The Nightwalkers Saga: Books 1 - 7

by Candace Wondrak

  “If the last principal and secretary didn’t get brutally murdered by a supernatural force, I wouldn’t be here,” Koath told me gently, calming somewhat. So far, this conversation sucked more than I thought it would. “Add onto that tragedy the fact I had to practically beg on my hands and knees to be positioned here.”

  I bit the bullet and drew him in for a hug. Hugs were usually dumb, stupid, worthless things, but on some occasions, they were vital, crucial, meaningful things. I felt his body relax, and soon he hugged me back.

  “All things considered,” I spoke into the hug, squeezing him with all my might, “I’m glad you’re here.”

  He chuckled softly, agreeing, “Me too.”

  Our hug ended, and I stared at him square in the eye. “And from now on, don’t listen to anything Gabriel says, because ninety-nine percent of the time, it’s not true.”

  Our walk in the cemetery was over. There were no more creepy headstones and no more eerie sightings of the wolf. The first part I was happy about, but I wished the second wasn’t true. That wolf, I needed to see it again.

  Koath and I were now walking on the sidewalk that was on my street. My house was still a good distance, but that didn’t matter to me. It was a rare occasion when I had Koath all to myself with no Max or Gabriel around.

  I watched a huge moth fly straight into a streetlamp and get zapped by the heat. Why were bugs always attracted to light? It sucked for them, because usually when they reached the light, be it a bug zapper or a television screen, they died. The zapper would do its job and the person watching the TV would quickly and gently kill it, being extra careful to not hurt their TV.

  “Let’s see it,” Koath smiled and glanced at me.

  “See what?” I asked, truthfully not knowing what he meant by that.

  “The necklace,” he offered, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I see the chain around your neck. Let’s see this infamous piece of jewelry that cost Michael over a thousand dollars.”

  “Oh,” I breathed, suddenly realizing what he was talking about. The necklace Gabriel bought me over three years ago using Michael’s stolen card. The one he recently gave me, on his own birthday to boot. I reached for the costly necklace and surfaced it, glinting it in the dim street light.

  I forgot that I put it on this morning. It was a habit; I did it so much that when I thought about it, I didn’t even remember doing it.

  The necklace the other Gabriel gave to me sat at the bottom of my underwear drawer. Wings instead of a cross and heart. Different, yet the thought behind it was the same. It was my way of focusing on the differences between that Gabriel and mine.

  There was no way my Gabriel was the Devil, anyway.

  “That…” Koath softly touched the silver and gold cross and heart. Diamonds covered the face, which was definitely why it was so expensive. “…is beautiful.”

  A warm smile erupted on my face. One that I could not stop from forming. “I know.”

  “Why do you hide it under your shirt?” Koath posed the question like he was a reporter, trying to find out every, single detail about something that, in the end, didn’t matter.

  “Um…” I slid the pricey diamond-studded necklace back into its rightful place. “Because I don’t feel like making up a story when people ask me where I got it from.” Truth be told, that was a fear of mine. I hated talking to people, especially high school teenagers. “How am I going to explain how I got such a nice necklace?”

  Koath considered my worries thoroughly as we continued to meander to my house. “Who’s to say you can’t tell the truth?”

  “Are you kidding?” I was incredulous.

  “Now, don’t get me wrong,” he said, holding two hands in the air, as if saying slow down, before continuing, “I’m not saying the whole truth. Just some of it.”

  “It’s a gift? That’s what you want me to say?”

  He nodded vigorously. “Yes.”

  “People are going to start thinking I have a rich, eighty-year old boyfriend.” I was serious as I was saying it, but soon after I broke into a fit of laughter. Koath joined in, reminding me of old times. Sure, I was in a lot more danger now than I was then, but the basics were all here: me and Koath. Koath and I. Us, together. An unbeatable team.

  As his laughter quieted, he said, “He cares for you, you know.”

  I flipped my head to him quickly, momentarily hitting a mental block. “Who? My eighty-year old boyfriend?”

  Koath chuckled. “No, Gabriel.”

