“What does that mean?” Amber asked.
Alan let out a long breath.
“We honestly don’t know,” Liz said.
“The locals used them. They used the power of the things in order to cure sicknesses, like cancer. It’s like how people use leaches to restore circulation. For every valid use, there have been a million misuses. The migrators were like that. The locals had rituals and ceremonies. As far as we know, that was all misguided.”
“And it’s over now,” Liz said.
“As far as we know,” Alan added.
“Why do you think they’re cousins to whatever is out there?” Amber asked.
“Mostly from what you were saying,” Liz said. She ticked off points on her fingers. “They’re hard to see. The migrators are really well camouflaged. They’re so good at blending in that they’re pretty much invisible.”
“Sometimes you can see the shadows,” Alan said.
“Yes. Sometimes,” Liz said. “We think that the migrators have some kind of role in the ecosystem that science doesn’t know about.”
“Soul eaters,” Alan said.
“Not, like, of living people, but ones that are already buried,” Liz said. “Like, maybe they move around consuming the leftover spirit energy of people who have passed away.”
“So they’re a kind of parasite, like your things,” Alan said. “And they move around through bodies of water and underground. They can only be called to the surface in a few specific places during certain times of the year. The woods near our house is one of those places where their orbit brings them close enough to come in contact with living things once a year.”
“October,” Liz interjected.
“And some locals—one of the old families—learned over the decades that they could be harnessed to eat other things, like cancer, out of living people.”
“But maybe they were causing the cancer as well,” Liz said.
“We’re not too sure of that part,” Alan said. “But we do have evidence that people who have interacted with the migrators don’t fare well if they move away from our town.”
“That’s one of the main reasons we stay,” Liz said.
“At least until Joe is old enough to decide for himself,” Alan said.
“In a couple of years when he goes to college, maybe,” Liz said.
Amber processed that information for a couple of seconds.
“The creatures themselves,” Amber said. “How much did you learn about them?”
“Not that much,” Alan said. “We learned how to call them to the surface using a mineral, fire, and blood. Their skin, when we could see it, was a weird pattern of yellow and purple. Their bodies were almost shaped like human bodies, but they moved in strange ways.”
“Normally, they wouldn’t bother the living,” Liz said. “But they could be called and they have an affinity for demons.”
“Not literally demons,” Alan said. “That’s what the book said, but we think it was referring to illness, like cancer. They move around in small packs. The book said that they were tied to the bones of the witches who called to them. We allowed them to destroy the bones that were stored in our house, and it’s possible that the connection to our property was severed with that.”
“But we play it safe and we don’t go near the place in October.”
Amber thought carefully about what she was hearing. She wanted to reject all of it. Until that point, Liz had seemed rational and strong. Amber had no reason to doubt her. But now that she and her husband were dumping so much craziness in her lap, Amber felt like she was really seeing them for the first time. The two of them were clearly out of their minds.
Amber reminded herself that she had felt like she was out of her mind more than once since the summer. It was easy to retreat from her own memories and start to believe that everything had been a weird fantasy. Evidence to the contrary was all around her though. She was currently trapped in a hotel room because of the tapping that she had almost convinced herself was something she had made up.
Liz must have read the doubt on her face.
“I know how it all sounds,” Liz said. “Believe me, there have been a ton of times when I’ve wanted to forget everything and write it all off as a bizarre dream. All I have to do is get a look at Alan’s foot and it all comes back.”
Without hesitation, Alan kicked off his shoe and raised his foot to remove his sock.
“I was a photographer in a lot of conflicts overseas,” he said. “But my worst injury to date was during one of the ceremonies where they were trying to raise those creatures. It took my shoe and half of my toe.”
Amber almost reached for her flashlight. What she could see of his mangled foot in the dim light was enough—she didn’t want to see more of it. She told herself that it didn’t prove their point. Alan’s injury could have been from anything. But she had to admit that it was evidence.
“And how did you get rid of them? You destroyed some bones?” Amber asked.
“The bones were stored in a ceramic case so the creatures couldn’t consume the spirits. We let the creatures have the bones,” Alan said.
“And disrupted their ceremony,” Liz said.
“Right,” Alan said. “After all that happened, the family left town. Without being called to the surface, the migrators might never bother anyone in our area again, but we don’t like to take any chances.”
“Which is why we don’t live there in October.”
“Why live there at all?” Amber asked. She had been asking herself the same question. It wasn’t like she had a ton of treasured memories at her uncle’s house. She barely visited when she was young. She probably should have moved out the day after she was attacked.
“There is a passage in the book that suggests that breaking ties with the area will bring back
