”

He didn’t respond. He didn’t appear to be bleeding from any head injuries, but the impact of the two cars colliding could’ve driven him into the steering wheel, especially if his seat belt hadn’t been functioning properly. If so, he could have some broken ribs, one or more of which might’ve punctured a lung. She needed to get a closer look. Keeping her Glock trained on him with her right hand, she opened the car door with her left. He still didn’t move.

“Sir, can you hear me?” she repeated. “Are you injured?”

His eyes snapped open and his head turned toward her. She gasped when she saw the feral yellow glowing from his sockets.

“I’m just fine, Officer. How are you?”

Her voice trembled slightly as she spoke. “If you’re able, please step out of the vehicle.”

She once more took a two-handed grip on her weapon then stepped back, not only to give him room but also so she would be out of reach if he tried something. The man unfastened his seat belt then climbed out of his car. She expected him to move stiffly, but his motions were fluid and easy, in a way that put her in mind of…. A cat, she thought. His mouth stretched into a cold smile.

“Sorry about the love tap I gave your car, but I had to stop you. I couldn’t let you take him away from me.”

He nodded toward Arron. Arron said nothing, only looked at the man, face expressionless. The man turned back to Darla.

“I have to take him to someone. If you let me, the rest of you can leave unharmed. If you interfere, I’ll have to hurt you.”

There was no braggadocio in his voice, no sense of malicious threat. He spoke these words as if they were a simple statement of fact.

Arron spoke up. “Don’t trust him! He’s one of hers – a Surrogate!”

Darla didn’t know exactly what Arron was talking about, but she got the gist well enough. This man was under Night’s spell, which made him one of her servants. Maybe he wasn’t as great a threat as the Harriers, but she had no doubt he was still dangerous.

“Turn around and put your hands on the vehicle,” Darla ordered.

The man’s cold smile didn’t waver. “Now why would I want to do that?”

Before Darla could react, the man stepped forward and lashed out with his left hand. He struck her hands hard – it felt like the motherfucker was made of concrete – and broke her grip on the Glock. The weapon spun away through the air, fell to the street, bounced, clattered, and slid to a stop ten feet from where Darla stood. Pain erupted in her right wrist, and she feared it might be broken.

The man lunged toward her, moving with inhuman speed. Still, Darla was able to jump to the side to avoid him. She no longer had her Glock, but that didn’t mean she was helpless. Ignoring the pain in her wrist, she grabbed hold of her expandable baton, pulled it free from her belt, and with a flick extended it to its full twenty-one-inch length. Ordinarily, she might have struck the man on the upper arm or bent down to hit his leg. But she was in no mood to fuck around right now, and she swung the baton toward the back of the man’s head as hard as she could. Polycarbonate polymer struck hair, skin, and bone with a sickening crack, and the man stumbled forward. Staggering, he turned toward Darla only to receive another blow to the side of his head. He took two more unsteady steps toward her, a bemused expression on his face as if he wasn’t precisely sure what had happened, before finally collapsing to the ground.

Darla’s wrist felt like it was on fire, and she could no longer maintain her grip on the baton. The weapon slipped from her fingers and fell to the street. Suddenly Jordan was at her side. He retrieved her baton and reached out to steady her, but she waved him away.

“I’m all right, thanks.”

She saw Lucius headed toward her gun. Most likely he intended to pick it up for her, as Jordan had done with her baton. Letting a civilian handle her baton was one thing. But her weapon? No fucking way.

“Don’t,” she said. “I’ll get it.”

She walked over to Lucius, Jordan accompanying her.

“It’s just as well you do it,” Lucius said, his voice shaky. “I’m not sure I’m able to.”

He held up his hands for her inspection, and she saw that his fingers were thick and tapered to hooklike ends. The skin looked scaly, too, as if he had some sort of rash.

She bent down, picked up her gun – her wrist screaming at her once more – stood, and holstered it.

The boy gave her a pleading look. “What’s wrong with me?”

“I don’t know. I’m having trouble seeing. How about you, Jordan? How are you feeling?”

“A bit feverish and nauseated. I figure it’s a response to the stress of the crash.”

“Maybe,” she said. But maybe not.

She turned to look at Arron then. He still stood by the Prius, gaze fixed on the yellow-eyed man lying on the ground only a few yards away. The man was motionless as a rock, but Arron watched him intently, as if he expected him to jump to his feet any second and attack. She didn’t especially like that. Arron knew far more about what was going on than the rest of them, and if he was acting as if the man was going to recover soon, Darla intended to take the possibility seriously.

“All right. Let’s go get our stuff from the car, and then we’ll go into the salon and I’ll call for backup once we’re inside.”

She’d dropped her phone when the Taurus struck Jordan’s car, and she wanted to get it back so she could call for help. Lucius likely wouldn’t want to leave his backpack and trombone in the car, nor Jordan his satchel. As far as she’d been able to tell, Arron had no personal possessions with him. Maybe he could give Lucius a hand carrying his things. They started back toward the Prius, but they’d only gotten halfway there when the yellow-eyed man abruptly sat up.

“Move!” Darla shouted, and the three of them started running.

The yellow-eyed man jumped to his feet, leaped on top of his Taurus, and fell into a crouching position.

“No need to run,” the man said. “I’m only here to counsel you in your time of need – and you need to stay the hell out of my way and let me take this bastard to my goddess!”

He hunkered down, and Darla knew that he was preparing to launch himself at Arron. Ignoring the pain in her wrist, she drew her Glock, fell into a firing stance, braced her right arm with her left hand, aimed, and fired. The round struck the yellow-eyed man in the left shoulder, spun him around, and knocked him off the roof of the Taurus. The recoil caused her injured wrist to explode with agony, and she couldn’t stop herself from screaming. She dropped the gun once again, but Lucius caught it in midair with one of his clawlike hands, and this time she let him hold on to it. He curled his thick fingers around the Glock awkwardly, but he managed to maintain a grip on the weapon. Fuck her phone, she decided. She could call for backup using Cut & Curl’s phone.

“Let’s go,” she said, and the three of them started across the street toward the salon.

* * *

Strictly speaking, Night didn’t have a full telepathic link with her Surrogates. In order to create them, to awaken what remained of the Wild inside them, she first had to create a Blight, and that took a great deal of her power, which didn’t leave a lot left over for mind-to-mind communication. She didn’t see through their eyes or hear with their ears. She could send messages to them, but she had no idea whether or not they were received or if her Surrogates acted on them. Surrogates – while stronger, faster, and more aggressive than ordinary humans – were simple, single-minded creatures. Once she gave them a command, they would do everything in their power to carry it out, even at the cost of their own lives.

The first indication she had that Charley had caught up to Arron and his new friends was the sound of crashing metal coming from the distance ahead of her. A mile, she thought, maybe more. The Harriers understood what the noise meant too, and they growled softly and pushed harder against the leading edge of the Blight, leaning forward, the tops of their heads flush with what seemed to be an invisible solid surface. As strong as they were, there was nothing they could do to make the Blight spread faster, but she shared their frustration and didn’t command them to stop. Being a hunter meant you had to have patience, but she’d been chasing Arron for so long now that she had little left, and it was all she could do to keep herself from pushing at the barrier along with her pets.

She heard a gunshot, listened carefully, did not hear a second.

She didn’t know if Charley still lived and if so, how badly injured he might be, but she sent him a thought-message anyway.

Get off your ass and get him!

Although she knew it was fruitless, she waited for a response of some kind. She wasn’t surprised when she didn’t receive one.

She continued walking down the middle of the street, two Harriers on either side of her, one slow step after another as the edge of the Blight moved torturously onward.

* * *

“Careful not to take too much off. Last time I let you mess with my hair, I was practically bald when I left here.”

Krista Herrera held her breath for a moment to keep from sighing. She let it out slowly – and hopefully silently – then returned to misting her mother’s hair with water from the plastic bottle she held.

“Mom, if you don’t like the way I do hair, why do you keep coming to me for a cut?”

Victoria Herrera sat in the salon chair, black cape draped over her front, facing the long rectangular mirror on the back wall. Her gaze flicked to her daughter’s reflection as she answered.

“Because you don’t charge me.”

She burst into one of her deep belly laughs, the kind that had made Krista smile ever since she was a little girl, and sure enough, she smiled now.

Krista Herrera was thin, in her early thirties, with straight hair dyed magenta. She wore a copper-colored blouse, black slacks, and open-toed shoes. She was big into makeup – she watched YouTube tutorials on it all the time – and she favored a bold look, but not overdone. She loved accessories, too, and today she had on hoop earrings and copper bracelets that jangled against each other as she worked. She figured that if you ran your own salon, it was important to look your best when you were at work, although she was looking forward to closing up shop for the day, heading home, slipping on a t-shirt and sweatpants, and watching the next episode of the Netflix drama series she was obsessed with.

But first she had to finish her mom’s cut.

Cut & Curl was a small salon, and Krista only had two other employees besides herself. Monica had gone home already – she had twin toddlers and went home at four every day so she could make dinner for them and their father – but Erika was still here. She stood behind the salon chair to Krista’s left, braiding Casey Shaw’s long blond hair. The teenager had come in to get her hair cut short and donate the rest to Locks of Love, something which Krista found very commendable, even if people who donated got their haircut for free. So here she and Erika were, still working, neither of them making a dime from their efforts. Some businesswoman you are, she thought, then she smiled. Who gives a damn? There’s more to life than money.

Victoria looked like an older version of Krista, except her graying hair was dyed black, and she was twenty pounds heavier. Sometimes when Krista looked at her, she felt like she was getting a preview of what she’d look like in twenty years or so, and it gave her a weird feeling. Who wanted to hear that they were destined to become their mother? But on the other hand, it was kind of comforting too. It made her feel as if she was part of a long line of strong women, stretching who knew how far back into history.

Cut & Curl’s interior was long and narrow, which made it a bit cramped to work in. The entrance was at the north end, and a small waiting area and the front counter and register were located near it. Posters of models – all young, gorgeous, and thin – adorned the walls, each with a different stylish cut. The interior sound system was tuned to a soft rock channel, and right now a Steely Dan song was playing. Krista hummed along to the tune as she put the spray bottle back on the counter beneath the mirror, grabbed a pair of scissors, and prepared to start trimming her mother’s hair, when there came a sound of metal slamming into metal outside. A car accident, more than just a simple fender bender, she guessed. It sounded serious.

“What the fuck was that?” Victoria said.

Despite professing disapproval for profanity throughout Krista’s life – especially when Krista used it – her mother had a tendency to swear when she was startled. Normally Krista called her out on it whenever she did this, but not now. She laid the scissors on the counter, hurried to the salon’s entrance, and peered through the glass. She saw two vehicles in the street, both of which looked to be in poor condition. People had gotten out of the cars and were standing around, so it appeared that no one was badly injured. That was a relief. One of the people was wearing what looked like a police uniform, but neither of the vehicles was a police vehicle. Weird.

“A couple cars got into an accident,” she said. “I don’t think anyone was hurt.”

Krista removed her phone from her back pocket and called 911. Most likely, someone involved in the crash would call too, but she figured she should do so as well, just in case. When the dispatcher answered, Krista quickly told her what had happened, and the woman promised that police officers and EMTs would be on the scene shortly. Krista disconnected, put her phone back in her pocket, then returned to her mother, Erika, and Casey.

“Everything should be okay now,” Krista said.

Then they heard a gunshot.

Guess I spoke too soon, Krista thought.

A few moments later, the entrance door burst open and four people rushed in: the woman in the police uniform, a teenage boy, an older guy wearing a brown suit jacket, and a bearded man around her age dressed in an outfit like a medieval peasant might wear. The officer, Krista noted with alarm, was carrying a gun in one hand, and the older guy carried a police baton. Not good.

The older man turned and locked the entrance, and Krista’s first thought was that these people had come to rob her. But that was ridiculous. Why would thieves stage a car accident outside her salon as part of a robbery attempt? The officer squinted, as if the light in the salon was bothering her eyes and she was having trouble seeing. The older man was pale and trembly, like he was sick. And there was something wrong with the kid’s hands. The fingers were scaly, long and curved, and ended in clawlike points. Like a bird’s talons, she thought. Like the hawk on his school jacket. Aside from his clothes, there was nothing obviously strange about the bearded man, but Krista did notice a weird smell filtering through the air, an odor of dry, barren earth and rotting vegetation that for some reason she assumed emanated from the bearded man. The scent made her dizzy for a moment, and she gripped the back of the salon chair to steady herself, but the sensation passed as quickly as it had come.

“Where’s your phone?” the officer said.

Krista didn’t reply immediately, and the woman repeated her question slowly and more loudly.

“Where. Is. Your. Phone?”

“I…. We don’t have a store phone,” Krista said. “I just use my cell. I already called 911.”

“I need to borrow it,” the officer said. “Please.”

Victoria, Erika, and Casey were all staring at the intruders with alarm. Victoria looked at Krista, and in a small, frightened voice, asked, “Honey? What’s happening?”

“I don’t know, Mom.” Whatever it was, it wasn’t good. She pulled her phone from her back pocket, walked toward the officer, and held it out to her. With her free hand, she took Krista’s phone. She squinted at the screen, then handed the phone back to Krista.

“I can’t see well enough to call. Would you do it for me?”

Before Krista could answer, the officer cocked her head to the side, as if listening to something. Krista didn’t hear anything, though.

“He’s coming,” the officer said. “Everybody move away from the entrance!”

Practically shoving Krista in front of her, the officer and her companions moved farther into the salon just as the front door, despite being locked, was wrenched open so violently that glass shattered and it was pulled halfway off its hinges. Victoria screamed, and Krista wanted to tell her it was okay, everything was going to be all right, but she didn’t know that and couldn’t bring herself to lie. A black-haired, pudgy-faced man walked into the salon, eyes shining with amber light. He moved with eerie grace, and his lips were drawn back from his teeth in an expression that had only the vaguest resemblance to a smile. His left shoulder was bleeding, but the wound didn’t appear to be bothering him. The officer raised her gun and pointed it at him, and her companions moved aside to give her a clear shot. The older man gripped the baton tight, as if prepared to use it should the yellow-eyed man attack.

The man stood near the entrance, smiling that non-smile of his.

“There’s nothing you can do to stop me, so you might as well—”

The officer fired her gun. The man’s head snapped back as blood sprayed from his throat.

Krista’s mother screamed again, and this time she was joined by Erika and Casey. Krista wasn’t sure, but she thought she might be screaming too. The bullet’s impact caused the yellow-eyed man to stagger backward, but he didn’t go down.

“Good shot!” the older man said.

“I was aiming for his head. Can’t see a fucking thing.” The officer grimaced in pain, and the hand that held her gun was trembling, as if she were having trouble holding it.

The yellow-eyed man focused his amber gaze on the officer. He opened his mouth to speak, but instead he coughed blood. Some of it struck his shirt, but most of it splattered to the floor. Krista felt stomach acid hit the back of her throat, and she knew she was on the verge of throwing up. She fought to keep from doing so.

The yellow-eyed man’s features twisted with rage, and he rushed forward, hands outstretched, as if he intended to wrap them around the officer’s throat and choke the life out of her. She tried to fire again, but she hissed in pain, unable to squeeze the trigger. The boy stepped in front of the officer, and when the yellow-eyed man drew close, he swept out with one of his claw-hands and raked the man’s chest, tearing his shirt and cutting bloody furrows in his chest. The boy struck with such force that the man was knocked to the side, and he collided with the older guy. They both hit the front counter, and the older guy – who didn’t have enough room to wield the baton – put his hand on the man’s face and shoved him back. The man, still bleeding heavily from his throat wound, reached up to touch one of his cheeks. Crimson lesions erupted on his skin – face, neck, hands – and his yellow-eyes clouded over. His entire body spasmed, as if his system was experiencing some kind of overload, and then he slumped to the floor and lay motionless, eyes now milk-white, wide, and staring.

The older man gawped at his dead attacker.

“Did I do that?”

“Don’t touch me with those things,” the boy said.

The older guy looked at the boy’s clawed hands. “You’re one to talk.”

Up to this point, the bearded man hadn’t said or done anything, merely observed as events took place around him. But now he spoke.

“We can’t stay here. The Blight is coming toward us. Can’t you feel it?”

From off in the distance came the sound of approaching sirens. Krista assumed they were in response to her 911 call. Were they the Blight that the bearded man spoke of? It didn’t matter. All she cared about was someone taking away the dead body lying on the floor of her salon so she could start cleaning up the blood, and afterward, begin looking for a therapist. After tonight, she was going to need one.

“The Blight won’t affect any of you. Night’s power can’t claim you, not when I already have,” the bearded man said.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” the officer said.

“Neither do I.” The older man scowled at the bearded man. “What do you mean by claimed?”

“It’s…complicated,” the bearded man said.

Bolts of pain shot through Krista’s hands like miniature lightning, and she drew in a hissing breath. She quickly examined her hands. Her fingers looked normal at first, but then they took on a gleaming metallic cast. They lengthened, edges sharpened, tips became pointed. I’ve got scissors for hands, she thought, and if she hadn’t been so horrified by what had happened, she would’ve laughed hysterically at the idea. She flexed her new fingers, and the blades made soft snik-snik sounds as they touched. Her new fingers weren’t entirely devoid of sensation, but it was muted, distant, as if she was wearing thick gloves.

This can’t be real, she thought. But it sure as hell looked and felt real.

She looked at her mother, saw Victoria staring at her daughter’s transformed hands.

“What in the shit happened to you?”

“Don’t swear,” Krista said absently. Was this transformation what it meant to be claimed by the bearded man?

Erika and Casey were looking at her scissor-fingers too, and they seemed just as horrified as her mother. None of the three women appeared to have undergone any changes, though, thank god.

Krista felt a sensation of cold pass over her then, as if there was a winter storm outside and someone had thrown open a window. The sensation quickly faded, but in its aftermath, Cut & Curl became…different. Mold appeared on the walls, the floor warped beneath their feet, the long mirror cracked and became cloudy. The salon chairs aged, their vinyl coverings splitting, revealing discolored foam rubber beneath. The colors of the wall posters faded to the point where the photographic images on them became almost entirely whited out. The music on the sound system slowed down, became distorted, then cut out completely. The lights flickered, went out, then came back on, dimmer than before.

“The Blight has reached us,” the bearded man said, his voice hushed.

So much had happened in so short a time that Krista felt overwhelmed. None of this could possibly be real. She was having some kind of mental breakdown or maybe an aneurism or something. She turned to her mother, hoping to find some measure of reassurance that, whatever was happening in her salon, it wasn’t as bad as her broken mind was perceiving it. She started to speak, but her words died in her throat when she saw her mother’s gleaming yellow eyes. She looked at Erika and Casey, and saw them regarding her with amber eyes of their own. The three women smiled, their expressions cruel and amused.

And then they attacked.

Chapter Ten

Collier, Ohio. Now.

Jordan gazed upon Night’s prone body lying on the asphalt, her face a mangled ruin of blood and torn flesh. She looked dead, but Jordan didn’t believe it for a second. A creature like her – a being of power – might go down, but she wouldn’t stay down for long. They had to finish her while they had the chance. She’d been weakened during their last encounter, and she had further depleted her strength by casting a Blight on the building – just as they’d planned. They would never get another opportunity as good as this one, and they had to take advantage of it. Unfortunately, the three surviving Harriers were not about to stand by and allow their mistress to be slain. They came bounding across the parking lot toward Jordan and the others, fury blazing in their yellow eyes.

He turned toward the rapidly approaching cats, pumped the shotgun to eject the spent shell and chamber a fresh one, then shouldered the weapon.

“You know what to do, Darla,” he said.

“Damn straight,” she said, voice filled with grim anticipation.

Lucius and Krista joined Jordan, Lucius on his right, Krista on his left.

“You two ready?” he asked.

Krista clicked her scissor-fingers together.

“You know it,” she said.

Lucius said nothing, just flexed his bird-claw hands.

The three watched as the Harriers raced toward them.

* * *

Darla couldn’t see the big cats, but she could hear their massive paws thumping the ground, their breath chuffing in and out as they ran. She did her best to tune out the sounds. Jordan, Krista, and Lucius would hold off the Harriers long enough for what she had to do – she hoped.

For the last five years, the four of them had traveled together, learning to use their new abilities while helping each other deal with the physical changes that had accompanied their transformations. Darla thought of her companions as fellow freaks. Each had become something more – or perhaps less – than human, and they were the only ones in the world who could understand and empathize with what they’d gone through. They’d also spent their time together preparing for their revenge against Night. To that end, they’d traveled extensively, seeking out the darker places in the world, areas where what most people considered reality overlapped with a realm known as Shadow, seeking knowledge of how they could destroy a creature like Night. They learned much on their journeys, but at a price: repeated exposure to Shadow caused them to mutate further, rendering them less human. But the cost had been worth it, for after years of searching, they discovered the existence of a mystic weapon called a mortuum blade, an ancient weapon carved from a stone said to have been taken from the great forest on the back of the King of the Wild, and which possessed the capability of permanently harming – and even killing – any of his subjects.

Like Night.

Of course, learning about the existence of such a weapon was a far different thing than actually possessing it, and it had taken several more years until Darla and the others tracked it down. But they did, and they obtained it, but only by selling all memories of their lives before they encountered Night to the weapon’s owner, a mysterious being who called himself Brother Nothing. None of them had hesitated to pay the price, but sometimes Darla wondered if it had been truly worth it. But without access to her lost memories, there was no way she would ever know.

She carried the mortuum blade in an ankle sheath on her left leg, and she bent down, took hold of its stone handle, withdrew it, and stood. The stone was rough and cold in her hand, and she could feel the markings that had been carved into its surface, runes from a language that had never been spoken on Earth. Sound emanated from the blade, one that only her enhanced hearing could detect, a low hum of barely restrained energy, like a dynamo building power.

She heard the Harriers’ roar then, followed by the boom of Jordan’s shotgun discharging, the kee-eeeee-arr of Lucius’s birdlike attack cry, and the rapid metallic clicking of Krista’s scissor-fingers. The battle had been joined. But even over the din of her friends fighting the Harriers, she could hear the soft whispery sound of Night’s flesh beginning to knit itself back together. She needed to get a move on.

She began speaking the words she had been taught that would awaken the mortuum blade’s full power, harsh syllables in an alien language not meant for human tongues. The knife’s cold stone began to warm in her hand as it came to life, and she knew it would only take a few more seconds until the weapon was ready. Then she heard Night’s voice.

“That’s a nasty-looking toy you have there.”

* * *

Lucius dug his claws into the Harrier’s neck as it slammed into him. The creature’s weight bore him to the ground, but as it tried to fasten its jaws around his throat, he slashed viciously at its neck, one rapid swipe after another, and a torrent of thick, hot blood rained down on him. The cat shrieked in pain, and Lucius smiled in dark satisfaction and kept slashing. When he’d first transformed years ago, he’d hated what had been done to him, not least because he’d become a living embodiment of his high school mascot – a red hawk. He wondered if the fact he’d been wearing a sweatshirt with the image of the mascot on the front had somehow inspired his change, or if it was because he’d been a big fan of the high school football team. He didn’t remember anything about his life from before the moment Jordan and Darla had picked him up, so he didn’t know how he’d felt about the team, one way or another. But regardless of why he’d become the Amazing Bird Boy – whether it was a coincidence or a cruel joke – he sure as shit appreciated his talons right now.

But as badly wounded as the Harrier was, it wasn’t a natural creature, and while it had lost a lot of blood, it was not yet mortally wounded. It plunged its head toward Lucius, fastened its jaws on his shoulder, and bit down hard. Lucius’s scream was a high-pitched avian cry. It came out as a reflex, but once it began, he put as much force behind it as he could. The volume increased exponentially, and the Harrier released his shoulder and stepped back, shaking its head as if trying to dislodge the pain that pierced its ears, blood flying from its throat wounds.

Lucius broke off his cry and smiled. Hope that hurts like hell, motherfucker.

