The oscillating wall of shadows spun faster and faster.

Please, look up! I’m here! Can you see me? Don’t go near them. Go back inside. Please, Andrew, look at me!

He squared his shoulders and ran into the wall.

A dull concussion rocked the roots of the tree. The trunk groaned as it began to crack in half.

Andrew lay stunned on the porch, his legs and arms bent into bizarre angles.

Kate pleaded with the tree to let her go. She could feel its terror through the palms of her trapped hands.

It was dying. The moon canted as the tree started to fall.

Now a scream ripped free as Kate tumbled down, down, down.

Heading toward Andrew.

The sap snapped and she broke free, flailing in the night sky.

She didn’t remember hitting the ground. She lay within the shadow wall.

Every bone should be broken, but she’d never felt better, stronger, healthier.

Her hand brushed against the wall. It was like touching the backs of bees in a hive, the kinetic energy of Mother Nature’s joy buzzer.

Kate laughed.

She was hungry.

Andrew lay broken and unconscious.

Why was he always running at things?

Running from things?

Her stomach grumbled.

The fading pulse at his neck looked so delicious.

No! I won’t do it!

An impossibly large shadow stepped into the doorway within the cottage. This wasn’t a shadow. This was real. She couldn’t discern a shape or any features, but she knew it was real.

And it was watching her.

Waiting for her to feed.

To heal.

Kate found herself on her knees beside Andrew, weeping. Hot saliva dripped from her mouth. She touched her lips to the savory pliancy of his neck. It would be so easy to bite down, to rip and tear and eat.

“Noooooooooo!”

She jerked away. The shadow thing in the cottage gave a warning grunt.

“Go to hell,” she whimpered, pulling Andrew’s lifeless, crooked arm over her body. He breathed his last breath against her neck. She nestled into his corpse, the little spoon cradled by the big spoon, willing herself to ignore the escalating cries of the shadow thing as it stormed out of the cottage.

* * *

It felt like someone had ripped the flesh from her side, exposing her steaming meat and sinew to the jaggedly cold night air. Kate awoke breathless, dizzy, utterly disoriented by the fiery agony.

Forcing herself to calm down, she looked down to see Andrew had his arm draped over her. The weight of his arm had sent her nerves into a frenzy.

Grabbing him by the wrist, she whisked Andrew’s arm away. It hit the mattress with a dull plop. He didn’t even break a snore.

It hurts, it hurts, it hurts so much.

Rubbing her side only made it worse.