Fallows couldn’t pull Stockton’s rifle away from him. The strap was still snagged over his shoulder, and Stockton himself was clutching the butt, in a last, failing effort to resist.

Fallows glanced back at the boys.

“Don’t, Peter,” he said.

Peter finally grabbed the CZ. He slid open the bolt to make sure it was loaded. It was.

Fallows stepped over Stockton and turned to face them. Stockton still had the strap of the rifle over his shoulder and was clutching the butt, but Fallows had one hand under the muzzle and a finger on the trigger and the barrel pointed at Peter.

“Stop,” he said again, his voice almost toneless.

Peter fired. From so close the blam of the gun was deafening, a great roar followed by a deadening whine. A chunk of blazing-white wood exploded from the tree trunk to the right and just behind Fallows. As the splinters flew past him, Fallows slapped Stockton’s hand away and squeezed the trigger of his gun. Peter’s head snapped back, and his mouth dropped open in an expression that had been common to him in life: a look of dim-witted bewilderment. The red-and-black hole above his left eyebrow was big enough to insert two fingers into.

Christian heard someone screaming, but there was no one left alive in the blind except for Fallows and himself. After a few moments, he realized he was the one making all the noise. He’d dropped his sketch pad and held up both hands to protect his face. He didn’t know what he said or promised, couldn’t hear himself through the ringing in his ears.

The trapdoor rose about a foot, and Charn looked in on them. Fallows wrenched the rifle free from Stockton at last and turned the barrel around to point it at the old man. Charn fell, just as quickly, the trapdoor slamming behind him. Christian heard a leafy crunch as the tall man hit the ground below.

Without a look back, Fallows flung open the trapdoor, dropped through it, and was gone.

Christian in Flight

It was a long while before Christian moved. Or at least he felt it was a long while. In that half-lit world, the passage of minutes was difficult to judge. Christian did not own a watch and had left his phone, by command, in the other world. He knew only that he’d had time to dampen his crotch and then time for that dampness to grow cold.

He trembled in convulsive bursts. He lifted his head and peered through the lookout. The fauns had long disappeared from the steps. The hill was silent in the gloaming.