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Chapter Ten

Valli

For the last three weeks, we have been fully focused on Harvest Moon preparation, and tonight we will see all our hard work pay off. I have barely seen my men lately. Every night I fell into bed and was out cold as soon as my head hit the pillow, then I was up again before the sun.

Cave has been training and running test after test to make sure he is ready. Cipher has been buried in generators and backup systems because Nixie is leaving no room for error. Noa has been getting the cemetery ready and helping people in other zones.

I miss them and can’t wait to be able to breathe again. After tonight, everything goes back to normal, or our version of it anyway.

Tonight the island doesn’t look like it normally does; it looks possessed. Every zone is live and every hunter on the island is out. Tonight there are no wristbands, and the people who visit will be pushed to their limit, to the point that they might regret ever signing up. They have paid to scream, and Nixie calls those screams the sound of money.

Everyone who steps through those gates tonight will have their fears thrown at them. Each person had extensive background checks run, and experts have gone over them and picked them apart. Some hunters have targets, but everyone has been briefed on each person’s fears to play into, faces to remember.

As people arrive and everything transforms in front of my eyes, it’s amazing seeing all the hard work pay off. Time blurs, and Nixie and I become a two-woman army. Guest check-ins, rotation changes, a sprained ankle in one of the mazes, a VIP guest who wanted to negotiate his limits mid-event.

“Breathe,” Nixie tells me at around one in the morning, pressing a coffee into my hand. “Look around and see how magical it is.”

Looking around and across the grounds, I can see the cornfield, where the queue wraps around the cemetery fence. Grown adults are waiting an hour to be hunted by the Scarecrow, who is normally off-limits. From this viewpoint, I can see the stalks moving and know he is doing exactly what we made sure he is comfortable doing. Every few minutes a guest breaks free from the stalks—some leave crying, others laughing.

My chest tightens, knowing he is mine.

By four in the morning, the night is winding down. The last session is running through, and guests are drifting toward the courtesy buses ready to take them across to their accommodation.

Nixie finally lets me off the hook. “Nothing is on fire. You’re now off the clock.”

I have no idea where Noa and Cipher are, so I cut down Sideshow Alley, where all the stalls are now closed, but the hairs on my arms stand on end.

I don’t see anyone when I scan my surroundings, yet I swear I feel them watching me. But I shake it off. It’s the atmosphere, being in complete darkness, and working for almost sixteen hours straight.

My phone rings, and Leni’s number flashes on my screen. It’s four a.m., so my stomach drops. You do not call people at this time with good news.

“Len, what’s wrong?”

“Valli,” she whispers. “Help me. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come. I wanted to surprise you, but it’s so dark.”

“Come? Where are you?”

“I’m on the island—there are headstones. Valli, I think someone is out there.”

The line drops out, and all ability to think rationally leaves my body.

I run, diving off the path and heading down the back toward the cemetery. My heart is trying to exit through my throat in the two minutes I take to sprint to the gate. My baby sister is somewhere in the dark, and it’s tonight of all nights that she comes. The one when the hunters think everyone is fair game, and she has no idea what we do here.

“LENI!”

The gate is open, and the lights we normally use here are off.

I switch on my phone’s flashlight, but three steps into the cemetery it dies, turning my surroundings to pitch black. I keep walking, allowing my eyes to adjust, all the while feeling someone watching me. Then I push into a run, hoping Leni will see me, but pull to a halt when something drops in front of me. My scream shatters the air as I come to a stop, then slowly back up.

A hand comes over my mouth, and a second person catches my legs as I kick out. Something is pulled over my head, and I am sent back to that day. Every fear is coming back to haunt me.

There is no way I will give up so easily, not when my sister is here. So I fight, buck, and kick as I’m carried away.

“Let me go!” I scream, though it’s muffled by the fabric. “You have no idea what will happen when they find you.”

Terror washes over me when I think about what my men will do when they can’t find me. This is not what they need right now. I have to fight; I am not weak.

As I’m carried away, a scent I’d know anywhere hits me, but the fear doesn’t leave me all at once. Relief crashes into me first, then a half-sob, half-laugh merges into an anger that holds no real weight. “I’m going to kill all three of you!”