Out of Mind

downstairs—and she wasn’t going down there alone. Her hair shone as brilliantly red and curly as usual, but her eyes were underscored with dark shadows. “Glad I looked,” she muttered.

This was ridiculous. She was held captive by something she had never seen.

But she had seen what it was capable of. Ben told her he got the cuts from glass, and she assumed he told her the truth, otherwise he’d be worrying about his future. But she didn’t like to think that protecting her had caused him to collide with glass.

She thought of all those who were ranging around trying to keep her safe. What kind of danger was she exposing them to?

Willow’s anxiety embarrassed her so she stood where Ben wouldn’t see her when he got out of the shower. The water droned on. Evidently, he was addicted to long showers.

The room canted to one side.

Willow stumbled, grabbed a chest of drawers and saw its drawers fly open. Lamps shot from tables and smashed. The lowered slat blinds rattled and swung.

She looked toward the bathroom. Steam billowed, thicker, from the partly open door, and the sound of splashing water grew louder.

A rumble, deep beneath her, brought a bubble of fear to her throat.

Earthquake?

No, she’d never been in an earthquake.

The house was collapsing.

Without warning, Marley appeared in the doorway to the bedroom.

Willow took a step toward her, but Marley held up a warning hand. Her pale face twisted as if with pain, and Willow could see waves of tremors passing through her body.

“Marley?”

Marley shook her head, no, pleading with her eyes. She slipped inside the room. The blue smock she wore was one she used for her refinishing work, splotched with varnish and paint. Her feet were bare.

The edges of Willow’s vision turned fuzzy, faded to gray. A pale green and glaring light illuminated Marley.

Willow moved toward her sister, feet dragging, each step threatening to tear her farther away. She tried to shout for Ben, but any sound choked in her throat.

She was awake.

She was conscious.

This was real.

The wall behind Marley disappeared, replaced by the entrance to a hole. The light she made shivered against the edges of the hole, but everything beyond was black.

A sound started far away and approached, gathering volume until a boom vibrated through Willow’s body. Marley tilted her head on one side, and she cried tears that swept to wet her smock. Her hands turned this way and that in begging motions.

Once more Willow attempted to reach out, but cringed away, horrified at the eruption of a huge head from the dark tunnel behind Marley. An enormous, beaked head, no visible eyes, and a beard of misshapen fat hanging beneath its beak.

The head undulated from side to side, the great beak opening slowly to reveal a thick tongue while vast shoulders squeezed through and a wing that seemed to fill the room shot free and gave a swinging flap.

The rush of air upended Willow. She fell, scrambling away, and finally screaming.

Creaking, shaking, the house trembled on its foundation, and Willow cried, “Marley,” while she hid her eyes.

At once a force scooped her from the floor and threw her against a wet wall. It held her there, trapped, unmoved by her flailing fists and feet.

“I’m coming,” she yelled, using her nails to strike out until a talon took hold of both wrists and squeezed them until the bones ground together. “Don’t hurt her. Please.” She yanked and tugged but her wrists wouldn’t move.

“Be still.” A voice near her ear sent pain through her head.

“What do you want?” she cried.

“Just be still.”

Panting, she stopped twisting her wrists, stopped bucking her body and pumping her feet.

Slowly, completely terrified, she opened her eyes.

Water from Ben’s body soaked her dress.

Chapter 22

Her wrists would be bruised. Ben hated that he’d caused that. If he hadn’t stopped her, she could have clawed his face until he couldn’t see to help her.

“Willow?”

Limp, she sagged in his arms, her head dropped back. Her skin glistened with sweat.

He shook her. “Willow, talk to me. It’s Ben. I’m here.”

Willow came up through layers of darkness, gathering anger, gathering strength, and screamed. She tossed, trying to get free. “Marley,” she called, tears clogging her throat. “Wait for me, Marley.”

Ben shook her harder. He dared not put her down because he knew she would run. “Look at me.” He let her legs slide down and held the hair at the back of her head. “Look at me, Willow.”

Her eyes opened, as if from troubled sleep, and she blinked at him. Slowly the focus cleared. Ben didn’t slacken his grip. She would regain control, and he could only guess what she might do next.

“Did something attack you?” he said, trying to see her skin without attracting her attention too much. “Tell me, for God’s sake.”

It was Ben who held Willow against his naked body. Water dripped from his hair, over his shoulders and chest.

She pushed at him. “I’ve got to go. Please, Ben, don’t stop me. They’ve got Marley. It’s got Marley. Over there.” She tried to twist and see behind her.

“The house shook and everything broke,” she said, pleading with him to understand. “Glass everywhere. It was an earthquake, then that, that—It came. It wants me, not Marley. I have to go.”

“Talk to me,” Ben said. “Slow down. What did you see?”

In a rain of hands and feet, butting him with her head, Willow battered him. He grabbed one of her wrists and she bit his hand. Her strength was abnormal, crazy.

Closing his hands around her waist, he held her at arm’s length, but she jumped and crashed both feet into his diaphragm, shoving herself beyond his arm’s reach, and shot from his grasp.

She landed on the floor and scrambled.

Ben caught a foot, but she rotated her entire body, launched through the door and stumbled to the top of the stairs.

“Don’t come nearer,” she said, pointing both first fingers at him. “Stand there.” Her eyes, the pupils hugely dilated, raked around.

“Calm down—”

“Shut up. Don’t tell me anything. It happened. Everything fell over and broke. There was a hole and Marley was in front of it. It was a raptor coming for her. One of its wings was…” She wanted to see her sister’s face.

There was no hole, no tunnel, no bearded, beaked head—and no Marley.

Willow buried her head in her hands and backed away. “It took her,” she sobbed. “What have I done? She’s gone. Marley!”

Ben had barely an instant to stop Willow from careening backward down the steep flight of stairs. He threw himself at her, wrapped her in his arms and groaned aloud when they fell onto the edges of the steps.