by Alina Banks
That was partly a distraction, to take my mind off what we were doing. In theory, it was easy enough to think about going out into the forest to investigate the area where a dead body had been dumped, but actually doing it, knowing that someone was murdered here, was an entirely different thing. I was sure we were making the right choice. I felt like I was meant to end up in Clermont. I thought we would have been a part of the bigger picture if things hadn’t ended catastrophically before. Now, it was our choice to make. We were the ones being drawn into the investigation. A part of me wanted to leave everyone else out of this, so they wouldn’t be in danger. Then again, that would mean I’d be making the same mistake our parents had made.
We all stopped a short distance from the yellow tape. We could see that the bright yellow wrapped around the trees and formed a large rectangle. As I stood there, it was almost as though I could feel the lack of life where the body had been.
I breathed in and peered around at everyone. “Okay, so, we’re here.” I raked a hand through my hair. “I’m not going to ask any of you to step past the tape with me, so you guys should decide what you’re comfortable with. I’m going past the tape to learn more about what happened to the body that was here, and then we can figure out what we’re going to do next.”
Chapter Thirteen
Alex lifted the yellow tape. He gave me a nod before stepping in behind me, Sabrina and James had decided they’d rather be on lookout. I could understand it. I wasn’t the only one who could feel the presence of death, though I was still certain the body had been dumped.
I stood at the edge of the tape and connected with all my senses in a way I’d never really tried before. I didn’t know what I was looking for, so I tried my best to calm my nerves and focused on my breathing. I took in the scent of the forest around us, heard what must have been insects moving in the fallen leaves, saw more of the trees around me than I thought should be possible, and felt something I’d felt before, but had never understood.
I saw the spirit of the person who’d died. He was sprawled on the ground in a way that made me certain he’d just been dumped there like an old piece of furniture, like he didn’t matter at all. Slowly, I knelt down beside the spirit and reached out to touch it. My hand went straight through. Making certain I didn’t make the same mistake a second time, I moved a little way back, studying the spirit. Its throat had been cut, but there was no blood. I looked at his arms and found obvious rope marks. He must have fought his restraints. I would have done the same thing, especially if I knew I was going to die. I checked his legs, but the trousers he wore covered his ankles. Down his arms were marks I couldn’t quite make out. I tried to pull him into more detail, but it didn’t work. Had I been there a day or so earlier, maybe I’d have been able to see him better.
Alex put his hand on my shoulder and I jumped. The spirit drifted away, but I knew I’d already seen everything it had to show me. The fact it was there meant that I really should ask Mom more questions, but it was obvious to me she didn’t want to tell me anything more than she had to. I’m sure she had a reason for it, but…I shook off that thought and turned to look at Alex, who gave me a soft smile. “You’ve seen something the rest of us couldn’t, haven’t you?”
“Probably.” I nibbled my bottom lip. “What have you found?”
“There are tracks leading to this point, but I couldn’t tell you what made them.” He sighed. “It’s not any animal I know. To be honest, I never thought this had anything to do with an animal. Animals wouldn’t waste meat by just leaving it. They would have made certain the body was safe to come back to later. This is much more human.”
“Especially since I don’t know many animals that slit throats.” I stood. “That’s what killed him. He was tied down to something and then his throat was slit.” I shuddered. “Someone is doing this ritualistically, I think, but the police haven’t brought that up, and there has to be a reason for that.”
“They don’t want everyone to be scared of what this stuff means.” He nodded, but he looked confused. “The only problem is, is that the tracks I found aren’t human either. At least, they don’t look human.” He gestured for me to follow him, so I did, and we stopped close to a tree. He pointed towards the ground and shook his head in bewilderment. “What I’m seeing there is a print that doesn’t belong to any animal I know, but it also doesn’t belong to a human.”
“I see where you’re pointing, but I have no idea what I’m supposed to be seeing.”
He nodded. “That’s to be expected. I’ve been taught this kind of thing for a long time, but you haven’t.” Kneeling down, he drew a shape, and as he did, my senses clicked in once more, making it possible for me to see something I was certain he couldn’t. The tracks glowed. I was right about the ritualistic murders. Maybe someone was sacrificing people to gain some kind of magical power, but that would mean magic was real. “What I’m seeing is something that seems to almost be cloven, like a hoof, but it’s much bigger than the hooves of any of the animals around here.” He glanced around and then looked up at me. “You remember how I said before there were rumors about demons?”
“Of course.”
“Maybe I’m very wrong about this, but what we’re staring at right now looks like it could belong to a demon.” Alex shrugged. “I hate the idea that this could have something to do with supernatural beings, because they aren’t supposed to be real, but this…I don’t know if I could say it was anything else, Ana. If we’re dealing with demons…”
“For now, we have no reason to think so. This could be someone doing what they can to put people off the scent of who it really is.” I smiled at him. “Let’s follow the tracks and see where they take us. Once we know where they lead, we can make a better decision.”
