Ahead of me, trees swayed and crashed. Behind me, my sisters' shouts faded.
I ran, panting, up the hill. “I can fix this.” All I had to do was get the thing to look into the mirror, humming in my slick hands.
And not fall on my scissors.
Somewhere in front of me, a dog howled. There was a yelp and a whimper.
“No, no, no. Leave the dog alone!” I cursed and ran faster, through yards and across streets. But baby weight and lack of exercise slowed me down, strained my lungs.
Footsteps pounded behind me.
A sharp ache pierced my chest. “I'm here, Jayce! Lenore,” I shouted, not slowing.
At last, I hit a downslope, and my speed increased. I raced between two backyards and emerged at the north end of Doyle’s little downtown, where businesses and houses mixed.
There was a shrill scream.
I whirled. Tall pines swayed behind a neat bungalow. I raced through the open gate.
Another scream, from the backyard.
Cramp squeezing my side, I pounded around the side of the house and stopped short, rooted to the lawn.
A mummy flailed between lines for laundry. Sheets and clothing encased what must have been a woman and obscured all but her hands and feet. A lacy bra snapped from one of the lines and wrapped around her neck. Her shriek turned to a gurgle.
I relaxed my gaze.
The inky, tentacular knot hovered above her, its long arms twisting in a bizarre dance.
I shakily adjusted the mirror, resting it along my arm and bracing it with my chest, so as not to obscure its black surface.
Yanking the scissors from my belt, I aimed them at the thought form.
I licked my upper lip. “Azathoth,” I gasped. “I command you into–” Thick fabric wrapped around my head, smothering, blinding.
Frantic, I adjusted my grip on the mirror. Something struck my shoulder, and I staggered.
The mirror slipped from my grasp.
I dropped the scissors, fumbled the mirror. The mirror bounced off my fingertips, and there was a crash.
I gave a horrified, muffled shout. “No!”
The fabric sagged to my shoulders. I flung the towel to the grass, scanned the yard.
The woman was on all fours, yanking the washing free and breathing in deep, ragged gasps.
Azathoth zipped over the pines and down the fire road behind the houses.
I'd swear it was laughing.
Pulse thudding dully in my throat, I stared down at the mirror. It had struck the single rock in the lawn and lay in pieces, glinting blackly in the watery sunlight.
There are moments when you know. You just… know. There’s no more doubt. No more fear. I knew I was going to end this and possibly die in the process. But that last part didn’t matter anymore.
I’d loosed something terrible into this world. It had been an accident. I’d been trying to do the opposite. But I couldn’t argue the results. And my family and friends, my town, were not going to pay the price for my mistake.
I swore. “Hex this.”
Grabbing the biggest shard, I ran after Azathoth, down a tree-lined road.
The stitch grew in my side, agonizing. Would the mirror even work after it had been broken?
I’d make it work. Energy buzzed faintly in my hand. Was I imagining that tingle?
A whistle shrilled, and my heart stopped.
The daycare center. The children. Other people's children. Children who were loved as desperately as Nick and I loved Mitch and Emmie.
The mirror's edge bit into my palm. “Azathoth!”
I turned off the road. Barreling through a stand of pines, I raced to the low, chain link fence that surrounded the center's red barn.
Two older women herded the toddlers, bundled in colorful parkas, through the playground. Amy stood smiling in the open door, waiting.
But three toddlers had been left behind. They sat on the ground, confused, terrified looks on their faces. My jaw clenched to bite back a scream. They were turning blue.
I forced my gaze to relax.
The demon-thing hovered above the children, its murky tentacles wrapped around their necks. I took an involuntary step backward, my heartbeat thrashing in my ears.
“Stop!” I aimed the scissors at Azathoth, focusing my will, all my magic into their blades. My knuckles whitened. Ribbons of golden energy streamed from my heart into the scissors. Their handles heated.
Something wrapped around my neck and hauled me backward.
Hot breath warmed my ear. “What did you tell them?” Greg asked.
I struggled, off balance, unable to breathe, and nearly dropped the fragment of mirror.
“What did you tell them?” he demanded
One of the children fell to her side.
I flipped the scissors in my hand and rammed them behind me, into hard flesh.
Greg yelled and jerked backward, tearing the scissors from my grip.
I whirled. I needed those scissors.
His face a mask of fury, Greg yanked the blades from his thigh. “What did you tell Puck?”
I growled. “I need those scissors, Greg.”
“Don't worry, you'll get them.” One hand clutching his bloody jeans, he flipped them in his hands, pointing them at me. His hand wavered.
I relaxed my gaze and saw… scissors. Just scissors. The magical energy of the scissors was gone.
No. They were useless. I had to do something. I had to stop that thing.
I raced to the chain link fence.
One of the older women was walking toward the children, limp on the ground. Her face creased.
I unzipped my jacket and squeezed the mirror. Agony knifed through my hand. Blood dripped from my palm. I visualized its energy wrapping around the mirror, binding it to me.
“You want someone, Azathoth?” I thumped my chest with my free hand. “Take me!”
Azathoth's tentacles released around the children's necks.
“I invite you. I invoke you!”
An expression of alarm spread across the older woman’s face. She ran toward the children with a cry.
Azathoth bulleted toward me.
The children stirred, crying.
I twisted my palm outward, smacking the back of my hand against my solar plexus.
Azathoth slammed into the fragment of the mirror. The impact sent me staggering backward. Numbing cold sheeted over me. Gasping, I fell to my knees.
I wheezed. Had it taken me? Slowly, I lowered my hand, stared into the mirror. My blood seeped around its edges, and inside it...
My gaze relaxed. Something shifted, moved like liquid in the black glass. I opened my palm wide, gasping with pain as the glass pulled free of my skin.
Azathoth swam inside the fragment of mirror.
My knees buckled, and I fell on one hand.
It was over. We’d done it.
“Karin.” Greg's voice was faint, broken.
Dazed, I turned.
He knelt on the ground, his face white. “Something's wrong.” Blood streamed from the wound in his thigh.
“You shouldn't have pulled those scissors out,” I said wearily. Because of him, three children had nearly died. I wanted to crawl away. I wanted to let nature take its course.
But Greg hadn’t known about the children. And I wasn’t a killer.
I swallowed and staggered to standing, pressed my hand to my stomach…
I looked down.
My flat stomach. Well, mostly flat. A little curvy, but… I shook my head. Not the time. “Throw them over there.” I nodded toward a pine. “I'll try to keep you alive.”
He tossed the scissors to the base of the tree and tumbled onto his back.
“Help,” I shouted toward the daycare center. “There's an injured man back here.”
Carefully, I set the mirror fragment beside the scissors. I clumsily tugged off my jacket and pressed it against his thigh with my knee.
With my free, bloodied hands, I called nine-one-one.