Chapter 5
My flashlight came back on, but I decided it was best to go back to my tent. The atmosphere changed like someone flipped a switch. There wasn’t one thing watching me anymore. The space felt occupied now. The air crackled with energy, lots of it.
I got a fire going in the teens’ old makeshift pit and put down a thin salt circle around my camp. The fire held the bulk of the spiritual energy back, but shadows moved all around me.
I crawled into my tent and sleeping bag, knowing that I should get rest while I could. The witching hour would be when things cranked up.
The second I stopped moving William came to my mind, making tears prick my eyes again. What did he want?
Part of me longed to prove my worth to him, but that was desperation to be accepted and I knew it. So I closed my eyes, pretending that none of the tears escaped.
Why couldn’t anyone give me forever?
That’s not true. Esme and Willow were always with me, even when they weren’t. I let out a breath, resting heavier on that bond than what was healthy.
But that would have to be a problem for future-me. Today I had enough battles to fight.
The sensation of a gentle caress brushed under my eyes.
I sat straight up, my heart pounding out of my chest. My cheeks were wet as if I’d been sobbing. I scrambled out of the tent and found that the fire had almost died.
I’d fallen asleep, for a long time.
I clicked my watch to find it was three in the morning. The witching hour. I fed the fire. The response was almost immediate. The fire whooshed up and filled the area with dim light.
A scream echoed off the trees and filled the air. My eyes went to the area the sound came from and found multiple figures dressed like it was the 1800s, walking around like it was a normal day in the village.
Each one was a faded light gray that seemed to vanish and reappear as if they were on a loop, stuck on a track they couldn’t get off of.
Like they were nothing more than echoes of what once was.
Ghosts.
I checked the other side of the settlement to find the same thing. The spirits walked around with stony faces that said they’d seen too much and didn’t dare hope things would get better.
More screams in the distance, but the other ghosts didn’t respond. This was their normal.
A ghost nearby stopped in her tracks, grabbed her face and screamed like she was on fire. She climbed to the top of a rock, tossed a rope over something that didn’t exist anymore, and put the noose around her neck.
The man who’d been escorting her begged wordlessly for her to stop. His hands shaking in her direction, but she didn’t even blink when she jumped off the rock. He slumped with defeat, before joining her.
Their spirits hanged eerily as the rest of the town folk carried on, not sparing them a glance.
A gasp escaped me before I could smother it behind my hands.
Every ghost halted and their eyes tiredly slid to me. Only to grow wide with horror a few seconds later.
Fuck.
Nothing like having hundreds of souls looking at you like you might eat their baby. I swallowed harshly.
So much for not bringing attention to myself.
Men clutched their female companions to them protectively. Children hid behind their mother’s skirts. Women covered their mouths much like I had a moment before.
Why were they all looking at me like I was a monster?
A bad feeling rolled through me and made my hands shake. Why did I suddenly feel like I wouldn’t survive this hunt?
A breath blew across my neck, making the truth snap with a click inside me. They weren’t looking at me at all.
They were looking over my shoulder.
My stomach shrank as the realization threatened to drown me. I took a deep breath to steel my nerves, before I slowly turned on my heel.
Did I even want to know what terrified the dead?
A shapeless black shadow radiated behind me. A space where light ceased to exist, even though it was only a few feet away from the fire pit. I squinted to get a better look at the thing before me, as if that would help me make sense of what I was seeing.
The shadow moved like vibrating bugs, until I blinked and the shadow tucked itself into the outline of a man with bulking muscles and was just as tall as I suspected. The edges of his silhouette blurred in a way that told me he’d chosen to present himself to me in this form.
His face didn’t have eyes, a nose, or lips, but there was some underlying bone structure that made him appear more human than he was.
He slowly lifted his hand as if he was hesitating. I didn’t dare run or do anything that would make him respond violently. My breath shook as he moved so slowly I wasn’t sure what his intentions were. His fingers hovered inches away from my chin like he was hesitant.
My heart pounded against my chest as the whispering started up again. Horrified gasps and whimpers filled the space. They were terrified.
What is he doing?
After a long moment, he took a step forward, making the foundation crack as he did. That was him.
The shadow finally cupped my cheek, caressing my lips with his thumb, like he expected me to shatter to pieces as soon as he touched me. His cold breath washed over me like he’d been holding it. Like the need to touch me had plagued him so much it hurt.
Women sobbed and one man muttered, “That poor girl.”
Their fear was for me.
But nothing happened despite their pleas.
His body froze, but the edges of his form blurred and crawled as if he was struggling to hold his shape.
Despite not having eyes, his gaze locked onto me, searing my skin deep to my core.
The heat of his intensity rolled around my stomach uncomfortably.
