"It's a bit like 'Dracula,' isn't it?" William said, propping his arm on the open car window.

Chloe side-eyed him as she pulled into Arcadia Drive and flipped on her headlights. "What are you talking about?"

"This. Hunting a creature who preys on women, who draws the life out of them to sustain his own. You're like Van Helsing, riding headlong to Dracula's castle."

"This isn't DnD," she muttered. "It's not an adventure, and I'm no fearless vampire hunter."

"I suppose not. Sorry. You're worried about Max."

"Putting it mildly." Chloe gripped the wheel tighter and tried to focus. The more she thought of Max alone with that murderer, the more she wanted to floor it. But she couldn't afford an accident now, not in her addled, sleepless state.

Instead, she peered into the darkness beyond the windshield. Night had stolen across town; street lamps had lit up all along the road, and to her left, the sun had disappeared into the sea, turning the horizon the color of dried blood.

But for another passing car, the avenue was oddly empty. She felt isolated—except of course for the man sitting in the passenger seat. She glanced over at him as her truck pushed deeper into town. The street lights seemed less real than he was as they passed over him, revealing then concealing his features.

"Are you even here, Dad?" she blurted out. "I mean, is this happening? Are you actually a ghost? Last time we were on a road trip like this, you pulled a disappearing act on me and I didn't hear from you for years. I was sure I imagined you."

"Does it matter?" He shrugged, eyes twinkling. "Whether I'm a spirit or your subconscious, I'm here for you." He shot her that familiar, innocent smile every time he mentioned something he thought was funny.

"I—" Chloe bit the inside of her cheek as she looked back to the dark road ahead. "I dunno, I guess I'm just tired of things not being real."

"I get that."

All around, the world was falling silent. No night birds singing, no rustle of leaves, no creak of the trees as they passed. Even her tires grinding on the road sounded distant and muted. Entropy, she thought. The gradual progression of everything from order to fuck-all.

"So…why are you here?"

"Oh, you know. Burnin' the midnight oil. Offering a little guidance. Standard dad stuff." His smile dampened a bit as a gravity settled in his eyes. "You need some help, kiddo—for a bit longer at least."

"No shit." Chloe turned her attention back to the road. "I'm up against a serial killer with a gun pointed at my girlfriend. Really puts things into perspective."

They passed the church, and after that, the cemetery. When she was younger, Chloe hated going near that place—it always felt like the headstones were pale eyes in the darkness, watching her as she passed.

"You can't fail," her dad abruptly said.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Dad," Chloe replied. "I know Rachel and I took out the Twins but—"

"No." He was staring right at her, the weight never leaving his gaze. "I'm saying you cannot fail, not with this. You must save Max. You must prevail. If you can't, daughter mine, the consequences will be dark and inescapable."

Chloe looked at him, at how the passing lamps moved him from light to shadow, light to shadow. "What are you saying, Dad?"

"That it all hinges on tonight. You, Rachel, Max, and this town."

Chloe turned the car down the dirt road that branched off from the avenue. A lifetime ago, she and Rachel had cut class and taken this same road to catch a train. It looked friendlier in the daytime. Less so now, with nothing but the moon above and her headlamps giving little islands of light to follow. Was she imagining it, or had the trees around her grown into towering giants? Anything could be waiting in their shadows, ready to catch an unwary girl by surprise.

As a kid, she'd always imagined werewolves hiding among those trees. Now, she knew better: werewolves hid among people, dressed up as fathers, uncles, cops, and lawyers. Sometimes they taught Photography in a preppy art school. Sometimes they preyed on women's dreams.

"Dad," she mumbled, "how much more of this do I have to do? I have to tell you…I'm scared. I've never been this scared in my life."

"I know, honey. It's alright. You're scared because you know what you're up against. But since there's no getting rid of the fear, you will have to do this scared."

"How? How can you be brave with something like this?"

The seriousness lifted from his eyes as he smiled. "You know better than I do, honey. You're the one who saved Rachel, after all. All I know is getting up early, going to work, putting food on the table, and coming back home at the end of the day to watch some TV with my daughter before hitting the hay. I think of that and I can do all it over again tomorrow.

