The Monster Hunter's Manual (7 page)

Alex took a lighter and candle from his pocket. I didn't know where he had gotten them or even how he knew he needed them. “Lift me up.”

I gave him a boost and he placed a small white candle in the stone lantern. He hesitated then lit the candle. I dropped him to the ground and he fell with a thud. We all looked out at the sky, waiting.

“Maybe you should call their names or something,” Roger said.

“Mom! Dad! If you are out there, come see us!” Alex cried.

Nothing happened. I could hear Roger doing some kind of silly dance on the grass, but there was nothing else.

“Don't call them Mom and Dad. Call their real names, idiot,” I said.

Alex scowled at me. “If you know so much, you do it.”

“Caroline Allaire and Bastian Allaire, I call you to come and seek your sons!” I yelled.

“I knew this wouldn't work,” Alex complained. He kicked the lantern and started to head out of the cemetery.

Roger followed Alex. I hesitated and looked up. There was something wrong with the sky. It was getting brighter.

“Wait!” I called. “Don't you see that?”

“No,” Alex said. “This entire thing is stupid. I'm stupid.”

The sky was definitely getting brighter. It wasn't just brighter. The color of the sky had changed. It was an odd shade of green. The clouds thickened and a thin mist settled over the ground. The air around us became colder. Clouds obscured the moon and the stars faded. In the dark, I could see a small light coming towards us.

“Look!” I yelled. “You don't see that?”

Everyone stopped and looked up. It was Mom and Dad. I laughed out loud. They looked like themselves, but they were luminous like Eleanor. They were made of light. I ran to Mom and tried to hug her and she smiled down on me with love. She was beautiful. I had forgotten how beautiful my mother was. Her long, black hair spilled over her shoulders framing her perfect moon-shaped face and my father looked well. He was tall and square shouldered.

“You're really here!” I yelled.

“Yes,” my mother answered. “We are here, but you shouldn't be.”

I had forgotten what it felt like to be scolded by my mother. It had been so long, I actually liked it. I loved being scolded. Alex ran for Mom and tried to hug her but fell in the grass instead. Mom reached out to him and somehow lifted him to his feet. She put a phantom hand on his shoulder and Alex cried with joy.

“I missed you so much,” he wept.

“I know, baby, I know,” Mom said.

“Why did you go?”

Mom leaned down to him and smiled at him with lips that seemed to be made from stars and then she put a hand on my shoulder. “We never wanted to leave you, my beautiful boys. We would have loved to have stayed with you forever, but God has different plans for all of us. We can't fight our destinies.”

“Destiny?” Alex asked. “I don't care about destiny I just want you to stay with us.”

“It is not our place to choose,” my father said. He was smiling too. “We love you so much, but we can't stay.”

Tears ran down Alex's face. “Why not!”

“Because you and Gabriel have a destiny. You have to be brave now, my two sons, you have to be brave.”

Mom looked at me with her starry eyes. “Do you remember when I told you the world was older than time and that magic tied it all together?”

I nodded.

“I wasn't lying, was I?”

I shook my head and leaned into her.

“Now it's time for you two to find the magic in yourselves,” she said.

My father joined us in our strange embrace. “Find the magic and don't ever lose hope, we are always with you, even if you can't see us. We are always with you.”

“Really?” Alex asked.

“Yes,” Dad said. “And you should have studied your French like Aunt Perrine told you to.”

Alex looked down sheepishly. “I'll do my best.”

“Now listen carefully,” Mom said. “Don't do this again. This is dangerous. Do you two hear me?”

We both nodded.

Dad kissed us both on the cheek with his phantom lips. It felt like a gentle breeze. “Now we need you to run as fast as you can to the castle and close the gate.”

“What?” I asked.

“You woke the dead,” Mom said. “You need to run.”

Their light began to fade. Alex and I looked around. The soil around the graves was moving. The dirt was shifting as if someone was trying to get out. Alex yelled and ran for the gate. I looked up at the fading image of my mom and dad.

They spoke together in unison. “We are always with you.”

“Take care of your brother. You are the wiser of the two,” Mom said to me and then they vanished.

The first ghoulish hand pushed its way through the soil and I began to run after Alex. Roger only smiled and lay down in the grass.

“I'll catch up with you later,” Roger called calmly. “I wanna see what happens.”

