Blood Ghost (The Hunting Tree Book 2)

by Ike Hamill

  “Do you think that’s fair?”

  “I guess.”

  “Will you do things differently next time?”

  “Depends,” David said. “If someone is going to get hurt, I think that’s more important than obeying a rule.”

  “But her rules are to protect you from getting hurt. Aren’t they?”

  “I suppose.”

  “So she’s just trying to help you stay safe, isn’t she?” John asked.

  “Yes.”

  “So in the name of helping someone else, aren’t you preventing her from helping you?” John asked. “Do you see the position that puts your mom in?”

  “Yes. I understand. If someone wouldn’t take my help, it would make me frustrated,” David said.

  John nodded. David crossed his legs and retied one of his shoes.

  “So you haven’t dreamed of Mare. Do you remember any of your recent dreams?”

  “Yeah,” David said. “I wrote one of them down.”

  David pulled a piece of paper from his pocket. John set his coffee on the table next to the recorder.

  “This one was from Tuesday. I was at my new school. It was really strange inside. There were wires that held the roof down inside and all these tall metal columns everywhere. I was in a hall waiting for the play.”

  “Recess?” John asked.

  “No, like a school play. Like Shakespeare or something. They didn’t really have a backstage area, so we were waiting in the hallway. They invited me to be an actor in their play. It was flattering. I hadn’t tried out or anything. They just liked the way I looked, or thought I could act, so they gave me a role.”

  “What was your role?”

  “I was the lead of the third act—the main guy. But I didn’t have any lines or anything until the third act. They gave me a copy of the script and I was standing there in the hallway in my costume.”

  “What was the costume?”

  “Just regular clothes. Clothes you’d see any high school kid wearing. Actually, I had most of it on, but I didn’t have the jacket yet and they hadn’t done my hair or makeup. I was mostly ready though. The first act was already going. I saw some people coming off as their scene ended and there were some famous people there. I knew they were famous at the time, but I couldn’t tell you who they were now, just that they were famous.”

  “And how did you feel?”

  “I felt great for awhile. I felt special because they picked me to be in their play. Then I realized that I hadn’t learned my lines yet. I had been putting it off because I know I’m not that great of an actor and I didn’t want everything to sound stale as I said it. I didn’t practice or anything. I was planning on just getting up and saying my lines naturally. Then I got really nervous and started sweating.”

  “Why do you think you got nervous?” John asked.

  “Because it wasn’t just about saying the lines. I didn’t know what I was supposed to say. I mean, I could say them naturally if I read them from the script, but if I didn’t know the words, then what? I couldn’t take the script out there with me.”

  John nodded.

  “Then I woke up.”

  “How did you feel when you woke up?”

  “I don’t know,” David said.

  “Were you relieved?”

  “Not really,” David said.

  John waited to see if David would try to draw any conclusions or delve into any other aspects of the dream. He didn’t. The boy just scratched the back of his head and looked up at the ceiling.

  “Is that the only one you wrote down?” John asked.

  “Yeah, but I remember another one. It was last night,” David said.

  John picked up his coffee and took a quick sip before setting it down again.

  “We were having dinner—my family. My dad was there, too. He died years and years ago. I remember what he looked like, but just images of him. Like photos. I don’t remember what he looked like when he moved around. So it was nice to see him moving around in my dream. We were at our old house, but it was now. I remember because he asked me about my new school next year. And he knew all about Susan’s swimming classes, which just started this summer.”

  David smiled and picked at the fringe of the blanket he was sitting on.

  “What did you eat?”

  “We had potatoes and salad and steak. I was drinking lemonade—the real sour stuff. Dad was only eating vegetables. He said he didn’t eat meat anymore. And Mom was drinking wine. She doesn’t drink wine anymore, so that was weird. Susan had wine, too. Dad didn’t have any.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  “Like I said, Dad knew about my school. He asked a lot about that. He also wanted to know about Mare. He said the cousins were right to burn her up, even though it was a waste. He said that the potential for evil was greater than the potential for good. Mom kept nodding every time he said that.”

  David squinted and looked like he was concentrating very hard. John leaned forward a little. He didn’t want David to lose his thought. When the boy spoke again, it was halting, like he was having trouble remembering exactly what happened.

  “Dad asked me why I was afraid about the Master. I told him that I didn’t see where the Master went when it left the dog. Dad said the dog was cunning. He kept saying that—cunning. He said that to be cunning was to know.”

  “What is the master?”

  David closed his eyes. John saw the boy’s eyes moving under his lids.

  “Mare served the Master,” David said. “Dad said that without Mare, the Master couldn’t exist any longer. The Master would evaporate. Mom held up her hand like she wanted to say something, but she had a mouthful of food. When she swallowed, she said, ‘The Master is within us, and everything that evaporates, rains back down.’”

  David opened his eyes and smiled.

  “What do you think about the Master?” John asked.

  David shrugged and said, “I was just glad to see Dad. It’s been a long time. I hope I dream about him again.”

  “I’m sure you will,” John said.

  Ike Hamill

  Topsham, Maine

  July, 2013

  Blood Ghost

  Thank you for reading Blood Ghost. I had a difficult time with the end of Hunting Tree. Davey’s little family was so damaged by the events of that book, I wanted to duck out early and leave them to heal. Unfortunately, that didn’t give many readers enough closure to the story. If you were left wanting to know more of what happened, I hope you found that in this book. David turned out okay, and even his sister Susan (who was not a favorite, I’ve heard) demonstrated a little humanity. I found it exciting to return a world where giant monsters once stalked the woods and where families show strength in the face of adversity. If you haven’t read Hunting Tree, I hope you didn’t find this book too confusing.

  If you’d like a free copy of my next book, please join the mailing list at http://www.ikehamill.com. People already on the list received free copies of Blood Ghost and Extinct before those books were available for purchase. Did you like Blood Ghost? If so, I’d be thrilled if you’d leave a review on Amazon, or even just shoot me a note — ikehamill@gmail.com. Even if you didn’t like it, let me know. I’m interested to know why. Happy reading!

  Sincerely,

  Ike

  More by Ike Hamill

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  Join Jack, Ben, and Stephen as they strap on their backpacks and go out looking for adventure. The woods behind Jack’s house contain endless trails to explore, and the boys have weeks to investigate them all. Their neighborhood finally seems at peace again, now that the man who snatched the kid from down the street has been caught. But there’s still danger in those woods, and the boys are
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  Lynne, Carol, and Marta are on a collision course with the same goal: they must stop Gregory. Join these three women as they battle supernatural forces and discover their own paranormal powers. They each have their own reasons for fighting Gregory, but the fate of the world rests in their hands.

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  For thousands of years a supernatural killer has slept in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. An amateur ghost hunter has just woken him up. Now that he stalks the night once more, he's traveling east. Although the monster's actions are pure evil, he may be the only thing that can save humanity from extinction.

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