A flutter of something I immediately hated tried to take hold, but I rejected the desire.
His grip on my face tightened hard enough, I was sure I’d bruise. It was like he was testing if I was real.
Think, Sasha!
Burning rosemary a day keeps the ghosts away. All my training finally grabbed me by the scruff. I reached into my pocket and lit a bundle of rosemary with my lighter.
One by one, the audience of ghosts faded away as the herb soothed their souls into temporary peace.
But he remained before me.
The shadow man tilted his head to the side as if I’d done something curious. His fingers slid up my cheek, until his huge hand expanded up to my temple.
He stepped forward until his chest was an inch in front of my nose. Too close. Even my husband hadn’t been that close in a year.
I couldn’t hold back the urge this time. I pushed him to create space, but my hands went right through him as if he was one of the spirits. My hands crackled with static electricity, but I couldn’t grab anything solid on him.
My heart dropped for a beat before picking up double time. None of this made sense.
If this was a spirit, the rosemary would have worked.
My fingers clenched in the air, testing to make sure I was understanding this right. The stench of sweat and my own fear filled my nose as I took too long to understand what was happening.
He could touch me, but I couldn’t touch him.
The longer my hands hovered inside his shadow the more my hands tingled, yet were simultaneously numb, as if they were disconnected from my body. It reminded me of sitting on my foot for too long. I yanked my hands back through his body, cradling them to my chest.
As if my hands could keep my pounding heart from lurching out of my chest as full-blown panic made me lightheaded.
What was he?
What did my ancestors do?
“Stay back!” I spoke, but my voice shook and didn’t carry the authority I meant it to have.
Why did the older witches command we never hunt here? A bad feeling twisted my stomach into knots. I’ve fucked up.
I should’ve done more research before I trolloped into this place like an idiot. I stumbled back to retreat, but he followed me step for step, holding his space beside me.
“What are you?” a deep voice whispered. But it didn’t come from where his mouth should be. It came from all around me.
From inside me.
My fingers trembled as the implication of that settled. That would be impossible.
Stop showing this monster fear. You are a hunter. You’ve done this every day since you were a thirteen-year-old girl. Act like it!
“I could ask you the same question,” I shot back with more bravado than I actually had. I clenched my fist hoping to keep him from seeing my shaking hands.
“You...” He stepped even closer as if he couldn’t stand to leave a sliver of space between us.
He was impossibly close, yet somehow still wasn’t touching me.
It was more like he was smothering me. His icy breath rolled over my face.
The cool air didn’t help my facade, since all it did was make me tremble harder. “You are a lovely dandelion.”
I blinked, bemused by his assessment. Me? A dainty flower?
He chuckled as if my response amused him. As if I were nothing more than some adorable puppy chewing on his shoes.
That made enough anger boil inside my chest to shake me out of the freeze I’d been in. This motherfucker was killing all those kids, and he had the audacity to act like nothing would come of it.
He’d get his. I’d make sure of that.
I grabbed an iron knife from my belt, slashing the blade across his chest. My arm went through him, and he didn’t so much as flinch.
Definitely not a spirit.
But something strange happened to the blade. It turned to rust and crumbled away right in my hand. I didn’t let a new wave of panic set in, even though I’d never seen such a thing before.
Sage! Something!
I’d just chosen the wrong herb before. Easy fix.
I lit a bundle of sage and tossed it between our feet. He didn’t so much as twitch to stop me.
The billowing smoke made the air thick between us. He even made a show of taking a deep inhale, as if to prove how futile my efforts were.
Ok. So, he wasn't mutated by a witch.
Fuck.
Why wasn’t anything working?
The elderwood wasn’t impacted by him when the vines burned away from the wall. Yes!
This time, I whipped out an elderwood stake, jabbing it where his heart would be. The elderwood clattered to the stone beneath us as if nothing was there.
It didn’t disintegrate like the knife had, but the echo of it hitting the ground ripped any illusion of hope that I could win away from me.
For the first time in my life, all my training failed me. I didn’t have a single possible answer on how to deal with this.
The air grew thin as I panted.
If you panic, you die. Stay calm and think.
“You can burn your sage, draw your symbols, and pray to your goddess, Dandelion.” He caressed my cheek as if it was the most natural thing in the world. “I’m not leaving.”
I wasn’t sure which shook me more.
The calm or the certainty in his voice.
He was standing inside my protective salt circle, so obviously that wouldn’t protect me.
I’d met a lot of cocky monsters over the years. They all proclaimed to be invincible. This was the first time I believed one.
Why hadn’t my ancestors already taken care of him?
The answer was simple.
Because they couldn’t.
My sister, turn back. Death awaits you here.
Run.