Heidi Lang - Infestation

Whispering Pines Infestation

Heidi Lang & Kati Bartkowski

Whispering Pines

The Mystic Cooking Chronicles:

A Dash of Dragon

A Hint of Hydra

A Pinch of Phoenix

MARGARET K. McELDERRY BOOKS

An imprint of Simon & Schuster Childrens Publishing Division

1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

www.SimonandSchuster.com

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the authors imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Text 2021 by Heidi Lang and Kati Bartkowski

Jacket illustration 2021 by Xavier Collette

Jacket design by Tiara Iandiorio 2021 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

MARGARET K. McELDERRY BOOKS is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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Jacket designed by Tiara Iandiorio

Interior designed by Mike Rosamilia

Jacket illustration 2021 by Xavier Collette

Jacket design by Tiara Iandiorio 2021 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Lang, Heidi, author. | Bartkowski, Kati, author.

Title: Infestation / Heidi Lang & Kati Bartkowski.

Description: First edition. | New York : Margaret K. McElderry Books, [2021] | Series: Whispering Pines; 2 | Summary: Rae discovers that killer alien centipedes have overrun the town of Whispering Pines, while Caden deals with the fallout of his brother Aidens return from the Other PlaceProvided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020054461 (print) | LCCN 2020054462 (ebook) |

ISBN 9781534460508 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781534460522 (ebook)

Subjects: CYAC: SupernaturalFiction. | Extraterrestrial beingsFiction. |

MonstersFiction. | SecretsFiction.

Classification: LCC PZ7.1.L3436 Inf 2021 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.L3436 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020054461

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020054462

For Alan, who has helped dig us out of a few plot holes over the years and will undoubtedly do so again in the stories still to come. Thank you.

B lake woke to the most horrible screaming hed ever heard. He lay frozen on his cot as it went on and on, high-pitched and awful.

Heed the warning cry of the banshee, his grandmother used to say. They wail when someone you love is about to die. Eyes red and swollen from endless weeping, long streaming hair, and bony hands extending with nails curved and dirty. Blake could picture it perfectly.

He hadnt been there the night his grandmother finally passed away, but his father had told him stories about it. About the spirits that had surrounded the house, their sorrow loud and keening, and how his own father had run outside with a shovel in one hand, a cross in the other, trying to keep them away. It hadnt worked, of course. And in the end, the banshees had taken him, too.

Blake clutched at his thin blanket as if it might protect him. But gradually he realized it wasnt banshees at all. The goats were shrieking.

His uncle kept nine of them in a large pen outside his yurt, and every evening he took them out for a hike to settle them down before bed. Blake had been staying with him for the past three weeks, and they had been peacefully quiet every night before this. Why would they be so agitated now?

Uncle Gary? he whispered. His uncle was lying on his own bed on the other side of the yurt. Blake could see the gleaming white of his wide-open eyes, but he didnt answer.

Another goat bleated, high-pitched and terrified. Blake recognized that voice: Waffles. His favorite. Every morning the goat would trot up to him and put his little goat head against Blakes shoulder until he scratched him behind the ears.

Blake sat up and swung his legs over the side of his cot. He couldnt stay here and do nothing. Not if Waffles was in danger.

Wait, his uncle croaked, and Blake froze, his hand on the door latch. I cant protect you if you go out into the night. When the sun sets, the forest belongs to them.

Them, who?

The other things that live here.

Blakes heart pounded, his mouth dry. He thought of his nice, safe, solid house with its thick walls and firmly locked doors, and wished hed never run away. Tomorrow he was going back home. Immediately. What other things? he asked.

His uncle didnt answer.

Waffles shrieked once more. Blake couldnt take it. We have to help the goats. He pulled open the door and slipped outside, half hoping his uncle would try to stop him again.

But he didnt.

It was dark here in the middle of the Watchful Woods. His uncle didnt like peoplehe barely tolerated Blakeso hed set up his yurt as far from the streets and houses of Whispering Pines as he could. The tall pines loomed overhead, patches of brilliant starlight visible between each treetop. They gave off just enough light to see the outline of the goat pen a few yards away, but not enough to see the goats in it. Blake could hear them, though, bleating in sharp, anguished tones.

He hesitated, the cool night wrapping around him. There were no crickets chirping, no owls hooting, nothing but the goats. It felt wrong, like the rest of the night had been artificially muted by something that didnt belong here. An unnatural force worse than any banshee.

Blake shivered, wishing he had grabbed a jacket and a flashlight, and maybe a weapon. He thought of his friend Jeremy and what had happened to him just weeks ago, and almost sprinted back to the yurt. But in the end, it was just a glorified tent. If there were something truly dangerous out here, he doubted its walls would protect him, no matter what deals his uncle had made. So he forced himself to walk toward the goat pen, the grass whispering against his bare feet.

When he reached the gate, he could just make out the goats all huddled together in the nearest corner like one trembling mass.

All except one.

Waffles lay motionless on his side in the middle of the pen, the white star-shaped fur on the top of his head almost glowing against the dark. The night breeze picked up, and beneath the ever-present smell of goats Blake caught a whiff of fresh-turned earth and the metallic tang of blood. The scent of new death.

He made a small involuntary sound, his fingers trembling as he yanked back the lock on the gate and pulled it open. He stepped inside, careful to shut the gate behind him, and moved closer, still staring at that sad crumpled form lying in the starlight like one of his baby sisters abandoned toys. Closer still, and he noticed the scuff marks in the dirt, like the goat had been dragged.