I didn't even answer him I was running so fast. I ran so fast my feet almost slipped out from under me. I passed under the castle gates and Uno, Alex, and I cranked the wheel to close the gate.

“What should we do?” Alex yelled.

Uno had trouble talking. “We – we need to get Aunt Perrine.”

“What?” Alex said. “What would she do?”

Uno began to run towards the house. “Come on,” he yelled and we followed because we didn't know what else to do.

We ran into the living room and Uno pulled at a candle that was located beside the fireplace. Alex and I watched in amazement as a secret passage opened into a dark hall behind the fireplace. Uno ran in and we followed.

We ran down the long, stone hall. Candles on the wall lit up as if by magic, as we passed them. The hall ended at a spiral staircase that went up and down. We went up to a
room, which seemed to be hidden in one of the back towers of the castle. It was circular and the window looked out on the old woods. Bookshelves, covered with ancient books, lined the walls, and there were glass cases filled with herbs, vials, and old skulls. Swords and axes were mounted to the walls next to cross bows and maces.

Alex and I stood staring out at the green bottles and ancient books. It looked like a wizard's study.

“What're you doing?” Uno called out. “We have to find the book.”

“The what?” I asked stupidly.

“Le Guide de Bagarreur Le Monstre
. I know she left it in here some place. If we can find it we won't have to tell Aunt Perrine and we won't get into trouble,” Uno replied. “The book will tell us how to stop the zombies.”

“Zombies?” Alex yelled.

“Book?” I said.

“Would you two stop staring and help me? We are going to be in so much trouble,” Uno said.

I ran to the bookshelf and started reading the titles, “What does it look like?”

“It is quite large and bound in dragon skin.” Aunt Perrine's voice caused us all stop dead in our tracks.

We turned to see her at the top of the stairs with her arms crossed angrily across her chest. She was wearing a robe with dragons embroidered on it and she looked fierce for an old lady. “I expected more of you, Uno. I expect Roger to be involved in zis kind of foolishness, but you are smarter zan zis.”

Uno looked down. His red eyes filled with remorse and he looked a little sheepish.

“And you two boys,” she said, “have gotten into nozing but trouble since you 'ave been 'ere.”

“Sorry,” Alex and I said in unison.

“Magic is dangerous. Little boys should not play wiz zings zey do not understand.”

“Sorry,” we said again.

“OK, zen. Now we deal wiz zeez zombies.” Aunt Perrine looked around. “Where is Roger?”

“He stayed to watch the zombies,” I said.

Aunt Perrine shook her head. “I'll deal with him later. But now, you three need weapons.”

Alex and I just looked at each other.

Aunt Perrine seemed very calm about everything. She hummed as she pulled a large, red book from the shelf. She set it down on the table. The book was bound in shiny, red scales and labeled in long elegant script,
Le Guide de Bagarreur Le Monstre
.

“What does it mean?” I asked Uno.

“It means the guidebook for monster fighters. It's
The Monster Hunter's Manual,”
Uno whispered.

Aunt Perrine took out the book and then walked over to a weapon-covered wall. She looked up at the swords, knives, crossbows, silver guns, crosses and shields. She shook her head, and turning away from the wall, went over to a chest.

“Ah,” she said. “Zis is just what we need. Zee perfect weapon to fight zee zombies.”

She pulled four out four very large, cartoon style hands, mounted on long, brightly colored plastic sticks. Each hand had one pointed finger. She put one stick in each of our hands and kept one for herself.

Alex looked at the stick. “You're joking right?”

“No. I never joke about zombies. Zey are very serious,” she said in a tone that implied she might have been joking.

Alex opened his mouth to say something else, but Uno shook his head in warning and Alex shut his mouth.

“OK,” she said. “Now we go to zee garage.”

We left the secret tower and the secret hall and as we passed each candle, it mysteriously blew out again. Aunt Perrine closed the secret door and took us all to the garage. There we found five large refrigerators. Aunt Perrine opened one and looked at it.

“I need four buckets,” she said.

The garage was a mess. There were piles of furniture, axes, books, and old clothes. All this junk was piled up in no particular order. It took us forever to find the buckets and then we placed them at Aunt Perrine's feet.

She handed us each a stack of brains, still in the wrapping from the supermarche. Uno started unwrapping the brains and putting them in his bucket and I figured I should follow his lead.

“I thought these were for us to eat,” Alex said.

“No,” Aunt Perrine said. “I 'ate brains. Do you like zem? I can save some for dinner tomorrow?”

