Maybe—Phillip forced himself to believe in this hope—maybe the farmers had just gotten lucky and shot a massive buck wandering through the woods, and had dragged it downstairs to dress it properly. It might explain the marks on the door—antlers as they dragged it through. His father had shot a six-point buck at their lake house once, but got it halfway into the cabin before realizing there was still fight in it left.

The third possibility—the one Phillip didn’t want to explore—wrapped its thorny vines around him and wouldn’t let go. That thing he’d seen in the woods. The inky, sinewy creature, slithering out of thin air. Surely he’d hallucinated it. But the ripple of those dark muscles, the awful smell and sharp crackle of electricity . . . could he have imagined that, too? How could such a thing be real?

Phillip hefted the poker, letting its weight ground him, then slid his pistol from its holster with his free hand. Just in case. If nothing else, he might have surprise on his side: for Nazis, deer, or anything else.

He descended the root cellar stairs into darkness.

No sounds but the faint groan of wood beneath him—nothing but the same wilted-vegetable stink and a pungent layer of dust and mold. Once he reached the bottom, he stopped and waited for any movement, any noise. Nothing. He risked a tentative step forward, but his foot struck something solid. Dense. He pulled back and waved his hand above him until he caught the pull string for an overhead light.

The bulb clicked on and washed the cellar in dull gold.

Two bodies glistened before him: a man and a small girl. As far as he could tell, anyway. They were mostly gleaming, blood-slick heaps, large swaths of skin missing to expose muscled limbs and torsos and patches of hair, their unbound intestines spooling off to one side.

Phillip was too petrified to scream: he could only stare, clammy sweat soaking him through, words nothing but a jumble of noise in his head.

Who—

Why—

Deep within the cellar, tin cans clanked together as something moved.

Nope. No thank you. Phillip whirled back toward the cellar stairs, feet acting of their own accord. But as soon as he started up them, heavy footsteps sounded overhead.

Trapped.

Mutilated bodies in the basement and God only knew what upstairs. And something else rattling in the darkness. At least upstairs there was a way out. But as he moved up the steps, the air congealed around him, shadows wrapping around his limbs like steel wool, chattering and screaming from inside his skull.

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