“We can’t go any further.” Alex shook his head. “The tracks stop here, but it’s not a natural stop. It’s as though whoever this was didn’t want anyone to be able to keep following them past this point.”
If I was willing to point out I could still see the tracks, then we would have been able to keep going, but I really wasn’t ready for that. Instead, I nodded. “That’s not your fault.”
“Still frustrating. The footsteps started to become lighter and lighter a little while ago, and it seems as though they somehow understood how they would be tracked. I can’t be certain, but there’s something about this that does seem very human, no matter what the tracks themselves look like.”
I nodded in agreement and looked around. The sun was setting, and I knew it wouldn’t be long before we wouldn’t be able to see anything. “It’s getting late, so the best thing we can do is leave the forest and find somewhere with a bit more light to talk this through.” I wanted to keep going, alone, but I knew that none of them would support that decision. “I know there’s a cafe close by, we can talk there.”
“Yeah, I think that would work.” Sabrina looked relieved. “Let’s go.”
All of us turned silently to make our way back through the forest, and it was then that I realized how the tracks had led us closer to the school than we had been before. We left the forest and emerged close to the school field. Until then, I had believed that the tracks we’d been following were the ones that took us to the body, but maybe they’d taken us away from it. Maybe they were coming back to the school.
I blinked and gave Alex a look. He nodded. “It’s possible. It’s probably the more likely scenario, to be honest.”
That left me with the question of the other tracks. I’d been able to see them making both journeys, because they hadn’t been trying to hide those tracks. What they’d been doing was minimizing the chances of a hunter, or someone skilled in tracking physically, to find them. “There was nothing about the tracks that made you think that before?”
“That’s the problem when you’re dealing with unknown tracks, unfortunately. Because I’ve never seen anything like that before, I have no way of knowing which way they’re moving, but it could have worked out either way
. If they know enough about tracking, there is a chance they’d have used their own tracks to confuse us.” Alex shrugged. “If I’m trying to track something successfully, I need a chance to learn more about them, and I didn’t have that chance.”
I reached out to gently squeeze his shoulder. “You did the best you could, considering the circumstances.”
It was late and I expected the cafe to be empty, but it was surprisingly packed. Sabrina went up to the counter to order while the rest of us grabbed a table. At first, I thought we weren’t going to be able to find one, until we came across one tucked into the back, almost as if it had been saved for us, so we could talk things through without being overheard. Alex slipped into the seat on one side of the booth. I sat next to him, since James and Sabrina would want to be together.
Our close proximity made it impossible for me to ignore how good he smelled. I did my best to push that thought to the back of my mind and tapped my fingers on the table as we waited for Sabrina.
Luckily for me, she didn’t take too long. Coffees were placed in front of us. I stared into mine, trying to work out what I should say. It was likely I’d already said too much to Alex, because I hadn’t thought about keeping what I knew to myself. Looking back up, I shrugged. “From what I could see, there was a body sprawled on the ground. That makes it obvious to me that he was left there, but the other sign was the lack of blood. However he was killed, it’s likely there would have been blood on the leaf litter, because there hasn’t been any rain recently. I suppose it’s possible the person in question might have washed the blood away, but I didn’t see any signs of that either.” I sipped my coffee. “I couldn’t tell anything more than that.”
Alex studied me for a moment. I waited for him to say something, that I’d seen something he couldn’t, and then he smiled. “I couldn’t either, but I am the one with the tracking skills. What I saw didn’t belong to any animal I’ve come across before, and it also didn’t belong to a human, which makes me think whoever it was hid what they were from any trackers. They didn’t want to be found.”
“Well, considering what they’ve done, that makes sense.” Sabrina sighed. “I was hoping we’d be able to find more clues, because that’s about what Mom knew, but obviously that wasn’t meant to be.” She looked at Alex. “You said before that it was possible, when Ana looked at you. What did you mean?”
“When we came out of the forest, I was hit with the idea that we were following tracks that weren’t leading us in the right direction. Someone wanted us to link the murders with the school again. Those tracks were calculated.”
Sabrina and James headed off down the street, hand in hand. I watched them for a few seconds before turning back to the forest.
Alex was right there. “Why didn’t you tell them everything?”
“How was I supposed to explain it?” I nibbled at my bottom lip. “You seem fully capable of accepting the weird, but I don’t know for certain they’d be as open-minded.”
He made a noise of agreement and studied me. “You’re going back to the forest. You saw something I couldn’t, and you’re planning on heading back alone, which is easily the worst choice you could be making. If there is something special about you, and I’m right about this having something to do with the supernatural, you going back to the forest is dangerous at best, so I’m not willing to let you walk away.”
“You aren’t going to be able to protect me.”
“Probably not, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t go with you. I’m the one who understands, sort of, so I’m the one who should be going with you. At least, for now. I just hate the thought of you being out there alone, Ana.”
