Quinn was submerged save for a blistered arm, bent at the elbow and resting flat against the ice. He gripped Aaron’s ankle with the assuredness of death.
Aaron screamed. He howled himself hoarse, his terrified gaze leaping to the silent shapes of Reggie and Henry, then to the dark water. Quinn outweighed Aaron by at least thirty pounds. He would sink — and pull his captive along with him. Aaron sat up, clawing and beating the hand, but it would not let go . . .
Light shone across the lake. Aaron looked over to the parking lot to see a pair of headlights gleam back at him.
Aaron skidded on his butt another half foot toward the frigid water. He flopped back down on the ice. More surface area spread across the ice was less likely to break it. And there was nothing harder to move than dead weight. Dead weight. He prayed that he wouldn’t die this way.
A figure, silhouetted by the headlights, made its way across the lake. It moved carefully but quickly.
The ice cracked around the hole, the sound like a cable snapping. Aaron screamed for Reggie, for Henry, for the person on the lake, for God, for anyone. No one answered.
The figure drew closer, taking deft, precise steps over the cracked ice. It balanced itself with a cane.
Aaron slid again, and his legs were dragged into the water. The monster seized his belt, trying to pull itself up, but instead pulling Aaron deeper into the ice hole.
There was a dark blur across Aaron’s vision; it took him a moment to make out the familiar face.
“Eben ... how?”
The old man set his cane to one side, bent over in a wide stance, and with nimble fingers unbuckled the belt. Under Quinn’s weight, the belt slipped its loops, and Eben yanked Aaron back from the water. He was free.
Eben snatched Quinn’s hand by its wrist and pulled.
“No!” Aaron shouted. “He’s one of them!”
Quinn broke the water’s surface, now only a semblance of what he was before. Sheets of wrinkled and blackened skin hung from his face and arms. Eben held him up by the wrist, viewing him not with horror, or fear, or any visible emotion at all; he looked like a fisherman unimpressed with his catch.
The oozing, blistered face stared back at Eben.
“You,” the Vour said, its voice like a warped cello. “We killed you a long time ago.”
Eben said nothing. In a single twisting motion, he snapped the wrist like dry kindling, and then he let go.
The Vour opened his mouth wide and smoke poured out in place of a scream. It seeped from his eyes and nostrils and stretched out above his head. The monster dwarfed the size of the Vour in the basement, a shadow blacker than deep space. It smothered Aaron and Eben, wrapping wispy talons around their necks, but the Vour itself had no physical strength.
The spirit stretched and twisted, tethered to the sinking body like a vile kite.
A lucid look flashed across Quinn’s face. “Aaron?” he whispered. And then he went under, dragging the Vour behind him, down into the icy water.
Coughing, Eben stooped to pick up his cane. When Aaron met his eyes, they held a depth, or perhaps a coldness, like he’d never witnessed before. He felt the man’s smile in his stomach.
“What are you doing here? How did you know —”
“Hold your tongue and get on your feet, Mr. Cole. We still have some work to do.”