Murderguy must have dropped his flashlight in terror, either that or Enola had vaporized him. The flashlight fell in such a way that the only light cast onto the monster was reflected off a few trees, illuminating only its eyes, the rest of the creature shrouded in darkness. She couldn’t see its hands, both of which were around her, encasing her like spiders the size of ceiling fans, clamping around her head, closing in on her orifices. “No!” she screamed, the only word she was capable of. “No, no, no!”

Enola paused, but not for her. Murderguy had caught his attention and was now hanging in midair not three feet away from Enola, whose sharp gaze regarded the man quizzically. Then the man fell to the ground, his muscles slack, his mouth and eyes hanging open.

Then both hands were on her again. She tried to grab for the pulse emitter in her hoodie, but was held fast by those shining black digits, the spider wrapping its prey. She continued to scream on instinct as it pried around her head, forced her cheek to the ground while she fought and struggled and screamed and cried. She didn’t realize that it was focused on her earbuds until one of them was pulled out.

For the moment, its attention stayed on the earbud, not on her, one hand still holding her down and the other holding up the earbud for examination. Then, its gaze shot back down at her. It forced her cheek back down to the ground and shoved the earbud back in place.

“SSSSENSNSE. AURARALLL.”

A voice in her ear, a new one with a strange echoing effect that made it difficult to understand, like each word was being said twice a second apart, half overlapping. “SSSSENSNSE.”

Cora jerked in each breath, looking up into the eyes of the monster, the only part of it she could really see. Its hands were on her, crawling up her neck, wrapping themselves around her torso, black widows about to inject their poison, suck her dry.

“SSSSENSNSE,” said the voice. “SSPSPEAKK. SPEAK. SPEAK!”

“No!” she screamed, still sucking in quick, horrified breaths, tears now streaming down her temples. “No, no, no!”

“SPEAK!”

“I can speak!” she finally managed. “I can speak!”

Enola leaned in closer to her, inches away from her face, and she nearly choked on her shallow breath, gagged on it, cried out incoherently. “CCALLLL YYOURR MMASSTERR.”

She was in a field again, Obelus was on top of her, his meat hooks inside her, extracting her viscera, the meat that made up her being, for that was all she was, meat to be butchered. She was begging Obelus, No, no, no, please stop, please stop!

“CALL YOUR MASTER!”