"You chose that thing over me!" he screamed at her.

"I did what I thought was right!"

"You know what, if that's what's right, I don't want nothin' to do with it! I want the opposite!"

As soon as Dallas spoke those words, he cried out and, dropping the wire he'd been clutching in his fist, the fledgling fell to his knees and crumpled, facedown.

"Dallas? Are you okay?" Stevie Rae made a hesitant move toward him.

"Stay away from him," Rephaim rasped as he laboriously gained his feet.

Stevie Rae paused, and then instead of continuing to Dallas, she hurried over to Rephaim, pulling his arm around her shoulders. "Are you okay? You look kinda fried."

"Fried?" Despite everything, she made him want to laugh. "What does that even mean?"

"This." Stevie Rae touched one of the feathers on his chest. He was surprised to see that it looked singed. "You're a little crispy around the edges."

"You touch it. You probably f**k it, too! Damn, I'm glad it stopped me before we finished doin' it. I ain't gonna ever be sloppy seconds to a freak!"

"Dallas, that's just such a load a' - " Stevie Rae began, but when she looked at Dallas, her words stopped short.

"Yeah, that's right. I'm no stupid fledgling anymore," he said.

Brand-new red tattoos in the shape of striking whips framed Dallas's face. Rephaim thought they looked disturbingly like the tendrils of Darkness that had entrapped Stevie Rae and him within the circle. His eyes glowed an even brighter red, and his body seemed to grow larger, swelling with newly gained power.

"Ohmygood ness, " Stevie Rae said. "You've Changed!"

"In a bunch of different ways!"

"Dallas, you gotta listen to me. Remember Darkness? I saw it grab-bin' for you. Please try to think.

Please don't let it get you."

"It get me ? You can say that when you're standing beside that thing? Ah, hell no! I'm never gonna listen to your lies again. And I'm gonna make sure no one else does, either!" He sneered the words at her, his voice filled with anger and hate.

As he stood up and began reaching for the wires he'd used before to channel power, Stevie Rae moved.

Pulling Rephaim with her, Stevie Rae backed from the kitchen. Stepping outside the entrance, she lifted her hand, took a deep breath, and said, "Earth, close this for me, please."

"No!" Dallas yelled.

Rephaim got a brief glimpse of him grabbing the wire and pointing at them, and then with a sound like the soughing of wind through autumn boughs, the earth rained down in front of them, closing the tunnel entrance to the kitchen and shielding them from the wrath of Darkness.

"Can you walk okay?" Stevie Rae asked.

"Yes. I'm not hurt badly. Or at least I'm not anymore. Your earth made sure of that," he said, looking down at her where she stood small, but proud and powerful in the circle of his arm.

"Okay, then. We gotta get outta here." Stevie Rae stepped from his side and began hurrying down the tunnel. "There's another way outta the kitchen. He'll be out in no time, and we need to be gone from here then."

"Why don't you just seal the other exit, too?" he asked as he followed her.

The glance she gave him was visibly annoyed. "What, and kill him? Uh, no. He's not really that bad, Rephaim. He just went nuts 'cause Darkness was messin' with him, and he found out about me and you."

Me and you . . .

Rephaim wanted to hold on to the words that linked them together, but he couldn't. There was no time for such things. Rephaim shook his head. "No, Stevie Rae. Darkness wasn't just messing with him.

Dallas chose to embrace it."

He thought she'd argue with him. Instead, he saw her shoulders slump. She didn't look back at him, but only said, "Yeah, I heard him."

They climbed the ladder silently and were making their way through the basement, when a sound drifted to Rephaim through the wrenched-open gate. He was just thinking that it seemed familiar when Stevie Rae gasped, "He's takin' the Bug!" and she sprinted outside with Rephaim at her heels.

They emerged in time to see the little blue car pulling out of the parking lot.

"Well, that sucks like roadkill," Stevie Rae said.

Rephaim's sharp eyes went to the eastern horizon, which was beginning to go from black to a predawn gray.

"You need to get back into the tunnels," he said.

"Can't. Lenobia and those guys'll be here crazy fast if I'm not back by dawn."