Witch Hunter Olivia (15 page)

“Are you sure you’re willing to risk facing whatever’s in that forest at night for the life of a witch?”

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve done something crazy like that. Besides, I swore to her mother I’d protect her. I’m a woman of my word.”

“If you’re serious about this, we’re going to need some supplies first. You don’t want to go into those woods half-cocked … trust me on this one.”

“Then let’s get going. We don’t have much time.”

“What the hell are you doing here, Tara?” I fume when I see her strolling up the sidewalk toward the Theta Chi house. “I told you to stay put, and that we’d be back soon.” I hear my voice getting increasingly agitated and feel bad when I realize I’m taking out my frustrations over what just happened on her.

“I know, but I felt so terrible about the whole Angelica thing that I had to come help get her back,” she explains, which only succeeds in making me even more pissed for some reason.

I place my hand on her back and spin her to face Heath’s car before giving her a light shove in order to get a little more privacy for our conversation, since we’re still close to the frat party.

“Malcolm took Angelica, Tara. She’s gone. So please, before anything happens to you, can you go back to the room and stay there? How many times do I have to go over this with you?” I truly hope my concern for her is coming through with my words and tone, and that I don’t sound like an asshole.

“I’m already dead, Olivia. What else can happen to me? You see all this?” she asks, pulling on the skin of her arm, “this is all just a pretty covering for a dead person. The only reason I’m not eating someone’s brains or my flesh isn’t rotting off is because I was brought back with light magic instead of dark. I don’t eat and I don’t sleep. I’m a walking, talking spell who is delusional about the fact that I can still have a normal life. You brought me back for yourself, Olivia, so let me do something instead of just hanging out in our dorm room, okay?”

I’m caught off-guard from Tara’s outburst, but I guess she was trying to match the intensity I was bringing to this conversation. I never did think about why I brought Tara back to life. It was more of a reactionary thing, and the fact that I couldn’t bear not having her in my life anymore. She has nothing here now except me, and maybe it was selfish to bring her back. I need to start treating her better, making her feel included and not like a pet I come home to and let outside every once in a while.

“Tara, you’re my best friend. That’s why I brought you back. Yeah, maybe it was a selfish decision, but I couldn’t see my life without you in it. I gave up being a Hunter for you.”

“I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, really, but I didn’t ask you to do any of that. What I am asking is to let me help you with this, please? You left Angelica in my hands and I let her slip away. I wouldn’t feel right not helping get her back,” she explains.

I move over to the back door of Heath’s car and pop it open before motioning for Tara to get in. She beams and wraps me up in a huge hug. After closing the door when she gets in, I turn to open mine, but Heath’s standing there blocking my way.

“I think you need to tell her,” he whispers so only I can hear.

I sigh. “Not now, but I agree she needs to know the truth. I’ll tell her after all this is over. I’m afraid of how she’s going to handle the news.”

“Better late than never, I guess.”

*****

“Why do we need all this stuff exactly?” Tara asks, picking up an automatic multi-bolt crossbow that Heath had set on his father’s office desk moments prior. “Are these woods we’re going to really that dangerous?

“In a word, yes,” I reply while helping Heath search through his dad’s weapon cache for anything useful on our trip.

“Cool beans,” Tara says hesitantly.

My attention is drawn to her when I hear the sound of something dropping onto the desk’s metal top followed by multiple impacts on the wall opposite us. Three bolts are stuck in the wall, and Tara’s standing there with her hand over her mouth and wide eyes. “I. Am. So. Sorry.” I can hear her muffled voice through her hand.

“Back away from the weapons, now. No touchy,” I say before walking over to the bolts protruding from the wall and plucking each one of them out.

“Okay, I think we’ve got everything we need. Let’s get going before Tara pisses my dad off more than she already has,” Heath laughs.

“I said I was sorry,” she comments. I hand her a vial of holy water to hold since that’s pretty much the only thing in our arsenal that won’t harm any of us. “Holy water?” she asks.

“You never know,” Heath answers before swinging the duffle bag full of weapons over his shoulder and leading the way out to his car.

After driving for what seems like forever, we finally make it to the dirt road leading into the forest. It’s like we’ve entered another world the moment we pass under the archway of ominousness. This place takes on a whole other feel when it gets dark out. The car’s headlights are barely even showing anything in front of us as we continue moving forward.

“Yeah, you so weren’t kidding about this place,” Tara pipes up from the backseat.

“This is the easy part,” Heath responds. “Wait until we have to get out of the car and walk the rest of the way.”

“Wait, walk? Like, out there?” she asks, her voice echoing her fretful tone.

“Hey, you wanted to come, remember?” I turn to look back at her.

“Oh, I know, I was just making sure I heard Heath correctly,” she answers, but hardly sounds convincing.

“Mmmhmm,” is my quick response.

BANG!

A thunderous noise reverberates throughout the car as its entire frame shifts over to the side after something hits us from the right.

“What the fuck was that?” Heath shouts, attempting to pull the car back on track after the sudden impact caused him to swerve.

I narrow my eyes and try to see any movement outside. “I can’t see anything. It’s too dark.”

BANG!

The same noise sounds out from the driver’s side this time as the car swerves to the right, causing Heath to fight with the steering wheel again. We skid on the muddy road, but he’s able to steer us back on track.

“Whoa, something’s really pissed off at us for being here,” Tara whimpers. “I think we’re gonna need a bigger car.”

Heath speeds up in order to outmaneuver whatever’s outside that’s trying to mess with us. With him driving as fast as he is, it doesn’t take us long to reach the closed gate. He pumps the brakes and throws the car into park. We haven’t had another incident with something ramming into the car up to this point, but that doesn’t mean I’m not nervous and wondering what did it and whether it’s still close by.

