Page 46 of The Executioners Three

If Divya had thought the archives were wiggins central during the day, Freddie thought as she galloped toward the woodsman cottage, she really should see it at night. No Keebler elves would be toppling out of there now.

Serial killers, though? Definitely.

Freddie ran right up to the archives door. The red of the window frame beside it looked like blood. A nail was sticking out too; she should probably tell Mom about that.

Or maybe you should just get out of these woods alive!

She tried the door handle, but it didn’t budge. Breaking and entering it would have to be. She spun around, searching and searching until she spotted a hefty oak branch ten steps away.

Freddie didn’t have much in the way of upper body strength. Plus, her wrists were still bound, handcuffs dangling down, and her left wrist was swelling more and more by the second. But didn’t adrenaline turn people into Super Strong Muscle Machines? Who could lift a car off of a baby or something?

The answer, Freddie soon learned, was no . At least not when you were Freddie Gellar. Her first swing at the window bounced back right at her face. She barely bit back a yelp before it bonked her forehead.

She swung again, aiming lower. Again, again.

But of course the window was freaking weatherproof, to protect Mom’s precious historical documents.

By the fourth swing, Freddie had to accept this wasn’t going to work.

That she would be better served running the half mile to the Village Historique and trying to use the phone there.

Freddie dropped the stick. Her breaths sawed in, sawed out. She swiveled to aim for the Village…

And that was when she saw it: the figure in the snowy autumn trees. Fuzzy and cloaked in the rotten stench of impending death. It moved toward Freddie with a slow, methodical stamp.

Then a different body slammed into Freddie. So sudden she hadn’t heard it coming. So fast she had no time to react before she was smashed to the earth. Her skull slammed down. Stars and darkness splattered in.

Fingers closed around Freddie’s neck and thighs squeezed around her rib cage.

Freddie struggled and squirmed. Clawed her zip-tied hands at some unseen face and unseen body.

The handcuffs were still attached to her zip-tied hands, doing more damage to Freddie than her attacker.

And no matter how hard Freddie fought—no matter how hard she strained to see—all she got were shadows.

It was like a black fog had swept in, and somewhere inside there was a figure she could not seem to grab hold of.

And flames. There were flames in there too, flickers that danced off a hidden skull.

The fingers at Freddie’s neck squeezed tighter.

She choked. She wheezed. She fishtailed and writhed.

And it was like two tracks were playing in her brain.

On top was a track screaming, Stay alive!

The track below that was saying, This has to be a hallucination, and any moment now, you’ll snap out of it.

She had to snap out of it because right now, no breath was entering her lungs. No oxygen was reaching her brain. But no matter how hard she fought, she couldn’t stop the hand at her throat.

She couldn’t avoid the face now leaning in. “Libérez-nous,” they whispered.

And Freddie realized she knew that voice. She knew that shadowed face, even if the eyes were now filled with flame. Laina hissed, teeth flashing, and Freddie could have sworn she saw smoke coiling off the girl’s tongue.

“Libérez-nous.”

Tighter, tighter. Laina’s fingers squeezed tighter.

Libérez-nous. The words scraped inside Freddie’s skull. Meaningless, yet inescapable. And also undeniably pleading. There was a desperation in that voice and an ancient sadness in the fathomless, flame-fueled eyes. Libérez-nous.

Suddenly, the pressure at Freddie’s windpipe released. An abrupt influx of air, air, air. A heartbeat after that, the weight on Freddie’s chest leaped free.

Laina was gone. The shadow was gone.

Divya’s face swam into view. She was there— right there —and trying to help Freddie rise. And Cat too, Freddie thought, as a second face materialized from the darkness.

“Get up,” Divya and Cat were saying in voices that sounded too far away. Like Freddie was in a swimming pool and they were shouting from the opposite end. “Get up, Freddie—you have to get up.”

So Freddie got up. Somehow, with limbs made of ice and a brain made of fog—and with hands still bound by zip ties and a dangling set of handcuffs—she got up. Only to find Kyle and Luis by the archives.

Luis held a baseball bat and he was yanking at it while Laina clutched the other end in her hand. It was as if he’d swung it at her, and she’d stopped it midair. Effortless. A Super Strong Muscle Machine that Luis could never win against.

Flames licked off the bat’s edge, but that wasn’t what made Freddie gasp. That was Kyle, dangling from Laina’s other hand as easily as a doll. She held him around the throat, and already, his movements grew weak.

