"You want me to what?"

"Restrain me. You must tie me down."

Emery was horrified at the request. "What are you talking about? I need your help! Why would I tie you up?"

Cathbad pushed through the cabin door and threw the coyote carcass into the circle with his other artifacts. "We haven't the time to argue. For all my learning, I am ignorant of so much! Do you not see that Evil has arrived? He has turned the men from the inside! He will not attack our exterior but will turn us against one another. And I cannot allow myself to be turned against you, Emery. I could do great harm."

"Well what about me? What if--what if I do something to you?"

The druid faced her, looking wild in his current lack of attire. He was glistening with sweat, likely from being wrapped in that cowhide. "That would be far preferable to the alternative. I am of little value, but if you are harmed . . . I dare not think on it. The Knights and I have one duty, and that is to protect you. It would serve nothing if I lived and you did not."

"But--but what do I do? You have powers! How could I possibly restrain you? And Cat, I need you. What will I do if you can't help me? Evil will come, and I have no clue what to do!"

"Mayhap I can send you back to your home first." He groaned in immense frustration. "By Gods how foolish I've been! I thought bringing you farther from our place of origin would prevent Evil from nearing you, but all it's done is brought him to the rest of us and made us impotent! He seems able to follow you, perhaps has gained in strength. Sending you home might be even more dangerous . . . I just do not know! But I am certain that I am at risk of harming you if you leave me be--"

A car horn honked, and Emery spun about to see two cars pull into the drive. Both relieved and dismayed at the arrival of her friends, the girl took off jogging toward them. The lighting was poor--only the glow from the frozen fire and the moonlight above enabled her to make out Tess and Charlie and Xavier, Liam, and Natlya as they exited their cars.

"What are you all doing here?" Emery cried, approaching them.

Unaware of the severity of the situation, Tess waved her friendly wave, smiled her cute smile, and caught sight of Emery's expression as she reached them. "What is it? What's the matter?" she asked.

But Liam's frightened words rang out: "What's wrong with them? They're not moving!" She knew he'd spotted the warriors.

And then Xavier's voice added, "What's up with the trees? Talya, you see that?"

Charlie moved in front of his sister and right to Emery. "What's going on? Why didn't you tell us? We're supposed to help!"

"I don't know!" Emery cried, beginning to panic. "It just happened so fast. Cat said Evil is here, and the trees--"

"It's a forest fire!" Natalya yelled over them, waving her hands at the distant trees, which appeared to be lit bright red down to their roots and beginning to emit wisps of black.

"No, no it's not!" yelled Emery to all of them, attempting to reign in everyone's scattered attention. "It's something really bad. You've all got to get out of here. I've got Cat, so I'll be fine. Please, just leave me--"

"Like hell we will. You're coming back with us." Charlie grabbed hold of her arm.

As wise as it might have been to hop into a car and zip out of camp, Emery wasn't having it. Perhaps it was her concern for the druid, or maybe it was her desire to just get this over with . . . or it might even have been the fact that Charlie was trying to tell her what to do, and she wanted to make her own decisions. Pulling her arm from him, she snapped, "No! I told you to go! I'm staying here."

"Yeah, Charlie, she told you to back off!" That was Liam, suddenly stepping in out of nowhere and shoving Charlie so hard and unexpectedly that he fell backward to the ground.

"What the hell?!" Charlie leapt to his feet.

Xavier wasn't to be left out. He turned to Liam and got right up in his face, began yelling something about getting what was coming to him, sprinkling in enough obscenities to coat a cupcake.

"Shut up, everyone! Just shut up!" screamed Natalya, grabbing hold of Xavier's shaggy hair and yanking his head back. "I hate all of your drama!"

The four of them yelled and swore and pushed and shoved, and Emery found herself backing away in astonishment. Suddenly, she realized Tess was next to her, also backing away, tears beginning to run down her cheeks.

"What's wrong with them?" Tess sobbed.

"It's Evil," Emery gasped.

"Make them stop!"

"I can't. Hurry, come with me!" So saying, Emery took Tess's hand and dragged her away from the sight of their fighting friends, up into the woods toward Cathbad's cabin.

