Dont Be Such A Witch - Ali Mac

Don’t Be Such A Witch Copyright © 2010 by Ali Mac All Rights Reserved. Cover Photo: iStockphoto/ © Tyler Stalman Designed by R. A. Macy This document may not be re-distributed. (Please respect the time and effort I’ve put into creating this story, and do not “re-publish” this document on ANY document publishing site, this includes Scribd. I only ask because recently this has happened, and it’s frustrating to find my work being “published” by people I don’t even know.) Thanks for reading and supporting – Ali

ONE

“Ash!” my mom screeched. “Ash, get your ass out here!” I was trying to block out the sound of her wail, so I turned up the volume on my iPod. The heavy guitar ballad was great for muting her annoying voice. Looking back, I began sketching a skull on my wall. I saw everything as my drawing palette. I’d already filled up two of the walls in my room with my sketches. They were how I expressed all the crap I was going through. The one with the heart on fire was from when I got my first boyfriend. And the one with the heart cracked down the middle was from when I found out he cheated on me.

My bedroom door burst open. “Hey! I’m talkin’ to you!” my mom yelled. She stood there for a moment waiting for me to respond, and her stringy blond hair fell into her face. I just kept drawing. She stormed over and yanked the pen from my hand, causing my skull to have a funny squiggle over the left eye. “Hey!” I hollered back. She stood over me yelling something. Thankfully, the power ballad was playing in my song, so I didn’t have to hear it. I just observed how funny she looked as she yelled. Finally, she caught on that I wasn’t listening, and ripped the earbuds out of my ears. As she did, the stench of cigarettes permeated my nose, followed by the reek of beer. She and Bob had obviously been partying last night. “Go on!” she yelled. “You heard what I said. Get your ass to school! I’m not gonna have you become messed up like me.” Her words slurred together. She must have been drinking a lot. “Thanks, Mom,” I said starkly. “Your concern touches me.” Since when did she give a damn whether I went to school? As long as I kept my job so I could pay for groceries, she didn’t care what I did. She grabbed my shoulder in a tight grip and said, “You better watch your attitude.” She started to wobble a little, but used me to steady herself. I shoved her hand off and walked around her. “Yeah, or what? You’ll spank me?”

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“You think you’re hot shit, honey,” she said in grumpy slur. “But let me tell you somethin’. You’re nothin’. There’s a whole world out there, and nobody’s gonna care about you.” “You’re rambling again.” I rolled my eyes. When my mom would get really drunk, she would go into these long-winded speeches about how hard the world was, and how everybody was out to get her, blah, blah, blah. Grabbing my bag, I left her in my room. On my way out I saw Bob, my mom’s loser boyfriend, passed out on the couch with a bottle of whiskey under one arm. He looked like he hadn’t bathed in weeks. Smelled like it to. The air in the living room was foggy from all the freak’n cigarettes that he and my mom had gone through. I held my breath as I passed through the worst of it, and took a huge gulp when I got outside our dilapidated trailer. I hated the way the smoke made my hair and clothes smell—not to mention the money my mom would waste on them. It was already ten o’clock, and school had been going for two hours. I didn’t really care. School was almost as crappy as my home-life. Thanks to the new zoning laws, I had been transferred to Westminster High, the school where all the pompous preppies went. Unfortunately, my trailer court butted up against the back of the preppies’ new development lands, and they were slowly moving closer. Several of our neighbors had said that the preps were offering to buy their land from them. I was sure that if the preps had it their way, they would buy all the land from the trailer owners just so we would move away. There

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was a distinct class clash in this town. The problem being that there was no middle class. It was just the super-rich living next to the super-poor. And sadly, they had the money and power to make our lives suck. They’d already gotten Mason High, home of the trailer class, torn down so they could put up a McMansion subdivision. So now, all the trashies—that’s what the preppies called us—were being shipped to the upper crust high school, and being picked off one by one by the inbred spawn of the wealthy. After Mason closed, I stopped going to school. There was no point. As soon as I turned eighteen, I was getting the hell out of this town and going far away. I didn’t care if I had to hitch-hike the entire way. Making my way out of my small, run-down neighborhood, I decided to head up the street to Iggy’s, a small hole in the wall café that served to my kind of people. It was one of the few places where my life sucked a little less—at least on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Those were the days that my ex, the cheater, wasn’t working the counter. I was almost there when I heard the siren of a police car coming up right behind me. “Aw, crap,” I said under my breath as I stopped walking and turned around to face the car, putting my hands on my hips. “Hey, Charlie,” I greeted the officer in the car with the casual air of familiarity.

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Charlie was one of three police officers that Sunnyview had to offer. He wasn’t bad or anything. I’d even babysat for him once. But he had a serious problem with truancy. He pulled up so that he could look out his window at me. “Ash,” he shook his head, “do I even have to ask?” “I’d prefer if you didn’t,” I replied, doing my best not to take out my life’s frustrations on him. It wasn’t his fault my life sucked dirt. “Get in. I’ll give you a ride to school,” he said. “I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume that you were on your way to school, and had no intentions of skipping. Because if you did, I’d have to take you down to the station and fill out a report, and then call your mom…you get my point?” “Yeah, I got it, Charlie.” I walked around the cruiser and got in. “But I was skipping.” He winced. “I didn’t hear that.” I let out a laugh, and rested my forehead against the cool window. So much for not going to school. I’d just have to wait till Charlie was gone, and then sneak back out. The cruiser came to a stop at the curb in front of Westminster High a few minutes later, and an uncontested snarl marred the normally stoic expression I kept. This place was Hell in disguise. I got out of the car and started trudging my way to the entrance, and was a little surprised when I heard Charlie walking up behind me.

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Turning around, I said, “You don’t have to walk me. I’m a big girl.” “I know,” he replied. “I also know that you’re gonna ditch as soon as I pull away.” I let out scoff. “Damn, you’re good.” “Come on,” he said, and led the way to the office. This wasn’t the first time he’d escorted me to the school office and it probably wouldn’t be the last. Dragging my heels as I walked behind Charlie, I pulled my iPod out of my pocket. If I was gonna have to sit through one of Principal Wrecker’s lectures on tardiness, I didn’t want to have to actually hear it. “Charlie,” the office assistant greeted when he approached the counter. She had one of those big flirty smiles on. “What brings you here?” Noticing me, she added in a gloomy voice, “Oh. Miss Maverick. What a surprise. I’ll just go and let the Principal know you’re here.” “I think she likes you,” I said to Charlie after she was gone. He shook his head disapprovingly at me. The smell of Hai Karate aftershave hit me before I could actually see Principal Wrecker. It was normally a dead giveaway of his impending presence. All of the students knew to run like hell if they smelled Hai Karate coming down the hallway. “Ah,” his nasally voice said. “Miss Maverick, you finally decided to join us. What is this, your third attendance this year? I think you’ve hit an all-time high for yourself.”

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“Damn.” I snapped my fingers dramatically. “I was trying to get keep it at two so that next year I’d have something to celebrate.” “Hm,” he scoffed. The bright fluorescent lights of the office shined off his bald head. “Marge?” he said to the office assistant, “Will you please escort Miss Maverick to her class?” Marge’s shoulders slumped. “Of course, Harvey.” She skulked around the front desk, and over her shoulder she said, “Come on!” I assumed she was barking at me. “If it’s any consolation,” I said as I followed her down the quiet school hallway. “I didn’t want you to escort me either.” I heard her let out a little grunt at my barb, but otherwise, she didn’t acknowledge me. After what seemed like miles of hallway later, she stopped outside a door that was labeled English, and said, “Go.” “Sure thing, Marge.” With my iPod out in front of her, I put in my earbuds, and proceeded by cranking up the volume to a dull roar. Giving her a big fake-assed smile, I opened the door to class with more enthusiasm than necessary. She rolled her eyes and started lumbering back to the office. She, as well as every other teacher, knew it wasn’t even worth trying to take the MP3 player from me, because they would have to physically wrestle it from my cold dead corpse. And they all knew that I wanted them to kick me out, so the most they could do was roll their eyes and ignore me. Inside the class room, everyone was staring at me, most with dropped jaws. I wasn’t sure if it was because I had on a

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black mini skirt with fishnets and shiny, hot pink Doc Martens, or if it was because they never thought I would actually come to class. Grabbing the only empty seat on the back row, I hunkered down low. I could still feel eyes watching me, and wished my iPod had a cure for that. Too bad I hadn’t worn my hoodie— it was great for blocking out annoying faces…and bright lights. Deciding not to pretend that I was paying attention to the teacher’s bogus lesson, I pulled out my sketch pad. My fingers were itching to draw something. I made a funny sketch of Principal Wrecker with a supersized, bald head. He was wearing a ninja suit and attempting to chop through a stack of flaming English books with his bare hand. In the background I made huge letters spelling out, “Totally High Karate.” I was just about to add a background to the sketch when a crumpled piece of paper landed on my desk. Looking around, I didn’t see anyone looking at me. I knew I was going to regret it, but I unbunched the paper anyway and wasn’t surprised to see scribbled in messy writing:

Go back to the trailor park, Skank! “Cute,” I said out loud. “But the genius who wrote this needs to learn how to spell. Trailer has an E, Moron!” I crumpled it back up and tossed it in the general direction of the trash can, not really caring if it went in or not. The teacher was looking rather peeved at my interruption, but the only thing she could do was try and ignore me.

