I'm moving before the sound finishes echoing, bare feet hitting cold floorboards as the bond screams alarm through every nerve. The creature didn't test our defenses or probe the forest perimeter. It went straight through the center of town, past the patrol routes, past the safe houses we'd prepared.
Straight to her.
"Rowan!" I bark into the radio as I sprint down Main Street. "Code black at the Moonhaven Inn. All units converge now."
The static crackles back empty. Then Rowan's voice, tight with understanding: "On our way. How close?"
"Too close."
The inn's front door hangs by what looks like a single screw. It’s torn from its hinges. Jim lies unconscious in the hallway—breathing, thank god, but out cold. The thing didn't waste time on him. It knew exactly what it wanted.
I take the stairs three at a time. But the silence from her room makes my chest tighten.
"Ellie?" I call through the wood.
"Caleb?" Her voice is steady, controlled. Not hurt, not yet. "It's in here with me."
My hand freezes on the doorknob. The creature is inside with her, and she's talking to me like she's reporting the weather. Like she's not terrified out of her mind.
"Are you injured?"
"No. But it's not exactly giving me space to redecorate."
Even now, she can't help herself. Even with a supernatural predator breathing down her neck, Ellie Carter makes jokes.
"I'm coming in."
"Don't." Her voice sharpens. "It's waiting for you. This whole thing—it's a trap, Caleb. It didn't come here to hurt me. It came here to draw you out."
The realization hits like a physical blow.
"Ellie, listen to me very carefully. Can you get to the bathroom?"
"Already here. Locked the door, but I don't think that's going to slow it down much."
"It won't. But it'll buy us thirty seconds."
Footsteps pound up the stairs behind me—Rowan and the others, finally arriving.
"The window in the bathroom—can you reach it?"
"Caleb, I'm on the second floor."
"Can you reach it?"
A pause. Then: "Yes."
"Open it. Now."
"What are you…?"
"Open it, Ellie. Trust me."
The sound of splintering wood comes through the door. The creature is through the bathroom barrier. Ellie's sharp intake of breath cuts through the radio static, and every protective instinct I've spent weeks suppressing roars to life.
I kick in the bedroom door.
The room is chaos and silence at once.