The Shuddering

Out of the corner of her eye she saw something move. Someone was out on the deck. She blinked, staring wide-eyed toward the figure. Was that Sawyer? Could he have possibly been stupid enough to go outside to smoke? She ran across the room, her hands pressing to the window. She balled up her fist and knocked on the glass. What are you doing? she wanted to scream. Have you lost your goddamn mind?
    She fumbled with the lock when something rustled behind her. Veering around, she was ready to yell at Ryan about how Sawyer was about to get himself killed, but her words fell soundless when she found herself staring into the eyes of the man she was convinced was standing out in the cold.
    Jane’s stomach flipped.
    “Where’s Ryan?” she asked, because if Sawyer was inside, who was standing out in the snow?
    Sawyer shook his head.
    “ Where’s Ryan?! ” she yelled, the world suddenly wavy with frantic tears. She turned away, unlocking the dead bolt, fear overwhelming logic.
    “Whoa!” Sawyer exclaimed. “What are you doing?” He ran at her, catching her a split second before she pulled open the door. Jane thrashed against him, trying to fight her way free.
    “Where’s Ryan?” she wailed.
    “I’m right here.” Ryan caught his sister by her arm, trying to calm her down.
    Looking back to the porch, she stared at the dark figure that was still lurking outside the window. Her heart crawled into her throat, threatening to choke her if the fear didn’t asphyxiate her first.
    “Oh my god,” she whispered, suddenly afraid to move. Her eyes were locked on that shadow, unable to look away. She heard Ryan say something beneath his breath, felt Sawyer’s arms tighten around her and pull her back. The shadow spun around, jaws pulled open impossibly wide. Its eyes were as black as tar, staring at them through the window as it slapped its claws against the glass.
    Jane screamed, waiting for the demon to burst through the window. The thing stepped in front of the kitchen door, stood to its full height, its gray skin nearly blending in with the white background behind it. And just as she was sure it was going to come through the glass, it twisted in the wind and leaped over the railing.
    “This is it,” Ryan said, setting three white emergency candles onto the ledge of the fireplace, the glass glinting beneath the flashlight’s beam. Sawyer had thrown a few extra logs onto the metal grate and was blindly tearing out pages of a magazine, frantic to keep the fire that had nearly extinguished itself from going out. Ryan lit the candles he’d found in the laundry room, but those tiny flames were swallowed by the vastness of the cabin.
    Taking a seat next to a trembling Jane, he watched Sawyer twist glossy paper into ropes before shoving them beneath the wood. This was, in Ryan’s opinion, the worst-case scenario. Without power the heater wouldn’t kick on when it got cold, and the cold would come on fast. That, and they couldn’t see a damn thing, but he doubted the darkness inhibited those creatures’ ability to hunt.
    Sawyer held a twisted piece of paper over one of the candles, waiting for it to ignite. The end caught fire, glowing in weirdshades of blue and green. He leaned away from the flame, the quiet sizzle of firewood filling the silence.
    “We can’t be the only ones,” Ryan finally announced. “There have to be other victims, right?”
    “What difference does it make?” Jane asked quietly. With her arms wrapped around her legs, she stared into the fire, her mouth and nose hidden behind her knees. “We’re stuck out here,” she whispered.
    Ryan couldn’t argue her logic. “That thing had the perfect opportunity to attack, but it took off instead. Make sense of it.”
    Sawyer shook his head as the flames in the fireplace grew. Shadows danced across the walls.
    “You know that has to be what April saw through the window,” Ryan said. “It could have gotten us then too. We were outside, standing in our T-shirts on the back patio, but it didn’t make a move.” He swallowed, seemed to hesitate, then asked, “You think they’re smart enough to stake a place out before they come in for the kill?”
    Sawyer pulled the fire poker from its holder and nudged one of the logs. “Maybe they’re afraid of big groups.” The log shifted, spitting sparks up the chimney.
    They all went silent.
    “Maybe they’re like wolves,” Ryan said after a long while. “When wolves sense there’s a threat within