Page 170 of Stay Scared

“I could move the camera farther down the service channel.”

“No.”

His eyes lift.

I point toward the mount. “You stay there.”

Owen looks past me into the maze.

Months ago, he would already be thinking about how to follow without being seen. I can almost watch the calculation happen.

His fingers press harder around the camera housing, then ease.

“I stay here.”

I pick up Ash’s old mask. The leather strap drags across my knuckles.

Cade watches me raise it. “You look wrong in that thing.”

I pull it over my face. The padding catches against my damp skin.

I adjust it until the narrow eye openings align.

Cade is still staring.

“Better?”

“No.”

Behind the glass, Owen keeps his attention on the camera.

I turn toward the maze entrance.

My own breath sounds thick inside the mask. The sealed mouth traps heat against my lips. Old leather presses into my cheekbones.

I can smell Ash in the padding beneath the dust: skin, metal, and the stale trace of sweat caught somewhere the lining never fully dried.

I step inside.

Darkness closes around me.

My boots strike the floor. The sound comes back from the wrong direction.

Another step shifts the echo again.

The first mirror catches the edge of Ash’s mask, then another, and another.

The Voice appears ahead of me, beside me, behind me.

Dozens of faces float inside the maze. Some stretch across cracked glass while others disappear until only the eye holes remain.

I put one palm against the nearest mirror. Cold bites through my skin.

My reflection does the same.

Beyond it, another Salem wears Ash’s face with her hand pressed to mine.

The mask drags against my cheeks when I turn.