The black sludge that had bubbled there before writhed and heaved, pulling itself upright into a shape—a human shape.White smoke bled off its surface in curling strands, spiraling up through the high branches.That was the plume we’d seen from the road.
“What… what is that?”I whispered.
“Get down, you idiots!”Tani’s tiny voice shrilled past my ear.The fairy, once again fun-sized, zoomed past our faces in a streak of pink.
Owen grabbed my arm and pulled me with him behind a screen of brush.We dropped to our knees and peered out.
The black sludge finished knitting itself into a man.
Tall.Dark-haired.Clothes as black as the muck he’d risen from.His eyes were closed as he took a long breath, chest expanding, then exhaled slowly and opened his eyes.
Thick black hair brushed his shoulders, threaded with faint silver, and his eyes were the color of a storm-tossed sea, blue-green shot through with gold.
Every fine hair on my body stood on end.
He took a step away from the tree.The last of the ooze sloughed off him and soaked into the ground.The smell of sulfur burned my nose.I shot Owen a look and mouthed,Who is he?
He shrugged and shook his head.
The man tilted his head up to the sky, closed his eyes, and inhaled the air like a man gulping in fresh air he hadn’t had in years.Then he smiled and spoke.
“Come out, my friends.There is no need to hide.”
His voice was a deep, resonant drumbeat that reverberated through my chest.The words sank into my skin and wrapped around something deep and lonely inside me, tugging hard.
I started to stand.
Owen caught my hand and yanked me down.“What are you doing?”he hissed against my ear.
His voice broke the spell for me to realize I was halfway up.I dropped back to my knees, heart hammering.“I—I don’t know.”
“Come, all of you,” the man in black said.“You don’t have to be alone anymore.”
Again, the words pulled on me.On the hollow ache I didn’t realize I’d been carrying since Alice died.Everything in me screamed that I needed to go to him.That he understood.That with him, I’d never feel this empty again.The ground tipped.Nausea slammed into me.I pressed my fingertips to my temple, trying to anchor myself in my own body.
“Piper?”Owen whispered.
I grabbed his hand and squeezed so hard my nails dug into his skin.
“What is it?What’s he doing to you?”
“I… I don’t—” The words shredded in my throat.
Tani zipped by again.“Get her out of here, Owen.Now.”
“Why?”he demanded.
“He’s riding the breach.Drawing on whatever’s leaking through the ley lines.He’s pulling her into his spell,” Tani said.“Take her out of here.”
“No.”I shook my head, fighting the urge to stand.“I need to see.I need to know.”
I forced myself to look back at the clearing.
Shapes rose from the ground—humanoid mounds shedding grass and wildflowers.As they shook free their camouflage, five other figures appeared—three men, two women—all dressed in black like him.
The man in black opened his arms.“My children.”
They went to him in a rush.Touching, clinging, pressing their faces to his shoulders like lost souls finally coming home.Their sighs of relief blended with his low, satisfied laugh.
