Matt

That's weird, right?

Like, specifically for us?

He looked at me pointedly.

Let's just not say our names out loud for a while, I joked weakly.

We'll be like Voldemort, he who must not be named.

Ha, Miguel said without humor.

Cool, I've always wanted to be a pronoun.

We followed the wash back toward camp, quieter now.

Every little sound, a lizard skittering under a rock, the wind shifting through the scrub, felt amplified.

Halfway back, we found the bundle of bones Ryan had thrown the night before.

It was back in the wash, not where he'd tossed it, but almost exactly where I'd first found it.

Only this time, the leather wrapping had been cut open cleanly, and the bones were arranged in a little spiral on the sand.

In the center of the spiral, stuck upright, was a stick.

Impaled on the top of the stick was a tiny dried coyote skull.

Miguel swore under his breath.

Ryan went pale.

We didn't do this, he said.

Nope, I said.

We absolutely did not.

We stood there, the three of us, staring at this little arrangement like it was a live animal that might leap at us.