The Hunter’s Game: Blood for Blood: 01

by Fox, Logan

  Nausea wells inside me, and I bend over, hurling while I’m running.

  Can’t stop.

  It’ll get me.

  He’ll get me.

  In the dark.

  At night.

  Every night.

  I clear the trees. Drops of rain shatter against my face, too hard to be just water. Biting my cheeks.

  I run through puddles and reach out for the shape rearing up ahead.

  A cabin.

  Light flickering in its single window.

  Stout, but small, but so solid in a forest that’s whipped into a frenzy by a howling wind and stinging, driving rain.

  I slip. My teeth crack together as I land on my belly.

  Warm breath on my neck.

  A hand holds me down.

  A weight pins me.

  Nails scrape, scrape up my legs.

  “No!”

  There’s a perfect rectangle of white on the cabin door, and another arrow—

  No, not an arrow. A cross. Dry, slightly weathered.

  I crash into the door, and rip at the handle.

  It’s locked.

  It’s fucking locked.

  “Let me in!” I bang a palm on the rough wood.

  Obey me.

  Drink me.

  Open up, Love.

  I spin around, expecting to see a teeming fog of hands and claws reaching for me.

  But I ran too fast. The darkness is still leaking from the trees. It skips over the sodden ground, covering the puddles so not a trace of light shines on their surfaces.

  Unlock the door, Love.

  “Please,” I whisper, my words shaking as hard as my hands.

  I spin around again, slam my fists into the door. It rattles, but doesn’t open.

  “Please!”

  Wind whips around me, and the square of white turns into a thin bird. It flutters, heading for the heavens, but it’s been nailed to the wood.

  Tearing.

  It’s tearing—

  I snatch the piece of paper. Fold it open against the door so I can read it before the wind tugs it from my hands.

  The paper is damp. The ink, running.

  Tr…st me

  What might have been words dissolve into nothing but a black smear.

  I squeeze my eyes shut.

  “Please…”

  The rain had turned into a torrential downpour. Water splashes against my bare legs. Debris sticks to my skin, kicked up by those splashes.

  It’s charging me now, the dark.

  I’ve lost, it’s won.

  Pitter patter. Pitter patter. It has substance now. I hear it approach.

  I press my forehead to the wooden door, inhale its scent.

  I’m sobbing like a little girl, because I still am one. I never grew up. I never changed. I’ve always been this kid. I grew boobs and got my period and did tons of grown up stuff, but I’ve always just been a scared little girl.

  Frightened of the dark.

  Terrified of what waits beyond it.

  Fuck this shit.

  I spin around, teeth gritted in defiance.

  Rain creates a halo around the hunched figure making its way toward me.

  Walking slowly, carefully. There’s no rush, when your prey has run out of hiding places. Why run, when she can’t?

  You always knew where to find me. You knew I couldn’t run, and you knew I’d never say a word.

  Because this is my karma. This is my life.

  I wished she was dead, and then she was.

  I deserve everything coming to me.

  Even you, Dark.

  Even you.

  Rain clatters from the Dark. It reaches out a shapeless arm as if to touch me.

  My body goes rigid. I want to shut my eyes because I don’t want to see what’s coming. I want to die because that’s better than feeling.

  Water pours down my face, obscuring the Dark, making it impossible to see anything more than three feet away.

  I’m a coward, and a thief. I stole a life, and I must pay with my own.

  “Trust me.”

  I let out a shivering, spluttering gasp.

  “Trust me, Clover.”

  Another command, and I’m so good at obeying, aren’t?

  Unlock the door, Love.

  Get on the bed, Love.

  Keep quiet, Love.

  Open up, Love.

  A strangled sob escapes me. I try to press myself through the door as that hand comes closer and closer.

  It’s different now, that hand. The nails neatly manicured. The skin sun dark, not withered.

  “Wha…?”

  It reaches past me, and I see it’s holding a key.

  I tumble aside, barely catching myself against the door jamb.

  The door swings open. A hand clutches my arm, hard, tight. My legs are wooden under me, like they don’t belong.

  The Dark shoves me inside, and I trip over my useless, pathetic legs. I sprawl on a rough floor the same instant the Dark sweeps into the room and snatches every last molecule of light from the air.

  Midnight falls on me like a lead blanket.

  I go into a huddle because I don’t want to see what’s coming. I don’t want to feel anything anymore.

  Ever.

  The fury of the storm abates as soon as the door is closed.

  The key turns.

  The Dark descends on me again.

  Chapter Fifty

  Hunter

  She’s a shivering wretch. Her sobs fill the small cabin, the warmth of our bodies evaporating the rain water we brought inside and turning the air humid. A gust of wind had snuffed out the candle standing on the window sill—my last beacon to call her in from the dark.

  I shrug out of my black rain jacket and hang it up on the back of the door. I must get light back in this place, but first, I need to get her off the floor.

  She recoils when I touch her.

