Free The Descent by Alma Katsu Page B

truly something to be afraid of; I felt it to my bones. However, as I stood there, doubled over and breathless, I berated myself. What kind of behavior was this? Did I honestly want to help Jonathan or not? I had to screw up my courage and go back down the corridor and face the creature. For Jonathan’s sake.
    I stood up and took another deep breath. The pounding ofmy heart began to slow. Courage. I’d just about gathered my wits and was about to head back the way I’d come when, suddenly, the demon appeared around the corner. He was closer now, and I could see him in more detail. He had an obscene air about him, due no doubt to the genitalia openly displayed between his legs, swaying heavily with each step. There was no mistaking his yellow eyes falling on me heavily, deliberately, and I thought I saw the corner of his brutish mouth turn upward. He is coming for me. My scream froze in my throat. I couldn’t move and it was only with great luck that before he could lay one of those large, maniacal claws on me, I lurched awake in Adair’s arms.

SIX

    “I t was a dream. Just a dream.”
    Adair meant to be reassuring. I knew that he wanted me to blink my eyes and see that I was in his study and not the horrible dungeon of my dreams; to catch my breath and say with an embarrassed chuckle, “Oh, you’re right of course. I see that now.” But I didn’t.
    I didn’t need him to tell me it had been a dream. I knew I was awake now and on the other side. However, wisps of the dream were still trapped in my head, making it hard to separate nightmare from reality. I could still see the demon’s rippling red haunches and shoulders, as well as the golden eyes that had sized me up with such calculation. I could still smell the monster’s ashy, earthen odor.
    “It was more than a dream. I know it.” I shuddered against the memory.
    He didn’t release me. Instead, he started to rub my back as you might to console a child. “It was a bad dream, I’ll give you that. You had me worried . . . you were making horrible noises in your sleep. I thought you were choking. I tried to wake you up, but it was as though you were in a trance. I called your name and I even shook you, but you didn’t respond.”
    “That’s what I mean—if it had been a regular dream, you should’ve been able to wake me. Something’s going on, I can feel it.” I let him hold me for a long moment and buried my face against his chest, breathing in his once familiar scent.
    After I’d had a minute to gather my wits, Adair gently pulled me to my feet. “We’ve been cooped up in here too long. We should get out of the room for a while. Clear our thoughts. I think the girls have made lunch. There’s something delicious in the air, mushroom soup, perhaps? Why don’t we see what they’re up to?” He was trying to take my mind off my fright, and was probably right about our needing a change of scene: I couldn’t hide in the study forever.
    We followed the aroma down to the cavernous kitchen, where the two girls were huddled over a huge stockpot on the stove. They lifted their heads when we entered.
    “Ah, look who’s here. Come to join us?” Terry asked, stepping to the worktable. She wiped her hands on her apron before taking up a massive chef’s knife to mince parsley.
    “Still among the living, are you? We thought maybe you’d died in there.” Robin’s rejoinder fell flat, like the taunt of an insecure young child.
    “We’re catching up on old times,” Adair said. A wooden bowl held slices of rustic homemade bread. He fished one out.
    “If you can bear to come up for air, you are welcome to joinus for lunch,” Terry said briskly as she scooped up a handful of parsley and dropped it into the pot. “It’s just about ready.”
    “It smells heavenly,” I offered, and then I thought of Adair’s description of the hallucinogenic meal the witch sisters had made for him and wondered where the mushrooms had come from, if they could’ve