Matt's smug smile hurt.

"Molly," she said, grasping for an answer. But it made sense. Sort of.

"Really. A dog?"

"Yeah, a dog. A dog that's alive!" Molly was still living in the Samson's home. Paula Bell, their neighbor, had been feeding and walking her since Mr. Samson was admitted to the hospital. It was a stretch, but could the Samsons be protecting their dog? Of course they could. Molly had been like a child to them.

Or maybe it wasn't so simple. G.o.dd.a.m.n! If only she could put the pieces together...

"You're nuts." Matt laughed, a good old guffaw. "Crazy-looking midget angels descend from Heaven to protect...wait for it-" he held up a finger "-a dog."

And us, she wanted to shout. She had the urge to smack him right across his smirking face. She loved his sense of humor, his ability to turn even the most mundane circ.u.mstances into an adventure, but sometimes he just didn't listen. Usually it was over something so trivial it didn't matter.

But this mattered. Now mattered.

So she reached across the table and smacked him, the sharp crack echoing through the kitchen. Matt's head jerked to the side and a splotch of red spread across his cheek like a five-fingered disease. He turned back toward her, jaw muscles twitching, tears twinkling in his eyes. He blinked to keep the tears from falling.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm so sorry. But you have to listen to me."

"You hit me," he said in barely a whisper, as if in shock.

"I'm really sorry." She reached out and squeezed his hand. "But you need to listen. You saw that thing move. You saw it with your own eyes. I'm not crazy. I'm not! We're in danger, Matthew. From what, I don't know, but it's not good. Trust me, please."

He remained quiet for a long time, and it took all that Katie had not to prod him along. "Fine," he said, his voice like a soft breeze.

"Thank you." She pulled him to his feet. "We need a lighter, and quickly."

Moving zombielike, he pulled a barbecue lighter from the kitchen drawer and followed Katie outside. She found the candle a few feet away from the child. It smelled of old copper. A tender kind of warmth flowed into her when she held it, and she smiled.

"Lift it," she said, pointing to the body at Matt's feet.

He hesitated. "For what?"

"Stop asking questions, will you? Just do it." She was running on adrenaline and instinct.

Grabbing hold of the child, Matt inhaled sharply, groaned as if he'd been punched in the stomach. His body stiffened, twitched. The green of his eyes disappeared, his pupils stretching into sightless black orbs. Drool slithered from the corner of his mouth like a gla.s.s snake and shattered on the gra.s.s below. He lurched upright, gasping for air, flailing his arms to find his balance.

"Christ," he said. "Holy f.u.c.kersucks!"

"What happened?" Katie said.

"Wow."

Matt stared down the street, wide-eyed. Katie thought about slapping him a second time. "Matt, focus! What happened? What did you see?"

"Too much," he said, turning toward her. His eyes were still wide with fear, but finally focused. "They've seen us."

"Oh no." Hands shaking, Katie flicked the lighter. The flame sputtered. She kept at it, and it caught on the third try. She held it to the candle.

There was no wick.

She placed the flame directly to the candle's tip. Nothing happened. It wouldn't catch.

"Here," Matt said. "Try this."

Kneeling, he hoisted the child to a sitting position. The child's body hung limply, its head bowed. Grabbing its hands, Matt placed them together, palms up, as if accepting sacramental bread.

Katie stood there, staring into the sky, waiting for the blood-red raindrops to fall, like they had in her vision. But again, nothing happened.

Her heart plummeted.

"Give it the candle," Matt said. "Hurry."

She silently cursed herself. This wasn't your everyday candle. She should have known better. Instantly the child reacted when she placed the candle in its palms. Its body stiffened as if air were being blown into a balloon. With Matt's help, it stood. Eyes shifted from white to black.

Matt let go and stepped back.

Flee...now...

The voice was weaker, but the urgency still clear.

Matt grabbed Kate's arm. "Let's go!"

They ran the short distance to the house. Once inside, Matt slammed the door shut, locked it, and turned out the lights. Through the window they watched a single drop of fire descend from the sky like a dying firefly.

As if praying, the ghostly sentinel bowed its head.

The air around them seemed to gasp. A fiery glow pulsed within the child, growing brighter, stronger, hungrier, the air shimmering and blurring like waves of heat over a desert highway until all was bathed in a dazzling orange hue.

Matt went to the kitchen sink and splashed water on his face. "Holy c.r.a.p," he said. "Katie, come check this out."

He had moved the curtain aside and was looking out the window that faced the back yard. There, too, stood one of the strange children, surrounded by the beautiful orange sheen. Two more stood silently on the other sides of the house, four in total, all afire from within, a protective dome encapsulating the house.

They moved to the front window again and watched the street beyond. Though they couldn't see the wormlike shadows, nor truly fathom the danger, they knew where they were by the way the firelight dimmed as the dark things repeatedly tried to break through the near invisible walls that kept them at bay.

Matt pulled Katie close and kissed her forehead. "I'm sorry," he said.

She embraced him, not sure what to say. The kiss, innocent as it might have been, had sent her heart aflutter. "It's okay," she said quietly.

"So now what do we do?"

"I don't know." Katie hadn't had time to process what had already happened, let alone figure out what they should do next. Halloween had come alive in ways more real than she could ever have imagined, shattering the fictional barrier that usually separated her world from that of the dark. "We wait, I guess."

