Emma Hartley's Arc

Chapter 3 of 4

Mara led Emma off the smoking path and between the black trees. The lantern swung between them. Emma held Mr. Whiskers tight against her chest with one hand and Mara's hand with the other. Mara's fingers felt like nothing. Only the shape of a grip. "Stay close to the light," Mara said. "It's how we don't get found." Emma looked at the flame. It was smaller than before. It had been the size of a walnut when Mara burned the smoke beast. Now it was the size of a thumbnail. The glass around it had gone dim at the edges. "Is it supposed to be little like that," Emma whispered. Mara stopped walking. She lifted the lantern and looked at it flatly. "No," she said. "It's going out." Emma's stomach dropped. She heard something wet shift in the trees behind them. Then another sound, farther off, on the other side. More than one this time. "They can tell," Mara said. "They wait for the dark." "Can you fix it," Emma said. "Not here." Mara pulled her forward. They moved faster. The mist thickened around Emma's knees. The flame guttered once and Mara made a small sound, not quite a word. Smoke began to gather at the edge of the lantern's light, low to the ground, feeling forward like fingers. Something slid out from under a root ahead of them and stopped in the path. Emma froze. It was a cat. A black cat, edges smoking soft into the air, tail curling like a question. Its eyes were pale and steady. It was the only thing in this place that had looked at her without hunger. The cat turned and walked three steps off the path, then looked back. "It wants us to follow," Emma said. "I know what it is," Mara said. She did not sound afraid of it. She sounded surprised. "It only comes for the lost. Go." Emma went. She pulled Mara with her. The cat kept ahead, weaving between roots, its misted tail bright against the black. Behind them, the branch-legged shapes broke from the trees. Emma heard the wet ash smell before she heard the steps. The cat led them onto a new path. This one was blacker than the last, with wisps trailing off its edges like ink in water. The moment Emma's bare foot touched it, the smoke behind them thinned. The beasts slowed at the path's edge and would not step on. Mara let out a breath. "They can't cross this." The lantern flame shrank to a pinprick and went out. Emma waited for the dark to swallow them. It didn't. The path itself glowed faintly under her feet, gray-white through the black. Mara stared down at the dead lantern in her hand. She did not lift it again. "That was mine for forty years," she said. Then, flatly: "We follow the cat now."