Whispered Darkness by Jessica Sorensen Page 0,2

it.

Used to her.

Used to death.

Okay, maybe the latter isn’t completely true.

Truthfully, I’m not sure I want to get used to it.

But even though I’m used to Beth just up and fading, it seemed like she was spooked by something this time, which is creepy.

What the hell spooks a dead girl?

My gaze travels to the window, the last place she looked. My blinds are shut, so I can’t see anything. Maybe Beth was just being weird. Nevertheless, I get up and pad over there. Then, sucking in a deep breath, I peer outside.

Darkness blankets the land, along with dim lighting of nearby porch lights. The forest that lies just outside my house’s property is a shadow against the nighttime, the trees nothing more than silhouettes. While I’ve seen shadows creeping around in there before, I can’t see anything now. Beth warned me, though, that the shadows were things that’d try to conceal the truth from me. One had once grabbed me in the forest, and the fingers had felt inhuman, but I’m still not sure what it was. Part of me doesn’t want to know what it was, either.

Evil, Beth had said.

Evil is near, my instincts whisper to me.

As my heart rate accelerates, I step back then turn away from the blinds. I make my way to my bed, exhaustion overcoming me.

I text Kingsley again, my worry for him rising. And again, I only receive silence.

So much silence.

That’s all I sense right now.

I need to see him. I just don’t know how to do that without giving my mom a panic attack.

After lying in bed, fighting not to go to sleep and trying to figure out a way to get out of this house without making my mom super worried, I decide that I’ll talk to her tomorrow morning, explain some things.

But not everything.

Then, hopefully, I can go see Kingsley.

Because I feel like he needs me.

And I feel like I need him.

I need him. He’s my other half, is the last thought that wanders through my mind before exhaustion takes over and hauls me into dreamland.

2

Harlynn

I’m walking in a forest, and the trees are laced in fog. The air is chilly, yet I feel like I’m part of it. Part of the cold. I am the cold—

Snap.

A branch breaks from somewhere close by, and I stop, peering around at the shadowy trees. That’s when I see it. The shadow, looming in the distance, the moonlight casting across its face. Only it doesn’t have a face. It’s just a shadow, too, with no eyes, no mouth, no nothing.

Evil.

Run, Harlynn.

Run now!

I spin around and sprint through the trees, branches and rocks tearing at my bare feet. I realize I don’t have any shoes on and am wearing nothing but my pajama bottoms and a tank top.

How did I end up like this?

I’m not sure. All I know is that I need to run, that if I turn around, that shadow will grab me. So I keep going, moving as quickly as I can until I break from the trees. Only then do I slow down, somehow knowing that I’ll be okay here.

As I turn around and look back at the trees, I see the shadow still standing there, watching me, but not moving toward me. I don’t know why it won’t come after me now that I’ve left the forest and am …

I swallow hard as the scent of lake water touches my nostrils. Then I twist around before stepping back as a soft wave reaches up to the shore and tries to grab my feet.

I want nothing to do with this lake.

Why did I come here?

Why?

Why?

Why?

My gaze travels to the cliff where Foster’s truck went over with me in it. A night I can barely remember, yet if I somehow could, this might all be over. But there are holes in my memories, empty graves, like the girls who keep haunting me.

Pressing my lips together, I inch back from the lake, but my feet start to sink in the mud. I try to wiggle free, yet I keep sinking.

“Harlynn,” the wind whispers. “Save us.”

“Help us.”

“Please.”

Movement forms in the middle of the lake, like limbs reaching out of the water.

As I squint against the darkness, I become painfully aware that that’s exactly what they are—arms and fingers reaching for me.

I try to run away from them, yet my legs won’t budge, and now the water is rushing around me, pulling me out toward them, toward the bodies.

Fingers wrap around my arms, my waist,