Chapter 35

“Here puppy, puppy ... where are you hiding? I know there’s at least one more up here ….” The bloodcurdling words make me scrunch my face up to combat hysterical tears, the voice alien to me, almost satanic, low, and husky, with a heavy accent in its depths. Foreign, yet I don’t know what. I don’t know this voice. The scent is nothing I’ve ever encountered before and dampens over the one I vaguely recognize. It’s not Vanka, but I can smell her close, which only confuses my fear-addled brain. The sadistic laugh that follows his bold verbal turns my insides to mush, and I physically weaken with an icy wave as whatever, or whoever, it steps inside the room with me. “I can hear your heart beating, little one ... Bumpity, bumpity, bump, bump, bump. You’re scared. Why don’t you come out and play like your friends are doing? I want to play with you, too.” He laughs again, a sound that curls my toes and sends shivers across my scalp and down my spine so that I shudder uncontrollably. The sound