Predator & Prey

by James D. Horton

  “What do you mean go home? You bring me here then just send me on my way? This can’t be right! Besides I know . . .” he stares at me and I drift off. What am I doing! Screaming at myself does no good, my mouth seems disconnected from my own thoughts. “Too much.” I finish lamely.

  “Do you?” he says softly as he steps closer and my heart skips a beat. There is a musky animal smell about him.

  As he moves in close, I hear the first sounding of a howl, met by another, then another. I jump at the din, terror washing through me again but my body can’t handle the adrenaline and with nowhere else to go I collapse into his arms. They close around me like the jaws of a vise, clasping me close. I look out over one of his arms as green and amber reflections appear between the trees around us.

  “What are those?” my voice trembles to match the tremors running through me.

  “Friends,” he says. He makes sounds, a lot like a dog would. Yips and yaws, growls. When he stops the eyes all disappear and I hear a soft padding through the woods as they leave. He looks down at me, setting me firmly away from him. “You will no longer be safe.”

  “What do you mean I won’t be safe?” my voice rises with anger and fear.

  “The others have seen my interest in you. Probably one of them sent that gang after you. It’s how they work, they want to draw me out.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  He blinks at me and says nothing.

  “Well?!” My voice is even higher now. “What kind of shit have you gotten me involved in?”

  Wolf shrugs and stares at me. His eyes reflect moonlight and shadows play across his sharp cheekbones. His tall frame is an outline in the dark and the musky smell of him stretches across the space between us. I am suddenly aware of the state of my clothing, with flesh exposed that I would normally cover. My skin tingles where he stares and goose bumps form on my arms from the cold.

  “I’m waiting,” I demand. I stand up straighter, defying him.

  Slowly his eyes blink and he seems to sigh. It’s the first breath I’ve noticed him take.

  “There are . . . monsters that work in darkness,” he says.

  “Vampires,” I state bluntly. “Yes, I know.”

  He stops talking and stares for several long moments. Again the slow eye blink, something changes in his look as he does so. At last he nods.

  “They were using you to draw me out.”

  Using me? Fear floods through me, What the hell have I gotten into!

  “Why me?” I say through my tightened throat.

  I see his nostrils flare in the shadows; hear the intake of his breath. His lips part and I swear he licked them. He leans in towards me slightly but then pulls himself back, his hands closing into fists.

  “They found out,” he says simply.

  My mind races as the pieces start to click into place. “You listen to the show…” I say, voice soft. “You’re the caller.” I had been regularly getting the same guy calling in to my show, always around three am. He always called and talked or asked questions. He asked me to share stories of my life with him, to talk about my family, to talk about growing up.

  Now in front of me, Wolf just stares and says nothing.

  “Well if they found this out then I’m sure as hell not safe back in town!” I yell at him.

  Still he remains silent and unmoving.

  “You can’t just come in and tell me all this then send me on my way with a good luck!”

  Reality crashes into me. The monsters in the night, the things that I have spent my whole life trying to steer clear of are all here; I’m in their sights now.

  “They will hunt me down and kill me,” my voice is weak as I stare at him and try to hold back tears. Even with all the shit that has happened in my life, all of the pain, all of the bad decisions I’ve made, I have still managed to avoid this one fate. By coming to their attention I become a pawn in their games. I am weak and there is no power on earth that I can run to. Except maybe this man in front of me.

  “All right,” he says at last.

  “All right! ALL RIGHT! That is all you have to say? All right! So I’m screwed? I’m dead because you decided to like my damn show! What in the hell is wrong with you?” Fury blinds me at the injustice, how unfair it all was. I quit trying to hold on to the tatters of my clothing and I attack him, empty handed, with only my human strength. I pound my fists on his chest and kick at his shins. I hit him with everything I have and I don’t let up.

