“You ready?”
“Yeah. Where did you go?”
Lisa held up a notebook. “Research.”
“Right. Come on. Oh no ... they’re moving.”
“Crap. Where are they going?”
Charlie started walking forward, nearly tripping over a stray chair as he watched things happening in a separate wing of the Key altogether.
“Looks like she’s showing him one of the guest bedrooms. I guess we need to get used to the council being in our stomping grounds.”
“Stomping grounds?”
Charlie felt his ears warm up. “It’s a phrase my dad uses in his books. I think we’re safe for now. Might make it a little difficult to get into Loch’s room, though.”
They ran down the hallway, feet muffled over the thick rugs between the Library and Main Body. Charlie had been so focused on what was happening upstairs that he hadn’t noticed anyone coming through the front door until he heard the creaking.
This time it was Lisa who pushed him to the side. They hid behind a painting with a ridiculously large frame. It still wasn’t enough to completely hide them. And then Lisa dropped her notebook.
Their hearts stopped, and they both plastered themselves harder against the wall. Priest walked into view, stopping to look to his left. Busted.
The Irishman frowned, asking them with his eyes why they were trying to hide behind a picture frame. Charlie shook his head, putting a finger to his lips to try and convey their situation. Priest nodded, putting a hand on his broadsword. Charlie shook his head again, this time more vigorously, and then Priest really looked confused.
“Priest, I was hoping you would be here soon. I’d like to go home for the night.” They all jumped, including Priest. He squinted at Charlie and Lisa, then at Elizabeth who, by the way he tilted his head upward, was walking down the stairs. “How did it go?” they heard her ask.
“What do we do?” asked Lisa.
Charlie squeezed his fists in concentration. “Sh.”
“Is there something wrong?” asked Elizabeth.
“Horribly,” Priest answered. “It went horribly. Nobody in Hunter’s Grove has a hint of where Chen might be, and although the boys are good at traversing the woods as they do, what we are looking for is something supernatural. I believe this is beyond even Fish and Dink’s broad skill set. We need to try other methods. Let me take Charlie around the same places. My fear is that we’ve waited too long, but he might be able to pick up some other trace with his Sight.”
“Charlie has other things worry about. With Wotan arriving today, and the others arriving tomorrow, I don’t want Charlie or any of the others to get mixed up in something that they can’t handle quickly.”
“Elizabeth, I understand, but this is a matter of Chen’s life we—”
“Furthermore, I believe the boy is not as trustworthy as you think right now,” she said, a hint of anger creeping into her voice. “Nor is Lisa. Nor Liev, for that matter.”
Priest’s face showed his bewilderment. “What do you mean?”
“I think they were the ones who released Dräng. Their hearts may have been in the right place, but the fact is, if I am right, they have let feelings get in the way of responsibilities. You cannot trust a boy like that to find Chen right now. I can see it in Charlie’s eyes. With everything going on right now, his mind is hectic, unstable.”
Charlie was slightly offended. He wondered how much of what she had just said was influenced by the curse clouding her judgement and how much of it was her own feelings. Deep down, he knew that, either way, she was right—he was beyond stressed.
Mrs. Witherington finally walked into view, throwing her jacket around her shoulders. She paused, sensing something was wrong. Charlie grimaced, trying to time it right.
She glanced their way. And kept looking.
Lisa thought they were discovered. She started to move, but Charlie shook his head. A trickle of sweat ran down his neck as he focused on a mental image of the hallway being empty, sending that image to Mrs. Witherington and merging it with what she actually saw.
“Are you feeling all right, Elizabeth? You look ill.” And she did. The circles under her eyes were a mix of mottled green, black, and purple now. She was thinner than usual, and gaunt.
She shook her head, rubbing her temples. “I’m fine. Headache. Probably from the stress. Just keep looking for Chen. I have some of the authorities working on it as well, from a human standpoint, but every bit helps. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Aye.”
