The Silent Soldiers

by Travis Stinnett

  Chapter 20

  Not a single dream interrupted my sleep that night. I woke up the next morning, which was Sunday, feeling completely rested. Grandma left for England before I woke up. I waited patiently for any word from her or Jack about my mother. Grandpa told me it may be a few days before we got word from Grandma. My fathers’ family lived in a very remote area of England, he explained, and it took several days of treacherous travel to get there. This was not what I wanted to hear. I had no choice but to deal with it.

  Classes started the next morning. I found out that the Silent Soldiers, minus Dakota of course, were taking our classes separately from the other students. We were told that the reasoning behind this was to keep the other students from getting jealous when we got to miss classes for soldier business. It made sense, but I hoped we wouldn’t have to miss much class. If we did it meant we were probably going to be risking our lives in some way. I would much rather be in class than out fighting bad guys.

  I looked for Jack in his classroom between classes, but his room was never open. I didn’t know if he just didn’t have a class today, or if he was out searching for my mother. Toward the end of the day I decided to text him and see what was going on. He didn’t respond to my text. I wondered if he even knew how to text at all. That evening when classes were done for the day I called him. The phone didn’t ring and went straight to voicemail. I didn’t leave a message. It was driving me crazy not being able to talk to somebody. Both Jack and my grandmother told me they would contact me when they found something out. I decided to try to be more patient and wait for them to contact me.

  “Let’s run tonight after dark,” I told Matt and Jenna as we sat in the dinning hall having dinner.

  “Ok, that sounds great to me!” Matt exclaimed.

  “Heck yeah, sounds good to me too,” said Jenna. I saw disappointment flash on Ava’s face, but she immediately put on a nervous little smile.

  “I just need to take my mind off waiting around to hear something,” I said trying to make Ava feel a little better. I definitely didn’t want her to think we were ditching her.

  “I understand,” said Ava, “I just wish I could run with you guys,” she said.

  “Maybe you can,” Jenna said as we all turned to look at her curiously. Jenna blushed as she continued, “I have been doing some searching through the computer system, and I found a bunch of spells your mom had stored in a secret file on the Silent Soldiers’ database.”

  “What kind of spells?” Ava asked.

  “Well, one in particular is a Transformation spell. It’s a spell using a creatures’ blood that allows you to temporarily transform into that creature,” said Jenna.

  “Show me!’ Ava exclaimed as she grabbed Jenna by the hand and practically dragged her out of the dinning hall.

  “Well, ok,” Matt said.

  “So, what’s up with you and Jenna?” I asked Matt.

  “I think were going out,” Matt said shyly, “What about you and Ava?”

  “I’m not really sure. We kissed the other night, but we haven’t really talked about it,” I said.

  “Yeah, it looked like y’all were getting all hot and steamy out in the garden,” Matt said laughing. I looked down smiling as I felt the blood rush into my face.

  Just then my phone rang and I jerked it out of my pocket to answer.

  “Hello?” I said.

  “Luke, its Grandma. I found out where she is staying, and I’m headed there now,” said my Grandma’s voice on the other end of the line.

  “Tell me where she is so I can come,” I said ecstatically.

  “NO! I will call you again when I find something out. I don’t want to talk too much over the phone in case someone might be intercepting the call. You need to stay where you are until we know something for sure.

  “But…” I started, but the phone went dead as Grandma hung up. I couldn’t believe she had cut me off. Now I would be waiting even longer to find something out. I so am not a very patient person. Grandma and Jack were killing me with all this waiting.

  “Who was that?” Matt asked.

  “Grandma thinks she found out where Mom is. She is headed there now. It will take her a day or so to get there, so I’m waiting again,” Matt’s phone chirped with an incoming text message just then. He pulled it out to look.

  “It’s Jenna. She says to meet them in the garden in half an hour.”

  “Cool,” I replied. Matt and I made small talk about our classes and stuff while we waited for the girls to meet us in the garden. We sat on the bench and waited patiently for them to arrive. The sun was setting by the time they got there. Ava had a huge smile on her face. I wondered curiously what they had come up with.

  “Let’s do this,” she said excitedly.