His own throat felt sore and raw, and his shoulder wound burned like fire, but he ignored the pain. While the Harrier was distracted, he jumped forward and jammed his claw-thumbs into the big cat’s eyes, shoving them as deep as they would go. When they were all the way in, he gripped the Harrier’s head with his remaining claws to hold it steady, and swirled his thumbs around, reducing the animal’s brain to a liquid mush. This, added to the blood loss from its throat wounds, proved too much for the Harrier, and the cat slumped to the ground, dead. Lucius continued swirling his thumbs around for a few more seconds, just for good measure, then he pulled his hands away from the creature’s head, his thumbs making a sickening squlerch as they slid free from its bloody eye sockets.

Lucius had no time to revel in his triumph. He fell back onto his ass, clapped his right hand to his shoulder wound to staunch the bleeding, and tried not to scream from the resulting pain. He didn’t know how badly he was wounded, but he could feel blood running down his chest and back. The transformations he and the others had undergone five years ago had given them each strange new powers, but advanced healing capabilities hadn’t been among them. He felt lightheaded from blood loss, and he knew he needed medical attention as soon as possible. But he’d have to wait until the battle was over. He watched as Jordan and Krista fought the remaining two Harriers, ready to help them out if they needed it.

He hoped they wouldn’t.

* * *

Normally, Krista hated her scissor-fingers. The goddamned things made it impossible to perform even the simplest of everyday tasks. But she had to admit that there were times they came in handy, like when a monstrous panther was trying to kill you, for example. The cat snapped at her with its teeth and swiped at her with its claws, but she managed to avoid its strikes, if only barely, and land several blows of her own. Five years of training had prepared her for this fight, and she reveled in her speed and strength. Slicing and dicing a Harrier might not be the same as killing Night – that was Darla’s department, right now – but it was still damn satisfying.

Her Harrier was bleeding from a dozen wounds, but so far none of them was serious enough to cause it any real damage. She needed to get at its underbelly so she could disembowel the damn thing, or better yet, strike at its chest and pierce its heart. It would be tricky, but if she was fast enough—

She wasn’t.

The Harrier lashed out with one of its massive front paws and hit Krista on the side of her head. Claws raked flesh, tearing half of her face away, but that didn’t matter, as the impact of the blow snapped her neck like a twig. Bright light flashed behind her eyes, and she had an instant to think her death would be worth it if Darla succeeded. And then the darkness rushed in and Krista was no more.

* * *

Jordan had blasted his Harrier multiple times with shotgun shells, and the beast – while bleeding heavily from the resultant wounds – was still on its feet. He’d known the creatures possessed unearthly strength and stamina, but damn. He had more rounds in his gun, but that wasn’t the only, or deadliest, weapon he had at his disposal. The Harrier might still be standing, but it swayed unsteadily, amber eyes half-lidded. Jordan knew he wouldn’t get a better opportunity. He shifted the shotgun to a left-handed grip so that his right hand would be free, and then he ran toward the Harrier.

Jordan’s plan was to approach the big cat from the side, slap his hand against the creature’s body, and infect it with his rot – preferably on a place where the Harrier was wounded, so that the disease might enter its system more swiftly. When he’d first gained the ability to create a wasting sickness in others, he’d been horrified. It was as if the cancer that had killed his husband had entered his body, only instead of killing him, it debased him, turning him into a monster to mock his grief over Stuart’s loss. He didn’t remember much about Stuart, just the things he had thought and felt from the moment Darla had run up to him outside Bullock High School and pleaded for a ride. He couldn’t even recall his lover’s face and voice. But he remembered enough, and he had come to view his rot as a power he could wield in Stuart’s name, turning the disease that had killed his husband into a weapon to wield against the world’s evils. And he planned to use it to destroy this Harrier and, if Darla’s part in their plan failed, he’d turn it against Night as well – to honor the ghost of a memory of a man he once loved.

Jordan might’ve had a plan to attack the Harrier, but unfortunately, that didn’t mean the big cat had to co-operate with it. Jordan came at the creature from its left side, but as he reached toward a particularly nasty-looking wound behind its shoulder, the cat – suddenly full of life once more – spun around and sank its teeth into Jordan’s hand. Jordan screamed as the cat bit down harder and shook its head back and forth vigorously. Jordan felt his wrist break as he was yanked off his feet and hit the ground. He lost his grip on the shotgun, and the weapon tumbled to the grass out of his reach. Not that there was much he could’ve done with it at that moment. The Harrier continued shaking him back and forth, and he realized the cat was trying to tear his hand from his arm, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop it. Well…there was one thing, but he needed to do it fast, while his hand was still attached.

As he was flung this way and that, he concentrated on his hand, doing his best to focus past the pain of the Harrier’s teeth tearing muscle and breaking bone. He concentrated on the hot wet feel of the Harrier’s tongue on his palm, the rough ridges of the roof of its mouth against the back of his hand – and he told his rot to spread. He felt disease leaving him and entering the soft flesh of the Harrier’s mouth, sinking instantly into the meat and spreading rapidly throughout the creature’s system. The cat would die just like the one Jordan and Krista had lured into the forest earlier, and when it lay on the ground, glassy-eyed and motionless, he’d piss on its corpse.

The Harrier’s breath came thick and ragged now, as if its lungs were filling with fluid, and its body began to weaken. It still shook Jordan, but not nearly as hard as before, and its grip on his hand was starting to loosen. Another few moments and the cat would be dead. As if realizing this, the Harrier marshaled the last of its strength and yanked its head viciously to the right, and Jordan’s hand tore free from his wrist in a spray of foul-smelling black fluid. Jordan screamed in agony as he fell to the ground and lay there, the dark substance that ran through his veins instead of blood gushing from the newly created wound. He watched the Harrier spit out his hand and focus its gaze on him. He thought the cat would attack then, but it had lost a great deal of weight, and now its skin clung tight to its bones. Patches of fur had fallen out all over its body, revealing flesh covered with thick, pustulant lesions. The cat took a single trembling step forward, and then – as if deciding it wasn’t up to the task – it turned and limped slowly away.

As Jordan watched the beast go, he heard Krista cry out. He tried to push himself to his feet so he could go to her aid, but when he pressed his bleeding stump against the ground, fresh agony exploded, the pain so intense that his mind said fuck it and shut itself down. He slumped back onto the asphalt, unconscious.

* * *

Darla couldn’t see Night’s face, but she imagined the woman looking at her, her yellow eyes restored in a crimson ruin of a face that was still in the process of healing. The mortuum blade was cold as ice in her hand, and she thought it had fully awakened, although she wasn’t certain. But she knew that if she didn’t strike now – before Night regained her strength – she’d never get another chance.

She lunged forward, intending to slash Night’s throat with the mortuum blade. The wounds the weapon caused could not be healed by any power, natural or supernatural, including Night’s. The woman would bleed to death, and Darla and her companions would finally have the justice they deserved. Darla had dreamed of this moment for five long years, and her heart sang as she swiped the blade through the air. Her hearing was so acute that it was almost akin to a bat’s sonar, and she could picture Night’s exact position, knew exactly where to strike. Which was why when the mortuum blade encountered only empty air, she was surprised.

Night whispered close to Darla’s ear, “I can be very quiet when I wish to be.”

Darla spun around and thrust the mortuum blade toward where she judged Night to be, but once again the weapon failed to find its target. Night grabbed her wrist, squeezed hard, and Darla cried out in pain. Unable to maintain a grip on the mortuum blade, she dropped the ancient artifact. It fell to the ground, only a few feet away, but it might as well have been on the other side of the universe for all the good it did her now. Darla tried to pull free of Night’s grip, but the woman – although weaker than when Darla had encountered her in Bullock – was still stronger than an ordinary human, and there was nothing she could do.

Night’s voice burned with fury. “You and your friends killed two of my pets. For that, I’ll tear you open, scoop out your guts, and feed them to the other two. A kinder death than you deserve, but I’ll be rid of you all the faster.”

Darla heard more than Night’s words. She heard the sound of Jordan’s harsh wheezing and knew that he had been injured. She heard thick, phlegmy breathing and knew that Jordan had managed to infect one of the Harriers with his rot. She heard blood oozing from numerous wounds on the other surviving Harrier, knew that it was weakened but would eventually recover. She heard one thing more: the sound of Lucius approaching at a run.

No, boy – stay back! she thought. Don’t let her get you too!

But Lucius kept coming, and as he did, he said, “Sorry about this, Darla.”

He then released a deafening avian cry, one far louder than she’d ever heard him make before. The sound was like a physical blow to her enhanced hearing, and she cried out in agony. The pain was too much for her to take, and she thought her head might explode, but then, mercifully, she passed out.

* * *

Lucius had no idea how serious his wound was. He’d never experienced pain this intense before, and every step sent fresh bolts of agony through his shoulder. He couldn’t move his left arm, and he didn’t know if that was due to some kind of shock, or if the Harrier had severed important muscles when it had bit him. He was inclined to think the latter. Their plan to kill Night had fucked up royally. Krista lay dead on the ground, head bent at an unnatural angle, eyes open and staring. Jordan lay several yards from her. He’d lost his right hand, but Lucius couldn’t tell if the man was alive or dead. The Harrier Lucius had fought was dead, and Jordan had afflicted the Harrier he’d been fighting with his sickness, and the creature, now emaciated and covered with lesions, hung back, watching Lucius warily with cloudy eyes. The last remaining Harrier, the one Krista had fought, bled freely from its ravaged neck, and while clearly weakened, it was still on its feet. It seemed to have no appetite for further battle, though, and like its diseased sibling, it stayed back for the moment and observed. Good. The last thing he wanted was to have to deal with those fucking things right now.

He wondered what his parents would think if they could see him now, a mutated warrior fighting monsters from…well, wherever they came from. Would they think he was a monster too, with his bird-claw hands and avian cries? He knew he had parents because he’d been thinking about them that night five years ago when Darla and Jordan had picked him up outside the high school, but he had no memories before that moment. He didn’t really know what his parents had been like, couldn’t recall their names, didn’t know whether he had any brothers or sisters. When he and the others had been offered the opportunity to obtain the mortuum blade, their memories had seemed like such a small price to pay for the weapon. Now he wasn’t so sure.

Night and Darla stood together, Night holding tight to Darla’s wrist, preventing her from escaping. Night’s face hadn’t completely healed from Jordan’s shotgun blast yet, and it looked like raw bloody hamburger. He hoped it hurt like hell. Darla didn’t have the mortuum blade, and while it was hard to tell given how much blood had splattered onto Night’s clothes when Jordan had shot her, it looked as if Darla hadn’t been able to inflict any new wounds on her. He knew Night would kill her if he didn’t do something fast. He didn’t have time to look for the mortuum blade, but he had other weapons to fight with. He started running toward the two women, and as he did, he said, “Sorry about this, Darla,” knowing that she would hear him. He was less than two yards away when Night turned to look at him, and he stopped, planted his feet, opened his mouth, and released a bird cry louder than any he’d ever made before.

Kee-eeeee-arr!

Waves of sound rippled outward from him, so intense they possessed physical force. He did his best to aim them solely at Night, but his control was limited, and the sonic blast struck Darla as well. She cried out and fell limp, unconscious, and Night let her go so she could press her hands to her ears. Darla fell to the ground and lay still. Lucius saw that she was bleeding from her ears, but at least she was out of the range of fire now. He continued screeching, pouring all of his strength into the sound, the muscles on his neck tight and straining. Sharp pain tore through his vocal cords, but he didn’t let up. At first, Night had glared defiantly at him, but now she grimaced as the sonic attack forced her to take a step backward, then two. Lucius thought she was going to go down, and when she did, he would run to Darla and search for the mortuum blade. He’d find it, grab it, then use it to end Night’s life once and for all.

But then the Harrier whose throat Krista had sliced ran to its mistress’s side. Its gait was unsteady, and when it came in range of Lucius’s sonic attack, it screamed. But it managed to take hold of Night’s fingerless hand in its mouth and, with surprising gentleness, started pulling her toward the tree line. Night, moving as if she was only half-conscious now, gave no resistance. As the Harrier with the bleeding throat towed her toward the woods, the disease-ridden Harrier followed on trembling legs.

No! Lucius thought. He couldn’t let her get away, not after all the suffering she’d caused.

He redoubled his effort, pouring the last reserves of his strength into his voice. But it was no use. He felt something snap within his throat, and his voice cut out. He coughed and blood dribbled over his lower lip onto his chin. He swayed, dizzy, and fell to his hands and knees. He watched Night and her two surviving Harriers reach the woods and disappear among the trees, too weak to give pursuit.

No…he thought. We were so close….

* * *

As Bethany and Arron fled UR Money’s office, she realized she had no idea where to go. She couldn’t think straight, could barely think at all after what she’d just witnessed – Nate becoming some kind of murderous beast and attacking that crazy man with the yellow eyes. And she had undergone her own transformation, her skin becoming thick and gray. Had she contracted some sort of horrible disease? Should she go to a hospital? If a person suddenly found themselves covered in rhino hide, they should head immediately to the nearest emergency room, shouldn’t they? It was only common sense. These thoughts swirled like a maelstrom in her head as she hurried down the hall, pulling Arron along with her. Arron, Arron, Arron…. She needed to get him somewhere he would be safe. That’s what was important now, was the only thing that was important. Once this thought entered her mind, it drove out all others, even the horror at what was happening to her body. If she could get him to safety, everything would be all right. Somehow.

Her first impulse was to take him out of the building so they’d have more room to run and more places to hide. But that felt wrong – very wrong – and she discarded the thought almost as immediately as she had it. They needed to stay inside the building, so that meant their choices for finding refuge were limited, to say the least. She thought of Soo then. Soo was a psychologist. It was her job to help people, and she was smart. If anyone in the Delgado Building could make sense out of the madness that was happening this morning, it would be her. And Soo’s office was just down the hall from UR Money’s. They could be inside and safe within moments.

But just before they reached Healthy Minds, the door flew open, and a woman and a teenage girl burst into the hallway. The girl – the woman’s daughter, presumably – was pale, eyes wide, features slack. The mother was crying with great racking sobs. When she saw Bethany and Arron, she said, “Don’t go in there! She’s a witch! A witch!”

The woman looked at Bethany – really looked at her – and her eyes grew wide with shock. Must look worse than I’d imagined, Bethany thought. The woman lowered her gaze, as if she couldn’t bear the sight of Bethany, and hurried her daughter down the hall toward the elevator.

The woman’s reaction concerned Bethany, but less so than it would have at a different time. Right now, the need to get Arron to safety overrode all else, including her worries about her appearance. She pulled Arron the rest of the way to Soo’s office, opened the door, and dragged him inside. She then turned and pushed the door shut so hard it slammed.

“Bethany?”

Bethany turned to see Soo standing in the doorway of her personal office, staring at her.

“Yes, it’s me.” She tried to smile, but her thick, gray lips weren’t very pliable, and she couldn’t manage it. “I’ve changed.”

“I’d say so.” Soo looked at Arron. “Who’s your friend?”

“His name’s Arron. He’s in trouble. We both are.”

Soo regarded them for a moment, then said, “Why don’t you both step into my office?”

She turned and went back inside, and Bethany – still holding tight to Arron’s hand – followed. Once they were in, Soo said, “I’m afraid I only have two places to sit. Arron, why don’t you sit at my desk, and Bethany, you can have the comfy chair. You look like you could use it. I’ll be fine standing.”

Soo’s office had a single window facing the street, just as Bethany’s had, and like Bethany’s, this window had streaks of dark mold on it. The Blight, Bethany thought and shuddered.

Arron went to Soo’s desk without comment, pulled out her chair, and sat. Bethany lowered herself into the armchair with a little oof sound. She felt heavy, and she supposed it was due to her new skin. It was like she was covered by several weighted blankets, and each movement was increasingly more of an effort. She wondered if she would reach a point where all she could do was lumber around ponderously like an elephant. Now that she’d brought Arron here, the all-consuming drive to get him to a place of safety began to recede and the full terror of what had happened hit her.

Soo was looking at her intently, and Bethany had the sense the woman knew exactly what she was feeling.

“Calm yourself,” Soo said. “Picture a smooth, still pond on a quiet spring morning.”

Bethany closed her eyes, and suddenly she was there, sitting on soft sweet-smelling grass at the edge of a crystal-blue pond, the water still as glass, sunlight glimmering on its mirrored surface. There were trees all around, leaves rustling in a warm, gentle breeze, and Bethany felt her fear drain away. She’d never felt so relaxed, so peaceful in her life, and she thought she could spend the rest of eternity in this moment, and it would be her own personal heaven.

The images and sensations faded then, but the sense of deep calm remained.

“How did you do that?” Bethany asked.

“You’re not the only one around here who’s changed,” Soo said. She looked at Arron. “Is he a part of whatever’s happening?”

“Yes,” Bethany said.

Soo regarded Arron for a moment, eyes narrowed, almost as if she was trying to read his mind. Then she returned her attention to Bethany.

“Tell me everything,” she said.

* * *

Kellie fled down the hall, afraid that the fat blob was coming after her but too frightened to look back over her shoulder and confirm it. Of course it’s coming for me, she thought. It had wanted to get inside her her entire life – had lurked in every cookie, candy, or ice cream she’d turned down, every greasy fast-food hamburger and container of oversalted French fries she’d longed for but refused to touch. It had grown tired of waiting for her to succumb to its sugary-carby temptations, and if the girl wouldn’t come to the fat, the fat would come to the girl.

Your sister’s dead – that’s what you should be thinking about, not your fucking weight!

In her mind, she saw Miranda’s body, now nothing more than an empty sack of torn skin, lying on the floor of their office, along with the bodies of their clients who’d come in for today’s session. But as much as she wanted to mourn her sister, it was difficult to do so when she was running for her life from a mound of living fat – especially when it spoke with her sister’s voice.

Smiles for Miles, the orthodontal practice, was located down the hall from Feels and Meals, and as she approached their office, she realized for the first time that both of their businesses had rhyming names. Kind of dumb now that she thought about it. If she survived today – and found a way to carry on without Miranda – she’d consider changing their business’s name to something less silly. Her plan, inasmuch as she had one, was to go into the orthodontist’s and beg someone to help her, call 911, maybe fight off the fat blob with dental instruments, anything, just as long as she wouldn’t have to face it alone.

When she reached the door, she made the mistake of looking back the way she’d come, and she saw the fat blob oozing down the hall toward her, the damn thing large as a fucking horse. Its voice – Miranda’s voice – spoke in her mind.

You don’t need to pretend any longer. You want us, and we want you. Open up and let us inside….

Kellie gripped the handle of Smiles for Miles’ door, but she hesitated to open it. What if other bad things were happening in the building? What if there was something terrible waiting for her on the other side of this door? She glanced at the fat blob again, saw that it was much closer now. Fuck it. Whatever might lie inside Smiles for Miles, it couldn’t be as bad as the thing that was coming for her. She opened the door and hurried inside.

A naked blood-covered woman stood behind the reception counter, staring blankly into space. The waiting area was filled with dead bodies – at least they sure looked dead – all of them bleeding from one of their eyes.

Okay, so she’d been wrong. This was just as bad.

From the look of things, the woman behind the counter was the only one who’d survived whatever had happened here. Her eyes darted back and forth, as if she was returning to awareness. She looked at Kellie and spoke in an emotionless voice. “Are you the police?”

Do I look like the police? Kellie thought, but all she said was, “No.”

“Oh. I called them after…after…. They should be here by now, don’t you think?”

“I…couldn’t say.”

Kellie wanted to ask the woman if she could use the office phone to call 911, but she realized there was no point. The woman had already called, and hopefully, the police were already on their way. All they had to do until then was—

The door. Kellie had been so stunned by what she saw when she’d entered Smiles for Miles, that she hadn’t thought to lock the goddamned door behind her. The fat blob had been closing in on her when she entered, and now it was probably almost to the door. She quickly turned, threw the deadbolt, then depressed the lock button on the knob. Excellent. They might be stuck in here for the time being, but at least the blob couldn’t get inside. They were safe.

She heard a sound then, moist, fleshy, like someone trying to shove raw chicken into a small-mouthed container. She looked down and saw a roll of fat squeezing through the crack beneath the door. Shit.

She stepped back just in time to avoid the fat blob as the rest of it came through with an audible pop, as if someone had just squeezed the world’s largest pimple. The blob reared up into what she thought of as a standing position, although it possessed no discernible human features, no arms, legs, or head.

The woman behind the counter turned her head to look at the fat blob.

“That’s weird,” she said, voice still not showing the slightest trace of emotion.

She’s in shock, Kellie thought.

A pair of pseudopods extruded from the blob’s side, a hideous parody of a pair of arms.

Come on, the blob said in Miranda’s voice. Give us a hug.

Kellie was about to let forth with the loudest scream of her life, when the fat blob leaned toward the waiting area. It remained that way for a moment, and although it possessed no apparent sensory organs, Kellie had the impression it was sniffing the air, or at least performing an equivalent action. The blob then flattened itself and began sliding across the floor toward the bodies.

Not a lot of fat in them, Miranda’s voice said. But waste not, want not.

The blob took up a position near the bodies, and as Kellie watched, they began to split open, just as her and Miranda’s clients had in Feels and Meals. The blob intended to harvest their fat before coming after her again – and when it was done, it would be even larger. This was her cue to get the hell out of there.

She hurried behind the counter, took the naked woman’s hand, and pulled her toward the door. The woman said nothing, but she came along easily enough. She watched fat ooze forth from the bodies and begin making its way to join the blob as Kellie unlocked the office door. She threw the door open and, towing the woman behind her, rushed into the hall. She had no idea where to go to next, but anyplace had to be better than here.

Hadn’t it?

She started running, and her new companion ran with her.

Chapter Eleven

Harvey stepped out of the MedTek office and into the hallway. His throat felt like it was caked with sand, and he couldn’t believe he was already hungry again. He briefly considered going back inside and seeing if he could drain a few more drops from his coworkers’ bodies, but he knew there was no point. He’d sucked them drier than the Mojave. Besides, he needed more than a few drops of blood – a lot more.

He was already starting to dislike being a vampire. In the movies, they made being undead seem like a cool gig. You seduced a hot chick, bit her, drank your fill, and then you had the rest of the night to do whatever you wanted – and you got to live forever to boot. But he’d drained the entire staff of MedTek, almost a dozen people, and he felt as if he hadn’t anything to drink in weeks, months, years…. He wondered where all that blood had gone. There were around ten pints of blood in a human body, and he’d pulled many times that amount into his needle-hands where, he assumed, it had gone directly into his circulatory system. So why hadn’t he exploded like an overfilled water balloon? He’d felt fantastic when he’d been draining it, but now all he felt was horribly, horribly empty. He wondered what would happen if he extended his finger-needles, jammed them into his own neck, and tried draining his own blood. Would he kill himself? Or would his blood continue circulating through the needles, back into his body, and out again in an endless loop? If so, would that mean he could maintain the sensation of ecstasy? Would he always feel blessedly full? Maybe that’s why no one ever saw any vampires in the real world. Eventually they ended up feeding on themselves and dwelling within their own personal nirvanas for all time. Didn’t sound like a bad way to spend eternity, really. But no – he was a science dude. He knew that a closed system couldn’t sustain itself for long. The Laws of Thermodynamics were a bitch.

The MedTek office was located near the stairwell, and when the door burst open, Harvey’s achingly dry throat caught fire and he thought, Blood! His finger-needles extended of their own accord, ready to take a nice long drink. He turned to face the stairwell door, hands raised, prepared to charge, but when he saw the person coming toward him, he stopped. The man was covered with black fur, had long claws, and sharp vicious-looking teeth.

Harvey spoke, his dry throat making his voice sandpaper-rough.

“Holy shit! You’re a werewolf, aren’t you? Looks like I’m not the only one around here who found himself inexplicably monsterized this morning.”

The man’s only response was a low canine growl deep in his throat. He continued toward Harvey, drool running from one corner of his mouth. Rather than being afraid, Harvey smiled.

“So we’re going to play Dracula vs. the Wolf Man, are we? That’s cool.” His smile stretched into a grin. “I wonder what your blood will feel like when it’s running through my veins.”

The man snarled and started running at Harvey, and Harvey stepped forward to meet him.

Harvey was stronger and faster than he’d been before his transformation, but the wolf man was far swifter. Before Harvey could plunge his needle-fingers into the man’s flesh, he swiped out with his claws and raked Harvey’s left cheek. The impact of the blow knocked Harvey into a wall, and he gritted his teeth against the pain that blossomed in his right shoulder. Dazed, he dropped his chin to his chest and saw reddish-brown flakes falling to the floor. That’s my blood, dry as fucking dust, he thought, falling from where that motherfucker cut me. No wonder he was so goddamned thirsty.

