Hunting Shadows

by Rain Oxford

  We all headed up to the porch and then Logan knocked on the front door. A minute later, a middle-aged woman opened the door. “Yes?” she asked. Her voice was wobbly, as if she had been crying, and her hygiene was utterly lacking.

  He showed her his badge. “Mrs. Oak, I’m Logan Wayne, and this is Aurora Ares. We need to ask some questions and we would like to do a search for evidence.”

  “FBI? Did you find out something that the cops don’t know?”

  “We are doing our best. This time, we’re looking for something in particular that may give us an idea as to where Kenneth is. It will not take long.”

  She nodded and moved out of the way. “Please, just find my son.”

  “Deimos, Phobos, you know what to do,” I said quietly. The boys both nodded and split up, looking for a scent they could track.

  “Are those drug-sniffing dogs?” Mrs. Oak asked.

  “No, they’re looking for anything that can help us. Where is his room?”

  She led me upstairs while Logan searched the bottom floor for anything suspicious. On the second floor, there were two rooms and a bathroom. The child’s room looked like any other boy’s room, or at least what I thought a boy’s room was supposed to look like. There were toys and clothes everywhere, but nothing that looked like witchcraft. It also smelled like old cheese and children.

  “I’m sorry about the clutter. He never cleaned his room.”

  “It’s okay. It’s better not to move anything until he’s been found.”

  “Officer Lewis said… since he ran away, I could.”

  “The cops find a letter and stop looking for evidence. We don’t.”

  I checked the window and didn’t find anything like scratches or salt. However, I did notice that the window had a child lock on it.

  “Has he tried to run away before?”

  “No.”

  “Were there any windows or doors open? Anything broken?”

  “No. We put a lock on the window because he liked to go out on the roof.”

  “So, he locked the door behind him?”

  “No, it’s got a deadbolt and he doesn’t have a key.”

  “Then how did he get out?”

  “I don’t know… but he did. I mean, he’s not hiding in here,” she said as I checked under the bed.

  How can you tell?

  “What is it you’re looking for?”

  “Signs of a struggle. Did Kenneth have a lot of friends over?” I asked, searching his racecar blankets. All I found was dried pizza crusts. It certainly smells like he’s been missing for a month. Maybe she should have done something about the mess after all.

  She shook her head. “He rarely brings anyone over or even talks about friends. Does Officer Lewis still think he just ran away?”

  “I take it you don’t? I saw the letter for myself. Was it not in his handwriting? Was he not adopted?” I searched the closet and found a strange scent. It was similar to anger, except it wasn’t human.

  “It wasn’t like that,” Mrs. Oak said. “Yes, Jim and I have been fighting, and yes, he overheard us discussing his situation… but we’re his biological parents. I couldn’t get pregnant, so we got a surrogate.”

  “Did you notice anything odd about him or his friends… or the house? Before or after his disappearance?”

  “No.”

  “Really? Nothing? No flickering lights or strange scratching?”

  “How is that related to anything?”

  “You’re saying there hasn’t been?”

  “It’s an old house. Yeah, there have been some creaks and flickers. That’s to be expected.”

  “Did Kenneth tell you someone was after him?”

  “He had… nightmares. Sometimes, he thought something was following him, but Officer Lewis looked over the surveillance at the school. There was nothing.”

  They didn’t mention that in the report. “Did he say he saw who was following him?”

  “Not who— what. He said it was some kind of animal. An animal that could walk through walls… which is crazy.” I didn’t say anything. A loud growl from the doorway made her shriek and jump.

  “Deimos, what have I told you about sneaking up on people?” I asked. He had only growled to tell Mrs. Oak to get out of his way; it wasn’t his aggressive sound, but he was large enough to scare most people, including shifters who came to my bar. He ignored me and sniffed the air until he found his way to the closet. This time, his growl was deeper.

  “I’ll get out of your way,” Mrs. Oak said nervously. She left quickly.

  Logan entered a moment later. “Anything downstairs?” I asked.

  “No. What has he found?” he asked.

  “Something in the closet. I can tell something was in there, but I’m not sure what.”

  He stepped into the closet and Deimos moved out of his way. That was a first. “You’re right; there was definitely something in here. Not human, but with a whole hell of a lot of power.”

  “Crap. You’re one of those psychics, aren’t you? I swear, if you say it was a poltergeist, I’m going home.”

  “No, I’m not a psychic, and this wasn’t anything as nice as a poltergeist. I know magic; it’s my job. Let’s go.”

  “I haven’t checked everything yet.”

  “Most of the evidence is gone. We need to move on to a more recent house.”

  We left after promising to inform Mrs. Oak if we found her son.

  “It looks like we’re dealing with a witch,” I said as we headed to the next house. “Maybe she coerced the kids to leave, maybe she kidnapped them. It doesn’t explain why she was hiding in the kid’s closet.”

  “I don’t think it was a witch hiding in the closet. You talked to the mother?”

  “The kid said something was after him. It could be a witch and her familiar. That would at least partially explain the creepy doll under Lilly’s bed.”

  “Forget the doll; it doesn’t fit.”

