Blood Ghost (The Hunting Tree Book 2)

by Ike Hamill

  “You left a note?”

  “It just said we went on a road trip to chase a lead on Barney, and I said I would text every hour after he texts me to let me know he got the note. Plus, I have maps. I think I found the farm that Davey was talking about. I can tell you how to get there.”

  “My god, why are you always sneaking around doing such nefarious things? How does your brain work that you always figure out the exact way to commit crimes? You must have been adopted.”

  “That’s rude,” Chelsea said. She slapped his arm. “That’s rude to suggest that adopted people are better at crime. What’s wrong with you that you’d say something like that.”

  For the first time that night, a smile played at the corners of Don’s mouth.

  # # # #

  They ended up switching twice. Don was back behind the wheel when they navigated the twisty road that led down into the town’s valley. Ferbes sat on the western side of the Green Mountains in Vermont. In a few hours, the sun would rise slowly on Ferbes, first lighting up the backs of the tree-covered hills to the east. Now, in the dark, Don followed his sister’s directions, but questioned her at every turn, especially when the road turned to dirt as it crested the steep pass.

  Don gripped the wheel tight and downshifted into second gear to give the brakes a rest.

  When the phone rang, he jerked the wheel and eased towards the side of the road. He could almost feel the brakes heating up as they ground the vehicle to a stop and the phone rang again.

  “Shit, that has to be Dad,” Don said.

  “Want me to get it?”

  “No—no way. It will be bad enough if he’s yelling at me directly.”

  Chelsea picked up the phone from the center console and handed it to her brother.

  “Hey, it says…” she began.

  “Unknown caller,” Don finished. “Hello?”

  “Who is this?” a low voice asked. The man coughed and over the phone it sounded like he spat.

  “You called me,” Don said.

  “Yup, that’s true enough. Are you the kid who came around a couple of days ago, looking for your dog?”

  “Yes, why, have you seen him?” Don asked. His face lit up as he turned to his sister.

  “Nope, sorry. Didn’t mean to get your hopes up,” the man said.

  “Oh,” Don said.

  “David asked me to call you.”

  “David?”

  “Yeah, the kid you went to see yesterday at baseball camp?”

  “He told us where he thought Barney is. He said Barney would be going to the witch in Ferbes. It took hours to drive here though. I don’t see how my dog could have gotten up here in just a few days.”

  “He’s a smart dog,” Chelsea said from the side. Don hushed her.

  “I don’t know about your dog, but I know a little something about that witch. That’s why David asked me to call you. She steals blood, and she’s been stealing your blood for weeks.”

  “I know. I mean, I guessed that,” Don said.

  “Good. That’s good. Seems like you’re on top of things then. What else can I tell you…” Morris said, trailing off. Don looked at his phone to be sure they were still connected and then shrugged at his sister. He was about to say something when Morris continued. “Oh, right, salt. You’re supposed to throw salt on her if you can. I think it traps her skin or something. There were some herbs, too. Hey, if you do get ahold of a skin, I’d take it off your hands for you.”

  “Salt?”

  “Yeah, that’s what my uncle said. She’s allergic to salt or something. If you get close to her, throw a bunch of salt. Otherwise I think she can take off her skin and run away or some such.”

  “So I put salt on her and then what?”

  “Pardon?”

  “The salt makes her not fly away, and then what do I do?” Don asked.

  “Oh. I don’t know. We never really got that far in our thinking. I suppose you just put her in a bag or something.”

  “A bag?”

  “Look, if you get her in a bag, bring her to me,” Morris said.

  Don shook his head. Chelsea raised her hands as if to ask what was going on. Don shrugged back.

  “Okay. Well, thanks?”

  “Take care of yourself, young man,” Morris said. “David seems to think you’re in danger. Course he also said I was going to die, so go figure.”

  “Thanks.” Don held the phone to his ear until he heard Morris end the call.

  “What was that about? Was that the guy from the trailer?”

  “Yes. He said to get salt.”

