One Was Lost by Natalie D. Richards

Author:Natalie D. Richards
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Published: 2016-08-23T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

It’s Emily, and there’s blood. That’s all I can sort out at first when we stumble back to the fire. My brain flips through images like a slide show in fast-forward. A charred, still-smoking log rolled away from the fire. A hunk of dark hair hanging over Emily’s left eye. A smear of blood on her chin. On her hands. But she doesn’t look injured.

Is it Jude’s blood?

My focus widens, and the scene unfolds, making no more sense as a whole than it did in pieces. Jude’s shoulders are tensed, and Mr. Walker is sleeping again, head lolled on one shoulder. Emily is a trembling mess.

The cooler is pushed out, cockeyed from where it was. I can see that there’s a rectangular hole in the soil beneath it. A hole one of us was bound to find.

It was right there, waiting for us. A raw ache in my gut tells me whoever dug that hole was counting on us finding it.

I don’t want to look at what’s inside, the thing that has Jude and Emily so pale. The thing that left blood spatters on Emily’s fingers.

My first glance doesn’t tell me much. The hole is maybe ten inches deep and wet at the bottom. My insides shrivel up. Please don’t let it be a part of Ms. Brighton inside that dirty hole.

I lean closer, spotting the bundles of sticks. I think they’re tied together. Like they’re supposed to be something.

“What is that?” I ask. Sticks and blood? What kind of art and craft from hell is this? Then I see it. They’re arranged and bound into torsos and limbs, little heads and scraps that might be clothing. Like voodoo dolls made from bits of trees.

There are four of them. Three dolls are standing or sitting, and one is sleeping. My eyes catch on a scrap of red fabric on the biggest doll. Red like Lucas’s shirt. There are curling leaves on the head of the doll beside it—poplar leaves, I think. They remind me of Jude’s hair, and I don’t think that’s accidental, especially when I see the black moss and sharply slanted eyes on the doll that’s supposed to be Emily.

These dolls are supposed to be us.

That means the sleeping doll must be Mr. Walker. And I’m…missing? Hidden? I inch forward, my belly a sack of eels and every one of Emily’s hitching sobs making it worse. The doll in the middle has dark hair. There’s a jut of sticks—a pointy chin—dark eyes, and a pool of black liquid underneath it. Ink?

And then it all comes together. That’s not Mr. Walker; it’s me. It’s a me-doll, and it’s lying in a pool of blood.

A wave of vertigo rolls over me. I want to look away, but I can’t.

“Where did you find these?” Lucas asks. “Were they here?”

“The whole time,” Jude says, sounding broken.

My vision’s gone blurry. I can’t focus.

“Sera.” Lucas’s voice is low. He means to be soothing. Because I’m standing here, mouth gaping and eyes wide like a crazy person, and I’m probably scaring the fricking crap out of him.

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