  He stands without reacting. I hit him until the skin on my knuckles breaks and it makes no difference at all to him. Wolf grabs both of my hands in one of his and lifts. I’m off my feet dangling in his cold grip. He raises me up to meet his eyes and I know, in that instant, I’m going to die. No more dodging the bullet, no more waiting, the time is now. His amber eyes stare into mine and he starts to lean in. His lips part slightly and moonlight gleams off his fangs.

  I hope this doesn’t hurt, flashes through my mind . . . then his lips are pressing against mine, cold and yet filled with passion. The musk of him fills my nostrils. I resist the kiss, but then my body betrays me and I shudder.

  “Put me down!” I yell at him, pulling my head back.

  He stops and stares at me with hard eyes. He lowers me back to the ground and I pull my clothes tighter around me, trying to regain a modicum of decency. Images of the recent attack flash in my mind; the man leering over me, his face close to mine. Thoughts of childhood hide behind that face. Memories swell and threaten to drown me so I push them away and let anger fill the void.

  “How DARE you!” I yell at him. “You bring this fate down on me, you tell me to go home and deal, then you want to force yourself on me, too! You’re no better than that gang back there!” I can’t hold back the tears, they stream down my face. It makes me even angrier.

  He steps back from me, his head hanging lower. “Yeah.”

  “I CAN’T go home!” I yell again. “There is nowhere safe for me now! What am I supposed to do?” My legs go numb and won’t hold my weight; I drop to the dirt, raising my hands to cover my face so he can’t see me sob.

  “You’re not prey,” he says.

  I look up, he is crouched down a few feet from me.

  “How the hell would you know anything about me? How do you know what I am!”

  “You’re not prey,” he says again. “Come with me.” He rises and starts walking deeper into the woods.

  I watch him walk away from me. I turn back and look at the distant lights of the city, of the life I know. I think of my tiny apartment, the radio station, the ‘favors’ to keep my job, the bills, the rent, and the risks. No matter the new dangers, the old ones are bad, too.

  I push myself up off the ground and wipe my hands on my jeans. I give one last look back at the city before I turn and follow Wolf. What was there to go back to?

  I follow Wolf through the forest for what seems like hours to my exhausted, bruised body. The night sounds of the forest surround us; insects chirp, owls call, and things make small movements in the darkness. He walks without speaking, though I hear him sniffing at the air as we go. He moves through the forest with confidence, this is his home and it shows.

  After the moon has sunk far enough I can no longer see it above the trees, we come over the top of a hill to a dale. The ground is covered with last season’s leaves and Wolf moves easily down the side but I cannot keep my footing and slide, stumbling into his back. He catches me without even looking at me and sets me on my feet.

  “Where are we going?” I ask at last.

  “Home,” he says simply.

  I look around for signs of a house or cabin but see nothing. He keeps walking across the bottom of the dale, straight across to the cliff on the opposite side. Wolf reaches out and pulls aside a netting to reveal a cave. He steps aside and motions for me to go in. I feel my eyes widen at the sight of it but I obey.

  I feel numb and tired, as if moving through a dream. The cave is simple, natural, nothing
to make it stand out or feel like a home. The entrance is narrow, wide enough for one person to pass through. I make my way in deeper, feeling him behind me more than hearing him. I feel the hairs on my neck telling me a killer is behind me, alerting me to the danger I am in. It can’t get worse, can it?

  The cave opens up around me. There is a fire pit in the middle, blankets to one side and a pile of clothes at another. He walks past me to the pile and digs through it quickly, pulls out a few pieces and tosses them at me. I move to catch them, hooking one but drop the other. It’s a shirt and a pair of sweatpants so I check the sizes. The shirt will fit fine, but the sweatpants are a mile too long for my 5’2” frame. At least they’re clean. I look around for a place to change but find nothing in this one room cavern.

  Wolf walks over to the blankets and lays down, taking his hat off for a moment before resting it on his face. I walk over to the far side of the cave from my rescuer, turn my back and quickly change out of my torn clothes. When I’m finished, I turn back around and see that he is still lying there so I go to the pile of clothes and pick through it, finding a single blanket for myself and a few shirts to use as a pillow. Crossing to the opposite side of the cave I spread out the blanket, then lie down on it and wrap myself up.

