The smell of it is like burning paper, wildfire smoke, benzene. Warm breath on his face, and a deep resonant grumble of sound that rattles Will’s teeth — he can feel the fever-heat of its body as it dabs at the air with a black and shining tongue. Will’s as naked as Cassie Boyle in death, bent backward to receive the stag’s scrutiny — his knees spread, his soft cock adhering to his thigh with all the dignity of a garden snail.

Its head is lowered, smooth black tines spreading out above them. The sound the beast makes is like a junior cellist doing warm-ups on the body of Douglas Wilson — raw and harsh with the shrillness of rending metal. Nothing like that, embedded in dead flesh, should have been capable of sounding a note. A scene from a killer’s dream, and not from reality.

Will reaches up and takes in his hand a fistful of mud-crusted feathers. The black stag’s hide is algae-streaked and muddy, like something dislodged from the primal depths. In rutting season, male elk get haggard — too much energy expended sparring with their rivals and mounting anything that’ll hold still. Will can feel the bones beneath the skin.