Taken by Nightfall

by Sierra Storm

  But at first, everything remains silent.

  The first thing I notice about the inside of the cave is the smell. I don't remember it being so strong last night, but maybe that's because of the shock. But something in here definitely smells dead, or dirty. I guess they don’t have running water down here, or showers. It's also dark. I remember reading that wendigos act at night. I step inside, and the boulder slides shut behind me and latches with a click.

  Instantly the hall before me lights up. This whole place is nothing more than a facade. The torches on the wall are plugged into sockets, though the flames look real enough. The ground under me is polished stone, smooth and dark and blending in seamlessly with the pine-strewn ground outside. The walls as well are rugged, but intentionally so. I reach a hand out to touch the earthy smoothness. This place is beautiful. Not in any conventional architectural fashion, but it’s more beautiful the way the woods are beautiful, the oaks and redwoods and pines covering the red ground with their branches.

  “Well, lookee what the cat dragged in.” The speaker comes from the shadows, where I hadn’t noticed her earlier. It’s Natasha, the girl on the drums that I really hadn’t wished to speak to when I came here. She offers me a deranged smile, raises her hand in the air, and snaps.

  I don’t even have a choice to respond. These people—people, if that’s still even a word for them—slink out from nowhere around me. Some I recognize from the scene last night. Most I’ve never seen. They look inhuman, with a cold bloodlust instead of the offense and curiosity I’d expected. They’re in front of me, to my right and left, behind me, all eyes and teeth and overgrown fingernails, and all with the same horrid smell reeking from them.

  Tristan isn't with them. I don’t know if that realization relieves me or terrifies me. My impulsiveness is not working for me today, and something tells me that having a jackknife won’t make any difference. I turn and start to run, but freeze when I see them lining up to the entrance of this hellish labyrinth.

  Then I see the old man who’d been reading a book. He looks as scraggly as the others, but calm and level-headed. “I told you to leave us alone,” he says, weighing his words by the syllable.

  “You told her,” says Natasha. “She didn’t listen. I say she’s ours.”

  “It is a dilemma,” says the older woman.

  Natasha runs her tongue along the top of her teeth like she’s sizing me up as a meal. “I call dibs,” she says, cheerful as if we were playing a game at my youth group.

  “Leave her alone,” says a man’s voice near the back.

  Everyone backs away, leaving an aisle that runs from me to a handsome blond man who is leaning casually against the cave wall. He walks forward, meeting me with large gray eyes. I've seen him before. I’ve seen those eyes before. Is he—?

  The wolf. "I've heard of you," he says. His voice is laid-back and casual. "Tristan's young friend who came to the camp last night. I'm afraid I don't remember any of it. I was in wolf-form, so mostly I just remember fresh air and a bite of good meat. They say they told you to go away. Why did you ignore their advice?"

  Natasha feigns a bored yawn. "Vince, she made her decision. No one wants you to come here and moralize to us."

  Vince snaps his head around and glares at her before turning back to me. Natasha shudders visibly and steps back. "Let's go outside and get away from the savages, Violet," he says.

  Vince knows my name. I wordlessly follow him out of the cave to the clearing in the woods.

  "Thanks for saving me," I say as he rolls the boulder in place behind us.

  "You shouldn't have come back here," says Vince. "Wendigos won't hesitate to kill when they're hungry. Their creeds mean nothing when you offer yourself to them like that. Not that I hold it against them—it's what keeps them alive, a survival mechanism that everyone has. But you need to stay away from them if you don't want to be their next victim, okay?"

  "I didn't mean to wander into their nest like that," I say with a hint of a smile. "I just wanted to find Tristan."

  "I'm sorry about what happened to your friend," says Vince. "But everything you might have heard is true.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “Tristan Carter has has already been taken. One of the girls ate one of his hairs in a ritual. Boo-hoo. If you as me, Lucius doesn’t care one bit about what his group does if he doesn’t officially see it. Tristan’s as good as gone already, and you’d scram if you had any sense in you.”

  “I don’t understand,” I say.

  “Your friend out there,” says Vince. “He can try to play normal if he wants, but he's one of us now. It's nice that you want to save him, but you came too late. You need to focus on saving yourself instead. I won't always be around to protect you, and neither will he."

  I swallow. My head feels light like I’m going to be sick.

  "Tristan's personality has already begun to change. He can't afford to be human. Don't try to save him, Violet."

  I place a hand on his sleeve. "I know what I'm doing. I'm not done saving him."

  "Maybe you don't need to worry." Vince and I both turn. It's Tristan. His eyes are red with a paranormal force and cruel, and his skin is pale. "Maybe I don't need saving."

  The Forbidden Craving

  Natasha Rowell has only two missions in life. The first is to avoid human contact as much as possible. The second is no never become a monster like her parents. Everything seems simple enough as she joins her mother’s Exigency of old-school wendigos, but then she meets one human boy with the determination to overturn everything.

  Read the prequel for the Midnight Valley Saga free now: https://www.darkstarpress.org/free-book.html

  About The Author

  Sierra Storm is a New England based author with a flair for adventure and the dramatic. The Midnight Valley Saga was previously self-published as her first attempt at a YA paranormal series, and she hopes you have as much fun reading her stories as she has writing them.

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