“Marcella…?” I call, turning around and hoping to find the reflection was lying. But the room is empty. Quiet.
I hop off the counter, still in the same light blue gown from earlier. Stalking toward the bedroom, I stretch my neck to check the room beyond.
“Marcella, where are you?” I whisper, trying not to panic.
As I walk across the door’s threshold into the bedroom, everything quivers and blinks suddenly into something else.
I’m no longer in my room, I’m in a forest. Flooded with fog that obscures everything around me, turning even the closest trees into shadowed silhouettes.
I’ve been here before. In my dreams.
A snapping branch behind me propels me into a sprint, knowing what usually comes next. Gathering my skirts, I leap over fallen logs and rocks. That heavy weight on my shoulders following me like a ghost, the feeling of eyes locked on to my back.
“You cannot run from me.”The voice slithers through the forest around me, trembling the trees and sending ravens shooting off into the sky.
The forest suddenly grows quiet. Like someone told it to.
No matter how fast I run, it’s there behind me. Stalking slowly, with what feels like a smile on its curled lips. A warm breath constantly teasing the back of my neck.
I lose my footing on a root and fumble forward. Panicked breath coming in quick pants as I flick a quick look over my shoulder at the fog creeping closer.
“Come on!” I’m grabbed by the arm and jolted to my feet.
As I turn my attention to my savior, my jaw drops.
Marcella.What is she doing here?
“If you don’t move we’re both dead,” she growls, ripping my arm forward to prompt me.“Go!”
We both break into a run. She slows her pace to keep up with me. She leads me left, then right. Winding her way through the trees. Leaping over obstacles like she was born to do it. In the distance is that blasted ravine.
The ground drops dramatically below us, and we fall several feet off a ledge. Pain splices through me as I hit the dirt. Marcella scrambles up first, reaching for me.
I snag her arm. “Wait. It’ll follow us there.” I glance behind us to the ledge we fell from. It’s carved into a rocky overhang with gnarled black roots and dripping green moss draped over it. Yanking her back with me, we crawl underneath it, backs pressed to the rock.
A woman’s terrified scream ripples out in the forest before it’s cut short. Then a second one. A third. A fourth. I grip Marcella’s arm, fear shaking my limbs.
A heavy stamping of feet grows closer before there’s a hardthump. Out of the corner of our view is Stella on her belly, crawling forward with terror pinching her features.
“No, no, no, please!” she whimpers as something pins her to the ground just outside of our line of sight.
I jerk forward, wanting to help her somehow, but Marcella holds me back. Shaking her head.
Stella claws at the mossy, slick earth, crying until she’s dragged backward screaming. Ripping flesh and wet gurgling replace the sound of her scream, and I cover my mouth, trying not to cry.
A slow pool of blood seeps out.
She’s dead.
Oh, Gods…
Marcella pulls me back, her forearm bracing my chest as she withdraws her dagger.
A black-clawed mockery of a human hand, almost a paw, steps into the pool of blood.
The heavy weight I felt when running rushes over me again, stealing my breath. A pulling sensation tugs me forward, like I’m being beckoned. Lured forward with such strength that I’m pressing back into Marcella’s forearm. She snaps a look to me, then back at the creature,who begins to stalk through the puddle of blood. All four of its legs now visible.
“You cannot run from me,”the voice whispers around me.“I can smell your fear, Seer.”