Elizabeth stole one more glance down the hallway before walking out the door. Charlie let go of the breath he’d been holding, collapsing his back against the wall. Lisa patted him on the shoulder.
Priest nodded at them knowingly and started up the stairs.
They listened to a car door close outside, the engine rumble, and tires grinding cement and dirt. The sound of Mrs. Witherington’s car faded into the trees, and they were on the move again. Priest raised his eyebrows at them before he crested the stairs and went to his room, and they began their own ascent.
They could hear Wotan Gregory in his room, talking on the phone. It sounded like an unpleasant conversation, and Charlie was tempted to listen in, get a step up on a man who could have a hand in deciding his fate, and the fate of his friends and fellow hunters, but decided against it. They had already pushed their luck with Darcy’s mom.
Charlie and Lisa slipped into Loch’s room and closed the door without so much as a creak—thank goodness the Key had been cleaned up and renovated since that first time they had tried sneaking in. All the doors had been dusted and oiled. Before that, every hinge in the mansion betrayed people’s locations.
Lisa flipped the light on and, for a moment, their breath caught in their throats like a cotton ball on fire. Priest stood in the shadows, surprising them. “Would you care to share a bit more about what is going on?”
They spent the next half hour catching him up to speed. Charlie let him know that—yes—he had opened the cell door for Dräng and they helped him escape, and that something was indeed very wrong with Elizabeth Witherington, and that Donnie was becoming a much bigger problem than they could deal with on their own. Most importantly, that they needed Loch.
“I suspected that something worse than sleep deprivation plagued Elizabeth, and I did have my doubts about Dräng’s guilt. You should have told me sooner.”
Charlie glanced at Lisa, and they both shrugged sheepishly.
“Maybe we’ve been too careful,” Charlie admitted.
“Care is one thing, lad. Paranoia is another thing altogether. Don’t forget to trust those of us not touched by the dark.”
Lisa nudged Charlie, who said nothing.
Exhaling a deep breath, Priest gestured to Loch. “How exactly do you plan on waking him?”
“We’re working on it. We’ve tried simple healing spells, a spell for getting rid of ill-intent, and even one for minor curses. It’s been hard to narrow down what this is exactly.” Charlie watched the black swirl above Loch’s body.
“There’s something else,” said Lisa. “Charlie saw something in the Key tonight.”
“Something else? As in?” Priest cocked an eyebrow at Charlie.
“I don’t know what I saw. Not yet. But I don’t think it was anything good.”
“Hmph. That seems to be the case with most things these days. I’m going to try and get some sleep. You two should do the same. Tomorrow will prove to be a big day.”
He glanced at Loch and nodded to them once before leaving the room.
“He’s right,” said Lisa. “Let’s go.”
Charlie nodded, frustrated that they really hadn’t accomplished anything after sneaking onto their own turf.
“What do I do?” he whispered as Lisa left him alone with Loch for a moment.
The magic above Loch shuddered, and sweat beaded over the old man’s forehead. The medical equipment chirped as Loch’s heartbeat picked up. Charlie
felt his own heartbeat in his throat and he gripped Loch’s arm.
“Fight it. Fight it! Lisa!”
She rushed back into the room, hissing, “Be quiet! Gregory will hear you!”
“I don’t care. Something’s wrong. Help me!”
Lisa’s face grew pale, and she jumped forward. Charlie opened his mouth to tell her to start creating some protective runes when his body began to spasm. The temperature in the room increased rapidly by several degrees and, for Charlie, the room began to spin. His vision went black, replaced with familiar images of stairs, a room ... and a book. It was the same book he’d seen in a vision days before—the varcolac’s diary.
The vision was disrupted and replaced by two eyes glaring back at him in his mind. Bushy eyebrows scoured over the eyes—one, a striking clear blue, and one, angry red. Loch!
He felt a hand clamp his mouth and realized he was raising his voice. “The Tower,” Charlie gasped, hearing Lisa whispering questions, concerns. “There’s ... a book in the Tower.”
In the hallway, they heard a door open, and then a voice call out.
