Something else caught Maria’s eye then. A sight she’d never seen before. A tall, dark shape stood at one end of the grove. It almost looked like a building—but it couldn’t be. There weren’t any buildings this far out on campus.

Maria moved toward the shape, picking her way carefully through the grass in her bare feet, her gold high-heeled sandals looped over her little finger.

She squinted against the glimmer of moonlight, trying to get a better view of the shape. She rubbed her eyes. She hadn’t slept much lately, and it was making her vision blurry. Making her see things that weren’t there.

A shadow flitted to her right. Maria tried to follow it with her eyes, but it was gone. Instead she glimpsed another shadow in the distance. A dark shape standing under a tree. Tall, lean. A human shape.

“Altagracia?” Maria hated how small her voice sounded. How much fear it held. “Is that you?”

The shadow tilted to the right. Like it was swaying in the breeze.

Not swaying. Swinging.

Swinging from a tree branch.

Maria clapped a hand over her mouth to keep from crying out. She could see the thin shadow of the rope. The dark figure in the distance swung in the wind.

This couldn’t be real.

The figure in the distance moved. It wasn’t a gentle sway this time. This time, the figure jerked in Maria’s direction. The wind picked up to a gust.

The other spirits. They were trying to scare her again.

Maria turned away and tried to make herself stop trembling.

She wasn’t a little kid anymore. If the spirits wanted to frighten her, it would take more than a shadow in the distance.

She turned her attention back to the trees. She still hadn’t found the right spot. She peeked around a trunk, looking for anything else that was familiar.

The wind stopped suddenly. The air grew unnaturally still.

Something pricked at the back of Maria’s neck. She turned slowly.

The figure wasn’t hanging from the tree anymore.

It was on the ground. It was halfway to where Maria stood.

It was still moving.

Maria turned and ran.

She ran toward the tall, dark shape at the end of the grove. There was a point at the top of the structure. Maybe she could hide behind it.

Maria picked up her pace, her legs pumping, crunching down on twigs that broke and cut into the soles of her feet. She hit a tree root and tripped, cursing as she caught herself with her hands and scrambled to her feet. She looked over her shoulder, but she couldn’t see the figure anymore.

She turned back. That was when she got her first good look at the building.