Altar.

My mind flickers to Jason Lambert, drip, drip, dripping blood from his curled fingers.

Shit. Looking around again, I spot a table draped in assorted items. There are ties, and bouquets of dried flowers, old t-shirts, barrettes, framed photos … including the one of Jenica that went missing from the girls’ dorm. It’s all gathered there together, trophies of dead students collected into a glittering shrine.

Uh-oh.

The sound of a door opening draws my attention to the opposite side of the room, away from the raised stone dais and toward a group of people, dressed in black robes and fox masks. Just like that day in the woods when Spencer and I were running for our lives.

Fear flashes through me, ice-cold and definite.

The Fellowship of the Divine might have the creepy cult cliché thing going on, but it’s not funny. It’s not funny at all. It’s terrifying.

The people file into the room without speaking, walking down a narrow path with pools of dark water on either side. There are statues sticking out of the water, draped in moss, faceless monsters watching over their procession. Stalactites hang from the ceiling, and crumbling white columns dot the room here and there, little hints of neoclassical architecture that remind me of the auditorium.

The cultists start lining up against the walls around me, the sound of their footsteps echoing in the oversized chamber. Another cool droplet of water hits me in the forehead, leaking from the stone above me.

This, this is where the tunnels lead. I wonder if this place floods when it rains, too?

I blink a few more times, and then pull against my restraints, the flouncy pink dress fluttering as I move. But even if I weren’t tied up, I’m not sure I could get out of here. They must’ve drugged the food and drinks with … something. At least that means that everyone else is okay, right? Because even in that moment, it’s not about me. It’s about my dad and the boys.

Exhaling sharply, I try to focus on what’s happening without letting panic set in. Whatever drug they’ve given me must be dulling my emotions because I’m not freaking out. I’m scared, but … not panicked. Think, Charlotte, I snap at the dulled edges of my brain. If you don’t, then you’re dead. That’s it. No college, no future, no more happy moments and stolen kisses and sweet nothings whispered in the dark.

Shit, that was markedly better poetry, huh?

Too bad I’m not exactly in a position to appreciate it.

One of the robed assholes moves to the front of the room, several others fanned out on either side of him. A student dressed in a suit appears first, his mask firmly in place, and kneels down before the dais.

“I have caught for you a fox, a little fox that plundered the vineyards,” he says, and I know right away that it’s Mark’s voice speaking from behind the mask. Arrogance drips from every practiced word. That, and I can smell a turd sandwich from a mile away.

The people around the room begin to chant, their voices echoing off the stone walls and bouncing back at me as I struggle to climb out of my mental fog.

“And the fox’s name?” asks the man at the front of the congregation, his voice sparking just a hint of recognition in me.

“Eugene Mathers,” Mark replies smoothly, lifting off his mask and rising to his feet. He pauses just briefly to look over his shoulder, his ugly mouth curving into a smirk. That gets a bit of a rise out of me. If Charlotte Carson is anything, it’s ornery, and seeing him look so smug? It just pisses me the hell off. He turns back to the front of the room and steps forward, holding his mask over his chest.

The next person to appear in front of me is wearing a scarlet dress, her red-orange hair frizzing out from behind the mask. She doesn’t even need to take it off for me to know who she is. She kneels down, just like Mark did, but with a touch more humility.

“I have caught for you a fox, a little fox that plundered the vineyards,” Aster Hayes repeats, pulling off her mask and rising to her feet in a mess of silk and tulle.

“And the fox’s name?” the leader asks, without a hint of emotion coloring his words. They’re talking about dead kids here, and they don’t give a fuck about what they’ve done. It’s all a game to them, like it has been from the start. The boys had said, if one of these families wanted me dead, they could hire someone to do it. That’s not what this is about. This is ritual, sacrifice, and tradition.

“Jason Lambert,” Aster replies easily, making my breath catch. So, she was the female attacker all along—at least one of them, anyway. That means she danced with me on Valentine’s Day, and then tried to kill me on the same night. How messed up is that?

She takes her place next to Mark as the third hoodie-wearing dickhead comes up to the stage, kneeling on the hard stone in his tux.

“I have caught for you a fox, a little fox that plundered the vineyards,” the boy says, and even though I know I’ve heard that voice before, I’m having trouble placing it. It’s got to be Gareth though, right? Our detective work was solid.

“And the fox’s name?”

I know before he even speaks that it’s me. I’m the little fox. My eyes close tight, and I wish with everything I had that I wasn’t lying here, helpless, drugged, hoping and praying for a miracle. But truly, am I even going to get out of this? There are dozens of people in here, dozens. We’re very clearly underground somewhere. Where, I’m not sure, because the boys ventured into those tunnels and found nothing.

Jack though … he said he’d seen it, this underground church, so maybe …

“Spencer Hargrove,” the boy says, and my heart shatters to pieces. Spencer?! My head whips around, but I can’t find him anywhere. That is, until I force myself to sit up as far as possible, straining against the ropes, and find that there’s another altar opposite mine. All I can see from here are a pair of shoes, but my worst fears are confirmed when the boy pulls off his mask and I see Gareth McConnell’s stupid, ugly face. Yes, I’ve been reduced to petty insults, so sue me. I’m under a lot of freaking stress here.

“Make it right,” the leader says as another of the members approaches with a knife and hands it to him. On the hilt, I can see that symbol, the one that was on the stone that I found on my windowsill. Who it was that put it there, I may never know. But clearly, this has been in the planning stages for quite some time.

Gareth moves around the altar where Spencer lays, passed out and unmoving. He pauses with his hands on the knife, the tip pointed down at my boyfriend’s chest.

“Spencer!” I scream, my voice ripping through the cavern, cutting right through the dull chanting of the other members. Nobody pays me any attention, not even as I struggle and continue to scream. “What do you need him for when you have me?” I ask, but already, there’s another person moving down the center of the room in a golden dress.

She takes her place in front of the dais, blond hair pulled up into a bun at the back of her head.

“I have caught for you a fox, a little fox that plundered the vineyards.”

“And the fox’s name?” the leader asks again.

“Charlotte Carson,” Selena McConnell says, rising to her feet and removing her mask. She glances back at me, but her face is devoid of any emotion whatsoever.

“Make it right,” the man in charge repeats, and Selena is handed a knife that’s identical to the one in her brother’s hands. “The McConnells have disappointed the Fellowship this year. Your sister did not make these sorts of mistakes.”