The pressure on my boot was relentless. I slid back into the heart of the cluster of Hosts, my chest and stomach skating over ice. My chin bumped along the ground.
I looked back at Patrick. His gun was aimed, but if he fired, the pellets would tear into me, too. I rolled over and hammered my heel into the Chaser. She recoiled, readjusting her grip, and I yanked my foot free.
The others dove in at me from both sides.
Alex thrust her hockey stick toward me, and I grabbed at the slanted blade with numb fingers. She ripped me forward just before the Hosts piled onto me.
By some miracle I held on.
Fingers brushed the back of my shirt as I jetted out of the embrace of the mob. One of them tore at my sleeve and came away with a swatch of fabric.
Alex shot me like a puck onto the slick patch of open ground before the widow’s porch. I spun in a half circle, the snow-filled night sky rotating crazily overhead. Patrick and Alex were running backward toward me, holding off the seething tide of Hosts. Barely.
I shot to my feet.
The porch was about fifty yards away now.
Not a speck of cover.
The Hosts’ gurgles rose in a terrible chorus as they bunched in the snow, a wave ready to break.
It broke.
They bounded at us.
We turned and ran.
Their ragged breath chased us. The tapping of footfall quickened. Snow streaked my vision. Patrick jacked the shotgun.
“Now!” he yelled.
We spun around. The Hosts, blurs against the whiteness. Feet away.
Patrick leveled the Winchester.
Another noise rose above the din.
Howling.
Dog howling.
The Hosts spun, disoriented by the noise.
Ridgebacks barreled out of the trees on either side of the front yard, arrowing in at the Hosts. A perfectly executed attack.
After all, they were bred to hunt lions.
Tanner hit first, bulldozing the biggest Mapper, knocking him right off his legs. Deja and Princess lasered in on the Chaser who had grabbed me. Grace had one of the others by the scruff of the neck, whipping her head back and forth. Cassius held the rest at bay. He straightened his front legs and sank down behind them, ready to pounce, his square head lowered. He was issuing a rumble of a growl that would’ve frozen a grizzly.
Cassius drew himself back up to his full height, the rumble growing even louder, an animal sound that drowned out the animal sounds of the Hosts.
Then he lunged.
Tanner streaked into the mob after him.
We watched the ridgebacks dismember the Hosts. It felt like watching a massacre. At last the dogs paused, staring at the streamers of mist, but no more Hosts emerged from the snow.
It was over.
The ridgies circled us, wagging their tails, nuzzling our palms. A victory dance. We petted them in long strokes along their sides—their reward.
The celebration was cut short.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Where’s Atticus?”
I looked around, growing frantic.
I pictured the last time I’d seen him. He’d been limping. I thought about how much losing a step could cost you in the wild.
My gaze moved from dog to dog, and then I searched among the trees. Cassius sat in front of me and cocked his head, his forehead wrinkled in that distinctive ridgeback way.
“Why didn’t you protect your brother?” My voice rose with emotion. “You had one job—one job more important than any other. And that was to protect your brother.”
The dogs were cowering, and I realized I was yelling.
A sting of guilt now, to add to the grief.
“Brothers always protect each other,” I said. “No matter what.”
Patrick rested a hand on my shoulder. “Chance,” he said. “It’s not their fault.”
Alex scratched Cassius’s head and then Deja’s.
But the dogs were still shifting from paw to paw, their tails tucked, looking at me. Uncomfortable, upset. After all, I was the one who’d raised them.
I lowered to my knees and held out my arms. The dogs crowded in, leaning against me, and I hugged them, buried my face in their fur.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Good dogs. Good, good dogs.”
“Why don’t we bring them inside?” Patrick said. “Give them some food.”
I rose, and we walked to the house. The dogs loped along beside us. When we stepped up onto the porch, they halted.
Alex opened the door, and we turned back.
The dogs stared at us, waiting. They were panting, wearing big dog smiles. Their breath misted the air.
A familiar sadness tugged at my chest. No matter how many times it happened, I couldn’t get used to this part. But I had to.
“Release,” I told them.
They bounded off into the forest again, playing and nipping at one another. A blast of snow sheeted the air, and when it cleared, they were gone.
Alex and Patrick were already inside, the door left ajar for me. I took a moment to gather myself and then stepped in after them.
They were standing frozen in the foyer. I almost bumped into Patrick.
I said, “What are you—”
Patrick raised a finger to his lips.
A scraping sound carried up the stairs from the basement, as unsettling as the tines of a fork across a plate.
It wasn’t the Widow Latrell. She’d headed into town at the beginning, along with most of the other Hosts. In a fight for our lives, Patrick had kicked her into the forge. We’d watched her burn, watched the flesh of her neck bubble as sparks flew up all around her. She was long gone.
Which prompted the question:
What was down in the basement?