Chapter 263
It was a wolf—but not just your regular run of the mill might-be-a-Husky wolf. This sucker was huge! We’re talking Jacob on Twilight huge. And it was running at full force at my sister’s back. Elliott was grappling for his gun in the pebbles and ash at his feet, but I had a feeling that wasn’t going to make a difference. Since I had no idea what this thing was—an actual wolf, a werewolf, or some freaky kind of Vampire—I didn’t know what it could do, either. I almost screamed, but I clamped down on my tongue and waited to see what might happen as the creature continued to barrel down at my sister and my boyfriend.
I realized Aaron was down there now, too, and he and Elliott were both emptying their chambers into that devil dog, but it wasn’t even slowing down. The wolf was almost to them when Brandon rolled out of the way, and Cadence leapt into the air, doing some sort of backflip that landed her behind the attacking wolf. She shrieked in pain, however, as one of the bullets Elliott had meant to land in the wolf hit her in the shoulder blade instead. She seemed okay as she reached out and grabbed the wolf by its tail, just before it reached Elliott. I stood there in shock, wondering what in the world she was going to do with it now.
Once again, my sister was wincing in agony as the wolf turned and bit her arm. She was on top of it then, as blood spurted from her forearm. She didn’t let go though, and for the first time, I looked down at the ground to see how far of a leap it would be if I were to go in and help.
“You’re going to have to slam it into something hard,” I heard Jamie shout as he ran over to them. He was the only other teammate who wasn’t engaged, other than myself, and I realized if things got any worse, it would be up to me to go in next, even though I was pretty sure that neither my sister nor Aaron wanted that. I was comforted by the fact that Jamie seemed to have some experience with this wolf thing, though. Maybe he knew how to kill it.
I watched Elliott jab his fingers into the creature’s eyes. It roared and bucked, but let go of my sister’s arm, and then Brandon grabbed one end of it, and Aaron took hold of the other and they followed Jamie’s advice and slung it against the closest RV. It didn’t quite work as they had hoped, however, since it went straight through the thin walls of the motorhome and into the living room. After some more curse words were mumbled, Elliott went in through the door while my sister leapt through the hole, her arm still bleeding, Aaron and Brandon having to make the opening slightly wider for them to fit in, but they were right behind her.
The wolf was getting to its feet, though it seemed a bit woozy, when I realized that Jamie was behind Brandon. He came into view with something in his hand I didn’t recognize at first. It was long and either made of wood or metal. I couldn’t quite see from Brandon’s angle. Cadence was the first to engage the wolf again, and it jumped into the air at the same time she did so that they hit each other and then went careening in opposite directions, but Cadence swung around in the air somehow so that she landed on top of it. The blow was enough that Jamie could get into place, and then I realized what he had. It was a wooden stake, and the tip was silver. He rammed it into the wolf’s chest right where I supposed its heart would be.
The wolf yelped, its body convulsing for a moment before it turned to ash. It was the first sound any of the dead had made, which was unusual. My understanding what that Vampires usually screamed as they were dying, but I guess the ones at this particular RV park had nothing to say. I did wonder if the fact that the wolf had turned to ash meant that it really was a Vampire somehow shifted to appear to be a werewolf. But that answer wouldn’t come at the moment, and the team didn’t have time to sit around and contemplate it either since there were more creatures to kill.
Brandon was out of the motorhome before Cadence even got up, and I saw him trailing his dad across the park, though I didn’t know where they were going. I thought now might be a good time to reach out with my mind and see if there was anyone willing to talk, but I didn’t have time to concentrate at that moment, and I certainly wasn’t about to close my eyes now that I was standing in this tree by myself.
Brandon walked into the RV where Meagan and Hannah had been fighting the same Vampire this entire time, and I could see why it was so difficult to bring him down. The guy was so big, he took up almost the entire width of the kitchen with just his broad shoulders. But the women had worn him down so much that as soon as Elliott grabbed ahold of one arm, Hannah was able to take the other while Meagan and Brandon ripped his head off. The girls were bleeding and exhausted, but the four of them headed back out of the trailer together, only to discover yet another creature none of them had ever seen before.
Aaron, Cadence, and Jamie were chasing around some sort of mist monsters. That’s really the only way I could describe them. They hung in the air like a blue fog, sort of sparkly, but mostly just fluid, and I heard Jamie say that he had encountered them in Wallachia. I remembered from my discussions with him about his past that he had fought Dracula in Wallachia, and I was pretty sure that Aaron had been there, too, but maybe he hadn’t seen anything like this. I wondered if Christian had, but he was all the way at the other end of the park at the time, and I hadn’t even checked on any of those teammates. They seemed to be taking care of things on their end, though every time Brandon’s eyes flickered toward the RVs down there, it seemed like a few of them were rocking enough that they might fall over. Perhaps they had some mist monsters of their own.
“Aim for where the neck should be!” Jamie shouted, and within a few minutes, the mist monsters were gone. It was really incredible to see my sister and the rest of the team beheading something that seemed to have no head, but Jamie’s tactic worked, and it would’ve been cool to see them fizzle away instead of turning to ash if I hadn’t suddenly become very aware of what was happening at the other end of the RV park.
I wasn’t expecting anyone to be calling for help from me, especially not now that it seemed like everything was under control, but the voice I heard in my head calling for me to come wasn’t through the IAC, and I recognized it only because I’d heard it the night before. As the rest of my teammates gathered themselves together and headed toward the last RV on the edge of the park, I knew what I needed to do, and if it required me to get myself out of this tree all by myself, so be it. But this was something only I could do, so with a deep breath, I finally looked down
