I snatched the oars and started rowing.

I rowed past cypress knees poking up bald through the muck.

I rowed past tree stumps and under limbs and dodged snakes dangling like poison fruit. I bumped a dead hollow oak and a funnel of bats burst out from it, high and black and swirling like a tornado in reverse. Tally kept glancing behind us, but I didn’t even need to look. I knew Mr. Hugo and Cecily Bob were gaining ground.

We came up on a tangle of trees buried deep in the fog and muck. The moss hung curtain thick down to the water.

“In there!” said Tally, and I tried to angle us through the knees and roots until we were hidden safe behind that moss curtain, in a circle of fat trees, some hollowed out and leering down over us.

We stayed dead still, Tally holding my hand, the two of us crouched and quiet in the bottom of the boat. The tree swaddled us with its moss, big limbs draped around us like a giant wretched mother’s arms, bony and gaunt, bugs crawling all over them. The water was grayer and murkier here, it swirled in a baby little whirlpool that kept bumping the skiff into the trees. The trees were something else too, the bark carved on by human hands, symbols and scratch marks like how you figure a witch’s spell book looks. Above us dangled bones clacking together like wind chimes, another daisy chain of digit bones, jawless skulls wedged between branches and in the knots of trees, gaping at us, all those empty eye sockets watching.

“Where are we?” I whispered, and Tally just looked at me, eyes all big and scared.

Cecily Bob and Mr. Hugo rowed right by us, their lantern light casting us deeper into the shadow of the trees. They passed so close the moss swooshed in their wake. All the time calling, “Here, little boy! Here, little fella! We know where your daddy is, we do. Come on out!”

How do they know about me? I wondered. Was it because I came chasing after them at Pop’s house? Was it because of how he yelled when they blew my boat up? Did Pop think I was dead?

They came to the circle of trees where we were hidden.

“That’s the Creepy’s lair it is,” said Mr. Hugo. “I ain’t going in there.”

“If that’s where the kid went,” said Cecily Bob, “I reckon him a goner already.”

“Aye,” said Mr. Hugo. “Not much human left to the fella, is there? Come on, let’s get back to hunting the father.”

And they rowed themselves away.

“We did it,” I whispered. “Come on, Tally, let’s get out of here.”

I heard a splash right next to us, on the starboard side. That’s when I realized Tally wasn’t holding my hand anymore.

The boat was empty except for me.

“Tally?” I whispered. Then louder, who cares if I got caught. “Tally. Tally! Where are you?”