"I'm just a squire, Chloe. You're the knight. You tell me how to be brave."

Before Chloe could think of another question, he turned his eyes front and said, "We're here."

Chloe stopped the truck. Up ahead, beside the road, her headlights revealed another vehicle, half-hidden behind a tree and covered with a green tarp. Both a good omen and a bad one.

Chloe's skin prickled. There was something else here. The softest movement of air, like the darkness itself was sighing.

With shaking hands, Chloe reached for her pistol and her flashlight. Stepping out of her truck, she crossed over to the other side and shone the light at the water tower. Her skin tightened around her as the pupils of her eyes dilated.

Beneath the red moon stood the tower, covered top to bottom in ravens. They perched on every square inch atop the chain-linked fence, crowded the roof of the concrete hut. As her cone of light crawled up the tower, it revealed more black bodies cramming themselves along the metal struts and every rung of the ladder. Here and there, one fluttered, stretched its wings, and rasped "Ra-ak," as if calling for more of its kind.

Chloe felt very small—a mouse in the grass, approaching the den of a predator.

"Don't be afraid, Chloe," her father said from the car behind her. "'A moment's courage, and it is done.'"

Chloe nodded once. What else was there to say?

Well, maybe one thing, in case she never got another chance.

"Dad? Whether or not any of this is real, even if you were never really here, I just wanna say…I'm glad I got to see you again." She paused and turned, smiling at him. "If I'm brave, I learned it all from you. It took someone like you to raise someone like me. I still miss you. I will, every single day of my life."

She couldn't see her dad's face through the shadow of the car, but he reached out and laid a hand on her shoulder. In a thick voice, he said, "Heaven's not enough without you there."

She touched his hand, and as ever, it was solid and warm. "Will I see you again after this?"

"Of course you will, honey. Of course." His hand fell away from her. "Now go on, Chloe. Go kill us a vampire."

Swallowing the painful knot in her throat, Chloe approached the tower.

There was hardly time to plan; the key now was not to get caught.

Max leaned forward and spit on the palm of her right hand, rubbing the moisture over her ring finger. She just needed enough to grease her skin. Using her thumb and pinkie, she started to work the ring up to her knuckle. And there...it got stuck.

She stopped pushing, gasping for breath, and eyed the door at the far end of the room. Whatever Jefferson was doing in there, Max was glad he was taking his time.

When they'd last visited, her grandmother commented that she'd grown way too thin. Well, here's the real test of how slim I got, Granny. Taking a breath and trapping it in her lungs, she pushed at the ring harder with her thumb. Just a little more and—

The damned thing popped over her knuckle and shot up her ring finger. Her heart leaped into her mouth as it slipped up to the very tip of the digit, spun a full circle, then slipped down to rest on the pad of her thumb.

She sighed as she held the ring up with her fingertips. One press of the catch and the curved blade popped out, glistening in the light like a smile.

Her heart was going wild; Max gulped down a deep few breaths to slow it down. She had to fight every urge to hurry. If she got careless and dropped her little lifeline, well, chances were good that no one was ever going to see her again.

And this wasn't even the hard part. With her wrists tied down, she couldn't reach the tape binding her limbs. She had to get creative.

Max leaned toward the ring as far as she could while simultaneously reaching up with her hand. The ring teetered at the edge of her fingertips; how she maintained her grip was some kind of miracle. Still, she pressed on, the muscles on her lower back protesting as she stretched—and stretched—and stretched—until her lips closed around the hook-shaped blade.

Her fingers let go of the ring and she straightened up, allowing it to fall right into her mouth. Horror rippled down her spine at the thought of accidentally swallowing the damned thing and screwing herself in every possible way. But the ring stayed trapped between her tongue and teeth. Her Caulfield luck still held.

Sweat beading her forehead, one eye on the door at the other side of the room, Max opened her mouth just a tad and pushed her tongue against the blunt side of the hook, slowly turning the ring till the blade stuck out of her mouth. Then she gripped the ring tightly between her teeth again.

