Then the song of incantation stopped. In a flash, the smoldering vapor yanked Ash out of the room and out of the house.
Both Joe and I ran to the door, watching helplessly as Ash soared down the street until he disappeared in the distant gloom.
“Get your coat,” I called to Tucker, but he already had it on. No one needed to speak of what had just happened or what we planned to do. It was instinctive. It was part of the incantation, though none of us realized it at the time. We all rushed out the door after Ash, even the dog galloped down the street, feet scuffing up clods of snow and dirt.
We ran, slipped and jogged down snow-covered streets, not even bothering to take the sidewalk or to get into a car. And as we ran, we were joined by other villagers, some wearing coats and hats, some dressed in pajamas, bathrobes and slippers. All of us hurled ourselves down the street as if in a panic, as if our lives—our very existence—depended upon it.
And not one of us stopped, from the youngest to the eldest, until we all stood at the junkyard.
Chapter 78
That Awful Quiet
Sheriff Kyle:
The pristine chill evaporated, turned into a sweaty panic-throbbing heat. I got ready to hike back up the ravine for the fifth time, my coat open, hat pushed back. Flashing lights spilled through the woods and over the highway. Three more deputies combed the woods and the deputy coroner picked his way down toward the dried-up riverbed.
“Nicole’s in labor,” he said, explaining why it took him longer than expected to show up.
“ ’Bout time she had that baby,” I answered, trying to smile but knowing that it hung wrong on my face. “Rodriguez is down there waiting for you.” I gestured back toward the pool of light that glowed in the mists. “We saw some coyotes earlier.”
“Lovely.”
“I was just getting ready to head over to the junkyard,” I said as we passed each other on the trail. “I want to check up on the kids. This might be our second body of the evening, and if it is . . .” I paused.
“You don’t need to explain it to me.” The deputy coroner held up a hand and kept walking. “I’d rather the body count didn’t get any higher. Do what you need to.”
I braced myself for the wind that had been howling through the mountain pass, but when I climbed back out onto the road I was met with silence instead. The wind had died down.
It felt like that awful quiet right before a storm.
I wasn’t sure why, but ever since we found Agnes’s body I’d been worried about all the kids still out wandering the streets. The snow had slowed down. Only a stray snowflake fell as I jogged across the highway and got into my car. A quick glance to the locked rack between the two front seats gave me a surge of confidence.
My weapon of choice. A Ruger Mini–14 semiautomatic rifle.
I hoped whoever killed Agnes would cross my path sometime tonight. Because I was going to take him down, blow the legs right out from under him, knock him flat on his back.
Maybe I’d even blow the bastard’s head off.
My SUV plowed through snow and slush, faster than I ought, still, not fast enough. My skin rippled with gooseflesh, the sort of thing that used to happen when someone told ghost stories when I was boy. I couldn’t stop thinking about Agnes, all alone back there in the woods with no one to rescue her. Something swooping down from the hell-black sky to drag her off, screaming.
And then, sucking out her life, drop by drop.
Some evil beast was stalking this town and it was my job to catch it and kill it. Before it struck again.
I whipped around a corner, passed the line of cars with cracked windshields. Only a few more blocks and I’d be at the junkyard. Hopefully, all the kids were together. There was safety in numbers—though not much if they were trying to defend themselves against some unnatural demon.
That was when I heard it—an awful ripping and tearing, as if the village itself were being torn asunder, from foundation to crowning sky. An explosive crack rumbled and a massive furrow bolted down the highway, dissecting the road in two. I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw that an earthquake had just missed me. A second earlier and my car would have been tossed into the flanking woods like a toy.
I pressed my foot against the gas pedal, leaned into the steering wheel, not daring to look behind me. Strange clouds were forming overhead. And a song began to wend through the air; tendrils of unearthly smoke snaking down the street, testing every window and door that they passed. Then one vaporous hand reared up alongside my car window, seemed to hover beside me as my vehicle raced down the street.
Don’t look at it. It’s not real.
Ghostly fingers tapped the glass.
“Go away!” I shouted.
Then it paused, seemed to nod at the other serpentine branches of mist, and it slithered on down the street. Hunting.