I grip the shard violently, foot sliding in cave dust, sweat and rot dripping from overhead. I pull the weak Spear shard, place its tip to my side—just below the ribs. It’s cold, harsh. I press it in. Pain cracks through me; hot and sharp.
A breath rips from me. I taste blood. I don’t pull it out. I let it sink.
The connection sears. The Veil fractures wide in front of me—light bleeding through the tears, rotting lights trailing in from the other side. I stumble forward. Peggy Sue lunges, but I step into it.
I fall through. What I find is Walnut Falls, but broken.
Streetlights bent like broken spines. Sidewalks cracked, fountains dry and splintered. The fairgrounds—burnt tents, burned-out glow of lanterns, carnivals cages empty. Shadows flit where people once laughed—half-seen figures dragging themselves. Faces twisted, eyes glowing with hollow hunger. Mothers calling for children that never answer.
The scent of ash, rot, gasoline, loss. The air tastes of dusk and dawn mixed together wrong. My bones ache with longing.
I can still hear him—Kursk—somewhere in this echo. His whisper caught in wind-withered leaves, his footstep in broken boards.
“Here,” I call, voice cracking. “Kursk!”
The undead shadows shift. They moan low, fingernails scraping concrete. One turns.
The world inside the Veil smells of dust and echoes. My breath comes ragged, mixing with Kursk’s shallow wheeze as I find him—half-slumped against a broken beam, his skin pale under the flicker of that twisted, dripping light. The Vorfaluka hovers over him, phantom arms wrapping air, voices layering: one like ice, one like fire. One calling his name; the other promising oblivion.
“Kursk!” I stagger forward. My hand presses his shoulder. His eyes open—one face looking back at me through smeared rot, lips cracked, breathing shallow. I taste copper. He tries to grin but pain steals the shape. The beast’s shadow ripples over his chest, feeding on some part of him I can feel too: the soul, the fire, everything he used to be.
The amplifier wagon sits half-buried in shattered stone, cables trailing like wounded snakes. I crawl toward it, trying to steady my hand. My legs burn; the shard-Spear wound throbs in his side. I lean in, fingers fumbling with switches. Sparks flick, metal groans, and then—hope. The amp roars to life. The 12-bar blues chain rigged from before—Booger’s setup—sputters through the speakers carried in with me inside the Veil.
The cavern shakes. Stone above cracks. Fungus overhead pulses sickly green. The voices of the Vorfaluka twist, wail in protest. Kursk tries to rise; pain sharp as broken glass, but strength flickers back in his eyes.
“You still with me?” I shout, voice raw.
He nods, though his skin glistens with sweat and ichor. “Always.”
The beast’s dual faces swivel. One snarls at me, the other sneers at Kursk. Its limbs lash out. It summons more shadows—hands bare knuckles dragging through the Veil air, trying to pull me back.
I raise a flashlight—one I carried in, old, cracked lens but still able to burn with brightness. I switch it to the strobe-mode. I point it at one of the Vorfaluka’s faces—the one that whispers soft seduction, the voice that once mimicked my brother dying. Light flickers against slimed skin and fissured eyes. Flesh splits where light touches; that face howls, squints, recoils.
“Now, Kursk!” I yell, voice breaking.
He staggers upright, spear in hand, muscles trembling, veins black-lined. Pain tears through him with each step but something fiercer drives him: hope, love, righteous fury. I don’t think about what comes after. I think only this moment.
The Vorfaluka claws at the shadows, its handsome side weeping, the other snarling. It lashes a corrupted limb at Olivia—no, at me—trying to silence the light. I duck, stumble, drop the flashlight. It rolls over rock, strobing unpredictably. I snatch it back, blind with courage.
Kursk charges. The spear arcs like lightning: sharp, intent. He shoves it through both of the Vorfaluka’s faces—one face screaming in betrayal, the other shrieking in suffering. Screams echo. Flesh splits. Rotted sinew parts. Voices tear. The shockwave knocks us both back—stone dust rains, air rips with pain.
I see Kursk’s face—one eye clear, one dripping with ruin. He pulls the spear clear, twisting with all his might. The shriek rips through the Veil like metal tearing. It’s one voice? Two? Warped, stretched into something no creature was ever meantto reproduce. Kursk’s shoulders shake as the Vorfaluka dissolves before us—rot dripping away, flesh peeling into shadow, those dual faces screaming and then silent. The fungal walls retract; shadows spool back into nothingness. The cavern hums, a low electric buzz, like the last heartbeat of something unnatural.
Light burns in my eyes—whiter than anything I remember. Sparks, shards of corrupted stone detaching and floating for a moment, then falling into oblivion. The scent of ozone and acid and holy smoke echoes in nostrils. Dirt tastes dusty, bitter. My heart gallops, like the wings of trapped birds.
Beside me, Kursk stands, spear in hand, blade glowing bright-white, veins of pure light running along the edge, pulsing in cadence with the roar of dissolving Veil. He looks exhausted. His shirt is torn; skin scorched; blood crusted. But there’s fire in his eyes.
“It’s collapsing,” he says, voice cavernous with effort. “The Veil—if I don’t stay… it won’t seal.”
I step forward. “You don’t have to stay,” I say, flesh pressed against heat, sweat slick on my skin. My voice breaks. “We finish thistogether. You leave with me.”
Dust falls in ash motes. The air sizzles. I can feel the pressure—the Veil, like living fabric, tearing. Sound unravels; reality frays at edges.
He lifts his hand, the spear’s glow nearly blinding. “Olivia—if I step away?—”
“No,” I cut him off. My voice louder than the collapse, louder than fear. “If you step away, I never forgive myself.”
I throw myself into his arms. His chest is hot; I feel his heart hammering. His breath catches, ragged. I clutch him close. I can taste his sweat, the tang of metal and ash. His hair is dusty; his skin scorched. His hands tremble on my back.