The wolf man moved in for another strike, but this time Harvey was ready. He rammed the needles on his right hand into the soft underside of the man’s fur-covered jaw and began to suck. Draining regular human blood was close to orgasmic, but this – this was the good stuff. It was like mainlining a bolt of sizzling lightning, and his entire body sang with power. The wolf man tried to pull away, but Harvey grabbed the top of his head with his free hand and held him in place. No way was he going to let the fuzzball take this primo vino from him before he’d drained his fill! The wolf man roared with fury and began clawing Harvey’s chest with both hands, shredding his MedTek shirt and carving deep furrows into his chest. Powdery blood poured from the wounds, and they hurt like a motherfucker, but Harvey didn’t care. Thanks to the strength he’d gained from the wolf man’s blood, the wounds healed almost as fast as they were created. All Harvey needed was a few more moments, and then the wolf man would be dead, reduced to a desiccated fur-covered husk.

“Hey! You two!”

A woman’s voice, one Harvey didn’t recognize, hit his ears like a whipcrack.

He turned to see an older woman coming down the hallway toward him and the wolf man. She wore a gray cardigan over a white blouse, had on black pants and heeled shoes, the kind that made annoying clack-clack-clack sounds as she walked. Her eyes were an odd yellow color, Like Leon’s, he thought, and her expression was one of barely restrained anger. She approached them without hesitancy, as if she didn’t notice – or care – that she was in the presence of a pair of monsters.

“Do you know where he’s at? If you do, you’d better tell me, and fast.”

The woman’s hands curled into fists, as if she intended to hit them if they didn’t tell her what she wanted to know. Her pugnacious attitude amused Harvey, but there was something about her that raised his hackles. He’d never seen this woman before, and he already hated her with a passion. And it seemed his hairy companion felt the same way, for his gaze was fixed on the woman, and he began to growl. Harvey pulled his needle-fingers from the wolf man’s throat and removed his other hand from his head. The wolf man made no attempt to attack him. His attention was entirely focused on the yellow-eyed woman.

“Who’s he?” Harvey asked.

“You know who I’m talking about,” the woman said. “I’m supposed to find him and drag his ass outside so she can have him.”

He, she…. It was the same sort of crazy shit Leon had talked about, and he had no more idea what it meant now than he had then. He didn’t really care, though. All that mattered to him was that she was filled with blood – he could smell it – and he was so very thirsty. He stepped toward her, intending to jam his needles into the sides of her neck. But before he could do so, she swung her arm outward and backhanded him. She was far stronger than she looked, and the impact of the blow slammed him into the wall.

“Bitch,” he hissed, and spun around, intending to make her pay for what she’d done.

But before Harvey could take a step toward her, the wolf man – still bleeding from the wounds beneath his chin – rushed at her. He grabbed hold of her midsection, and the momentum of his attack knocked the woman off her feet. She hit the floor hard, and the wolf man straddled her and swung his right hand toward her throat, clearly intending to tear a huge chunk out of it with his claws. But as fast as the wolf man was, the woman was faster. She caught his wrist in mid-strike and then flung him off her. He smashed into the wall and bounced off. But before he could fall to the floor, the woman leaped to her feet, raised her arms over her head, and brought her fists crashing down on him. He struck the floor so hard, the tile broke beneath him with a loud crack.

Instead of being intimidated by the woman’s show of strength, Harvey was excited. Given how powerful she was, her blood must be something special, and he couldn’t wait to get a taste. He rushed her from the side, and as she swung her arm to backhand him, just as she had his furry friend, he was ready. He ducked, came in under her strike, and rammed his needles into her abdomen. Her only reaction was to make a tiny oof sound, and then she brought her fists slamming down onto his back. The blow hurt, not that he gave a damn. He’d begun to drain her blood, and he was already drunk on the heady stuff. This was good, even better than the wolf man’s, and it lit up every nerve in his body. Fireworks were going off inside him, and he couldn’t conceive of ever feeling better than he did in this moment.

The woman continued pounding on his back as he drained her, but within moments she began to weaken. Harvey heard the wolf man snarl, caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye, then felt the woman’s body jerk hard, once, twice…. Hot blood splashed down on him, and he looked up to see the woman no longer had a head. Blood geysered from her neck stump, and he opened his mouth to catch as much of it as he could. As he drank, he saw the wolf man holding the woman’s head in his claws. His face was bent toward hers and he was tearing the flesh from her skull with his teeth.

Nice.

The blood fountain dried up quickly since Harvey was draining her with his needle-fingers, and when she was empty, he withdrew his hands and her withered dead body slumped to the floor. The wolf man had stripped the flesh away from the front of the woman’s skull, and as he swallowed the last bit of meat, he dropped the head. It bounced, rolled, and came to a stop next to her body.

Harvey and the wolf man regarded each other for a moment. The woman’s powerful blood sang in Harvey’s veins, and he was in too good a mood to immediately attack his new partner in homicide.

“I’m Harvey. I work at MedTek. Well, I guess I should say worked since I killed everyone in the office.”

The wolf man spoke in a guttural nonhuman voice.

“Nate,” he said.

Harvey frowned. The name sounded familiar, but he…. Then it came to him.

“You work at UR Money with Bethany, don’t you?”

The wolf man – Nate – nodded.

Harvey gestured toward the woman’s corpse. “You have any idea what she was? She’s the second yellow-eyed fucker I’ve run into today.”

“No,” Nate growled. “Hate them.”

“I’m right there with you, buddy.”

“More.”

At first Harvey didn’t know what Nate meant, but then he sniffed the air. Now that he’d tasted the woman’s blood, he had her scent, and he could smell that there were others in the building who shared the same kind of blood as hers – and he was suddenly thirsty again.

“We make a good team,” Harvey said. “Want to hunt together?”

Nate smiled, blood-smeared lips drawing back from sharp animal teeth.

Harvey smiled back.

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

* * *

Hope really wished she had a gun right now.

Two of the officers had their Glocks trained on her, and two had theirs trained on Dan (including Terry Curtis, who Dan knew). All four officers had weird yellow eyes, like the woman in the gray cardigan she and Dan had passed in the hallway on their way here. The crowd in Grinders, who’d all been chattering excitedly when they arrived at Grinders, had now fallen into a shocked silence. Everyone stood still as statues, including Salvador and Yvette behind the counter, gazes fixed on the four armed officers, afraid to move or even breathe as they waited to see what would happen next. Hope knew how they felt. This entire situation was like something out of a nightmare. People could enter the building but not leave it, and when they did enter, some kind of change came over them. Their eyes became yellow and, evidently, they lost their goddamned minds. Hope knew she and Dan had to de-escalate the situation before any of the civilians in the coffee shop were hurt. The trick was doing so without their getting shot in the process.

The best chance she had of getting through to any of the officers was not to focus her efforts on all of them, but rather choose one that she could address. She needed to remind that person that she and Dan were (or at least had once been) fellow cops, and that they were all on the same side. She also needed to make this person aware of all the civilians around them, get them to calm down and stand down before anyone got hurt. She decided to address one of the two female officers. In her experience, women were more clear-headed in stressful situations, less likely to allow adrenaline to propel their actions – and they didn’t have to deal with an overabundance of testosterone screaming at them to Fight, motherfucker, fight! She supposed it was sexist of her to think this way, but she didn’t care. All she cared about was making sure no one ended up in the morgue today, including her and Dan.

She recognized the woman officer – a stout blonde with a square jawline – but she wasn’t sure she remembered her name. They’d spoken several times when Hope had been on the force, but they’d never talked for very long and never about anything especially important – the shitty Ohio weather, how it was high time the city got rid of the department’s old crappy cruisers and got new ones, how the majority of male cops treated women officers like eternal rookies, that sort of thing. She thought her name might be….

“Maggie?”

The woman’s yellow eyes narrowed, but she didn’t correct Hope.

“I don’t know why you four have drawn your weapons, but I’m sure you had a good reason.” Hope wasn’t sure of any such thing, of course, but she wasn’t about to tell that to Maggie. “Look around. See all these people? They’re scared, Maggie. Why don’t you and the others put your weapons down, and we can discuss whatever’s going on calmly, without freaking everyone out.”

Maggie’s eyes flicked away from Hope to quickly scan the crowd, then they focused on her once more. At first Hope thought the woman was going to do as she asked, she even lowered her gun several inches, but then, as if her resolve returned, she raised it again and her expression hardened.

“Where is he?” she demanded.

Hope had had enough of this.

“Put your fucking gun down – now.”

As she spoke this last word, she felt something in her mind push. Maggie blinked several times, and then she lowered her gun to her side.

“What the hell are you doing, Mags?” Terry didn’t take his eyes off Dan as he said this, and his gun hand didn’t waver.

Maggie frowned. “I…don’t know.”

Dan began breathing heavily, and Hope turned to see her husband had clenched his hands into fists. His jaw muscles were tight, his shoulders tense, and he was trembling all over. Panic gripped her. Was he having a stroke or a heart attack? His side of the family was prone to both, and although he took great care of himself physically, she knew that genetics played a huge role in a person’s health. She was about to plead with the officers to call an ambulance for Dan (or allow her to do so), but then she saw that Dan was…growing. He wasn’t getting taller, though – he was getting bulkier. Muscles swelled all over his body, and his shirt and pants quickly grew tight on his expanding frame. The transformation must have been quite painful, for Dan had squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth, and he moaned softly.

Everyone in Grinders watched in fascinated horror as Dan changed, but no one was more alarmed than Terry, Maggie, and the other two cops.

“You’re one of his servants!” Terry shouted, and then he squeezed his Glock’s trigger.

Dan’s head snapped back as a bullet struck his forehead. The round exited the back of his head in a spray of bone fragments and brain tissue. His eyes rolled white, and he fell backward, dead before he hit the floor. He remained bulked up, gazing at the ceiling with glassy eyes, blood running from the bullet wound in his forehead, more blood pouring from the exit wound, widening around his head like a crimson halo.

The people crammed into Grinders remained in shocked silence for an instant, and then they all began yelling and screaming at the same time. Hope wasn’t sure, but she thought she might be adding her screams to the mix as well. Terry stared at Dan’s body, an expression of puzzlement on his face, as if he was struggling to understand what he’d done. He still had his Glock raised, as did the other two male cops. Maggie stared at Dan too, but she continued holding her weapon at her side.

“You fucking bastard!” Hope shouted.

She intended to rush Terry and claw the sonofabitch’s eyes out, not caring if she got shot in the process. She’d rather get killed, actually, than to live the rest of her life without Dan. But as she stepped toward him, he swiveled his Glock and trained it on her.

“Don’t move,” he said. “Just tell us where he is, and no one else has to get hurt.” Without taking his eyes off her, he said, “You guys contain this fucking crowd.”

Maggie and the other two male officers holstered their weapons and began to circulate among the people in Grinders, telling them to calm down, that they had the situation under control. No one was buying their bullshit, though. They kept yelling and sobbing, and telling the officers to get the fuck away from them.

And that’s when the werewolf and the vampire showed up.

They came running into Grinders and made straight for the cops. Their faces and clothes were covered with blood, making them appear even more fiendish than they already did. Terry turned toward them and began firing, and a second later Maggie and the other two cops did as well. Some of the rounds went wild, striking terrified bystanders, but most of them hit their intended targets – not that they did any good. Hope could see where the rounds struck, but other than the monsters’ bodies jerking a bit from the impact, the bullets had no effect. The werewolf leaped at Terry, knocked him to the ground, and began tearing him apart with tooth and claw. The vampire ran to the other two male cops and jammed the needlelike points of his fingers into their throats. The men’s bodies spasmed as their blood was rapidly drained. Maggie raised her gun, intending to fire at the werewolf killing Terry, but Hope said, “Don’t,” gave the word a mind-push, and Maggie lowered her weapon once more.

Fuck Terry, she thought, and she watched with grim satisfaction as the werewolf eviscerated her husband’s killer, yanked forth a loop of intestine, and began to gnaw it.

Terry and the other men tried to fight back. Despite the horrific injuries Terry had suffered, he punched the werewolf in the head, first with his right hand, then his left, continuing to alternate strikes, the blows coming faster and landing harder. The werewolf seemed shaken by Terry’s counterattack, but he did not falter. He spit out the intestine, rammed his hand into Terry’s now-open body cavity, and shoved his arm up to the elbow. He rooted around in there for a moment – Terry screaming as he did so – then with a sickening wet sound the werewolf withdrew his arm. In his hand was a blood-slick hunk of meat, which Hope realized was Terry’s heart. Terry went limp and the werewolf eagerly raised the organ to his mouth and began feasting.

Hope fought to keep from throwing up.

The other two male officers continued shooting their guns, emptying their clips into the vampire’s chest and abdomen, but without any discernible impact, other than causing him to bleed streams of crimson dust. The vampire’s fingers pulsed sickeningly as he fed, and the officers soon began to grow pale, their bodies shrinking in on themselves, as if the vampire was draining their life energy along with their blood. After several more seconds, it was over. The vampire withdrew his needle-fingers from the officers’ necks, leaving a pair of dried, empty husks to fall silently to the ground. Maggie watched the scene with horrified fascination, but she made no move to do anything.

The werewolf rose to his feet and licked blood from his muzzle. The vampire stepped to his side, and together they fixed their gazes on Maggie. Without pausing to consider whether she was about to commit suicide, Hope stepped between the two monsters and Maggie.

“You can’t have her,” she said, and gave the thought a push.

The werewolf and vampire exchanged glances, and then the vampire looked at her, shrugged, and said, “Sure, whatever you want.”

The Grinders’ crowd had not stood idly by as the monsters fought the four yellow-eyed police officers. A good portion of them fled toward the hallway that led deeper into the Delgado Building, pushing and shoving each other in their panic. Others tried to break the front window so they could climb out, but no matter how hard they pounded on it, the glass refused to so much as crack. Hope wondered if that moldy stuff was holding it together and reinforcing it.

She walked over to the werewolf and vampire, more than a little afraid of them. Too bad she didn’t have a crucifix or wolfsbane, some shit like that. The needles had retracted into the vampire’s fingers, and when she got a close-up look at him, she thought she recognized him. She’d seen him earlier that morning, sitting at a table here in Grinders when she and Dan had stopped in for their first cuppa of the day. Needless to say, he’d changed since then. Haven’t we all, she thought.

People had continued fleeing from Grinders and now, apart from one or two customers who had yet to make it out, only Salvador and Yvette remained, along with Hope, Maggie, and the Monster Twins. Yvette started to come out from behind the counter, but when she saw Salvador wasn’t going to follow, she went back, took his large hand in her smaller one, and he allowed her to lead him. When they reached the others, Salvador looked at Hope, tears glistening in his eyes.

“I am so sorry for your loss, my friend.”

Hope didn’t know what to say, so she settled for nodding. She stared at Dan’s face, thinking how she would never hear his voice again, never see him smile.

“Hope?” Maggie said softly.

Hope answered without looking at her. “What?”

“Can you tell me where he is? Please? I really need to find him. I have to—”

“Shoot yourself in the head,” Hope said, and pushed.

Maggie raised her Glock, pressed the barrel to the underside of her chin, and squeezed the trigger. The round exited out the top of her skull in an explosion of bone, brains, and blood. Her dead body toppled over backward and joined the corpses of her fellow officers on the floor.

“Good god!” Salvador said. “You…she….”

The vampire grinned. “That was fucking awesome!”

Still looking at her husband, Hope said, “Get out. All of you. Now.”

She pushed – hard.

Without anyone speaking another word, they ran – vampire and werewolf included – and seconds later Hope was alone. She fell to her knees next to Dan, clasped his left hand, ran her thumb back and forth across his wedding ring, and began to cry.

* * *

“Let me see if I’m understanding this correctly,” Soo said, addressing Arron. She leaned against the arm of the chair where Bethany sat, and both of them watched Arron closely. “You’re being pursued by a supernatural being called Night who can break off the fingers of her left hand, which then transform into panther-like cats that do her bidding. You can’t tell me where she comes from, why she wants you, or anything about who you are other than your name. Night has cast some kind of spell on the building, which you call Blight.” She nodded toward her office window which was now almost entirely covered with dark mold. “No one inside the building can leave, and anyone who enters is magically transformed into powerful servants of Night’s who seek to find you and force you to go outside because Night can’t come inside, not as long as the building remains civilized. As the Blight spreads, it will suffuse the building and begin to make it Wild. Once this process is complete, Night finally will be able to enter. You are also supernatural, but the only power you possess is the ability to mutate people – like Bethany and myself – so they can protect you from Night, her Harriers, and her Surrogates.”

“Yes,” Arron said.

“Okay then.” Soo let out a long breath and then fell silent.

“Do you believe him?” Bethany asked. She looked at Arron. “No offense.”

“We have some direct evidence for his claims,” Soo said. “You and I have definitely changed, as did Nate. You encountered one of the yellow-eyed Surrogates.” She pointed to the window. “And we can see the effect of the Blight.”

“True. It’s all just….”

“Too bizarre? It’s always discomfiting to discover that reality isn’t what we thought it was.” She turned to Arron. “Have you examined the morality of your actions?”

He frowned. “I do not understand what you mean.”

“You were being pursued by Night, and you chose to seek sanctuary in this building. In doing so, you put everyone here at risk. We already know of one death – the Surrogate that Nate killed – and there may well be more that we’re unaware of. You’ve also caused some of us to mutate into beings with special abilities so that we might protect you. You didn’t ask our permission. You forced the change upon us.”

Arron looked at Soo blankly, and Bethany could see he was having trouble processing her words.

“Let me put this in simpler terms,” Soo said. “You’re a selfish prick, Arron.”

He jerked in his chair as if she’d slapped him. She went on.

“I’m not saying you should’ve allowed yourself to be captured by Night, but if you had – or at least if you’d chosen a different hiding place – Bethany and I, along with everyone else who works in this building, would be experiencing a normal Monday, and we wouldn’t have found ourselves turned into monsters so that we can fight monsters – all to protect you. What makes you so fucking special that your life matters more than ours?”

Bethany knew that Soo was right. How would Elissa react when she saw the gray-hided monstrosity that she’d become? Would she be forced to live out her days as a freak, assuming she survived the struggle between Night and Arron? Up until this point, she’d felt only sympathy for Arron, but now she was angry at what he’d done to her, what he’d done to Nate, and to who knew how many others in the building.

“I do not choose who changes or the manner of their change,” Arron said stiffly. “It simply…happens.”

“But you know it happens,” Soo said.

“And you chose to come into my office,” Bethany said. “Why?”

Arron looked at her. “I saw you by the elevator earlier. You seemed kind. I…needed someone kind.”

“Needed to use me, you mean.” Bethany looked at Soo, anger blazing inside her. “We should call the police and have this bastard arrested.”

“That would be a bad idea,” Soo said. “If what Arron has told us is true, the instant any officers set foot inside the building, they’d become Surrogates. And I don’t think it’s a good idea to have servants of Night’s roaming around the building carrying guns.”

Bethany thought of the yellow-eyed man who Nate had fought and killed. If the lunatic had been armed….

“We have to do something,” Bethany said. “Nate’s still out there somewhere, and he’s more animal than human now. He could kill someone innocent.”

“Perhaps,” Soo said. “But it seems as if Arron’s protectors function like white blood cells attacking an infection. We’re programmed to go after Surrogates.”

“Yes,” Arron said. Then after a moment, he added, “Although this does not mean Nate won’t hurt anyone who gets in his way.”

The monumental absurdity of the situation hit Bethany then, and she let out a strained bark of laughter.

“This is crazy. I’m crazy. We’re all crazy!”

Soo opened her mouth to reply when the sound of police sirens came from off in the distance, faint at first, but quickly growing louder.

“It seems someone else has called 911,” Soo said.

Arron shifted in his chair. “This is not good.”

“No shit,” Bethany said.

The door to Soo’s outer office opened then and two women hurried inside. Soo stood and went to meet them, and Bethany and Arron followed. One woman was middle-aged and skeletally thin, while the other was younger – not yet thirty, Bethany judged – naked and covered with blood. Was it hers? She didn’t appear to be injured, with the exception of a puckered line of flesh that ran horizontally across her lower abdomen. Bethany didn’t know either woman, although she’d seen them both at Grinders before. The younger woman seemed dazed. Her face was expressionless, and she looked off to the side, as if she was unwilling or unable to meet anyone’s gaze.

The thin woman’s eyes widened when she took in Bethany’s appearance, but she made no comment on it.

“I’m Kellie,” she said, “and this is…. Actually, I don’t know her name. I’m sorry if we’re disturbing a session or anything, but I didn’t know where else to go. You’re a psychologist so you help people, right? We could use some help right now.”

Soo glanced sideways at Bethany then turned back to Kellie and smiled.

“A lot of people come to me for help. Can you tell me what—”

Soo was interrupted by the harsh pop-pop-pop of what sounded like gunshots – and they sounded close.

“I believe the police have arrived,” Soo said.

* * *

This was turning out to be the worst Monday ever.

Yvette ran down the hall alongside Salvador, surprised at how fast he was going. The old guy could really haul ass when he wanted. Then again, considering what had just happened in Grinders, he was probably so jacked up on adrenaline that he could set a new land speed record. Christ knew she was. Neither of them was as fast as Harvey and that hairy guy, though. Those fuckers were long gone, although she didn’t know where they’d gotten to. She assumed they were still in the building since no one could leave, and wasn’t that weird as hell?

She’d never seen anyone die before. Hell, she’d only ever seen a dead body once, and that was at her great-grandma’s funeral when she was twelve. Great-Grandma had been prepared by the mortician so that she looked almost like she was sleeping. But the cops who’d died in Grinders had been a bloody fucking mess. And it wasn’t just the gore that got to her – although that had been bad, really bad – it was the suddenness of it all. One second the cops had been alive, and the next, they were lumps of dead meat lying on the floor. Was life really so fragile? Could she die just as swiftly? The answer to both questions, she now knew, was yes, and it fucking sucked.

She had no idea where she and Salvador were going, and – come to think of it – no idea why they were running. Not that she’d wanted to stay at Grinders after what had happened, but it hadn’t occurred to her to start running until that woman, the one who owned the security business with her husband, had told them to get out. Yvette had experienced an overwhelming need to do exactly what the woman said, and so she had. She assumed Salvador had experienced the same compulsion. Now here they were, running down the hallway side by side, like a couple of terrified characters in a scary kids’ cartoon.

Her energy was swiftly deserting her, though, and she knew it had something to do with running so close to Salvador. Earlier that morning, she’d noticed that whenever she stood too close to him, she began to feel tired, and so she’d done her best to keep her distance from him while they were working. She didn’t know what had happened to him exactly, but she was certain it was connected to all the other weird shit that was going on in the building today.

Her legs began to feel heavy, and she started to fall behind.

“I need to rest,” she said.

She didn’t know if he heard her, and if he did, whether he would stop. She was only his employee after all. It wasn’t like they were friends or anything. But he slowed, stopped, then turned and walked back to her.

“Are you all right?” he said, clearly concerned. “What am I saying? Of course you aren’t, not after the things you’ve seen. You should sit down, try to calm yourself.”

Now that Salvador stood close to her, she felt even more weary, and she wished she hadn’t said anything to bring him back to her. If this got any worse, she’d probably pass out.

They were close to the MedTek office, and Salvador took her hand and started leading her there.

“We will go inside and rest a bit,” he said. “Maybe hide out there until all this madness blows over, if they let us. How does that sound?”

She wasn’t sure it was a good idea to go into MedTek. That’s where Harvey worked, and he’d become some kind of vampire. What if he’d gone back to his office and was waiting for them when they entered? Would he insert those gross finger-needles of his into their necks and drain all their blood, like he’d done to those two cops in Grinders? She was too overcome with lethargy to voice her concerns though. It was all she could do to keep putting one foot after another and follow Salvador. When they reached MedTek, he pushed the door open and ushered her inside.

At first Yvette thought the office was empty, but then she saw a pair of bodies lying on the floor – a man and a woman – both of them withered husks, like unwrapped mummies. It seemed Harvey had already fed here, maybe before he’d shown up at Grinders with his werewolf buddy. When Salvador saw the bodies, he said, “We should go.”

