Chapter Two

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Zoe gasped as she stepped inside the house. She had been expecting some disgustingly dirty hovel with blood covering everything. Instead, it was well looked after, apart from a couple of claw marks on the walls and small patches of dried blood on the floor. There was a posh cream sofa like rich people in the cities had, and it was so clean Zoe doubted it had ever been used. There was also a bed with a blood red pillow and duvet, and a pure white sheet. Zoe loaded an arrow in her bow when she saw what was attached to the posts of the bed. Chains, each with an open cuff. She heard a noise behind her and spun around, arrow ready to fly. Aoife took a step back.

"Oh, it's you guys. I thought I was about to be attacked." Zoe said, breathing a sigh of relief and lowering her bow.

"Keep your voice down! We don't want to draw attention to ourselves if whatever took Alba and Evie is in here somewhere." Nessa whispered.

"But if Alba and Evie are being kept prisoner in here, they might hear us and yell for help. Then we could find them more easily!" Zoe hollared. Alex covered her ears. Kat put her hand over Zoe's mouth.

"Stop talking. If the evil thing is in here, we'll probably be killed if it finds us." she said, glaring at Zoe. Alex whimpered. Kat suddenly withdrew her hand from Zoe's mouth and wiped it on her jeans, looking disgusted. "She licked me!" Alex giggled, and Aoife and Nessa rolled their eyes. There was a banging noise from the other side of a door, which probably lead to another room. Alex froze. Nessa lifted a spear, Kat pulled out a knife, Zoe and Aoife raised their bows. Bang. Bang. Bang. It sounded like...

"Footsteps." Zoe murmured, edging towards the sound. Bang. Bang. Then silence. Zoe pushed the door with her foot. It swung open, creaking loudly. Zoe stepped through the doorway. She gasped.

"What?" Aoife whispered.

"There's someone in the house. He just left the room. He looked at me first..." Zoe murmured in response. "I- I think he was trying to get away from me. He looked like a young deer when it sees a hunter. Like he was trying to get away from a predator. He was definitely a boy. He looked scared, but, at the same time, sort of happy, like someone had given him a really nice present, but he was terrified of it." Zoe went towards the door the boy had gone through. The other girls followed, weapons out and ready to be used. Zoe seemed more hesitant. Her bow was out, but it was only raised half way: not much use if they were ambushed and needed to fight back quickly.

"He went through there?" Nessa asked, and Zoe nodded, lowering her bow and opening the door.

"Maybe we should check upstairs first, seeing as that's probably where he came from." Aoife said, but Zoe shook her head.

"We'll follow the boy. He was definitely trying to get away from something, if it wasn't us, we'd be walking straight into trouble." she demanded.

"You mean we're not in trouble already?" Kat muttered, and Nessa, being the only person who heard her, smirked. Zoe walked into the room. There was a boy in there.

"Get away!" he all but screamed, staring at the weapons in the girls' hands, amber eyes wide in terror. Zoe removed the arrow from her bow and placed it in her quiver, before placing her bow on the ground. She raised her hands, taking something seriously for probably the first time in her life.

"It's okay, we're not going to hurt you." she said, making her voice soft and even, nothing like her usual energy-filled tones that were constantly jumping to different octaves. She looked at the other girls and gestured for them to put down their weapons. Aoife obliged, but slid her hand into the pocket her kitchen knife was in. Kat put her knife on the floor, and Nessa slid her spear back into her bag with the other two. Alex kept her knife in her hand, clinging to it like it was her lifeline, but lowered her hand.

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