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Chapter 6

Hazel can't breathe. She struggles to suck air into her lungs, but they're tight. She sits on the ground, Sadie nuzzling beside her. Like a pair of sisters bonded over trauma, they keep at Moira's side as though she were their own.
Leshy taps her shoulder and Sadie's and they both swivel their heads, startled.

Hazel takes a deep breath of foul air and jumps to her feet, running to the bathroom.
A sickening ten minutes later, she brushes her teeth, gargles some mouthwash, and fights to keep down whatever's left.

She grabs Sadie and her bag. "We're finishing the week in a hotel, fuck this shit."

Everything feels deceptively calm in the hotel room. Calm and wrong. Her friend just died. Was brutally murdered in front of her. And who knows if that monster is still loose.

She can't sleep and notices the four missed calls from Effie, all mysteriously cut off mid-message. As though Effie got through to leave a message, only to have her signal drop mid-sentence.

"Hey, Hazel, I know you're probably asleep by now but-"

"Sorry, the call dropped before I could-"

"Okay, this is absurd, Hazel I-"

"I'm coming home, explanation later."

No texts come through, and when Hazel tries to push one through, it is unable to be sent. Something was wrong with Effie's phone. Or hers. She tried the hotel phone, calling Effie until she got the voicemail.

"Effie, don't go home. Whatever you do. My experience got-" her phone goes dead.

She sets it down and grabs her keys, running to the door. "What else, what else?" she mutters. She picks up the antler piece–when had she grabbed that? It sticks out of her back pocket. "Sadie, I can't leave Sadie alone."

She grabs Sadie and rushes back to the apartment. It's all too quiet. She waits outside, eyes scanning the darkness for anything that moves.

Effie's ride pulls into the lot and Hazel lets out a big sigh.

"Effie, we have to go. We can't stay here-"

The cab driver gets out and tips his hat back. A shadow covers his face, but there is clearly something off about it. Like the eyes and mouth are not quite in the right spaces, but it's fuzzy when you look at him directly.

A second figure slips from the passenger's side door and throws a bag over Effie's head.

Hazel can't move anything but her head just enough to see the shadow stretching toward her, long, connecting to herself.

Someone places a bag over her head.

She hears a yelp and whine as Sadie is also shoved into the backseat with them.

There's some amount of movement and then Hazel blacks out.

The smell of rain, and the uncomfortable dampness wakes Hazel up. She gasps in the warm, humid air and tries to wipe the condensation off her glasses. But her hands are tied.

A blurry figure gets close to her and removes them, then returns them cleared to her face.
"Ah yes, the inconvenience of glasses. You know, I used to wear glasses before I started this company. Eyesight is the first thing to get better and the last to go in this case."

She squints. She can barely see the person speaking in the dim light. Everything smells like that soft post-rain scent, and the chair she's sitting in feels damp and soft underneath her. A pine-y forest familiarity permeates the room, and it could have been a comforting smell if not for the fact that she is tied up, and indoors.