Yvette shook her head. “Not yet. Let me sit for a minute.”

She pulled her hand free from Salvador’s and walked slowly to a vinyl-covered couch beneath a rectangular window. The glass was cracked and completely covered by some kind of disgusting mold, and it had spread to the back of the couch. Normally, she would never have considered sitting on the damn thing, but she was too tired – and honestly, probably in too much shock after watching those cops die – to care. When she reached the couch, she sat and leaned back, grateful to be off her feet. She hoped Salvador would keep his distance. If he did, maybe the weariness she felt would begin to dissipate, and she would—

Cold stabbed into her back and swiftly spread throughout her body. All her muscles tensed as the sensation intensified to the point of being painful, and she thought she might scream, but then the cold passed as quickly as it had come, and she felt alert again, and strong. Stronger than she’d ever felt before.

“What’s wrong?” Salvador said. “Are you all right? Do you need a doctor?”

She stood and smiled at him. He must have seen something in her smile that disturbed him, for he took several steps back.

“Your eyes,” he said. “They…. They’re yellow.”

Yvette didn’t give a shit what color her eyes were. There was only one thing she cared about now.

She ran to Salvador, wrapped her right hand around his throat, and lifted him off his feet.

“Tell me where he is,” she said.

Salvador grabbed her wrist with both of his hands and tried to free himself, but she was too strong now.

“Who…?” he managed to choke out.

Yvette looked into his eyes and saw only confusion and fear. He had no idea where the man she needed to find was, and that made him useless to her. She gave her hand a sharp twist and Salvador’s neck snapped like an old, dry branch. She looked at him a moment longer. She felt nothing, no sadness at his death, no horror at what she’d done to a man who’d only ever been kind to her. She did like the way his eyes bulged from their sockets, though. It was funny.

She released her grip. His body fell to the floor, and the instant it hit, she forgot about him. She had more important matters on her mind than her dead former boss. She needed to find someone – that weird bearded guy who’d come into Grinders earlier that morning, the one who smelled funky.

She opened the door and stepped into the hallway to begin her search.

Chapter Twelve

Bullock, Illinois. Then.

Krista – unable to understand what was happening, let alone believe it – could only stand and watch as Erika, Casey, and her mother attacked. All three of them now had yellow eyes, like the dead man lying on the floor of her salon, their features twisted into cruel, bloodthirsty masks.

They’ve turned into monsters, she thought, glancing at her scissor-hands. Just like me.

Casey rushed toward the boy with the bird-claw hands, Erika went for the cop, and Krista’s mom came at her. The older guy, the one holding the police baton, stepped in front of the bearded man, as if to protect him. That was all Krista saw before her mother slammed into her, knocking them both to the floor. The impact forced the breath from Krista’s lungs, and she could only lie there, stunned, as Victoria bared her teeth in a snarl, her nose only inches away from her daughter’s. Krista’s first thought was that her mother was going to bite her nose off, but then Victoria coughed and blood sprayed from her mouth to splatter Krista’s face. Krista wanted to scream, but she couldn’t draw in a deep enough breath to do more than make a soft eep sound. Had her mother been injured when they hit the floor? That didn’t make sense, though. Victoria was in good health for her age, and she’d landed on Krista. If anything, Krista should have been the one to—

Her hands. She had raised her hands as her mother attacked. Her scissor-hands.

Oh god.

Victoria coughed again, this time ejecting even more blood. Krista closed her eyes as the thick hot liquid hit her, but she’d failed to close her mouth, and some of the blood hit her lips, her teeth, her tongue…. She found her scream then and it ripped out of her, high-pitched and shrill.

She saw the light of consciousness fading in her mother’s eyes as she tried to speak. Krista thought that the wounds she’d sustained might shock her back to herself, imagined her saying, Oh honey, I’m so sorry. I love you.

“Fuck…you.” A wheeze escaped Victoria’s lungs, and then she fell limp, becoming nothing more than dead weight on top of her daughter.

“No,” Krista said, then louder, “No!”

She tried to pull her finger-scissors free from her mother’s body, but the blades were too deeply embedded. Worried how the others were doing, and wanting to look at anything other than her mother’s dead face, she turned her head to see. Casey had her hands around the boy’s throat, and he was trying to shove her off him with his claw-hands. She wondered why he wasn’t ripping the shit out of her, as he’d done to the yellow-eyed man who’d burst into the salon.

He doesn’t want to hurt her, she thought, but as fond as she was of Casey, she feared that if the boy didn’t start getting mean and fast, he’d die. Casey was a slender girl with thin arms, but she was choking the ever-loving shit out of the boy, and despite his efforts, he wasn’t able to break her grip. Whatever change had made her, Erika, and Victoria violent had also made them stronger than normal, Krista realized. If she hadn’t accidentally stabbed her mother, she might be dead now.

The cop no longer held on to her gun, and she cradled her hand to her chest. It hung limply, and Krista guessed that Erika had likely struck the woman’s wrist to disarm her and broken it. Not that the weapon would’ve done the officer much good now. Flaps of smooth skin had grown over her eyes, and Krista remembered what the woman had said when she’d shot the yellow-eyed man in the throat instead of the head, where she’d been aiming. I can’t see shit. Well, she really couldn’t see now.

Erika, most likely viewing the cop as no longer a threat, had moved past her in order to get at the bearded man. The older guy stood in front of him, police baton gripped tight in his right hand, and when Erika came at him, he swung the weapon hard at the side of her head. The baton connected with a loud crack, and Erika veered to the side, staggered by the blow. Krista thought she might go down, but she swiftly regained her balance, spun around, and with a backhanded strike knocked the baton out of the older guy’s hand. The weapon flew through the air, struck the decayed wall, penetrated the soft surface, and lodged there.

Erika lunged toward the bearded man, but before she could reach him, the older guy stretched out his left hand and caught hold of her wrist. Crimson lesions erupted all over her body. She spasmed once, stiffened, then collapsed. The man released his grip as she fell to the floor and lay there, dead.

Casey continued to choke the boy with the bird-claw hands. She was too strong for him to push her away and, with tears in his eyes, he raised his hands, plunged the tips of his claws into her throat, and swiped his arms out to the sides. Blood exploded from the gaping wound he created, and Casey’s head – almost severed from her body – lolled backward. Her grip on his throat slackened, and her fingers slid away from his flesh as her body fell to the floor. The boy drew in great gasps of air as he looked at her, tears streaming down his face.

Through all of this, the bearded man hadn’t done a thing except watch. He’d looked frightened, sure, but he hadn’t so much as lifted a finger to defend himself or help the others. Maybe he’d been too scared. Or maybe he was simply a coward. She remembered something he’d said earlier.

The Blight won’t affect any of you. Night’s power can’t claim you, not when I already have.

He’d done this to them, had changed them so they could fight for him. The fucking manipulative bastard!

The now-blind police officer had stood unmoving during the fight. The older guy went to her, leaned forward, examined her face.

“Your eyes,” he said.

“I know.” She sounded like she was scared but trying not to let it get to her. Krista wished she had the woman’s strength. She sure as hell could use it right now.

“The fight’s over,” the older guy said. “We won.”

The cop nodded. “I heard. Can you get my gun for me?”

“Sure.”

As the man started to do so, the officer went over to the crying boy. She moved confidently, as if she didn’t need eyes to guide her. She took the boy in her arms and held him close. Once in her embrace, he began sobbing loudly.

As the older guy bent over and reached for the gun, he looked at Krista, his expression surprised, as if he’d forgotten about her. He left the gun where it lay and rushed over to her.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“I think so.”

He bent down and reached for her mother’s body, but he hesitated before touching her. He took a moment, as if to build up his courage, then he rolled Victoria off of her. He had to shove hard to pull the body free of Krista’s knife-fingers, but he managed. Victoria flopped onto her back, her abdomen covered with blood, eyes sightless and staring.

The older guy offered his hand to help Krista up, but when he saw her fingers, he thought better of it. He stood and watched as she got to her feet. She had to press the tips of her blood-slick knife-fingers against the tile in order to accomplish the maneuver, but she succeeded. Her mother’s blood soaked her copper-colored blouse and stippled her face. She regarded Victoria’s body, emotions numb, unable to believe that her mother was gone. She turned to the older guy.

“She’s my mom.”

“How awful. I’m so sorry.”

She accepted his sympathy with a nod. He then retrieved the gun and handed it to the officer. She broke away from the crying boy, who seemed to have gotten some measure of control over himself, and took the weapon. She engaged the safety, slid the gun into its holster, then turned her eyeless face toward Krista, as if she knew exactly where she was even if she couldn’t see her.

“The Harriers are coming,” the woman said. “I can hear their paws slapping asphalt as they run. We need to get out of here – fast. Do you have a car?”

She didn’t ask what Harriers were. She could tell from the woman’s tone that they were bad, and she did not want to be here when they arrived.

“It’s parked behind the building,” Krista said. She held up her hands. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to drive with these, though. The keys are in my purse.” She pointed one sharp metallic index finger toward the counter where her purse lay.

“I’ll get them,” the boy said. He wiped the last tears from his face before walking over to the counter and picking up Krista’s purse. He removed the keys, then brought the purse to her. She reached for it automatically, then withdrew her hand when she realized she might damage it if she touched it. The boy seemed to understand, and he slipped the purse’s strap over her shoulder.

“Lead the way,” the older guy said. He’d retrieved the police baton and once more gripped it in his hand.

Krista nodded and started hurrying toward Cut & Curl’s rear entrance. The older guy followed directly behind her, and the officer and the boy came after him, the boy holding on to the officer’s arm to guide her, not that it appeared she needed his help. Lastly came the bearded man, still conspicuously silent. The rear door was a wooden one with a knob, and the older guy had to step past her and open it. They then filed outside, one by one.

It was full dark by now, and the lone light on the back of the building had come on. It was dimmer than usual and didn’t do much to illuminate the small parking lot. Krista wondered what might be lurking in the shadows where the light didn’t reach, and she shuddered. She saw signs of the Blight the others had spoken of everywhere. The rear of the building was covered with mold, and the asphalt of the lot was gray and cracked. The air had a flat, lifeless feel to it, and the sole tree in the lot was now leafless, withered, and gnarled. There were four vehicles in the lot – Erika’s, Casey’s, Victoria’s, and Krista’s, and they all showed signs of wear. Their colors had been dulled, their windows streaked with mold. Krista’s was a black Chevy Suburban and she pointed it out to the others. The boy pressed the key controls to unlock the SUV, and everyone quickly piled in. Krista took the front passenger seat as it was her vehicle, and the older guy took the keys from the boy and got behind the wheel. Krista didn’t know if the Suburban would start, given its condition, but it did. The engine didn’t sound healthy, though – it coughed and sputtered – but it didn’t cut out, which was encouraging. As everyone else got in, the older guy squirted washer fluid on the windshield and activated the wipers to try to get the mold off. For a moment, all this did was smear the shit around, but eventually the windshield became clear. As this took place, the officer, the boy, and the bearded man got in the back, the cop sitting on the bearded man’s right, the boy on his left.

The officer introduced herself as Darla, and told Krista everyone else’s names. Krista told them hers, and then Jordan backed the Suburban out of its spot, put the vehicle in drive, and headed down the narrow driveway that led to the street. As he turned right, Krista saw the two banged-up cars sitting in the middle of the road, the result of the accident she’d heard take place earlier. She assumed one car had belonged to her new friends – if that word fit a group of strangers that barged into your place of business bringing death with them – and the other to the yellow-eyed man who’d pursued them into the salon. She felt guilty leaving the bodies of her mother, Erika, and Casey behind. It was like she was abandoning them, but if Darla had been right and these Harriers were coming, they needed to get out of here before—

A pair of shadows emerged from the darkness and streaked toward the Suburban. They slammed into the vehicle’s driver’s side with such force that the SUV was lifted up on two wheels, and for a sickening instant, Krista thought they were going to tip over. But then the tires came back down onto the asphalt and Jordan jammed the gas pedal to the floor. The Suburban swerved, but Jordan got control of the vehicle and it roared forward, past the pair of wrecked cars. Then two more dark forms moved swiftly in front of the Suburban, and in the vehicle’s headlight beams, Krista could see that the Harriers were large black cats, their eyes the same feral yellow as Victoria’s, Erika’s, and Casey’s had been.

“Hold on,” Jordan said.

He pointed the Suburban straight at the Harriers and didn’t let up on the gas. Krista thought the cats weren’t going to move – or worse, that they’d launch themselves into the air toward the vehicle’s windshield. But at the last moment, they darted to the side, and the Suburban proceeded undisturbed. Krista let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.

The Blight had overtaken the neighborhood, leaving houses mold-covered and in ill repair, trees sickly versions of their previous healthy selves, sidewalks broken and crumbling, the street – like Cut & Curl’s parking lot – turned gray, its surface shot through with cracks. It was as if the entire world had been transformed into a distorted version of itself, and they now found themselves inhabiting a living nightmare. Krista desperately wanted to believe that’s all this was, a bad dream that would vanish upon awakening, soon forgotten in the light of day. Her mother, Erika, and Casey would be alive, and she wouldn’t have fucking scissors for hands. But as much as she wished she could lie to herself, she’d never been prone to self-deception. This all felt too real to be a dream.

She began to cry then, only a few tears, her grief leaking out despite her intention to keep it under control. Without thinking, she reached up to brush away one of the tears and sliced a two-inch cut into her cheek. She drew in a hissing breath and pressed the back of her hand to the small wound to staunch the bleeding. From now on, she was going to have to be a lot more careful about what she touched and how.

From the back seat, Darla said, “We’ve got a new problem.”

Krista didn’t know what the woman meant at first, but then she saw that people were walking out of buildings on both sides of the street. This area of town contained numerous small businesses like Krista’s, and she assumed the people were a mix of employees and customers. When they reached the sidewalks, they stopped and watched the Suburban go by, but then as if an unspoken signal had been given, they rushed into the street, yellow eyes wide and gleaming.

“The Blight has touched them,” Arron said. “They are Night’s Surrogates now.”

Jordan swore as he struggled to avoid hitting any of the swarming people. Hands smacked the vehicle’s sides as the Surrogates desperately attempted to gain a handhold on the SUV, but no one succeeded – yet.

“What do we do?” Jordan said. “If enough of them get in front of us, we won’t be able to keep going. Even if I wanted to mow them down – which I definitely do not – they’ll eventually stop us by their sheer numbers.”

“Don’t stop,” Darla said. “If we can reach the end of the Blight, we can outrun them.”

“Now that we are inside the Blight, we cannot leave it. If we try to drive across the demarcation line, the vehicle will crash as if it has struck a stone barrier. The best we can hope to do is stay close to the leading edge of the Blight as it spreads,” Arron said.

They continued on. Jordan couldn’t avoid clipping a couple Surrogates who came too close to the SUV, but he managed not to hit any others. Soon they saw the lights of a police cruiser coming toward them, and Krista said, “Shit! I forgot I called 911.”

“Whoever’s in that car is going to be a Surrogate,” Lucius said.

“I know!” Jordan snapped. “What do you expect me to do about it?”

Krista thought the question was rhetorical, but Darla answered it anyway.

“Keep driving. Maybe they’ll be too intent on getting to the salon to pay attention to us.”

Krista held her breath as the cruiser shot by them. She expected the officer behind the wheel to slam on the brakes any second, spin the car around, and haul ass to pursue them. But when she looked at the rearview mirror, all she saw was the cruiser receding into the distance. It looked like they’d dodged a bullet.

Moments later, they reached the leading edge of the Blight. Everything was normal beyond what Arron had called the demarcation line – the streetlights shone brightly, the road was smooth and unbroken, and the buildings on either side of the street were free of mold. On their side, however, the Blight was in full effect. The buildings and road were mold-ridden and decaying, and the Suburban remained a barely functional piece of junk, its engine coughing and juddering so hard Krista wouldn’t have been surprised if it fell out any second. And I had only three more payments to make before it was all mine, she thought.

Jordan’s gaze kept flicking to the rearview mirror, but each time he checked, there were no police lights flashing in the glass.

“I don’t think this piece of shit is going to last much longer,” he said. He looked at Krista. “Sorry.”

“We need to find somewhere we can park,” Darla said.

“Somewhere safe,” Lucius added.

Arron spoke. “The more civilized an area is, the more difficulty the Blight has corrupting it.”

“Which means the spread of the Blight would be slowed there, right?” Darla asked.

“Yes,” Arron confirmed.

“What do you mean civilized?” Krista asked.

“A place which is not Wild,” Arron said, as if the answer was obvious.

“That clears things up,” she muttered. “Thanks very much.”

Arron tried again. “A place of artificial and overly complex order, where materials or even concepts taken from the natural world have been changed by the hands of humans, turned cold and lifeless.”

“Like machines?” Jordan said.

“Yes,” Arron said. “This is why this vehicle still operates, although poorly. The Blight cannot completely disable it.”

“So we need a place with machines in it,” Darla said, “complex ones to keep the Blight at bay.”

“To slow the Blight,” Arron corrected. “No force in this world save Night herself can stop it.”

“Okay,” Darla said, “to slow it. Anyone got any ideas?”

No one spoke for several moments, and then a possibility popped into Krista’s mind. She didn’t want to say anything, though. After all, she didn’t know these people, and it was because of them that her mother, Erika, and Casey were dead. She supposed Night was ultimately to blame, but Darla and the others could’ve sought refuge anywhere, but they’d chosen Cut & Curl. If they went to the place she’d thought of, they’d be endangering anyone present there. How could she drag anyone else into this fucking mess without their permission? And even if she could somehow get their permission, that still didn’t give her the right to put them in danger. But if she didn’t do something, these people riding in her SUV were as good as dead, and most likely she would be too.

“I know a place that might work,” Krista said.

* * *

When Lloyd Larson got the call that there’d been a traffic collision outside the Cut & Curl salon, he knew exactly where to go. His wife got her hair cut there once a month, although he suspected she went as much for the conversation as anything else. He was driving solo tonight – he usually rode with Glen Banks, but he was home sick with a nasty case of the flu – and without anyone to talk to, he’d been bored shitless. He was grateful to have something to do, even if it ended up being nothing more than a routine fender bender. He activated the cruiser’s lightbar, hit the siren, and pressed down on the gas.

He reached County Road 34A in five minutes, and was heading toward Cut & Curl when he was gripped by a sudden sensation of cold. It was so intense that he feared he was coming down with the same flu that had sidelined Glen, but then it passed as swiftly as it had come. That was weird. Maybe he should stop off at a pharmacy after his shift, lay in a supply of medicine in case he was getting sick. He hoped he wasn’t. He knew he became a big baby whenever he caught so much as a cold, let alone the flu, and his wife teased him about it the entire time he was recovering. That was just as bad as the illness itself. He….

Something wasn’t right.

The road ahead was a strange gray color, asphalt cracked and bumpy, streetlights flickering and dim. The trees lining the road were dead, twisted, leafless, the buildings old and on the verge of collapsing, roofs sunken in, exteriors covered with some kind of greenish-black gunk. What the fuck had happened here? Had there been some kind of accident, a chemical spill or something?

A pair of headlights came into view as a vehicle pulled onto the road a quarter mile in front of him. The vehicle swerved a couple times, and Lloyd wondered if the driver was drunk, high, or both. Whatever the driver’s condition, they were hauling ass, and a moment later, Lloyd watched the vehicle – a black SUV – flash past him. If he hadn’t already been responding to a call, he would’ve done a quick U-turn and gone after the sonofabitch, but he was….

Find him.

A woman’s voice, so clear it sounded as if she was sitting in the cruiser next to him. He turned to check out the passenger seat, found it empty, looked forward once more – and nearly shit himself when he saw a blond woman garbed in black standing in the middle of the road, a pair of what looked like black panthers on either side of her. He jammed his foot down on the brake, and the cruiser’s back end fishtailed, and then the vehicle came to a stop less than ten feet from the woman and her big cats. Lloyd sat there, hands clenching the steering wheel in a death grip, and stared at the woman. She and the cats all had the same yellow eyes, and he found them fascinating, almost hypnotic. Calm descended on him then, and with it came a steely determination. He had to find him, and he had to do it for her.

The woman gestured, and the four cats raced past Lloyd’s cruiser, their huge paws making no sound on the asphalt as they ran. The woman – his mistress –approached the cruiser, moving with slow, almost shuffling steps. She walked to the passenger side, opened the door, and got in. He knew what she wanted. The bearded man, the one who Lloyd could now see in his mind as clearly as if he was looking at him right now, although he’d never met him.

“Turn off the siren and lights,” the woman said in a tired voice.

Lloyd quickly complied. He saw her fingerless left hand and wondered why it was like that.

“I want you to follow the vehicle that passed you a moment ago, and I want you to drive at a normal rate of speed. Do you understand?”

“I can catch up to them easily, Mistress,” Lloyd said. He caught a glimpse of his face in the rearview mirror, saw that his eyes were now yellow like hers. He knew this marked him as one of her servants, and he felt a swell of pride. “You can have him in your hands within minutes.”

“I do not want to catch him. Not yet.” She leaned back and closed her eyes.

“Is something wrong, Mistress?”

“Creating a Blight large enough to encompass your town wearies me, especially as it spreads. But riding with you will give me an opportunity to rest and regain some measure of my strength. In the meantime, do as I say and follow Arron and his companions at a distance. They have just fought and killed several of your fellow Surrogates, and are thus still prepared for battle. I want to give them a chance to relax and let down their guard before I attempt to capture Arron again. None of his companions are experienced warriors, and they will only remain on alert for so long. When they least expect it, I will make my next move.”

Lloyd understood almost nothing of what his mistress said, but he was still impressed by her strategic thinking.

“You’re very smart.”

She opened her eyes and gave him a sideways look.

“Just drive,” she said, and closed her eyes once more.

Lloyd was happy to do as she commanded. It was, quite literally, all that he now lived for.

* * *

Darla was trying her best not to freak the fuck out.

She sat in the back seat of Krista’s SUV on Arron’s right. Although she couldn’t see him, she would’ve known his pungent body odor anywhere. She might’ve asked Jordan to lower the windows so they could air out the vehicle’s interior, but they couldn’t risk it, not with the Harriers out there somewhere and half the town turning into Surrogates determined to kill them. She’d just have to put up with the man’s stink until they reached their destination. Besides, right now she had a more important matter to worry about than Arron’s hygiene. She was blind.

She held her right hand against her chest. Her wrist hurt like a motherfucker, and she was fairly certain it was broken. She reached up with her left hand and gingerly touched a fleshy patch that covered the place where one of her eyes had been. She couldn’t feel the eye behind it, and when she tried to move that eye – look up, down, from side to side – she felt nothing. Her eyes weren’t merely covered up. They were gone. If they’d still been there, hidden beneath those flaps of skin, a simple operation would’ve allowed her to see again. She supposed she should be grateful for the skin coverings. At least she wouldn’t have to wear eyepatches.

She was angry at herself for stopping to help Arron in the first place. If she’d let Night have his ass, she would still be able to see and her friends wouldn’t have been transformed into monsters like her. And all the people who had died – Ernie, the man who’d rammed Jordan’s Prius in the street, the three women in the salon – would still be alive, not to mention how many more people might die before this was all over. She was angry at Arron too. It was clear he understood who and what Night was, and what she was capable of. He had to have known what would happen if he sought help, how others might end up paying with their lives to protect his. Yet he’d done it anyway. But he hadn’t been the only one to be so cavalier with other people’s lives, had he? She’d been the one to involve both Jordan and Lucius, and it had been her idea to seek shelter in Cut & Curl. Five people had died so far tonight – counting Ernie – and she was responsible for three of those deaths. When it came down to it, she wasn’t any different than Arron. Her need to survive and to help those in her charge do the same trumped her concern for anyone who might get caught in the crossfire. She was supposed to protect and serve, not protect some and serve herself. Maybe she’d deserved to lose her eyesight.

Her hearing had been boosted exponentially, as if to make up for her lack of vision, but this was as much a handicap as it was a superpower. She could hear everything – the rumbling of the SUV’s engine, the hissing of its tires on the road, the sounds of her companions’ bodies working, hearts beating, lungs breathing, digestive systems gurgling…. The din was maddening, an aural assault that she couldn’t shut out, not even if she pressed her hands to her ears. That only added the sound of her blood whooshing through her veins on top of everything else.

