by Tara Brown
Liz brushed past her mom, waving backwards. “Be home later.”
“It’s a school night. You better be home earlier.”
“Whatever!” Liz sighed and walked away. I followed, not sure if I should say something to her mom or not. “Night, Mrs. Whitburn.”
She waved and when we rounded the corner, Liz gave me a look. “What the heck is wrong with you? You look like you’re about to spazz! You look like crap.”
“I am about to spazz. But I can’t tell you. I have to show you. I swore I wouldn't say anything. Come on, this town is effed. We need to find Josh and go to something called Colliers Caves. It’s like a park.”
“Yeah, I know where it is. My mom took me there today after she explained some weird-ass shit about our weird-ass family.” Her eyes darted back at her house. “We need to walk.” She grabbed my arm, pulling me along the broken sidewalk.
I grabbed her hand, “Wait. What did your mom say?” I panicked. What if she was something creepy like Briton? What if it was true?
“My grandma was a witch, dude, a real one. That shop was hers and she was magical. This town is some bullshit place for weird things or something. She called it a name, started with a V.”
I squeezed my eyes shut. “Oh my God. It’s true, isn’t it? Your family must be the ones who are guarding the town with the spells.”
“Dude. How the shit do you know that?”
I opened my eyes. She was pale in the moonlight, more pale than before. “Briton. If you know about the spells, you must know about the monsters here in the lovely town of WOLFVILLE! That shit is making more sense. How did I not see Wolfville meant werewolves?”
She swallowed, but it didn't steady her voice when she spoke, “It’s all real. I saw it.”
“Show me.”
She nodded and pulled me down the road. “My mom said it was a secret.”
“Yeah well, Briton said the same thing. I guess we are both in on the secret.” My feet weren’t hurting, which was super odd. They had been when I had left the house. We ran the whole way to the edge of town.
She pointed at a field as we gathered our breath. “The—cave—is—over—there!” she gasped.
I put my hands on my hips, walking in a circle. “I haven’t run in like four months, since my soccer ended last June.” I felt lightheaded for a second but she looked sick.
“I don't run,” she wheezed.
“We can catch our breath in the field.” I grabbed her arm and pulled her, helping her across the hayfield. I had never crossed one before. The whispering of the long dried grass was eerie, but the way it tickled against me was like having something crawling on me. When we got to the other side, I froze. I heard a voice, I could swear I did. It whispered on the wind, like the forest called to me in an odd way. I could feel a pull from the darkness. I hadn’t ever been in the woods either, so to see them and feel that was completely creepy.
She pulled me into the trees and instantly there was a trail. It glowed almost. It was the damnedest thing.
We walked silently for a minute before I spoke, “So you’re a witch then if your grandma was?”
“I guess. I mean, I always sort of knew things were different for me, like things I could do that other people couldn't. Sometimes when I’m alone I catch a glimpse of someone there with me, hanging out, watching me. It scares me and then it’s gone, but my heart is pounding and my body freezes up. Scary as hell.”
My skin crawled. We were in the woods and she was talking about ghosts. I couldn't fight the urge to look around. It made her laugh. She nudged me. “You are an idiot. There aren’t any ghosts here. It’s just sometimes, and I don't even know if they’re ghosts. They could be something like my imagination.” She glanced at me, stopping dead in her tracks. “Dude. Your eyes are glowing, like hardcore.”
“What?” I raised a hand to my face, feeling my eyes. They didn't feel different when I closed and opened them.
She stepped back. “Dude, they’re like really glowing in the friggin’ dark. Like flashlights. It’s spooky. Stop it.”
“I don’t know how.” I panicked, “What did you do? You did some magic juju thingy and made them glow. Make it stop.”
She laughed harder. “I don't get any powers before I’m eighteen. I didn't do it. You are having some kind of reaction to the caves probably. They have some powerful spell on them.” She chuckled when she dragged me along. “Come on, crazy. This night gets any weirder and I’m going to commit myself into the nuthouse.”
I didn't feel crazy, but I was getting a little light-headed. Damned town, damned hot guy making me know shit I didn't believe in, damned witches making my eyes glow. “I need some eye drops.” My insides were clenching. I glanced up at the three-quarter moon shining down on us through the trees. I felt like I was seeing it in a whole new light.
When were deep in the forest, with only the sounds of our rapid heartbeats to keep us company, she pulled me into a dark cave. I tried to pull back but she seemed different suddenly. “Liz? Let’s just look. I don’t want to go in.” I swatted at her grip, but it was like a vice. She dragged me into the scary caves, even when I tripped on a rock I didn't see, she kept pulling. I heard her mutter something. The air grew cold and thick, like we were surrounded by fog. I pulled back but she dragged farther on, jerking me to stay with her. She stopped as suddenly as it had all started, looking around like she was lost as to how we got there.