Jefferson still hadn't emerged. Good. But now the real challenge had arrived.

Clenching on the tiny bit of metal, she bent toward her wrist again. There was no way to see what she was doing—she had to feel her way through, prodding the blade to where the tape met her skin. If she could just find the edge, slip the hook through…

The blade dug into her flesh, just above where the tape should be. Ow.

Max eased off and looked down. A bead of blood stood out on her pale, exposed flesh. She sighed; there was nothing else to do. Try again, Max.

She bent down and moved the blade closer to the tape. This time, it met and caught the edge. Inhaling fiercely through her nose, Max pulled it toward her elbow.

The hook tore into her skin. Wetness seeped between the tape and her flesh. She had cut herself. Don't do that again or else you'll be doing Jefferson's work for him, a voice inside her said. It sounded like her mom. Tears leaked beneath her lashes—she last saw her mom 48 hours ago, and she couldn't remember if she told her 'I love you.'

Focus, Max. Forget the pain and pull.

And she did. Breathing in bursts to control the pain, ignoring her aching back and the gashes on her wrists, she began to cut.

Cut.

Cut.

Cut.

Minutes passed that could have been hours. Max let herself breathe, air bursting from her lungs, saliva drenching her lips and chin. Her jaw hurt from clenching so hard. She straightened her aching back and looked down at her handiwork.

The blade had torn past two-thirds of the tape. Max hissed through her teeth as she forced her arm up. The rest of the tape ripped open and her bloody forearm came through.

Max couldn't stop the sob that escaped her lungs as she looked up, unbelieving, at her bleeding arm. The ache was nothing compared to the painful lump in her chest. I did it!

There was no time to celebrate. She took the ring from her mouth and slipped it back onto her finger. Wiping the blood off against the chair arm, she started cutting the tape binding her left wrist. It took no time at all and far less blood. Then she bent down and did her ankles, one after the other.

As the blade cut through the last of the tape on her right foot, the door on the far end of the room opened.

Max straightened up in her seat and pressed her wrists back against the armrest. With the fingers of her right hand, she rotated the ring so the blade pointed down and was hidden away. Then she stayed very still, like a lamb before a wolf, as her captor approached.

I'm in control.

Shaking deep in his skin, Mark Jefferson splashed water on his face before staring at the image in his bathroom mirror. A haggard face gazed back beneath the lonely orange light, the lines beneath his eyes proof that sleep was far from a friend. Death was actually closer.

"I am in control."

He forced the words out like a mantra. And though he had no time to lose, he lingered there before the mirror, staring into his own bloodshot eyes, fighting his own shivering flesh.

She's lying—lying! The wee bitch, the cunning little cunt, she thinks she can get the better of me. The better of me. The better of me.

But a part of him, a cold, logical part knew what the score was. He'd been right from the get-go: it was Rachel. She WAS the one who fit the profile. She WAS number one in a long list of suspects. Rachel was and had always been the Incarnate.

The trouble was, another part of him DIDN'T want it to be Rachel. That intuitive slice of his brain that sought poetry in patterns and images, his fingerspitzengefühl, saw Max's ingénue face, tasted the fear and recognition in her eyes, held up the cigarette case, and declared: it must be so.

And he'd been wrong! That scornful laugh of hers, that look overflowing with contempt! She couldn't have faked any of it! Now he was left standing under the fallout of his horrific mistake—

"I have this under control," he babbled to his image. "This is my life's work at stake. There must be a way to regain—"

There must be some kind of way out of here, said the joker to the thief

"I must cut and cut clean. Get rid of the girl, get out of town, before the Incarnate can find me."

He pressed the heels of his hand to his eyes. The world seemed off-kilter, like he was standing on a boat at sea. He could take to Maja's advice from earlier, leave now, disappear, and become nobody—

Nobody

Nobody

Controlcontrolcontrolcontrolcontrolcontrolcontrolcont olc ntrol o tr lc ntrolc ntr l ontro con o

Then the coldest part of him whispered, the girl is worth something to someone.