  “I heard,” Chelsea said. “Where are we going to find salt?”

  “We’ve got some,” Don said. “In that emergency kit Dad keeps in back. I think there’s a box of rock salt.”

  “Would that work? Is it the same thing?”

  “I don’t know. Look on your phone. Maybe there’s a twenty-four hour convenience store or something in town.”

  # # # #

  “Are you sure its okay?” Chelsea asked the clerk.

  “Doesn’t matter to me,” he said. He had his feet up on the counter and his head resting on a stand that held stacks of brownies, covered in plastic wrap. He didn’t look up from his paperback when he answered.

  Chelsea held two handfuls of salt packets that she’d found next to the napkin dispenser.

  “Are you sure you don’t sell salt?”

  “Nope, I’m not sure at all. But if you don’t see it, then we probably don’t. They put it in everything anyway. Corn and salt are taking over food, you know?”

  “Okay,” Chelsea said. She backed through the door, pushing it open with her elbow. When the little bell sounded, the guy waved.

  “You get it?” Don asked. He was sitting behind the wheel, looking at a map. The radio was on and his left leg was bouncing with nervous energy.

  “I got these,” she said. She unloaded dozens of salt packets onto the car seat. “Dad has some little plastic bags here somewhere. I’ll unload them. I asked the clerk about the farmer who lives behind that school.”

  “Oh yeah? What did he say?”

  “Nothing. He didn’t know him. He said the guy sells vegetables at a roadside stand, and he sells milk too. He didn’t know the guy’s name or anything,” Chelsea said.

  “Huh,” Don said. He still had his attention focused on the map.

  Chelsea moved the salt packets to the dash. She climbed into the seat and ripped each of them open to dump them into a sandwich bag.

  “So do you have a plan yet?” Chelsea asked.

  “Yup,” Don said. “Close your door, I’ll tell you while I drive.”

  Don started the SUV and signaled for a left turn at the exit of the convenience store. The store was on the outskirts of the small town, and it seemed to be the only thing awake. The sign above was only half lit, and the lights on the gas pumps were dim as well—perhaps a concession to the few neighbors. Down the hill from the store, Chelsea saw more closely packed buildings and a pretty little bridge over the river. This time of night, the moon cast the only light on the village. That all faded behind them as Don drove away from the center of town.

  “I figure that if we sneak around, we’ll never find her,” Don said. “But if she spots me, she might want to try to pull me in again. You know, hypnotize me and steal more of my blood.”

  “But that might kill you,” Chelsea said. “You’re still weak.”

  “I know, I know,” Don said. “That’s why I’ll bring salt. Like that guy said, when she gets close, I’ll throw salt on her and put her in a bag. Then, hopefully, I’ll find Barney. You’ll stay in the car and wait—that’s non-negotiable.”

  “This is the worst plan I’ve ever heard,” Chelsea said. “It’s not even a plan. It’s just half of an idea.”

  “Do you have a better idea?”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t. But if you’re not back in twenty minutes I’m going to call the cops.”

  “Give me thirty.�
�

  “Fine, but if I hear anything, I’m calling,” Chelsea said. She kept her eyes forward and slipped her hand down to the tray where her brother’s phone sat. When he looked left while making his next turn, she picked up the phone and slipped it under her leg.

  Don turned off the SUV’s lights as he approached a spot with a wide gravel turnaround next to the road. He pulled off and killed the engine. Chelsea handed him the bag of salt she’d liberated from the packets. Don split the pile into a second bag and put one in each pocket.

  “I’m going in over there,” Don said, pointing. “The farmhouse is back there and you saw where the school is. I’m serious now—don’t get out of the car.”

  “I know,” Chelsea said. “Don’t forget the rock salt from the back.”

  Don walked towards the rear of the SUV. As soon as he was out of sight, Chelsea unlocked his phone and linked it with her own, so she could track her brother on the map. Her finger shook as she typed his password. She’d only seen him do it once since he’d been home and she prayed that he hadn’t bothered to change it. The phone accepted the password and she completed the link. She practically threw the phone back down to the tray as Don walked back up to the driver’s door.

