The Watchers (Book 1: The Watchers Series)

by Lynnie Purcell

I jumped the last three stairs and threw back the door. As I did, a gust of icy wind rushed into the house. The sun had finally fallen beyond the tall mountains, but even without the sun to let me know what the sky was doing, I could tell there was a storm brewing; it was the kind of storm that ripped through the world and left mayhem in its wake.

  Beatrice stood on the porch, her beautiful face illuminated from the light pouring out of the hallway. Her auburn hair moved with the wind. “Sorry for using your mother like that,” she apologized as soon as the door was open. “Cell phone calls are too easily traced and we are running out of time.”

  Ellen’s Beatrice face popped into my head, and I shivered. “It’s okay.” Another surge of wind billowed, and thunder boomed deafeningly around the mountains. “Is this natural or is…”

  “Margaret is creating cover for us, to distract the others and throw them off our trail, which is why we must hurry and help the girl. She will not last long in this weather.”

  “All right,” I said. “What’s the plan? How can I help?”

  Beatrice smiled, although I could tell it was to calm me rather than from any sense of pleasure. In her eyes, I could see her worry. “You will go with Margaret.” She gestured behind her, and I saw the others standing on the porch, blending effortlessly into the dark. “Jackson will take your friend. I gather she will refuse to be left behind?” I nodded in agreement. “Han and I will take your mother to Sam’s. I’ll join the search later. Where should we start looking for the girl?”

  “Have you got the bridges narrowed down?” I asked Alex as she reached the hallway, her steps slower than mine had been.

  She looked at her map, her thoughts grateful I wasn’t leaving her behind. “It has to be the Wright Bridge where Fulsom Creek merges with the river. It’s the closest bridge to Amanda’s house. If I remember correctly, it’s a really pretty spot. Dad and I go there to fish sometimes.”

  “Do you know how to get there?” I asked the group on the porch.

  Jackson stepped forward and held out his hand. Alex handed him the map. He glanced at it and said, “Point it out.” After a second of consideration, she pointed to a spot. “Okay, I’ve got it,” he said.

  “Once Han and I get your mother to safety, I’ll look for Daniel’s trail,” Beatrice said. “It might give us a clue as to what happened… Please be safe out there. If anything remotely strange happens, get out of there and contact us. I don’t want you to go missing as well.”

  Jackson put his hand on Beatrice’s shoulder. “We’ll be fine. Margaret’s meaner than all of us put together…and I can take care of myself.”

  Margaret almost smiled at him. Beatrice took a deep, calming breath. I knew it wouldn’t be enough to lessen her worry. Her worry was a mother’s fear for her child.

  Ellen bounded down the stairs fully dressed now and pushing her hair back into a ponytail. She looked at the group, slightly uncomfortable. She was used to running from Watchers, not trusting them. Walking down the steps, instead of running away took a lot of willpower. Trust in my judgment was the only thing that kept her calm.

  “You have to go with Han and Beatrice, Mom. They’re going to take you to Sam’s and make sure nothing happens to you,” I told her.

  Ellen bit her lip as she nodded. Han held the screen-door for her with a kind smile lighting his face. Looking into his eyes, her fear dropped a couple of degrees. “Be careful?” she said, turning back to me.

  I knew she wanted to tell me a million things, like not to go, or to let the others take all the risks. She knew me better than that. She knew I would do what was right. To ‘be careful’ was a reminder that I was still human.

  “I will.” I touched her face.

  “We should go,” Beatrice said.

  Ellen, Beatrice, and Han got in a red car and disappeared down the street. I squared my shoulders when they were gone, preparing for what lay ahead. Jackson noticed and grinned mockingly. He probably thought I looked silly trying to be tough; that my darkness was nothing compared to their kind of dark. I rolled my eyes at him.

  “Come on,” Jackson said. “We’re wasting time.” He headed to the curb where their black motorcycles were parked. I had been so consumed in my worry for Amanda I hadn’t heard them drive up.

  Margaret threw me a helmet off the back of her bike. I caught it and tried to act cool about our means of transportation, though I was scared out of my mind, particularly with Margaret driving. Jackson handed Alex his helmet and waited for her to climb on behind him. I was intimidated to do the same with Margaret. She looked at me and told me with her eyes to hurry.

  Margaret’s motorcycle roared to life as soon as I was on the back. I gripped her lightly, so she wouldn’t hit me, or hold true to her promise of breaking every bone in my body. My grip tightened as she swung us around the cul-de-sac and followed Jackson down the road. Alex yelped at the speed and put her head against Jackson’s back, so she wouldn’t have to look at the road. My reaction was quite different.

