Horror Game? Looks Cute novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: Knife in the Well

I walked out of the Bear House, straight across Maple Lane, and dropped the knife down the well.

It hit the water with a small, fat plop.

Garvan came out onto the step behind me.

"That was a perfectly good knife."

"It was a murder weapon with a muffin on it."

"It was the only way out I've been offered in three years."

"No," I said. "It was Dex's way out, with your name on it."

He came down the steps slowly, hands open.

He was taller than I had worked out in the dark.

He stopped an arm's length away and looked at me.

"You don't know what you're turning down."

"A man with a mind is not a monster you put to bed." I crossed my arms. "I've known you for one pancake."

"It was a good pancake."

"It was a very good pancake. I'm still not stabbing you."

His mouth did the thing again, the quick twitch, there and gone.

Then he looked at the ground.

"There are eleven people downstairs," he said. "If I'm gone, I don't know what happens to them. Maybe they wake up. Maybe they don't."

"Then we find out another way."

"There isn't another way."

"There is always another way. I test games for a living."

"This isn't a game," he said, very gently.

"It's a game with a bug in it, and I'm good at those."

He laughed.

It was a short, rusty sound.

It changed his whole face.

I looked away first.

"I'm going back to Cottage Four," I said.

"No."

"Grover's there. He looked sick when Dex pushed me. And someone new shows up at the fountain every few days, don't they?"

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