Page 92 of Woods of the Raven

I stayed quiet so he’d keep talking.

“But Wright wasn’t giving up, so he went to interview the cultists, and they talked to him for whatever reason, probably because they weren’t afraid of anything he’d say.”

“And?” I couldn’t stop myself from prodding.

“They told him they needed to kill a lot of people and Spencer was just the first.”

“Of how many?”

“They didn’t say, probably didn’t want him alerting the authorities which—c’mon—no one was listening to him anyway, so what did it matter?”

“Sure,” I agreed sadly. “I wonder why they didn’t kill him?”

“He was a journalist, right? He wasn’t from here. He would’ve been missed.”

It made sense. “What else did they tell Wright?”

“They told him that they were supposed to use corpses to bridge the doorway.”

“That’s horrible.”

“Oh, I agree. They went on to say that the bodies were supposed to be laid half on our side, the human side, and half into another realm.”

“And then the god could walk over them all, like a bridge, and be here in Osprey,” I said, thinking of my dream.

“That was their belief, yes.”

“So this account by Wright, he says this could bring the god into our world?”

“They certainly believed so.”

“But just him, singular?”

Dominic squinted at me. “Who else would be coming?”

“His soldiers, his retinue. His minions.”

“Yeah, but to do that, in theory, they’d need to kill a lot of people.”

Yes, exactly. Which, again, went back to my dream. “That would be tragic.”

“It would be, yes,” he agreed. “Can I ask you something?”

I nodded.

“Do you have journals from your family at your cabin?”

“It’s a cottage, actually,” I clarified.

“Oh yeah, sure. But do you have stuff like that there?”

“Yes.”

“Well, if you come across anything by Mattie Corey, I’d love to read it.”

“Of course.”

“Because Wright didn’t know where the cultists were thinking to open the doorway, but maybe Mattie did. I like to think of her as an avenging angel, after they killed her friend, making it her mission to foil the plot to bring the god over.”