The sky grew dark as Sabina hurried home between the mismatched streets of Salem, running between the craggy shadows of houses as old as the witch trials and the smoother modern shapes of contemporary businesses crammed between the historic buildings. A few blocks too far from the historic park, she realized that she had left work while still wearing the complete uniform of a working Englishwoman in the 1600s. Pausing on a street corner, Sabina pondered for a moment if she should turn back.
But then she heard the yells. Monster hunters. It sounded to her as if they were chanting some of their cursed creeds – or maybe just drinking songs – and slowly moving through the streets behind her. Gaining. Sabina's heart thudded anew with fear, and she decided that she could just bring everything back with her to work tomorrow and concentrate on the more terrifying facts at hand. She still had a good fifteen blocks to get to her lonely apartment, for example. Hiking up her heavy woolen petticoats with one hand, Sabina let some of her fear channel into her feet and took off at a nimble sprint for her home.
Salem was strange that night, she thought. Something about it was pitched high and off, like the energy she had sensed beyond the hedges of the historic zone earlier. The streets in front of her grew emptier as the sun disappeared beneath a bloodred sunset.
There were just a few other walkers out for an evening stroll or a last-minute run to the corner grocery store. These were all people friendly to Sabina who just shook their heads bemusedly as she bolted past in her historic gown and coif. They were no threat to her.
As Sabina ran, she could also sense things in the contorted shadows of the crowded city, things with tentacle arms, furry faces, and fangs. These, also, recognized her, and knew she meant them no harm. Though she could not afford to stop in her own dash to safety, Sabina indicated to these neighbors that they should be on their guard tonight. The things in the shadows shrank back into their small corners or clambered up to the safety of rooftops with a grateful wave or growl. Knowing that at least a greater percentage of Salem's supernatural population was in a more secure place for the night and out of the hands of monster hunters, Sabina trained her eyes on her path ahead and kept a ruthless watch for any more friends – or foes – which would intercept her path.
She first spotted trouble in the usual shape: a mob. A larger-than-usual gang of men and women clustered around a corner by the church only a few blocks from Sabina's home. As she drew closer, she could see flashes of that deadly purple sash amidst the crowd and realized that not only her fellow locals but also a good number of monster hunters were milling about. Though the church was a popular stop on ghost and historic tours of the area, things didn't look that way. She wondered what so many of them could be doing with so many locals. Something in the air, again, felt...heated. Frantic. Wrong.
Sabina's gut told her to take a wide loop around the mob and avoid the situation entirely. Just before she peeled off to take the alternate route, she heard someone calling her name. On reflex, Sabina's feet froze. Within a heartbeat she could pinpoint who had summoned her; an older local couple who were regulars at the historic village. Her chest squeezed at the sight of such unassuming people mixed in with the hateful rest of the monster hunters. They blithely waved at her, and she paused long enough to give a small wave back.
Somehow this motion attracted more faces to turn towards her from the crowd. Some – maybe some who couldn't see her face well at half a block's distance – pointed wildly at her brown dress and other old-timey dress items with cries of fascination or...something else. As Sabina listened, the friendly yells that recognized her were rapidly drowned out by yells of another kind.
"Is that a ghost?"
"There's a..."
"She's right there!"
"Someone get the hunters!"
"WITCH!"
Sabina backed up, nausea rising in her throat. It was possible that the community members and monster hunters and who-knows-else who were yelling such things at Sabina – pointing at her fiercely now, and moving in a flood in her direction – didn't know what they were talking about and were just captured in the hysteria of a mob, just like their predecessors had been in the 1600s.
Or, it was possible that they knew something that Sabina had taken pains to ensure that no one knew.
Either way, Sabina was getting the hell out of their way before the truth of it all became deadly relevant.
Something behind her swished and cracked. When she whirled around, hands up to combat whatever was out there in the darkness, Jack Russell dropped down from a tree next to the sidewalk. He landed smoothly next to her, brushed off his black suit, then looked down at her hands with wide eyes. "Oh."
Sabina followed his gaze and realized with horror that she the shock of Jack's appearance had unveiled what her hands looked like in attack mode: inch-long, thick, curved nails sticking from beneath the regular human nails, outstretched and ready to shred the enemy. With the mob behind her closing in and Jack Russell standing so close now, Sabina had no time to reconceal the talons. Throwing caution to the wind, she let her normal teeth – elongated canines – and catlike eyes flash at him in a battle pose. Sarcastically, she spat, "So, monster hunter, what weapons do you have on you for killing a witch today?"
Unexpectedly, Jack reached forward, smoothly closed his hand around hers – talons and all – and took off running in the opposite direction of the mob. "COME ON!" He called, somewhat unnecessarily. "WE NEED TO LOSE THEM!"