  “Quiet,” I murmur. Her body stiffens as she wails. She’s not fighting me, but it’s obvious she’s not encouraging my touch.

  If I could explain this to you, I would, Clover. But this is something you need to understand for yourself. Only you can walk this maze. I can be there for support—a light that beckons at the end of a dark, twisting road—but you must make the trip.

  You have to stumble. You have to fall. You have to get up.

  I can’t do it for you.

  I lead her to the bed. She makes a pitiful sound as she collapses onto the mattress and goes back into her little huddle. The storm rages outside, but I think she’s muttering something under her breath.

  Or is that the sound of her teeth chattering?

  She’s soaked through from the rain, her hair a wet rope down her back.

  I need to undress her.

  The thought lingers in my mind like the remnants of a dream on waking.

  What is wrong with me?

  “Light. Light. Light.”

  The night light.

  The way she kept searching the shadows…

  Darkness. Is that her phobia?

  It might not be a full-blown phobia—yet—but if left untreated…

  Perhaps two miracles will be accomplished here tonight. But not if I’m going to keep having impure thoughts.

  I’m a scientist. My only passion should be to deepen mankind’s knowledge, not to…not to undress her.

  At the same time, however, I realize she might be going into shock from the cold. I didn’t give her a big dose of Ayahuasca, but it treats everyone different. One dose could be sufficient—other people need three to four times the regular volume.

  It all depends on how hefty you built the barriers in your mind.

  “Light. Light. Light.” Her chant sounds like a desperate mantra.

  I climb on the bed, and fumble with the snuffed candle. Outside, light glanced from the slanting rain. It’s late afternoon, but you’d swear it’s twilight how dark it is. Especially in here where there’s only this small window to let in any a
mbience.

  The candle sputters to life.

  I’m kneeling beside her, my thigh but an inch from hers.

  I can feel cold pulsing from her skin.

  Is she going into hypothermia? It’s possible I underestimated her resistance to the elements.

  I grab her shoulder and turn her onto her back.

  Her eyes are squeezed shut, her mouth a trembling line. I don’t know what she’s seeing in her mind, but it can’t be pretty.

  I should sympathize with her. After all, I remember how this feels. But my mind is on my subject’s body. If her core temperature has dropped as drastically as I assume it has, then she won’t be able to warm herself even if I layer blankets over her. With zero body heat of her own, she’ll just fade out like a candle starved of oxygen.

  “Do you trust me, Clover?”

  Her eyes fly wide open. They are the color of a brewing storm, and they pull at me like a magnetic current.

  “Hunter.” She’s breathless, surprised.

  I grab one of her trembling hands, and place it on my breast. Can she feel my heart beating?

  “Do you trust me, Clover?”

  Her eyes search mine. Her mouth becomes a hard line.

  “No!” she spits out, wrenching her hand free. “You’re a fucking monster.”

  Did I mishear her?

  But then she’s scrambling off the bed, and I barely catch her in time to stop her reaching the door. I locked it, obviously, but she could hurt herself trying to get free.

  “Clover.”

  “Let me go!” she yells, and in this tiny cabin the sound reverberates. “Help!”

  Why are you being so cruel to her, Mother Ayahuasca? Why won’t you let her know I’m here to help?

  I’m struggling with her, trying to contain her wrath, when I hear the answer. I’m not on anything—my mind is clear, if a little distracted—but that doesn’t make the voice any less real.

  Any less correct.

  I’m not trying to help her, am I? I’m trying to prove my theory. This is nothing but a test for me. If she fails, I’ll find someone else. If she passes, I’ll mark it a success and set up another trial.

  But the Mother knows.

  Clover needs my help.

  I must be her guide in the most unselfish of ways.

  I release her, and she falls to the floor. I land on my ass a few feet away and watch as she gets her bearing. She swings around, face wild with terror, and then stops.

  We’re both breathing hard; panting like animals.

  “Let me help you,” I whisper.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Clover

  A brilliant surge of light destroys the dark, embracing me. I surface from black, muddy waters, choking for air. I’m on a bed, Hunter kneeling over me.

  I’m frozen to my very core.

  “Do you trust me, Clover?”

  “Hunter?”

  It’s a trick of the light. It must be. There’s only one person in this world as decrepit and cruel to drag me into this isolated cabin.

  I know what he wants to do to me. It’s the same thing he did all those nights he was supposed to be my protector. My caretaker.

  I had to call him Father.

  He insisted on it.

  It was the sick game he played with me. I’d lock the door, but he’d always have a key. And then he’d punish me for keeping him out.

  I tried to tell someone. But the words would never come. Mortification gagged me every time.

  And guilt.

  He would tell me every night why he came into my room. What I’d done to deserve his punishments.

  I killed my mother.

  Not physically. I didn’t smother her in my sleep or poison her water.

  I wished her dead, and she died.

  The mind is a powerful, powerful thing.

