“Is this how Liva and Carter felt too? Did you give them time to consider your motive before they died?” The only way I can keep moving is if I make light of this situation.
I walk into Councilwoman Yester’s “body” and the mess of blankets that have slid off the table and onto the floor. I try to kick out, and immediately my foot gets tangled in the fabric. It’s heavy to move. Too heavy, almost.
As if there’s a real body underneath my carefully placed bundle. If I kick loose too hard, it’ll be uncovered.
Hands might reach out to grab me.
Empty eyes. A gaping mouth.
I scream my anger and my fear, and I kick.
The blankets fall loose on the floor, letting go of my feet. Fabric again, nothing more.
This is not how it was supposed to be. This is not how it was supposed to end.
Silence.
I realize the constant hammering sound has stopped, and when I look toward the window, it’s empty. Finn is gone. Finn is gone.
No.
I dash toward it. He can’t be gone. What happened?
Finn is my home. Outside of Elle and my dad, he’s the closest thing I have to family. He understands me in ways they never could, even with all the secrets I’ve kept.
The cabin grows colder around me, and I don’t know whether it’s the actual temperature or my fear that chills me to the bone—and deeper.
I should’ve told Finn my secrets, both the ones that I was afraid of and the ones I was ashamed of. I should’ve held him more often.
I should’ve held Elle more often too. I should’ve protected her from the world whenever I could, and done a better job preparing her for life, even if it wasn’t necessarily my job to do so. I could have. I should have.
I don’t want to die with that regret in my heart. And I don’t want Finn to be gone without having told him everything that haunts my heart and my head.
There’s a magnificent crash.
I leap back, my heart hammering.
A hand grabs hold of the window frame. Then another. It’s red and raw.
I take a step back—not that that’ll do me any good while I’m trapped here.
Then Finn reappears. His light hair shines silver in the moonlight, as he pulls himself to his feet. A bruise forms on his head and his hands are trembling. If he goes any paler, he might become translucent—or phosphorescent.
I fell, he mouths.
Oh. I don’t know what to say. Fear and relief surge through me with equal strength. Enough that when I try to draw breath, my voice catches and I tear up instead.
Finn is there, and his eyes are trained on me, and he presses his palm against the glass.
It’s not warded then. Not electrified.
In my absurd relief, somehow that’s what my brain snags on.
I kick a puzzle box out of the way. It breaks with a sharp crash, and I push closer to Finn. Until I’m close enough to also reach the window, to press my hand against it from this side and try to hold him.
It’s not comforting to have him so near and not to be able to feel him, but it helps to be able to look into his eyes and know he’s still standing, know he’s still breathing, know he’s still trying to get me out.
There’s so much I want to tell him.
I move away from the window and look around for the crutch I’d dropped by the door. My brain runs wild. Every time I kick against something, I’m equal parts sure it’s the crutch or a trap.
“We’ll figure out a way out of here,” I tell the darkness in my game-master voice. “I won’t let you win. We’ve faced down the world before and didn’t let it break us, and we won’t let you break us either.” My poker face is on. I may be lying, but at this point, does that matter?
It takes me the better part of an eternity before I stumble across a lone metallic something. When I accidentally kick it, it clatters.
I crouch down and reach for it, until I have a hold. The crutch is a bit battered from being tossed, the edges of the hand grips sharper than before, but I can make do.
I hold it up to Finn. “Okay if I smash it?” I shout.
He tilts his head, then nods. “Please.”
We set to work, hammering at the window with the crutches, like we’re Snow White’s dwarves or goblins in a mine. There’s a methodical rhythm to it. Finn, then me. Finn, then me. I’ve never been more grateful for all those hours lugging boxes full of books around at the store, because while the work is hard, and I’m shivering, I can keep it up.
But the cabin grows colder and outside the shadows lengthen. In order to focus on breaking the window, I have to stop talking to the darkness. The silence and emptiness is yawning, threatening to swallow me whole. The smashing of the crutches doesn’t change that.
It sounds like someone behind me is laughing.
A breath of air dances across my neck and sets my hair on end.
Ever, I’m not feeling well. I’m scared.
I don’t want to be alone, Ever.
Worthless.
Worthless.
Worthless.
The crutch slips under my fingers. I have to keep my head in the game. It’s only a cabin, there’s nothing here. It’s only a collection of logs and memories. That’s all this place is and nothing more.
And it is said all the cabins are haunted by the killed—or the killers. The mountain is hungry. The night has teeth.
Raise the crutch, I tell myself. Keep hitting the window.
Keep the rhythm. Finn, me, Finn, me.
But no matter what we do, nothing changes.
Maybe I should stay here.
The worst we can do to the glass, it seems, is create some hairline fractures. I pull the crutch away and pound my fist at it, but it still feels as whole and unbreakable as it did when we started. Why won’t it
