Page 79 of Hallowed Bones

Run! An inner voice screams at me. Run!

I can’t. I’m locked in place, my eyes trapped by the creature’s gaze.

Pop! Pop! Pop! The lights no longer flicker at all. They just erupt in a shower of sparks, and then darkness at the opposite end of the hall.

The temperature drops all around me. My breath fogs the air. It’s almost on me—the creature’s focus is so strong that it doesn’t seem to notice anything else around it. The carpet under its nails rips and shreds apart with its speed. The popping of lights grows faster, louder. Darkness no longer hinders my ability to see it, though.

My breath catches as it halts—too suddenly to be normal. After all that speed and intensity, it freezes, as if time has stopped, a foot from me. A beat passes, its eyes boring into mine. Then it unfolds from the ground, rising higher and higher, arching over me. Its limbs are so long that the back ones are bent in half, the joints pressing into the floor, and it still rises taller than my five-foot-three height.

“What are you?” I whisper the question before I even realize it.

Clawed hands tipped with only three fingers and razored nails stretch toward me slowly. All its earlier haste is forgotten. I swallow the sudden lump in my throat.

The air has gone thick with something heavy. The walls seem closer than they were before. An invisible pressure collides with me, pressing in on all sides. My feet won’t move. I can’t even hear my own heartbeat in my ears anymore as the monster’s touch creeps ever closer.

We’re on the precipice—the creature and I. It makes me start to consider that maybe, it isn’t here to hurt me. Maybe I should’ve done this the first time. Maybe I wouldn’t have spent the last year full of constant terror and waiting for the next time one of these things would emerge to chase me down.

Almost as soon as that thought occurs to me—that hope—it’s dashed as the creature swipes out, faster than I can follow with my eyes. A shocked and garbled scream leaves me as fire burns across my bicep as it latches onto me. Its razored nails dig into my flesh, and the wet trickle of blood escapes the wound.

“Stop!” I scream.

It doesn’t listen. My head snaps back and forth as it shakes me with a strength I hadn’t expected. Stupid. I was too damn stupid. I should’ve kept running.

Its small mouth opens, the skin at either corner ripping as it keeps going beyond what it should. Black blood flows from the tears in its already-too-thin flesh. Pieces try to cling to either side, but it’s too late. The monster unhinges its jaw and grabs ahold of my other arm.

More pain flares as the fire sinks past the cuts and into my veins. I grit my teeth against the agony. I should have known better.

“Stop,” I try again, hissing through the bite of my own skin being sliced into.

The monster either doesn’t listen or can’t understand, because in response, it shakes me once more. My head rocks on my shoulders, my neck straining with the too-fast movement.

A curse escapes my lips, and I try to yank myself out of its hold—even knowing that doing so will likely cut me deeper. The elongated skull of the monster twists to the side, cracking noises accompanying the movement. It lifts me, and I gasp as my feet leave the floor entirely. One flip-flop plops to the ground under us, and the other clings to my foot by the thin strap between my toes.

Liquid lava flows into my veins, burning into my system from where it clutches at me. The pain is more than anything I’ve ever experienced. I drag in lungfuls of air, trying to assuage the sharp and acrid torment the wound elicits—like a thousand tiny fire ants have been unleashed inside my flesh.

“Fuck!” I kick and strain against its hold to no avail.

Its mouth now fully open—even more so past what should have been its normal capacity—the creature screams at me. Wind scented with decay and wet ashes slaps my cheeks. I turn away, gagging at the smell.

Kicking again, I manage to rid myself of the second flip-flop before pressing both feet into the monster’s chest. Straining, pity turned to rage, I shove as hard as I can.

“Let. Me. Go!” Each word is filled with my anger, my hurt. A light flares between the monster and me, growing with its brightness, and the scream from the creature turns sharp and distant.

The curling hands gripping my arms disappear, and my body hurtles to the ground. I fall, slamming to the floor on my back as the air is knocked from me. Blinking back the white-and-black spots, fresh light invades.

I sit up and gape at the hallway. The lights that had been shattered by the creature’s energy are fixed and once again bright, illuminating the entire corridor. The buzzing noise of music plays through someone’s speakers behind the closed dorm room doors. The tears of the carpet are gone. There’s no sign of the monster.

Behind me, the creak of a door opening has me whipping my head back. Elodie peeks her head out into the hallway and frowns at me when she sees me splayed out on the ground.

“I thought I saw that you’d dropped off your stuff,” she says and then arches a brow as she comes out of the room. “What happened? Did you trip or something?”

What. The. Fuck.

Still shaking, I scramble to my feet, snagging my flip-flops and shoving them into the caddy resting on its side against the wall. “I’m fine.” I blink through the lie, shuffling past her and into the room.

“Hey! You’re bleeding!” Elodie’s sudden announcement has me looking down to the thin streaks of blood on my arms.

Dropping my caddy at the end of my bed, I shove the sleeve of my shirt up to reveal three thin lines where the monster’s nails had dug in. The edges of the wounds are torn as if when it had shaken me, and the skin had ripped rather than been sliced by its claws.