“Who’s there?” A velvety voice. Not Priest’s. Then, footsteps.
Mumbling a quick curse under her breath, Lisa shoved Charlie under the bed, stuffing him in with both of her feet. There was hardly enough room—he stuck out, feet just covered by the draping blanket. He protested in his weakened state. “What about you? Where are you—?”
She hissed at him, finger over her lips, and disappeared as the blanket fell back into place. He watched her feet stutter as Lisa looked for a place to hide. The door began a slow swing open, and he saw her feet find their way behind the high-backed damask chair. It didn’t hide her well enough.
In walked a pair of blue silk slippers. The man, Wotan Gregory, if Charlie had to guess, stood stock still. His soft but unhappy voice muttered curses and, Charlie hoped, not the type of curses or spells that would reveal their presence. For the first time he wondered about Wotan’s gift, and how powerful the man truly was. Fear gripped Charlie as he was sure they’d been found out.
“Look at you,” the man said bitterly, and Charlie closed his eyes in resignation. He put one hand forward, ready to pull himself from the cramped space under the bed. “How did you manage to get yourself into this mess, Loch?”
Charlie stopped. Wotan hadn’t seen them after all.
The man turned and lazily walked out of the room, flicking the light off on his way. “Fat lot of good you ever did us,” he growled.
Loch’s room went dark as the door swung shut. The door latch seemed to echo when it clicked in the hallowed silence of this lifeless room. Now, only the beeps of the medical monitors witnessed their presence.
Charlie blinked, looking around the room with Sight. He waited a moment, then pulled himself out, taking a deep breath of air that seemed fresh in comparison to his hiding place.
“I’m afraid,” said Lisa.
“He’s gone. We’re okay.”
“No, that’s not what I meant. I mean that’s supposed to be one of the world’s most powerful hunters, and he didn’t notice two teenagers hiding in plain sight. No wonder we’re in this situation.”
He frowned at her humor.
“We have to get that book.”
“But it’s in the towers. Which one?”
“The middle one.”
“Great. The Tower. The one that Loch specifically said not to go into, ever, unless he was with us.”
“Lisa, Loch just sent me a vision from his coma, it was a message to go up and get that book. I think we have permission now.”
“Try explaining that to Mrs. Witherington.”
“Darcy’s mom isn’t somebody we can trust right now, anyway. She doesn’t need to find out.”
Lisa huffed in frustration. “Okay. But not tonight.”
“But, Mrs. Witherington isn’t here, it’s the perfect—”
“Charlie, don’t you think we’ve pushed it far enough? She isn’t here, but Wotan is. Our parents are probably wondering where we are right now, as well. It will be easier to disappear when the whole team is already at the Key. All of us. Okay?” she pressed, when he didn’t respond.
“All right, tomorrow then.”
“Tomorrow.”
Chapter 6
Tomorrow was a long, restless night away.
Charlie woke up several times with dreams of fire and relentless havoc haunting him. He had no doubt the demon was messing with him, pushing him further and taunting him. He had similar experiences leading up to the faceoff with the Dark Prince, but those were more like warnings, threats. This demon was revealing chaotic details of his own personal traumas.
When the morning finally did come, it was too early and Charlie was just as well to sleep the entire day away.
His phone buzzed loudly against the wooden night stand. Annoying, like a mosquito zinging in his ear each moment he dozed off again. With a bit more force than was necessary, Charlie snatched up the phone and swiped the screen. It was a group text from Darcy.
Second council member has arrived. Some guy named Ashikaga Akio.
Charlie closed his eyes, feeling them tingle and relax from the pleasant feeling that came with not having to look at anything.
It didn’t last long. His eyes shot open again with another text buzzing through. This one was from Nash.
Can we go up to the Key again yet?
From Darcy. Yes. Mom said she was just concerned that we would be pinned down if Wotan was the first council member to meet us.
From Liev. y u guys no txt like every1else?!?
Lisa. Ignore him.
Nash. Glad to see ur feeling better.