Jordan said something, but his voice reverberated in her ears like thunder, and she couldn’t understand what he was saying.

“What?”

She concentrated extra hard on his voice as he repeated himself, and this time she was able to make out his words.

“We’re here.”

She felt the Suburban slow and then Jordan turned into what she presumed was a parking lot. He drove a bit more then stopped and turned off the ignition.

“This is a really good idea, Krista,” Jordan said.

“Yes,” Arron said. “It should serve our needs well.”

Darla couldn’t see where they were, but she didn’t need to. She’d been here plenty of times and could easily picture it in her mind. Cinemagic was the only movie theater in Bullock, a small cinema that showed two second-run films at a time. If you wanted to see first-run films, you had to drive twenty minutes to Champaign. Darla and her husband were regular patrons – at least they had been before he’d run off with her bitch of a sister – and while the place was definitely no-frills and the films they showed were often scratched and grainy, Darla always enjoyed herself here. She tried to imagine what it looked like right now. A small one-story building, dark brown brick, flat roof, glass-door entrance beneath a marquee with the current movie offerings spelled out in red plastic letters on a white fluorescent background. It was dark, so the marquee would be lit up, as would the lights in the parking lot. It was a weekday, so there wouldn’t be many customers tonight, which meant there would likely only be a dozen vehicles in the lot, if that. Good. The fewer people they endangered by their presence, the better.

Then she remembered – the Blight.

“How does it look?” she asked.

“Not too bad,” Jordan said. “The Blight’s only partially affected it.”

“Do you really think this will work?” Lucius asked.

“Arron said we needed a place where humans have taken things from the natural world and made them into something…well, unnatural, I guess,” Krista said. “What could be more unnatural than movies? Made-up stories with actors pretending to be people they aren’t, with music and special effects. All you can do is watch and listen. You can’t smell, taste, or touch anything. You’re not involved in the action, and no matter what happens on the screen, you’re safe the entire time. The whole experience is about as far from reality as you can get.”

“Which is why it is perfect,” Arron said. “Night’s power is weakest in a place like this. And as you can see –” he paused, then continued “– as most of you can see, it’s even proven resistant to the Blight to some degree.”

“Does that mean we’re safe here?” Lucius asked.

“Nowhere in Bullock is safe as long as Night lives.”

“Are you saying we have to kill her?” Jordan asked. “That’s a damn tall order.”

“It will not be easy,” Arron admitted, “but it’s possible. Creating a Blight drains Night’s strength, especially when the Blight is large enough to cover an area the size of this town. And if we were to attack her in a place like this, a place of artificial reality that’s the antithesis of the Wild, she would be at an even greater disadvantage.”

Everyone was silent for several moments while they contemplated Arron’s words. Darla had never killed anyone before tonight. Hell, she’d never even fired her weapon in the line of duty. She’d shot the Surrogate who’d attacked them in Cut & Curl, but that had been more of a reflex than anything. Attempting to kill Night would be a premeditated act, and she wasn’t sure she was capable of that. She told herself that Night wasn’t human, that she was a monster or a demon or something, and if they didn’t kill her, more people would die – maybe a lot more. By killing Night, they’d be saving lives. Since the moment Arron had run in front of Darla and Ernie’s cruiser, everything had happened so fast. There had been no time to think, only react. And they still had no time. Night was coming, and they needed to prepare.

Jordan clapped his hands together – the sound loud as thunder to Darla – and rubbed them vigorously, as if trying to work up his energy for what was to come.

“Okay then. How do we kill this bitch?” he said.

“I think I know a way,” Arron said. “Although it will not be without some risk.”

“No shit,” Lucius said.

“From what you’ve told me, Night is responsible for the death of my mother,” Krista said. “I’ll take any risk to make her pay for that.”

“God help us,” Darla whispered, but whether this was a prayer, an expression of despair, or both, she couldn’t have said.

“Here is what we must do,” Arron began.

Chapter Thirteen

Collier, Ohio. Now.

Soo had a bathroom in her outer office, and she sent Sheri inside to clean herself off as best she could. When Sheri emerged, Soo gave her a pair of sweatpants to put on, along with a Healthy Minds t-shirt. She had a pair of sneakers too, but they were too small for Sheri’s feet.

“I change into these before I exercise,” Soo said. “I go for walks during my lunch hour or when I don’t have a client scheduled or one cancels. Physical activity is just as important to one’s mental health as therapy.”

Both the shirt and pants were a little tight on Sheri, but they fit well enough.

“Thanks,” the woman said. Her voice was flat, her face expressionless.

Soo caught Bethany’s eye and mouthed the word Trauma. While Sheri had changed, Kellie told them what had happened in the orthodontist’s office, and Bethany wasn’t surprised at Sheri’s emotional state. Given what had happened to all of them this morning, she figured they were all traumatized to one degree or another. Except maybe for Soo. She seemed to almost be reveling in the chaos, as if she’d been waiting all her life for a crisis to occur in which her expertise in psychology would prove valuable, and now it was finally here.

Arron hadn’t spoken since Kellie and Sheri’s arrival. He seemed lost in thought, and Bethany wondered if he was contemplating what Soo had told him, about how it was selfish of him to seek shelter in the Delgado Building when by doing so he brought danger to others – not to mention transforming them against their will.

Speaking of transformations….

Both Kellie and Sheri couldn’t stop sneaking glances at her, and she wondered what she looked like in their eyes. Probably something as monstrous as anything else they’d encountered this morning. Was this change permanent, or would it be reversed once Arron was gone, whether he left the building safely or Night captured or killed him? Or would she remain an elephant-hided freak forever? How would Elissa react when she saw what had happened to her? She’d be horrified and repulsed at first, of course. Who wouldn’t be? But once past the initial shock, would she stay or would she flee, unable to bear the sight of what her lover had become? Bethany wanted to believe that Elissa would keep loving her no matter what she looked like, but Elissa was only human. As much as she might want to stay and support Bethany, she might not be able to. Bethany wondered if she would be able to stay if their positions were reversed. As much as she liked to think she would, the truth was she didn’t know, and this shamed her.

Arron broke his silence then.

“The Blight is beginning to spread into the building,” he said. “We must prepare.”

Bethany thought of the moldy grime on the window of her office downstairs. The same gunk covered the window of Soo’s private office too. If Arron was right, it would begin seeping into the building, changing it into a place where Night could enter and walk freely. When that happened, they would be well and truly screwed.

Kellie looked at Arron then at Soo.

“I don’t understand.”

Soo smiled. “I’ll explain later, dear.” She turned to Arron. “What do you suggest we do?”

“We cannot leave the building as long as the Blight remains active,” he said. “Therefore, we must make our stand inside. We need a place where we have room to maneuver when Night and the Harriers come at us. The only such place I’ve seen in this building is the coffee shop. Do any of you know of a more suitable location?”

They did not.

“How are the five of us supposed to take on Night by ourselves?” Bethany asked. She didn’t know if any of the other women had been transformed as she’d been. If so, their changes weren’t obvious ones. But none of them appeared to possess the kind of power that would allow them to stand against a being like Night, at least not from the way Arron had described her.

Arron smiled.

“We won’t be by ourselves. I have friends outside who will help us.”

* * *

“What the fuck is that thing?”

Harvey and Nate were on the third floor. They’d been having fun chasing some of the customers that Hope had banished from Grinders. They hadn’t run across any more of the yellow-eyed bastards – which was too bad – but while the ordinary humans didn’t put up as good a fight, they were still fun to kill, and their blood was just as nourishing. But now they found themselves facing what looked like a gigantic wad of living phlegm, stretching from wall to wall and halfway to the ceiling, oozing its way down the hall toward them.

“Blob,” Nate growled.

That was as good a word for it as any, Harvey supposed. He brightened then as a thought occurred to him.

“Dracula and the Wolf Man vs. the Blob!” he said. “Awesome! Let’s do it!”

Nate bared his blood-slick fangs in a grin, and together two monsters ran toward the yellowish-white mound, Nate with claws raised, Harvey with finger-needles extended. The blob possessed no obvious eyes or ears with which to perceive them, but as they approached a half dozen rubbery tentacles extruded from its mucous-like surface, ready to meet their charge. Nate slashed at a tentacle as it whipped toward him, and his claws cut through the thing as if it was made of tapioca. The severed end fell to the floor with a wet plap and then slithered back to the main mass where it was reabsorbed. A pair of tentacles came for Harvey, but he intercepted them with his finger-needles. He started sucking, trying to drain blood from them, but he got nothing. Their substance was too thick to enter his needles, but even if it hadn’t been, Harvey wasn’t certain he would’ve gotten any blood out of the thing. It didn’t appear to possess a circulatory system.

Another tentacle lashed out and struck Harvey across the face, knocking him backward. He fell on his ass and sharp pain lanced up his spine.

Nate – whether because he saw Harvey get knocked down or just because he was spoiling for a fight – roared and leaped at the blob.

“No!” Harvey shouted, but his warning came too late.

Tentacles caught hold of Nate in midair, wrapping around his wrists and ankles. Nate struggled, but the blob was too strong, and he couldn’t free himself. A fifth tentacle streaked toward Nate’s mouth, plunged past his sharp teeth, and forced its way down his throat. Nate’s body stiffened and his eyes went wide, and then smaller tendrils exploded from his eyes, ears, and nose, along with a massive amount of blood. Nate’s body jerked and shuddered as if he was being electrocuted, and then he fell still.

“Jesus!”

Harvey fell forward onto his hands and knees and vomited. Reddish dust blasted from his mouth and chuffed against the hallway’s tiled floor.

The blob held Nate’s dead body suspended in the air for a moment, and then it flexed its tentacles and hurled the corpse at Harvey. Nate’s body struck him hard and sent him sliding down the hall away from the blob, thereby saving his life – or at least postponing his death a bit longer. The blob’s tentacles stretched toward him, but he was beyond their reach. The thing had made no noise the entire time they’d fought it, and it didn’t make any now, but Harvey could sense its anger and frustration at being denied its prey. The main mass started sliding down the hall toward him, and Harvey decided this would be an excellent time to make his exit.

He shoved Nate’s body off of him – getting an uncomfortably close view of his blood-smeared eyeless face in the process – rose to his feet, and hauled ass toward the stairwell at the end of the hall. The mass followed, tentacles whipping the air as they reached for him, and Harvey thought, Blob 1, Dracula and the Wolf Man 0.

* * *

Night sat with her back against an oak tree, her black shirt a too-thin layer between her skin and the rough bark. It was uncomfortable, but she didn’t adjust her position. She liked that it hurt. It helped distract her from the pain of her ravaged face, if only a little.

Her two surviving Harriers sat next to her, the one with the throat wound on its haunches, the sickly one lying with its head on its paws. Both watched her with concern. They had never seen her so weak before, and she almost wished that they would take advantage of the situation, attack her, and tear her throat out. It was what she deserved. But the beasts were too loyal for that, and they merely observed, waiting to see what their mistress would do next.

What Night was doing, besides resting, was listening and watching, alert to any sign that Arron’s friends might have pursued her into the woods to resume battle with her. Her ears rang as a result of the boy’s sonic attack – she thought they might be bleeding too – so they might be able to approach her without her knowing it until it was too late. She hoped they were too busy licking their own wounds to worry about her right now. They’d almost killed her five years ago in the cinema parking lot in Bullock, and they’d come close to finishing the job this morning. They’d managed to kill two of her beloved Harriers and had almost done her in as well. How? Even with the enhancements that Arron had given them, they were still only human. Then again, they were only human last time, and they’d come close to killing her then. She should’ve known not to underestimate them, but she had – again – and she’d almost died as a result.

She would heal swiftly enough, could already feel herself doing so, but she doubted she’d be able to regain her whole strength in time. Once she created a Blight, it would run its course regardless of her condition, so there was no danger of it ending early, but even so, a Blight – even one as localized as that which encompassed the Delgado Building – could only last a couple hours at most before it began to falter, and soon after that it would lose its power to contain anyone within its confines. People could enter or leave the affected area at will – including Arron. If she didn’t capture him here today, he would escape her again, and who knew how many more years it would be before she managed to locate him again? She couldn’t afford to rest much longer, not unless she wanted Arron to win, which she most definitely did not.

The King of the Wild did not look kindly upon those who failed.

So far, none of her Surrogates within the building had succeeded in catching Arron and bringing him to her, and she didn’t think it wise to wait any longer for them to do so. She had only one real option left. She would have to reabsorb the greater part of the Blight’s remaining energy to strengthen herself. She would leave the Blight immediately around and inside the Delgado Building untouched. She had to if she wished to be able to enter it and confront Arron at last.

She looked at her two surviving pets. Seema’s throat wound still bled, Nohemi’s body continued to be eaten by disease, and they were both sorrowed by the deaths of their siblings Kellum and Odis. She smiled and reached out to touch their heads.

“It’s been a hard day for us all, hasn’t it, my loves?”

She concentrated and sent a measure of her flagging energy reserves into her two pets. She couldn’t bear to see them hurting, and while she couldn’t spare the power to heal them completely, she would need them to be as strong as possible for the final confrontation with Arron. Seema’s throat sealed, although the skin remained tender and the wound would likely reopen during battle. The lesions on Nohemi’s skin receded, although they did not disappear entirely, and she regained some of her weight, although she remained far thinner than normal.

When Night was finished, she allowed her arms to drop to her sides. Seema and Nohemi purred their thanks and licked the backs of her hands to further show their appreciation. Night gave them a faint smile, then closed her eyes. The healing, incomplete though it was, had taken a great deal out of her. She would regain much of her strength when she reabsorbed the Blight’s energy, but for the moment she just wanted to sit here and rest. Seema and Nohemi curled up next to her, and the three of them drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Night woke to find herself standing in the midst of a fog-shrouded forest. The ground swayed beneath her feet – back and forth, back and forth – and she grabbed hold of a nearby tree to steady herself. The forest was silent, no birdsong, no rustling of small animals in the underbrush, the air still and stale. This place wasn’t dead, but it wasn’t exactly alive either. Muted threads of energy flashed in the sky above her. Lightning, she thought, almost completely hidden by the fog, silent, with no accompanying thunder.

How did she get here, wherever here was? She had no memory of traveling to this place. One moment she had been sitting in normal woods with her two surviving Harriers, back against an oak tree, and the next she was here, in a place of fog and constant earth tremors, alone.

A great booming voice rumbled across the vast empty sky.

You have failed.

It was his voice – the King of the Wild. Night knew where she was then, knew why the ground swayed. She was in the great forest on the King’s back, and what she perceived as earth tremors were the movements of the King as he made his endless trek through the realm of chaos. She fell to her knees, looked upward, saw only trees that disappeared into a thick ceiling of mist, the dim lightning flashes beyond them. She raised her hands to the sky and tried to keep her voice from sounding too obsequious as she spoke.

“My lord, it is true that I have experienced several…unanticipated setbacks. But my Blight still holds Arron trapped inside the Delgado Building, and my Surrogates roam its halls, searching for him. Soon, the Blight will have suffused the building, then my Harriers—”

The two that yet live, the King interrupted. Night decided it was best not to acknowledge these words and continued speaking.

“My Harriers and I will enter the building and Arron will be ours. He will be unable to flee as long as the Blight remains in place. He will not escape me this time.”

That is what you thought would happen in Bullock. You nearly died there. The damage you sustained that evening weakened you, and now – after the events of this morning – you are weaker still. You no longer have the power necessary to bring your quarry to ground.

“That’s not true! I—”

Do you know what happens to those of my servants who fail me?

She heard a skritching sound off to her left, but the fog was too thick for her to see what made it. Then she heard another skritching, off to her right, then more, in front of her, behind her…. She hadn’t noticed before, but now she saw that the trees were mottled with dark splotches, and the ground was dotted with hard white crusts. She saw movement within the fog, large silhouettes that she could barely make out. The air was filled with skritching sounds now, so loud they were almost deafening. One of the silhouettes came closer, and as it did so, its shape became clearer. It was a huge, rounded thing roughly the size and height of a horse, but instead of clip-clopping hooves, it made those skritching sounds as it moved. It emerged from the fog, and Night saw that it was a giant insect, a black-shelled beetle-like creature with large hooked mandibles and six multijointed legs. She got off her knees and fell into a defensive crouch, ready to fight if the insect should attack, but it seemed to have no awareness of her existence. It pulled the dark spots off the trees and chewed them up, did the same to the hard white patches on the ground. Other beetles came into view then, and Night could see they were tending to the same task: cleaning the forest of imperfections.

I am old, the King of the Wild said, unimaginably so, and my body requires far more grooming than it did in my youth. I depend upon my Attendants to keep me clean – and I am always in need of more.

Terrible pain gripped Night, and she doubled over, teeth gritted, eyes squeezed shut. She couldn’t maintain her balance on the swaying ground, and she fell onto her side and curled up, knees to her chest, and breathed in harsh, rapid pants as she fought to endure an agony greater than anything she’d ever experienced in her long life. She felt stabbing pains in her sides, and a pair of long, thin limbs burst through her flesh and shirt and extended outward. They flexed their various segments, as if testing them out. Her back grew hard and rounded, and her arms and legs became spindly and segmented, matching the new legs jutting from her side. Her head became tough and shiny as a helmet, and her teeth receded into her gums to be replaced by a pair of sharp curving mandibles. The rest of the transformation occurred swiftly, and when it was complete and Night’s clothes lay in tatters on the forest floor, she had joined the ranks of the King’s Attendants.

No longer sentient, she obeyed her simple instincts, peeling up patches of dry white soil, gnawing away the dark blotches on the trees, chewing them rapidly, swallowing them down, and searching for more. She did not enjoy this process, but neither did she hate it. She felt nothing, knew nothing. She did not even possess the sensory organs that would allow her to taste what she was eating. She ate because that’s what she was made to do, and she needed nothing more than this to motivate her. She did not have the slightest touch of awareness, but if she had, she might’ve thought herself the luckiest creature in the Omniverse, for few ever experienced the fulfillment of their life’s true purpose. But she did, and she would go on cleaning her master until the far-distant day when time itself died and the Gyre finally swallowed all existence and perhaps, in the end, even itself.

But deep down inside this new Attendant, a woman was screaming soundlessly and pleading with her master.

Give me until the Blight runs its course! Please! If I do not succeed in capturing Arron by then, I will return and willingly serve you for the rest of eternity.

Her lord replied. Willingly or not, it’s all the same to me.

Even so, the new Attendant experienced a jolt of agony, and it let out a high-pitched insectile screech as its body began to twist itself back into its original shape. The fog grew thicker, rolled in, and obscured the giant beetle’s vision, and when it receded, Night was returned to her normal form, and she was once more sitting with her back against a tree – one blessedly free of dark splotches – with Seema and Nohemi by her sides.

She heard the King of the Wild’s booming voice in her mind once more.

Until the Blight runs its course.

He fell silent then, and Night began trembling uncontrollably. Her Harriers sensed that something was wrong, and they laid their large heads on her body, one in her lap, one on her legs. She petted the tops of their heads, Seema’s with her whole hand, Nohemi’s with her fingerless one.

“Let’s go, girls. We have much to accomplish and little time remaining.”

The Harriers lifted their heads from Night’s body, and the three stood. Night began walking in the direction of the Delgado Building, her cats at her side, and as she walked, she planned.

* * *

Lucius couldn’t believe Krista was dead. For the last five years she’d been family to him, along with Darla and Jordan – his only family since they’d all sacrificed memories of their previous lives to obtain the mortuum blade. And now she was just so much dead meat lying in the grass. He was so angry he wanted to scream, but his throat was too damaged to produce sound right now, maybe so damaged that he would never be able to speak again. That meant he was going to have to go up against Night and the last two Harriers without his hawk cry. Good thing he still had his claws.

Darla sat cross-legged on the grass not far from where Krista lay, blood running from her ears. Lucius had thought of Krista as his substitute big sister and Darla as his substitute mom. He wasn’t sure what that made Jordan. Not his substitute dad. A substitute grouchy grandfather? Darla’s ears had been injured when Lucius had used his hawk cry against Night, and as super-sensitive as her hearing was, it was possible that she’d been rendered completely deaf. He’d tried calling her name several times, but each time he’d received no answer. He supposed she might be having trouble dealing with Krista’s loss and wasn’t ready to talk yet, but he feared the worst. If she was both blind and deaf now, how could she possibly help them against Night?

Jordan had been injured far more severely. His right hand had been torn off at the wrist, and he’d lost a lot of blood, or rather, the tar-like substance that flowed through his veins instead. He’d cupped the wounded stump with his left hand and now cradled it against his chest. His eyes were closed, but he didn’t look like he was in pain. He looked like he was concentrating. After several seconds of this, he removed his hand, and Lucius saw that the stump was now covered by a scab-like growth of purple-black flesh. Lucius understood at once what his grumpy substitute grandpa had done. Jordan had used his ability to create disease on himself, forming a large tumorous growth to seal his wound. When the process was finished, he was pale and sweating, cheeks hollow, the flesh around his eyes dark and swollen. Jordan had stopped the bleeding, but at what price? He was sick now, sick bad. Maybe too bad to fight. Maybe so bad, he was dying.

If so, then they needed to get their asses in gear. They’d come here to kill Night, and if all of them ended up dying in the process, that was okay, as long as they took the bitch with them.

Lucius walked over to Darla to check on her. He knelt and put a hand on her shoulder, startling her. She reached up and ran her fingers lightly across his bird-claw hand to identify him.

“Are you all right, Lucius?”

She spoke more loudly than normal, but her voice was clear and strong. In answer, he took her hand and placed it on his throat, then he put it on his cheek and shook his head.

“Is something wrong with your voice? Can you not speak?”

Still holding her hand to his cheek, he nodded.

“I’m not surprised you injured your throat. That was some scream you let out. Do me a favor – clap your hands next to one of my ears as hard as you can.”

His left arm was still nonfunctional, so he couldn’t clap. Instead, he curled the bird claws on his right hand and thumped his chest hard three times. The vibrations of the impacts caused his wounded shoulder to flare with pain, but he endured it.

She nodded. “I heard that – barely – so I’m not totally deaf. How are Jordan and Krista?”

He wasn’t sure how to respond to her question, but Jordan walked over then, swaying a bit unsteadily on his feet, knelt, and placed his mouth close to one of her ears.

“I’m okay,” he said loudly.

“Good. And Krista?”

Jordan didn’t say anything, but his silence answered Darla’s question.

“So it’s just the three of us now.”

Her tone was emotionless, but Lucius knew this wasn’t because she didn’t feel anything at Krista’s loss. She was fighting to keep her anguish under control.

“Night?” she asked.

“We killed another of her Harriers and injured her, but she got away,” Jordan said.

Darla thought for a moment before speaking again.

“We need to go inside the building and find Arron. Night will be able to enter soon, and we need to be at his side when she does.”

They had hoped to kill Night before the Blight could overtake the Delgado Building, but they’d known there was a good chance that they would end up having to fight her inside. Now that time had come.

Jordan helped Lucius remove his shirt and tie it around his shoulder as a makeshift bandage. The process was awkward, as they each only possessed one functional hand, but they got it done. They then inventoried their weaponry. Darla and Jordan still had their Glocks and KA-BAR knives, and of course Lucius still had his claws…well, his right ones anyway. Without his right hand, Jordan would be forced to fire with his left, which meant he could no longer wield the shotgun, so he decided to leave the weapon lying on the ground.

Now they only needed one last thing: the mortuum blade. Without it, they stood little chance of stopping Night.

Lucius and Jordan searched the grass and soon found the weapon. Lucius couldn’t hold it, so Jordan would have to be the one to use it.

“It’s cold,” Jordan said. “Damn cold.”

Instead of sliding the blade into one of his pockets, he held it for several seconds, turning it back and forth, examining its black stone surface. Then, as if having made a decision, he placed the blade in Darla’s hand. He then leaned close to her ear.

“You were the first of us. You should be the one to carry it.” Before she could protest, he added, “You can always give it back to me later if necessary.”