The two burst in through the door and found the druid attempting to wind a rope around himself. Seeing the girls, he immediately stopped, and Emery was sure even in the poor lighting that he reddened.

"Lady Tess!"

"There's no time," Emery interrupted before her friend could say anything in reply. "Stop their fighting, Cat--freeze them like you did the warriors. They'll hurt each other!"

Cathbad hastened outside and caught sight of the four, who were embroiled in the most intense argument Emery had ever seen. Someone was definitely going to get hurt.

"My ability to hinder him fades," Cathbad said sorrowfully. "See?" He pointed toward the Knights, who were beginning to move again, though quite slowly. "I can delay, but I cannot stop." He took his staff and stamped it on the ground, muttered something, and again the light and the deep echoing sound. When the glimmering ripples had faded, Charlie, Xavier, Liam, and Natalya were moving in slow motion as well. "The damage is mitigated, but it will not hold," Cathbad informed them. "Now please, I beg of you--confine me!"

"I'll do it," Tess asserted. "Emery, you go get the keys to one of those cars and go."

"You shall not stay, Lady Tess!" Cathbad said so firmly that it startled both girls. "I--I will not risk harming you."

"And I won't leave you, anyway," Emery said to her friend. "Come with me--"

"I'm not leaving him by himself!" Tess practically yelled, more forceful than she'd ever been in her life.

Emery gaped. Both she and Cathbad stared at Tess, who looked so ridiculously sheepish that they might have laughed had the situation not been so severe.

Seeing the two of them determined to help one another, Emery felt sure that she couldn't drive off and leave them. But she knew, too, that staying would only endanger her friends further. Breathing deeply, she made up her mind and, giving the bewildered two a nod, she left the cabin, ignoring their frantic inquiries. The minute she was outside, Emery realized everything had grown more urgent. The figures of the warriors and her peers were moving more quickly, and the trees, as Natalya had noticed earlier, were exuding snakes of black smoke. If she wanted to keep everyone safe, she'd have to lure Evil toward her. So she walked swiftly past the cabins and headed deeper into the woods, hoping Evil would follow. What she'd do if it caught up, she had no idea, but hadn't all three brothers been after her? And what did it matter, now, if they got her? Everything was falling apart--had been falling apart for weeks. She'd lost any hope of normalcy; she was beginning to doubt what she wanted; and she no longer even knew who she was. All of this was for some reason because of her curse (which she hardly understood), and now this monster was trying to hurt the only people that actually seemed to care about her. If Evil took her, it would end. Then none of these people would have to try to protect her anymore. She was tired of being their burden.

Uphill Emery moved, passing dark cabins weirdly illuminated by the hot-poker glow of all the trees. She began to feel as if she were in some bizarre dream where the only colors were black and flame red. The branches above spider-webbed the jet beyond like upside-down streams of lava. Her feet crunched against fallen leaves, and soon enough her steps and her heavy breathing were all she heard. She couldn't have walked far, but when she paused and glanced behind her, she could no longer see the cars or the firepit or any of her friends.

Farther she moved, unsure how large these woods were. She recalled being a camper, years ago, in this place. Had any of the events she remembered actually happened? Had she really fished and swam and roasted marshmallows? Had she and Tess and the other girls crushed on that one counselor and argued about which should marry him? Had they attempted a food fight only to get in trouble and be suspended from camp activities for a day? Was all of what she remembered mere fantasy? And this--this right now? What was this? She felt she was in a dream. The only thing that felt real, anymore, was her meadow. She wished she were there, now, in all its buzzing flowers and melty sunlight, stark in contrast to this netherworld through which she roamed. As she thought about it, the smoking and smoldering trunks seemed to fizzle like static, flicker in and out of her vision, and on the other side of them, Emery thought she saw the fields of her dreams around and before her. Was that place just right beyond this? Hiding behind these woods? Instinctively, she held out her hands, felt sure her fingers brushed the tips of grasses, her ears picked up on the trillings of insects. Even the air smelled sweeter.

But no. Whatever shifting images she'd thought she'd seen suddenly vanished, the trees around her solidified in cruel sharpness, and Emery knew what would be there if she turned around.

