Harlan pointed at them both through the windshield, then pointed toward town. He cranked his wheel and turned back toward the street and was gone.
“Sleep?” Timber said. “Who needs sleep?”
They threw their equipment into the back of Canyon’s truck, tied it down quickly, and sped after Harlan.
35—Too Scared to Sleep
Sage woke from a light sleep, instantly alert, unsure what had woken her. She fervently checked the next bunk for her young daughter. Paisley was there, sleeping soundly, thank Rhen.Her long brown hair was fanned out behind her on the pillow, her small body curled into a tiny ball under the blankets.
Sage put her head back on her pillow and tried to relax. She was on her side fully dressed to the shoes, a light blanket on top of her. She blinked in the darkness, listening intently. She wasn’t home, she was up Morning Bluff, at the Inn, with her family, in lockdown.
The large room was dark, and sleep-quiet, with starlight casting shadows. The location of the constellations out the windows told her the time was around 5 a.m.
“Khain’s in the Ula,” someone whispered to her left. “I can feel him.”
Someone gasped. Someone else started crying—a child. Sage instantly felt nauseous.Here we go again, she thought, hoping Paisley would stay asleep.
Sage and a few dozen members of her extendedfamily were bunking together in an open-bay room of a large building at the northwest boundary of The Morning Wood Inn. They were in lockdown, and had been for days, all of them together hiding from the demon that stalked thefoxenin Serenity, plucking them like fruit from a vine.
Sage sat still and quiet, a strange mix of fear, trepidation, and liquid rage swimming through her. How dare Khain? Howdare he? She would kill him if she could. If she could shift, she would hunt him down, she would—
A few feet past Paisley, Frannie stirred in her bunk. She woke, and the first thing she did was look for Paisley. Finding her safe and asleep in her bunk, she met Sage’s eyes.
“What’s going on?” she whispered.
Sage raised her eyebrows in a you-know-what expression. The crying went on and on in the dark.
“Shhh,” a voice whispered. It was Mina, who slept across the room near others her age, and a few of the younger children. “He’s not going to find us,” Mina said in a loud whisper. “He hasn’t found us yet and he’s not going to find us this time. Nana White knows what she’s doing. You can go back to sleep.”
“I’m too scared to sleep,” the crier whispered back.
A few people murmured at that, then several of them got up and moved about, comforting the crier and each other. They pushed the bunks closer together. They hung blankets and talked quietly. The crying slowed, then stopped.
Sage threw off her blanket and got up silently, meaning to go talk to some of the aunts and uncles and get their read on the situation, but someone was already hurrying over to her. It was Mina. She grabbed Sage by the elbow and whispered directly in her ear.
“Sage, please make sure Abigail is on the grounds.”
“Okay,” Sage whispered. She found Mina’s hand and squeezed it once. Mina squeezed back. They held on tight for a second, then Mina let go.
“I’ll stay with Paisley,” Mina said.
“’Thanks,” Sage whispered. She hurried toward the front room where Nana White had set up temporary operations, threading her way through rows of empty military-standard bunk beds set up like corridors and storage cubbies. Nana Whitehad a military surplus obsession. If the military didn’t want it anymore, Nana White did.
Sage made it around the last bed, meaning to knock, but the door was already partway open. The lights were on inside the office, and something magical sat just inside the doorway on a table, catching Sage’s eye. She stopped just outside the doorway, mesmerized.
The thing was small, the size and shape of a snow globe, and it even looked like a snow globe—but one alive with power and energy. Sage sank down to its level, transfixed, not daring to get any closer. Nana White collected everything, and she especially liked crazy crap like this, anything that looked like it might set your house on fire or maybe fry your brains if you got too close.
Sage studied the thing from a distance. It had a thick wooden base that would fit in the palm of your hand. The top of it, the snow globe part, looked like lightning in a bottle. It was slightly opaque, enclosing a landscape of some sort, a landscape that looked a lot like—Sage forgot her wariness and leaned in closer, surprise and delight filling her. The landscape was the entire top of the bluff including the sinkhole and the buildings of The Morning Wood Inn!
The Inn was large and sprawling and situated right at the top of the Morning Bluff just north of Serenity, and here it was replicated down to the last building. The tiny toy cabins of the snow globe were no bigger than pencil erasers. The tiny trees and plants of the grounds were like grains of rice. The sinkhole itself was the size of a quarter, and then the forest took up the rest of the visible landscape. Her eyes traced every detail, while her fingers itched to touch the circular lightning. Was it electric? Would it shock her? Burn her? Or fill her with power? Would it make a sound? Would Nana White know?
A phone rang inside the office and Sage froze, crouched just outside the door.
Nana White answered it, her voice dry and irritated. “Eldred.”
She was silent for a beat. Sage held her breath, caught between an urge to leave and an urge to stay.
Nana White spoke again. “We know he’s here. No, I don't want you here. No, I don't want any of your mongrel curs here either. When we find him, you personally will wait at the maintenance entrance and Number Six will bring him to you.”
