⥐ ⋞ ☽ ⋟ ⥐
| Jackson |
What was the plan? Jackson stared at Raphael, watching him while he stood a few feet from him and Damon with a pondering look on his face. His eyes shifted every couple of seconds...like he was reading some sort of invisible book—maybe he was going over several plans or ideas or what he knew in his head.
Jackson then turned his attention to the siren. The faceless creature was still standing on the rock, its lanky body twitching and convulsing. It didn't look like the strange creature had spotted him, Damon, and Raphael, but he didn't want to make any sudden movements and alert it of their presence.
"They react to sound," Raphael said quietly. "There's a good chance it can't hear us over the undead, so it's going to take something loud to draw its attention."
"Such as?" Damon questioned, glancing around.
"If the three of us howl, the siren should be able to tell the difference between our call and the noises those cadejo are making."
Jackson grew a little more anxious. "I uh...I don't know...how to howl." There were a lot of things that he didn't know how to do. He didn't know how to use his connection to Damon to talk to him from a distance—he didn't know how to connect to him at all. He didn't know as much as he'd like to about scents or sounds or ethos, he didn't know how to track as well as he'd seen the others do, and he didn't know the full extent of what being a wolf walker meant.
Raphael frowned strangely at him.
"He hasn't had time to learn everything," Damon said. "We've been too busy for lessons; he only knows what he needed to know at the time."
"Well, we don't have time for wolf walker school now," the orange wolf muttered irritably. "Once we have the siren's attention, it'll attempt to get within range so that it can paralyze us. Jackson, since you're the only one immune to its ability, you're going to have to lead it as far away from that ledge as possible. I'm hoping that it's going to be confused as to why you haven't frozen. Either that...or it's going to attempt to get up here to kill us."
Jackson tensed up even more. He knew how dangerous those things were; he hoped he'd never have to see one ever again...but there it was...and he was going to have to swallow his fear if they were going to help Wilson.
But Damon confidently said, "He saved my entire pack from a group of those things. We'll be fine."
However, something suddenly hit Jackson, and it made him frown in confusion. "Wait...you aren't immune?" he asked Raphael.
The orange wolf looked at him. "Why would I be?"
"Well...I just...thought that I was immune because I'm a hybrid. Aren't you also some kinda...hybrid? You've got wolf walker and demon blood, right?"
"We don't use that term; we're not half-wolf walker, half-demon; we're wolf walkers with demon blood. And as for being immune, we haven't exactly exposed ourselves to cadejo to find out, and I don't plan to, either."
Jackson had a million questions, but now wasn't the time to ask them. Wilson would be getting down to that ledge soon, and he had to make sure that Siren was nowhere it could hurt him. "Okay, so...you guys howl, and then I protect you or lure the thing away if it isn't far enough already?"
Raphael nodded.
With a deep exhale, Jackson did his best to grasp a calm composure. "Okay...okay." He could do this. It wasn't like he had to go down there and face it, was it? All he had to do was ensure that he kept its attention. That wouldn't be so hard, would it?
"Are you ready?" Damon asked him.
"Yeah, I'm good," he said with a nod.
"All right," Raphael mumbled. "Damon?"
The Alpha nodded.
Jackson stepped back and watched them move closer to the edge of the cliff. And when they lifted their heads towards the moon and howled, a shiver ran down his spine. He'd only heard Damon's howl a few times, and whenever he did, he always felt a strange sort of anticipation, like he was ready to face whatever might follow. And he was ready.
He set his sights on the siren. The faceless creature turned its head in Damon and Raphael's direction, and a lot of the cadejo looked up, too. The entire ocean of undead turned around and started flowing towards the bottom of the cliff that they stood on, and the siren started moving, too. It climbed down off the rock, but it struggled to slip through the tight crowd...so it started climbing and walking on top of the cadejo as if they were the ground itself. And the snarling corpses didn't react, either; they let the siren walk on their backs, and it made its way towards the cliff.
Dread and angst constricted Jackson like a snake, but he held on to his composure. "It's coming," he told them.
Raphael stopped howling to glance at the siren. "Get ready," he told Damon, and then he continued his howl.
Jackson kept his eyes on the siren, watching as it prowled closer and closer. He could hear it chittering as it tilted its head and moved its strange body, and the nearer it got, the faster Jackson's heart raced.
"I-it's halfway here," he told them, glancing at Raphael and Damon.
And then it started moving faster.
"And...now it's speeding up," he panicked.
The creature sprinted over the corpses, snarling and panting—but then it stopped. It halted as if the cold had frozen its bones...and Damon and Raphael went silent.
Jackson shivered worriedly when he looked at them both and saw the swirling black patterns in their iris', the same ones he'd seen when they first came into contact with a siren. They were stuck in its trance, and now it was down to him to deal with it.
