Absinthe. Just the absinthe.
“There’s a bag beneath the back window,” she says. “It has wine and chocolates. Now, if you insist on singing us a damn song, go for it.”
Silence. Then they say in unison, “Give us food. Give us wine. Then our song shall be thine.”
“I did!” Ava’s voice rises. “It’s right outside the window.” She jabs her finger toward the bedroom. “Go get it.”
Neither figure moves.
“Peyton,” Michael whispers.
Ava glances at him.
“It’s Peyton or Chris,” he says. “They’re both at the chalet tonight. They know where we’re staying, and they were there when you talked about the mummers. They set this up.”
He walks to the window. “Peyton sent you, didn’t she? Or Chris.” He glances back at Ava. “Maybe Jory. Your brother knows where we’re staying, doesn’t?—?”
The glass smashes. Four hands reach in and grab Michael. Grab and yank him off his feet so fast that he’s sailing out the window before Ava realizes what’s happening.
She snatches at his feet as they fly through, and she catches one, but the mummers easily rip it from her grasp.
She starts scrambling through the window, screaming for them to stop. She’ll give them what they want, whatever they want.
“Give us food. Give us wine. Then our song shall be thine.”
Their voices float back as they cross the snow at an impossible speed, Michael struggling and shouting as they drag him behind.
Ava wheels. Her gaze lights on the bottle. Not good enough. She flies into the kitchen and grabs a knife. Then she races out the door.
They’regone.
Completely gone.
Ava can’t even find tracks in the snow. She’s been out here for at least twenty minutes, walking and listening and trying to hold it together. Every whistle of the wind or cry of a bird has herjumping, knife raised. She’s long since lost feeling in her feet, but she never considers going back for her boots or coat.
As she walks, she thinks of earlier, envisioning a moonlight walk in the snow.
The perfect cap to a perfect evening.
She swallows back a gasping sob.
When she hears a grunt, she follows it, expecting to find an animal. Instead…
She isn’t sure what she’s seeing at first. The moon has disappeared behind cloud cover, and all she can make out is three figures standing in the forest. When she blinks hard, she sees white pillowcases over the heads of the two mummers. But it isn’t Michael between them. It’s a tree. They’re flanking a tree, and they’re…
Give us food. Give us wine. Then our song shall be thine.
One lifts a glass and takes a drink. The other pushes something into his mouth.
Michael. Where is?—?
The cloud passes, and the moonlight shines down, and she sees Michael. He’s tied to the tree. Bound and struggling, grunting against a gag.
Blood streams down his chest, glistening in the moonlight.
The first mummer presses his glass against a cut in Michael’s neck, filling it with blood. The other chomps down on Michael’s arm, ripping out a chunk of flesh and gobbling it down.
Ava runs at them, screaming, “No!”