Barely understanding what was going on, Sabina was yanked along behind Jack down the sidewalk and into the overlapping shadows of the trees on either side of the street. Behind her she heard indistinct yells, now filled with sinister energy. The thought occurred to her that Jack could be leading her to another group of monster hunters. Yet somehow there were other things that made Sabina trust him and keep running. The main thing – as they bolted through the night, he looked over his shoulder every few steps, his deep brown eyes furrowed in concentration and locked on her. And he hadn't flinched at the sight of her witch features. Jack wasn't scared of her, and Sabina couldn't bring herself to fear him, either. All the same, she broke his hold on her hand.
They fell into stride side-by-side, pumping arms in sync as their legs ate up the space between the outskirts of Salem and the more populated central area. Over the whoosh of air past her ears, Sabina told Jack, "Hang a right! I can't go back downtown! Did you see the number of other hunters there?"
"But the village –" Jack waved at Sabina's dress, indicating her workplace, "I saw a very powerful protective relic in the merchant's house exhibit today. If we can get inside the hedge and to the house, no one else should be able to pick up your trail. It can shield you just long enough!"
Sabina knew exactly the artifact – which was indeed a functioning relic – and grudgingly agreed with Jack's logic. As they sped through the beginning of downtown Salem's back alleyways, she asked, "How did you do it? How did you pick up my trail?"
Jack's grin and the white slashes on his cheekbones shone as they ran beneath a bright orange street light. "What, how did I know you were a –"
"Don't say it out loud!" Sabina yelped, panic sending the talons back beneath her nails and her eyes and teeth back to their human shape. "People in this town get triggered by that word!"
"All right, all right." Jack laughed easily, his breath seemingly unaffected by their extended sprint away from the mob. "You had an unnatural sort of shape."
"Excuse me?" A laugh exploded from Sabina's lungs. "What sort of a shape?"
Jack led them to cut across a dead street and down yet another alley that led down a hill. At the end Sabina could see the split-rail fences of her workplace, and a sense of relief refreshed her lungs. Jack explained, "I could tell that there was something different about how you looked. Now I can see – it was your hands, your eyes, your teeth. Maybe other things, too. All things you were hiding. I could..." Sabina heard Jack clear his throat, even over the noise of their feet hitting the asphalt together. "I could sense it. I have very developed senses."
"But why?" Sabina decided to go for broke and just ask. "If you're a monster hunter, why are you helping me?" Silently, she added, Should I believe you are as good as you seem?
The alley narrowed out as they ran down the hill and approached the dark hedges of the historic zone. Sabina felt Jack's elbows graze hers as they shifted closer together and caught gusts of his hot exhales. Something about it gave her goosebumps even as she sweated fiercely. "When I said that I am a monster hunter," Jack mused "I perhaps chose the wrong words. I prefer to help the monsters – or the people – whichever one needs it most."
"And you found me to help." Sabina paused with Jack just before the hedge. Looking up and down the city streets in either direction, she found them unexpectedly quiet. The bar crowds didn't seem to be here, and neither did the mob from the church neighborhood. She could hear people somewhere, perhaps a few streets over, but this one was still. Empty. Sabina couldn't put her finger on the feeling, whether it was the calm before a storm or an ambush. Backing up to the hedge, she whispered, "Let's go. It feels..."
Jack panted and pivoted in a complete circle, his warm eyes narrowed at the alley from which they had come. "Staged. I agree." Turning back to her, he gestured at the hedges. "Up and over or through?"
Pulling at the edges of her long skirts, Sabina shook her head. "Through. Follow me." Reaching forward, she extended her talons and swept back a few loose branches from the closest bush, making a pathway through the hedge. "After you."
"Yes, ma'am." As Jack bent his lean form and passed her, Sabina did her best to not notice how he smelled like...some sort of cloves. Or how his presence made her feel tranquilized when they were inches from each other. Despite the lurking danger in Salem that night, Sabina took a second to clear her head before following Jack through the hedge.
On the other side, she took her bearings. The historical zone, with its village and green lawns and gardens between buildings, looked different at night, but not so different that it was indecipherable. There was no street lighting on a broad scale inside the park as there was outside on the sidewalks, with instead three large streetlights positioned within the groves of trees near the hedge that ran around the park. The effect was that some areas in their immediate vicinity were starkly lit, while the rest of the park lived in variegated fading shadows. Sabina picked out some landmarks – old chapel here, market square there, raised garden beds there – and realized that she and Jack were standing in the backyard of the merchant house. What were the odds? Or... Sabina glanced over at Jack, wondering if he had planned for them to wind up at this exact location. If saving monsters – or humans – was what he did professionally, perhaps he had.