  A soft sigh escaped me as I replied, “I know.”

  “I don’t know if you do,” he said quickly, “I thought I knew, but after our conversation today, I realized just how much he does care for you. He’s very protective of you, even from

  me—”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I cut in as we rounded my driveway. “Because you’re you. You’re Koath. Why would he—”

  “Gabriel doesn’t want you to get hurt. His intentions are pure, as they always are with you. I know,” Koath laughed to himself, “sometimes it may not seem that way, but it is. Gabriel’s growing into a good man.” He reached for the front door, stopping shortly.

  The door swung open, revealing an ecstatic Gabriel. He was practically jumping up and down when he said, “Kass, Michael made me pizza rolls. A whole bag. Technically, he made some for you too, but since you weren’t here, I ate them.” His broad shoulders shrugged. “I didn’t want to waste the deliciousness.”

  I took a single step into my house before turning back to Koath, saying, “Man? More like boy.”

  Koath laughed at Gabriel’s quizzical, one-eyebrow-up expression. “I’ll see you both tomorrow, bright and early.”

  We said our goodbyes to him. Gabriel hurried and shut the door, facing me with an accusatory look. “What were you two talking about?”

  Smirking, I walked into the kitchen and went for the graham crackers. I mischievously tossed one his way, watching him catch it with ease. As I put one in my mouth, I said, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Uh-huh,” he nodded with his words, “yes, I would, that’s kind of why I asked.” Gabriel acted like the bad cop, getting closer to me when I finished the first round of graham crackers and opened the next. His eyebrow lifted. “Was it about me?”

  “Speaking of you,” I expertly caught a giant crumb before it hit the ground, “what’s the matter with you? Why would you yell at Koath?”

  “So you were talking about me.”

  “Yeah, so what?”

  “What’d he tell you?”

  I smashed the empty box and threw it in the garbage, saying, “Everything.”

  Chapter Ten – Kass

  A field of green grass surrounded me, occasionally interrupted by a giant, protruding tree every now and then. This place…

  I breathed in the warm, fresh air.

  …was stunningly simple, and yet it was filled with more beauty than I’d ever seen. The sun was blindingly bright as it heated up the field, making everything that much greener. The temperature was balmy and the wind was gentle; it was a perfect day here, wherever here was.

  A loud scream pierced the stillness of the area, sending chills up my spine and raising the hair on my arms. Anticipation swept over me like a storm at sea. The scream wasn’t a normal one. It sounded like a gurgled, blood-curdled scream of last hope.

  I was slow to turn around, fearing the worst and hoping for the best. I was not expecting to see a woman tied to a cross, said woman being burned alive. I gasped and made my way closer, inching at a snail’s pace.

  This woman seemed so familiar. I knew I’d seen her before…but where? She was beautiful, with her pale complexion and noble face. Her mouth opened for either another scream or a groan, but nothing came out. Her Daywalker teeth became visible as her flesh began to sag.

  Prickly grass was being crushed behind me.

  I turned to face who, I guessed, was the culprit of this whole mess.

  There stood, less
than five feet away from me, in a tight and aristocratic ruffled shirt and leather pants, with long, black hair strung into a loose ponytail, Crixis. His green eyes were the only unchanged thing. They were bright, vivid, and unapologetically wicked.

  He shook his head, crossing his arms and saying, “My dear, I see life hasn’t treated you well since my departure.”

  “Please,” the woman was able to gasp, “help me…”

  A short, curt laugh erupted from his lungs. “Help you? Tell me, why would I help you when I’ve already done so much for you?”

  “Bastard…” Her red lips dribbled blood onto the fire, fueling it.

  Crixis cocked his head, looking directly into the fire. But at what specifically he was staring at, I had no clue. Flashing beside the flames, he used his inhuman speed to reach a hand inside the fire and pull out what he had his eyes fixed on.

  A diary.

  “Interesting,” he mumbled to himself. “I do say, I am intrigued by your…protégé. We will most definitely have to meet in the near future. Perhaps discuss some sort of agreement, because, honestly,” his handsome face looked up to the bones and muscle tissue that remained on the cross, “I was unaware that fire would do this much damage.”