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In the corner of the classroom, Malcolm Werner was trying to get his goony cohorts to shut up because they were elbowing him and laughing. He must have been the brilliant note writer. Jerk. Fortunately for my sanity, the bell rang. I scooped up my sketchbook and joined the hoi polloi of preps exiting the class, many of which tried to stay as far away from me as possible. Now, I thought, would be as good a time as any to ditch. It was actually a good thing that I was at school, because I had left one of my favorite sketchbooks in my locker. I tuned out the sneers and oh-so-ugly-faces of the preps I passed, and made my way to my butter-colored locker. Using the famous punch-and-pull method, I was able to open the locker without actually touching the lock. A big smile tugged at my lips when I saw my prized sketchbook waiting for me. The cover of which was completely filled with random sketches. “Oh, how I have missed you,” I cooed to the book. I had started to flip through the sketch-covered pages when Malcolm’s annoying voice disrupted me. Fortunately, it wasn’t directed at me. Shutting my locker door, I leaned back against it to watch the spectacle he was making of himself. He and his goons were roughing up another preppy boy. His name was Steven Spikafalaus. Great last name, right? Everyone had taken to calling him Spike.

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I only knew who he was, because he was the only preppy that didn’t seem to fit in with the other preppies. He was short and scrawny, and I don’t think I’d ever heard him mutter a single word. Watching the goon squad mess with him almost made me feel bad………..Fine. It did make me feel bad. “You know, Mal,” I said, taking intentional steps in Malcolm’s direction. “It’s such a turn-on when a guy picks on somebody who’s half his size and not nearly so twisted.” I placed my hand confidently on Spike’s shoulder. He flinched a little, but held still. “What would you know,” Malcolm sneered back. “You’re just a piece of trash.” “Is that the best you’ve got,” I replied in my best droll voice. Adding a few large words to throw him off, I continued, “Well, I shouldn’t be surprised. I mean, you are inept at spelling, and you can’t even go to the bathroom without your boys. I’m beginning to wonder if you even have a brain. PS: That’s one ugly shirt. Your mom must still be dressing you.” The traditional ‘oooh’s coming from the onlookers at the burn amped up the energy in the hallway. Anger flared up in Malcolm’s face and he took a menacing step towards me. “Hey!” Marge the office attendant yelled. “What’s going on here?” I casually shrugged, “Oh nothing. Just a big jerk making a big ass of himself.” Malcolm snarled.

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“Miss Maverick!” Marge squealed, and her eyebrows practically disappeared into her hairline. “Watch your language!” “Will do, Marge,” I pledged, and started to walk away. “Miss Maverick?” Marge’s increasingly annoying voice called. Stopping, I replied, “Yes, Marge?” “Where do you think you are you going?” Damn. When I didn’t answer, she said, “This way, Miss Maverick.” Turning around and heading back towards the office aid, she led me to yet another painfully boring class. The rest of the day was much of the same. A boring class followed by an escort from Marge—lather, rinse, and repeat. By the time Marge finally said I was done, I had listened to every song on my iPod twice…and that was saying something. Like a prisoner being set free, I made fast tracks out of the oppressive school until it was just a distant nightmare fading out of sight. My pace slowed down to a trudge as each step led me towards the other oppressive place in my life: home— or rather, the place where I lived. Home was where you felt safe and loved, and I definitely didn’t. The smoke clouds were thick as ever when I opened the door to the trailer. I stood in the doorway for a moment, contemplating running away. “Shut the damn door!” Bob yelled from his place on the couch. “Love to,” I said under my breath, “in your face.”

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“What’s that?” he bellowed. “Nothing.” I closed the door behind me and made a beeline to my bedroom. Noticing the lack of banshee-like yelling, I asked, “Where’s my mom?” “Out getting smokes.” He took a puff of the cigarette he was currently working on and gave me black-toothed smile. “Wanna come over here and keep me company?” Blecch. I’d rather eat cow poop. Without verbally answering his creepy question, I went in my room and locked the door. And just for good measure, I pushed my desk in front of it. Even if it wouldn’t keep him out, it would make a hella noise if he tried to come in. As I crossed my room, I pulled off my now reeking coat and tossed it into the hamper of clothes that weren’t dirty, but stunk too much of cigarettes to be worn without washing. I’d only done laundry just the other day, and I’d already filled the hamper to capacity. Staring down at the toxic clothes, I secretly wished Bob would asphyxiate from the fumes of his own cigarette, leaving me with less laundry to keep up with. I knew that was totally unlikely; Bob was like a cockroach…an insect-like pest that just wouldn’t go away. I tried to assuage myself by pulling out the small calendar I kept in my desk and admiring today’s date. In today’s box were the letters B.D. I had written them in a year ago today. “Happy freak’n birthday to me,” I said glumly to myself. With a thick permanent marker, I crossed a big X over the box. “One more to go till I’m free.”

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I put the calendar back, and went over to lie down on my bed. As was habit, I put in my earbuds and let the music of my playlist blast into my ears, drowning out all the depressing thoughts I wanted to ignore. Too bad it didn’t work very well. Unwanted thoughts about my dad started to drift through my mind. Who was he? Why did he leave?—Well, with a wife like my mom, it wasn’t that hard to guess why he left. These thoughts generally seemed to appear whenever I was still, or when I’d had a particularly crappy day. Probably because I subconsciously believed that if he was here, my life would be completely different, better. The thoughts swirled around my brain until they suffocated me, and finally things started to dim as my eyelids closed.

¢ Twigs snapped under my boots as I walked through a forest. The branches of the glittery black trees reached out, almost as if to grab me. Above me, the sky was pitch black with no stars in sight. The only thing illuminating the gothic scene was the eerie full moon. The wind made an unnatural sort of music that surrounded and confused me as I forced myself to keep moving through the black forest, unsure of where I was going. “Ash….” an ethereal voice called to me, almost seeming to put me into a sort of trance.

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I wanted to follow the voice. I felt its pull, and followed it as it led me through the black forest that seemed to fade farther away as I walked. In the ground, large white stones started to appear in the black forest floor. I started stepping from stone to stone until the forest floor ended, and a cliff emerged. But somehow, the stones were floating in the air, forming a bridge away from the cliff. “Ash, come to me,” the voice called again. Without hesitating, I stepped onto the first floating stone. My weight caused it to sink slightly, but it held. I stepped onto the next stone, and the next after that, till I was far enough out that I could see something forming in the distance. I continued and finally reached the last stone which stopped just before the ledge of a white forest. My boot made a soft thudding sound as I landed on the white ground. The trees here were white too. It was like the opposite of the forest I had just come from. I felt the pull to go forward, and moved through the leafless trees that opened out into a small clearing. I heard the voice say my name again, this time it sounded less ethereal and more physical. Trancelike, I watched as a bright white figure moved towards me from the opposite side of the clearing. The light emanating from it was almost too bright to look at, and I wasn’t able to make out who, or what, it was. “Ash,” it said to me. I reached out my hand towards it, impatient for it to reach me.

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¢ “Ash!” Boom! Boom! Boom! “Ash! Open the damn door!” a very familiar voice yelled. “What do you want!?’ I yelled back, rolling from my sleepy position on the bed. “Get out here!” Bob screeched in reply. I blinked through my groggy stupor and saw that the time on my alarm clock was 2:02 a.m. After getting out of bed, I chaotically shoved the desk out of the way, and wrenched the door open. “What?” “We ordered a pizza.” He gestured towards the front door. “So go and pay the man.” “Did the thought ever cross you mind that I don’t go to work to pay for your pizza,” I responded in a grumpy tone. “Did you ever consider that I wasn’t asking?” He leaned threateningly close to the door, which I put my foot behind, just in case. “Will you hurry up!” my mom said, coming over to the doorway. “Look, Ash, I’ll pay you back.” Grabbing my wallet from the desk, I took a deep breath to calm myself, and pushed through them so I could walk to the front door. “No you won’t.” The delivery boy was impatiently bouncing up and down on the doorstep, but perked up when he saw me coming. I

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recognized him as one of the trashies I used to go to Mason with. “Hey, Clark. How much?” I asked. He returned a smile and said, “Ten.” I handed him the money and took the pizza. “Thanks.” “Yeah, no prob. See ya around, Ash,” he said. He gave me another smile before he left, and I nearly dropped the pizza when his eyes seemed to turn completely black. “Hey!” Bob yelled, snatching the pizza before it could fall from my hands. He gave me a hostile look, but I was too busy trying to figure out what the hell I just saw. Bob, on the other hand, didn’t seem to have noticed anything weird. But then again, he was probably too boozed up to see anything clearly. My mom held out a slice for me, but I pushed passed her and went back to my room. After putting my security measures back in place, I got back in bed, and chalked up the pizza boy hallucination to a sleep overdose. I had already been asleep for ten hours, but somehow, I was still exhausted. Several hours later, I rolled over feeling a little more rested. I pulled myself out of bed and took a shower before my mom or Bob had a chance to wake up and harass me. Although, they’d probably just passed out and hour ago, and would stay that way for the rest of the day. Nuclear bombs couldn’t even wake them when they got that wasted. Good. I knew if I got an early start, Charlie wouldn’t be able to bust me—or drag me to that awful place called ‘school.’

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With my bag packed full of my sketching supplies, I grabbed a slice of left over pizza on my way out the door. Iggy’s would still be closed, so I decided to head over to the tracks. It was exactly what I needed right now, quiet, as well as Mom-and-Bob free. The dreary daylight made the deserted trains littering the desolate tracks look almost eerie. I found my favorite graffiticovered train and climbed in. The backseat of a car had been abandoned in the old train, leaving me with a semicomfortable, but stale place to sit. I curled up into my favorite position for sketching and cranked up my iPod. Letting the music carry me away, I started to sketch. At first, it was just a bunch of random squiggles and streaks, but slowly the picture started to come together. A gothic princess stood on a balcony, overlooking her gothic kingdom. But something was wrong, her face was sad. The heavy chains around her ankles disappeared off the page, holding her captive. I had been so into my drawing that I hadn’t noticed when my iPod had stopped playing. Thanks to the silence I heard a voice yell, “What the hell are you doing here?!” With the crap sufficiently scared out of me, I jumped up. Still, defiant to the end, I yelled back, “That depends! Who the hell are you?! Henry the freaking King of England!” I still couldn’t see where the voice came from.

