CHAPTER 107 BUCK

107

Buck

EMILY WAS ALONE, THEN she wasn't.

Rodney Campos was standing next to her.

That didn't make a lick of sense, none of this did, and when Buck blinked, he half expected Rodney to vanish as quickly as he appeared, but he didn't.

Twenty paces ahead of them, Emily and Rodney rounded a corner and Buck found himself moving faster, trying to catch up, Riley and the boy on his heels.

When they rounded that same corner, the three of them found themselves in an enormous underground cavern. The frigid air was so cold it seemed thick enough to touch. Every inch of Buck's body ached with it—joints, muscles, tendons—all slowing, becoming less responsive, and he realized this was hypothermia setting in, ice stealing the life from his limbs. The walls of the cavern were covered in that same black mold they had found in the Pickerton place, but here it was alive, crawling over the stone and ice, moving with purpose, excited. Stalactites and stalagmites, every inch of the cavern walls was alive with it, and Buck had an unsettling thought—it looked like they were wandering the belly of some beast.

"We can't stay here."

The words left his mouth between chattering teeth in a voice he barely recognized, and when he risked a look back, he caught a glimpse of Robby with his arms around himself, trying to keep warm, and failing.

Riley seemed oblivious to the cold. Her eyes were wide, filled with bewilderment, and the oddest thing was happening with her skin—the names were glowing. All of them clearly visible in the dim light.

He needed to get them out of here. If they died, it would be on him.

When Buck turned back around, Emily and Rodney had stopped moving. They were standing at the edge of what could only be described as an underground lake. The waters were frozen, a mix of that black over ice, but they inched up the rocky shore, as if attempting to crawl out, and Buck realized that might just be what that black stuff was doing—it was crawling out of the lake, up the walls, and out the cavern. It was escaping this place through the hole punched out by that tree. This insane and horrible world was somehow leaking out into their own.

The three of them reached the edge of the lake, and Riley let out a sharp gasp, pointing below the surface. It took Buck a moment to understand what she had found because it simply couldn't be true, but as he stared, it remained—Ellie was several feet below the ice, one hand grasping up, her mouth open, caught in a silent scream. Buck thought she was frozen there, until she blinked.

Behind him, Robby softly said, "The lowest, blackest, and farthest from Heaven. Well do I know the way."

Buck had no idea what the boy meant by that. He barely heard it, because he realized Ellie wasn't alone in the icy waters of that lake. He saw Evelyn Harper next to her. Josh Tatum. His wife, Lynn, both their children. The old man from the library. One of the women, too. What was her name? Gilmore, something. Edna? No, Arwa. That was it. Keith Gayton was there. Eisa Heaton. Her husband, Norman. People from town. Some he'd seen just in the past hours; others he hadn't seen for years. They were all in that frozen lake, and somehow they were all still alive.

He turned back to Emily, his heart beating like a sledgehammer in his chest. "What the hell is this place?"

She eyed him with a sorrow so deep it pained him to look at her. "This is the end."

"The end of what?"

"The end of all things."

She gently stroked Rodney Campos's arm and pointed out toward the center of the frozen lake. He followed her gaze, then nodded solemnly and stepped out on the ice. Began walking toward the middle.

For the first time, Buck noticed the deep red stains on Rodney's shirt. Smaller in the front, much larger in the back.

Exit wounds.

He'd been shot.

He's—

The realization struck him, and he knew he had to be dreaming. Dreaming. Having a nightmare. Caught on the back end of some bottle-induced hallucination. Anything but this.

But when he looked back at Emily, he realized it was none of those things.

This was happening.

This was real.

Out on the frozen water, Rodney stopped. He was about thirty feet from them when he turned and faced back in their direction. When he started to sink, he didn't fight it. His body dropped slowly, like a man caught in quicksand. He stopped falling when it crossed his upper chest. His face twisted, and the most horrible of screams escaped his lips. It might have made Buck go mad if it didn't abruptly cut off when it did. Icy frost and black inched over him, froze him there, and while Buck wanted to believe the man no longer felt any of this, he knew the opposite was true—he felt all of it, and he would continue to feel it for all of eternity.

Emily had edged closer. "You shouldn't be here. Not like this. This isn't how you arrive. This isn't your station."

"My station?"

"Your place. Your purpose. Your end. Not yet. You need to leave." She looked at Robby. "You, too. You both must leave, now."

She stepped closer to Riley and examined the girl's arms. As her fingers rolled over the names, they glowed brighter. "You represent the innocents. Those caught unintended, but here nonetheless. It is for those I grieve most. You will stay as I have stayed. A shepherd to those innocent. That is your station, Riley Sanchez."

Buck shook his head and pulled Riley away from her. "The hell she will! None of us are staying." He jerked a thumb down at Ellie and Evelyn in the water. "We're taking them back, and we're all going."

"I didn't say it was a choice. It is what's meant to be. We can all only do what is meant to be."

She looked back down at the frozen water, and a tear trickled from her eye as she focused on another body beneath the water.

Inches from her feet, just below the surface, was Emily Pridham. His Emily Pridham. Exactly as she was the moment she disappeared all those years ago.

Her mouth twitched.

Frozen in the unholy lake, she managed a single word.

Buck.