THE MOON SHONE through the trees, scattering coins of light over their feet. The clouds above the gamekeeper’s shack were a flat, tarnished silver, and the grass moved like a rippling pond.
Sep blinked his hair away as it struck his eyes.
“I thought you wanted to come here when it was light,” said Lamb, looking around nervously.
“Maybe you didn’t drive quickly enough,” said Sep, snapping his head toward the sound of rustling leaves. “Jesus, you can’t bring that with you!”
Arkle was walking on lopsided legs, dragging himself along the hedge and hugging the inside-out squirrel. It hung wet and heavy in his arms, like a towel lifted from a washing machine.
“I’m going to call her Rosemary,” he said, a blissful smile on his face.
“I’m serious—you need to put it down,” said Sep.
“You’re not my dad, shiny-shoes,” said Arkle, his nose in the air. “And so, so, so what if I want a bagel?”
“Arkle, you’re not making sense,” said Sep. “That thing’s all rotten, and it was probably killed by the box. Who knows what it might do?”
“You think that was the box too?” said Hadley.
Sep looked at her. “What else would turn it inside out?”
“Well, she’s mine now,” said Arkle, wobbling as he leaned away. “I’m going to keep her forever, September October November December.”
Mack shook his head. “Just let him keep it.”
“Come on, Rosemary,” said Arkle, holding the glistening lump against his chest. “Can I have a bagel, though? For realsies?”
“Sure,” said Sep.
The forest’s nighttime whispers—the creaks of settling wood and the skitter of falling briars—surrounded them. The shack was dark, its doors and windows closed.
Lamb bit the inside of her bottom lip. “Something’s not right.”
“Well, we’ve come this far. We should—”
“Sep, we came to get help, but Roxburgh’s obviously not here! This is too dangerous, it’s too dark, and we’re too far from the truck—let’s go back.”
Sep looked at the little house. It was obviously empty. But something tugged at his thoughts, like clothes snagging on a thorn.
“But what if he needs our help?” he said. “Like, he’s lying in a pool of blood and can’t reach the phone?”
“He probably doesn’t even have a phone,” said Lamb.
“Whose point are you making?” said Sep. “If he doesn’t have a phone we definitely need to help him.”
She shook her head.
“This is dangerous, Sep. Don’t be reckless. He’s not here. He’s probably wandering around the woods, shooting things and spitting.”
“Me and Rosemary want to go to the car,” said Arkle.
“Fine. Well, I’m going to see if he’s in there,” said Sep. “Who’s coming with me?”
Arkle tripped into Mack’s arms.
“I’m going to take him to the car now,” said Mack, lifting Arkle over his shoulder. “If something happens, I don’t want to have to run while I’m carrying him. You can catch us up, right?”
“Yeah. I’ll be as quick as I can,” said Sep reluctantly.
Lamb shook her head, then followed Arkle and Mack.
Hadley looked agonized. “You can’t go on your own.”
A little knot tightened in Sep’s chest. “Thank you,” he said.
He helped her over a puddle, holding her hand a moment longer than he had to, then they stood in the darkness, listening to each other’s breathing and peering through the gloom. The shack was square and black and surrounded by the stumps of trees.
“If he’s really not there, then we’ll leave, all right? I promise,” said Sep. “I just feel like something’s happened to him.”
“It’s so creepy,” said Hadley. Her voice wavered, and she moved closer to him.
“What?”
“I said it’s creepy.”
Sep brushed against her arm. “Are you all right?”
“Not really. I feel weak and dizzy, like all my energy’s leaking out of me.”
“It’s the box; it’s trying everything it can to hurt us. That was something else Maguire told me: I was right about my tooth, but it’s not the crows that are making it hurt—it’s the rot.”
“What do you mean?”
“The box makes things decay; that’s how it reaches into the world—all those dead things on the ground, and the stink that was on Barnaby. My rotten tooth is connected to that—I’m tuned to the box’s frequency, and my tooth is dragging the signal through my deaf ear.”
“Bet you wish you didn’t eat so much rock candy now.”
Sep laughed, and as they approached the shack on delicate feet, Hadley slipped her hand into his.
“How did you go deaf?” she said.
He looked at her. The gloom reduced her face to a flat mask, and he saw only her eyes, nostrils, and mouth.
“You’re asking me now?”
“I’m scared,” she said, swallowing hard. “Tell me something that’s not about this.”
Sep looked at Roxburgh’s door. Instead of being tightly shut as it had appeared, it was slightly open. The frail noise of a radio came from inside, like a wasp in a jar.
“My mum was with this guy for a while when I was little,” he said. “All I remember about him is that he shouted at my mum, and he was loud. One time he was so loud, I started packing my ear with mud from the garden.”
“So your ear’s full of mud?” Hadley whispered.
“What? No. It—it got infected.”
“Oh.”
They laughed silently, and the world seemed real again, just for a second.
“Are you ready?”
“No.”
“Well, let’s go anyway,” said Sep, and edged toward the steps.