A person, then.

Or—her breath hitched in her chest, and despite the cold, sweat broke out along her forehead—her father had lied. He had never meant to let her go. He was just playing with her. And he’d sent the monsters to drag her back.

She grabbed her backpack and slid it silently over her shoulders. There was no time to dismantle her tent or pack up. She straightened up and slipped quietly into the darkness of the maze, wincing when her feet crunched down on dried and trampled corn husks. Instantly, she sensed a shift, a change in direction. Whoever—or whatever—was coming for her knew where she was.

Two lefts, and then a right. She felt rather than heard them pursue her—felt the sick heat of their breath, like the gas expelled from a dying body. Another right. She turned to see whether the monsters were behind her and stumbled, barely pivoting around the corner.

‎She hooked a left turn and came to a dead end. The footsteps were growing louder; she could hear heavy breathing, could practically see the monsters, rising up from the shadows, ready to grab her . . .

She turned and plunged desperately back the way she’d come from, a whimper rising in her throat. She thought she could hear them over the drumming of her feet, and the frantic slamming of her heart—slurping, sucking wetly through the holes in their nonfaces, tasting her. Her father had lied. He would never leave her alone. He would never let her be. She thought of what her mother had said—give them faces—but the idea skittered away. She couldn’t stop. She couldn’t face them. She heard a whimpering sound work its way out of her throat; please, she was thinking, to a god or an invisible protector or anyone who could help. Please, please, please.

Another right. Distantly, she thought she heard her mom calling her name. Dea. Dea. Stop. It’s all right. But she didn’t stop. She imagined the maze from above, the tangled network of turns radiating outward. She was close to the parking lot. Then what? She didn’t think, just kept running, desperate and panicked. The sun rolled into the sky at last, shifting the balance of the world from dark to light, chasing the shadows across the ground.

She caught a glimpse of the parking lot ahead as she approached the final turn, the tawny color of the gravel, so normal, so real. Hurtling left, she collided, hard, with a woman in a red jacket and fell back, gasping.

“Dea?” The woman pulled off her hood. It was Kate Patinsky. “It’s all right, Dea. It’s just me.” She put her hands on Dea’s shoulders. “What happened? Are you all right?”

Dea took long, deep breaths as the fear drained from her, all at once. Kate Patinsky. She was the one who’d been calling Dea’s name—Dea had simply been too panicked to recognize her voice. No monsters had leapt. She took a deep breath and looked behind her. Nothing. Nothing but a faint wind moving through the withered corn, stained russet in the new dawn light. Nothing but the glitter of frost and the dazzle of a new day. Kate Patinsky’s was the only car in the parking lot, a small VW patterned with a fine spray of dirt and salt.

And it hit her then: she really was free. Her father hadn’t lied to her. The monsters wouldn’t come after her again. She nearly laughed out loud, nearly took Kate’s hands and spun around for joy.

“I’m all right,” she said, gasping in the cold air, tasting the truth of what she said, sweet and new and unfamiliar. “I’m fine.”

Kate Patinsky looked as if she didn’t quite believe her. “Come on,” she said. “You must be freezing. And hungry.”

Only then did it occur to Dea to be suspicious. Kate might have been sent by Briggs. She didn’t seem like she was on the cops’ side—she’d helped Dea escape the motel, after all—but that didn’t mean anything. Maybe Briggs had promised he would give her information for her book if she found Dea and brought her into custody. Dea didn’t move, even after Kate had opened the passenger-side door and gestured for Dea to get in.

“How did you find me?” she asked.

Kate made a face, as if it were a stupid question. “How do you think?” she said. “Connor told me where to look. Well, Connor and Eleanor.” It took Dea a few seconds to remember that Eleanor was Gollum’s real name. “Neat little trick, calling Gollum and then hanging up right away. She was scared shitless. Thought something terrible had happened to you. She called Connor, and he called me. He would have come himself, but he has to be careful. His uncle’s basically tracking him.”

Dea’s sense of freedom immediately dissipated. Maybe the monsters would leave her alone. But they would still exist for Connor. They would still torture him almost every time he slept. Wasn’t that what her father had said? The monsters will stay in your friend Connor’s nightmares. And his memories, of course.

And she had less than twenty-four hours to choose.

Dea licked her lips, which were dry. She was cold. And hungry.

“Where are you going to take me?” she asked.

Kate paused in the act of climbing into the car. “To Connor,” she said, with a smile that seemed mostly sad. “Where else?”

Kate stopped at the local gas station for provisions, but insisted that Dea stay in the car. “Just in case,” she said, patting Dea’s leg. Dea assumed that she meant that the cops were on the lookout for her. While Kate was gone, she flipped down the vanity mirror, half-afraid that she would see a terrible face staring back at her, half-wishing to see her mom. But she saw nothing but her own reflection, her hair sticking up at crazy angles, a bit of mud streaked above her left eyebrow. She scrubbed it off and raked her fingers through her hair, wishing she didn’t care that she was about to see Connor looking like a deranged homeless person. She wondered if her mother could see her, if somewhere in that other-world a mirror showed Dea’s face, her breath misting the glass. She flipped the mirror back up.

Kate came back to the car with Styrofoam cups of coffee that were more like jugs, plus some packaged donuts and a lukewarm breakfast sandwich.

“Sorry,” she said. “Shitty selection. Dig in.”

Dea didn’t care: she ate the sandwich and all three donuts, feeling only a tiny bit guilty that she hadn’t saved one for Kate. When she was done, she leaned back, enjoying the taste of powdered sugar on her lips and the look of the lightening sky, the momentary sense of calm and safety. “Why are you helping us?” she asked finally.

Kate steadied the car with one hand while she ripped open sugar packets with her teeth. “I was always a sucker for a Romeo-and-Juliet story,” she said, and then punched down the window, spitting out a few ragged corners of paper.

Dea blushed.

“We’re not . . . I mean, it’s not like that,” she said, speaking louder over the rush of the wind—a wind so cold it was like metal, straight through the gut.

Kate didn’t seem to have heard. She rolled up the window again. “Besides,” she said, her face turning serious. “Connor has something I need.”

“What do you mean?” Dea asked.

When Kate glanced at her, she looked sad. Sad, and tired, like someone who’d spent most of her life seeing shitty things and trying to smile her way through them. “Memories, Dea,” she said gently.

Dea stiffened. Even if Kate was helping them, she didn’t like to think of Kate poking and prying around for the sake of her book, trying to suck Connor dry of information like a mosquito feeding on blood. “He doesn’t remember anything,” she said shortly.

Kate only frowned. “Maybe,” she said. For a moment, she was silent. Then she said: “Can I tell you a story?”

Dea knew she had no choice, so she said nothing.

“When I was three, my mom was killed by an intruder. Shot three times, point-blank range. Nearly took her head off.”

Dea was so stunned she couldn’t even squeak out an I’m sorry. Whatever she’d been expecting Kate to say, it wasn’t that.