  “Do what?” I asked. Ava pulled out a little vial of red liquid that looked a lot like blood. She pulled out the cork and put the vial to her lips.

  “Bottoms up,” she said as she turned it up and drank down its contents. The vial hit the ground as Ava’s body began to change its shape. We all stared at her as she dropped down onto her hands and knees. In a matter of seconds we all gasped as Ava’s transformation was complete. Ava stood before us completely transformed into an amazing red colored wolf.

  “Holy crap!” Matt exclaimed.

  “You got that right,” I replied. I immediately transformed into wolf form and watched as Matt and Jenna did the same.

  “This is so freaking cool!” I heard Ava yell in my head.

  “Ha ha ha,” I heard Matt and Jenna laugh. Ava turned up her head to the sky and let out a long echoing howl and took off like a jet toward the woods. I followed right behind her.

  “Hey, wait for us,” I heard Jenna say. Ava just laughed and kept on running. It wasn’t that long ago that I had my first run, so I knew exactly what Ava was feeling.

  “So, how long does this last?” I asked.

  “The spell said it lasts for an hour, but I only took half of it. I figure I have a good thirty minutes or so. I didn’t want to be stuck in some weird form for very long until I tried it out. I have the rest in my pocket if I need to stay longer,” Ava said. We ran and ran through the woods. I always felt completely free in wolf form. I felt as if nothing could touch me. All my worries went out the window as I ran with my friends.

  We had been running for about twenty minutes when Ava suddenly stopped and put her nose in the air sniffing.

  “Man, I can smell all kinds of stuff,” she said.

  “Yeah, super smell is awesome,” said Matt.

  “How far are we from the house?” Ava asked.

  “Not too far. We are straight back behind it right now. Why do you ask?” I asked curiously.

  “Does it make sense that I can smell Dakota way out here?” Ava asked. I sniffed the air myself and the hair along my back stood straight up as I crouched down and let out a soft growl. I could definitely smell Dakota. The only problem was his scent was mixed with the smell of fresh blood. I took off with my vampire speed leaving the others standing where they were. Nothing could have prepared me for what I found a few seconds later.

  As soon as I located the source of Dakota’s scent I shifted back to human form. Dakota lay on the ground in front of me very close to the perimeter wall. I feared he was dead at first sight. Dakota was wrapped in a very thin silver chain. The chain was burned into his flesh everywhere that it made contact with his skin. On top of the chain burning his skin, he had at least a half dozen wooden arrows sticking out of different parts of his body. I bent down and placed my hand on his chest as I heard Ava, Matt, and Jenna coming through the woods behind me.

  I heard Jenna scream and Ava whine as I turned around to see that Matt and Jenna were also in their human form now. Ava’s transformation spell had not yet worn off. I looked back down at Dakota as his eyes fluttered open. He stared up at me as he tried to speak.

  “You have to take the chain off,” he whispered, barely able to
speak at all.

  “Matt, help me with this!” I said as I began to remove the chain. I worked very slowly trying to cause as little pain as possible as I took the chain off.

  “I can’t touch it!” Matt said as he jerked his smoking hand away from the chain.

  “Pull out these arrows,” I told him. I could hear Jenna and Ava crying directly behind me, and knew that Ava must also be back to her human form. As quickly as I could I removed the chain just as Matt pulled out the last arrow. We watched in amazement as the wounds covering Dakota’s body began to heal slowly.

  “I need to feed,” Dakota said a little stronger than before.

  “We need to get back to the mansion for that,” I said. “I’m too weak to make it back,” he replied.

  “I’m going to carry him. Matt you shift and get Grandpa to the kitchen as soon as possible. Jenna, walk with Ava back to the mansion.” I told them. I didn’t wait for a response before I scooped up Dakota, as if he were light as a feather, and took off toward the mansion.

  Within seconds I burst into the kitchen and lay Dakota on the floor near the refrigerator. The kitchen staff gasped with shock at my sudden appearance in their space. I grabbed two bags of blood from the refrigerator before they knew what was happening. I tore one open and handed it to Dakota before I popped the other one in the microwave. Dakota sucked down the first one and had sat up against the wall as one of the staff brought over the second one. Grandpa and Matt burst into the kitchen as he finished the second bag. A