He stood on the edge of the cliff, trying to calculate whether or not it was far away enough from the ledge that Wilson would soon be on. It was only roughly thirty meters away from Raphael and Damon, including the vertical drop...and the ledge was at least double that distance away. So...Wilson would be fine, right?
But their howls didn't only attract the corpses in the pit.
The brush rustled behind Jackson.
He frantically turned to face the noise, tensing up, his heart racing. He could see something moving around in the gloom, and what it was, it was big.
Jackson stepped back and stood defensively by Damon and Raphael. Maybe if whatever was stalking him saw that there were three of them, it wouldn't attack. But if it was a cadejo—and he had a horrible feeling that it might be—then it wouldn't care how many of them there were, would it? It would just want blood.
He held his ground anyway, staring into the woods. The snow crunched quietly, and a low growl echoed from the dark. He could feel eyes on him, and he knew that it was watching him...but what was strange was that his feeling of danger wasn't focused on whatever was beyond the trees. He felt afraid, sure...but his instincts weren't trying to convince him that something terrible was about to happen once the watcher pounced out of the trees.
In fact, whatever was stalking him didn't make him feel threatened. So he shakily asked, "H-hello? Is someone there?"
There was no answer.
Jackson frowned unsurely and glanced over his shoulder. The siren was still frozen where he'd last seen it, and there was no sign of Wilson or—
"Salvator..." came a low, raspy voice.
He sharply turned his head and stared back into the trees. He didn't know what the word meant, but it did something to him—it snatched his attention as if it were the most important word in the world to him, but he didn't know why. "Hello?" he asked again.
"You're...the one," the voice echoed.
Deja vu struck him. That voice sounded familiar, and what it was saying did, too. The prowler that spoke to him when he was escaping Kane's patrol, the one which told him that he was a high lifeform—a perfect hybrid. The prowler which told him that it was tasked to take him to its Master. Had it come back for him? Was it...was it going to take him to its Master?
No...no, it didn't feel like that. He felt...he didn't know how to describe it. Whoever was hiding in the shadows wasn't there to take him away—he seemed to know that. But what did it want? What did it mean? What was it talking about?
He swallowed the saliva which pooled in his mouth. "I'm...what? Who are you?"
The twigs snapped—whoever it was, they were getting closer. "Salvator," they called again.
But then Raphael grunted, and Damon followed with a snarl.
Jackson turned to face them, and that was when he noticed the siren racing back across the ocean of cadejo. His heart started racing again as dread consumed him, but utter horror snatched him tight when he saw Wilson running along the narrow path in the side of the canyon, heading towards the ledge as the Amarok chased after him.
"Wilson!" he panicked, shoving past Damon and Raphael, who were recovering.
"What the hell's going on?!" Raphael snapped.
"I-I saw something, and then...I-I—we have to get its attention back!" he insisted, glancing back at them. "It's going straight for him!"
"Fucking hell," Raphael growled, and then he howled again.
Damon howled too, but no matter how much noise either of them made, the siren didn't turn around.
And Wilson didn't notice it. The tiger kept running, getting closer and closer to the ledge, and the faceless creature was almost in range of him.
Jackson had to do something. He had to warn Wilson; he had to stop that creature from reaching him! So he immediately burst into action, darting to the right. He ignored Damon and Raphael as they called his name; he hurriedly made his way around the edge of the canyon, racing as fast as his legs would carry him.
"Wilson!" he shouted as loudly as he could.
But the tiger didn't hear him. He kept leading the Amarok.
And the Siren was closing in.
"Wilson!" he yelled again, panting as his heart raced so fast that it felt like it might explode. If he knew how to use his wings, he'd take on his demon form and fly down there, but he had no idea. He wanted to use his fire, but he didn't know if he had the range or if he'd even land the shot. If only he had the inimă!
He kept running and running and running—he had to get close enough—
Raphael came out of nowhere and pounced on him. The orange wolf pinned him down before he could attempt to wriggle away, and he snarled into his ear, "I fucking said stop!"
"Get off me!" he growled, trying to overpower him, but Raphael was so much stronger. "He needs our help! He can't see it!"
"Get off him!" Damon then growled and grabbed Raphael's sides, but the orange wolf bucked like a rabbit and kicked the Alpha back thirty feet.
And then he growled to Jackson, "I can't risk losing you; you're the only chance any of us have!"
Jackson struggled and snarled, trying to break free, but he knew it was useless.
And even if he did get free...he'd run out of time.
Wilson was frozen. The siren had him.
"You have to do something!" he pleaded to Raphael. "You...I...Wilson!"
The Amarok crashed into the motionless tiger, and although the siren froze the monster's body, too, the force of the collision sent them both tumbling across the rock...
and over the cliff.
⥐ ⋞ ☽ ⋟ ⥐