“No! No! That's OK.”

“So if you bought these two days ago and they are for the zombies,” I said, “you must have known you were going to have to fight zombies this week?”

“You are a very smart boy.” She unwrapped a brain and put it in the bucket. “Of course I know. You boys just lost your parents. I know zat you would try to zay goodbye to
zem, so I buy brains, just in case.”

“Oh,” I said.

“That's really gross,” Alex said.

“No more gross zan a 'ungry zombie.”

“I get the brains,” I said. “But what is this stick for.”

“Zombies are easy to fight. Zere are zree steps. One…run…zey are very slow. Two…if zey get to close, push zem away with zis stick. Zree…give them a brain and zey go back to sleep.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Really,” Aunt Perrine said.

“OK,” I said dropping my last brain in the bucket. “Let's go fight some zombies.”

Aunt Perrine stood up. “Good for you. You say it like a real monster 'unter.”

We all stood up, with a hand stick in one hand and a bucket of brains in the other. We must have looked ridiculous. We were two boys in pajamas, one cowardly vampire, and an old lady, but I knew in my heart we were warriors, and as we opened the gates to the castle, I prepared myself to fight like a lion.

I stepped out onto the cobblestoned road and prepared to face my worst fears. I took a deep breath and held my stick like a sword. The zombies oozy monsters stumbled up the road. The monsters were gross. They smelled like my brother's farts after he ate bean casserole, and looked like something I found on one of his old tissues, but as soon as I saw them stumbling and fumbling towards us, I knew there was nothing to be afraid of. They moaned and reached out for us, but they were so slow I could have outrun them without even running.

The first zombie came up to me with its hands outstretched. He kept bumping into things, and somehow I
didn't feel too scared. It tried to grab me and I stepped aside. It fell. The next zombie came and I pushed it with my little stick. It fell too. I gave each fallen zombie a brain, they ate it hungrily and then dragged themselves up and stumbled back to the cemetery.

Alex looked as if he was having a lot of fun, as if he had discovered a new sport. He was jumping around the zombies, weaving in and out of them. He pushed them over and laughed at them. “You're a smelly, piece of dog fart,” he said. “Take that, you gross zombie. You're so ugly that even other monsters won't hang out with you.”

“Alex,” Aunt Perrine scolded. “Don't taunt the zombies. Just give zem zee brains.”

“Why not?” Alex pushed over another zombie. “It's not like it hurts their feeling or anything.”

“Iz not nice,” Aunt Perrine said. “Zey may have been someone nice in life.”

Alex shrugged and started handing out brains. It kind of felt like Halloween, except the zombies never said trick or treat. Slowly, the zombies began to thin out. Every once in a while, Alex would softly say, “There you go, stinky,” or “Have some brains, booger face.” I tried to ignore him and focus on the zombies, but sometimes I had to laugh.

It wasn't until Uno started screaming that I felt a little jolt of fear, but when I turned around I saw that Roger was hanging around Uno's neck screaming, “Braiiiins. I want braiiiins!”

Uno pushed him off and Roger rolled around in the dirt laughing. “I got you good.”

“If you're not going to be 'elpful,” Aunt Perrine said. “Just go back to the castle.”

Roger started hiking back up the hill to the castle, but he didn't make it. He fell and yelled out. I had just handed a zombie a brain and turned to see what was happening
behind me. At first, I thought it was just another one of Roger's pranks. I shook my head and continued my work. Alex and Aunt Perrine obviously thought the same thing, but Roger's screams escalated and when I turned around again I noticed that there was something latched onto Roger's leg. It wasn't just Roger either. Some of the zombies appeared to be trapped as well.

“What's going on?” I asked. I stared at the field.

“Oh no!” Uno cried.

In the field in front of me, there were at least ten zombies in some kind of traps. They were groaning and thrashing, but they couldn't get out. Roger was caught too. He flailed helplessly in the grasp of a lock-jawed, silver trap.

For a minute, I panicked. I froze trying to figure out was going on. Alex, who never stopped to think about anything, ran blindly into the field after Roger. I looked around. Aunt Perrine was acting slowly, cautiously. She was looking through her bag, removing vials of colorful liquid.

“Ahhhhh!” Alex yelled as the jaws of a trap clamped over his leg. He couldn't move.

“What is it?” I asked Aunt Perrine.

