Into the Dark

Chapter 21

After breakfast and giving thanks to Winston for his hospitality, the four of us were off again, heading north as the wizard had said. It wasn't much later, once we left the town completely, that we came across the first sign of more civilization. It was a seemingly deserted, three story brick house in the middle of pretty much nowhere. But to get where we were heading, we'd have to pass through the woods behind it. Now, in any horror movie where the characters had common sense, they'd find another way or not go past it at all. But the thing was: there was no other way... and I was sure none of us had the sanity to hang on to our common sense.

Before we neared anywhere close to the house, we let it remain in the distance and waited as Odis shifted into a wolf and sniffed out as far as he could without being spotted. When he returned, the news wasn't as good as we had hoped.

"There's definitely someone, undoubtedly vampires, camped out in that house. More than one, actually. If we want to get by, we're going to have to cover up our scent and move as quietly as possible. Who knows how many are scouting out that forest?" he said. At that time, a wily smile spread across our dear witch's face as she wiggled her index finger in the air.

"Leave the scent cover-up to me!" she exclaimed (but not too loudly). A sudden puff of smoke appeared over her hand and once gone, revealed a pile of some kind of herb. She flicked a portion at each of us and dusted her hands off as if proud of what she'd done.

I didn't smell anything new.

"It's a type of witch herd. It changes your natural scent to whatever scent is surrounding you. But it only lasts for a couple of hours so we'll have to hurry," Maeve urged. She wasn't wrong, but I wasn't sure if we could make such a difficult trip through a thick forest in two hours. All we could do was hope for the best.

"We better make this quick then. Sitting here chatting is just wasting time," Kade said, obviously annoyed based on his tone. I didn't know what had gotten into him, but he'd been acting pretty grouchy ever since our little conversation last night.

"You alright?" Odis asked, almost as if he had read my mind. Kade nodded quickly and looked out towards the house.

"Yeah, I've just heard a lot about how dangerous rogue vampires are. I'm not too happy about passing through," he answered.

"So you're scared?" I mistakenly teased which immediately earned me a glare. Maeve seemed to enjoy it because she smiled. Odis was too focused on the house and Kade just didn't think it was very funny. "Sorry..."

"Do you think it's smart for all of us to go as a group? If they find us, depending on the number there are, we could all go down. But maybe if we split up then we'll have a chance of making it through without being spotted. It would sure cause less noise to be made," Odis said, churning my stomach with his words. Kade had an agreeing look on his face and opened his mouth to reply, but I cut him off.

"Uh, no. Splitting up is bound to get us all killed," I said, referencing back to my previous thoughts of stupid things people did in horror movies. This was one of them.

"Splitting up decreases the noise level. Plus, if one of us gets caught, the other three could easily make a rescue attempt," Kade argued. "I think we can all handle ourselves... even you, Bella." I felt flattered that he had confidence in my abilities; too bad I didn't. But it wasn't the time to be a wimp. I didn't need to make things more difficult than they already were.

"Okay," I hesitantly agreed. "Let's get this over with." The satisfaction on Kade's face afterwards made me feel comfortable but nowhere near better about going alone.

"Then let's head out," Maeve stated quickly, already walking towards the woods ahead. We all silently followed. Without luggage (I still don't know what happened to all of it) nothing really slowed us down except our fear and suspicion. The walk seemed overwhelming quick because when we reached the edge of the woods and stared into its darkness, my stomach became even more twisted and I wanted to turn back. Too late now.