Jefferson wiped the sweat and stared down at his hands. "What? What? Stay? Fight?"

Max is the key. Why would she claim that the Incarnate would come looking for her if that witch didn't value her life?

"But I could be wrong again, overestimating things." His hands grabbed at his hair as if he could rip the intruding thoughts out of his head. "She could just be a tool. Nothing, no one, nothing at all!"

No, that can't be true. Rachel loved her friends, was too attached to the people in her life. She would come for Max.

"That's right," he muttered, grasping at that hope. It was a slim, silly hope, but it was the only one he had.

"Rachel would come. I have the bait. I just need the trap. She is worth something to someone, and I didn't come all this way to be destroyed by a bunch of children!"

Keep her alive, alive, alive, for now. Make her cooperate. And if she doesn't, well, Rachel only needs to THINK she's alive, right? And when her guard is down, strike, strike, STRIKE.

"Enough."

One look at his watch told him he had been gibbering in front of his mirror for more than half an hour. Enough was indeed enough.

Jefferson straightened up and tucked his shirt into his pants. Patting down his hair, he dragged in several deep breaths till his heartbeat slowed. Soon the voices in his head subsided.

Knock out the Caulfield girl, sit down, plan. Prepare for Rachel, come up with my demands. I can still win, still win, still win.

He looked at his hand and was gratified that he was no longer shaking. With that, he reached for the doorknob.

Chloe paused in front of the chain link fence and shone her flashlight all around. Attached to the fence was some kind of wordy warning sign, but she didn't bother with it. On the fence sat bird after bloated bird, all dark feathers and even darker eyes. Now and then one would croak, another would shake its feathers or flap its wings to keep its balance. But each held their positions like guards on the battlements.

No, that didn't feel right. More like guests waiting at a feast.

Yeah, let's not speed on that highway, Chloe. Especially since we're about to waltz into their territory.

"You're going to be alright, honey," her father's voice said in her head. "Don't make sudden movements or loud noises. Don't be afraid. Not here."

"A little late for that," Chloe muttered under her breath, which she realized was misting. The skin had puckered around her forearms and legs. Why was this place cold as a fucking walk-in freezer?

For a moment, she wasn't sure she could press on, but she imagined Max here, somewhere underground, even more terrified than she was and begging to be pulled out. That was enough; Chloe stepped through the gap in the fence, into the unknown.

Before her were the water tower's legs, and beside them, the square one-story building overlooking the train tracks. And lest she forget: ravens, roosting on the building's roof and high up on the tower's railing, their eyes converging on her.

There was also something else perched atop the tower, a silhouette of something large and looming that she dared not look at too closely.

Gulping, Chloe forced herself to think of Max—think only of Max—and approached the tower to check its base. She moved her flashlight beam in a slow circle, checking for anything resembling a trapdoor. Nothing.

Next, she peered through the building's windows. It looked like a shed containing desks and repair tools for the train tracks. No tracks on the floor's thick layer of dust. The floor looked solid—no seams to indicate a passageway.

Chloe tamped down on the panic in her chest as she circled the building and its grounds. "Dad," she whispered, clouds pouring out of her mouth, "there's nothing here."

"It's there," came his calm reply. "It must be."

She took another lap around the building, illuminating every object she could find. Large cable reels. Rust-covered steel drums. Concrete blocks. Stacks of replacement tracks abandoned by the railway. And grass. Plenty of grass.

"Dad, I can't find it!"

"Yes, you can."

"What if I can't?"

"You're close, Chloe. You just need to figure it out."

"I don't know where to look!"

Chloe stopped and leaned her back against the building, shivering, teeth chattering in the miserable cold. On the grass before her, a cluster of ravens sat in council, their heads pointed toward her.

"Pause a moment. Close your eyes and take a breath."

"I don't have time for this!"

"Please, Chloe, try. Close your eyes. When you open them, look again. Really LOOK."