  As Margaret blew through stop signs, and otherwise ignored most traffic laws, I felt exhilaration. I liked the wild ride. I liked the freedom of the wind and the possible danger of falling off. I could understand Margaret’s attraction to the motorcycle. It was liberating. It was fun. I didn’t want the ride to end.

  What should have taken us twenty minutes was accomplished in a few short minutes as the trees flashed past us on the dark road. The dim moon was just starting to brighten the dark horizon, only to slowly become obscured by the clouds boiling rapidly across our valley. The slow march counted down the time we had left to utter disaster.

  At the proper road, Jackson made a sharp turn to the left, Margaret close behind. Dirt flew up, choking me as we raced down the winding road. A tall bridge dwarfed the dirt road, and I felt a sense of déjà-vu. This was the spot. Margaret pulled up next to Jackson, and they both cut their engines. The sound of the dark water and the chirping of crickets were the loudest things in the night against the rushing water. I got off the motorcycle and looked to the water’s edge for any sign of Amanda.

  Alex clambered off Jackson’s bike as well and immediately fell to the ground. Retching horribly, she heaved and threw up. Jackson waved me away, reaching down to touch Alex’s shoulder.

  “It’s probably motion sickness. I’ll take care of her. Go find that girl.”

  I ignored Jackson and started towards my friend, my sister. She caught my eye and waved me away. Her eyes told me she was fine, that we were wasting time. I hesitated, then decided Alex knew her body better than I did. She would tell me if it was serious. Hating that I was leaving her, I started searching in earnest for Amanda. Margaret went one way along the riverbank and I went the other.

  As I searched near the eerily silent water, I got a sinking sensation we were too late. I had failed. Not only I had let Amanda down, but we were wasting time looking for her when we could be rescuing Daniel. I walked the edge of the river, trying to temper the panicked thoughts, and called Amanda’s name over and over again.

  The others had faded from view when I heard Amanda’s voice in my head. This is it. He hasn’t even bothered to look for me. No one cares whether I live or die, so why not just die? I’m sorry, God. I’m sorry.

  “AMANDA!” I yelled. I didn’t know where the thought was coming from, but she was seconds from doing something desperate.

  There wasn’t an answer to my call, only a dim flash of white from the top of the bridge. Seconds after I saw the flicker of light, I heard a splash in the sluggish water.

  I was running toward the water before I could register what had happened. I dove into the river without thought, the icy water instantly chilling me to the bone. I swam as fast as I could toward the ripples of her wake, feeling I wasn’t moving at all against the current. I treaded water for a second over where she had landed, to get my bearings. I didn’t see a body rise to the surface of the dark water, nor was the water carrying her downstream. That meant she was still under the water. Sucking
in a ragged, emotionally charged breath, I dove down.

  I cut down through the water as quickly as I could, my eyes stinging from the cold. The water was murky and deep, deeper than I had thought. I couldn’t see more than two feet in front of me. If she had moved downstream, I would never find her in the murk.

  Luckily, she hadn’t. A dim shape appeared below me in the water, materializing in front of me in a mirage of surreal, absolute reality. I swam closer and saw Amanda floating like a rag doll in the brutal current. Her pale skin and dark hair drifted eerily around her face in time to the water rushing past. Her body was immune to the current – she hadn’t moved as far as I had feared. I sliced through the water and grabbed the arm that floated uselessly above her head, eager to get her back to air. I tugged as hard as I could but she only moved a millimeter – if that. Something was wrong. I tugged again and a large rock fell out of her pocket.

  Air bubbles surged out of my mouth as a string of expletives escaped me. She had filled her coat pockets with rocks. She had made sure she wouldn’t rise to surface and accidently survive.

  I dropped her arm and muscled my way down to the bottom. Every inch was a struggle against simply leaving her to the watery depths of this hellhole, so that I wouldn’t join her in death. I worked at her coat, struggling with the heavy wool fabric. Her pale face kept drawing my eyes. Was she already dead? Was I rescuing someone who didn’t want to be saved? Would it even matter if I managed to get the jacket off?

  It did matter. It mattered to me.

  A burst of energy flooded through me at the thought, giving me strength. With a final heave, I pulled off her jacket. She rose slightly in the current and started drifting downstream. I grabbed her around the waist and kicked my way back to the surface. My chest was tight, my lungs burning with the need for air. Dim moonlight danced on the surface of the water, teasing me with the distance I had to go. Would I make it? I kicked harder. Seconds passed. Then more seconds. Was I close? Would this be the way my adventures ended?