  “Okay,” he said. “I have this old duffel bag that Dad had the emergency supplies in. It’s small, but from what I remember, she’s pretty small. I’ve got the rock salt and the salt you emptied. What else?”

  “Don’t forget your phone. In case you break a leg or something,” Chelsea said.

  “Oh yeah,” he said. He picked up his phone from the tray and stuffed in his back pocket.

  “You’ll stay here?”

  “Yes.”

  “Swear?”

  “Yes.”

  “Pinky swear?” Don asked.

  “Yes,” she said, holding out her pinky.

  Don nodded and closed the door. She watched him look both ways before he crossed the moonlit road. The interior lights in the SUV faded out. Chelsea reached over and pulled the keys from the ignition. She slipped them into her pocket as she watched her brother climb the bank and slip into the woods.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  Chelsea

  AFTER A FEW SECONDS, she reached to the door panel and hit the switch to lock the doors. She waited several minutes in the dark SUV. As her eyes adjusted to the night, she saw more of the terrain around her. Ahead, the road snaked around a turn and disappeared into the dark woods. Behind, the woods thinned and scrubby pasture took over. Chelsea slipped over to the driver’s seat to get a better look. Across the field she could see the outline of the old windmill against the night sky. Next to the windmill, a white farmhouse rambled between barns and sheds. The whole compound seemed to be connected with little walkways, perhaps so the farmer could tend to the cows in the winter without having to shovel a path to the barn.

  She waited in the dark to see if Don was trying to trick her. Maybe he was waiting just behind the bushes to see if she would break her promise. But she hadn’t really pinky-sworn anyway. He hadn’t looped his own pinky around hers. That meant the swear didn’t really count.

  Chelsea pulled out her phone. She brought up the settings and turned down the display until it was as dark as it would go. She waited to see if her tracker app would find Don on the map. She used it to keep tabs on her parents all the time, but she’d only had a few seconds to set it up on her brother’s phone.

  She bit her bottom lip and took a deep breath.

  “Come on, come on,” she whispered.

  The display only showed positions for her mom and dad, back in New Hampshire. Next to her brother’s name, it only said, “Locating.”

  Chelsea sighed and looked out the window again. She saw nothing but dark Vermont landscape. She lunged across the center console and scooped up the few salt packets that she hadn’t emptied into baggies. She stuffed these in her pockets and unlocked her door. She paused.

  The SUV’s interior light surprised her when she opened the door. Chelsea slipped out into the night quickly and pressed the door shut behind her. She crossed the road. For just a second the crickets stopped chirping as Chelsea’s shoe scraped on the asphalt. They decided that she was no threat and restarted their summer song. Chelsea ducked into the woods.

  From here she could see down the sloping pasture to the dairy farm. Chelsea kept the farm in view as she picked her way between the trees. Even though the farmhouse was dark, it gave her comfort as she moved through the foreign woods. She walked alongside a tumbled stone wall and stopped every few steps to listen. After she lost sight of the road behind her, Chelsea pulled out her phone to check on her brother. It still said, “Locating.”

  “Damn,” Chelsea whispered. She felt a sting on her arm and pressed her palm to it. Her hand came away bloody from the smashed mosquito. Her arm already itched.

  She stood, debating what to do. Her plan had been simple, but it relied on being able to track her brother. Without a map tracking his position on her phone, how could she find him? Chelsea looked back in the direction of the SUV and considered retreating. Don was smart and capable. Surely he wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize himself. Chelsea actually turned around and took a step towards the road.

  Then she remembered how he’d looked in the hospital. Barely alive, and hooked up to a dozen machines to monitor him, Don had looked like a little kid. He looked like the baby pictures on her dad’s desk at work. He was helpless. That’s the state the witch had left him in last time, and now he had just barely recovered.

  Chelsea looked at her phone one more time before putting it in her pocket. It told her that it had no signal.

