Corbin looked thoughtful. “I don’t think wehaveto. I think this is your place, and if you don’t want to, then you don’t have to. But whatever is in the woods… It isn’t… pleasant. I think it will be there until you deal with it.”
I huffed a sigh. Yeah, he was probably right. It didn’tfeelpleasant. It felt like dark clouds and gloom, and even if I wanted to, I wasn’t sure I could make the sun shine right now. (It was usually overcast and a bit foggy here until I cleared up the weather. That was fine—fog was cool looking.)
I turned and walked into the forest, and Corbin and Crow followed behind. We didn’t talk much as we walked, and following the path led me closer and closer to the icky feeling. We walked in silence for a few minutes before we came upon a bend in the path. There were large boulders a bit taller than Corbin blocking the way.
Whatever was icky was hiding behind the rocks.
Before I could stop him, Corbin stepped off the path and walked around the rocks, coming out on the other side perfectly fine.
“They’re encased inside. My guess is you’ve had them there since everything happened. I don’t know if they’re waking up, or if you’re just ready to deal with them. I’m not sure why we didn’t notice them before, because I can definitely smell the rot now.You don’t carry them with you out in the world, so this must be an actual place and not just a part of your mind,” he said, staring at the stone.
“Huh?” I mumbled. What the fuck was he talking about? What was encased in the stone? And if it was rotten, why didn’t I smell it?
Corbin looked at me, explaining, “There’s someone very bad inside. I think you can let them out. I should have realized that you reaped them, but I don’t know how any of this works. If it works the way I think it does, there will be another stone encasing another person somewhere else in the forest.”
“If they’re very bad, why would I let them out?” I asked. After all, being trapped in stone seemed like a good place for someone who was “very bad.”
Corbin looked thoughtful, and Crow cawed. She flew up onto the stone and pecked at it. I had the urge to shoo her away from it, and I wasn’t even sure why.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But you came here for a reason.”
I looked back at the rocks. Yes, I supposed I had come here for a reason. I lifted my staff, but before I could do anything else, Corbin put a hand on my arm. I looked over at him.
“I think… I think once they’re free, I won’t be able to speak to you anymore. I know this is your place, but can you let me deal with them? Can you trust me to do the right thing?”
I looked at him, surprised. “Of course I trust you, Corbin. But I don’t want you to have to deal with… whatever this is.”
He smiled. “It’s my job, Little Reaper. All you have to do is give me permission.”
As if the words were some sort of signal, the stone began cracking. I looked at it to see it falling away, and when I looked back, Corbin was gone and the hellhound was in his place. It still kinda felt like Corbin, though. He wagged his tail at me, then helooked back at the stone and growled. Flames spurted up along his back.
Well, that was kind of cool. They weren’t just red—it looked like one of those campfire things that made colors appear in the fire. The flames were small but beautiful and mesmerizing.
He growled again, and I looked back at the stone. The boulders were gone, crumbled to the ground, and where they had been stood a man. He was frozen in place, just like the son who’d been fighting with his dad. I recognized him after just a moment. He was the man from the cult house—the one who’d died that day when I’d been kidnapped. Corbin (the hellhound version) stopped growling and tilted his head, and Crow cawed.
“Oh,” I said, looking at the guy. “It’s the old guy from the cult house who was being held hostage with me.”
Although he didn’t exactly look like an old guy anymore. The man at the cult house had been wrinkled and shriveled, mere skin and bones. I’d been so mad at the time thinking how they must have tortured him, but he didn’t look so bad now. Yeah, he still looked old, but he looked healthy.
I looked down at Hellhound Corbin, and he looked up at me. His head tilted again and his tongue panted for a second, and I got the impression that this guy wasn’t what he was expecting.
“Huh. I thought it was a very bad person in there?” I asked. “This guy was being tortured by the very bad people.”
Corbin looked back at the figure and growled again, and the flames on his back spurted higher for a moment.
It was like a lightbulb went off in my head. This was Aiden’s grandfather. This was the man who was apparently looking for him in order to kill him. Or maybe he’d told Aiden’s brother to go kill him? I couldn’t remember all the details—but I was pretty sure hewasa bad man, despite what had happened to him.
I took a step forward, knowing Hellhound Corbin would come with me.
The man blinked his eyes, and he looked at me. He straightened up and sniffed disdainfully. He looked like he was someone who would wear cufflinks and a tie to breakfast, like he was kind of snooty. I felt an immediate dislike for him and stepped back.
“Where am I? You cannot hold me,” he stated, a sneer appearing on his face as he looked around.
“You’re dead,” I answered.
He laughed, and it wasn’t a nice sound. He sounded mean, like a bully. “I can’t die, boy.”
Corbin growled next to me. I kind of didn’t know what to say.
