Chance sprinted out the front door, yelling, jumped onto the banister, and like the Suuke, leapt. Onto the Suuke’s back.

He held it in a chokehold, struggling, shouting, “Go, mujer. Go without me.”

Amy was at Calliope’s heels, aiming her gun at the Suuke.

Calliope knocked her friend’s hand down, panted through choked breath, “No, you’ll hit Chance.” She closed her eyes a moment to think. She should have been running to the truck, turning the ignition, driving Eunjoo and herself away.

Bullets had done nothing to the Suuke but slow it down, momentarily distracting it like wasps stinging a bear.

Its curved knife reflected starlight, inches from Chance’s face, his neck. Chance swerved side to side, squeezing the monster’s throat. The Suuke didn’t flinch.

Calliope glanced at Eunjoo, who seemed impervious to the snow though she was nearly naked as a wild animal. Wild as a coyote.

Coyote’s story.

Eunjoo had said Coyote told it to her for a reason.

Susana’s letter—turned to stone. The Suuke, come alive from stone.

The stories were real.

“Chance!” she screamed. “It’s like Coyote’s story!”

Chance’s gaze shifted momentarily away from the Suuke and toward Calliope, and in that split second the Suuke slashed his knife upward before Chance could dart away. The blade grazed his face, which bled down the Suuke’s white hair, staining it red.

Calliope winced.

“With his own rock.”

Chance nodded, let go of the Suuke and dropped to his feet on the snow, tensely circling the Suuke, his arms extended, his eyes on the Suuke’s knife.

Calliope told Amy, “Get the girl to the truck, then come get me and Chance.”

Amy’s expression said you trust me after I abandoned you?

Calliope said, “And give me your gun.”

“You got it, momma. You’re crazy, but you got it.”

Amy handed over the gun, scooped up the barefoot girl with her tortoise-­shell backpack, and sprinted toward Loren’s house.

Calliope breathed deeply, yelled, “Chance, move.”

He darted sideways, toward the frozen hedgerow, as Calliope steadied her hand, aimed at the Suuke’s hand, and shot. Over and over. Wasp stings.

The Suuke dropped the knife.

Chance sprang forward, grabbing it, and thrust it into the Suuke’s neck.

The Suuke clutched at Chance, still holding the knife, by his neck, wrapping its large hands easily around Chance’s throat, strangling him.

Chance pulled the knife out and thrust it in again and again despite his own choking, his own gasping for breath.

Blood poured from the Suuke’s neck, but it didn’t release its grasp.

Chance sawed back and forth several more times until one last thrust, he sliced clean through the Suuke’s neck.

Its head lobbed to its shoulder, then fell, its white hair billowing across the now-bloodred snow. Its hands released, and Chance pulled away from the grotesque body as it too fell to the ground.