She rested her head on Matt's shoulder.

He hugged her a little tighter.

The minutes ticked by and they watched their little corner of the world through the unbelievable orange sphere.

Again Katie thought of her father. She'd felt lost since his death, but had tried to remain strong. Her mother had dealt with the loss in a completely different way-isolation, denial, anger-and Katie's relationship with her had suffered greatly.

But maybe her father was still here with them. Perhaps, with Katie's help, her mother would soon emerge from the darkness in which she had descended.

Perhaps.

Katie had always wanted to trust in what the religious folk preached, but it had always seemed so hokey. Now, however, it seemed wonderful. The possibilities warmed her heart. And even if it weren't entirely true, could believing in some higher power, having faith in it, be so terrible?

Beyond the window, past the strange child and the enchanting sphere, there lurked a darkness more menacing than Katie could ever have imagined.

She closed her eyes, thought of her father, found hope for her mother, and dared to believe.

- K. Allen Wood's fiction has appeared in 52 St.i.tches, Vol. 2, The Zombie Feed, Vol. 1, and Epitaphs: The Journal of New England Horror Writers. He is also the editor/publisher of Shock Totem, a bi-annual horror fiction magazine. He lives and plots in Ma.s.sachusetts.

For more info, visit him at http://www.kallenwood.com.

BLACK MARY.

by Mercedes M. Yardley.

The other girl, she has eyes like oil. They're dark and black and slick. They widen like holes and one day they'll swallow me completely.

I tell her this. She smiles, just a little.

"Maybe."

I go outside to drag some heavy wood to the house. I wear a large pair of men's boots that I tie as tightly as I can, but I still step out of them. I'm not allowed to have a pair that fits.

The wood is running low and this worries me. I remember the first nights here, the howling of the wolves in the freezing darkness, venturing from the forest that looms on the edge of the fields. The dank little house doesn't have windows that fully shut. There's no way to keep the wind out.

"If you bring me an axe, I'll chop my own wood," I had told him. I stood there in bare feet, hugging my arms around my torn dress. "You won't have to do anything. I'll do all the work for you."

He hit me then, once, hard enough that it knocked me to the ground and I couldn't get up right away. Black Mary crouched over me like a cat, hissing at him. He didn't seem to notice her.

Later he took me to his bed, gently rubbing my freezing arms and legs. The black-haired girl stood in the doorway, silently. I met her eyes over his greasy shoulder.

"Little girls aren't meant to use axes, honey," he said. "What if you hurt yourself? n.o.body is here to help you, not for miles. It isn't safe. Do you understand?"

I wanted to tell him that I would be careful, that I was almost eleven years old, but I only nodded, my hands clasped between my knees.

"Tell ya what I'll do. I'll bring in wood when I come, okay? Lots of it. Will that make you happy?"

I nodded, and the gentle caress on my arm turned into something different. The girl turned away and I squeezed my eyes shut.

That was two days ago. Now the black-eyed girl stands behind me, brushing my hair. "He wears a wedding ring," she says. "That means he has a wife. Maybe some kids. Maybe his kids are the same age you are."

I turn my head to the side and throw up. "Sorry," I say, and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.

She steps in front of me and crouches until we're eye level. "Don't you ever apologize to me, get it? I'm your friend. I love you, real love, nothing like what he says love is." Her eyes burn, scorch, like watching fire rush across oil. "I'd like to kill him."

"You wouldn't!"

Black Mary was fierce. "I would. He knows it. Why doesn't he leave an axe here, huh? Because he knows I'd kill him one day. I'd take it and swipe at his head when he wasn't looking. Or even when he is. Either way."

I back up a little. She snorts.

"What, I'm too harsh for you? Are you scared, sweet little thing?" She stands up, tossing her hair back. "This is why he takes you, you know. You and not me. Because you give in. Because you're so good and quiet, and men love little girls who are quiet. Me?" She shrugs. "n.o.body loves me. Not anymore."

She turns and walks away. It hurts me to see her go, but I have other things to tend to. I still have bruises inside and out. I still have the nightmares.

Black Mary is gone for several days. I look for her on the horizon, but there isn't anything besides fields of weeds. The food is almost gone. I'm hungry and sick and almost want the man to come again so that I can have something to eat. Almost.

"That's what he wants, you know," Black Mary says to me. She's sitting on a large rock out in the field. Her pointed nose and shiny hair remind me of a raven. A crow. Something that could simply fly away.

"Why did you come back?" I ask her.

"Didn't you miss me?" She tilts her head, again like a bird. I wonder if she sheds her skin at night and there are feathers underneath.

"Of course I missed you. I missed you so much. But weren't you free? Didn't you get away? Why would you come back?"

She reaches for my hand but I pull it away.

"Do you remember your mother?"

I freeze. "Why?"

My mother wore yellow dresses and grew lavender in the front yard. Her eyes were brown, like mine. Or maybe they were blue.

"Do you think she's out there looking for you?"

I sit down, my back against the rock. My stomach is hurting.

She isn't letting it go. "Do you?"

I want to think so. But it's been so long. She's probably given up by now. I wipe my face with my sleeve.

"Know what I think?"

I shake my head.

She slides off the rock and grabs my wrists. She's careful of the bruises. She always has been. "I think moms never stop looking for their kids. Not ever. No matter how long it has been."

"I don't look the same anymore."