  Crixis sighed and reached to the exposed facial tissue, caressing it gently. “Such a shame…once upon a time, you were a very beautiful woman. Now you are nothing except innards and bones.”

  The skin-free woman bared her teeth. Crixis laughed and began ambling away, clutching the diary as he seemed as uncaring as ever. Having a thought, he gazed back, saying, “The Vampire’s body is a miraculous thing. I wonder if you will still feel all the pain after he’s through with you.”

  I jerked back to reality, comprehending the fact that I stood in the shower and gripped a bar of soap so hard there were finger marks in it.

  Rubbing my forehead and trying to make sense of the vision I just had, I shut off the water and stepped out. In seconds a fluffy, white towel was around me and I was inches away from wiping the hot steam off the bathroom mirror when a déjà vu moment hit me.

  It was just like this. I got out of the shower, heard my name and slipped on the floor. I saw two bloodied feet and felt evil I had never knowingly experienced before. Later I found out that man was John.

  In that case I put together the puzzle, just not quick enough.

  After throwing some shorts and a tank top on, I wandered downstairs, looking for more food. I knew all those graham crackers weren’t going to be enough. Was this how it was going to go from now on, until my punishment was over? If so, it sucked. How was I supposed to survive on snack foods alone? I needed dinner like a fish needed water.

  Laziness overcame me, so I grabbed a water bottle and sat at the kitchen table. I took a swig as Michael sat across from me. His finger pushed up his glasses. “How was your day?” His tone was nice and sincere, a complete switch from this morning.

  Shrugging, I said, “It was okay. Yours?”

  Michael sighed. “Same. Listen, I want to apologize for snapping at you this morning.”

  “It’s fine.” Truthfully, I had forgotten all about it, until now. Today was a long day.

  “I had no reason to get angry with you,” he continued apologizing, “after all, they are your parents and you do have a right to know. It’s just…”

  “Just what?” I prodded, hoping he would give a little more information.

  “You’re not allowed to know.” Michael ran a skinny hand through his dark hair that, honestly, needed a trimming.

  I blinked, not understanding. “Not allowed to know?” I echoed. “Says who?”

  “The bloody Council says so,” he answered quickly, holding my gaze. He slid the newspaper to me. “I doubt you’ve read it, but…”

  “The white wolf,” I said too quickly, remembering Steven talking about it when he was stitching up my finger.

  “Oh,” Michael looked stunned somewhat, “then you have read it?”

  I thought about it. “Not exactly.”

  “Then how?”

  “I’ve seen it.”

  Michael stared at me, unblinking and completely incredulous. “What?”

  “I saw the white wolf that everyone’s been making such a big deal about,” I mumbled softly, breaking eye contact and fearing that he’d know I was over Claire’s house today getting stitched up by a shirtless Steven who told me all about the beast.

  Okay, not all about it. He merely informed me of its presence.

  “When?” he wanted to know. “How? Was it hostile or predatory in its movements? Why haven’t you bloody told anyone?”

  “Whoa,” I said as I held up two hands, “calm down. I just saw it when Koath walked me home. I was the only one who saw it and, from what I could see, it was a normal, slightly bigger than average, white wolf.”

  “It was a simple wolf, nothing more?”

  “Nothing more, nothing less.” I eyed him, watching as he abruptly stood and left the room, whispering about how this town was filled with too many sodding supernatural things. It made me chuckle.

  Then again, almost anything he said could make me chuckle. I blamed that English accent.

  I could not get my mind off the white wolf as I slowly made my way upstairs. Was it a wolf, or was it something more? No wolf I’d ever seen, be it at a zoo or on the Discovery channel, looked quite like that.

  Magnificent. Awe-inspiring. Mind-blowing and mind-boggling.

  I quickly decided that, if I wanted to actually get some sleep tonight, I’d stop thinking about the abnormal wolf. With that in mind, I was confident that sleep would come quicker than it normally did.