  She heard singing. It was a woman singing. Chelsea remembered that soothing song—it was the same song she’d heard by the side of the road before she’d seen her brother.

  “That’s her,” Chelsea whispered.

  She headed for the sound of singing. A ridge of rock blocked her path. It was only about six feet tall, but the smooth rock gave her nowhere to climb up. Chelsea picked up speed and jogged through the dark, getting farther and farther away from the road and the farmhouse. She couldn’t even see the white building through the woods anymore. She knew her brother would be headed for the same sound and she wanted to get there before the witch had a chance to do something terrible to him.

  A break in the ledge gave Chelsea a place where she could scramble up to the top of the ridge. She stopped and held her breath, listening. The singing was so faint, she could just barely hear it. It was coming from a dark stand of pine trees, straight ahead. Chelsea headed for it, ducking under the brittle branches.

  She stopped to listen. The singing stopped.

  Her eyes grew wider. The woods were so dark and quiet, she felt like she’d been dropped to the bottom of a cave. Somehow, as she stood there, a shift occurred and she no longer felt like she was the hunter, she felt like the hunted. She spun at every creak and crack from the woods. Chelsea pulled out her phone and held it up like a talisman to ward off evil, shining the display’s light into the dark. The effect was not comforting. The display only lit up a tiny circle around her, and somehow made the rest of the darkness look even more sinister.

  She took a few steps deeper into the woods, hoping she was still pointed in the right direction.

  # # # #

  When she heard the growl, her feet stopped on their own.

  She’d been walking in the woods for several minutes, following nothing but her memory of where she’d last heard the soothing singing. Every so often she checked her phone, where the map still said, “Locating.”

  Then the growl had made everything else seem unimportant.

  Chelsea jerked her arm towards the sound. Two eyes reflected jade-green light back to her. The eyes approached and the growling intensified.

  Chelsea took a small step backwards. A branch jabbed into her side. She needed more light—it seemed that the light from her phone might be the only thing stopping this animal from rushing her. Chelsea used her
free hand to reach into her pocket. Past the packets of salt, her fingers found the keys to the SUV with the little flashlight. She pulled it out and found the switch with her thumb.

  The growling broke into angry little barks as Chelsea turned on the light. Now she could see teeth, a black muzzle, and pointed ears.

  “Barney?” she asked. Her voice wavered with fear. “Is that you?”

  The growling was cut off as the dog worked its tongue. When the growling began again, it sounded unsure.

  “Barney,” she said. “It’s me, Barney. That is you, isn’t it?”

  The dog barked. It was close enough that Chelsea felt its hot breath on her outstretched hand. She took another step back. The growling started again.

  “Barney?” she asked. She heard the nervous fear in her own voice. She made her feet stop retreating—forced them to hold their ground. Chelsea took a deep breath and let it out slowly as the dog’s growling reached its peak. She bumped her elbow into another branch and the flashlight swept upwards, pointing deeper into the woods. She spotted something.

  Chelsea ignored the fevered growling and pointed her light at the thing she saw. It was Don. He was facing away from her.

  “Don?” Chelsea called. He didn’t move. In one hand, his fingers loosely held the duffel bag.

  Chelsea took a step forward. She didn’t dare look down at the dog. His growling broke into barks—savage, hungry barks, like he was biting at the air. His breath and spit landed on her arm as the dog jumped and snarled. Chelsea took another step, still refusing to look down at him.

  As she took another step, she had no doubt. Don was standing right there, just a few steps away. The tiny beam of the flashlight lit up just the back of his head and his shirt.

  “Don?” she asked.

  She tucked her phone in her back pocket and reached out as she took another step. Barney, the pitch of his barking now feverish, rammed his head into Chelsea’s thigh and she stumbled.

  “No, Barney. Bad dog,” she said.

  He whined in response.

  “Don, turn around,” Chelsea said. She finally reached him and put a hand on his shoulder. He offered no resistance as she pulled, turning him around.