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“Nothing quite that grand,” the voice said again. This time it was at a much more pleasant decibel. “Yeah, well, last time I checked, America was free country, dude. I have just as much right to be here as you do.” “That is true.” A boy, a little older than me by the looks of it, was standing at the other end of the train car. He was flipping through a book…and not just any book. “Hey!” I yelled. “That’s private!” I crossed the car and snatched my sketchbook back. I had no idea how he managed to snag it without me seeing, but I was less worried about that and more worried about what he might have done to it. After insuring that it was still intact, I looked up at the rude stranger. It was so dark in the car that all I could make out was dark hair and dark eyes on an attractively pale complexion. I cleared my throat after realizing that I was staring. “I like your drawings,” the boy said. “They’re dark, like me…and you apparently.” Something about the way he was looking at me made me think that the darkness of the rail car didn’t obstruct his vision. “Hmm,” I said skeptically, and turned around to collect my things. “I’m sorry if I scared you,” he said. “I thought you were one of those annoying townies.” “Yeah, well, I’m not,” I retorted. “And you didn’t scare me.” He smiled. “Sure.”

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“You didn’t,” I defended. “Your incredible rudeness caught me off guard. That’s all.” He leaned back against the wall of the train car. “In that case, tell me your name so I can apologize properly.” With my bag packed I eyed him distrustfully. “Yours first.” Not seeming surprised by my demand, he answered, “Drake,” and moved closer. The name seemed to suit him. “I’m Ash,” I replied, still unsure of the eerily attractive stranger. He nodded, as if to say he liked it, and said, “I’m sorry, Ash, if my incredible rudeness bothered you.” I looked at him a little longer, trying to discern the color of his eyes. But given how dark it was, it was impossible. I started to leave, and he said, “You don’t have to leave.” “Actually, I do. I find that creepy stalker dudes are a bit of drawing buzz-kill.” “I’m not a creepy stalker dude,” he replied. “Oh?” I cocked my head to the side, “Then why are you skulking around abandoned train cars.” He gave me another amused smile and said, “First of all, I don’t skulk. It’s more of a prowl. And secondly, may I remind you that you’re also in an abandoned train car.” “Skulk—Prowl. Po-tay-to—Po-tah-to,” I retorted. “And I came here to draw, not lurk.” “We’re at an impasse then.” He leapt from the train car, landing deftly on the loose rocks below, and then held out his hand to help me.

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Rolling my eyes, I ignored his hand and jumped down like I always did. But this was the one time that my foot had to land on a wonky rock, and I started to tumble to the side. His reaction to catch me was fast, and before I knew it, his arms had wrapped around me to keep me from careening head first into the dull, but unfriendly rocks. Unfortunately, my leg had caught on the side of the train car during my fall, and I had skinned my knee. After Drake’s arms released me, I bent down to assess the damage. It was a small cut, but it was bleeding as if I’d severed an artery. “Damn,” I cursed, and stood back up. “Ho-ly…” Drake’s face had become distorted and unnatural. His eyes were wild and dangerous, and…fangs were extending from under his upper lip. A ferocious snarl ripped out of his throat, and I took it as my queue to get the hell out of there. Digging my feet in hard as I ran, bits of gravel kicked up with each step. I didn’t look back, and I didn’t stop until I was bursting through the door of the trailer. When I was through, I slammed the door behind me and locked all three locks. My heart felt like it was going to explode out of my chest as I slid to the ground, trying to catch my breath. “What the hell was that?” I asked out loud, hoping that maybe it would help. “What was what?” Bob asked, rousing from his coma on the couch. Collecting myself, I stood up. “Nothing.”

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Before locking myself in my room, I quickly grabbed a wet wash cloth, some antiseptic, and Band-Aids. I sat down at my desk, and while tending my wound I contemplated what had just happened. After sticking on the last Band-Aid, my fingers hungrily searched for my drawing tin. I picked the best charcoal I had, and began to sketch. It was the only way I knew of to deal with what just happened. I framed out the face, then the eyes, and then the full, almost decadently so, lips. The stylishly shaggy hair was next, followed by the shading. When I was done, it looked like a snapshot of the way I remembered seeing Drake’s face before I jumped out of the train car. After staring at it for a while, I hastily flipped the page. I needed to draw while the image was still fresh in my mind. The second sketch started out a lot like the first, but when it came to the mouth and eyes, it was different. A lot different. His pupils were huge, almost taking up the whole iris and making them appear pitch black. His teeth were pointier and definitely dangerous, and his canines were terrifyingly long and sharp. The shading in the second picture made him look paler. Combined together, the changes made him look almost…wicked. I tore out the first drawing so that I could compare the two. And for over an hour, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the sketches. I kept looking at his eyes in the normal picture and then the eyes in the not-normal picture. And then the teeth.

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Without thinking about it too much, I wrote a title on the not-normal sketch.

Drake the Vampire.”

It said, “

I didn’t really believe it, but it was the only thing I could think of to explain the fangs. It started to make more and more sense the longer I thought about it. I had been bleeding right before he went all psycho on me. Not to mention the fact that he was skulking around. Vampires did that right, skulk? But if he was a vampire, why did he let me get away? Weren’t they supposed to be evil, bloodthirsty monsters? Look at me! I’m acting like vampires are actually real. This all had to be a big misunderstanding. Or a joke. Maybe Drake was a friend of the preppies, and together, they were messing with me. Although…those fangs were pretty convincing—so was that snarl.

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TWO

Thud…Thud…Thud My boot tapped a rhythm against the wall in my room as I laid in bed. Tacked to the ceiling above me were the two sketches of Drake. I put them there so that I could contemplate the mystery boy while still being comfortable. It had been two days since I had seen him, and I still couldn’t get the image of him out of my mind. As my thoughts got more confused the thuds would speed up. Eventually it got so bad that Bob started pounding against the door and told me to shut up. I really wanted to punch him. Maybe one of these days I would. I could just wait till he was passed out, and then

WHAM! Right across the chops. He’d never even know, and I would feel a hell of a lot better. I shook my head to get back to my current dilemma. I stared up at Drake #1 and Drake #Crazy for a little longer, but I couldn’t stand it. I wanted answers. “That’s it!” I exclaimed, standing up on the mattress so I could retrieve the drawings. I stuffed them into my sketch book, and put the book in my bag. “Where are you going?” my mom asked as I stormed through the living room. “Out.” I walked with purpose all the way to the train tracks. In my head, I dared Charlie to try and stop me. I was on a mission, and no one was gonna get in my way. No one! Luckily, I didn’t run into anyone on my way, and my crazy mission-rant was spared. I realized, a little too late, as I was walking, that Drake may not be at the tracks anymore. I mean, it’s not like he lived there. If he did, I would have run into him sooner. “He’ll be there,” I told myself. “He has to be. I have to know the truth.” The familiar crunching of the rocks under my feet signaled that I was officially at the tracks. The almost-logical side of me was saying that I should run back the way I came— vampires weren’t good company to keep. The cocky side said, “You’re Ash Maverick, damn it! Not even a freak’n vampire is gonna scare you away from your own turf!”

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I decided to listen to the cocky side. Squaring my shoulders up, I stepped farther into the tracks. My tough act might have been a little better if my hands hadn’t been trembling though. As I stepped around the first deserted train in the yard, my eyes were drawn to the train that I usually hung out in. And there, leaning against it was the mysterious Drake himself. My feet froze where they were, and shockingly, I couldn’t even think of a witty remark. “It took you long enough,” he said to me with a nonchalance that was the complete opposite of his attitude the last time I saw him. I looked around for possible preppies who might pop out and yell, ‘Gotcha, trashy!” When they didn’t, I realized that this wasn’t a joke, and that whatever happened to his face the last time I saw him was for real. “What are you?” I asked. I was just folding my arms across my chest and I realized, that Drake was once again holding my sketchbook. Still unsure of him, I didn’t make a move to get it back, but monster-boy or not, if he caused one penciled line to smear…there would be hell to pay. He arched an eyebrow and held up a paper from my book. It was the not-normal sketch I had made of him. Pointing to the title, he said, “I think you know already.” “So, what? You’re actually admitting to being a vampire?” I asked, almost annoyed. “Isn’t that, like, against the rules or something?”

26

He shrugged. “For someone who didn’t know what I was, you have a good grasp on the rules of my world.” I scoffed. “Puh-leez. Everybody who’s got a pulse,” I then gave him a nod, “and those who don’t, know that that’s a rule.” He let out a muted chuckle at my over-simplification. I walked proudly up to him and snatched back my book. I still couldn’t explain how he had taken it from me, because I hadn’t even seen him move from the spot he was standing. As if I was handling a priceless work of art, I started to make sure the sketchbook was unscathed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I scared you again.” My eyes whipped up to his, and for the first time I noticed that they were dark blue, almost black. “Well, once again, you didn’t scare me.” “Oh?” He didn’t look like he bought it. “So when you screamed and ran away, that was just you being not-scared.” My lips pulled into a tight line. “It wasn’t a scream. It was an exclamation. There’s a difference. And…” I hated that I couldn’t think of something else to say that sounded tough. “And…you we’re scared.” He smiled because he knew he was right. “It’s okay, vampires are supposed to be scary.” “Okay, Drake, so you did scare me. But why apologize? And if you weren’t trying to scare me, why go all fangy in the first place?” I crossed my arms expectantly. “Well, it’s not every day that I run into a witch. Especially in a town like this. It’s kinda the reason I moved here.” He was about to say more but I held up my hands to stop him.