She thought for a moment, nodded, and put the blade in her pocket where she could more easily reach it. She then reached out and squeezed one of Lucius’s thick, scaled fingers.

“I’m going to need you to be my eyes and ears. Can you do that for me?”

Lucius put his other hand on her shoulder and squeezed once, indicating his assent.

“Good. Let’s go.”

The three of them started walking toward the Blighted parking lot, Lucius keeping hold of Darla’s left arm to guide her, Jordan moving with shuffling steps. Lucius hated leaving Krista to lie on the grass like discarded trash, but they didn’t have time to properly attend to her right now. Hopefully at least one of them would survive to do so later.

While they’d fought Night, the Blight had continued to spread, and now it reached all the way to the building’s back entrance. When they reached the rear door, they stopped, each alone with their thoughts as they contemplated what lay ahead.

No going back now, Lucius thought. But that had been true for the last five years, hadn’t it?

Jordan opened the door and they entered.

* * *

As Arron and the others exited the stairwell onto the ground floor, he was dismayed to see how far the Blight had already penetrated here. The walls and ceiling had splotches of mold on them, and their surfaces were fissured with cracks. The floor tiles were yellowed and warped, and they split apart beneath their feet as they walked. He had known the Blight would claim the first floor before the second and third, but he hadn’t expected it to occur this fast. Evidently, Night had healed more than he’d anticipated in the five years since their last encounter. He hoped this wouldn’t prove to be a fatal miscalculation on his part.

He could sense Surrogates elsewhere in the building, six of them, people who had entered the building after Night had created the Blight. There had been more, but as they’d searched offices for him, they’d encountered those who’d been transformed by his power, and they’d been killed – although often not without taking their attackers with them when they died. And some of the transformed had become crazed and violent, attacking and killing one another. Dozens of small-scale battles had occurred within the Delgado Building since Arron had first sought sanctuary here, resulting in numerous casualties that remained hidden behind closed doors. He was glad his protectors could not see these dead bodies, for doing so might cause them to lose their resolve and abandon him.

Bethany led the way to Grinders, and Arron thought how lucky he had been to encounter her. She was brave, clear-minded, adaptable, and functioned well in a crisis. She’d proven to be an excellent protector so far. Soo possessed formidable intelligence, but she possessed a strong streak of independence, and he did not fully trust her. He had not been in the presence of the other two women – Kellie and Sheri – long enough to have formed opinions about them. Kellie struck him as a nervous type, although she was holding up well given the circumstances, and as for Sheri…. She had been traumatized nearly to the point of catatonia, and while she had been transformed by his power – he knew this because otherwise she would’ve become a Surrogate by now given how much the Blight had infested the ground floor – he doubted she would be of much use in the fight to come. It would’ve been better to leave her in Soo’s office. She would’ve been safer there and less likely to get in their way when the battle began. He had not suggested this to Bethany, Soo, and Kellie, though. Doing so would’ve made him seem unsympathetic, and he needed to maintain their good will if he wanted them to continue protecting him.

He thought again of what Soo had said in her office, about how selfish he was to involve others in his conflict with Night. He was bound by ancient rules that these women could never understand, rendering him literally incapable of raising a hand against Night himself. In order to remain free, he needed others’ help, and like anything else that lived, he had a right to defend himself, didn’t he? He had always done so automatically, without hesitation beforehand or guilt afterward. But now…. Despite having caused the changes in these women, he wasn’t immune to their powers, and they would prove as much a danger to him as to Night if they turned on him. He wondered if Soo had used her new abilities to plants seeds of doubt in his mind, or if she had merely brought feelings to the surface that he had tried to deny for all the long years he’d lived. He felt unsettled, unsure, and he knew this was no way to go into battle. He couldn’t help it, though. He looked at his companions, Bethany especially, and wondered how many of them would live through what was soon to come. Some of them would surely die, maybe even all of them. But if he was lucky – very, very lucky – he would survive. And in the end, that was all that mattered.

Wasn’t it?

* * *

What the fuck are we doing? Bethany thought. Were they seriously heading to a coffee shop to prepare to fight a supernatural being capable of putting a spell on the building that turned people into yellow-eyed killers? Sure, Arron had given her and the others powers of their own, but that didn’t mean they’d be able to defeat Night and her servants. What they were doing was tantamount to a suicide mission. But what else could they do? Cower in their offices and wait for Night and her yellow-eyed bastards to find them?

We have another option….

Soo’s voice, whispering in her mind.

When she comes, we can give her what she wants.

Bethany glanced at Soo. The woman was looking straight ahead, but she had a sly smile on her face, as if she was concealing a secret. She didn’t want Arron to know that they were ‘talking’, Bethany realized. She faced forward as well.

She’ll kill him, she thought.

All that we know of Night’s motives is based on information Arron has given us. Are we to trust the word of a man who’s transformed us without consent and purposely put us in danger, all for his own benefit?

Bethany had to force herself not to glance at Arron. She had to admit, Soo had a point. Still, she was unwilling to sign Arron’s death warrant just yet.

We need him to change us back to normal when this is all over.

Assuming he will, Soo thought. Or if he’s even capable of doing so. I suggest we let events play out for the time being and see where they lead. But if it comes down to it, I’m going to choose our lives over his.

I understand, Bethany thought. And despite the fact she wished Arron no harm, she found she couldn’t disagree with Soo.

They continued on – Bethany feeling something like a traitor to Arron – and as they approached Grinders, she was surprised at how quiet it was. Normally, it was a busy, bustling place, but it sounded as if it was deserted now. If so, that would be ideal. They wouldn’t have to worry about putting anyone else in danger when the time came to confront Night. But as they entered the shop, Bethany saw it was far from empty. A blond-haired woman knelt next to the body of a hugely muscled man, blood pooled on the floor around his head. Four other bodies – two female, two male, all wearing police uniforms – lay on the floor close by, guns gripped in their unfeeling hands. One had been eviscerated, and the other two had become dry, shrunken husks. One of the woman cops was missing a sizeable chunk of her head, and it might have just been Bethany’s imagination, but she had the impression the woman had killed herself. The Blight had completely overtaken Grinders – mold covered the walls, window, and door, the floor was buckled, the tiles cracked, the counter looked on the verge of falling apart, and the lighting was dim. Mold-encrusted tables and chairs were overturned, and there was no sign of Salvador or Yvette behind the counter. Bethany had never been in Grinders without seeing one or both of them, and their absence made the shop seem even more bleak. One table remained upright and relatively mold-free, and a short stocky man sat at it, his clothes positively slathered with blood. Crimson stained the lower half of his face as well.

“Hey,” he said. “I guess you guys had nowhere else to go either.”

Bethany recognized him: Harvey Logue, a former client who’d come to her for financial advice. He sat with his hands on the table in front of him, and she saw that they too had blood on them. She felt a stab of fear – was he a Surrogate? – but a quick glance at his eyes showed he wasn’t.

“Do you know what happened here?” Soo asked.

“Kind of,” the man said. “I mean, I was here when all this –” he gestured toward the dead bodies “– went down, but as to why all the other weird shit is happening, I don’t have a clue.”

“Join the club,” Kellie said.

Bethany only paid partial attention to what the others were saying. Most of her attention was focused on the woman kneeling next to the dead man. She seemed to be oblivious to their presence, and her eyes were red and puffy, as if she’d been crying, although she wasn’t doing so now.

That man is her husband, Soo thought to Bethany. She watched him die. Let me show you.

Before Bethany could protest, Soo connected her to the woman’s – to Hope’s – memories, and she witnessed the four police officers enter Grinders, saw them transform into Surrogates, watched powerlessly as Hope and her husband Dan confronted the yellow-eyed officers, and a shoot-out took place. When it was over, all the officers as well as Dan were dead, and Hope used her own psychic power to force everyone to leave and allow her to grieve her husband’s death in private. She saw the man at the table – Harvey – also had been involved in the fight. It had been him who’d drained the life of the pair of mummies lying on the floor. And it had been his companion – Nate, of all people – who’d gutted the other cop. She was horrified to see what Nate had done to his victim, but she was glad to know he was still alive, or at least had been during the time of the attack. After the fighting was over, Hope remained with her husband’s corpse, unable to leave him.

The mind connection Soo had forged between Bethany and Hope ended, and Bethany found herself alone in her own mind again. What had happened felt wrong, even dirty. It was one thing that Soo spoke to her psychically. That was the equivalent of having a private text conversation with a friend when you were around other people. Sure, it felt weird to experience another presence in your mind, but it wasn’t that different from normal communication. But to be exposed to someone else’s memories without their consent…that was a violation, a mind-rape, and Bethany was horrified to have been part of it, however unwittingly.

“Don’t be such a drama queen,” Soo said. “If it makes you feel any better, I granted Hope access to our memories as well. Given the situation we’re in, I thought it was best if we all got up to speed as quickly as possible.”

Bethany understood the logic behind Soo’s actions, but that didn’t mean she condoned them.

“You can vent your anger at me later,” Soo said. “Assuming Night doesn’t kill us all.”

Hope rose to her feet. She walked to one of the dead cops – the woman missing the top part of her head – and took the gun from her hand. She held it at her side as she joined Bethany and the others.

“So the thing that started all this is coming here,” she said, “and you want to kill her.”

“Yes,” Bethany said.

Hope nodded. “I’m in.”

The coldness in the woman’s voice made Bethany shudder. Would she be so ready to exact vengeance if someone killed Elissa? Maybe. Or maybe she didn’t love Elissa as much as she thought she did.

Before anyone else could speak, three more people entered the coffee shop. Hope raised her gun and trained it on the newcomers, and Bethany automatically stepped in front of Arron to shield him. Did she do so of her own volition or because she was one of his protectors and had no choice? She supposed there was no way to know.

The three new arrivals looked like hammered shit. They were tired and spent, and Bethany was impressed that they were able to remain on their feet. The woman had no eyes, just smooth patches of skin that covered the sockets, and the young man’s hands resembled large bird claws. He was bare-chested, his shirt wrapped around his shoulder, blood leaking through the cloth. Another of Arron’s protectors? The older man was missing his right hand, and the stump terminated in a discolored mass of lumpy flesh. Lesions dotted his skin, and he was so feverish she could feel the waves of heat rolling off of him. The older man was armed, but he made no move to draw his weapon. Hope didn’t fire, but she kept her gun aimed at them.

“My friends!” Arron said. “It’s so good to see you!”

He pushed his way past Bethany and hurried to greet the newcomers, but when he reached them, he stopped, and in a soft voice said, “Krista?”

The older man shook his head.

“We took down two Harriers, though,” he said. “And—” He broke off and coughed several times, the sound wet and rattling. “And we managed to weaken Night.”

“That is good,” Arron said. He turned to face Bethany and the others.

“She will be coming soon. We must prepare.”

Up to now, Harvey had been silently watching the interplay happening around him, but now he spoke.

“It looks like the gang’s all here,” Harvey said, “but would someone please tell me what the fuck is happening?”

* * *

Yvette stepped out into the hallway, closing the office door of Hedges and Clevenger, Attorneys at Law behind her. She’d decided to start looking for the stinky bearded man on the third floor and work her way down. She knew he couldn’t leave the building – although she wasn’t sure how she knew this – so by conducting a methodical search, she was bound to locate him sooner or later. When she entered the lawyers’ office, she was confronted by a bent and twisted thing that possessed two heads, four arms, and four legs. The parts that formed this hideous conglomeration came from both a male and female – Hedges and Clevenger themselves, she presumed. The combined creature was naked, which only made sense since no clothing designed for a human shape could fit its distorted body. Apparently, it could not speak, for all that came out of its two mouths were inarticulate moans. She demanded to know where he was, but all the conglomeration did was moan louder and then attack her.

The creature had the strength of two humans, but Yvette was a Surrogate, and thus stronger and faster. The fight lasted only a few minutes before she snapped the conglomeration’s two necks and the thing slumped to the floor, dead. She searched the office suite thoroughly, just in case he was hiding here, but she found nothing.

She walked to the next office. The sign on the wall next to the door said this was Tigmon Advertising. Yvette had no idea who or what a Tigmon was, but she intended to find out. She put her hand on the doorknob, but before she could turn it, she heard a voice whisper in her mind.

I am here. Come greet me.

Yvette removed her hand from the knob and began running. She ran to the stairwell at the end of the hall and rushed down the stairs, taking them two or three at a time. She burst out onto the first floor, ran down this hall, turned left at the elevator, and stopped when she reached the building’s rear entrance. Her heart was pounding a mile a minute, and she was so excited she could barely contain herself, though she had only the vaguest notion of why. All she knew was the mistress was coming and it was vital she be present to greet her.

Yvette reached the door first, but she wasn’t the last person to arrive. Five other yellow-eyed men and women came running, and they all crowded together as they peered through the glass door to see who was approaching. The parking lot looked different now. The asphalt was gray and cracked, the vehicles were rusted, windows streaked with grime, tires flat, their rubber decaying. Across the lot strode a regal-looking woman in black, blond hair flowing behind her in the wind, a large black cat on either side of her. Their eyes gleamed a wild, savage yellow, the same color that burned in the eyes of the Surrogates. As the mistress came, the parking lot behind her was restored, the asphalt becoming flat and black once more, the vehicles returning to their previous rust-free state, tires re-forming. With each step, she seemed to gain more strength, and by the time she reached the back entrance, she virtually crackled with energy.

Yvette hurried to open the door for her mistress.

“Thank you, my child,” the mistress said, giving Yvette a small smile that made her heart soar.

The mistress and her cats stepped inside the building, and once they did, the entire parking lot returned to normal. Yvette knew she had witnessed something miraculous occur, although she didn’t understand the nature of it. She stepped back inside and stood behind the mistress and her pets as she addressed the Surrogates.

“The time is at hand,” she said. “Will you follow me into battle?”

As one, the Surrogates raised their fists and cheered, and no one cheered louder or with more enthusiasm than Yvette.

Chapter Fourteen

Bullock, Illinois. Then.

“Slow down.”

Lloyd eased his foot off the gas, as his mistress commanded. They were approaching Cinemagic, and he saw his mistress’s four pets standing at the edge of the movie theater’s parking lot. The cats turned to look at the cruiser as Lloyd drew near them, as if to say, What took you so long?

The street and buildings here had been affected by what his mistress had called the Blight, as had the cruiser. The longer they’d driven, the rougher the vehicle’s engine had run, and the interior had become old and musty, the windshield grimy, the glass spiderwebbed with cracks. Lloyd didn’t know how much more the cruiser could take before it finally gave up the ghost. But Cinemagic appeared to have resisted the worst effects of the Blight. The lights in the parking lot were dim, the marquee was missing several letters, and the few vehicles in the lot had patches of mold on their bodies, as did the building itself. But these patches were small and spread apart, and if Lloyd hadn’t known about the Blight, he might not have noticed them at all. One vehicle looked much worse than the others – a black SUV. Its tires had decayed to the point where the vehicle rested on its rims, its body was covered with mold, and a majority of its window glass had broken and fallen away, leaving the interior of the SUV exposed to the night air. It looked so different from the SUV his mistress had commanded him to follow that he might’ve thought it a completely different vehicle, except for one thing. He could sense his presence here.

“Pull over next to my Harriers and park,” Night said.

Lloyd obeyed. He pulled the cruiser off to the side of the road. He hit the hazard lights, although they hadn’t seen any traffic since Night had first gotten into his vehicle. He wasn’t sure why. Were drivers instinctively avoiding the Blight, veering off or turning around rather than entering it? Or had they become servants as he had and parked their vehicles, awaiting a direct order from their mistress? The specific reason didn’t matter, though. No traffic meant less chance of interference in his mistress’s plans – whatever they were.

As soon as the cruiser came to a stop, his mistress got out. Lloyd followed, and a moment later he was standing next to her and her big cats as she surveyed Cinemagic’s parking lot.

“He’s here, isn’t he?” Lloyd asked.

“Yes, along with his protectors.”

Lloyd drew his Glock. “I’ll go get him.”

He started forward, but Night clamped a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

“Wait. I need a moment to think.”

Lloyd remained where he was. He scanned the parking lot, searching for any sign of his mistress’s quarry or his companions – his protectors – but he saw nothing. There was one strange thing. The air in the lot rippled, like the distortion caused by intense waves of heat, although it was a cool September evening.

“You see it,” Night said.

“I do. What is it, Mistress?”

“I’m not certain. Clearly this place is resistant to my Blight, but I don’t know why. What is Cinemagic?”

“It’s a movie theater,” Lloyd said. When Night made no comment, he went on. “It’s a place where stories are projected on screens for people to watch.”

Night considered this for a moment. “These stories…are they true?”

“They can be, but most of the time they’re made up. People write them and other people act them out, all for the audience’s entertainment. My wife and I are big movie fans. We come here every week. We bring the kids if it’s a family-friendly film.”

Thinking about his wife and children made Lloyd feel uncomfortable. His allegiance was to Night and no others, and yet, he experienced a nearly overwhelming need to go to them now. He suddenly felt that what he was doing here was wrong, and more than that, it was dangerous. He wanted the comfort of holding his wife in his arms, of hugging his son and daughter. He wanted everything to be normal again, to make sense, to be safe.

Night tapped him on the cheek to get his attention.

“Stay with me, Lloyd.”

His family faded from his mind, and a second later he couldn’t recall their names and faces, couldn’t even remember that he’d ever had a family. There was only his mistress and the overwhelming desire to do whatever was necessary to serve her.

“Clever,” Night said.

Lloyd waited on her to elucidate.

“This is a place of illusion. In the Wild, there is nothing that is unreal – things either are or they aren’t. But humans are geniuses when it comes to deception, especially when they are deceiving themselves. That makes places like Cinemagic ultimate expressions of civilization: a veneer of falsehood overlying emptiness. Even the Blight can only affect it to a degree. My power will be limited here, assuming I can even enter at all.”

She looked to one of her Harriers and gestured for it to enter the parking lot. The cat looked dubious, but it did as its mistress wished. It padded forward, onto the sidewalk in front of the theater then into the lot itself. The instant one of its paws came in contact with the asphalt, the cat hissed, as if it was in pain. It did not retreat, however, but kept on walking, moving slowly, as if every step was an effort. Although it didn’t look easy, it appeared the Harrier was able to function in Cinemagic’s semicivilized environment.

“That answers that question,” Night said. “If my Harrier can enter, so can I.”

“Could it be a trap, Mistress?” Lloyd asked.

“Of course it’s a trap.” She smiled. “That’s what makes it fun.”

She started walking toward the lot, Lloyd and her remaining three Harriers accompanying her. When Lloyd set foot on the asphalt, he expected to experience pain, as had the first Harrier to enter, but he felt nothing.

Night must’ve sensed his surprise, for she said, “My Surrogates can operate in civilized spaces. It’s why I create you. Now stay alert.”

Lloyd focused on his surroundings and dismissed all other matters from his mind. He was a cop entering a dangerous situation, and he let his training take over. He brought his Glock into firing position and swept his gaze back and forth as they proceeded, knowing that an attack could come from anywhere at any time. Nothing happened immediately, though, and they were halfway to the theater’s entrance when a gunshot broke the silence. Lloyd looked around, trying to determine where the shot had come from. Off to their right, he thought, although he wasn’t certain.

“Get behind a car,” he told Night. “You need to protect yourself.”

“Don’t be absurd.” She gestured and two of her Harriers headed off in the direction where Lloyd believed the shooter was located. They trotted rather than ran, gaits unsteady, and he knew it was because they were having difficulty moving in this half-Wild, half-civilized environment. Would their senses be dulled as well? He thought they might, in which case….

The Harriers trotted past a red pickup, and as they did, a man rose from the bed and jumped toward them. He was an older guy, in his sixties, maybe, and he didn’t look particularly threatening. But when he landed on top of the Harriers, he slapped his hands to the beasts’ sides, and they began writhing, as if in the throes of agony. In the dim illumination of the parking lot lights, Lloyd saw raw-looking lesions break out across the Harriers’ bodies, and they began rapidly losing weight, disease-ravaged skin drawing tight to their skeletons. They shrugged off the man, and turned toward him, teeth bared, intending to make him pay for what he’d done to them. The man rose to his feet, but he made no effort to run, only stood there and watched as the Harriers advanced.

Two more people came running around from the other side of the pickup – a woman with magenta hair and a teenager in a Bullock High jacket. Both of them had hands that looked more like weapons, the boy’s claws, the woman’s scissors, and they attacked the Harriers from behind, stabbing and slashing. The animals screamed, and blood flowed copiously as their assailants hacked away at them. In other circumstances, the big cats might’ve spun around and fought their attackers, but being so near Cinemagic had dulled their reflexes, and they were further weakened by the disease the older man had infected them with. Because of this, they collapsed to the ground, and the woman and boy continued their assault, and blood ran freely from the cats’ numerous wounds. The older man wasn’t finished with his part in the attack, though. Once the Harriers were down, he stepped forward and placed his hands on their heads. More lesions bloomed on their bodies, swelling and joining with others until the Harriers became masses of tumorous growths that possessed only a rudimentary resemblance to feline forms. The Harriers’ screams dwindled to moans, and Lloyd knew the cats were dying.

“Go!” Night shouted, and the remaining two Harriers leaped forward and ran toward their siblings, moving as best they could across Cinemagic’s parking lot. As they passed a blue Honda CR-V, a woman in a police uniform stood up and began firing on them, shooting round after round. Lloyd recognized her. Darla Fisher. Wasn’t she supposed to be riding with Ernie Raynor tonight? If she was here, where the hell was Ernie? There was something strange about her firing stance. She held her Glock in her right hand, bracing it with her left, but her head was lowered to her chin, making it impossible for her to see what she was shooting at. She hit her targets dead-on, though, and the Harriers cried out in agony as bullets tore into their flesh. She grimaced with each shot, as if firing the gun hurt her hands.

“Kill her!” Night shrieked, and Lloyd knew it was his turn to go into action.

He started running toward Darla. She was a good cop and he’d always liked her, but she was harming his mistress’s servants. He didn’t know what had happened to make her do such an evil thing – maybe she’d gone crazy or something – but the reason didn’t matter. He had to stop her, and the only way to do that was to kill her. It was what his mistress demanded.

Darla continued firing on the Harriers as Lloyd ran, and the cats staggered under the onslaught, blood pouring from numerous wounds. Lloyd had been counting Darla’s shots, but the way she was going, her clip would be empty soon. He didn’t know if she had a reload on her, but he had to assume she did. All the more reason to take her out fast.

There was a minivan parked between Lloyd and Darla, and as he approached it, a bearded man stepped out from in front of it and blocked his path. He held a tire iron in his right hand and he was smiling. Lloyd’s first impulse was to shoot the motherfucker, but then he realized who he was looking at: it was him, the one his mistress had been searching for. He was almost overcome with exaltation. He would be the one to bring this man to Night, and that would make him the most beloved of all her servants.

He stopped six feet away from the man and pointed his gun at his chest.

“You need to put the tire iron down and come with me.”

Having a gun trained on him didn’t seem to bother the man in the slightest. His smile didn’t falter, and he appeared completely calm.

“You won’t hurt me,” he said. “You can’t. Night wants me alive, and because of that, you are literally incapable of causing me harm, just as I am incapable of attacking Night directly. But do you know what I am capable of?”

He started walking toward Lloyd. Lloyd tried to squeeze his Glock’s trigger so he could put a bullet into this smug fucker’s chest, but his finger refused to obey him. The man stopped when he stood directly in front of Lloyd.

“I can attack her Surrogates.”

He swung the tire iron at Lloyd’s head. Lloyd tried to block the strike, but he was too slow, and the metal rod collided with his skull with a dull thud accompanied by the crack of breaking bone. White light exploded behind Lloyd’s eyes, and as he collapsed to the ground, he knew that he had failed his mistress, and because of this, he deserved to die. And after a couple more blows from the tire iron, he did.

* * *

Night couldn’t believe how fast the tide had turned against her. Within moments, all four of her Harriers had been seriously wounded and her Surrogate killed. If she didn’t act soon, the Harriers would die as well, and without them, her power would be greatly diminished. Losing even one of her pets was unbearable, but to lose all of them at once? It was unthinkable. But she hesitated to enter Cinemagic’s parking lot. She knew she could function inside that in-between place, but the question was how well? The Harriers had been slower than usual, less resistant to injury, and there was no reason to believe it would be any different for her. Arron and his protectors would’ve been no match for her normally, but here, now, in this place? Who was to say?

