The laptop sat open on the desk, softly calling to her. Sarah forced herself to ignore it. She’d dreamed that night of a crying baby, and a sharp-nailed claw. A dark forest, a bright moon, and blood. She’d dreamed of blood.

When she’d woken up, her bare feet were filthy, again, and her hands were dirty, again, and, worse than that, worst of all, there was a terribly coppery taste in her mouth, a taste like she’d bitten her own tongue, although Sarah was growing increasingly certain that her tongue was not what she’d bitten.

She reached for her phone and then dropped it. Because who would she call, besides Will? And what would she say, if he answered? He’d done this to her. She couldn’t avoid the truth any longer. This was where stories came from, not the west wind whispering, but a bad man—if Will was a man at all—infecting her with it, somehow. Somehow, Will had gotten the seed of this story inside of her, turning her into its vessel. And oh, how it had grown, and how terribly it had bloomed! Sarah had no doubt that it would kill her in the end. And maybe she deserved to die. She’d done terrible things in its service, made offerings on its terrible altar. Because “art demands sacrifice,” she heard Will say.

She closed her eyes. She was remembering how it felt when her agent told her that her previous publisher didn’t want her, that they were dropping her, too, how furious she’d been, how she’d screamed, her blood fairly sizzling with rage. She knew that she was talented enough, deserving enough, that her work was so much better than the shit on the bestseller lists, that she could hit those lists, she could win the prizes, and that she’d do whatever it took, make whatever sacrifices were required, for that to happen. I’ll do anything. That’s what she’d said. If Will had planted some dark seed inside her, she was the one who’d fertilized the soil, who’d made the ground ready, and invited him to work his dark magic. He’d put this story inside her, and now it was hungry, hungry, hungry.

Sarah put her hand in her pocket and groaned out loud when her fingers encountered a scrap of fabric. Part of her knew what she’d see even before she’d pulled it all the way out and that part wasn’t surprised when she saw it—white with pink polka dots, barely half the size of her thumb. A tiny baby sock.

The knock came at the door at almost eleven o’clock at night, Bucky had gotten to his feet, but Laura had been closest to the door. She’d been the one to open it.

“Vaughn!” he heard her say. “What brings you out so late?”