"Maybe that's how it was formed," Layla began.

"I don't see back. That's Cal's gig. I see what might be coming."

"That'd be handy in your profession."

Gage shifted his gaze back to Cybil, smiled slowly. "It doesn't hurt." He picked up his stone, tossed it lightly in his hand. "Anyone interested in a little five-card draw?"

As soon as he spoke, the light snapped off.

Rather than romance or charm, the flickering candles they'd lit as backup lent an eeriness to the room. "I'll go fire up the generator." Cal pushed up. "Water, refrigerator, and stove for now."

"Don't go out alone." Layla blinked as if surprised the words had come out of her mouth. "I mean-"

"I'm going with you."

As Fox rose, something howled in the dark.

"Lump." Cal was out of the room, through the kitchen, and out the back door like a bullet. He barely broke stride to grab the flashlight off the wall, punch it on.

He swept it toward the sound. The beam struggled against the thick, moving curtain of snow, did little but bounce the light back at him.

The blanket had become a wall that rose past his knees. Calling his dog, Cal pushed through it, trying to pinpoint the direction of the howling. It seemed to come from everywhere, from nowhere.

As he heard sounds behind him, he whirled, gripping the flashlight like a weapon.

"Don't clock the reinforcements," Fox shouted. "Christ, it's insane out here." He gripped Cal's arm as Gage moved to Cal's other side. "Hey, Lump! Come on, Lump! I've never heard him like that."

"How do you know it's the dog?" Gage asked quietly.

"Get back inside," Cal said grimly. "We can't leave the women alone. I'm going to find my dog."

"Oh yeah, we'll just leave you out here, stumbling around in a fucking blizzard." Gage jammed his freezing hands in his pockets, glanced back. "Besides."

They came, arms linked and gripping flashlights. Which showed sense, Cal was forced to admit. And they'd taken the time to put on coats, probably boots as well, which is more than he or his friends had done.

"Go back in." He had to shout now, over the rising wind. "We're just going to round up Lump. Be right there."

"We all go in or nobody does." Quinn unhooked her arm from Layla's, hooked it to Cal's. "That includes Lump. Don't waste time," she said before he could argue. "We should spread out, shouldn't we?"

"In pairs. Fox, you and Layla try that way, Quinn and I'll take this way. Gage and Cybil toward the back. He's got to be close. He never goes far."

He sounded scared, that's what Cal didn't want to say out loud. His stupid, lazy dog sounded scared. "Hook your hand in my pants-the waistband. Keep a good hold."

He hissed against the cold as her gloves hit his skin, then began to trudge forward. He'd barely made it two feet when he heard something under the howls.

"You catch that?"

"Yes. Laughing. The way a nasty little boy might laugh."

"Go-"

"I'm not leaving that dog out here any more than you are."

A vicious gush of wind rose up like a tidal wave, spewing huge clumps of snow, and what felt like pellets of ice. Cal heard branches cracking, like gunfire in the dark. Behind him, Quinn lost her footing in the force of the wind and nearly took them both down.

He'd get Quinn back into the house, he decided. Get her the hell in, lock her in a damn closet if necessary, then come back out and find his dog.

Even as he turned to get a grip on her arm, he saw them.

His dog sat on his haunches, half buried in the snow, his head lifted as those long, desperate howls worked his throat.

The boy floated an inch above the surface of the snow. Chortling, Cal thought. There was a word you didn't use every day, but it sure as hell fit the filthy sound it made.

It grinned as the wind blasted again. Now Lump was buried to his shoulders.

"Get the fuck away from my dog."

Cal lurched forward; the wind knocked him back so that both he and Quinn went sprawling.

"Call him," Quinn shouted. "Call him, make him come!" She dragged off her gloves as she spoke. Using her fingers to form a circle between her lips, she whistled shrilly as Cal yelled at Lump.

Lump quivered; the thing laughed.

Cal continued to call, to curse now, to crawl while the snow flew into his eyes, numbed his hands. He heard shouting behind him, but he focused everything he had on pushing ahead, on getting there before the next gust of wind put the dog under.

He'd drown, Cal thought as he pushed, shoved, slid forward. If he didn't get to Lump, his dog would drown in that ocean of snow.

He felt a hand lock on his ankle, but kept dragging himself forward.

Gritting his teeth, he flailed out, got a slippery hold on Lump's collar. Braced, he looked up into eyes that glittered an unholy green rimmed with red. "You can't have him."

Cal yanked. Ignoring Lump's yelp, he yanked again, viciously, desperately. Though Lump howled, whimpered, it was as if his body was sunk in hardened cement.

And Quinn was beside him, belly down, digging at the snow with her hands.

Fox skidded down, shooting snow like shrapnel. Cal gathered everything he had, looked once more into those monstrous eyes in the face of a young boy. "I said you can't have him."

With the next pull, Cal's arms were full of quivering, whimpering dog.

"It's okay, it's okay." He pressed his face against cold, wet fur. "Let's get the hell out of here."

"Get him in by the fire." Layla struggled to help Quinn up as Cybil pushed up from her knees. Shoving the butt of a flashlight in his back pocket, Gage pulled Cybil to her feet, then plucked Quinn out of the snow.

"Can you walk?" he asked her.

"Yeah, yeah. Let's get in, let's get inside, before somebody ends up with frostbite."

Towels and blankets, dry clothes, hot coffee. Brandy-even for Lump-warmed chilled bones and numbed flesh. Fresh logs had the fire blazing.