There was nothing else to do. Chloe paused, rubbing her arms against her torso to help her blood circulate, and made her body relax. I can do this. I just need something to help me—

She opened her eyes and tilted her flashlight forward.

There were no more ravens on the grass. In their place stood a circle of dead girls.

Chloe's breathing went silent even as her heart thudded madly in her ears. Each of the girls was looking at her, though not all of them had eyes. Some wore the sallow, expressionless faces of cadavers, others had no more than rotting flesh hanging from their skulls. They wore the dresses they died in, torn skirts and faded tops marred by worm-eaten holes. The one standing before Chloe was burnt to the bone, her head no more than a mass of blackened flesh.

And yet, Chloe knew her. In part, she knew them all.

"Tell me," she whispered. "Tell me where he is."

As one, all the girls pointed pale fingers down on the ground between them.

Chloe fell forward on the grass, one hand shining her flashlight on the dirt, the other scouring the ground for something—anything—that could help. All the while, she tried not to think of all those eyes, all those dead girls—

Her fingers brushed against something metal.

She dropped her flashlight, grabbed the rusted steel handle, and pulled. Her shoulders clicked at the effort. Fake grass parted from the soil as the ground swung open, and wings fluttered all around her as a metal cover hit the ground. Gasping, Chloe shone her light down, revealing a short passageway illuminated by a dull red bulb.

At the bottom of the stairway, a solid steel door thumped like a frantic heart.

Max pressed her back against her chair, taking every bit of space to keep away from Jefferson. She kept her head level, but her eyes switched from him making his way to his desk to the torn duct tape bindings on her arm and the bright red blood underneath. There was no hiding any of it; all it would take was one glance.

Max had no choice but to attack.

He didn't look at her as he opened one of the drawers and started taking things out. Max's insides shriveled as he placed them on the tabletop next to his enormous Hasselblad camera: a small medicine bottle, a syringe, a pair of latex gloves. Not again.

"It was foolish of you to tell me all that, Max," he said calmly. "But I'm grateful. There's a parable about a monkey who threw a coconut at the head of a monk. The monk then cut open the coconut, drank the milk, ate the meat, and made a bowl of the shell."

Stop looking at your arm—stop looking at your arm—stop looking at your arm—

He plunged the syringe into the bottle and Max couldn't suppress the shudder that ran through her, as if the needle had already violated her flesh. She could barely think through the blood rushing through her head. She had no rewinds, no David coming to save her, no one who knew she was here. But she'd be damned if she'd let him take control of her ever again.

Let him get close. And then—

She clenched her fingers tighter together; the ring was hot and pulsing against her skin.

Her muscles tightened as Jefferson glanced at her once, but he noticed nothing amiss as he set the bottle down and held up the needle in his gloved hand.

"I'm glad you're so calm, Max. By now, most of my subjects would be crying and begging and making a mess of themselves. You truly are the perfect subject." He smiled. "But there's no need for that. Unlike that other Dark Room, there are no cameras in here. No one's watching, not Prescott, not Dionysus. It's only us."

Max realized panic was taking over; her limbs were seizing up and she was hyperventilating. She forced herself to swallow one shaky breath after another, just as Ms. Quinn had taught her. Forced herself to keep still, to wait.

Finally, he approached her, each step the languid motion of a jungle cat.

Wait.

"Ah, Max. If you had been the Incarnate, Dionysus would have taken you to an entirely different room. And I promise, your experiences here will be a pleasant getaway compared to the horrors they would've unleashed upon you there."

He was standing before her now, the needle held up against the light, in his eyes a tender gaze that sickened her. He was close yet not close enough.

Wait.

She sat up and held his gaze, letting him see the fear in her eyes. She even let out the tiniest whimper. It wasn't hard.

"Shh," he said. "You may not realize it, but I have saved you from utter annihilation—a fate that, I regret, still awaits Rachel Amber. Don't be afraid. I will preserve what makes you you. Your innocence, your spirit will live on in my pictures. Let Prescott and Dionysus burn the world down. You will remain—immortal. Sacred. And, by extension, so will I."

