Into Pitch | Black

“I can’t.” She nodded toward the far wall. The phosphorescent thing had arrived, its glow spilling across the chamber. And there, carved into the stone, was an inscription:

Mira grabbed Leo’s wrist. “Now!”

He burst into a chamber. And there was Mira.

She was alive. Kneeling on the stone floor, the massive lantern beside her, unlit. In her hands, she held a match. Her face was calm, almost serene, as if she’d been waiting.

Leo threw his phone into the right passage. It sailed end over end, screen still glowing, and the creature whipped around, drawn to the brighter, more frantic source. Mira dropped the match into the lantern’s wick.

“Great,” he muttered. “Fifty-fifty.”

The thing raised an arm, pointing past Leo, back toward the fork. “She chose right.”

“You brought the wrong light,” it said. Not with a mouth. The words simply appeared inside Leo’s skull, cold and precise.