Page 28 of Grave Beginnings

I lifted the plastic lid a half inch, expecting something to jump out at me. When nothing did, I threw it open and peered inside. Nothing other than a huge stash of paperbacks with their covers ripped off. Wasteful.

I sighed and took a step back when I heard the giggle again. This time, when I turned, I caught a glimpse of a child, or their ponytail, disappearing around the corner.

“Stop!” I shouted, and chased after them, rounding the corner to see them vanish into the alley between buildings.

“Dammit,” I huffed, and ran toward it. When I slid into the alley, darkness engulfed me with a rise of nausea. Oh, fuck. I’d crossed the Veil. I spun around, hoping to go back the way I came, but any sign of the alley entrance had vanished, and I was left in a long, narrow street of shadows, smoke, and spooky-looking buildings.

“Want to play with me?” a childlike voice asked from behind me.

My heart hammered in my chest, and I couldn’t breathe. I turned slowly, fists gripped at my sides, the icy breeze raising goosebumps on my skin. I’d heard legends of black-eyed kids before.

Don’t let them in!I stared at the kid with deathly gray skin and eyes a well of nothing but darkness. Their smile was creepy and fanged, between dimples and blond curls. I shivered as the cold reached down into my core and threatened to freeze my soul.

“You’re not real,” I whispered. I’d looked it up in the manual over the weekend because it wasn’t the first time I thought I’d seen one. Wikipedia said they were an urban legend, stories from American culture to scare people from letting random kids into their homes. “You’re not supposed to be real.”

“Let’s play, Jude.”

Holy fuck, it knew my name!

I took a step back and the kid stepped forward.

“Stop!” I demanded, holding my hands out in front of me. For a half second, the kid froze, as if covered in a block of invisible ice. Then, the kid laughed. The sound started light and airy like the tinkling of bells, then turned into a deeper cackle as it morphed into a massive, looming, dark shadow that reached for me.

“Demon spawn,” it muttered. “Let me taste you.”

I threw myself backward, landing in a half roll, then popped back up onto my feet, gun in my grip, walking backward and aiming. I never fired first, but as the thing leapt, I squeezed the trigger. Bullets slammed into it one after another, tearing chunks out of the shadow that oozed back together as if the whole thing were liquid smoke instead of corporeal. Not once did it pause.

“Jude…” The thing cackled. “I’ve been searching for one like you.”

“Creepy bastard. Stay back!” I kept squeezing until the gun clicked empty and my gut rolled over in terror. The creature swirled, the form of the shadows coiling until they built into ahuge silhouette of some sort of giant man. Nothing definable about it—him—whatever, other than the sheer size, like a giant troll taking shape.

It smacked the gun out of my hand and sent the piece flying. I couldn’t tear my eyes from it as I continued to back away and reached for my taser.

“What the fuck are you?” I gasped. My heart raced, pumping so hard I feared it would burst. It reached for me, talons stretching long and dripping dark ooze. The taser blasted a jolt of electricity that sizzled in a smothering fire of blue and purple, snapping at the creature, making it hesitate. Then it grabbed the muzzle of the taser, fist closed around the end, crushing it as if it were no more than Play-Doh.

I let it go and turned to run, stripping out of the gear that weighed me down as I went, throwing everything at it and in its path to slow it down. Enough time on the track, and self-defense classes, had taught me to use my smaller size to move, and that meant away from danger when I couldn’t defeat it. Though, here, across the Veil, I didn’t know if anywhere was safe.

The deep laughter resounded behind me as the cackling got closer. The taser flew past my head, hurled just a hair’s breadth from my ear. I swallowed the flinch and kept running, aiming for the buildings and possible cover. I rounded a corner, racing down a long street, and dove through the first open door of a structure, slamming it closed. I stared at a dark room filled with ghostly, half-translucent faces.

“Oh fuck,” I said, pressing myself to the side of the door as I heard the cackle outside. I sank to the floor, crawling back into the corner as much as possible while the wavering white shadows saturating the building with their chilled presence closed in around me. I tucked my knees into my chest, face to my knees as I covered my ears with my hands, trying to shut out the noise.

My heart hammered hard enough that I was certain the beastie outside would hear and follow me inside. The chillingswirl of the ghosts pressed against me, as if crowding close for a chance to touch me. I whimpered and mentally shoved at the weight of that icy grip, screaming, “Leave me alone!”

Something heavy poured from inside me—power, magic, something I couldn’t define—sweeping the chill away. With it, I blinked twice, the white wisps vanishing as my world collapsed into darkness.

10

My gut churnedand the mother of all headaches arched a slicing pain behind my left eye as I woke. Something snuffled my face, and I realized a weight was pressed to my side, leaving one arm numb. The heat of it warmed my entire left side. I blinked through the dark to find glowing eyes attached to a giant cat head, which rested on my chest, purring. The vibration soothed the racing of my heart, though I gulped at the idea the cat could easily bite me in half.

“Hi?” I asked. Was it real, or some ghost thing?

The building around us stood empty and silent. The ghosts, or wavering white things, had vanished. Hiding? I sat up slowly, worried the cat would attack, but it kept low to the ground, pressed to my side. The door gaped wide open, a strange, orange haze adding light to the room. Was there daytime across the Veil?

I held out my hand to the cat, studying it. “You sort of look like a tiger, but with leopard spots?” I said out loud, more to hear my own voice than expecting a response. The cat licked my fingers and bumped them, like Peanut Butter when he wanted scratches.

“Is it okay to pet you?” I asked as I reached for an ear and gaveit a good scratch. The cat chuffed at me and pressed into my touch. “Okay, guess petting the giant kitty is okay. I always knew I’d die saying, ‘Here kitty, kitty.’”

The cat rose to its feet, giving a long body stretch and nudging my shoulder.