Perhaps she should consider summoning her Harriers back to her and retreating, allowing Arron to slip through her hands for the time being so that her pets had time to recover their strength. Although it might take years, she could track down Arron again, and the next time they faced each other, the circumstances might prove more favorable for her. She was tempted, but she knew she could not do it. The King of the Wild would deem her weak for walking away from a battle, regardless of her reasons for doing so, and weakness was the one thing he would not tolerate. He would destroy her and her Harriers before they could leave Bullock, which would by default make Arron the victor. And that, she could not bear.

She squared her shoulders, assumed her best haughty expression, then stepped into the parking lot. The instant her foot touched asphalt, she felt strength begin to drain out of her, but she was committed now, and she continued on.

Arron watched her approach, Lloyd’s dead body at his feet, tire iron still gripped in his hand.

* * *

It was a wonderful night to die, Arron thought. The air was cool, with just a bit of bite, and the stars above – far beyond the reach of the Blight – were bright and crisp. And there were so many of them…. He’d walked the face of this world for more years than he could count, and he never ceased to find the night sky mesmerizing. He liked the feel of the tire iron in his hand – the solidness, the weight of it. He liked the way the blood dripped from its other end, the soft plap-plap-plap the drops made as they fell to the ground. It was a good night to die, yes, but it was an even better night to kill.

He watched Night approach. She was doing her best to project confidence and strength, and to someone who didn’t know her well – like his new friends – she might’ve seemed most formidable. But he could detect the subtle indicators that spoke to her weakness. Jaw clenched tight, brow furrowed, right hand curled into a fist, stride overly deliberate, as if she had to concentrate to keep from stumbling. Most telling of all, the yellow light shining in her eyes was less intense than usual, and it flickered uncertainly, like a feeble candle flame buffeted by wind.

His smile stretched wider. Perfect.

He’d had no real plan when he’d rushed out of the cornfield into the path of Darla’s cruiser. He’d learned long ago that Night – who was, after all, the ultimate hunter – could anticipate any plan he might devise, so he allowed chance to plan for him, jumping blind into situations and allowing chaos to build and swirl around him. Chaos was the very essence of the Wild, and as the human expression went, the only way to fight fire was with fire. Now he was about to find out if the fire he had lit this night burned hot enough to defeat his old enemy.

He thought there was an even chance that Night would either go to the aid of her Harriers or directly confront him. To encourage her to make the choice he wanted, he stepped into her path, and to make himself appear even more enticing, he dropped the tire iron, fell to his knees, and bowed his head. It worked. Night came up to him, stopped, and regarded him for a moment. All was silent, save for the whimpers of the four wounded Harriers. Finally, she spoke.

“Do you truly expect me to believe you are surrendering to me? If so, you’re a bigger fool than I thought.”

He lifted his gaze to look at her. Even in her weakened state, she was magnificent.

“Could a fool have eluded you as long as I have?”

She smiled. “A lucky one, perhaps.”

“You and I both know that even in this place, where your power is limited and your Harriers are injured, the best I could ever hope to do was fight you to a draw. You are Night, the end that comes to all, and you cannot be defeated.”

Her frown deepened, but she didn’t respond. Arron continued.

“You see what I have accomplished here. I have demonstrated strength and ingenuity. I have acquired allies, given them abilities so they might fight for me, and I have chosen to confront you in a place where you cannot exercise your full power. I have done these things to prove I am worthy of your forgiveness, to demonstrate why you should call off your hunt and take me back.”

“I am impressed by the trap you set, it’s true, but you speak as if returning to my service is your choice. I take what I want. You have no choice.”

“I don’t want to be taken,” Arron said. “I want to be welcomed. Appreciated. Deemed worthy in your eyes.”

Arron’s gaze was locked on hers. It was vital he keep her attention focused on him. If she were to look away, even for an instant….

“Have I succeeded?” he asked, then paused a moment before adding, “Mistress?”

The left corner of Night’s mouth rose in a partial smile, and Arron knew then that he had her. She reached out and placed her right hand on his head, her touch gentle but firm.

“You have earned my respect, Arron, and I will gladly—”

Night didn’t manage to finish her thought. She was interrupted by a crack of gunfire, and a bullet slammed into the back of her skull. The impact sent her stumbling forward, and Arron dove to the side to get out of her way. Even in this in-between place, the shot wouldn’t prove fatal to Night, and she would begin healing immediately, but – he hoped – far more slowly than normal. She stumbled but did not fall, and Arron saw that the back of her head was a blood-sodden mess.

That’s when Lucius and Krista moved in.

While Arron had engaged Night in conversation, his protectors had left the Harriers – who were now too wounded to fight – and circled around behind her. Here in the Cinemagic parking lot, her senses were dulled, and she did not detect their movements. Darla, using her preternatural hearing, had honed in on Night and fired one of her last remaining bullets. Now that the great hunter was wounded, it was time to finish her off.

As they had with the two Harriers, Krista and Lucius began slicing into Night’s flesh, shredding her clothes and spilling copious amounts of blood. Arron had never seen her blood before, and he was a bit disappointed to learn that it looked no different than a human’s. She fell to her knees then, and Jordan came forward. Lucius and Krista were stabbing and clawing her from behind, so Jordan knelt in front of her and took her face in his hands. Lesions bloomed on her skin, small at first, but they swiftly began to swell in size. Her yellow eyes became rheumy, and her breathing became a liquid gurgle as her lungs filled with fluid.

Arron was elated. He wanted nothing more than to pick up the tire iron and bring it crashing down on her skull, but even now, wounded and sick as she was, he still could not raise a hand against her. All he could do was watch as she died, but that was more than enough.

Night coughed and a mixture of phlegm and blood sprayed from her mouth. Her right hand shook as she raised it, and Arron couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Was the mighty hunter signaling her surrender? Was she actually hoping they would show her mercy, break off the attack, and allow her to survive? This was delicious! He was tempted to do it too, if for no other reason than because the memory of her humiliating herself before him would burn in her soul for eternity.

He heard shouting then, coming from the direction of the theater. He turned to look and saw men and women running out of the building, a dozen or so, features twisted by rage and hate. Night had called Arron a fool before, and now he cursed himself for one as well. She hadn’t raised her hand to signal her submission. She’d been summoning Surrogates. Most came running straight for them, but several ran to their vehicles, got inside, and turned on their engines.

A chill settled in the base of Arron’s gut. He turned back to his protectors.

“Faster!” he urged. “You have to kill her before they can reach us!”

Darla, like him, had been watching the others attack Night. She could hardly fire on her now, not without risking hitting her companions. She ejected the nearly empty clip from her Glock, pulled another from a pocket of her uniform, and rammed it in. She racked the slide to chamber a round, then she turned toward the sound of the oncoming Surrogates, lowered her head, and listened. A moment later, she raised her gun and began firing.

These Surrogates, while devoted slaves to Night, did not possess the hardy constitution of those created within a full-fledged Blight, and a single hit from a bullet was enough to put them down. Darla got three right away, but as they fell, the rest spread out, making themselves more difficult targets. Four vehicles came toward them then, headlights on and engines roaring. Arron knew the drivers intended to run them down, their vehicles serving as shields against Darla’s gunfire.

Jordan, Krista, and Lucius stopped attacking Night and looked up to see what was happening.

“No!” Arron shrieked. “Don’t stop!”

The others paid him no mind. Their attention was now entirely centered on the vehicles racing toward them. Two of the vehicles screeched to a halt where the four Harriers lay, injured but not yet dead. Men and women jumped out of the cars and, working together, began loading the big cats into the vehicles, two per car. The remaining pair of vehicles – a Ford Explorer and a Mitsubishi Mirage – continued toward Arron and the others, and they showed no signs of stopping.

Jordan removed his hands from Night’s face, rose to his feet, and ran to Darla. He took her hand and led her toward a Jeep at a run, seeking shelter behind the vehicle, and Krista and Lucius swiftly followed. Arron remained where he was and faced the oncoming vehicles, rage and frustration burning inside him. So close…. He’d been so damn close!

The vehicles’ headlights blinded him, and he knew there was nothing more he could do. He turned and ran to join Darla and Jordan behind the Jeep. The Mirage’s driver veered off to follow Arron, but the Explorer’s driver came to a stop less than three feet from where Night knelt, covered in lesions, blood pouring from knife and claw wounds. A man stepped out – fifties, chubby, wearing glasses, a light jacket, jeans, and sneakers – and hurried to Night’s side. He gently helped her stand and get into the passenger seat of his vehicle. Once she was inside, he slammed the door, ran around to the driver’s side, got in, closed the door, and gunned the engine. He flew toward the street, the two vehicles carrying the Harriers falling in behind him, and seconds later they were on the road and racing away.

Night and her Harriers had escaped.

The Mirage hurtled toward the Jeep behind which Arron, Jordan, and Darla were hiding, and they managed to get out of the way just as the car slammed into the Jeep with a loud crash. Both vehicles slid a dozen feet before finally coming to a stop. The driver of the Mirage – a thirtysomething woman – got out of the car and started toward them, but her head must’ve collided with the windshield when she struck the Jeep, for blood was running down her face. She took two steps, wobbled, then fell to the ground, unconscious.

The other Surrogates, the ones on foot, had nearly reached them now, and Lucius stepped in front of them. “Cover your ears,” he warned, then braced himself and released a deafening bird cry. The Surrogates – Arron counted eight – grimaced and clapped their hands to their ears. They stopped running and shook their heads, as if by doing so they might somehow dislodge the pain. Lucius stopped then, and after a moment, the men and women slowly uncovered their ears, revealing thin lines of blood trickling down the sides of their faces. Instead of continuing their attack, they looked around, confused.

“What the fuck is going on?” one man asked.

A woman spoke. “I was watching the movie and then…and then I don’t remember after that.”

The parking lot seemed to go out of focus then, and when it became clear again, the lights burned at their normal strength, the lot’s asphalt was flat and black, and the vehicles and building were free of mold.

Arron lowered his hands from his ears, and Jordan and Darla did the same.

“The Blight is gone,” he said, “and the Surrogates have returned to normal.”

Before either Darla or Jordan could reply, one of the freed Surrogates shouted, “Oh my god! Call 911!” Whoever it was, Arron knew they’d discovered the ones Darla had shot, and the police and paramedics that responded would find the officer that Arron had killed as well. They needed to get out of here. With the withdrawal of the Blight, Krista’s SUV had returned to normal, so at least they had a ride.

“Come on,” Arron said. “We need to—”

He broke off as Darla stepped forward and pressed the muzzle of her Glock to his right temple.

“What we need is to talk,” she said.

Krista clicked her blood-slick scissor-fingers together. “That’s right.”

Jordan and Lucius took up positions behind Arron. He was surrounded.

“We may not have killed Night,” he said, trying not to sound as nervous as he felt. “But we injured her so severely that she will leave your town and take the Blight with her. She’ll need time to heal, and she will hole up somewhere she will be safe while the process completes itself. She suffered grievous harm tonight, and it’s possible she may be permanently weakened as a result. In the meantime, I will move on. I will not return to Bullock again, and neither will Night.”

“What about the people who died tonight?” Darla said. “Like my partner.”

“And my mother,” Krista said.

“The withdrawal of the Blight restores affected objects and land to their previous state, but sadly, those who died will remain dead.”

“What about us?” Jordan said. “Will we return to normal now?”

“Yeah,” Lucius said. “I’d rather not go through the rest of my life with bird claws for hands.”

Arron didn’t want to answer Jordan’s question, but he knew he had to.

“The transformations that occur to those around me happen only when I am in danger. It’s an automatic defense mechanism, and I have no control over it.”

Darla pressed the muzzle harder against his head. “Does that mean you can’t fix us?”

He wanted to lie, but he knew they wouldn’t believe him if he did.

“I cannot undo what has been done,” he admitted.

“So you’ve turned us into monsters,” Krista said, “and we’re going to stay this way forever.”

“Yes,” he said.

She extended her right finger blade and touched it to the soft underside of his chin.

“So why shouldn’t we kill you?” she said.

“Once Night gets better, she’s going to start chasing you again, right?” Lucius said to Arron. “The two of you will end up going to another town, and it’ll start all over again. You’ll run from her and turn other people into monsters to protect you, she’ll create a Blight and turn people into Surrogates.”

“And a lot of folks will die,” Jordan said.

“So if we take you out here,” Darla said, “we’ll save lives. Without you to hunt, Night has no reason to bother anyone, does she?”

Arron didn’t answer her question. He didn’t need to.

“You can’t kill me,” he said.

“Really? Watch us.” Darla tightened her finger on the trigger, but the Glock didn’t go off. She tried again, with the same result.

“Are you out of ammunition?” Jordan asked.

“That’s not it,” Darla said. “I can’t make my finger pull the trigger.”

“Then I’ll cut his throat,” Krista said. She moved her finger blade to the side of his neck and began to press. The skin dimpled, but it did not break.

“Fuck! I can’t do it either!”

“None of you can,” Arron said. “I made you the way you are, and just as I am unable to raise a hand against Night, you are unable to harm me.”

“Does that mean Night made you?” Lucius asked.

Arron smiled. “Not exactly.”

“Can we kill ourselves?” Jordan asked.

“If you wish, but that would be a terrible waste. Together, we nearly destroyed Night. Given the chance, I think we could actually do it. You would have to come with me, though, leave Bullock and the lives you’ve built here.”

The four of them exchanged glances as they considered his words. Arron had no idea which way they would decide, or if all of them would make the same decision. The uncertainty was most invigorating.

“Listen,” Darla said.

No one heard anything for a moment, but then the faint sound of sirens came from a distance, no doubt in response to one of the former Surrogates calling the authorities.

“Let’s go,” Jordan said. No one argued, and the five of them ran toward Krista’s SUV, Arron grinning the whole way.

Chapter Fifteen

Collier, Ohio. Now.

After Arron’s friends showed up, there was no time for introductions beyond exchanging names before Night arrived, accompanied by two Harriers and backed up by an entourage of Surrogates. Bethany was surprised to see Yvette among them. The barista had always been standoffish at best, but now she wore an expression of cruelty, and Bethany knew she would kill you as soon as look at you.

Night was nothing like she expected. Arron hadn’t described her, so Bethany had created her own image of the woman, something that looked like a cross between a regal vampire and the Wicked Witch of the West. But Night was stunning, not because she was beautiful – although she was, in a cold, wolfish way – but because of the power she radiated. Arron had said she’d been weakened after their last encounter, but she still exuded an intense atavistic strength, as if she were one of the most dangerous predators to ever walk the face of the Earth, a dinosaur in human form. Her Harriers were equally as frightening, beasts carved out of shadow, yellow fire burning in their eyes, mouths open to display gleaming white fangs.

Bethany and the others stood in front of Arron, protecting him, Jordan, Darla, and Lucius in the front, Bethany, Soo, Hope, Kellie, Sheri, and Harvey directly behind them. Jordan and Hope held handguns and they trained their weapons on Night, although for the moment they held their fire.

Night regarded them for a moment, as if taking their measure.

“Is this the best you were able to do, Arron? Frankly, I’m disappointed.”

Arron didn’t reply.

“Krista is dead because of you,” Lucius said. His voice was raspy, as if he had a severe sore throat. He flexed his bird-claw hands, as if he was eager to sink them into Night’s flesh.

Night laughed.

“Boy, I’ve been hunting since before your kind could stand upright. I long ago lost count of how many lives I’ve claimed.” She looked at Arron then. “This is your last chance. You’ve led me on a grand chase these many years, but the game is over. Come with me now and no more blood need be shed.”

“I will never go with you willingly,” Arron said.

Night shook her head. “Stubborn to the last. Very well. Let the deaths of your protectors be on your head then.”

Bethany expected Night and her servants to attack then, prompting Hope and Jordan to begin firing their weapons. But before that could happen, Soo stepped forward.

“It must be difficult being you,” she said. “Existing solely for one purpose, having no real autonomy over your own life. Don’t you get tired of being an elemental force of nature? Don’t you want more?”

Night frowned. “What are you babbling about, woman?”

Soo went on.

“You must have hopes and dreams like everyone else.” Soo smiled. “And fears.”

There was no outward sign that Soo did anything, but Night’s eyes widened.

“No,” she said, voice soft. “Don’t do this. You don’t know what will—”

Two things happened next. Night’s Surrogates screamed as a large mucous-like mass reared up behind them, waving tentacles that extruded from its surface, and a thick fog rolled in rapidly, seemingly from the walls themselves, filling Grinders and making it impossible to see. A scent came with the fog, a pungent mixture of fresh green plants and rotting vegetation, a smell that Bethany recognized as being a much stronger version of Arron’s peculiar body odor. The fog thinned a little then, and Bethany saw that they were surrounded by trees with large trunks and high branches. Some of the leaves were new, green and lush, while others were dry and curled at the edges, close to death. The tree bark was healthy in places, but in others it was dark and mottled, as if diseased. Same with the ground: some sections looked normal, while others were white and flaky, like patches of dried skin. The fog remained, although it was spread out now, more like mist, and far above, silent streaks of lightning lit the occluded sky. The ground shifted beneath their feet, swaying this way and that, the movement too regular to be a quake, she thought, but she had no idea what else could cause it.

Night glared at Soo.

“You idiot! Your simplistic mind probe only served to catch his attention. Now we’re all in danger!”

Bethany looked to Arron. “What happened?”

“We’re in the King’s Forest,” Arron said. “This is not good. Soo tried to confront Night with her greatest fear, but this is no illusion. We’re really here.”

Bethany had no idea who this King was, but if both Night and Arron were scared of him, then she figured the rest of them should be absolutely terrified.

The white mass had followed them to this world, and it grabbed hold of several Surrogates and pulled them into its substance, as if intending to absorb them. Kellie ran toward it and shouted, “Stop! Let them go!”

The mass seemed to hesitate, and then it released the Surrogates, who hurried to put some distance between themselves and the hideous thing that had almost devoured them.

Kellie stopped in front of the mass, which stood easily twice as high as her and many times wider. Its tentacles waved lazily in the air, and although it had no eyes, Bethany had the impression it was looking at Kellie.

“My sister used to tell me that I needed to face my obsession with fat,” Kellie said, as if addressing the blob. “That I had to embrace it. Well, I’m doing it now! I don’t know if I created you or whether Miranda did, but either way, you have to stop killing people. Do you hear me? No. More. Killing.”

The mountainous mass didn’t react for several seconds, and then its tentacles lashed out, grabbed hold of Kellie, and pulled her into itself. It had happened so fast that Kellie didn’t even have time to cry out. One instant she was there, the next she was gone.

“Damn!” Harvey said. “That was nasty!”

“Looks like it embraced her,” Soo said, voice queasy.

Up to this point, Sheri hadn’t done or said anything. But now she rushed forward to stand in front of the blob.

“That wasn’t nice,” Sheri said. “She was my friend. How would you like it if the same thing happened to you?”

She lifted her shirt to expose her abdomen, revealing a horizontal line of puckered flesh that resembled scar tissue. The line parted, yawned wide, and a glistening organ shot forth. It was pear-shaped, kind of like a flower bulb, and was connected to Sheri’s body by a long cord. A uterus? Bethany thought. If so, it was one that had been radically transformed by Arron’s power. It opened at the end, exposing twin rows of sharp teeth, and then it plunged into the mass’s substance and disappeared within.

The fleshy tube connecting the organ to Sheri went taut, and Bethany thought the white blob was going to pull her in and absorb her as it had Kellie. But then the cord began pulsing, and Bethany realized that the mouth that had emerged from the woman’s body was feeding. The process must have been painful for the mass, for it flailed its tentacles about, lashing tree trunks close by and stripping the bark from them. Then the mass began to shrink, slowly at first, then faster, dwindling in size until it was no taller than Sheri, then half her size, and then it disappeared, like the last spaghetti noodle being slurped up by a diner.

The mouth organ – which despite all it had eaten was no larger than before – returned to Sheri’s body and her abdomen sealed up. She was no larger either, and Bethany wondered where all that fat had gone.

“That was seriously disgusting,” Hope said, sounding nauseated.

“Agreed,” Jordan said.

Sheri turned toward them, smiled sweetly, and flipped them off with both hands.

During all this, Night and her Harriers had been looking around, as if they were anticipating – or maybe a better word would be dreading – someone’s arrival. The surviving Surrogates, Yvette included, appeared nervous, as if reacting to their mistress’s anxiety.

Bethany turned to Arron.

“Something’s coming,” she said. “What is it?”

“The King’s Attendants,” Arron said, and shuddered. “We need to leave this place. When Soo attempted to make a psychic connection with Night, she also connected to the King of the Wild, and he brought us here. If she can break the connection, we should be able to return to your world.”

Bethany didn’t like hearing should.

She turned toward Soo, intending to go to the woman and tell her what Arron had said, but then a dark shape came hurtling out of the mist, wings buzzing as it flew through the air. It was a gigantic beetle, easily the size of a horse, if not larger, and it went straight toward Soo. The woman turned to run, but she was too late. The beetle snapped off her head with its hooked mandibles and kept going. Soo’s head flew through the air, trailing blood behind it. Crimson fountained from her neck stump, and her body remained standing for a moment, as if it hadn’t yet realized it was dead. Then it collapsed, and an instant later, Soo’s head hit the ground, bounced, and came to a stop. A second giant beetle emerged from the mist, this one crawling, and it snatched up Soo’s head and swallowed the grisly morsel down whole.

“Christ almighty,” Bethany said. Now it was her turn to feel sick.

More beetles – Attendants – appeared then, some crawling, some flying. Bethany counted ten in all, and they lost no time in attacking those who had dared to trespass on the King’s land. Within seconds, the forest became a scene of mass chaos as friend and foe alike fought for their lives. Jordan and Lucius protected Darla, Lucius with his claws, Jordan with his gun, although he seemed to be having some trouble wielding the weapon left-handed. Hope stood alone, firing her gun. She hit more targets than Jordan, but the rounds did little to penetrate the Attendants’ rock-hard carapaces. When a beetle came too near, she thrust her free hand toward it, and the creature veered off, as if repelled by some invisible force. Sheri’s uterus-mouth slithered out of her body again and snapped at any beetle that came close to her. Bethany didn’t know if the organ could cause the Attendants harm, but none of them seemed eager to get close enough to find out. Bethany stood with Arron, ready to use her thick skin as a barrier to protect him, and watching in horror as the battle unfolded around them.

Night had backed up against a tree to prevent any of the Attendants from attacking her from behind. She had no weapons on her, but she did have her two remaining Harriers, and the big cats leaped at every Attendant that came near, biting and clawing. The Harriers didn’t seem to be doing much damage to the Attendants, but their efforts kept the huge insects at bay. The four surviving Surrogates, which included Yvette, fought the beetles using the inhuman strength granted to them by Night’s power. Yvette broke a large branch off a tree and wielded it like a club, smashing beetles in the head when they came too near Night. Her blows didn’t appear to harm the giant insects, but they did get them to back off.

Bethany turned to Arron. “What do we do?”

“I…don’t know. I’ve never been to the King’s Forest, and I didn’t anticipate that we’d find ourselves here.”

“Could you appeal to this King somehow? Ask him for mercy?”

Arron let out a harsh laugh. “That would be an excellent way to commit suicide.”

One of the flying beetles came at them, but Hope fired a couple rounds into one of its wings, and the insect veered off and slammed into a tree. It fell to the ground, the shell encasing its head cracked. Harvey ran toward the wounded insect and jammed his finger-needles into the wound. The Attendant’s legs quivered as Harvey drained its blood. Harvey grimaced and stuck out his tongue.

“Ugh! Tastes like cleaning fluid!”

So far, Soo had been their only casualty, but Bethany knew it was only a matter of time before the Attendants overwhelmed the rest of them. Hope and Jordan didn’t have unlimited supplies of ammunition, and presumably the giant beetles had reinforcements that would soon be here, the insects drawn by the sounds of battle if nothing else.

“You said we could get back if Soo broke her psychic connection with the King,” Bethany said to Arron. “Shouldn’t her death have severed that connection?”