Her eyes cleared and she looked normal. She looked at the cave and frowned. “Where are we?”
“Really? Really? You just dragged us into this friggin’ cave and now you don't know where we are? What the shit? It’s cold in here and creepy. It’s really dark.” I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and clicked the button, jumping back when I saw what was there. The screen went black and I scrambled to click it on and get the flashlight. She had hers out already and was pointing out the bad shit.
“Is that an altar?” I asked.
“Yeah. It’s just like the one in my grandma’s house.”
“Oh my God, is that a coffin? Oh my God, there’s like five more coffins in here. What the shit? Oh God. Why are we here? Why did I drag us here?”
She gave me a look. “You wanted to see it.”
“NOT INSIDE OF THE CREEPY CAVE!”
She shook her head. “What happened when I dragged us in here? What did I say? Are you sure it wasn't you and the spooky eyes?”
“It wasn't me,” I said as I looked around the large stone room. There were wooden coffins inside of the room, six of them. I backed away from them but stopped when I heard his voice. He was talking, but it was too far for me to make it out. “Briton is here. Hide,” I whispered.
She gave me another look in the bright cell phone lights. I pointed to the coffins. She shook her head and grabbed my hand. We hurried to the far corner of the cave and hid behind a wall. We switched our phones off and sat in the scariest silence I had ever known. My heart was racing, my hands were melting with sweat, and my entire body was trembling.
“What is Briton?” she leaned in and whispered into my ear.
“He thinks he’s a vampire. He has red eyes, so maybe. But my eyes glow blue and I’m still me. I think he’s insane.”
“Judith is a Michaels, right?”
I nodded against her face.
“They are all wolves—that’s what my mom said. They are wolves and then Briton’s family was vampires. They’re the people in the coffins.” She nodded against my face.
My stomach sank. What a shitstorm. I actually felt bad for Briton; his family was here, hidden in a scary cave, and he had thought they were dead. The image of his face confessing all that weird shit filled my mind. I liked him more than I should. He was right about the instant attraction thingy. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, I really liked him.
How had this happened? How had I ended up in this crazy town filled with crazy monsters with terrible secrets and falling for the king of the weirdos?
Why did G
od hate me? Me and Liz. We clung to each other harder when the voices came to the entrance of the cave we were in.
The man from the alley spoke. “This is it. We can’t cross the lines here. But look, six coffins.”
Briton muttered, “I have seven family members.”
“I would imagine at least one died, Nicolai. It’s impossible they’re here at all, let alone all of them.”
“How do we get them open?”
“We don’t. We leave them in their restful slumber where they can’t hurt anyone.”
Briton seethed, “You WILL help me get them out.”
A struggle occurred. The other man grunted. “NO. I WON’T. THE WITCHES WON’T EITHER! THEY DON’T COME HERE!”
Liz swallowed against me. I could feel her tense up.
The cave fell silent. Then Briton spoke with a smirk, I could hear it in his voice. “You don't hear that, Jamie?”
My head jerked around. Did he hear us there, moving around slightly?
It was silent for a moment and then he spoke softly. “Liv, what are you doing?”
I scowled. How did he know it was me? I held Liz, not moving or breathing.
“Holding your breath makes your heart beat faster. I would know your heartbeat anywhere. Come out.” He sounded weird, distant, like he was angry it was me.
I stepped out, leaving Liz there. Someone flashed their flashlight on me. I winced, putting my hand up. The light went to the ceiling, making the room bright enough to see.
Briton gave me a sad look. “What are you doing here?”
I shook my head. “I had to see if it was all true.”
The other man laughed, boldly. “You will see soon enough, child. You don't even have two weeks, I would imagine.”
I stepped back from them. “What do you mean?” My shaking started up again.
“The eyes, they are the first to change. They are the windows to your soul, after all.”
I dropped to my knees in the dirt, words spinning around in my head. “What does that mean? That's doesn’t answer anything.” My anger was bubbling just below the surface. “WHAT AM I BECOMING?”
The other man stopped smiling. “You will be like us, you are born like us. You will change around your eighteenth birthday.”
I gulped. “That's the second week of November.”
He nodded.
Liz walked to me, wrapping herself around me, but I barely felt her. I was lost inside of the words and my body and the glowing eyes. What was happening to me? Why was it happening?
Briton held a hand out to Liz and spoke in a calm voice I didn't recognize from him. “Come to me, Liz. Come and take my hand.”
She let me go, walking to him as if she were in the zombie trance again. I didn't care what they did. I was stuck, paralyzed by the things the man had said. My eyes were glowing and I was changing. I had heard them talking from two blocks away. I ran in heeled boots like it was nothing. I was craving meat lately too. I was going to become a vampire. I knew it. Oh God, my mother was probably looking down on me from the heavens, disappointed in the curse I was. I was a monster?
