Page 68 of The Witch’s Orchard

There’s another bang. Vibrating with energy and adrenaline, my heart thumping against my ribs, my lungs burning, I run around the west side. Smoke streams out of an upper window.

“Shit,” I breathe.

I try the windows again, giving each slab of plywood a hard shove as I run along. Finally, toward the middle of the building, one gives. Almost like it’s hinged. I push it again. It gives some more.

Up above, the screaming starts again. Wordless and horrified. Again, a woman’s voice.

“Mandy?” I call. But there’s no real answer, just more frantic screaming.

I push the plywood all the way in and find a tattered blanket lying folded over the rusting sill and old glass. I ease myself into the window and look back at the plywood.

If this place is burning down, I need to be able to find a way out. I yank at the wood, but it doesn’t come off. I look around. Find a couple old bricks, prop the plywood open so at least I can see the sunlight through the cracks.

Inside, the place is damp, dusty, and dark. Huge pieces of rusty machinery take up the entire ground floor. Here and there, pieces of dolls litter the equipment, the cement floor. They’re even nailed to the plywood over the windows. Some of the pieces, mostly heads, are defaced with markers or bullet holes. Some of the dolls’ plastic eyes have been plucked out.

Pretty much exactly what you’d expect in a defunct toy factory.

BANG!

I keep my gun ready, run to where I hope the staircase is. With all the dust and the dingy light and the smoke billowing down from upstairs, it’s hard to see.

I find a set of creaky metal stairs and hope they’re not rusted through.

It’s been only ten years since this place closed, but it’s humid in these mountains and this place isn’t exactly hermetically sealed.

I start to climb the steps, let my hip rub along the stair rail, guiding me up.

“Mandy?” I call.

A wave of acrid gray-black smoke crashes into me. I cough and sputter against the burning in my throat and pull the collar of my T-shirt up over my nose and mouth.

I hear yelling, screaming. A man’s voice shouting. Shouting that he needs help. And still the woman’s voice, screaming in terror.

I hit the top of the stairs and find that, unlike the open bottom floor, the top is split into several big rooms. I work my way through them asbest I can. Up here the smoke is worse, but at least the windows aren’t boarded up, so some light comes in. I use what little of it I can to find my way around the maze of rooms, ducking under the smoke.

I follow the sound of the screams.

“Help me, goddamnit!” the deeper voice screams again.

I round one more corner and finally find the source of the fire.

Smoke billows out of a room that’s too small for production, that maybe was once used for storage or as an office. A man lies on the floor in front of me, half his face melted off, his clothes charred black, still smoldering, no longer moving. I recognize him from the picture in the criminal records I’d pulled up my first night in Quartz Creek.

It’s Dwight Hoyle.

“Shit,” I hiss again.

Another scream behind me. I turn and see a smaller figure crouched in the corner across the room, just barely in my field of vision. It’s Elaine Hoyle. Staring at her husband, her mouth open to let out a prolonged, horrified scream.

“Elaine,” I say. “Elaine—”

But she doesn’t seem to hear me. Her hair, stained black from soot, is plastered to her face. She holds her fists so near her mouth, I’m surprised she hasn’t bitten her fingers off.

“Elaine!”

Across the room, the other, deeper shouting starts again.

“Help me! Goddamnit! Help me!”