  What am I doing? I’m fatigued to the point of collapse but my brain refuses to shut down. I have no answers to give myself. I look at my life and there is nothing worth returning to. Even without this new threat of danger to my life, what is there to go back to? A job I keep by being willing to let my fat boss get his rocks off? I have no friends, my brother is dead and my family abandoned me years ago. No one will miss me except maybe the people my voice reaches out to from my radio show and they don’t know me, they know my on air persona. Confident, sure of herself, filled with answers and no self-doubt. That’s not really me. I play that role to hide the scared girl I feel like most of the time.

  You’re not prey, he had said to me. I’m not prey. I had gotten this far letting other people make my choices for me. I never got to decide what I would do and what I wouldn’t. Other people made those choices based on what they could get out of me and I always gave it.

  I’m not prey. If not prey, then what am I? I roll over to my side and stare at the shadowed form across the cave from me. What am I is the question. If not prey, then what?

  Something bumps hard against my ribs and I startle awake, scrambling away in a tangle of blankets and clothes. My eyes are wide and frantic as I search around for the source of the attack; my breath comes in harsh bursts as adrenaline pushes through me. Memories of the previous night’s attack flood my mind.

  Wolf is sitting across the cave staring at me. No one is close to me, but I swear I was just touched. Bewildered, I fall onto my backside and let myself calm down and finish waking up. When I am settled enough to look around again, I see two sets of glowing eyes belonging to vague forms looking at me from across the cave. The shapes resolve and I realize that a pair of the biggest wolves I have ever seen is sitting next to Wolf.

  Did one of those things just nudge me? A shiver passes down my spine as their animal eyes stare at me. They are so similar to Wolf’s: unblinking, reflecting the light. One of them begins panting, showing teeth meant for ripping flesh from bone. The pit of my stomach sinks.

  “Morning?” I ask. Face the fear, face the fear, jeez- it’s too early for this!

  “Evening,” he says, his gravelly voice drifts across the cave. It makes my stomach clench in an entirely different way.

  Evening? I had slept the entire day away? I mentally assess myself. I’m stiff, sore, my knees are both badly bruised, my mouth hurts where I chipped my tooth and my head is throbbing. I’m really not used to the harsh way my body has been treated the last 24 hours.

  Strangely enough though, mentally I feel calm even if physically I’ve been run through the ringer. I have no idea why I feel so at ease. I’m sitting in a cave with a killer flanked by two gigantic wolves and I’m calm. I shake my head and start running my hands through my hair in an attempt to get some tangles out. My hands get stained red a little from the dye job I did in my bathroom sink a few days ago.

  “Well, what now?” I ask, not really expecting an answer while I work at my hair. He seems to like playing the part of the strong silent type.

  “We go to town,” he says. I feel like this should make me afraid, but I’m not. It’s like I can see the fear in a glass, I know I should be feeling it, but I don’t feel it. It’s not my fear, it’s just fear that is there. A low growl comes from the far side of the cave and I have no clue if it’s the wolves or the man. Wolf idly scratches the ear of one of the animals.

  “Town?” I say, expecting my voice to waver but it stays true. He nods. “Why? What are we going to do?”

  “Draw the line,” he says.

  I nod as if I understand what he means. Part of me thinks I do, but how can I really know what he is thinking? He is alien to me, a creature no more like me than a man from Mars. I’ve read all the legends on vampires and I have no idea what is true and what is not. I do know they have abilities and powers no human has. I do know they are violent and that they think nothing of death. I do know that they need blood to live. I’ve worked with their sycophants enough, those who give their blood freely. But who am I to judge, it’s a way to survive and I’ve done worse.

  “When?” I ask and I see him smile with actual amusement for the first time. His smile is every bit what you would call wolfish. It is broad, bares his teeth and shows his extended canines, long and so sharp looking. A small thrill runs through me, a tense excitement. I wonder what it would feel like for those teeth to drag across my skin.