27

“Whoa. Stop. Go back. Did you just call me a witch, you jerk?” I gave him a look signaling that he was now on my short list. “Yeah.” He didn’t seem the least bit sorry. “You are. So what’s the big deal?” “Look,” I said with a scathing voice. “If I wanted to be called names, I would go home, or school, but this is my turf, and not even a vampire is going to ruin that. Got it?” I moved offensively close to his face so that he understood that I wasn’t scared of him anymore. Not seeming fazed by my flare up, he said, “I think you’ve got the wrong idea. Ash, you’re a witch. A real one. I’m not just calling you a name.” That was…not what I was expecting. I staggered back a little. “No way. That’s…not even possible.” “Yes, it is. It’s why I went all crazy the other day,” he explained. “One minute we’re hanging out, having a good time, the next you were falling and I caught you, but then you started bleeding. Normally, that’s not something that would send me off, but when I smelled the Essence in your blood, I couldn’t stop myself. Vampires and witches…” He ran his hands through his hair. “Let’s just say they don’t get along.” “Too much,” I said. “Too much information.” My mind was imploding in on itself with the intake of all this mind baffling information. I thought I was cool for being able to handle the fact that vampires were real, but this…no way. He seemed confused. “You have no idea what I’m talking about do you?”

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I shook my head. He took a deep breath. “Explains why you didn’t try to attack me the other day. I kinda figured you weren’t like other witches when you ran away instead of standing your ground. Most would.” Focusing on the only part of that statement that my overloaded mind could comprehend, I growled out, “Are you calling me a wimp?” I took another defiant step forward. “Because if you are, you’ll find your coffin nailed shut and a ribbon of concrete chains holding it at the bottom of the ocean, Buddy!” “No, not a wimp.” He chuckled. “Just different.” Contemplating that for a moment and backing up, I said, “I guess I can live with that.” I walked over to my favorite train and jumped in. Drake followed. Flopping into the abandoned backseat, I asked, “So, what’s this essence stuff that’s stinking up my blood?” He slid down so that he was sitting on the ground in front of me. “Essence? Well, from what I know, it’s what a witch draws her power from. Potent stuff, too. If a witch is bleeding, I can smell it from several miles away.” I nodded slowly, taking in the information. “I suppose you smelled me for a while then.” “Yeah, can’t say it was unpleasant though.” I almost smiled. “Do we all smell the same? Witches?” I still couldn’t believe I was willingly referring to myself as a witch.

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“No. Every witch’s Essence is different, and some are more potent than others.” I couldn’t help myself, so I asked, “How potent am I?” He smiled. “Potent.” “That’s okay, I guess. If I’ve gotta stink, I might as well stink big.” “You don’t stink,” he replied. “Essence isn’t stinky…it’s just…I don’t even know how to describe it. But you’re right, the more potent the better.” “Why?” “The more Essence, the stronger the witch.” “Hmm.” I let that sink in. “If I’m so potent, how come I had no idea that I’m a witch?” “How old are you?” “Seventeen, as of three days ago. It’s kind of weird how we met the day of my birthday,” I answered, twiddling with the strap of my book bag. “No kidding,” he added. “Look, something is seriously messed up if you had no idea what you were. Most—well, all—witches are part a coven. The coven takes care of bringing up new witches so they’re ready when they inherit their powers, but you…” He shook his head like this was a baffling puzzle he had no idea how to solve. “I’m different.,” I answered for him. Lifting up his head hopefully, he asked, “What about your parents? Do they ever do things that you can’t explain?”

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“All the time.” I sank back against the seat and let out a heavy breath. “My dad abandoned me, and my mom decided that a drunk imbecile was more important than me.” “I meant—” he started to say. “I know what you meant,” I snapped. The subject of my parents was never a good one to linger on. Shaking my head to cool my touchy temper, I said, “I’ve never noticed anything witchy. It would be hard to anyways…my mom is either so drunk that she’s off her rocker, or she’s passed out in a slobbery mess.” Drake didn’t say anything, instead, he just sat there with me. It was like he knew that I needed the quiet, or maybe he was just like me, trying to escape his own sucky life. I was replaying our conversation over in my head, and had my interest piqued. “What did you mean about the whole ‘inheriting powers’ thing?” “Again,” he shrugged, “I’m not the expert on this or anything, but a witch comes into her power on her seventeenth birthday. Normally, she would be guided by the coven as she learns to master it, but, as I’ve noticed, you don’t have one of those.” “Seventeenth? Why that? It seems like it should be eighteen.” He wrapped his arms around his knees, and said, “I think I remember something about the numerology. If you add the numerals that make up seventeen, one and seven, you get eight, and an eight is also the same shape as the infinity sym-

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bol…it’s really complicated, and I didn’t pay that much attention. Didn’t want to.” “Huh,” I sighed. “So, does this mean that I can go all Carrie on the dorkwad preppies at my school?” This brought a smile to his lips. “It could…if you were trained. But as it is, I bet you’re about as powerful as a turnip.” “Damn.” My shoulders slumped. I had really started to like the idea of taking out my witchy vengeance on Malcolm and his mouth-breather sidekicks. “So?” I asked, moving on. “Why don’t we like each other?” “Huh?” he asked with a confused expression. “Witches and vampires. You said they don’t get along. Why?” “Oh.” He nodded. “Well, I personally don’t buy into all the propagated bullshit of the Underworld, but it has something to do with a war that happened forever ago.” I guess that was expected. I mean, couldn’t really expect the beings from the “Underworld” to get along peachy, could I? Stretching out my legs so that I could admire my Doc Martens, I asked, “Why don’t you? Buy the propagated bullshit that is?” Drake seemed to be admiring the exposed bare legs above my boots, but caught himself and looked away. “It all started way before I entered the picture. Besides, I think it’s stupid to hate a race of other people, just because you’re told to.”

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That made sense. Isn’t it why human history is such a freak’n mess? One group of people thinking another wasn’t good enough. I guess the same philosophy could apply to the Underworld. I can’t believe I just used Underworld in an actual sentence. “How long have you been a…you know?” I asked, raising my eyebrows as I said the last part. “How long have I been damned?” he rephrased in a hopeless, but careless tone. “Five years, almost to the day.” “Huh,” I breathed. “I was expecting something like twohundred.” “Do I look two hundred to you?” “No, but isn’t that the benefit of being a vampire?” I said with an isn’t-that-kinda-obvious tone. Watching the way his lips would form into a pout when he was thinking about something, or the way his bangs would fall into his face and he wouldn’t care, I couldn’t help but be attracted to Drake. It was almost inevitable. As the emo princess of Sunnyview, and now witch newbie, it would go against the laws of nature if I wasn’t attracted to him—well, maybe not the witch part. He leaned forward confidently and lifted the sketchbook that was resting in my lap. “May I?” he asked. I nodded, and he pulled it back. Starting to look through it, his hand unconsciously reached up and soothed a spot on his neck. “Is that where you were bitten?” I couldn’t help but ask.

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“Huh?” He looked up from the book, a little confused. I pointed to his neck. His hand dropped from it, and he said, “Yeah.” In the most polite tone I was capable of, I asked, “How did it happen?” He let out a jaded chuckle. “It’s actually pretty stupid. I mean, the odds of it happening were like one in a gazillion. I guess I was that really unlucky one.” His fingers traced the edge of the sketchbook as he talked. “It was a Friday night, and my friend had scored an invite to this rave. So, we showed up thinking we were gonna find some hot chicks to dance with—maybe even get lucky.” I rolled my eyes in complete disgust. “Do I really want to hear this?” “I don’t know. Do you?” He waited for me to answer. I debated, and finally gave relenting nod. “Fine, but no more talk of getting lucky.” “As you wish, Highness,” he mocked. Getting back to his story, he said, “We were making our way through the crowd to find some girls. It was dark out, but since we were in the middle of the desert, you could see almost every star in the sky. “I was just about to ask this pretty little blond to dance with me, when a hand glided up my arm. It was the most beautiful girl I had seen in my eighteen years of existence. She had crimson colored hair, pale alabaster skin, and eyes the color of jade. I thought I was the luckiest guy on the planet.

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“We were dancing so close that it felt like our bodies were fused together. The heavier the beats got, the more I felt like I was going into a trance,” he explained. His eyes weren’t even looking at me anymore. He was lost in his own memory. “She pulled my face down to hers and we started kissing. And not pretty either. She started making her way to my neck, and I was thinking, ‘Oh yeah!’ Then, all of a sudden, she bit me, hard. “I tried to push her off of me, but she was hanging on for dear life. The only thing that came to mind was to punch her—I had been drinking a lot before the party, so my logic was about as good as a caveman’s. “I wound up, and released the punch, which went right into her nose. Her head flew back, sending blood spurting everywhere, including my mouth. At the time, I wasn’t too worried about it. Looking back, I think, ‘What an idiot.’” He shook his head in disapproval of his past stupidity. “I later found out that she wasn’t a supermodel cannibal, like I’d thought, but instead, a vampire. And when her blood got in my mouth, it completed the final step in the turning ritual. Although, I’m pretty sure she was just trying to get a quick snack—not make an undead teenager. “And that is how I became ‘Drake the Vampire,’” he said, using the title from my picture. “Wow,” I said dully. “That sucks.” I thought about it for a minute and added, “You’re right, that is stupid. But…if it’s any consolation,” I scooted forward, “I think you’re pretty

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cool.” I picked up the sketchbook, putting it back in my bag, and stood up. “You’re leaving?” He seemed caught off guard. “Yeah. I gotta go to work.” I held out my hand to help him up. He admired it for a second, and then placed his hand in it. His skin was cool to the touch, but not uncomfortably so. “Where do you work?” he asked as I helped pull him up, although, it wasn’t that hard—what with his super vampstrength and all. In response to his question, I scrunched up my eyebrows. “Are you doing your creepy stalker thing again?” “No.” he laughed. “I was just curious.” “Mm-hmm,” I replied doubtfully, my eyes connecting with his. “Fine,” he relinquished. “I was thinking maybe I could walk you there.” “What?” I said blankly. “You want to…walk me to my job?” “Yeah, but not if it’s a big deal.” He shrugged, and started towards the opening of the train. “It’s not,” I said, quickly regaining my composure. “As long as you don’t skulk.” He leapt from the opening, barely making a sound on the loose rocks as he landed, and shook his head. “You do it once, and she’ll never let you live it down.” Trying to hide my smile, I approached the edge. He held out his hand for me—hm, déjà vu—and I thought about it.