And as he bent down the slightest bit, needle poised to stab into her neck, his gaze fell on her right arm. He froze.

Max was out of time.

She raised the hand and slapped him as hard as she could. She'd been aiming for his eyes, but she'd underestimated the drug's effect on her and missed—the ring blade tore into his left eyebrow instead, opening a horrific gash. The needle went flying as Jefferson stumbled back, hands grabbing his face, howling as the blood poured through his fingers.

Even as he was falling back, Max was on the move, shoving herself out of the chair and lurching for the exit. She tried to sprint but her legs could only manage a jog. Still, she limped across the room, flinging herself onto the door frame for support. One glance told her Jefferson was staggering back to his feet, fumbling not toward her but to his desk. Hope flared in her chest and she pushed on into the adjoining ten-foot long entry hall. At the far end, a heavy vault door stood between her and freedom.

Panting, one hand on the wall for support, Max limped down the hall, grabbed hold of the vault door's wheel, and turned.

It wouldn't budge.

Max tried again and got more of the same. When she pulled, the door gave a bit but otherwise remained shut. Was the lock broken?

She tugged at the wheel with all her might, pushed and pulled the door handle in hopes of shaking something loose. It remained shut. Driven to tears, she started pounding her fist against the door.

Heavy footfalls behind her. Max dared not waste time by looking back and focused on the problem. The lock mechanism wasn't working, so what was stopping it? Her gaze scoured the steel surface, and at last fell on the door jam at the bottom. She kicked it out of the way and tugged at the handle. The vault creaked open just as a heavy hand clawed at her shoulder and peeled her away from the exit.

Jefferson loomed over her, his face a contorted red mask from the blood pouring from his brow. His eyes spoke nothing but murder. He didn't hold a syringe in his hand, as Max had thought. No; he held his Hasselblad camera.

Out of time.

She lifted her hand to strike him again but Jefferson shoved her down to the floor. Stars burst across her vision as her head bounced against the concrete. She could do nothing but stare up at that nightmarish face—all bared teeth and red skin and eyes without sanity. She raised an arm to ward off the blow she knew was coming, but Jefferson pushed it aside and raised his camera high.

"NO!"

The camera hurtled down, the lens colliding against her forehead. Agony ripped through her skull. Her vision collapsed into flaring lights in a dark grey tunnel. She was dimly aware of Jefferson breathing heavily, straddling her waist, pinning her down and cutting off her breath. She weakly raised her arm but he thrust it aside and lifted his camera once more.

Makeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstop

The camera came down. A sickening wet crunch followed. The lights flared again, bright as lightning, swallowing everything but the unbearable pain. Then the camera lifted up before coming back down. Again. Again.

The haze consumed all light, and Max succumbed to the dark.

Chloe shook herself out of her stupor as the banging on the vault door stopped. Did it open by itself, just a crack? There was no further movement nor sound from it, but it told Chloe all she needed to know. Max was here; nothing else mattered.

Dropping her flashlight, she thumbed back the hammer of her pistol and led with it as she took the stairs down one at a time. If the wrong someone came out of that door—

A part of her remembered that she should be calling Rachel for backup. How quickly could she get here, and would there be time? She reached a hand down for her phone, but as she got midway down the stairs, another noise reached her ears. More repetitive thumping, but this time softer, like fruit squelching on a cutting board.

Something clicked in her head. She bounded down the last few steps to the door and shouldered it open and—

Max was lying lifeless on the floor, a halo of blood and broken glass around her head, her eyes wide open and her face frozen in shock. And him—HIM—sitting on her belly, his red face contorted in rage and hate, holding a camera with a shattered lens over his head like it was a heavy rock and there was blood everywhere—

"JEFFERSON!"

As his head reared up to look at her, Chloe aimed and fired.

The first shot lit up the narrow hall and caught him on the right side of his chest, shoving him onto his ass. The report rang inside Chloe's skull but she didn't hesitate; baring her teeth, she stepped closer and shot him again, this time on the left side of his chest.

