Eric can’t kill Jeremy. He won’t. He will not allow one more child to be sacrificed to the monster. Not if he can prevent it.

Instead he says, “I’ll make you a deal.”

Colchester stops laughing, interested.

“You get me,” Eric says. “You take me. You let him go. Forever. That’s the deal.”

“You think that will save him?”

“I won’t be the one to kill him. That’s enough for me.”

Colchester lurches forward before Eric can reconsider. “I accept,” he says, and plunges into Eric’s body.

It is the ugliest feeling Eric has ever had, and he has literally seen Hell.

He can see Colchester clearly now, with his third eye. The old sorcerer burrows into him, a black worm of corruption that thrashes and coils, stuck halfway into his chest. Shrieks of delight emanate from its little, triangle-shaped mouth, lined with tiny serrated teeth. It promises awful things. Horrible pain. Retribution. Death. Endless torture. It sounds perfectly happy at the prospect of forcing Eric to carry them out.

With every second, Eric feels himself slipping away, his eyes filling with the same darkness as Colchester’s other pawns, as the old sorcerer gets a feel for the new premises, begins flipping switches and figuring out how to use Eric’s particular brand of magic.

He feels his mouth moving, but the words are Colchester’s.

“Now, we open the last chapter, we break the final seal. We finally come to The End.”

Eric feels a tug of nerves and muscles, and watches as Colchester raises his hands and summons all the darkness, all the power he can muster.

There is no other magician to fight him. Jeremy cowers on the ground. He is small and tired, a toddler ready for a nap. He is so young, Eric thinks. He is too young for any of this. Without Colchester, he doesn’t have the first clue how to use his magic. He is helpless. He’s going to die along with the rest of the world.

“No,” Eric says. “Not yet.”

He resists with everything he has.

Colchester laughs again. It’s pointless. Eric will only last a few seconds.

But, as it turns out, that is enough time for Alana to stab Eric through the heart with her sword.

38

Into the Jaws of the Dragon

This is the part of the plan that Eric and Alana did not tell Danny and Carrie. They would have objected. They would have argued. They would have tried to find another way.

It’s the way they are. They believe there’s always another secret passage, another clever invention to save the day.

Alana and Eric know better. Their job was always more about surviving the night than saving the day. They learned some fights only end when someone dies.

After the other two left the hotel room the day before, Alana turned to Eric, and looked in his eyes.