  Father would always remind me of the fact. On the nights he didn’t come to my room, I would stay awake waiting for him to arrive.

  I dropped out of school. Knowledge was something I wanted no part of.

  I suppose I already knew there was nothing that could explain Father’s punishments.

  All I knew back then was that I deserved them.

  He was simply showing me the light.

  Every night.

  In the dark.

  Part Four

  Trust Me

  “Baby, I’ll learn to touch you

  I wanna breathe into your well

  See, I gotta hunt you

  I gotta bring you to my hell

  Baby, I want to fuck you,

  I wanna feel you in my bones”

  Meg Myers - Desire

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Hunter

  I lift a hand to her. She watches me as intently as a trapped deer, eyes wide and wet with fear.

  “You can trust me, Clover.”

  Dangerous words.

  I’ve been treating addicts for many years. I know almost all of them have triggers.

  Trust is always a trigger.

  Asking someone for it.

  Gaining it.

  Breaking it.

  I’m asking much of her, but I’m hoping I have Mother Ayahuasca on my side. If any entity can guide Clover to the light, it’s her.

  She showed me the light.

  And I opened to her like a flower.

  Can’t Clover see I’m doing the same? Guiding her. Showing her the light?

  Without light, you can’t banish the darkness.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Clover

  Around us, the forest turns pitch black. The walls breathe along with me—but at least I’m not panting anymore. But I am cold, and my breath shivers out of me at every exhale.

  Too cold.

  My body is numb.

  Brain turning to sludge.

  Hunter is still holding out his hand.

  He’s washed his face. He looks like he did the night I first saw him on that stage.

  Charismatic.

  Intelligent.

  Kind.

  How could I have been so very, very wrong?

  Another shiver, this one worse than the last—it clicks my teeth together.

  His eyes search mine, and that study is so intrusive I want to look away. But, at the same time, I’m hypnotized. It’s like he’s calling to me on some unconscious level. Begging my psyche to let him in.

  Open up, Love.

  I kick away from him, a scream bursting from my mouth. He’s on top of me a second later, clamping a hand over my lips.

  “No.” He’s calm, collected, but annoyed. “You have to trust me.”

  I struggle furiously and manage to graze my nails over his cheek. He recoils, grimacing at me, and then rips at my clothes like a wild animal.

  I scream. Fight. Lose breath and whimper. My fingertips are so numb, I don’t know when I’m making contact with him or grasping at thin air.

  All around me, the room grows smaller, darker. The air, thicker. I gasp, unable to breathe the dark soup surrounding me.

  My hoodie is off.

  Those silk boxers next. I’m naked, shivering. Hunter’s body is too heavy to shift.

  I can’t—I won’t—resign myself to this fate.

  Not again.

  I’ve paid my fucking dues.

  If I killed her, then I’ve already been sent to death row more times than I can count. I’ve lived hundreds of lives as a sex slave, and that has to count for something.

  But he’s not. He’s just lying there.

  Catching his breath?

  Waiting?

  The walls close around me. Tighter.

  What happened to the candle? It’s snuffed out.

  Darkness shrouds me. Invades me.

  I’m crying.

  But still he doesn’t move.

  My naked back is pressed to the rough floor. A heavy breath escapes me, shivering my body—maybe it’s just the cold—and I relax fully.

  There’s no fighting this.

 
There never was.

  I’ve tried before. Failed before.

  Fighting makes time slow down. With resignation, an hour becomes minutes, easily forgotten the next time you shove a needle into your vein.

  So easy to stop fighting.

  So easy to forget.

  Except you never forget, do you?

  Never.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Hunter

  She’s still under me. The occasional shiver bursts through her, but on a tangent it’s slowing down.

  That is not a good sign. She’s out of her wet clothes, but she’s not warming up. If her body’s own survival mechanisms fail, there’s not much energy left to fight.

  Her body goes limp, and for a heart wrenching second, I think she’s comatose.

  I thumb back her closed eyes, and there’s no response from her pupils to the light.

  No. Clover.

  “Don’t you dare give up on me.” The words are out before I even realize I’m going to speak.

  She’s a dead weight in my arms. I drag her over to the bed and haul her onto the mattress.

  The edges of her lips have turned blue.

  How could I have been so wrong?

  Instinct takes over.

  Instinct or muscle memory?

  * * *

  Eight Years Ago

  Exhausted, wet, drained. At first I think the light that beckons me from between the trees is just another hallucination.

  I’ve spent months studying Ayahuasca. I read over a hundred frank journals detailing its effects on people across the world.

  Yet nothing could have prepared me for this.

  Nothing.

  My mind is a terrifying, alien place. A forest as familiar as my home has turned against me. I have enemies everywhere, and my only friend—the sun—left me behind hours ago.

  The stars might be out by now—I have no idea. The canopy above is too thick for me to see the sky.

  I step into a tiny clearing, its only feature a log cabin, newly erected.

  There’s a pagan symbol painted on the door, and a candle in the window.