“You were right.” I hadn’t expected to be right. “You were right!” I hoped I was wrong. “You were fucking right!” Elena is whisper yelling, trying to keep her frustrations to a minimum but she’s squeezing the Kuroo’s head like it’ll give her answers. One of the eyes pops out but she doesn’t seem to notice.

“I will slap you,” Peggy says. She’s pacing, keeping her eyes moving as she wears a hole into the ground around me. “Take a breath and start using your head.”

The wood is my bow starts to creak under my grip and I release it before I snap the arrow.

“Okay,” I say. “A wizard was controlling the Kuroo. That Kuroo managed to keep up distracted long enough that we were able to be teleported here without noticing. We can’t get back without making a trek that has killed everyone else before us. About a mile away, there’s a village and the Sirens’ Lake. Is that everything?”

“We’re screwed,” Peggy says. “You missed the conclusion to that.”

“Stop saying we’re screwed,” Elena says. Her eyes are wide and I can see the pulse in her neck jumping. She takes off a glove and digs into her bag, pulling out a small wooden box. She drops the Kuroo head in and takes off her other glove. Her movements are quick and jerky as her hands shake. “We don’t know that. I just… I can’t believe Yvanna’s right.”

I can’t calm the quick beats of my own heart. For a wizard to be the reason our Hunters and Trackers keep going missing is a ridiculous notion. There just isn’t anything for them to gain from it, but human blood mixed with a Valley Beasts’… The reason for that would be if a wizard needed utter control of it.

Behind Peggy’s head, something small moves. It’s quiet, but its scales scrape gently against the dead bark of the tree. I pull a knife from Peggy’s belt and throw it, pinning the creature. It wriggles and writhes, hissing. Just a snake, but the darkened blood that oozes out of the wound means it’s only a few days away from fully transforming.

I straighten. “We can’t stay here,” I say. “Staying in one spot is how we get killed. Elena, pack up anything else you may think we need. We’re going to need it to study when we get back. Peggy, was there any sign of life coming from that village?”

“No,” she says. “I didn’t see any movement and I watched it for a while.”

“Okay,” I say. “We still need to be careful. An open space like that invites predators.” It doesn’t take long for Elena to look over the rest of the Kuroo body. Nothing else would be helpful to take the head the main focus of the spell. With Peggy in the lead, we march on.

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It takes about ten minutes for us to find the edges of the village. It’s strange but familiar. There are houses and roads and parks, but none of them look like ours. The houses are made of brick and something white that keeps them together with tall chimneys poking out of the top. The streets are smooth and grey with metal disks at the center of them. There’s an engraving on the top I can’t read. There’s a park at the end of the road, a square of grass blocked off by a fence. Inside there are slides and swings and obstacle courses all made from colorful material.

Peggy is right. There’s no sign of movement was we walk the perimeter, but there’s the unmistakable feeling of being watched by unseen eyes. Behind doors, behind curtains—ten or more sets watch us as we walk.

Walking the perimeter takes twenty minutes, and there’s nothing to find from it other than it looks like whatever village this is, it was taken here by force. It’s a 100-foot diameter circle perfectly placed into the floor of the Valley, the roads flush with the Valley floor. Houses are smoothly cut into where the circle ends, revealing their insides. Despite this, almost none of them have fallen.

After failing to see any movement, we stepped forward into the village.

A pressure falls over us and my ears pop. I shake my head, trying to figure out the uneasiness that settles over me as we start forward. It’s not just that we’re being watched. It’s something else that’s nagging at the back of my mind. Something big I’m just not placing.

“So much for this being empty,” Elena mutters. She looks around, white knuckling her whips. Her shoulders are tense and stiff.

“You’re still in slapping distance,” Peggy says. She looks like she’s ready for a hunt to begin—head on a swivel, hands tensely above her knives, legs tense like she’s about to run—but there’s nothing for her to chase. Just empty streets and cold houses.

A curtain moves in the house to our right and I lift my bow, taking aim. It’s still and for a moment I think it’s gone. Then it moves again. There’s a hand. It’s weathered and dark and it beckons us closer.

“Do you see that?” I ask. “A hand in the window.”

They stare and it’s just a curtain again, swishing slightly against the window. We stare, waiting for movement. A different hand appears, and I recognize this one.

“Mom?” Peggy says. She takes a step forward then stops, hand on her knives. “Elena, do you know of anything that would do this?”

“Uh, um, the-there’s the Sower which beckons their prey from afar, but it doesn’t look like anyone specific. It just looks like a pale hand, and they wait for their prey to be tired.”

“Anything else?” Peggy is coiled up like a spring, waiting for the okay to go.

“No,” Elena says. “Nothing that I can think of.”

“Then let’s go. I think our parents are waiting for us.” There’s a spryness to her that I haven’t seen in a long time. She’s excited. If she’s right, then at least we’ve learned something and we’ve got two smokers left. Maybe we’ll be able to get out of here yet.