Page 11 of The Heart of Moonlight Falls

“It can’t be a shade,” Sebastian muttered, hoping he wasn’t wrong. The last thing they needed was light-resistant ones out on a sunlit day.

A woman darted into a car parked in front of the park as a bear paced back and forth beside it. One of the picnic tables behind it was crushed.

Sebastian grabbed James, forcing them both to stop on the edge of the grass surrounding the stone. “What are the chances that’s a normal bear?”

The animal turned its head toward them, revealing onyx eyes and a chunk of flesh missing from its face.

James swallowed. “I’d say zero.”

Fuck, it was possessed. The longer Sebastian looked, the more wrong the bear seemed. Its fur was matted with dirt, its skin hanging loosely in some areas but not others. There were wounds on its side and chest, but the blood was black and dried.

It roared, flecks of something flying from its mouth. The bear abandoned the car and stalked toward them.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Sebastian tried to drag James backward. Why had they come over here? They couldn’t save anyone from a possessed predator.

James sent sparks at the bear. The embers landed in the fur on its chest and ignited. The beast jolted and growled but kept moving, burning as it walked toward them like nothing was wrong.

“Why isn’t it stopping?” James gasped, bewildered.

“I think it’s already dead. Look.” Sebastian pointed. “It’s half-decayed.”

“Is it the same bear Carson’s son shot in the woods?”

At this point, it didn’t matter. The horror that had once been a bear was coming closer. The fire spread up the beast’s shoulders, but the shade inside seemed unbothered, its dark eyes fixed on its prey.

Usually, you had to kill a possessed animal to get the shade to leave the body. Sebastian didn’t know what to do if the animal was already dead.

“Aim for its eyes,” Sebastian yelled, taking a guess and hoping that hitting the shade’s eyes would vanquish the beast.

He and James sent sparks and ran. The bear wouldn’t even need to bite them or swipe them with its claws to kill them. It would just knock them down with a flaming paw and set them on fire.

Parker burst out of the diner behind them. “Hey!”

The bear paused at the sound and turned. It hesitated as it tried to decide who to pursue.

One sure way to get rid of the possessed beast occurred to Sebastian. He was on the south side of the circle this time, but the vein was still underfoot.

It didn’t take the complete, hopeless desire to die to connect to the vein this time. Sebastian just had to focus under the earth, knowing part of him was down there, and pull.

His fingers crackled blue.

The bear turned back toward him and James and lunged, flaming paws launching into the air as it barred its onyx teeth. Sebastian shot pure, hot power at it, his nerves burning with the effort.

Blue energy cut through the fire and hit the bear in the chest. It screeched, but unlike the roaring from earlier, this was high-pitched. Shadow burst from the burning bear and dissipated as the body crumpled to the ground in a putrid heap.

Sebastian dropped to his knees, panting heavily, his head pounding like his heart and brain had swapped places. He released the power of the veins, but it didn’t help. He groaned.

“Sebastian!” James wrapped his arms around him and pulled him against his chest.

A moment later, Parker was on his other side. Sebastian closed his eyes. He swore he could hear the sound of a fire extinguisher, but less and less was penetrating the pain in his head.

He just needed to sleep. A little nap, that was all.

5

JAMES

James and Parker took Sebastian to his duplex. He was alive, his pulse steady, but James wished they could have taken him to a hospital instead.

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