“It's the slayers.” She looked calm, but her jaw was set. She was ready to fight.

“What are slayers?” I asked.

“Not what, but who. They are men who think they are monster hunters.”

“Think?”

Roger tried to pry the trap open on his leg and the trap tightened. It didn't just tighten, it got bigger and a part of it reached out to encompass Roger's other leg. Roger screamed and thrashed about desperately, but the more he fought the worse the trap became.

“We have to help them!” I cried.

I moved closer to the field, but stopped. I knew if I
stepped in, I would be trapped like the others.

“What should I do?” I asked Aunt Perrine.

Aunt Perrine lined the vials up in dirt in front of her.

“We wait,” she said.

The minutes dragged by. Alex was yelling and struggling to escape. Roger was trying to pry the trap open with his bony fingers. The zombies moaned.

“Give the rest of the zombies their brains while we wait,” Aunt Perrine told me.

I took her bucket and started handing out brains. Once fed, the zombies stopped wailing and sat down. Some of them even began digging back into the earth.

The slayers came from behind the castle. They looked like action heroes – James Bond on a mission. They were dressed all in black. Their hair was cut short and they wore bulletproof vests and combat boots. There were three of them and each of them held a machine gun in his hand.

The leader looked around and sized up the situation. “Bag what you can,” the leader told the others.

The others each took one of the zombies and put it in a body bag while the leader walked up to Aunt Perrine. He was at least a foot taller than our tiny aunt, and he was young and in shape. Compared to him, she looked like the frailest old lady in the world.

“We just can't get away from you, can we, old lady?” he said.

“No,” she answered plainly.

“I thought we told you to stay away so we can do our job.”

“Zis is not your job. You are throwing the balance of ze world out of order.”

“This is our job and you are in our way.”

The other slayers began bagging another zombie and Roger began to scream. “Help me!” he yelled. “Don't let
them take me!”

“Help him,” I said in desperation.

“There's no help for monsters, boy,” the leader said to me. “There's no place in this world for things like him.”

“We'll be taking that one too,” the leader said, pointing to Uno.

Uno hid behind Aunt Perrine, but Aunt Perrine only smiled and shook her head. “When will you learn?” she said. With that, she crushed all of the vials she had laid on the ground. The liquids blended together and formed a green fog. The fog rose up in twisting, spirals like serpents crawling towards heaven. It rose up and then spread out over the field. It engulfed Aunt Perrine until she was lost in it and I could hardly see her face. She raised her right arm and the traps opened. Roger ran towards the castle as soon as he was free. Aunt Perrine raised her left hand and the soldier's guns turned to smoke and vanished in their hands.

The leader looked angry, but not surprised. Uno ran off toward the castle behind Roger.

“Why'd you do that, old lady?” the leader asked. “Why do you always protect the monsters?”

“You and I 'ave a different idea of what a monster is,” she said.

Aunt Perrine looked tired, as if the spell had taken all her energy. I ran to her side and held her up. “Zanks you,” she said.

“Someday you won't have all your tricks,” the leader said. “And then it'll be you who loses.”

Aunt Perrine just shook her head. Alex ran to her and she wrapped her free arm around He hugged her.

“Bonsoir,” Aunt Perrine said.

Alex and I helped her climb up the hill and into the castle. The slayers took the two zombies they had captured,
put them in a black van and drove away.

“Those poor creatures,” Aunt Perrine said as we closed the castle gates and I wasn't entirely sure if she was talking about the zombies or the slayers.

We helped Aunt Perrine into the house and she sat down on the chair. She looked very tired, but she still gave us her usual warm smile. I fetched Aunt Perrine some tea and she took her time sipping it. It wasn't long before the color returned to her face.

“I'm getting old,” she said. “I'm not as strong as I used to be.”

“You were amazing,” I said.

“Zanks you.”

Alex's smile covered his entire face. “That smoke was awesome,” Alex commented.

Aunt Perrine took another sip of tea. “Zanks you,” she said again.

“Thank
you
for helping us,” I said.

“You should be more careful next time.”

Alex and I both rushed to promise that we would never make that mistake again. We would never use magic we didn't understand. Aunt Perrine took our promises as earnest.

“I think I should rest now,” she said and she pulled herself up out of her chair and went into her room. She closed the door and Alex and I were left alone with our thoughts. As we left the living room, I couldn't help but notice that she had left
The Monster Hunter's Manual
on the coffee table.