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But, I’m Ash Maverick, needer of no one, so I didn’t take it. But just because I don’t need him to help me out, doesn’t mean I need to be stupid. Instead of jumping, I sat down on the lip so that my legs were dangling. Drake, by now, had crossed his arms and was watching me amusedly. “Let me know of you need anything,” he offered casually. “I won’t,” I retorted. Although, I probably should have thought about how wearing a skirt might make this maneuver a little more complicated. Wiggling a little this way, and a little that way, I tried to make it easier to slide off without flashing my goodies at Drake. He seemed thoroughly smug with himself when I couldn’t. Giving up on propriety, I snapped, “Turn around,” at him. “Anything you say, Princess.” He turned around slowly, and started to whistle. “Princess,” I snarled under my breath. “I’ll give you Princess alright.” Now that I wasn’t worried about the goods showing, I pushed myself off the edge and landed with a thud. Unfortunately, the same damn rock that betrayed me last time reared its ugly rock face and tried to do it a second time. Arms once again wrapped around me, cradling me from falling over. I looked up into Drake’s eyes, accusingly, and said, “You were looking weren’t you!” I was pretty sure that wasn’t what he was expecting me to say.

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His arms quickly, and a little brusquely, released me, causing me to flail my arms a bit to balance myself. “You’re welcome,” he grumped, and skulked off. “What’s your problem?” I asked, slushing through the loose rocks back towards town. He shook his head. “Not-a-thing.” Joining in-step with me, he asked, “Are you gonna tell me where we’re going? Or do I have to wait and see?” “You don’t really have to walk me, you know?” I said while adjusting the strap of my bag on my shoulder. I wasn’t used to “bonding” with other people, and I figured it would be best if we just kept our interactions to the odd grunt here and there as we passed each other on the tracks. He could do his thing, and I could do mine. It wasn’t like we had to make something out of this—whatever this was. “I know,” he replied. “I want to.” Or not. “Frank’s Grocery,” I said. “What?” He looked at me. “That’s where I work.” “Oh.” He nodded. “S’cool.” “No,” I scoffed. “It’s not. But it pays enough to buy food and then stash a little away for my escape.” “Your escape?” His black-blue eyes perked up. “Yeah. When I turn eighteen I’m getting as far away from this town as I can. I’ve already got enough to support myself for a year, which should be long enough to find somewhere where I fit in and get a job.”

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“You sound like you’ve got it all planned out.” We rounded the corner and were within seeing distance of the grocery store where I worked. A tingle of disappointment ran through me at the knowledge that when we got there, he would be skulking back to wherever he goes, and that I wouldn’t be going with him. I liked being around somebody as messed up as myself, and he certainly wasn’t hard to look at. “I’m not gonna grow any warts am I?” I asked out of the blue as we approached the entry to the store. “I’m not even going to pretend to understand where that question came from,” he answered with an amused smile. “I’m a witch…and…witches have big bulbous noses with warts. I’m just wondering if I should start stocking up on some ‘Wart-be-Gone’ or something?” “Ash.” He shook his head. “Some of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen are witches. Deadly, but beautiful.” “Oh.” A smile found its way to my lips. That was definitely good to know. A small twinge of jealousy reared up at hearing Drake call other women beautiful, but I promptly smacked it back down where it belonged. Besides, he’d also called them deadly. “I’ll, uh, see ya,” I said to him before turning to go inside. “Yeah,” he said back. I caught one last look at him before the mechanical door slid shut, sentencing me to the next four hours of manual labor.

39

As I rang out a multitude of preppy shoppers, I observed all the random foods that they bought, and wondered what— or who—Drake was eating so that he could stay alive. I quickly decided I didn’t want to know—especially if it was a who. “Time’s up, Maverick!” Thames, my spindly middle-aged manager yelled from across the store. As he got closer to clock me out, I was able to make out the bad comb over that he used to try and cover his balding head. I turned the off light on my register, and gladly removed my apron. “Thank God,” I said to myself. “Good work, today,” his sniveling voice said while he wrote on his clipboard. “I barely even noticed your surly attitude.” Not being one to take gibes lying down, I replied, “Nice hair today. I almost didn’t notice you were going bald.” The pen he was scribbling with stopped, and the lower lid of his left eye started to twitch. Thames was phobic of people commenting on his baldness. I knew my comment was probably enough to send him into a suicidal state, but he started it. Pursing his lips tightly, he shoved the clipboard into my hands. I signed out for the day gave it back. “Later, Thames.” I stepped out of my cubby, and towards the door. Behind me, I heard him mumble something along the lines of “Ingrate.” It was music to my ears.

40

Outside, it was dark already. I liked it that way. The sounds of my boots hitting the pavement made little echoes as I crossed the street. The walk from the store to the trailer wasn’t that long, but I had to pass through several preppy neighborhoods to get there, and that was something I didn’t like. Up a-ways, the street lamp that normally illuminated the corner intersection was out. Most likely busted out by invading trashies. Go trashies! But right now, I sort of wished they could have waited to do it until after I had made it home. Sounds of goonish laughter in the distance made my ears perk up. I couldn’t tell if I was getting closer to it, or if it was getting closer to me. I started to pick up the pace, but came to a complete stop when I saw them. Malcolm and his gang. The way they were all wobbling made me think that it wasn’t cola in the cans they were holding. “Look guys!” Mal exclaimed, pointing directly at me. “It’s our favorite troshic gathy—I mean gathic troshy—” He paused a moment to clear his booze soaked brain. “I mean gothic trashy.” They started to stumble their way over to me, tossing their cans to the side. I looked around for possible routes of avoidance. During the daytime, I would have stood my ground, but right now…best to get the heck out of dodge. Too bad my damn Essence wasn’t trained to kick some preppy ass, or else I would have wiped the street with these

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jerks. I saw a side street to the left and started to head in that direction. “Whoa, whoa!” one of Mal’s boys said, blocking my escape. “Come on, Maverick!” Mal called out. “You’re never this quiet when were surrounded by an audience!” The rest of his boys started forming a circle around me and then tightening it up. I wondered if they’d learned this tactic in ‘How to be an Oaf 101.’ When he was close enough, Mal clumsily reached out and grabbed a handful of my ass, saying, “Come on, Trashy. This’ll be just between us.” Then started to lean his face towards mine. Snarling, I said, “Promise?” “Oh, yeah. The boys won’t tell a soul.” He started to pull me closer. “Good, wouldn’t want Charlie finding out.” The statement confused him, and he let out a, “Huh?” With my palm, I gave a swift thrust to the underside of his nose. I remembered it from the one and only time I watched “Miss Congeniality.” Mal’s head flung back and he yelled, “Shit! You broke my freak’n nose!” The blood was already starting to run down his face. “And you touched my ass,” I replied. “Consider us even.” When he looked back at me, there was murder in his eyes. “Not even close.”

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As if that was some unknown queue, the boy to my left delivered a mindbreakingly hard punch to my gut. I was seeing stars before I even hit the pavement. And just when I thought I might survive from the pain, a white Converse came colliding with my rib cage, followed by another to my face. The force of it threatened to knock me out, but somehow I managed to hang onto the edge of consciousness. I could see a leg preparing to deliver another blow when a deafening growl filled the air. At first I thought it came from one of the boys attacking me, but when they all froze and started to look around, I realized it wasn’t them. “What the hell was that?!” Mal yelled. “I dunno, man. Stray dog?” a boy replied. Another said, “No way! That was not normal!” Taking this as an opportunity to get away, I started to pull myself off the pavement. “Oh no you don’t,” the boy who punched me said, noticing my movement. He pulled back his arm so that he could punch me back down, and was just about to follow through when something collided with him, and before my eyes could see what it was, it pulled him into the darkness of the bushes. “Crap!” Mal yelled. “Did you see that!?” Just then, another one of his boys yelled, but by the time I could look at him, he was gone—taken by whatever was out there. “I’m outta here, man!” Mal’s remaining boy yelled, and started running down the road, only to be snatched into the darkness. After a moment, his scream sounded the distance.

