Thirty-One

We don't actually go onto the rooftop. Kit doesn't want anyone leaving the house, and I agree. Jayla didn't mean it that literally anyway. I'm going to attempt to communicate via the sound system.

Yes, our off-the-grid summer house has a sound system. It lets me play a podcast while I garden or an audiobook while I cook or music while I entertain. It can also, apparently, broadcast. Or it can after Kit tinkers. And by "tinkers," I mean that he shows me how to record myself and then play it over the speakers.

Jayla helps me craft a message. I think she's worried I'll leave some loophole for the entity to exploit. We get it worked to her satisfaction, and I record it on my phone. Then Kit plays it over the speakers on a loop. We can hear it even inside. The night has gone eerily quiet, with storm clouds hovering as if waiting, just waiting.

How silly do I feel recording an apology and explanation for an evil entity terrorizing my island? Damn silly. But finally something makes sense, insomuch as anything involving "evil entities" can make sense.

John Sinclair and Rachel Rossi wanted to scare me. So like a couple of prankster teens, they googled "dark magic" and started staging hex circles on my island. Except they stumbled over something that summoned an actual entity and made a promise. That entity emerges on my island and decides that, as the owner, clearly I called it. When I don't fulfill the promise, it traps us all on the island and starts picking us off, one by one, until I give it what it wants.

What does it want? I cannot even begin to imagine, and I don't actually care because I didn't summon it. Does that matter? I'm not sure. Jayla's acting as if we can negotiate with this entity like a neighbor with a fence dispute. All I know is that it can communicate. It is sentient, and it can use Sadie to speak to us—use her physical body to speak and her brain to speak in a language we understand. If it has the mental capacity to demand payment on its debt, then presumably it also has the capacity to comprehend the situation Sinclair and Rossi placed us in. Or so we hope.

We're in the great room. Jayla sits cross-legged on a recliner. I'm on the sofa bed with Madison, who's still unconscious but seems to be resting comfortably. Kit gets a fire going in the woodstove to ward off the autumn chill as darkness falls outside. When he's done, Jayla rises for a bathroom break. Kit starts to say something, but she lifts a hand to stop him.

"Downstairs powder room only, because it's close by and doesn't have windows," she says.

She continues walking, and Kit perches on the arm of the sofa bed. I ease sideways to give him room, and he slides down beside me and puts an arm around my shoulders.

"Madison's going to be all right," he says. "We all are. If that message doesn't work, help will be on the way in a few hours. We'll get off this island, and we'll be fine."

I nod and lay my head against his shoulder.

He clears his throat. "Not to put the cart before the horse, but when this is over, can we try again?"

"Yes, please."

His arm tightens, and he goes to kiss the top of my head, but I lift my face and meet his lips instead. He kisses me, tentative at first and then deeper, and I fall into that kiss, into the comfort and joy of it.

I will get through this. I will make damned sure I do, because here's what's waiting for me.

"And apparently I needed to take a longer bathroom break," Jayla says.

We separate. Not a guilty jumping apart, just a slow and regretful separation, with Kit's arm still around my shoulders.

"I have no idea how you two can make out with that." She gestures at the windows.

"An evil entity stalking the island?" I say.

"Nah, that's enough to get anyone's motor running. Near-death-experience sex. I mean that."

She points at my phone, hooked up to the sound system. Outside my voice continues its endless loop of apology and explanation.

When the wind picks up, Jayla says, "Even Mother Nature is trying to drown you out."

"Hey, as long as it works—"

A smack at the window has us all jumping. A dark shape swoops past. When we realize it's a crow, Jayla mutters, "Now you're driving the local wildlife to commit suicide."

I shake my head. "That's the problem with large windows. I've installed a few things that cut down on the fatalities but—"

Another crow flies at the window. This one swerves at the last second and then hovers there. The sight makes my skin creep. Can crows hover in flight? When it opens its beak and squawks, we all jump.

"Is it supposed to do that?" Jayla asks.

I hurry over to the phone and stop the recording. "It must be sending a weird frequency to birds."

My voice stops. There's a moment of complete silence. Then a sound outside the windows. A steady drumbeat. I start toward the windows. I get three feet before Kit stops me. He nods toward the deck, and I remember Garrett and step back. Then something catches my eye—a black cloud heading for the house. My stomach plummets.