  We broke the surface just as sadness at dying started to take root in my stomach. I gasped for air and pulled Amanda’s head above the water. She didn’t react to the air. I looked around for land, knowing I had to work fast to get her breathing again. I couldn’t see the bridge anymore. Thick trees obscured the road I had been following. Every bone in my body hurting from the cold, I swam toward the shore. It only took me moments, but between Amanda’s dead weight, my cold fear, the river, and the dark clouds closing in overhead, it felt like an eternity.

  Heaving with the effort, I grabbed hold of the low, thick turf and muscled my way onto shore. I dragged Amanda onto the bank beside me, knowing I only had moments if I wanted to save her. I started pushing on her chest in time to what her normal breathing should be, and hoped that if fate did exist it was my destiny to save her.

  Water gushed out of her mouth in response to my touch. Her eyelids fluttered uselessly. After what seemed like a gallon of water poured out, she started to cough. Her body convulsed with each cough. She coughed up more water then fell silent. I bent down and listened for breathing. It was rough but even. She was alive.

  I looked around for something to cover her with. All I had on me were wet clothes, which wouldn’t do much beyond making her wetter. I cursed my lack of foresight. Not knowing what else to do, I pulled Amanda into my arms. I wasn’t much above hypothermia myself, but I had to do something to warm her. I listened hard for any thoughts, trying to make sure she hadn’t suffered brain damage. Her thoughts were sluggish and ill-formed, but logical. She was okay, as okay as a person could be after such an ordeal.

  We sat on that brush-covered bank for several minutes, listening to the sound of water sloshing past. Amanda’s mind tried to understand what had happened and why she wasn’t dead. Her thoughts boiled with overwhelming primal emotions and fears. My thoughts were focused on trying to locate the others. Had they abandoned us to search for Daniel?

  Amanda’s eyelids fluttered, her wet face contorting with pain and sadness. A thought overrode all her emotions and she found the words. “Daddy?” she whispered in a scratchy voice, her eyes still closed.

  “No, it’s Clare.”

  She started crying, and I knew she had hoped her father had loved her enough to come find her. It was the one thing she had been clinging to all day. He would know she had come here. This had been their place. He had brought her here as a child, had talked to her on that very bridge she had jumped off. But, her father had stopped caring. That thought hurt more deeply than the idea that suicide was an acceptable alternative to a life, which, from her viewpoint, looked pretty bleak. I held her tighter.

  As waves of empathy poured through my body for her, I wondered again where my reinforcements were. It didn’t make sense. They would never just leave us, even if they found Daniel. Not like this. So, why weren’t they here helping me? Or at least making sure I hadn’t died? Come to think of it…why hadn’t they helped me when I was in the river? They would have seen and heard Amanda fall better than I did. Unless…

  “My, my, I am disappointed. I thought you would be much harder to catch than this. They were making such a game of it, too. To think the old man’s plan actually worked!”

  I looked up at the new voice, fear pounding in my veins. The voice was familiar in a way that made my skin crawl.

  While I had never seen the woman’s face before, her black eyes, her deadly nature, and certainly her voice, were as familiar as my nightmares. It was ‘Lady’ Cassandra, the Seeker who had searched for me for two years. Her blonde hair rippled in the wind that was pushing the storm along. Her face, which was round and girlish, was lifted in bleak amusement. As I stared into her midnight eyes, the rain started.

  “No more water…” Amanda said half-delirious. Her eyes opened briefly, then she passed out again.

  “What do you want?” I asked more bravely than I felt.

  I refused to look away from those eyes that so eloquently spoke of death. The woman laughed, causing the hairs on my neck to rise in alarm. There was no helping that response. Her laugh signaled that horrible things were coming my way.

  “You, of course. That’s why I’ve been on this stupid mission so long and dealt with so many…lesser beings. You have something we want, well, that Marcus wants. I will get it for him.”

  “Where are Daniel and the others?” I shifted Amanda in my arms protectively. “I swear, if you’ve hurt them…”

  “Oh, that’s sweet! You’re threatening me!” She leaned forward. “You’ve got spunk. I like that. It’ll make breaking you all the more fun.”

  I stared at her and swallowed hard. What did she mean? A clap of thunder shook the earth and lightning flashed across the sky. Cassandra looked behind her, worried. She turned back to me and looked over the water. Her round face contorted with concentration, then she smirked and straightened. “Now, be a good little girl and come with me. If you don’t, I’ll make sure your friend dies.”