  “Now,” he say rising as he does so. I let out a sharp breath and try to get over how that smile makes me feel.

  He walks to the back wall of the cave and opens a trunk I had not noticed the night before. Wolf pulls out a leather gun belt, turns and straps it on. Then he reaches back in the trunk and pulls out another one. He holds the belt, loaded with guns, out to me.

  “I don’t know how to shoot a gun.” I stay right where I am, unwilling to take the offered weapons.

  He pulls one of the guns out. “Point this end at the one you want to kill,” he says pointing to the end of the barrel. “Then pull on this bit,” he points at the trigger. He puts the gun back into its holster and holds it out again with no further explanation.

  I take slow steps forward until I’m close enough to take the belt. With fumbling fingers I get it around me and fastened. The weight is surprising as it settles onto my hips, it makes me feel off balance when I take a few testing steps. Wolf watches me and nods.

  “I thought bullets couldn’t hurt . . .” I trail off still not wanting to say out loud too many times what I know.

  He looks at me quietly. “These will put one down,” he says, pointing at the guns on my side. Wolf stares at me as if waiting for several moments before I realize what it is he wants. He’s testing me to see if I will pull the gun on him. He stands for a long moment, then he turns and gives his back to me.

  This must be trust for a vampire. He starts walking out of the cave, the two wolves fall in to either side of him.

  I follow them out and we hike for about an hour until we reach the edge of the forest. It had seemed like a lot longer last night. The two wolves stop but Wolf treads on. I follow a step behind him, slightly to his left. It is all I can do to keep pace with him now that we are beyond the trees. His long strides eat up the ground quickly and I’m taking two steps to every one of his. He moves in silence with ominous purpose.

  As we are walking through the city, I see things with fresh eyes. I don’t think I ever wanted to see it before but the rot is obvious. There is refuse piled in the gutters and trash in the alleys. The buildings have missing pieces of facade, broken windows and every car we pass has been stripped bare. Darkness lays over everything like a thin curtain, trying to hide how bad it really is. We pass bars with burnt out lights and the pe
ople coming in and out of them move out of his way without thinking. Instinctively they recognize and avoid the predator in their midst. They must be smarter than me.

  A gang of boys with painted faces walks down the sidewalk towards us, most of them carrying ball bats. My heart starts to beat faster as the distance between us closes. At 20 yards, sweat starts to form on my palms and I reach one hand to the cold steel on my hip though I have no idea if I can even use the thing. The distance closes to 15 yards and I hear a low grumble edging towards a growl from Wolf. The gang leader pauses in his step, his eyes look down as he refuses to meet gazes with my escort and then his whole group walks to the other side of the street without a word exchanged. I was unaware of the tension in my legs until now as I feel it drain away with the threat passed.

  We continue on our way and after a few minutes I notice something out of the corner of my eye. A dark shape is moving along the rooftops next to us, pacing our steps. My breath catches for a second as I see the form leap from one building to the next, an impossible distance and it makes no sound.

  “Ignore it,” Wolf says from in front of me.

  “What?” startled, my voice breaks slightly.

  “Ignore it. It won’t come down here.” He sounds annoyed at having to repeat himself.

  I nod as if that is what I expected, as if any of this is what I expected. In my mind I hear the jangle of spurs as he walks, even though he’s only wearing regular boots. I remember seeing old westerns on the television when I was very little and still had parents. I feel like I’m walking behind one of those men right now, brought to life and real. His duster floats out around him, his hair comes down just over the collar and drifts in the light breeze. The feral smell of him comes back towards me on that draft. I like it, it fits the animal in him and seems right, natural.

  It is not too much longer before we start to enter the nicer parts of the city, where the rich have money enough to make sure someone cleans for them. The dregs of society don’t come in this area. Police cars patrol by us. One slows and I think they will pull over and stop to question us, but they suddenly speed up and move on. I file this oddity along with the rest of my day.