Page 29 of Enter if you Dare: Part Two

By four in the morning, the night is winding down. The last session is running through, and guests are drifting toward the courtesy buses ready to take them across to their accommodation.

Nixie finally lets me off the hook. “Nothing is on fire. You’re now off the clock.”

I have no idea where Noa and Cipher are, so I cut down Sideshow Alley, where all the stalls are now closed, but the hairs on my arms stand on end.

I don’t see anyone when I scan my surroundings, yet I swear I feel them watching me. But I shake it off. It’s the atmosphere, being in complete darkness, and working for almost sixteen hours straight.

My phone rings, and Leni’s number flashes on my screen. It’s four a.m., so my stomach drops. You do not call people at this time with good news.

“Len, what’s wrong?”

“Valli,” she whispers. “Help me. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come. I wanted to surprise you, but it’s so dark.”

“Come? Where are you?”

“I’m on the island—there are headstones. Valli, I think someone is out there.”

The line drops out, and all ability to think rationally leaves my body.

I run, diving off the path and heading down the back toward the cemetery. My heart is trying to exit through my throat in the two minutes I take to sprint to the gate. My baby sister is somewhere in the dark, and it’s tonight of all nights that she comes. The one when the hunters think everyone is fair game, and she has no idea what we do here.

“LENI!”

The gate is open, and the lights we normally use here are off.

I switch on my phone’s flashlight, but three steps into the cemetery it dies, turning my surroundings to pitch black. I keep walking, allowing my eyes to adjust, all the while feeling someone watching me. Then I push into a run, hoping Leni will see me, but pull to a halt when something drops in front of me. My scream shatters the air as I come to a stop, then slowly back up.

A hand comes over my mouth, and a second person catches my legs as I kick out. Something is pulled over my head, and I am sent back to that day. Every fear is coming back to haunt me.

There is no way I will give up so easily, not when my sister is here. So I fight, buck, and kick as I’m carried away.

“Let me go!” I scream, though it’s muffled by the fabric. “You have no idea what will happen when they find you.”

Terror washes over me when I think about what my men will do when they can’t find me. This is not what they need right now. I have to fight; I am not weak.

As I’m carried away, a scent I’d know anywhere hits me, but the fear doesn’t leave me all at once. Relief crashes into me first, then a half-sob, half-laugh merges into an anger that holds no real weight. “I’m going to kill all three of you!”

“I told you she would know it was us,” Noa says through a laugh.

“Where is Leni?” I demand.

“In her dorm,” Noa reveals from somewhere beside me. “Eating pizza and counting her money after the best performance of her life.”

Tears prickle behind my eyes. “I thought she was out here alone.”

I’m lowered to the ground, but the bag over my head stays on.

“What is a fear that cannot be outrun?” Cave murmurs beside my ear.

I’m shaking, but I know what this is: the Harvest Moon is all about facing your deepest, darkest fears.

“Losing the people I love.”

“She is safe, you are ours, and nothing on the island touches what is ours,” Cipher says, and I love how much bolder he becomes around me. They know my fears; I have a file in Nixie’s drawer just like everyone else. My biggest fear is losing the people I love, and I don’t know if I could handle it a second time.

“Color,” Cipher says, his thumb moving across my wrist, checking my pulse.

I could end it all now. There is always a way out on the island; they don’t want to trap you if you don’t want to be here. My heart is pounding in my chest, but the panic has gone while the adrenaline remains.