Lily didn’t return home after purchasing the yeast.

She wanted—craved, needed—to see people about their business, to hear them laugh and talk or even grumble along. Spending a while just sitting in the main square, watching everyone act normal and then walking aimlessly around, mingling with them, helped put her more at ease than any amount of pancakes ever could. By the time her steps took her back to her grandma’s, the day was darkening fast, partly because of the hour and partly because of what felt like an approaching storm.

She’d probably been gone too long. Mackenna was probably worried. She probably shouldn’t have been freaked out by the morning’s incident.

God. I’ve been here all of two days and I’m falling apart worse than Mom. This is not what I came here for. I need to get a grip.

And to apologize, she decided. She would just be more open-minded and less of a worrywart for the rest of the month. It was the least she could do.

Then, when she approached the steps of the porch, something red flying in the breeze caught her eye and she stopped for a moment, unsure.

What was that?

The hair on the back of her neck stood up as she remembered the woman she’d seen when going out by the river Dee. There had been something red, too, something streaming down the current, but she had only looked for a second.

She turned her focus to the backyard beyond the house’s corner. A breath of air caressed her face and she saw it again, almost hidden behind the wall, too vibrant against the encroaching shadows. It was real.

Lily lowered her shopping bag to the front porch and walked toward the flutter. She almost felt like a kid again, finding an adventure in the most mundane things, and although she felt foolish, a sense of wonder accompanied her when she cleared the corner with a quick jump.

It was the laundry line. The day was anything but ideal, and the only piece of clothing strung out to dry was her grandmother’s favorite blouse. It was the one Mackenna had spent the best part of the morning searching for. Her grandmother loved the splatter of wild red flowers covering the fabric and said it was like carrying around your own spring. In the kind of weather they endured, she insisted it was the least she deserved.

Lily took it down from the line. It smelled fresh, like mountain rivers and morning dew, but it had dried already. She arched a brow, surprised, and checked her watch. She had been gone longer than she intended, longer than needed to reach the village and come back, but not quite long enough for her grandmother to find the shirt, wash it, and have it dry. She might have been out an hour and a half, two hours tops, and with the declining sun hiding behind heavy clouds and the moisture in the air ever higher, the blouse shouldn’t have dried.

Forget the drying, she thought. Where did she find it? She took the room apart and the moment I’m not there, it appears.

“Grandma!” she called out, clearing the steps to the back door in a small leap. “Where’d you get it?”

Mackenna didn’t answer and the sense of unease that had accompanied her for most of the day piped up. Her hand froze in the latch, pinpricks of apprehension tickling her fingers.

Why isn’t the radio on? Why isn’t she outside, tasting the coming storm?

She shook herself. Standing outside and wondering wouldn’t help, so she banished the discomforting thoughts to wherever they’d sprung from and entered the kitchen.

“Grandma!” she called again, flicking on the lights.

Out of her peripheral vision, she saw a shadow, a huge shadow occupying the center of the room that slowly folded in on itself instead of evaporating with the flood of light. She had to blink, and when she focused her gaze, everything looked normal. With a quick look around, she moved toward the living room.

“Grandma, as a joke, this is crap,” she said, her voice not quite as steady as it had been a moment before.

A noise came from the master bedroom. Lily left the blouse on the table and went to investigate. The hall lights were off, too, and it startled her. It was too dark, even though night hadn’t fallen, and in the recesses of the house, she had to squint. It was odd that her grandma hadn’t turned on the lamps to liven up the mood.

If she’s here at all, she thought. The idea crept on her and assaulted her, unfounded but unsettling. The house had never been this silent.

She opened the door to the bedroom very slowly without knocking, peering inside much like a child checks under the bed expecting to find all the monsters in spite of the irrational nature of such fears.

Holding her breath without even noticing, she reached in and flicked the lights.

“Hello? Is—?”

Something fell on her head. It wasn’t too big, perhaps the size of a big tomcat, but the impact suggested something much heavier.

Lily jumped back with a screech, batting at the thing perched on her head. Her hand found a clump of matted fur and something sharp clamped her fingers when she swatted at it. She wrenched her arm free and the thing thudded to the floor at her feet.

She would’ve kept screaming, but no air reached her lungs. A mixture of fear and incredulity gripped her throat as she stared at the unflinching yellow eyes leveled at her.

It wasn’t a tomcat.

The face staring at her might have belonged to a cat or a squirrel or a monkey, or to the twisted descendant of all three. Its ears were flattened against the sides of its head like a growling dog preparing to attack. It uncurled from the floor, stood on two legs and revealed long, ungainly arms, tipped with long fingers and twisted claws that came nearly to its knees. Its matted, brown fur was a mass of sweat and twigs with dull, rusty-red streaks that could have been dried blood.

Lily managed to drag in a breath and the air left her in a low, keening noise. The thing grinned at her, an expression entirely too human for its bizarre animal shape. There was amusement in that grin and its jagged teeth gleamed a thin crimson under the light from the bedroom.

Finally, Lily screamed, the sound tearing free from her throat and breaking the tableau. She stumbled backward, not daring to take her eyes from the thing, and it scurried after her with the disjointed movements of a two-legged spider. Something dug into her hip and there was a crash at her feet as Lily ran into the side table in the hall. She staggered and heard a hiss coming from the kitchen behind her, but it didn’t register, not until something sharp and twisted sliced into her calf.

There were more things in the darkness. The second one grabbed her leg with its over-sized arms and Lily kicked like a possessed woman, trying to dislodge it. It clung on, its claws digging deeper into her flesh as it prepared to bite. With a yell, she grabbed a flower vase from the side table and smashed it against the thing’s head. It let go with a yowl and Lily darted down the unlit hall.

She couldn’t stop screaming. It was one continuous stream of sound pouring from her throat, scraping and tearing at her vocal chords.

Lily collided against the front door. She wrenched at it with all her strength, shoved against it, but it didn’t budge. Behind her, she heard rattling laughter so close she could smell their tepid breath.

She had come in through the kitchen. The door she clung to now was locked.

Her trembling fingers held the latch for a few more moments, but then something big and hairy moved over her head, jumping lightly from one wall to the other, and her body bolted away of its own volition.

She crashed into the living room, the shadows and the panic making her trip and rush headlong into the furniture. The things scuttled behind her, their clawed feet tip-tapping against the floor, and their clawed hands scoured the walls with a screech.

She heard more scuttling in front of her. More things hid with her, and she lunged for a light switch. She needed to find an open window; she had to find something, a way to—

Through the sheer wall of terror, the state of the room hit Lily like a brick wall. The couch was overturned, shredded, spattered. There were red and black pools drying on the floor. The chairs had been shattered, and the table had become a convenient perch for yet another of those things. And the shades of every window were drawn.