Dr. Lily McMaster buries her face in her hands.
I've got to keep my shit together.
Her best friend is in the psyche unit. Dr. Lily tries to make sense of Rachel's hallucinations; a light, the Hound, the Awakener . . . the poor girl is now in restraints.
Lily searches the Web for anything matching Rachel's delusions. An old article appears.
Burning cabin, dead forest, circle of bloodstone boulders . . . four people dead.
The little girl in the picture has a smudge of freckles under one of her pale-blue eyes-just like Lily's. But that little girl is dead.
Lily arrives in the small town in the article and is inexplicably drawn to the beast of a man who will be her guide on the two-day trek to the site. Over six feet tall, all muscle and covered with deep scars, Gavin seems to resent her very presence. After Lily's past trauma of abusive foster homes, she decides she's better off trying to find the cabin on her own.
Out of nowhere, lightning splinters across the sky, followed by a powerful rumble that shakes the ground. The Council knows the Awakener is close to the bloodstone circle.