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I was barely able to sit up without grimacing in pain, which meant that running away wasn’t an option for me. Next to me, Mal was shaking with fear. Every time a twig would snap or a noise would echo, he would jump out of his skin like a little ninny. “Wuss,” I said, spitting out the blood that accumulated in my mouth. “Shut up!” he yelled back. The sound of nails clicking on the pavement was getting closer. I lifted my head in their direction, dropping my jaw when I saw two glowing gold eyes looking at me—almost as if they were suspended in the darkness. “Oh my God!” Mal whimpered when he saw it, and grabbed my shoulders to hide behind. What a douche! The…thing let out a ferocious snarl and started prowling closer. As it came out of the darkness and into the dim light of the street lamp, I could see just how ferocious it really was. Jet black hair covered it’s almost human-like head, and trailed down its back, forming a mohawk. It walked on all fours, but looked like it didn’t have to. Sharp teeth were revealed as it let out a snarl, and its nose protruded out farther from its face, almost like a snout—a scary snout. Its skin was just as black as its hair, giving me the impression of one big, scary shadow. I was sure if it stood on its back feet it would be at least eight feet tall. Which, as if it had read my mind, it reared back, baring its razor teeth at us.

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Frozen, I couldn’t even breathe. Mal, on the other hand, was shaking hard enough to cause a small earthquake. His hands were digging in to my shoulders so hard that I was starting to lose feeling to my arms. The thing let out another snarl. Slamming its front claws down on the pavement, he pounced towards us with lightning speed. I closed my eyes and braced for those deadly claws to sink into me, but was shocked when they didn’t. All I felt was air hitting my face, and then Mal’s hands being ripped away from my shoulders. Utterly bewildered, I sat there for a while, but then I realized that maybe, it would be coming back for me after it was done with Mal. So I waited, and waited…and waited. After a good five minutes passed with no sounds of growling, I decided to let myself believe that it wasn’t coming back. Slowly, and painfully, I pulled one leg under me, then the other. Bending my knee, I started to stand, and I was crazed to find that the simple act of standing caused a searing pain in the general vicinity of my ribs. I prayed that nothing was broken. With one foot in front of the other, I tottered the rest of the way home, and climbing the two concrete block steps to the trailer door caused me enough pain to wish I were dead. “You look like shit,” Bob acknowledged as I limped towards my room.

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“You too,” I replied limply. My body may have been broken, but my attitude was still strong. Haphazardly, I shoved my desk in front of the door, using the only part of my anatomy that didn’t hurt—my butt. And carefully, I lowered my aching body onto my deformed mattress. For the first few minutes everything, and I mean everything, hurt. But slowly, I was pulled into unconsciousness. Blissful unconsciousness.

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THREE

My eyes flickered open when a noise, something unpleasant, woke me from my sleep. As soon as I tensed my muscles to sit up, I wished I hadn’t. The memories, and the pain, of my misadventure from last night swirled to the surface of my mind. Knock, knock, knock…the noise sounded again. “Ash?” a voice that didn’t belong to my mom, or Bob, asked. “Ash, please open the door.” After coercing my body to comply with my brain’s commands, I was able to get up and go to the door. Using the same method I had last night, I pushed the desk out of the way, and cracked the door open just enough to get a glance at the person on the other side.

At seeing who it was, I opened it all the way. “Charlie?” I mumbled, carefully wiping the sleep out of my eyes, one of which felt swollen and sore. “Ash.” He winced at seeing my face, making me wonder how bad I looked. He looked back over his shoulder to where Bob had once again reclined on the couch with his newly lit cigarette in his mouth, and raised his eyebrow skeptically. Looking down at his shoes, Charlie formulated what to say. “I actually came here to question you about an incident that happened last night involving the Werner kid and his friends, but from the looks of it, I’d say whatever got them, also got you. I was kinda hoping it was you who beat them up.” He gave a sympathetic smile and looked at the desk that was erratically pushed to the side, and then glanced back out towards Bob, understanding why. The tips of his ears were reddening, which I knew this only happened when he was working to contain his anger. “Hey,” I said letting out a tight breath, trying to distract him. “Don’t doubt my mad assassin skills. It could have been me who beat em’ up.” I had to lean against the doorway to help ease the pain my ribs were now giving me. “Are you kidding?” He shook his head. “You look way worse than the boys do.” After having a little laugh, his eyes got serious, and he asked, “But seriously, Ash, are you okay?” “Me?” I replied, “I’m great. Never felt better.” “Ash,” he replied doubtfully. “Okay, okay,” I admitted. “So it feels like I’m going to die, but I’ll mend. Besides,” I looked out to where my Mom and

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Bob were sacked out, “there’s no point in being a baby about it.” “You need to go to the hospital. Come on, I’ll give you a ride.” He began to turn around, expecting me to follow. “No, what I need is to go back to bed. So if you don’t mind, I think I will.” I started to close the door, but he stuck his foot in at the last minute. “You could be seriously injured, Ash.” “I’ll deal.” I tried to shut the door again, but no use. “Fine,” he said. “But I’ll be back tomorrow, and if you’re not better, I’m taking you to the hospital. Whether or not I have to use cuffs is up to you.” “Kinky.” I raised an eyebrow, regretting it almost immediately as pain assaulted my swollen eye. Fortunately, my comment shocked him enough that his foot was no longer blocking my door from shutting, and I took the opportunity to promptly shut it in his face. So, the thing that attacked the Douche Crew last night had left them alive. What a shame. Honestly, I was a little surprised. It didn’t seem like you could get handled by those claws and live to talk about it. And speaking of fighting, it sounded like Charlie had thought I was the one who beat them up. My reputation proceeded me. Breaking Mal’s nose had felt really good. I wondered if the boys had told Charlie what attacked them, or if they even remembered. They had been really drunk.

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“Jeez!” I yelped when trying to sit back down. Maybe Charlie had been onto something when he suggested going to the hospital. Every time I inhaled, it felt like my lungs were doing a Turkish polka against my rib cage. As I settled back down against my mattress, I looked over at the time, and saw that I had six hours until I had to be at work. Thames would love any excuse to fire me, and another absence was a perfect one. I’d already missed two shifts this month, and he’d threatened that if I missed another one, I’d be done. Something told me that nothing short of death would be a reasonable excuse for missing another shift. My eyes started to drift shut, and before I fell asleep, I wondered what Drake would have to say about the thing from last night. That is, if he was still around. Who knew if he even lived in Sunnyview?

¢ My fingers clutched handfuls of earthy dirt. I opened my eyes to reveal the dark sky above me, and the white forest around me. I was lying with my back against the ground, and my hair was fanned out on the ground around my face. Sitting up to look around, I realized I was in the same place as before, when the voice had been calling to me. Lifting my hands up so I could observe them, the white dirt I was holding felt soft, almost friendly. An urge to rub it all over my body crept into my mind, but I resisted.

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“Use it,” that same mysterious voice commanded. It was impossible to figure out where it came from, but it sounded like it came from everywhere. “Use what?” I asked. “The dirt?” No reply came. “Hey!” I yelled out to the empty forest. “I’m talkin’ to you!” “Use it.” “Now you’re just repeating yourself,” I mumbled and stood up, patting my hands against my legs to remove the dirt. Looking around, I waited for the voice to reply. Still nothing. I was just about to call out again, when I felt hands on my back, and was shoved towards the ground. “Use it.” Falling to my hands and knees, I felt my anger growing. “What the hell!” I wanted to stand up and kick the crap out of whoever pushed me, but my hands and legs were stuck in the dirt, as if held by quicksand, and warmth started traveling up my arms and legs. “Hey! What’s going on?” I yelled, attempting to free my hands. The voice was stern. “Be still!” And as the voice seemed to get stronger so did the warmth flowing through me, almost uncomfortably so. “Ok!” I snapped. “I’m not a piece of toast—you don’t have to burn me!”

¢

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My eyes opened, and the shabby, paneled ceiling of my room greeted me. “Ugh,” I grumbled. “I’m losing my mind….Use it.” Tediously, I got out of bed, and noticed that I had forty five minutes to get to work. “Damn.” “Use the dirt?” I repeated, trying to work out the riddle of my dream. “How does a person use dirt?” I’d never been a believer that dreams held messages, but I’d also never had the same dream twice—that is—I’ve never dreamt about being in the same place twice. Maybe it had something to with my new witchy identity. It took me twice as long as it normally did just to hobble my way to work, but I noticed that my ribs weren’t screaming at me quite as loud as they had been before. Thames was impatiently thumping his foot at my register, waiting to clock me in. “You’re three minutes late,” he announced. “Dock me.” I flipped on the dim light above my register and entered my code into the machine. Noticing my bruised appearance, he said, “Did somebody finally get fed up with your bad manners?” “Ha. Ha,” I grumbled. “Are you done yet? Some of us actually have work to do, Thames.” “Thankfully, yes.” He finished scribbling on his clipboard and sauntered off, high water pants and all. Half an hour into my shift, I developed a method for moving the items from the counter to the bag that only provoked minimal amount of pain. It consisted of holding my breath to

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pick the object up, and bending my knees till I was at just the right level to set it in the bag. Ridiculous, yes, but it was better than the alternative. I had just finished checking out a snooty-looking prep soccer mom, when I saw Sherie Werner, Mal’s mom. Since it was late, there was only one other lane open, and the line for it was backed up. She stood in between my lane and the other, debating her choice. People only went through my line when there was no alternative. They liked the familiarity that the other normal cashiers offered. And with my mashed up face, I had to look super scary. Mrs. Werner looked at the other lane, and then back at mine which had no customers waiting. Taking a deep breath, she regretfully pushed her cart into my lane. Damn. “Ashley,” she said with a stale voice, her steel blue eyes never deigning to look at me. “Sherie,” I replied with the same tone. With the expression of a sour grape, she set her items on the conveyor belt for me to ring up. As I rang her gazillion containers of yogurt up, I caught her staring at my bruised face. She quickly looked away, busying her hands with getting her wallet out of her purse. “Looks like the same thing that attacked my son attacked you too.” “Not likely,” I replied. “Unless your son has developed the very rare ability of being able to beat himself up.”

