This earned a sharp, pained bark of a laugh from her. “I’m sure you’ll meet him soon. He has big plans for this world…and for you. This isn’t over. But it could have been different. I could have protected you. We could have been a family. Now you only have yourself to blame when everyone turns against you. And they will. I guarantee you that.”
Her eyes glowed bright red for a moment as pain twisted on her face. Then she fell heavily to her knees. The scary black vortex opened up behind her, accompanied by the tornado-like roar, and fear crashed over me to see it again arriving right on schedule as it sensed the demon’s impending death.
I scrambled back from her as fast as I could. And then, before I could say anything, scream anything, the dark hand of the Hollow reached out and grabbed her, pulling her back into its gaping mouth.
It had happened so fast.
Carly was at my side, clutching my arm, as the storm continued to rage in front of me. “What the hell is that?”
I stared at the spot where Natalie had disappeared with utter and complete shock even though I’d been expecting this. “You don’t want to know.”
Her familiar form blocked the swirling, roaring vortex. “Are you okay?”
“Not even close.” I forced myself to look at her. She hadn’t changed totally back to her former self, not that I’d expected she would. She was still a gray, which meant she wasn’t nearly as petrified about what had just happened as the old Carly would have been. “Why did you do that? Why did you save me?”
She frowned. “Because she was hurting you.”
“Thank you.” Gratitude welled within me and I grabbed Carly and hugged her fiercely. Maybe she wasn’t lost to me after all. I pulled back to look into her bright blue eyes.
“You’re welcome.” She smiled. “We’re still best friends forever. Right?”
She was still here. She was still Carly underneath it all. And I could get her soul back and fix her. I knew I could.
“Forever,” I confirmed.
Suddenly, I felt a pair of strong arms come around my waist to pull me back from her. It was Bishop, who now had me in his tight grip.
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“Look at her,” was all he said.
I looked at Carly and a scream caught in my throat.
Tendrils of darkness had begun to move over her shoulders like black fingers. The Hollow hadn’t closed after taking Natalie. It had moved closer. It sensed another supernatural entity nearby, and it was still hungry.
Terror gripped me, cutting off my breath. I couldn’t find the air to scream.
The sound of the vortex grew louder, so loud I couldn’t think. Carly stared at me with wide eyes as the Hollow’s grip tightened on her, covering her with its darkness. She reached a hand out to me, confusion written all over her face.
“Sam?” she asked, her voice trembling.
And then the Hollow yanked her backward into its swirling black mouth, just as it had Natalie.
“No!” My scream cut past the roar of the Hollow.
I was hallucinating, I had to be. Horror filled every cell of my body, freezing me, but I knew I had to do something. I had to try to save her. She’d only just disappeared. I couldn’t accept that—I could never accept that.
She’d just saved my life. I had to save hers.
I fought against Bishop, but he held firm. I struggled, I squirmed…I had to get out of his grip. My focus was completely on that black hole. If I could get to it before it closed, reach into it and grab her hand—
I couldn’t lose her. Not like this—not when I’d just realized that she could still be saved.
“Samantha, stop!” Bishop yelled at me as I scratched and clawed against him. “She’s gone!”
“No, she’s not. I have to help her!”
I finally managed to slip out of his grasp and scramble away from him. My eyes stung with tears, but I fought to see past them. I’d gotten away from Bishop in order to try to save my friend, but he’d been holding me back so the Hollow wouldn’t sense that I was in its path.
And, just like a gray, its hunger had no end.
The vacuumlike suction I’d felt last night with Bishop and Connor began to draw me closer to the black hole and I stared at it with horror. I lost my balance and fell hard to the ground. It was as if the world had tilted and I was now sliding feetfirst toward the Hollow’s hungry mouth.
My shock over losing Carly so suddenly and horribly was replaced by icy fear. I’d thought I could save Carly—fight this monstrous thing that raged mere feet away from me. I was wrong.
Bishop grasped my wrist before the vortex could gobble me up, but its dark fingers reached out to wrap around my ankles and pull me toward it.
“Hold on!” Bishop’s eyes glowed blue in the darkness that swirled around me.
Something about this sank into my mind, past the fear, past the shock. This was my vision—my very first vision. The one I’d had before I’d even met him, after Stephen had kissed me. I thought I’d been falling into darkness, but in reality I was being pulled sideways into it.
This was how it ended for me. I was bound for the Hollow just like my aunt, my father, my mother…and my best friend. It was my fate—the inevitable end to everything I’d been fighting against.
“They were wrong, Samantha.” Bishop’s voice broke as he said my name. “It never should have been me. This is the proof.”
“What?” He’d said this to me before. And in my dream he’d also let go of me. He didn’t think he deserved to be leader. He thought someone else could have done a better job—even with a fallen angel’s soul meant to sabotage the entire mission.