  “You are extremely stubborn. Has anyone ever told you that?”

  “Frequently. It doesn’t change the fact that I’m right.”

  “I may not know anything about investigations, but I do know that you have to fit the theory to the facts, not the other way around. The kid disappeared in a house with all the windows and doors closed and locked. What else could it be but magic?”

  “There are no tracks or energy around the house. That means that it’s not an entity that is haunting the house or family, nor is it a creature that had to track the child.”

  “What does that leave?”

  “I thought you were the paranormal expert.”

  “I know what vampires, shifters, fae, and wizards can and can’t do, and what their weaknesses and strengths generally are. I learned to get around in the paranormal world so that I could find my father and survive. Astrid spent her life fighting magic and monsters to save people. This isn’t my thing.”

  “If you could find your father, you should be able to---”

  “I never found my father,” I interrupted. “All I know is that he was highly involved with paranormals.”

  “What happened after he disappeared?”

  * * *

  I woke to something dripping on my face. It took a while for me to focus, and when I did, I wished I hadn’t. I was in a cage— like a dog. The room was dark with a concrete floor and no windows. The only light came from the doorway, as the door wasn’t completely closed and the other room was lit. Except for ten other cages, there was no furniture. Fortunately, not all of the cages were being used; the only other person was a boy in the cage next to me.

  Although he was sitting up, I couldn’t see much else about him. “Where are we?” I asked. My voice was strained because my throat had never been so dry before.

  “In Hell,” he answered. “Are you human?”

  “Of course I’m human. What else would I be, an alien? A dog?”

  “Then you’re going to be okay. Joshua and Janet Fox are bad, bad people. They find kid
s they think are paranormals and torture us. If they find out you are a paranormal, then the real experiments starts.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Living weapons. Impenetrable skin, psychic powers, and whatever else they think they can use. If they find out you have any magic, shifting, or vampire traits, they’ll start experimenting on you. I’ve seen it.”

  “Magic’s not real.”

  “I thought so, too, when I was first brought in. They’ve been testing me for months, but I’m completely human. What they did to my sister… just be glad you’re human.”

  Blood ran into my eyes at that point, so I used it as an excuse to turn away. Eventually, I fell asleep again, only to be awoken as someone opened the cage. I opened my eyes and screamed; it was a girl, sort of, and also a monster. She had the body and head of a girl, but her face was half wolf, like someone had taken a picture of the two and fused them together. Except it wasn’t a picture. The girl’s hands were also half-wolf and her arms were very, very hairy.

  She flinched and retreated a few steps, but I couldn’t stop screaming.

  The door burst open and Joshua entered with a large black stick. I knew it was for beating me with. I shut up, which was too little, too late. The wolf girl got out of the way quickly. Joshua grabbed me by the arm, pulled me out of the cage, and dragged me into the other room, where there was a metal table, a chair, and a bunch of sharp tools.

  The walls were concrete, the window had bars on it, and the two doors were made of metal. The concrete floor was also covered in wet and dry blood. Joshua sat me down in the chair and strapped me to it. “You’re not friends of my father’s,” I accused.

  He picked up a knife and laughed cruelly. “No, but I did meet you when you were two. I was only a teenager then, but your father is the reason I got into this business.”

  “What business?”

  “Hunting the disgusting paranormals.”

  “What are paranormals?”

  “Don’t play dumb. There are many of us, and we will hunt down every damn one of them. We know your father isn’t a paranormal, but he supports them, and that is just as bad.”

  “I don’t know anything about paranormals. My father was a scientist.”

  “Ascelin Ares was not just a scientist.” He cut my hand, causing me to scream. It wasn’t like I had ever been taught to resist interrogation. “Next time, I’m cutting off a finger.”

  “Why?! I didn’t do anything!”

  He aimed the dagger at my right eye. “It’s what your father did.”

  “Calm down, Josh,” Janet said, entering the room with an object that looked like a VCR. “She obviously doesn’t know what he did. We’re just going to have to figure it out ourselves.” She pulled off several cords that had sticky pads on the ends and stuck them to my temples.

  “Just let me go. Please. I don’t know anything about paranormals.”

  “If you are human, then you will pass our tests and we’ll let you go.” She pulled a deck of cards out of her pocket and held one up, facing away from me. “Your first test is to tell me what card this is.”

  “What?! How am I supposed to know that?!”

  “You have ten seconds.”

  “I can’t!”

  Joshua flipped a switch on the small box and intense, painful tingling struck me like a bus. My body stiffened and I lost all control, but I was still aware of what was going on. Although it only lasted for a moment, a horrible dull pain remained.

  Janet put the card down and picked up another one. “Ten seconds.”

  I tried to speak, but my mouth wouldn’t work.

  “Three seconds.”

  “Three of hearts,” I choked out.

  “Wrong.” Joshua hit the switch again.

  This went on for a long time, though I had no idea exactly how many cards she went through. After a few shocks, I couldn’t even guess anymore. The next thing I knew, I was being picked up. I was relieved until Joshua closed metal cuffs around my wrists. My heels were about an inch off the floor, meaning my feet were dangling and my wrists were instantly burning. The worst part, however, was that my feet were getting soaked in a small pool of blood. At that point, I realized that the section of floor under me had holes in it.