“Now that we’re here, perhaps the King of the Wild intends for us to remain,” Arron said. “Or, since Soo had to go through Night’s mind to forge the link, the link is still active because Night yet lives. Don’t ask me. I’m not an expert in hyper-psychic pan-dimensional physics.”

A beetle scuttled toward Jordan, Lucius, and Darla then. Jordan stepped forward and grabbed hold of one of the insect’s legs. Cracks formed in the creature’s carapace and a greenish fluid began to ooze forth. The beetle turned away, tried to run, but its legs gave out on it, and it collapsed to the ground. Green gunk oozed freely from the fissures in the beetle’s carapace now, and the creature lay still.

That was an extremely grotesque power, Bethany thought, but at the moment, an extremely useful one.

After the beetle’s attack, Darla broke away from Jordan and Lucius and hurried toward Bethany and Arron. Despite being blind, she found her way to them easily.

“My hearing’s starting to come back, at least a little,” she said. “I heard what you said, Arron. We don’t care what you aren’t. We care what you are. You can stop this anytime you want to, and you know it.”

“I don’t understand,” Bethany said.

“You see how Night doesn’t have any fingers on her left hand?” Darla asked.

“Yes.”

“That’s because her Harriers are her fingers, or maybe it’s the other way around. When Jordan, Lucius, and I first met her five years ago, she had four Harriers. We killed two not long ago outside the Delgado Building. The other two are here with her now. That leaves one unaccounted for.”

“Maybe it was killed before you first encountered Night,” Bethany said.

“I don’t think so,” Darla said. “I think that Harrier got tired of taking its mistress’s orders and hunting the prey she chose. It wanted to be free to make its own choices and live its own life, and so one day it ran off. And Night’s been trying to recapture it ever since.”

Even without eyes, somehow Darla was able to give Arron a pointed look.

“You mean Arron? You can’t be serious!” Bethany turned to Arron. “Is it true? Are you the fifth Harrier?”

He began speaking, his voice bitter and angry.

“You don’t know what it’s like literally being a part of someone else, always having to do what they say, never being allowed to do anything on your own…. It took me a long time to build up my courage, but one night I became separated from Night and my fellow Harriers during a hunt, and I decided my chance had come. For years, I had been siphoning small amounts of Night’s power when I was connected to her and saving it. I now used that power to change my shape, to make myself appear human so that I might fool Night. It didn’t work for long. She and the other Harriers got my scent, and I’ve been on the run ever since. I discovered that because I was in human form, I could go into civilized areas where my siblings and my-once mistress could not, although I was never comfortable in such places. I also learned that if humans were in my presence, the fragments of Night’s power that remained within me would begin to affect them, changing their forms just as they had mine. And with those changes came special abilities, all part of a defense mechanism, I came to believe, which allowed me to create protectors that would help me avoid being recaptured by Night. Darla and the others and I almost killed Night when we last encountered her, and this time I thought we’d take her down for certain. Except I hadn’t counted on this.” He gestured toward the woods and the fighting around them.

Bethany was having a difficult time trying to wrap her mind around what Arron had told them.

“So you used the Delgado Building – and everyone inside it – as a trap for Night?” she asked.

“Yes,” Darla said. “Although I’m ashamed to admit it. Our hope was that once Arron was inside, the rest of us would be able to attack Night and kill her before she entered. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way.”

“No shit it didn’t!” Bethany snapped.

A beetle rushed toward them, and without thinking, Bethany raised her rhino-hided arm and let the insect catch it between its hooked mandibles. The creature squeezed, trying to bite off Bethany’s arm, but her hide was too thick, and its mandibles snapped off. It scuttled back, shaking its head in pain.

“You talk about choice,” she said to Arron, “but you didn’t give us any choice, did you? You made us into these, these things, and forced us into a position where we’d have to protect your life because we had to defend our own. Soo was right – you really are a prick!”

The beetle that had broken its mandibles on Bethany’s arm came charging at them again, perhaps in mindless fury, perhaps to get revenge on the woman who’d hurt it. Bethany stepped in front of Darla and Arron – not that she wanted to protect the bastard – and steeled herself to meet the insect’s attack.

She heard a gunshot and felt something warm and wet strike the back of her head. She turned and saw that Darla now had a large hole above her left eye, or rather, where her left eye had once been.

“Darla!” Jordan shouted. “Oh god, Darla!”

Darla’s mouth worked for a moment, as if she was trying to say something. She reached into a pocket and withdrew what appeared to be a crudely carved stone blade. She held it out to Bethany in a trembling hand, and Bethany took it. It was freezing cold, and there were letters carved into the sides, but she didn’t recognize the alphabet. Darla managed to breathe out a single word – “Night” – and then she fell to the ground, dead.

Bethany was so shocked by Darla’s death, no doubt caused by one of Jordan’s shots going wild, that she forgot about the beetle racing toward them. The big bug rammed its head into her back and sent her flying. She landed on her left side, on top of one of the dry flaky patches on the ground, which did absolutely nothing to break her fall. She felt a sharp pain in her shoulder, and she wondered if she’d dislocated it, or if it was broken. She thought of the weird knife that Darla had given her and she looked at her hand. She’d managed to maintain her grip on the object, and she tucked it into her pocket so she wouldn’t lose it. She didn’t know what it was, but if it had been important enough for Darla to give it to her while she was dying, then Bethany wanted to hold on to it.

Lying there, she watched Arron hauling ass away from the beetle – that motherfucker was all about self-preservation. The insect inspected Darla’s body, although it no longer had the mouth parts with which to eat it, but this fact did not deter another beetle from running forward to challenge the injured insect for the right to devour the still-warm flesh. The two Attendants began fighting, slamming into each other like trucks, legs churning the ground as they backed up and rammed into one another again.

“Get away from her, you bastards!”

Jordan, tears streaming down his face, ran toward the clashing insects, waving his gun in his left-handed grip, and firing as he came. Bethany thought most of his shots went wild, and she wanted to yell at the man to stop shooting, but she couldn’t draw in enough air to do more than make a rasping whisper. Guilt over having caused his friend’s death was driving him, and even if Bethany had been able to shout, she doubted he would’ve heard her, let alone listened.

As he drew close to the beetles, the one with the undamaged mouth swiped its left foreleg outward and struck Jordan on the chest. Bethany heard the sound of ribs cracking, and then Jordan was flung backward. She heard more bones break when he hit the ground, and his hand sprung open and his gun bounced away. The beetle that hit Jordan was on him like a flash, and Jordan screamed as the Attendant began tearing him apart with its mandibles.

He didn’t scream for long.

Bethany, gritting her teeth against the pain in her shoulder, pushed herself into a sitting position and then stood. Her legs were shaky, but they held her up. She watched the beetle dismantle Jordan’s corpse with brutal efficiency, thinking she should feel something for the man’s loss, even if she hadn’t really known him, but she felt nothing. From the moment she had seen Arron walk by as she waited for the elevator, she’d found herself living a worsening nightmare, one that had culminated in a journey to another fucking dimension and an attack by absurdly gigantic – and deadly – insects. And she’d seen so much death…. Until today, she’d never seen dead bodies outside of a funeral home, and she’d certainly never witnessed anyone die right in front of her. It was all too much, and she couldn’t take any more. Her mind was teetering on the precipice of a mental breakdown, and she feared she had mere moments until she plunged all the way into full-blown madness.

This had to end. Now.

Yvette was still fighting off Attendants. She held two broken tree limbs in her hands now, and she wielded them with a savage speed that was entirely unlike the irritable barista Bethany had come to know. Evidently becoming the aggressively violent servant of a crazed demigod had been good for her. She wondered what Salvador would think if he could see her now. Young Yvette, all grown up and fighting monsters.

Stop it! she told herself. Focus.

She made her way over to Yvette, dodging beetles as she went. She passed Sheri, who was in the process of devouring an Attendant with her uterus-mouth. Bethany didn’t wonder how she was going to be able to fit the huge insect into her small frame. Her ability to do so made as much sense as anything else had this day.

One other Surrogate – a man Bethany didn’t recognize – fought at Yvette’s side. They were the only two of Night’s servants left alive. Yvette slammed both of her branches down on the head of a beetle so hard that they snapped in two. The beetle was stunned but not down, and the other Surrogate jumped in to finish it off. He grabbed hold of its mandibles with his powerful hands and began to force them apart. The beetle’s back shell opened, wings slid forth, and the insect leaped into the sky, taking the man with it. Man and beetle quickly disappeared into the forest mists, and were gone. Yvette was the sole remaining Surrogate.

As Bethany approached, Yvette whirled on her, yellow eyes blazing, mouth twisted in a snarl. Before the woman could attack, Bethany said, “Fuck these stupid bugs. You want to get Arron for your mistress, right? Let’s do it.”

Yvette’s eyes narrowed, as if she suspected Bethany was playing some kind of trick on her. Then she smiled.

“You really look like shit, you know that?”

“I do, but thanks for pointing it out. Come on.”

Together, they started walking toward Arron.

The man – or Harrier in a man’s form – was hiding behind one of the trees, peeking around the trunk to watch the rest of the battle play out. Night remained unharmed, but only one Harrier stood with her now. The other lay on the ground not far from her, ripped into two pieces, presumably by one of the Attendants. Hope had run out of ammunition, but she’d run over to Jordan’s body to retrieve his gun, an extra clip he was carrying, and his KA-BAR knife. She was shooting beetles and slicing at them with her new blade. She looked magnificent, like a warrior born, and Bethany wished she’d gotten to know the woman before now. But wasn’t that the way of life? Humans encountered hundreds, sometimes thousands of others throughout the course of their lives, and how many did they ever really come to know? Almost none, Bethany thought.

“Cover us!” she called out to Hope, and the woman nodded without asking what they intended to do.

Good thing Elissa’s not here, she thought. If she saw the way I was looking at Hope right now, she would be so damn jealous.

Arron saw them approaching, and for a moment, Bethany thought he was going to cut and run, plunge into the mists, and lose himself in the depths of the King’s Forest. But he remained where he was. She had counted on him being loath to abandon his protectors and fend for himself, and she’d been right.

When they were almost at the tree, Yvette sprinted the last few yards. Arron did try to run at that point, but it was too late. Yvette caught hold of the back of his shirt, spun him around, and – using all the strength she possessed as a Surrogate – backhanded him across the face. He fell to the ground, and Bethany feared Yvette might’ve seriously injured him with the blow, maybe even killed him. She wasn’t concerned for him as a person, not after everything he’d done to the people in the Delgado Building, but she was afraid that Night wouldn’t want him if he was dead.

As Bethany reached them, Yvette hauled Arron to his feet. Blood ran from his split lower lip, but his eyes were open and clear. He looked at Bethany, a mixture of bewilderment and disappointment in his gaze.

“I chose you because you were a kind person,” he said.

“I’m not that kind.” She looked at Yvette. “Let’s go.”

Yvette grabbed the back of Arron’s neck and held tight as the three of them began making their way toward Night. As they went, the Attendants broke off their attack and grew still. They watched the trio’s procession with glossy obsidian eyes, and then one by one, as if obeying some unspoken signal, they trundled off into the mist. Had the King commanded them to stop fighting, sensing that events were about to come to a close and his servants were no longer needed? There was no way of knowing, but Bethany was glad the big insects were leaving. She’d had more than enough of those bastards.

Of all of those who’d been brought to this place – not counting Bethany, Yvette, and Arron – only Harvey, Hope, and Lucius remained alive, and none had gotten through the battle unscathed. They’d sustained numerous cuts and gashes, were clearly exhausted, and looked more than a little shellshocked. I’m right there with you, Bethany thought.

Sheri lay on the ground, dead. One of the beetles had bitten through the cord that connected her uterus-mouth to her body, and she’d bled out. Bethany hadn’t known the woman, but she felt sorrow at her loss nevertheless. One more death to lay at Arron’s feet.

One by one, the weary survivors fell in behind Bethany, Yvette, and Arron, and the group continued on toward Night, who remained standing with her back against a tree. She had a few scratches on her face, and her hair was a tangled mess, but otherwise she appeared unharmed. The same couldn’t be said for her remaining Harrier, though. The cat had protected its mistress from the Attendants, but at a high cost. It bled profusely from deep wounds on its side and belly, and its trembling legs barely held its weight. Its tongue lolled from the side of its mouth, and its breath came in harsh pants. Bethany didn’t think the creature had much longer to live. But as they drew near Night, Bethany discovered there was still some small measure of life left in the Harrier.

The cat – perhaps thinking Bethany and her companions meant its mistress harm – leaped at Bethany and fastened its mouth around her throat. Its weight bore her to the ground, and the Harrier bit down as hard as it could. Bethany felt the pressure of the cat’s teeth on her neck, but her thick gray hide was too tough for the beast’s fangs to penetrate. It held its grip for a moment, perhaps intending to cut off her air supply and suffocate her, but then it released a last feeble breath and went limp. The Harrier was dead.

Hope and Lucius rolled the cat off of Bethany, and Yvette reached out her free hand. Bethany took it, and Yvette hauled her to her feet. Bethany was now covered in the cat’s blood, but she was unharmed.

“You okay?” Hope asked.

Bethany rubbed her throat, but she nodded. They continued the rest of the way to Night, who now stood alone. The woman still exuded an aura of unearthly power, but it was lessened now, and Bethany knew the events of this day had taken a toll on her as well. She stepped forward to meet them, head held high, but the yellow light in her eyes diminished.

She looked at Arron and smiled.

“I see you have something that belongs to me.”

Yvette forced Arron onto his knees.

“We do,” Bethany said. “He’s yours – if you send us home and return us to normal.”

Night turned to Bethany and her upper lip curled in a sneer. “What makes you think I will bargain with you?”

“You’re beat to shit,” Lucius said in his raspy voice. “You’re trying to hide it, but we can all see it. We may be tired too, but we outnumber you. Your Harriers are dead, so it would be just you against us. We could kill you if we wanted.”

Night laughed. “I’m not as weak as you think, boy. I could destroy you all with a thought.”

Hope still had hold of Jordan’s gun, and she aimed it at Night’s head.

“Then go ahead and do it,” she said.

Night glared at her for a long moment, then she sighed.

“Very well. I accept your terms.”

Hope lowered the weapon.

Yvette gave Arron a shove, and he sprawled on the ground before his mistress. She gazed down at him, the expression on her face unreadable.

Come on, Bethany mentally urged. Take him.

“Do you concede?” Night said.

Now it was Arron’s turn to sigh. “Yes.”

Night grinned. “Excellent! Well played, Arron.”

Arron rose to his feet. He smiled, although with less enthusiasm than his mistress.

“I really thought I had you this time,” he said.

“To be honest, you nearly did.”

Bethany couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“This was…a game?”

“A hunt,” Night corrected.

“People hunt to feed themselves,” Harvey said. He held up a hand to display his needle-fingers. “I should know.”

This time Night’s laughter was strong and full-throated.

“Are you not familiar with your own world? As a species, humanity hasn’t needed to hunt to feed itself for at least a century. Yet you still hunt. For love, for attention, for status, for distraction…. Each one of you is as much a hunter as I am. But in my case, I do hunt for sustenance – sustenance of the spirit. The chase is my air, my food and drink. Without it, I would cease to be as surely as your kind would die if your physical needs were denied.”

“All of the people who died…” Bethany said. “The suffering, the loss, the sorrow…. They all mean nothing to you.”

Night shrugged. “I am as I was made to be, as are all things.”

Bethany looked at Arron. “What about that story you told Darla and me? About how you ran from Night because you wanted your freedom?”

“It was false,” Arron said, without a hint of shame. “When Darla began to theorize about my motives for leaving Night, I went along with it. All part of the game.”

“A game that is completed.” Night raised her fingerless hand. “Time to come home, Arron.”

“Thanks for your help,” Arron said to Bethany, then he looked at Lucius. “You too. Sorry things didn’t turn out better.”

He faced Night once more. His form shimmered, turned shadowy, and re-formed itself into that of a Harrier. His body then blurred, spread outward, and made four copies of itself. Now five Harriers stood before Night. As one, they leaped, shrinking as they flew through the air, their tiny forms flying toward their mistress’s hand. They landed, joined with her, reshaped themselves one final time, and now Night had a full five fingers on that hand. She flexed them, smiled, and then lowered her arm.

“It’s good to be whole again,” she said.

Bethany struggled to understand. “So Arron was a part of you, as were the other Harriers? Does that mean you were…playing with yourself?”

“Sounds kinky,” Yvette said.

“I suppose you could view it that way,” Night admitted. “Who else do I have to play with?”

Lucius clenched his bird-claw hands and took a step toward Night.

“For five years my friends and I followed Arron. We lived to destroy you, even gave up our goddamned memories to obtain a weapon to kill you. And it all meant nothing?”

He swiped his right hand toward Night’s throat, but she caught his wrist easily and stopped the blow.

“I’m back to my full strength,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do to hurt me.”

She released Lucius and he stepped back, tears of rage running from his eyes.

Something he’d said echoed in Bethany’s mind – to obtain a weapon to kill you.

She reached into her pants pocket and wrapped her fingers around the cold stone blade that Darla had given her before she died, along with a single word as to its use. Night.

“Let’s cut the shit,” Hope said. “Are you going to send us home or what?”

“I am not,” Night said.

“Do you mean you can’t,” Harvey said, “or that you won’t?”

“The latter. You shall remain here, in the King’s Forest, and I shall return to Earth to begin my game anew.”

“But we brought you Arron!” Yvette said. “You promised you’d send us home if we gave him to you!”

Night’s lips drew back from her teeth, and her yellow eyes – now back at full intensity – gleamed.

“I lied.”

Keeping her gun trained on Night, Hope raised her left hand.

“You will send us home,” she said, and pushed her palm toward the woman.

Night laughed.

“Now that I am whole again, your power is useless against me. All of your powers are.”

Hope’s brow furrowed in deep concentration, and her hand began to shake, as if she was exerting a great effort. Night merely watched her, amused, until eventually Hope gave up and lowered her arm.

“Now stop whining, all of you,” Night said. “You have your lives, which is more than you deserve, frankly. Your kind are as much insects as the Attendants, but at least they perform a useful function. You do nothing but seek the fulfillment of your petty desires, consuming and producing waste to no particular end. But I must admit, your world does make a good playground. Besides, you know too much about me now, and I can’t have you running around on your planet telling everyone about me. It could skew the next game in Arron’s favor, and I can’t have that.”

Bethany slowly removed the stone blade from her pocket. She took a tight grip on the weapon, so cold it burned her flesh, then she stepped forward and plunged it into Night’s chest.

Chapter Sixteen

Night’s scream shook the forest.

Bethany and the others fell back, covered their hands with their ears, and watched Night die. No blood issued from where the stone blade had violated her flesh. Instead, she began to shrink and compress, then with an audible rushing sound, she was pulled into the weapon and was gone. The blade remained hanging in the air for several moments, and finally Bethany stepped forward and took hold of it once more. For an instant, it resisted her, as if determined to stay in place forever, but then it relaxed into her hand and she was able to lower the blade. It was no longer cold to the touch.

“That was weird,” Harvey said.

“Better end than the bitch deserved,” Lucius said.

“Damn straight,” Hope agreed. She’d kept her weapon trained on Night the entire time, but now she lowered it.

With Night’s demise, Bethany thought they all might return to normal, but Yvette’s eyes remained yellow, Harvey’s fingers still terminated in needlelike structures, and Lucius’s hands were still bird claws. She reached up with her free hand and touched her face, found the skin still rhino-hide-rough. She looked at the stone blade in her hand. Was Night really dead, or was she trapped inside the weapon, like a genie caught inside a bottle? She hoped for the former but feared the latter.

“Now what do we do?” Harvey asked. “Start walking and hope we find a clearly marked exit with a sign that reads Earth This Way?”

Before any of them could reply, a great voice spoke like thunder.

I am impressed.

The ‘sound’ that issued from within Bethany’s mind was so intense, it was like a white-hot spike driven through her skull. She knew she was hearing the voice of the King of the Wild, and for an instant she had a vision of a bear as big as a world – half of its flesh sore and rotting, the other half whole and healthy – striding slowly through an endless realm of white mist and lightning, a vast forest, half alive, half dead, growing from its back, a giant flock of birds circling overhead. She wanted to fall to the ground and abase herself before this being whose power was beyond her comprehension, but she resisted. She hadn’t come this far to grovel before anyone, god or mortal.

She felt the presence of the others in her mind and knew they had been mentally linked by the King. She felt what they felt, thought what they thought, and she spoke for them all when she said, This was a game for you too, wasn’t it?

Games within games, schemes within schemes…. It is how those like me pass the time while we wait for the Gyre to claim us in the end.

Bethany didn’t fully understand what the King was talking about, but she got the basics.

Will you send us home?

There was a long pause, and Bethany was beginning to believe the King would not respond to her question, but then he spoke once more.

You killed several of my Attendants. Perhaps you should replace them.

Pain erupted in Bethany’s hands. Fingers merged, her arms lengthened and grew thin, her thick gray hide became hard black carapace. She looked at the others, saw they were all going through the same transformation.

But then it stopped. The pain eased, and everyone returned to normal.

Then again, I am short a hunter. How would you all like a new job?

* * *

Harney, West Virginia. Now.

The five of them – Bethany, Hope, Yvette, Lucius, and Harvey – stood atop a grass-covered hill overlooking a small town nestled in a valley below. The sun was just starting to pink the horizon, and the early morning air was crisp, clean, and invigorating.

Good day for a hunt, Bethany thought. She wondered how Elissa was doing back in Ohio. She couldn’t imagine how hard it must’ve been to have your fiancée leave for work one day and never return, without any explanation or farewell. Elissa would come to terms with it one day, Bethany hoped – find someone else, fall in love, settle down, and forget about the lover who’d vanished like morning mist being burned away by sunlight.

They were all dressed in black now, just as Night had been, and they’d all been restored to their previous physical states, Bethany included. She liked the feel of the breeze on her smooth soft skin, and was grateful to experience it. The King was merciful, in his way.

Of course, looking human didn’t mean that they were any longer. They were more now, much more.

Not for the first time, she wondered why Arron had directed Lucius and his friends to seek out a mortuum blade, as killing Night with the weapon would also result in his death since he was intimately connected to her. Maybe he’d never meant the knife to be used against his mistress at all, maybe merely revealing that one of his protectors had it would’ve been enough for her to concede the contest right there. They’d decided the mortuum blade was too big an advantage for either side to have, so they’d left the weapon in the King’s Forest when they’d departed.

“All right,” Bethany said. “Lucius, Hope, and Harvey – you’re the quarry this time. Yvette and I will be the hunters.”

“Don’t make it easy on us,” Yvette said.

Harvey grinned. “Never.”

The ‘prey’ assumed the form of Harriers and glided off in the direction of Harney. They were all equals, and none of them were bound to another as Night’s cats had been bound to her. When Hope, Harvey, and Lucius reached the end of the Wild and the beginning of civilization, they would retake their human forms so that they might enter the town. As the hunters, Bethany and Yvette would be forced to create a Blight before they could set foot inside Harney. Those were, after all, the rules.

All of them were determined to conduct the very best hunt they could – one that would provide maximum entertainment for their King – but in a way that would minimize the involvement of others. They would not exploit humans as Night and Arron had done merely to make a hunt more interesting.

They wouldn’t.

“Let’s get to work,” Bethany said.

Yvette grinned, and they started walking down the hill.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to editors extraordinaire Don D’Auria and Imogen Howson for helping to make this book the best it could be, and special thanks to my agent, Cherry Weiner, my stalwart guide through the wild woods of publishing.

About this book

This is a FLAME TREE PRESS BOOK

Text copyright © 2023 Tim Waggoner

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Other titles avilable by Tim Waggoner: The Mouth of the Dark, They Kill, The Forever House, Your Turn to Suffer, We Will Rise

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Table of Contents

- *
- Chapter One
- Chapter Two
- Chapter Three
- Chapter Four
- Chapter Five
- Chapter Six
- Chapter Seven
- Chapter Eight
- Chapter Nine
- Chapter Ten
- Chapter Eleven
- Chapter Twelve
- Chapter Thirteen
- Chapter Fourteen
- Chapter Fifteen
- Chapter Sixteen
- Acknowledgements
- About this book
- FLAME TREE PRESS
- Further Information