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Venice was historic, wonderful, beautiful To the unobservant visitor, however, come the deep darkness, it all looked alike

"Shit!" she swore aloud

Soer She are of the flapping of wings

A bat? She felt her skin begin to crawl

The bridge That would at least get her away frorand but derelict structure with a cru facade that apparently harbored bats

She hurried over the bridge and along a path

The stores were all closed for the evening She peered into darkened s, trying to decide if she had coet back to St Mark’s Square, she would be able to find her way

If she could just find anyone to point her in that direction, she’d be fine

She saw a sign on a building ahead and hurried toward it An arrow pointed to her left with the words

"San Marco" printed above it Of course, that could justto the island would be a start Once there, of course, she’d find winding pathways, piazzas and bridges as well, but hopefully, she’d see son

She followed the direction of the arrow through another archway between buildings She looked back to assure herself she had co deep shadows on the ays beneath the light of thea darkened blue orb in the night sky as clouds drifted below it She started, stopping dead in her tracks, as the length of shadow sees across the piazza she had just crossed

Sole in her hair She let out a startled gasp Bats This ti the first sense of real fear

Nasty little creatures, boain, shaking her head, inhaling deeply Which way had she run? Ahead of her was another archway Was it one she had already walked beneath? No

Once again

Wings

Flying close, not touching her; she instinctively ducked

This tis, not formed into words, but sounds that see beneath the arch She cae that traversed a sth of water to another bridge

Sourea man In a dottore cape andfor her

"Jared!" she called again She had never been so glad to see anyone in her life, she thought as hethat she should coe

"Jared, wait, dae, then tripped on the cobblestone landing Despite her desperate effort to prevent a fall, she went doearing, she cursed her high-heeled red leather boots and looked at her leg, feeling a pain in her knee but hoping she hadn’t wrecked the rented vinyl costume As she looked over her uninjured costuround To her a toward her

Heedless of her knee, she leaped to her feet and ran She turned back The shadow seeround, to have beco to find the street that would lead around to the other bridge

A flutter of wings suddenly seeain, the hissing sound Fluttering Speech that wasn’t speech Shadohispers

She ran faster, bursting out upon a lighted square She could see the path to the other bridge It was now e called No, whispered, fluttered by bat wings A breeze was picking up She could hear it, whisking by her

"Jordan!"

She looked ahead A larger bridge looure, in a dottore costume

"Jared, damn you!"

She heard the panic in her own voice

She raced toward the bridge Jared was already over it It seeone down the darkest path before her

"Da herself not to look back

She couldn’t help but do so Shadows sees as well as the paths between the swiftly, as if they too ran, as if they would come and overtake her, and she would be sed into the darkness

She nearly ran into a dead end, just barely stopping herself froht into a wall She turned back The shadows had her nearly cornered She had to escape this dead end before the shadows covered it; somehow, she knew that, knew it in the naked fear that now ran rampant in her

She shot across the space to the pathway she had strayed fro it before the stretch of shadow