The wind picked up and rushed into the room like an uninvited guest—except she had opened the window, so she supposed it was invited after all. Either way, she pulled the blankets up to her chin and shivered in mildest pleasure, the room infused with the scent of the outdoors, of the coming cold, of—
Another high, trilling bird caw came, louder now, and Rose froze in her bed. It sounded closer, didn’t it? Or had opening the window just made it seem so?
Rose took a deep breath and watched it appear in front of her in a heavy mist as she exhaled. This had always been her favorite time of year, going toward the days of frozen chill, heading toward Christmas, toward that time when everyone on the village street seemed to greet each other with a little extra joy, as though it were a reminder of how fortunate they all were to have one another—
That didn’t seem likely to happen this year though, did it?
This year she’d be walking the streets by herself, if this new tradition continued. No one would look her in the eye. They’d all rush away, grabbing their children—the few there were—and pretending she was a disease carrier in the street.
No, it was best—
The hawk trilled again, loud, almost earsplitting, and Rose stirred, craning her head back to try and look out the window. There was nothing but black and starry sky above, no sign of this bird that seemed to be continuously trying to—
There it went again. Loud, like it was trying to—
A door slammed. Then another.
There was movement in the streets; Rose could hear it through the open window. Someone was out there—now another someone—more doors were opening, and voices melded together in the night.
“What do we do?”
“Is this it?”
“—now come to us?”
“—thought we had more time—”
“—not ready.”
It was a cacophony of action, like every house in the village was emptying its contents, its residents. Someone was ringing a bell, loud and clanging, and it hurt Rose’s ears. She’d only heard them ring it very occasionally, when there was an emergency, perhaps.
What, then, was this?
She got up on her knees and stuck her head out in the window, grimacing against the cold chill that caught her as she did so. The night’s darkness was nearly complete, a few exterior lights on houses casting shadows over the trees in her garden. The buzz of conversation was thick in the air, so thick it was like a stew of melted rubber, almost impossible to do anything with.
Graham’s voice drifted to her through the din. “What do we do?”
Rose frowned, the heavy lines creasing her brow. What was this?
A door slammed closer to her, and she heard her granddad speak, audible by dint of his proximity to her. “All right, then, you lot—”
“It’s happening.” Hamilton’s cool, calm voice split the night like an axe split cord wood.
Her granddad hesitated, probably contemplating his answer. “Right now?” he asked. The conversational buzz was fading to silence.
“Yes,” Hamilton said. “Right now.” A pause. “Where is she?”
“Inside,” Rose’s mam answered, strong, resolute. Had she gone out with Granddad?
Just what were they talking about? “She” was inside—?
Oh.
Rose.
“Come on then, lads,” Hamilton said, grimly, and the quiet spurred to life once more. “And lasses,” he added, as though in apology to someone who’d taken offense.
Rose could feel the change in the atmosphere of the house this time as the door opened, as though a groan ran through the entirety of her home from the change in pressure, the shift in the wood frame hidden inside those plaster walls. She was still half-out the window, listening, when she heard the footsteps coming toward her door.
She scrambled, like an animal panicking at a predator’s approach. They were coming for her, many of them, strong, confident footsteps echoing down the hall like thunder on the approach of a storm. Rose’s mouth went instantly dry, and her skin turned colder than any blustery winter wind could have managed in the space of a second.
Her feet rustled against the sheets as she started to propel herself out the window. Her only thought was of escape, and she knew not from what. There was only the threat of something, of the villagers coming after her, the target of their ire of late. Their scapegoat, they had alienated her so effectively that if she’d heard this entire conversation only a few months earlier, she’d have thought they were planning a party for her.
Now, her stomach roiled in blind panic as she lunged for the window. The only party she reckoned they were planning for her now was the kind where her neck would be at the end of a thickly knotted rope while her feet danced a good margin above the ground.
Rose hit the window sill on her way out, lower back thumping as she slid roughly against the window. She hadn’t raised it high enough; it wasn’t as though she’d planned to do anything other than get a little breeze. She certainly hadn’t planned to use it as an escape exit—not when she was in her nightwear. Her chest scraped against the sill on the way out and her lower back ached from where it had made hard contact with the window at the squeeze point of her pelvis and her arse. She’d gotten just a little too deep at that part of her body, and she couldn’t turn it sideways to get out like she had her head.
“What’s that?” someone said, muffled, through the door.
Rose felt a note of panic. They were almost—
Someone threw open the door, a booming noise that was like the arrival of death itself, and she looked back to see shadowy figures through the dirty glass. They were in her room now, standing inside, and Rose was here, briefly trapped with her damned arse stuck…
“Get her!” someone shouted, and someone else shouted back inside, thunderously loud, “She’s trying to escape out the window!” There was a frenzy of motion inside as Rose tried to wriggle her way through, out, away from this shite, blind panic settling over her now even as strong hands grabbed at her legs, clamping on and trying to yank her back. She kicked out madly, trying to free herself, but they had grips like iron, and they were on her calves, her thighs, and holding on tight enough to bruise the skin.
Someone yanked a hand away, and then another did, and a brief thrill of hope ran through her. Her powers! They couldn’t hold on, not if they wanted to—
“She’s burning me!” someone shouted. The voice was low and deep.
“Use the bloody sheets! Get a hand on her!”
Footsteps were coming around the house now. Rose’s stomach seethed. She struggled against the window even harder, and it slid up a few inches, allowing a little margin for her to try and slip out, butt bumping it again as it hit the widest point of her arse cheeks, pelvis thumping against the sill on the down side. And then—
She was free, worked loose of it, and tipping toward the earth and a good drop a few feet below. She could see the dark ground start to rush up at her—
Someone grabbed her by the ankle, arresting her momentum as she started to tip forward. This grip was strong, but strange, a cloth texture wrapped over the fingers. Another came a moment later on her other thigh, fighting hard against her body’s forward motion.
Rose hung there, almost out the window, and those grips dug in tighter to her skin. She cried out, unaware that she was even whimpering now, trying to escape this—this—whatever it was.
They seized her and dragged her back through the window, all pretense of being gentle dispensed with. She struggled as they reeled her back in, and someone punched her in the back after she’d rattled the window fearfully by bucking against it. The glass shattered and showered her with a few flecks that cut at her, but she ignored the pain. She was crying already. Someone threw the window frame open full, and now there were enough cloth-clad hands on her that they dragged her back in easily.