Please no more storms, nothing that will stop help from arriving.

It's not a cloud, though. It's inky black and undulating like a wave, that drumbeat drawing closer.

"Birds," Kit says beside me. "It's… birds."

He's right. A flock of crows is heading straight for the house. Again, my brain can only throw up questions. Do crows flock? I've never seen it like this—a huge undulating wave of birds flying over the—

The flock swoops toward the house. Kit yanks me back as the first birds hit the bank of windows. They smash into it hard enough that I think I've killed an entire flock of crows. Something in the broadcast frequency brought the birds crashing into our windows, breaking their necks.

But the crows don't break their necks. They hit the windows with their wings, smacking it as they hover there, a black mass covering the entire wall of windows. They smack the glass with their wings and claw with their talons and peck with their beaks.

"What the hell is happening?" Jayla whispers.

Nothing natural. That's obvious. At first, the birds peck and beat erratically but, like drummers finding a rhythm, within seconds every wing hits in sync. They stop clawing and pecking, and they hover there—impossibly hovering, their bodies still as only their wings move, striking the glass together, like a heartbeat that reverberates through the house.

Slap-slap-slap.

Jayla jams her hands against her ears. "Are they trying to break in?"

"Where can they get in?" Kit says quickly, turning to me. "Where do we have vulnerabilities?"

"Nowhere. Everything's sealed up."

That's partly for energy efficiency—critical with an off-the-grid house—but it's also for pest control—critical with a house surrounded by wilderness. Every spot I could get a fingertip through has been sealed or screened.

"They can't get inside," I say. "Not unless they break the glass, and they don't seem to be trying—"

The crows scream. In one voice, they let out a deafening sound like the scream of an eagle, getting louder and louder until we're running for Madison, hands jammed over our ears.

Then the lights go out. One second the house is ablaze, and we are running. Then it's pitch black. I hit something and go flying. Hands catch me. Kit's hands. A light appears, and I look over to see Jayla lifting her phone. I open my mouth to say something, but the screaming of the crows drowns me out.

I fumble past the table I'd tripped over, and I'm almost at Madison's side when the screaming stops. The beating stops. Everything stops.

I slowly turn toward the windows to see the crows in flight. Some land on the deck railing. The rest fly to trees or rocks and perch there. They all watch us. Dozens of black eyes stare at us, not a single feather fluttering, not a talon lifting to readjust its hold. They are perfectly, unnaturally still, black figures lit only by the barest wash of moonlight.

Silence falls. Complete silence, and darkness broken only by Jayla's flashlight.

"I thought you said we had enough power." She pauses and then snorts. "And that's a ridiculous thing to say, isn't it? We just had crows doing a synchronized drum dance against the windows. Obviously the power didn't coincidentally turn off."

"I can check the battery bank," Kit says, "but there are flashlights in the kitchen cup—"

He stops. I wonder why, and then I hear it. A thump-thump-thump against glass. Not the pound of crow wings but the muffled smack of what sounds like a fist.

I look at the front windows. The sound comes again, and we all turn, until we're facing the back hall.

Along the hall, we can see the patio doors. A dark shape blocks the moonlight.

Thump-thump-thump.

I look at Madison, still unconscious on the sofa.

"I'll stay with her." Jayla starts to hold out her phone, but Kit lifts his, flashlight on.

"Do you want to wait here?" Kit asks me.

I shake my head. Yes, I very much want to wait here with Madison. I want all of us to wait here and pretend we don't hear that knocking. Pretend it's just the wind hitting the door. But we need to see what it is, and I'm not letting Kit check by himself.

There's a reason Jayla didn't insist on going with him and letting me stay—whatever is out there blames me. It needs to speak to me.

Kit and I hold hands. Mine is clammy, but he only grips it tight. He tries to pass over his phone. I don't take it. I'll get mine later. For now, I just need to keep moving before I lose my nerve.

We reach the back hall. It's really too narrow for us to walk side by side, but we do it anyway, squeezing in together, hands clasped. We pass the powder room and approach the door to my office.

Thump-thump-thump.

That dark shape moves as it hits the glass. That's all I see, though. Motion and a huge dark shadow.

"I'm going to lift my flashlight," Kit says.

I brace and stop walking, my hand clutching his. His cell phone light rises, and I gasp, my free hand flying to my mouth.

The figure at the door is Garrett.