Calliope rolled down the window, handed Amy the gun. “You have to get its bow and arrow. That’s the only way to kill it. Chance knows.”

The Suuke watched from the cliff above as if planning its move.

Calliope scanned the rock face. She could do nothing, stuck in the truck in labor. She was worse than useless. What other weapons did they have? Shovels in the back. A glass jar in Eunjoo’s hands.

“I threw a peach at it,” Eunjoo said. “In my dreams.”

“Not now, chica.”

“In my dreams before my parents disappeared.”

“What?”

“I knew this would all happen. I dreamt it before.”

A rumbling outside.

“What do you want, beast?” Chance yelled. The Suuke snarled, revealing tusklike teeth. It raised its bow, steadied an arrow, released.

Chance dropped to his knees, tucked his chin to his chest, and the arrow struck the metal frame of the truck and wilted as a dead flower into the snow.

Rooted in the road, her lean body poised, a fury, an Artemis, Amy began shooting.

“Chance, the arrow,” Calliope called, nodding toward where it had fallen in the snow, six feet away from where he knelt.

Eunjoo wriggled across the floorboard toward the driver’s side and was opening the door. “Chica, no!” Calliope screamed, lunging forward.

The car door swung open and the little girl flew over the ravine, holding onto the car door. Calliope screamed for Amy—“Help her!”—then, holding the steering wheel, grabbed hold of the door. She pulled it, slowly, calling, “Don’t let go” to Eunjoo. The girl’s face was scrunched in fear and effort, her hands clasped around the doorjamb.

Calliope’s spine knotted in pain.

Below the dangling girl, a drop at least a hundred feet, snow belying the craggy rocks and jagged skeletons of forest.

She couldn’t fall.

Calliope couldn’t let her fall.

“Don’t let go,” she repeated, her voice a whisper as she struggled to reach the girl without losing her grip on the steering wheel.

Mara sat up, groaning, leaned forward, and entwined her arms around Calliope’s chest as Calliope leaned out of the car, pulled the door closer, straining as far as she could, lifting the girl back toward the snowy ledge.

Amy had stopped shooting, shuffled beside the driver’s side, and grabbed Eunjoo. She pushed her back into the truck.

“What were you thinking?” Calliope yelled.

The girl’s face streaked with tears, she breathed rapidly, a small, frightened bird.

Calliope repeated the question, gentler.

Eunjoo sniffled, wiped her nose on her sleeve. “I wanted to help.”

Calliope hugged Eunjoo, hard. She understood the futile helplessness of hiding and waiting. She wanted to help too.

Amy still perched on the shoulderless ledge, leaning across the hood, aiming the gun.

She shot, and the gun clicked without firing, empty.