“Being out there alone isn’t something I’m worried about, but I couldn’t tell you why.” I sighed. “To be honest, I’m more worried about you coming with me, so…” I shook my head. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what the right choice is. I want to know the answers to my questions, but going out there with you could put you in danger, and that’s not something I’m willing to do.”
“When I was out there before, nothing happened.”
“Doesn’t mean it’ll be the same this time.”
“Honestly, I don’t think they’re going to be out hunting for someone at this time of night. If they have someone, then it’s going to be someone they caught earlier.” Alex looked up. “I think whoever this is would be much more likely to drop off a body this late, so they wouldn’t be seen.” He smiled as he looked back at me. “Come on. We both want to know more than we did before, and the best way we can find that out is by going together. Being a tracker means I might notice things you don’t.”
I hated it when other people were right. “Okay. There is a chance something bad might happen while we’re out there, so don’t say I didn’t warn you if it does.”
Laughing, he wrapped his arm around my shoulders. “I knew there was a chance something bad might happen from the moment I offered to help you, Ana, but that doesn’t bother me. What bothers me is the fact that there's someone or something out there killing people, and no one seems to have any idea what it is. We need to change that.”
Chapter Fourteen
The forest was noticeably darker than it had been before. Being alone with Alex was strange, but I wasn’t going to complain. It was a nice kind of strange, and ever so often, I felt his eyes on me as we made our way back to where the tracks had stopped.
“Is there a reason you keep looking at me?” I glanced at him, giving him a smile I hoped he could see. “I don’t mind, but…”
He smiled back. “You’re different than everyone else. I see it, in a way I don’t think other people do, and that…maybe it’s because of my family.” He shrugged. “I know we aren’t like everyone else. Not entirely. I just wish they’d talk to me more, so I had a better understanding of why, because I feel like knowing would help me so much more than not knowing.”
“Mom’s still keeping things from me, so I definitely understand. She’s trying to protect me, but it's making it harder for me to be who I’m supposed to be.” I sighed. “I don’t know if I should be talking about this, though. Promise me you won’t tell anyone else.”
“Anything you tell me is something I’m more than willing to keep to myself.” He shrugged. “For a long time, I’ve been looking into my family, trying to find out more of the truth. It seems like the more I learn, the less I understand. Especially since I don’t believe I can ask anyone questions about what I’ve learned, because it’s only going to cause them more pain.”
“You can ask me. I’m not certain how much I’m going to be able to help, but I’ll do what I can. I’m in a similar position, and I really don’t want you to feel like you’re alone with that.”
“I appreciate any help anyone can give me.”
We stopped, and I focused a little more on the tracks I was able to see, which meant I could see both routes that were taken - one leading to the school and the one away from it. “Okay, so, from what I can see, the person we were tracking did use the same route twice, most likely because he was trying to hide what he was doing from other people.” I ran my tongue over my bottom lip. “They. I don’t know why I keep saying he.”
“You have a suspect.”
“Of course, I have a suspect, but that’s down to nothing more than a gut feeling, so I really shouldn’t share that with anyone.”
“Tell me, Ana. You know whatever you share with me won’t go any further.”
“Maybe not, but that doesn’t mean you won’t act differently around them and make it obvious that they are a suspect.”
“How about I make this a little easier for you? I have a suspect myself after everything that’s happened, and I have a feeling that our suspect is the same person, because you were the one who saved me from him.”
I raked a hand through my hair and tried to hide my relief. “Okay, so you think it’s Principal Woods too, which makes sense.”
“After he acted suspicious and locke
d me in that classroom, I started doing more research. I wanted to know his reasoning behind it.” He looked at me, and somehow, our eyes met. I didn’t know that was possible with how dark things were in the forest, but it was, maybe because both of us had pretty good night vision. When I realized there was something different about me, I’d been able to see a little better than I had before. “I still don’t know, not exactly, but I think I’m getting closer to understanding it. Or I could be very wrong about that.” He shrugged. “I just…everything that’s happened recently has been weird, and the way Dad’s been acting makes me think this is similar to what happened before.”
“That seems like it’s the most likely explanation for everything.” I breathed out and looked at the tracks. “This is the last chance you’ll have to walk away. If anything happens to you…”
“It’s my fault.” He squeezed my shoulder. “I know the choice I’m making, Ana, and I’m happy to make it. I don’t want you out here alone.”
I would have never imagined that I would be out in the woods trying to track down a killer. Ever so often, the tracks would take a detour around a tight grouping of trees, probably because whoever we were following was carrying a body at that point, and the awkwardness of a body made it impossible to go through the tighter spaces.
There was just one problem. The tracks were quickly fading, and I had a feeling that it was because of how long it had taken me to find out about the death. If I had known sooner, then it would have been so much easier for me to find out where the murderer had been going.
