David turned and looked out toward the open field and railroad tracks. He considered trying to outrun it. We all knew the truth, though. As this hungry, dark shadow grew larger, it became faster, hungrier. There was no outrunning such a thing. He nearly turned and tried, when a tiny little hand reached out to him.
David grabbed at Darby’s outstretched arm and fingers and took hold with both hands as the death moved under him, moved past, growing so fast you could hear it eating away at all within its path. First just a crackle, then a rumble, then the thunderous anger of a tornado unleashed to feed.
People in white fell all around us, dropping to the ground with shouts and screams, their bodies turning to black faster than they could fall, dead before they hit the ground—five, ten, dozens.
Through it all, Stella remained at the center. Her fingers pulsing against the ground, her arms twitching under her, her body shaking uncontrollably.
The circle grew beyond the ruined concrete, burning through the surrounding grass and weeds like a flameless wildfire, leaving nothing but scorched earth in its wake. It reached the trees and the first fell, then another, another after that. Tall timbers dropping like bowling pins.
I thought it would go on forever, devouring all, a blanket of lifelessness pulled tight and cinched shut at the edges, and it felt like that, too. If someone had asked me, I would have said this went on for an hour, more than an hour, but in truth, it was all over in under a minute.
Stella fell.
She dropped to the ground in utter exhaustion.
The trees had been enough. Finally enough.
The world went silent, save for a train whistle somewhere in the distance.
The ground all around us was black. A giant, concentric circle of nothingness with Stella’s tired, defeated body lying in a heap at the center.
The people in white were gone.
All dead.
Unlike the bodies found in the past, burned but not burned, of these, there was nothing left. The energy that had burst from Stella, her hunger, her curse, drained away the life all around her absolute. There was a blackened dust, nothing more.
A raindrop struck my head, followed by another as the heavens opened and began cleansing Mother Earth before the stain of what happened here had a chance to set.
To my right, my father still grasped my hand, his eyes unimaginably wide as he looked out at the void left behind, as he looked from there, to Stella, to the ground beneath him and finally up at me.
Cammie, Preacher, and David looked out over the ravaged grounds of Carrie Furnace with equal awe, their heads swiveling.
Preacher was first to break from the reverie. He released Cammie and Darby’s hands and stood. He straightened his body and turned toward David, ready to attack.
David took a step back and opened his mouth, and not a sound came out. This seemed to surprise him. His eyes narrowed in confusion. His free hand went to his throat, his other still clasped in Darby’s tiny grip.
David’s mouth mimed a shout, a scream, yet nothing came out but the release of a used breath.
Darby looked up at him, squeezed his hand in hers, and smiled.
I think David realized what happened the same moment I did. He looked down at his hand in Darby’s—the girl who could not speak—her gift finally understood, her gift graciously shared with him.
He broke from her hand and backed away in complete silence as Cammie and my father stood, his spell on them broken. He tried to tell them to get back down, silently mouthing the words, but this did nothing.
David Pickford ran.
We watched him run toward the gully and disappear into the trees on the opposite side. All of us too exhausted to give chase.
The train whistle broke through the silence, much closer now.
I turned back to Stella in time to see her get to her feet. She too began to back away, she too mouthed silent words as tears streamed down her face, “I’m sorry, Jack. I’m so sorry. I love you, I always have, please know that.”
How she found the energy.
Where she found the energy, I may never know.
Stella ran toward the train tracks.