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Her eyes flared, and her bottom lip sucked in as if I had just cussed at her or something. “Nobody likes a liar, Ashley,” she chided. Aware that Thames was watching me, I bit my tongue. I still needed this job if I wanted to make enough money to get out of here and survive on my own. And insulting Mrs. Werner would be a quick way of losing it. I got back at her the only way I could, I put her loaf of bread under her canned goods. Passive aggression was just as good as the real thing. Finally, her order was scanned, and the sound of her heels clicking on the floor as she got farther away was music to my ears. I took a moment to calm myself, and take some of the pressure off my ribs by leaning against the partition of my register. “Hey,” a voice said. I had been looking down at the ground and hadn’t noticed the tube of toothpaste that was moving towards me on the belt. I looked up and saw Drake’s familiar face smiling at me. Almost as soon as he saw my face, his smile disappeared. “What the hell happened to you?” “Long story.” I swiped the toothpaste across the scanner, giving Drake an inquisitive look in the process. “Toothpaste?” “Yep. Gotta keep the fangs plaque free,” he replied. He was still looking at my face with a worried expression. “I’ve got time, you know, for long stories.”

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“Unfortunately, I don’t.” After nodding to Thames, who had been gawking at Drake, the skinny man quickly dropped his eyes back to his clipboard. “Not right now anyways,” I added. Regarding Thames with a dry expression, Drake looked back at me and said, “Right, well, I’ll be around when you’re ready.” He handed me the money for the toothpaste, and I handed him the tube. “Ok.” As he was walking away, I noticed how the light from the fluorescent bulbs hanging over us seemed to be absorbed by his pale skin, instead of illuminating it. It was like he created his own darkness. Cool. The end of my shift came none too soon, and along with it, the pointed barbs that Thames and I usually exchanged. I stepped out into the dark night with a different attitude than last night, and with a new friend. In my pocket, my hand curled around a can of pepper spray. It would come in handy whether I was being molested by a pack of teenage goons, or a freaky mutant-thing. I was sure that those big golden eyes were just as susceptible to Mace as anybody else’s. I let out a sigh of relief when I made it past the point where I’d been bombarded last night. But when I heard a crunch come from the brush alongside the street, my whole body went on high alert. Another crunch… Then I got that feeling—the one you get when you know there’s someone behind you.

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Slowly removing the pepper spray from my pocket, I tried not to give off any clues that I was aware of the presence. When I was ready, I took a breath, and spun around on my heel, much to the objection of my ribs. With the pepper spray ready to douse my intruder, a hand quickly flew by my face, taking the can with it. “I come in peace,” Drake said, standing a mere five inches away from me. It was cold enough out that my breath was making little mist clouds in front of my face. Drake, on the other hand, wasn’t breathing. I let out a relieved breath, then sneered at him, “You’re doing it again, creepy stalking.” “No.” He smiled. “I was just making sure you got home okay.” My face went stagnant. “Oh.” Crossing my arms, I said, “I think I preferred the stalking.” “Fine.” He raised an eyebrow. “Have it your way, witch.” In a blur of black, his body disappeared, leaving me standing in the deserted street. “Wait!” I yelled to the emptiness. “You still have my pepper spray!” Damn. That pepper spray was expensive.

¢ The next morning came fast, too fast. And, as he said he would be, Charlie came to see me. He took a seat at the

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kitchen table, and watched me pull my Pop-Tarts out of the toaster then turn to face him while leaning back against the counter. He scrutinized my bruised face, obviously looking for signs of weakness that would give him an excuse to take me to the hospital. Fortunately for me, my ribs didn’t feel as crappy as they did the day before, and standing up straight was almost bearable. “You wanna tell me what happened?” he asked while I chomped down on my s’more flavored treat. I assumed he was talking about my beat-up condition. “What do you think happened?” I volleyed back. “Well.” He leaned back in the rickety dining chair. “I know that sometime after midnight last night, Mal was found on his mother’s kitchen floor bleeding and rambling incoherently about monsters attacking him,” he paused to choose his words, and continued with, “and you, Ash. But of course, he was way over the legal limit for alcohol, as were his friends. Then I found you barricaded in your room looking like you’ve been beat all to Hell and back. It doesn’t make sense Ash. None of it. Now tell me what really happened.” “You’re half-way correct,” I replied. “What, that something attacked you?” He wrinkled his eyebrows. “No.” Finishing off the first Pop-Tart, I reached for the second. “That something attacked them.” Throwing his head back slightly, he said, “What the heck is that supposed to mean, Ash?”

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“You tell me.” He shook his head, and looked back up at me. “You’re not going to tell me who did this to you, are you?” Leaning back against the faded kitchen counter, I said, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. And even if you did, there’s nothing you could do about it.” I rolled my eyes, not at Charlie, but at the simple truth of my statement. When it came to the trashies and the preppies, the trashies would always lose. Mal would never be punished for beating up a trashy, not even if they were a girl. Standing up, Charlie said, “You know, not everyone believes that people like the Werners are perfect. Maybe one day you’ll see that there are actually a few decent people in Sunnyview—ones you can trust. You let me know if you remember anything else. Okay?” He tipped his head to me, like a cowboy might tip their hat, and went out the creaking metal door of the trailer. So he knew that it was Malcolm and his gang that beat me up—so what. It doesn’t change a thing. Just because Charlie believes in me, doesn’t mean the rest of the town would—the preppy part, that is. “What’d he want?” my mom asked while sauntering out of her room. Her hair looked like a rat’s nest, and the eyeliner she had applied who-knows-when was smeared around her eyes, giving her the appearance of a hung-over raccoon. She took the half-eaten Pop-Tart from my hand and started nibbling on it. “You’re not in trouble are you?”

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“Of course I am, Mother,” I snapped. “But don’t worry, I can still keep working to buy food for you and your lazy boyfriend.” She winced at my comment, and for the first time in a long time, I thought I saw some remorse. She must be sobering up. She started to say, “I’m sorry, baby. I know I haven’t been a good mother—” “Save it.” I held up my hand. Her apologies had lost all their meaning a long time ago. Shaking my head, I went back to my room to gather some clothes. A steaming shower would help clear out my head from all of the crap that was rolling around up there. Crap like a vampire whose main hobby was stalking me, being beaten senseless by the one guy I truly hated, a creepy mutant thing prowling the streets, Charlie, and now that look of regret from my mom. It was enough to drive a girl crazy. Stepping into the misty hot water, I tried to ignore how filthy the tiled tub surround was. Almost as soon as the water hit my face, it was like instant crap-reduction therapy. I marinated in it for a while, and then decided to lather up my shampoo. I had just saturated my hair with it when the water started pressure started rapidly receding. “No, no, no,” I said to the showerhead, while cranking the water valve all the way to full. It didn’t seem to help, and within seconds, I was standing in the shower stall with no water, and a head covered in eyestinging shampoo. “Crap.”

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Fighting back the invading shampoo, I dried off and sealed my toxic hair up in a towel turban. After I was dressed, I stormed into the living room to find my mom sitting on the couch, bottle in hand. So much for sobering up. “There’s no water,” I spat. “Huh,” she chuckled. “Must not have paid the bill.” She took another sip from her bottle, not seeming to care about the water crisis. Probably because she never bathed anyway. And the only water she drank was in the form of melted ice cubes in her whiskey glass. “You’re a train wreck.” My voice was coated with disgust. “So are you, baby. So are you,” she cooed from her stupor. Letting out a scoff, I left the trailer, slamming the door on my way out. I needed to get away from her. If I didn’t, I was liable to do something reckless. Only after stomping through two blocks, did I realize I still had a towel on my head. Pulling it off, my hair fell into matted strands around my face. The shampoo was drying and making my hair feel sticky and rough. I needed to get it out. The trailer obviously wasn’t an option, so I wracked my brain for alternatives. The first one that came to mind was the showers at Westminster, but I quickly dismissed it. Any idea involving me going to school was a bad one. I remembered that I had seen a stream near the tracks, and figured it was better than walking around with sticky hair. Listening to the sounds of my boots clunk against the rocks as I walked through the abandoned rail yard towards

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the stream, I replayed my mom’s words in my head. So are you. Was I a train wreck? Sure my life was effed-up as hell, but a train wreck, really? Dashing my foot through the rocks, I said, “What does she know anyway?” Approaching it, I noticed that the stream was a lot smaller, and shallower, then I remembered. Being able to get all the shampoo out would be nothing short of a miracle. At least no one is around to see this utterly humiliating, and degrading, point in my life, I thought as I started sopping my hair through the low water. I all but kissed the ground as I tried to get low enough to get the shampoo hiding in the roots of my hair. “Not that this isn’t interesting to watch,” Drake’s smug voice said from behind me, bringing me to a sopping halt. “But what the hell are you doing?” I thought of ways to spin the situation so I didn’t seem so pathetic, but in truth, they were all pathetic excuses. I squeegeed the excess water from my hair, and stood up. “The water ran out while I was in the shower.” I scooped my hair, still covered in shampoo, back into its towel turban. I waited for Drake to laugh or make a funny face at me, but he didn’t, he looked at me in…in a way I can’t describe. It made the little black butterflies in my stomach start fluttering. Shrugging his shoulders, he said, “Well, I have a shower you can use.

