I stood in the mud, the rain hammering against the hood of my coat, the revolver heavy and cold in my pocket.
The Sawmill was a mountain of dead iron rising out of the fog. Windows, shattered decades ago, looked like jagged teeth in a skull. The wind howled through the skeletal structure, making the corrugated metal siding groan like a dying animal. It was the perfect place for a monster to hide.
“I’m coming, Elias,” I whispered, my hand tightening on the grip of the gun. “I’m coming to end it.”
I took a step forward, my boot sinking into the slurry.
Drrr-ring.
The sound was small, digital, and utterly out of place in the roar of the storm.
I froze.
Drrr-ring.
It wasn’t coming from inside the mill. It was coming from my other pocket.
The burner phone.
I had bought it at a gas station in Seattle three days ago. I hadn’t given the number to anyone. Not Julian. Not my editor. Not the police. I had bought it solely for this moment, a lifeline I prayed I wouldn’t need.
Drrr-ring.
My heart slammed against my ribs, a frantic, painful rhythm.
He had the number.
Of course he had the number. He had been in the motel room. He had been in the walls. He probably knew the serial number of the SIM card and the battery life remaining.
I pulled the phone out. The screen glowed a harsh, artificial blue in the darkness.
UNKNOWN CALLER.
I stared at it. The vibration buzzed against my palm like an angry hornet.
If I answered, I was acknowledging him. I was stepping onto the game board.
If I didn’t answer, he might disappear. He might take his “guests” and vanish back into the earth.
I slid my thumb across the screen. I pressed the phone to my ear.
“Hello?”
Static. The hiss of a connection made through wet wires and bad towers.
And then, breathing.
It was a wet, heavy sound. The sound of air moving through a crushed larynx, or a throat unused to speech.
“Princess?”
The voice was a shock. It wasn’t the smooth, menacing baritone of a movie villain. It was raspy, high-pitched, and trembling. It sounded like a rusty gate being forced open. It sounded like the boy I remembered, aged thirty years in the dark.
“Elias,” I said. My voice was steady, surprisingly calm. “I’m here.”
“I see you,” he whispered.
I spun around, scanning the treeline, the ridge, the looming bulk of the mill.
“Where are you?”
“Did you like the gifts?” he asked. He ignored my question. His tone shifted, becoming eager, anxious. “I tried to fix them. I used the silver tape. Dr. Dan used to use the silver tape.”
“They’re dead, Elias,” I said, the cruelty of the truth tasting bitter on my tongue. “You killed them.”
“No,” he said, a sharp, petulant note entering his voice. “No, no, no. They’re sleeping. Like Annabel. You bury them to keep them safe, and then you wake them up for the tea party. That’s the rule.”
“The rule doesn’t work on people,” I said. “People don’t wake up.”
“Why?” The word was a wail. “Why won’t they wake up? I told them to. I wrote it on the wall. Wake up.”
“Because you broke them,” I said. “You hurt them.”
“I saved them!” he screamed. The sound distorted the speaker, a burst of static violence. “The Dragon was coming! The Dragon is everywhere! I had to put them in the box to keep them safe!”
I closed my eyes. He truly didn’t know. In his mind, the violence was an act of preservation. He was preserving them in the only way he knew how—by stopping them.
“I’m not safe, Elias,” I said softly. “The Dragon is looking for me.”
“I know,” he whispered. The anger vanished, replaced by a terrifying tenderness. “I saw the Bad Prince. He took your gun away. He put you in a cage.”
He meant Julian. He had watched the arrest.
“He hurt you,” Elias rasped. “Does he need to go in the box too?”
“No,” I said quickly. “No. Leave Julian alone.”
“He lies,” Elias muttered. “He told you I drowned. He stole my shoes. He put the wrong shoes in the river.”
“I know,” I said. “I know about the shoes. I know you survived.”
“I waited,” he said. “I waited in the dark. It was so cold, Elara. The water came up to my chest. But I held the stone. The stone you gave me. And I remembered your face.”
A tear leaked out of my eye, hot and stinging. The pity was a physical pain, warring with the horror of what he had become.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry I forgot you.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “You remember now. You found the house. You found the wrapper.”
He paused. I could hear him breathing, a jagged, hitching rhythm.
“Are you ready for the Wedding?” he asked.
My grip on the gun tightened. “The Wedding?”
“Yes. The Knight and the Princess. We have to get married. Then the Dragon can’t touch us. We’ll be Kings.”
“Where?” I asked. “Where is the wedding, Elias?”
“The Castle,” he said. “But… not yet. The guests are quiet. They’re being rude. I need to… I need to find new guests.”
The threat hung in the air, unspoken but screaming.
“Don’t hurt anyone else,” I said. “Elias, please.”
“I want to see you,” he said suddenly. “Before the ceremony. I want to see if you’re still my Elara.”
“I’m at the Sawmill,” I said. “Come out. I’m right here.”
“No,” he hissed. “Too bright. Too open. The men with the lights are coming. I see them on the road.”
I looked back toward the highway. I didn’t see any lights, but Elias had the senses of a hunted animal. If he said the police were coming, they were coming.
“Where do you want to meet?” I asked.
“Our Place,” he said.
I frowned. “The cellar?”
“No,” he said, his voice soft, dripping with nostalgia. “Where we touched. Where you gave me the candy. Where the sky is metal.”
The sky is metal.
I searched my memory, sifting through the recovered fragments of 1999.
The Swing Set.
It was in the old elementary school playground, abandoned when the new district was built. The swing set was huge, an industrial metal frame that towered over the weeds. We used to lie on the swings at night, looking up at the top bar, pretending it was the sky.
It was where I first held his hand. Through the chain link of the swing.
“The swings,” I said.
“Yes,” he whispered. “Meet me there. Alone. If you bring the Bad Prince… I’ll break the dolls.”
“I’ll come alone,” I promised.
“Do you have the token?” he asked.
“The token?”
“The stone. The one I gave you in the library.”
I reached into my pocket. My fingers brushed the smooth, cold surface of the river stone.
“I have it.”
“Good,” he said. “Bring it. It’s the ring.”
The line went dead.
I lowered the phone, my hand trembling.
He wasn’t at the Sawmill. Or if he was, he was leaving. He was moving the game to a new location. A location that was open, exposed, and steeped in the emotional blood of our past.
I looked at the revolver on the dashboard.
“Strategy,” I whispered to myself.
He wanted a meeting. He wanted a moment of connection. He wanted to give me a ring.
He was expecting the twelve-year-old girl who fed him Snickers bars through a vent. He was expecting the Princess.
But the Princess grew up. The Princess learned how to shoot.
I climbed back into the truck. The engine roared to life, drowning out the sound of the wind.
I wasn’t going to the playground to play.
I was going there to end the game.
I threw the truck into gear and spun the tires in the mud, turning away from the Sawmill and heading back toward the town. Toward the rusted skeleton of the swing set where a boy once promised to save me.
I touched the stone in my pocket.
“I’m coming, Elias,” I said. “And I’m bringing a gift, too.”