“No,” Freddie tried to yell. Except that the word came out as garbled as the night—painful too, her throat having just been shredded by hands that had been way too strong. Supernaturally strong? her brain tried to ask, but she elbowed that thought aside in favor of surviving this moment.

“Let him go, Laina!” She stumbled forward. Laina’s back was to her; Freddie would attack if she had to. “Let him go!”

Clang . A bell tolled. Piercing, distant, yet also thrumming straight down into Freddie’s gut.

Laina’s head snapped toward it. Clang. She released Kyle. He crumpled to the snowy ground, coughing and sputtering. Clang . She released the baseball bat and bolted. A streak of fire-tipped shadows. Of unnatural speed and the stench of putrid flesh.

Then the last echoes of the bell ended, and Laina was gone.

For several seconds, no one moved. Not even Kyle, crouched and clutching at his throat. It was like everyone was afraid to breathe. Afraid to even think about what had just happened.

Until Kyle started coughing, and suddenly everyone was moving. Luis and Cat reached for Kyle. Divya grabbed for Freddie’s bound hands.

“Oh my god,” Divya said. “What happened to you?”

“No time.” Freddie’s vocal cords were shredded.

“We need… to get in there. In the archives.” She didn’t know why the bell had rung again, and she also still didn’t know from where.

But three tolls meant the Disemboweler was hunting—human or maybe otherwise—and Freddie didn’t want any of her friends to be outside a moment longer.

“You’re tied up.” Divya held fast to Freddie’s shoulders. “How did you get here? What happened?”

“I’ll explain inside, Div. There’s a phone in there. Luis? The window—break it.”

“Yep,” he said as he tugged Kyle to his feet. And seconds later, with Cat to prop up Kyle and Divya still holding Freddie, Luis had his bat ready. “Hey, batter, batter,” he murmured.

The window didn’t stand a chance. Glass shattered in a sound that was both magnificent and way too loud . Heat rolled outward.

Luis swung again. Again. Until enough of the glass had fallen out for him to reach through and unbolt the door.

Freddie was the first to shove inside. “Come on, guys,” she called, hugging her left wrist to her chest. “And lock the door behind you.”

The handcuffs attached to Freddie’s zip-tied wrists clanked as she climbed down the ladder into darkness. Every movement sent pain through new bruises, new scratches, and above all, her left wrist.

She tumbled off the ladder and grabbed at the light switch. It was a risk, turning on the light. But then, it wasn’t as if being in the dark had kept them safe. At least now, there were walls.

Flip. Light bathed outward, fluorescent and searing. Freddie squinted into the bunker-like space stretching ahead. Grunts behind signaled Divya had arrived too. “It’s so warm. Thank god.”

“Phone” was all Freddie replied, and she launched toward the cen tral support beam with its legally required emergency gear. (Although she would bet murderers weren’t the emergency anyone had ever planned for.)

Freddie laughed. A weak, hysterical laugh as she aimed for the central pole. She yanked down the first aid kit. “Scissors,” she told Divya, shoving it toward her. “I need to cut these zip ties.”

“On it.” Divya tore open the metal box, and moments later, Freddie’s wrists were free. The handcuffs fell to the floor, landing on Freddie’s frozen feet. Now she was able to grab for the phone.

Savoring the full freedom of her arms and hands, she dialed the police station. Bowman obviously—and frankly, thankfully —wasn’t there, but maybe the deputies were. And maybe the feds were with them, since boy did this feel like a job for federal agents with federal agent weapons and skills.

Three rings sounded before Ibrahim’s voice came through. “Berm Sheriff’s Department—”

“Ibrahim!” Freddie half shrieked. “The murderer is here. At the county park. Me and a bunch of other students, we’re stuck with a serial killer. Please, Ibrahim—send help.”

“Uh, who’s calling?”

“Freddie Gellar.” She cursed herself. She was smarter than this.

Cooler under pressure. Give him the facts.

Channel Bowman… no, scratch that. Channel Bowman when she isn’t under a murderer’s control.

“We’re at the Village archives, and it’s dangerous.

Like, really dangerous. There are several murderous, erm…

individuals hunting us. So please, send a lot of people.

Especially those feds that you mentioned are in town. ”

“And send guns,” Kyle inserted. He and the others had now reached Freddie. They clustered around her like the worst kind of peanut gallery. “’Cause there’s, like, fucking demons here.”

“And an ambulance,” Cat suggested. “For Laina.”