Charlie grumbled as his thumbs smashed out his own message. Group texts before 9am. Really?
Silence. He sighed, rolling back into his pillow.
The phone buzzed.
“I give,” said Charlie as he jumped out of bed, grabbing clothes on the way to the shower.
Donnie was surprisingly absent at school again. It wasn’t enough for everyone to completely relax, but it was still a nice break. Rumors continued to drift on the wings of whispers around school. A werewolf running rampant on school grounds and Lisa’s black shards of energy “attacking” a jock was plenty to keep the gossip fires stoked. The constant chatter wasn’t malicious, but it still clung to the five hunters, heavy, irksome.
When the final bell sounded, the five teens darted through the hallways, out the front doors, and as far from school as possible. It was when they were several blocks away that Charlie smelled the faint aroma of something burning. He wondered if he had imagined the suave, menacing chuckle as well, but doubted it. Whether it was imagined or not, neither Donnie nor the man in black appeared on their trek to the Key.
As they approached they Key’s entrance, there was a second, red, car parked next to Elizabeth’s. It was a rental. Apparently Ashikaga chose not to fly in on one of the monster hunters’ private jets, instead opting for the two-hour drive from the nearest commercial airport.
Always a team, the group shared a collective, nervous glance before walking into their stronghold which, at the moment, did not feel strong, or like it was theirs for that matter. The Key felt weakened, sick. There was a magical presence infecting it, weighing it down, and the air was thick with resentment.
It was quiet when they entered. There were no wise and ancient elder hunters flying angrily at them, such as the ones that hovered in their imaginations.
“Oh, you’re here,” said Elizabeth Witherington from the parlor room door. They all jumped, skittish at her sudden appearance. “Good timing. Mr. Ashikaga has just arrived. He will be down to join us shortly. Come, meet Wotan.”
Lisa glanced at Charlie, who intentionally made no movement to acknowledge her.
Inside the parlor, Wotan Gregory sat with a sour expression on his face, reading a dusty volume from a forgotten shelf, while his feet rested on a thickly-cushioned ottoman. His white hair was neatly combed and
, but for the crinkles at the edge of his mouth and eyes, his pale, smooth skin made him appear younger than they believed him to be. He was well-dressed, but seemed as comfortable as a lounging house cat.
As the hunters entered the room, he set down his cup of tea and examined them critically with his silver-blue eyes. “So then, these are the young troublemakers?”
Mrs. Witherington ignored the remark, pointing at them from right to left. “Wotan, meet my daughter Darcy, Nash Stormstepper, Charlie Sullivan, and the twins, Lisa and Liev Vadiknov. The Monster Hunters of Hunters Grove.”
“Well, we shall see.”
The five hunters recoiled, offended at his nonchalance and disregard. Wotan smiled at them with menace.
Elizabeth eyed the council member carefully. “Everyone, this is Wotan Gregory, the Warden.”
An awkward silence engulfed them. They stalled, afraid. Before them was one who would decide their fate. He could end them.
Wotan cleared his throat in order to break their sudden inability to speak. “An eloquent bunch,” he told Elizabeth, sarcastically. “I can see why Loch would choose them, from their powerful communication skills alone.”
“There is no need to be rude, Wotan,” Elizabeth snapped.
A sneer played across his lips as he loaded another insult, but before he could deliver it, his gaze slid to the presence in the doorway. Charlie looked over his shoulder.
Ashikaga Akio was a man who was short in stature with broad shoulders supporting his formal jacket. His otherwise well-groomed, obsidian black hair was streaked with gray, and a long-trimmed beard and mustache adorned a rugged, tanned face. He lowered his head and shoulders in a subtle, yet respectful, bow toward the five, and they found themselves bowing back.
Elizabeth remade the introductions, ushering the Asian council member to a seat by the window.
“Gregory-san,” he said with a heavy accent, sharing a reserved nod in greeting.
Charlie Sullivan and the Monster Hunters: Council of the Hunters Page 5