“We’re not getting out of the car now, are we?” Tara asks. Her voice squeaks with nervousness.

“As much as I don’t want to, we sort of have to. That’s the only way we can get to Jack’s place,” I answer.

“Hey, we didn’t bring any flashlights,” Tara mentions as I hear her digging through the bag of supplies we brought sitting next to her.

“I’ve got something better than a flashlight,” Heath chimes in before sending me a quick smile while drawing a clear crystal from his pocket.

He snaps his fingers and then holds out his other hand with the crystal resting at the center of his palm. A small orb of light appears from the inside of the crystal and hovers above it. He rolls down his window enough to send the small ball of light through the opening to the outside of the car. It beams bright and fills our direct area with a warm glow, illuminating the entire space around us.

“Let me guess, just another one of your many talents,” I say, causing Heath’s smile to form into a huge grin.

“I guess you could say that,” he replies, pulling on his door’s handle and popping it open.

“Wait, what about the thing that hit the car twice? Are we not even going to consider it’s still out there?” Tara asks from the backseat.

Heath pulls his door closed, sitting back against his seat. “Well, can you see anything out there right now?”

I draw my gaze outside and scan our surroundings with the assistance of the orb of light flitting around the car. After not seeing anything except a bunch of bare trees and mud, I turn to look back at Tara. She’s studying the woods with an analytical eye.

“I don’t see anything right now, but something did hit the car earlier. We all felt it,” Tara answers, still gazing out the window.

“We probably just crossed into something’s territory and it lashed out, but now it’s gone,” Heath says before opening his door again. “Can you pass me the duffle?”

Tara grabs the bag and heaves it through the space between the front seats. Heath grabs hold of the handles before pulling it the rest of the way to lay in the driver’s seat. He hands me a fully loaded crossbow before drawing out a medieval-looking axe for himself.

“Don’t worry, guys. We’re safe because I still have my holy water,” Tara mocks while waving the glass vial about.

“You’d be surprised how powerful that little item you’ve got there is. Probably the most effective thing in this whole bag against the right creatures,” Heath states before exiting the car, leaving the duffle bag behind on the seat.

“If you say so,” Tara comments, staring at the small bottle.

“You can stay in the car if you really don’t want to come along,” I say, making direct eye contact with her.

“Uh-uh. You’re not leaving me out here. No way,” she fires back with a nervous titter.

We hear Heath’s voice call out to us, interrupting what I’m about to say to Tara. He’s standing near the front of the car with the ball of light he conjured floating around him like a firefly. “You guys coming?” he repeats.

I look back at Tara and she nods her head slightly while clutching the bottle of holy water. We open our doors and exit the car together. My boots squish and slide a bit in the mud when I step down. Leaving the safety of the car, I wait for Tara to gain her composure before heading over to where Heath is waiting for us.

“Onward to Jack’s,” he says, and moves ahead. His little ball of light follows close to him, but still provides enough light for all of us to see the area around us.

The cool night breeze continually brushes past my face and jostles my jacket as we continue to walk up the hill toward Jack’s compound. The sounds I remember from the last trip through these woods are oddly absent, and all I can hear is the wind. My eyes keep darting toward the forest tree line, thinking I see movement. I can’t seem to shake the feeling we’re being stalked. There was nothing there when we started out, but now it feels like we’re surrounded.

“This place gives me a serious case of the wiggins,” Tara says in front of me.

That’s the other thing that’s changed since the last time I trekked through these woods. I lack the wonderful distraction of staring at Heath’s magnificent asset.

“Not much farther now,” Heath calls out over his shoulder to us. “See, I told you that—”

Heath’s interrupted by a loud howl in the distance that shakes the trees and the ground below our feet. The roaring noise echoes a few times shortly after, coming from all different directions. Out of the corner of my eye, I keep seeing the fleeting images of something moving amongst the forest all around us, just outside the ball of light’s reach.

“Werewolves,” I whisper under my breath when I see multiple sets of glowing, golden brown eyes peering out at us from the darkness between the tree trunks.

Growling fills the area and a high-pitched squeak emits from Tara as she huddles up next to me. I pin my back up to her shoulder and Heath does the same on her other side, all of us keeping watch on different sections of the woods. Movement continues to rustle the foliage around us, but none of the wolves decide to step out into the light. They’re waiting for the perfect moment.

“For some reason, I wasn’t expecting to see werewolves,” Heath mentions.

I crank back the mechanism that fires the bolts from the crossbow and point it out toward the trees I’m facing. “Funny, they were exactly what I was expecting to be out here,” I respond. “Hence, the silver bolts I grabbed from your dad’s vault.”

“What does holy water do against werewolves?” Tara’s worried voice chimes up between us.

“Uh, well, holy water doesn’t exactly work on werewolves,” Heath answers, and I can see him wrench his hands on the handle of the axe he’s holding when I look over my shoulder. A nervous whimper bubbles up from Tara.

Another loud howl sounds from in front of me just before I see a razor-sharp clawed paw step out from the darkness. It’s followed by another and then the wet black snout and full-on hairy face of a werewolf. Saliva drips from its bared teeth onto the muddy ground below it as it stares me down. It’s probably one of the largest werewolves I’ve ever seen, and the real problem is that this particular one is almost all wolf and has no trace of human in its transformed state. When a werewolf transforms and still semi-resembles a human, that means it still has its humanity, but when it transitions and takes the full body of a wolf, like this one in front of me, that means it’s acting on its primal instincts to hunt and kill.