Over her shoulder--yes, there he was, moving slowly but steadily up the hills toward her, at a distance but gaining--the huge, black, antlered figure of Evil, enormous in stature, far bigger than his brothers, and deeper than the deepest dark. Emery could make out little beyond his silhouette, but as Evil approached, she was certain a gleaming ball of flame ignited within its malformed head, and all at once, the trees were no longer just incandescent but began to writhe with angry fingers of flame that licked across their bark. The very silence itself was deafening.

Emery knew she should turn and run, but she couldn't move. A black sickness crept into her heart. She couldn't win this. She was absolutely worthless. Why did this thing want her? Why would anyone want her? Why did Cullen think he wanted her? She knew the answer: he thought she was someone else, someone she couldn't be. His intensity, his passion--she could never live up to who he wanted her to be again. Was she really so in love with her current life, her family and friends, school and sports and all the mundane normal things wrapped up in their neat little understandable package? Was that really the reason she didn't want to go with Cullen? Or was it deeper than that, more difficult to admit than that? Was she afraid for him to realize the truth--that she was no one and nothing and unworthy of whatever feelings he believed he had for her? That he'd regret everything he'd done for her, a waste of time and space? She didn't return the feelings he had for her, but that wasn't the real reason she wouldn't go, was it? It was leaving the easy path behind, the pressure of living up to his expectations, when there was just no way she could . . .

Evil drew nearer, and the trees were obscured by the black miasmic smoke and the vibrating flames and all Emery could focus on was that scintillating coal smoldering in the blackness beneath the absolutely massive black antlers. He'd be upon her in seconds.

Her thoughts were rabid, foaming and tearing at one another, her senses were in chaos, and that fiery point consumed her vision, when something from behind took hold of her sweater and yanked her backward, upward, and around, so that she was suddenly seated on something firm, her legs on either side of it, and an unfamiliar voice cried, "Take hold!" Obeying, Emery wrapped her arms around what was in front of her, tangled her fingers in thick, glossy black hair, and then everything was moving.

The air rushed past her, filling her clothing and chilling her to the bone. She held on, though the up and down and up and down made it terribly difficult to stay atop . . . what? But then, even before she opened her eyes, Emery's thoughts cleared, and she knew she was on a horse.

When she blinked her lids apart, what she saw made her dizzy; the forest flew by, the red-hot trees against the neverending night blending into stripes and then finally one massive wall of flame. What sort of creature she rode was difficult to make out because she didn't dare turn her head or lift it away from the horse's mane, to which her cheek was tightly pressed. Her arms she struggled to keep wrapped around the animal's thick neck, and her legs she attempted to hold firmly against its sides. It took every fiber of her being to focus on staying on that horse, every muscle tensed and aching. She was sure she'd die if she fell off at that speed.

Whether or not Evil was following them, Emery didn't know. The ride seemed to go on forever, and she'd open her eyes every so often to find that they were still in the forest, or they'd left the trees and were zipping alongside a highway with blinding headlights going in the opposite direction, or they were racing across flat plains, or near a river, or through neighborhoods, or . . . all of it became too difficult to comprehend. She had no idea where this horse had come from or where it was taking her, but she could only assume it was helping; if not, why wouldn't it have already given her to Evil? All Emery could do was hope everything would be all right, and as she shrunk her body against the galloping animal beneath her, some voice inside reassured her that it would.

Minutes and hours and darkness blurred into gray light and weariness, and though the world beyond her eyes felt heavy, Emery opened them and found herself staring up into a day sky coated in dull, low-hanging clouds. She had to shake her head a bit, turn it side to side, to recall what had happened and where she was, and even then, she had a hard time placing the events that felt as if they'd only just occurred.

There was grass on either side of her, green and soft, and on seeing it, Emery realized that the air was warmer, humid even. Before she sat up, a dark black shape leapt at her face, and though she flinched at first, when Tara's wet tongue began licking her cheeks, she smiled and lifted a hand to scratch under his chin. With a laugh, Emery pulled herself off the ground to find that she lay in a ditch on the side of an empty two-lane road. A fine mist hovered in the air. She had no idea where she was, but she had Tara back, and she had her phone. Taking it out of her pocket, she called Tess.