  “You have ten minutes to escape from your cuffs before the spikes emerge.”

  “Please don’t do this.”

  “You should spend less time crying, more time trying to escape.” He and Janet left the room. I spent about half my time just hanging there, hopeless, before the pain in my wrists became truly unbearable. The metal had already cut into my skin, and the more I struggled, the more I bled. Fortunately, that worked to my advantage; the blood made everything slick. Since the restraints were not made for wrists as small as mine, it was enough. I was able to wiggle free, only to collapse in the puddle of blood beneath me.

  My body was still weak from the electrocution. I crawled to the window, but I couldn’t reach the bars before the door opened. Joshua picked me up by my wrists, causing me to shriek with pain. “She didn’t break them,” Janet said. “We’ll have to get smaller restraints.”

  Joshua started wiping my wrists with a wet cloth. “It doesn’t look like she has silver burns, but it’s hard to tell. Get the blood.”

  “Please stop.”

  They ignored me, and the next thing I knew, Janet was shoving a jar of blood under my nose. I flinched back with repulsion. “Drink it,” Janet said.

  “No!” She used my protest to her advantage and poured it into my mouth. I spit it out, gagging violently at the metallic taste and cold, thick texture. “Please stop.”

  Instead of answering, she dumped the rest of the blood on my head. Then she reattached the wires to my temples and set the jar on the table. “You have five minutes to move this with your mind.”

  “You’re insane!”

  This torture happened every day for a month. Some days, they threw in strangulation, burning, and exposure to extreme weather. They asked the same questions about my dad over and over every day, as if I was lying about not knowing anything. They kept talking about my dad as if he was dead. When they weren’t questioning me, they were testing my endurance and speed by making me run for hours, and testing my reactions and pain resistance by cutting me and making me hurt myself. They didn’t even bother explaining the rest of the tests, like sticking me in a dark tube and dripping water in my face for many hours until the tube was full and I was seconds from drowning. With as much blood as they took from me, I was usually unable to stand, but they also checked my rate of healing.

  They did the same to the boy, who I learned was named Kade. His sister brought us food every day, although it wasn’t enough. I felt really bad about screaming the first time, as she seemed like a really nice girl. Of course, she couldn’t talk, so I didn’t know that for sure.

  One day, Joshua and Janet didn’t fully close the door before testing Kade. I sat there for hours, wishing he would stop screaming. Finally, he did. “I think it’s time to give up on him,” Janet said. “This one is not a paranormal.”

  “You’re right,” Joshua agreed. A few minutes later, I heard a gun go off. I never saw Kade again.

  Two days later, Kade’s sister woke me. It was darker than usual, although I later discovered it was because my vision was damaged. Before I could even ask what was going on, she was leading me towards the testing room. I tried to fight her, but she was too strong. She didn’t strap me to a chair or table, though. Instead, she grabbed the bars over the window and pulled, easily snapping them. Then she pushed open the window, picked me up, and helped me through. By this point, I had figured out she was helping me to escape. Once I was outside, I turned to help her. She shut the window.

  From the outside, the hellhole looked like a rundown storage building in the middle of an abandoned junkyard, surrounded by a forest. I hid between two junk cars until I was sure no one was watching, and then I took off into the woods. I ran as fast as I could all day, e
ventually reaching the road about sunset. By then, I was a complete mess. Fortunately, a woman picked me up and took me to the nearest town. From there, I hitchhiked home, which wasn’t my brightest move.

  Since I had missed so much school, my house had been searched by the police and everything was confiscated. It was a couple of days before I was discovered and put in a group home. I fought them, saying my dad didn’t leave and that he needed help. Everyone thought my dad had abandoned me and that I was just in denial. The only thing I was able to get back that belonged to my father was a silver ring with a pentagram and some Enochian letters. I didn’t know what the ring was for, except that it had something to do with magic.

  After a week, I was given to a foster family and returned to school. I didn’t blame the middle-aged couple for my problems, but they made it pretty clear I was a paycheck to them, as were their two other foster kids. A few days into it, the couple’s house burned down in a fire and they blamed me. My second foster family was nice enough until their house was broken into and, once again, I was blamed.

  My third foster family, a couple named Andy and Grace, had lost their daughter to cancer and they were the only ones to believe me when I told them my father didn’t just abandon me. They hired a private investigator to find him. I thought things were looking up. Then they were both mugged, Andy was shot, and I realized what was really going on; Joshua and Janet Fox were still after me.

  * * *

  We reached Andrea’s house. Although made with brick, the single-story house was a bit neglected. The yard was full of clutter, including old furniture, kid toys, and a bathroom sink. I knocked on the door, waited, and knocked again. The woman who answered the door a few minutes later was in her early forties. She had black hair with strands of gray and dark circles under her brown eyes.

  “Are you the mother of Andrea Sherwood?” Logan asked, holding up his badge for her to see.

  “Yes.” She was clearly not doing very well. I couldn’t even smell anything past her despair.