But how?
How did a girl with normal parents become a vampire?
Oh God. Oh God. I let my face fall into my hands. My parents weren’t my parents. It was the only way.
Oh God, I was a monster and an orphan. Oh God.
What could I do to stop it?
Liz screamed.
My head shot up.
Her hand was bleeding over the open caskets, blood dripping like she had a terrible cut.
The man with the flashlight was screaming and pounding on the wall of the cave. Apparently, he couldn’t get to us. He was screaming and motioning at me.
Everything fuzzed out. Briton’s eyes were glowing red and his fangs were dripping with blood. He looked at me, we froze for a moment. When I saw what he was, I screamed. It rang off of the walls of the cave. It made him wince, like I had hurt him. I screamed again. It forced Liz out of the trance she was in. She grabbed my hand, dragging me from the cave. We raced past the man with the flashlight, through the tunnels, tripping and screaming. When we broke out into the forest, we were both still running and screaming. Her hand gripped to mine, slipping in its grip from the blood that coated it.
We cleared the field fast, like track-star fast. She didn't wheeze and I didn't stop. When we got back into town, we hid amongst two buildings, leaning our butts and bent over gripping our knees. I was gasping for air and she had started the whole wheezing thing. Tears rolled down both our cheeks as incoherent words slipped from our trembling lips.
Nothing made sense. The whole world had fallen apart.
I shook my head after a minute, fully recovered from the run but scared I might never recover from the rest. “Why did you let him bite you?”
She started to cry harder. “I don't know. I don't know. He bit me. Now I’ll become like him. That’s how it happens in the movies.”
I wrapped my arms around her and prayed that she wasn't on the same track as I was, sort of. The selfish part of me was grateful to not be alone, but the mature part of me was heartbroken for her. She was shaking harder than I had been.
We were doomed.
Everyone from our class was partying somewhere and we were coated in blood and tears, hiding in an alleyway waiting for some sort of death to take us.
Chapter Thirteen
Briton
She screamed so loud, and her face looked frightened in a way that scared him. He wanted to soothe her but the beast was out. There was no calming it when he was in such a rage. Their eyes locked when she screamed again, breaking his hope of love forever. He looked past her, to where each of their gray faces started to take shape again, amongst the screaming of the girls and Jamie.
Suddenly, the girls were gone, and he was left with only Jamie screaming at him. He ignored him and looked down on his family. He had never been more excited in all his life, apart from the moment he saw Liv. Not that it would matter now. She was destined to be something he could never be with.
His kind always had red eyes, only wolves got to keep their natural color.
Hers were bright blue.
He pushed her face away from his mind and smiled down upon his reviving family members, apart from one. His brother Gunnar was not there. No doubt the witches had refused to save him. He had been the start of the trouble in the haven.
He had been the one who had shed innocent blood with no remorse, drawing the eyes of the hunters there. Unexplained deaths, tragic losses, strange behavior. And someone had betrayed the witches’ secret to the hunters. Someone had made it possible for them to come into town. Gunnar had no doubt taken the blame for that too, bargaining for his life and selling out the haven, in return for sanctuary. Briton didn't really know the story. It had been confusing and hushed up. He clenched his jaw at the thought of it.
It didn't matter now. His family was waking, thanks to the blood of the Whitburn witch. She might not have had power yet, but she could enter the caves and free his family with her blood.
“YOU FOOL! YOU WILL GET US ALL KILLED!”
Seeing the rage upon Jamie’s face Briton scoffed bitterly. “What did you think you brought me here for? Of course I would wake them!”
“I DIDN’T KNOW THE WITCH WAS HERE! I BROUGHT YOU TO LOOK! THEY ARE NOT USED TO THE NEW WORLD! THEY WILL EXPOSE US ALL!”
Briton shook his head. “No, they will learn to fit in like we all have. They will adapt. The old witch spared them because father is the oldest of us. She knew he held importance.”
Jamie’s face twitched slightly. “I asked Helena; your father held her children captive and forced the spell. He did it against her will when he heard the hunters were coming.”
“Then how did he save your family from the hunters if he was here?”
“It was all a ploy. When they felt the hunters coming, your family helped move all the wolves to inside of the guarded area where Helena’s sister Grace was keeping everyon
e safe with glamour. Only then did Helena cast her glamour, making it look like your family had fled for the farmhouse, leading the hunters there to the place outside of the guards. But only she went inside. Only the old witch burned to death in that fire. She sacrificed herself for her children and the town. Our debt has always been to the Whitburns, not you. You fool. Your parents fled for the caves with your brothers. It was a trap. She told them to get into the coffins and hide there, they were spelled to keep them hidden. But really it was the only magic the old witch had against them. She sealed them in there for the safety of everyone else.”