  “If I leave her here, she’ll die anyway!”

  “That’s a risk you’re just going to have to take.” Cassandra shrugged indifferently. “Death now or death later, what does it matter anyway? They’re all weak, useless things. Death is merciful for them.”

  I resisted the urge to get up and offer her my hand in the form of a fist to the nose. She was beyond evil. What kind of creature could kill, not because they needed food to survive, but because they simply wanted to, because they craved the destruction inherent in taking a life? I glared at her. Her threat was serious and I hated her for it. She wouldn’t think twice about killing Amanda, or Alex, or any of my new family.

  I sucked in a breath for courage, knowing what my choice was. I slipped my arm from around Amanda and laid her back down. Water poured down my face and splashed onto hers, but she didn’t react to it at all.

  Just let her live, I pleaded silently.

  Cassandra, her face triumphant, dragged me to my feet and marched me through the leaves. Beyond the foliag
e, an SUV waited on the same dirt road Margaret and Jackson had parked on, though I didn’t see them anywhere. Without any preamble, she threw me in the back. Rough metal dug into my skin as I landed in a cage commonly used to transport animals. Cassandra grinned as she locked the latch. “Stay,” she told me.

  She hurried to the driver’s side. The wheels spun a little from the mud as she punched the gas, but it was nothing to the all-terrain monster. The vehicle rocked over the thick underbrush and brutal rocks as she cut off-road. My head knocked into the steel repeatedly with every bump. I held on and tried to guess where I was going and what was waiting for me.

  I didn’t try to come up with an escape plan. I had no intention of escaping. It was clear what I had to do. I had to deal with this whole ordeal now and stop the chasing, stop the fear. As I traveled to the unknown, I went back to wondering if everyone else was okay and what had happened to them. Would I see them again? Would my sacrifice mean anything?

  After long minutes of nothing but fear for company, my captor slammed on her brakes, throwing me forward. I cursed and crawled to my knees again to look out. We had arrived at a small concrete structure surrounded by thick pine trees. The structure was almost completely covered by dead vines and dark mold, but it was impressive in the fear it instilled in me.

  Cassandra came around the SUV and unlocked my cage. Without giving me time to get out, she grabbed me in a harsh grip, her nails digging into my arm, and pushed me toward the only entrance, a rusted metal door. Stumbling over unseen roots and dead leaves, I walked to the door, resisting the urge to turn and say something sarcastic. I was pretty sure it would only get me killed…faster.

  I put my hand on the rusty handle and pulled, controlling my trembling with effort. It was raining harder now, the full brunt of Margaret’s fury unleashed to the world. I couldn’t see more than a foot in front of me, but the entrance to the structure was even darker, a black hole in the night. As I stepped past the metal door, I felt as if the earth was swallowing me.

  Cassandra pointed at a barely perceptible set of stairs that spiraled downward. “Be careful,” she said. “We wouldn’t want you to snap your pretty little neck.”

  She shut the door in my face with a hard slam. I listened for a moment and heard her pacing in front of the door. I sighed in relief. She wouldn’t have to guard the door if she had killed the others. But, if she stayed out there, who was I supposed to see? The brown-haired Seeker? That didn’t feel right. From the meeting I had overheard, Cassandra was in control. She had seniority. She had the power and, more importantly, she somehow had absolute control over the Nightstalkers. Had someone else been pulling the strings? Was it Marcus?

  I hugged my arms to my chest as I thought about it. Not only was it darker than night in this place, but it was colder. I couldn’t tell if it was a natural result of the structure being exposed to the elements, or if it had air conditioning, but it had the dramatic effect of being extremely unnerving. I imagined it was what a crypt felt like. I hoped I would never find out if I was right.

  Pushing aside my fear, I stepped towards the stairway. There was no turning back – Cassandra would just force me to do what she wanted. I didn’t turn back for another reason. Part of me, the part that knew Daniel, knew he was here. I could feel him. The same beating in my chest I had felt for Susan was intensified by a thousand. It was so intense I actually shook. He was here, and he was alive.

  At the bottom stair, I paused in surprise. Far from being a dim cave or a gloomy morgue, the room was elegant and classic. A chandelier hung from the ceiling, and rich, lavish carpets decorated every square inch of the floor. Large tapestries hung from walls, which stretched back a lot further than what the upstairs had led me to believe. And, standing in the middle of this opulent room, playing with an old fashioned, evil-looking, sword was someone I hadn’t been expecting.

  Chapter 19