To her surprise, Jack caught her gaze and smiled almost...nervously.
It made Sabina return the favor with a suspicious grin of her own. "What?"
Jack's deep brown eyes creased amusedly at her in the scattered glow of the exterior streetlights filtering in through the hedge. "Nothing. Usually, you know, I just help monsters I know... so this is new for me." He wrinkled his nose and shrugged in an exaggeratedly bashful pose. "You don't seem like the type to lure a monster hunter to her cauldron, though."
There was something so unexpectedly naïve about his comment that tickled Sabina's mirth. "If I did lure you to my cauldron, Jack Russell," she giggled, "you'd thank me for it." She took a step to approach the merchant house in front of them, then froze – her face burned as she rethought what she had said and realized how it sounded.
Just as she opened her mouth to walk back the innuendo, she heard Jack cough in a sharp burst of laughter. "Well, ahm...I didn't say I would have minded."
Risking a look over her shoulder, Sabina locked eyes with Jack again. As they stood there in the darkened backyard of the merchant house, holding each other's gaze, Sabina felt something new in the air. It was as if she could feel the hot pounding of Jack's heart and the energy rocketing through his veins when she looked at him. The silence stretched on around them but Sabina no longer felt afraid of the crowd. They were far away, out of earshot at least. What seemed much more dangerous was the way that there seemed to be a rapid, agreed-upon iron attraction between herself and Jack.
He broke the silence first. "I...usually do not stay, after everything is all right."
His eyes seemed to be saying something else to Sabina, but, like the nature of the silence surrounding the park, she just couldn't put her finger on it. His words, though, were easy enough to figure out. She turned back to the house, scoffing. "I don't think everything is 'all right.' There is still a town full of monster hunters out there."
When she arrived at the merchant house's door, she ran her fingers down the caulking on the outside until she felt the shape of a small skeleton key hanging on a nail. As Sabina unlocked the door, she heard Jack coming up the path behind her. "But you'll be safe," he said, in a tone that struck Sabina as if he was reassuring himself. "No one will think to find you here."
When she faced him, they were back where they had been that afternoon – she up on her stair, Jack waiting below. Just as it had been earlier that day, Sabina felt fuzzy with his proximity and like she couldn't put two thoughts together. Resisting the giddy numbness, Sabina told Jack, "I'll be fine. As long as I'm within range of the relic in there, any nonhuman traces I leave will be masked." Struck by a sudden thought, Sabina pressed her palm to her face. "I can't believe I didn't think of this earlier this afternoon."
Jack shrugged, looking down. "You seemed to be quite... frightened." He retreated a step, glancing back up at Sabina as he did so. His eyes mournful, he said, "I should go now. The others will notice if I am away too long."
Sabina found herself speechless as Jack backed up and headed for the hedge. Somehow – whether was it was because she had come to trust him as a safe person to have around or for some other reason – she didn't want him to go. Stuttering, Sabina suggested, "Maybe we should go and check to make sure the relic is inside?"
Once again, as Jack turned around and met her eyes there was a dangerous sort of weighty heat that passed between them, like a live power line. Sabina didn't want to touch it but felt that she might go insane if she didn't. It was a relief when Jack jogged back up the path and up the steps to join her inside the house. He reached out and took the door handle, looking at Sabina for permission before slowly pulling it closed behind them. "I think that's a very sensible thing to do," he told her softly.
The air of the historic house was musty and cold, with only faint light marking the outlines of glass panes from the rest of the dark walls. Sabina didn't move from the lintel of the door, and she sensed that Jack before her didn't move, either. Unsure what to do, Sabina whispered, "The relic is upstairs. I don't think we can risk turning on any lights that could be seen from the outside."
"Agreed." Jack's whisper was deep and faintly raspy. "Lead on."
Sabina cleared her throat as she let her eyes roam around the room. As her pupils adjusted to the light, she could again pick out features she knew existed in the space – a narrow walkway hemmed in by hip-height Plexiglas panels on either side which barred visitors from touching the historic furniture inside the room. It was the same story throughout the house. "Okay," Sabina nodded, "if you put your hands on my shoulders, I can get us to the staircase. Walk only where I do, or you'll go right over the barriers."
"Would that be bad?" Jack whispered as Sabina suddenly felt the weight and warmth of his hands over each shoulder. "Would I wreck something?"
Sabina rolled her eyes in the dark. "Oh yeah, that would be bad. The alarm systems in these buildings are old, but all the areas behind barriers are set to trigger the alarm and call the police if anyone sets foot inside them."
She could hear Jack sober up at the thought of an alarm revealing their hiding place and tipping off the monster hunters. "Ah. Got it."