  But as I reached for my doorknob, a wave of trepidation consumed me, gradually becoming larger and larger until my hand touched the metal knob.

  It was my room, so I had nothing to worry about. My room was safe. Well, if you didn’t count the time John was there, terrorizing me like the twisted Demon he was. Oh, and the time when I woke from a nightmare and had two slit wrists. Besides all that, my room was perfectly safe…

  No matter how many times I repeated it in my mind…my room is perfectly safe, my room is perfectly safe, my room is perfectly safe…it wouldn’t harden and solidify into a fact. It was just a theory that I wished were true.

  That didn’t explain why I felt like throwing up. Or why my hand couldn’t grab hold of the slippery knob. Or why the door handle was slippery to begin with.

  The queasy feeling multiplied tenfold as I began to hear a faint tune in the background. It was the same song that played on my clock radio this morning.

  Slow, deep, old. Songs you didn’t hear on the radio anymore. Soulful.

  Why did this song seem familiar? Where had I heard it before? Not in this house, because none of us listened to seventy-year old music. With the slow beat, the bad sound quality, the jazzy effect—it was unique.

  A scream echoed in the hallway, emanating from my room.

  Terror took hold as I frantically tried grabbing the handle. I had some slight problems with it, since the moment I reached for it again it turned into a big, bloody bubble.

  Ew.

  My reflection was clearly visible on the red bubble’s surface. It was twisted and distorted, as if I stared at myself in one of those funhouse mirrors. One second my face would be thin, the next, fat. One moment it would look happy, the next, sad.

  This was definitely not normal.

  Having enough, I poked an angry finger through the bubble. That turned out to be a huge mistake. The bloody bubble didn’t pop immediately. Its size grew exponentially, until it was as big as me.

  My reflection simmered, glaring back at me with contempt. Her eyes softened. I stretched out a hand, feeling like I was in one of those movie moments where two people, on opposite sides of glass, put their hands up in the same spot and feel connected with each other.

  Only I didn’t feel connected when I gingerly placed my hand upon the bubble.

  The reflected me laughed as the
blood-filled bubble surged out, coating everything it touched in the red liquid. Feeling gallons of blood on me, I closed my eyes and wished that it would all go away.

  Teeth clenching and fists shaking, I opened my eyes to come face to face with a door. A blood-free door that did not belong to me. It didn’t lead to my room, and yet I knew I’d seen it before.

  Another scream rushed from the room. I ran toward it and frantically turned the knob. But it wouldn’t open. It was locked.

  Warm temperatures scuttled the floor; I could feel it with my bare feet. My eyes fell. Blood seeped from the room, flowing to the hallway and onto my feet. What was going on?

  This wasn’t making sense. None of this made any sense.

  Shaking my head, I took a few steps back. The bloody floor and strange door disappeared from my vision. I was now standing in a greatly lit room with an enormous window. I spun on my heel, realizing someone was behind me.

  My mother.

  A silent tear rolled down her cheek as her skin began to fade away into the sunrise’s light.

  Oh, yeah. Because this was how she died. She faded into light. A weird and unusual way to go, but it was better than getting murdered, right?

  She was nearly all vanished when she spoke, “Kass.”

  “Mom.” I ran to her and hysterically tried yanking her light particles down, so that somehow I could put her back together again.

  The only thing that was left was her face. “Remember.”

  “Remember what?” I begged, giving up and falling to my knees.

  “The truth” her lips muttered before departing once and for all.

  “No,” I screamed at the top of my lungs. Why did she always have to leave me like that?

  Sweat rolled from my forehead as I bolted upright in bed. I glanced around, making sure I was not in another freaky vision. Nope. Just my room. Thank God. I laid back down and struggled to get my breathing under control. I didn’t even remember crawling into bed.

  That dream gave me the frights and a case of the sweats. My bed must be drenched in it, I swiftly decided as I felt the wetness around me. A sharp pain surfaced on my forehead. I put a sweat-covered hand on it, trying to sooth the throbbing.