Jefferson jolted, his face melting into a look of belated surprise. He gazed down at his white shirt to find two eyes weeping red on his chest, then he fell back on the floor, motionless.

Chloe meant to pull the trigger again, but she looked down at Max and all the fury drained out of her.

"Oh God, no, please no."

She tucked the pistol away and fell to her knees, cradling Max's head. There was too much blood. Her eyes were open, but there was no expression, no recognition in them. Chloe couldn't tell if she was breathing or not.

"I'm here, Max, I'm here. I'm so sorry. I swear I'll—I'll—"

Barely seeing through her tears, she pulled Max into her arms and hurried back up the stairs to her waiting truck.

"I swear I won't let you die. So don't you leave me, Max. Don't you dare leave me again."

The shots struck Jefferson like hammer blows to the chest; he hit the floor with the wind knocked out of him. He lay there stunned, eyes closed, fighting to breathe as the agony spread across his torso and the lifeblood seeped from his wounds. Lay there till the green-haired girl who shot him picked up Max and left without shutting the door.

When her footfalls receded, he opened his eyes and gasped, which quickly turned into fits of coughing. He looked down and he wished he hadn't—his white shirt had turned crimson. Every breath was agony.

Not like this.

Despite the pain, he pressed his palm on his chest and applied pressure, anything to slow the bleeding. His back didn't hurt or feel wet so that meant the bullets were still in him—or maybe he was going into shock. It was hard to tell. If he had exit wounds, it didn't matter how hard he pressed—he'd be dead in moments.

Still alive. Call for help.

But his phone was back on his desk. Gasping, he tried to stand but could summon no strength from his legs. He would have to crawl, and he did: one arm plastered to his chest, the other pulling him across the concrete floor, worming his way past the remains of his camera, leaving a trail of red.

He nearly passed out as he reached the doorway into the Dark Room. Still, his mind remained hyperactive, shouting its orders: get to the phone, call an ambulance. Duct tape and cloth to bind his wounds. Hang on until the paramedics could get him to a hospital. Then wait, heal, bide his time. It would all be for nothing if he perished. He didn't come this far to die like this.

Sounds, coming from down the hall.

Jefferson looked back in terror at the open door. Was the girl returning to finish him off? No, those weren't footsteps he was hearing. They were…

Wings.

He had no time to comprehend what he was seeing as birds poured in from the darkness beyond. Hundreds of them, pushing the vault door further open with their bodies. Every croak and caw a warcry. An unkindness. A murder.

Screaming, he pushed on into the Dark Room. But there was no escape. Filling the room, the birds fell on him like a thousand black knives, beaks and claws tearing into his clothes to reach his flesh. Every blow he threw at them dropped him flat on the floor. All he could do was crawl on as the birds ripped off pieces of him to eat.

Why?

He crawled on his belly as birds alighted on his back and tore into his scalp and neck. Their unbearable weight pressed him down on the slickening floor, and he screamed.

Whyyyyyy?

Then, as if on silent command, the birds ceased their infernal din. They fled from him, surrounding his cowering body.

Something was happening. Another noise coming down the adjoining hall—an odd clicking, like the footsteps of a woman in heels. Someone was here. Was it Maja?

"H-help me," he gasped at the dark silhouette that appeared at the doorway.

It was not Maja.

It was not human.

The thing that towered over him, standing in his blood, had the swayback legs and claws of a raptor, the black body of a monstrous raven. Yet the head—the head was a woman's. Oily, dark hair streaked with gray, brown lidless eyes that swallowed his gaze, a lined face pale with hunger. She looked at him and her lips split into a smile, showing rows of sharp, black teeth.

She stepped through the doorway, spreading her massive wings as if to embrace him.

"I've been dying to see you, Mark."

Tears filled Jefferson's eyes as the thing drifted closer. "No," he whimpered, "Not you. NOT YOU!"

The creature licked her lips with a long pink tongue. "Welcome home, son."

In the darkness of his tomb, Mark Jefferson began to laugh.

But when her teeth descended upon his face, he began to scream.