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It took a moment for the thought to register. I was still busy sorting out the look, and then I finally realized what he had said. “You have a shower? But you live at the tracks.” He rolled his eyes. “For one of the wittiest girls I know, you can also be the stupidest. I don’t live at the tracks, Ash.” Duh. “Right.” I shook my head, which caused my towel to wobble on my head, and joined him. Following his lead, we walked all the same streets it took to get back to my house, and even passed it. I tried not to look at it as we went by. There seemed to be an awkwardness hanging in the air between us, created by all the questions we had for each other, and not being able to ask them. Figuring what the hell, I said, “So how is this even possible?” Reaching over to grab his hand, I marveled at its paleness in the light of the sun. “How are you able to be in the sunlight? I thought that was a vampire no-no.” He seemed caught off guard by my contact, and I quickly released his hand. Clearing his throat, he said, “Myth. Vampires have always been able to go out during the day. We just stand out more during the day than at night. So, in a sense, we don’t like to go out during the day.” “Interesting.” He led us onto a quiet street, where all the abandoned trailers had been dumped. Nobody came here anymore. I looked around for signs of where he was taking me, but all I

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saw was the twisted metal and rotting boards of old gnarled trailers. “Are you gonna tell me?” he asked, keeping his eyes pointed straight ahead. “Tell you what?” Looking over to me, his eyes settled on my black eye. “Your long story.” “Oh, that. Um…” I thought of where to begin. “It was just a bunch of preppy jerks. They were drunk, and I had an attitude.” I shrugged it off. With a voice that was too casual to be genuine, he asked, “What are their names?” “Why? Are you gonna hunt them down and beat them up?” “Maybe,” he replied. “I haven’t decided yet.” I couldn’t help but smile. “You’re too late, Prince Charming,” I announced. “Somebody else beat you to it—well, it’s more like a something else.” “What?” he said, coming to halt. “What do you mean?” A crease formed over the bridge of his nose, making his midnight sky colored eyes stand out even more. “This thing, I don’t know what it was, stopped them. It was—well—it made your other face look friendly.” Drake didn’t like that. “Can you describe it?” “Big—really big, black all over, with hair going down its back, gold eyes the size of half-dollars, sharp teeth,” I described. “I know it’s weird, but its body almost looked human.”

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Putting a hand to his forehead, he turned away, “Great. One more thing to worry about.” “What?” I asked, stepping around so I was in front of him. I had to look ridiculous, standing there with my towel on my head. “That thing. The monster,” he started to say. “Yeah,” I encouraged. “It’s called a garoul.” With a confused expression, I said, “A what?” “A garoul.” “Okay, not helping. What’s a go-rule-thingy?” “It’s like a werewolf, except garouls aren’t infected with their ability, they’re born with it,” he explained with a troubled expression. Shaking my head, I asked, “How do you know it wasn’t a werewolf?” “Because,” his voice was low, “you’re still alive.”

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FOUR

“Hey! Wait up,” I called to Drake. After telling me the only reason I was alive, was because the creepy mutant thing was a garoul and not a werewolf, he’d started hauling ass further into the abandoned trailer lot. “We can’t talk out here,” he said tightly over his shoulder. “Why not?” I asked, slightly out of breath from running after him. The towel on my head was now bobbing wildly from side to side. “It could be listening.” “Oh. Well, that’s creepy.” Clamping a hand down on the towel, I focused on keeping up with him. We hung a left around a mashed up, mustard yellow trailer, and then a right around a crunched Winnebago. It was like a trailer cemetery.

But there, amidst all of this trailer-death, was beautiful, shiny silver Airstream, attached to the back of a black Hummer. “Whoa,” I gawked at it. It was the nicest thing I’d ever seen. Drake stopped to see why I wasn’t walking with him anymore, and when he saw my expression, he smiled, as if to say, “Thanks,” and then tugged me towards the heavenly trailer. “How can you afford something like this?” I asked, practically salivating over the trailer. “Won it in a fight.” He shrugged casually. Inside, it was like a hotel on wheels. Black walnut cabinetry flowed seamlessly with the chrome panels. And a massive white sofa banked up against a wall with a large window. “Why on earth were you hanging out at the tracks!?” I exclaimed. “If this was mine, I would never leave.” “Maybe I was looking for company,” he replied while shutting the door behind us. “At the tracks?” I gave him a skeptical look. “I found some, didn’t I?” “Hmm.” I shrugged. He had a point, but he was still crazy. “The bathroom is over there.” He pointed to a small door. “We can talk when you’re done.” “Ok.” I started to go in, and before I did, I said, “Thanks, Drake. You may be a creepy stalker, but at least you’re a cool one.”

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I didn’t wait for him to respond before shutting the door. I wasn’t sure I was ready for it. He was already doing things to me—things I wasn’t sure I liked. Things like making me think I wasn’t as big a loner as I thought I was, or that somebody actually cared whether or not I got attacked by jerks. Stuff like that was dangerous to a girl like me. It had the power to make me open up, and leave me vulnerable to attacks. Using Drake’s small, but gloriously clean shower, I was able to rinse away the rest of the blasted shampoo. Fully dressed, and renewed, I slipped back out into the main part of the trailer, only managing to catch a peek of the bedroom, with which I saw that Drake did indeed have a bed, a black one. “Okay,” I said in a somewhat perky voice. “Tell me more about this gruel thing.” Snagging a seat on the sofa next to him, I waited for him to explain. He cringed at my bad pronunciation. “You said it better the first time. It’s more like ga-rule.” Rolling my eyes, I said, “Whatever.” “Anyway—the garoul was around way before the werewolf. They’re stronger, faster, and unlike a werewolf, they’re in control of what they’re doing and when they shift.” “Shift?” “You know?” He nodded. “Go all wolfy.” “So it has nothing to do with the full moon?” I asked.

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“No, not for them. For werewolves, yeah,” he answered. Settling into the sofa, he said, “On the good-side of things, it’s a garoul, on the bad…it’s a garoul.” Confused, I said, “I don’t get it.” “In other words,” he replied. “Good news, it’s not an untamed monster running wild through the streets of Sunnyview. Bad news, there’s a person out there that can shift into a wolf-thing that knows who you are, and now it has your scent.” “Is it bad if it has my scent?” He cocked his head to the side. “Only if they don’t like you. And from the way you describe this town, that’s like half the population.” Further explaining he said, “Once a garoul has your scent, they can track you to the ends of the earth.” With the hairs on the back of my neck tingling, I mumbled, “That’s great. Just great.” “The fact that it didn’t hurt you, and instead went after the thugs hurting you, makes me think that it might not be part of the…what did you call them again?” “Preppies?” “Yeah, that’s it.” Nodding, I replied, “That does make a certain amount of sense. I mean, why would a preppy go after other preppies? They wouldn’t.” Slamming my head back against the sofa, I crooned, “Could life suck just a little bit more right now!” “I’m probably not the best person to ask that question,” he replied with a cool voice.

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Glancing up, I noticed that his eyes were fixated on my neck. “Great. You’re not getting hungry are you?” He smiled. “Just a little.” Not finding that funny, I said, “I’m outta here.” Standing up, I quickly paced to the door. “Oh, come on, Ash. I’m joking.” “Yeah, well…” My hand rested on the door handle. “Your humor needs work.” “Fine.” He stood up cautiously. “I’ll keep the vampire jokes to a minimum.” “Fine.” I released the handle. “But I think we should go somewhere a little less…enclosed.”

¢ Walking along the train tracks, I asked Drake, “Where do you get your blood?” “You really wanna know?” he replied, giving me an eerily dark, but somehow sexy look. “Yes,” I answered. “I do.” “It’s nothing sinister like you think.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I have a contact that works at a blood bank. Sends it to me whenever I need more.” “Not what I expected, but definitely better.” I kicked up the loose rocks along the steel track. Slowing his pace, he asked, “What if I’d answered differently? What if I didn’t get my blood from a bag?”

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His question caught me slightly off guard and I tripped on the track. Without really thinking, his hand quickly balanced me. He was still holding onto me as I looked up at him. “I would probably still be right here, with you.” His midnight eyes seemed to light up. “Nice answer, little corny, but nice.” “Says the vampire who used buying toothpaste as an excuse to come and see me,” I retorted. “It was not an excuse!” His eyebrows shot sky high. “I really needed to brush my teeth.” “Sure.” I was about to give him a friendly punch, but the sound of someone yelling my name distracted me. “Ash!” the voice yelled again. We looked towards the edge of the train yard to see Charlie, and his squad car. Drake’s smile faded. “Who’s that?” “A nightmare that just won’t go away.” My head dipped and I started trudging towards Charlie. Drake was a little apprehensive, but he went with me. “If you’re well enough to be walking around, you’re well enough to go to school,” Charlie’s disapproving voice said to me. He took his time giving me the ‘you’re in trouble, young lady’ look, and then scrutinized Drake. “Who’re you?” “Just visiting,” Drake replied with a dry tone, not really answering Charlie’s question. Hesitantly, Charlie pulled his skeptical gaze off of Drake, and back to me. “Let’s go.”

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“Charlie, it’s two o’clock! School will be over in an hour!” I complained. “Good, you can still get in an hour of learning.” He pointed to the squad car. “Move it.” I gave him a scathing look that only a emo-goth girl could manage, and stomped off towards the damn car. Over my shoulder I called to Drake, “See ya later.” “Yeah,” I heard him say. I got in and waited for Charlie, who was taking his precious time. No doubt, looking Drake over one more time. Charlie was skeptical of most new comers to Sunnyview, especially the ones that looked like Drake did. It probably didn’t help that I was caught with him while skipping school. “Didn’t know you had friends,” Charlie said as he got in the cruiser. “I don’t. Just lovers and acquaintances,” I replied. It would be enough to give him heartburn till next Wednesday. Charlie’s lip stiffened as he tried to ignore the comment, and he asked, “Is he the one? The one who beat up Mal and his gang?” “Nope.” Averting my eyes out the window, I prayed that Charlie would drop the subject. The last thing I needed was for him to find out that Sunnyview was quickly becoming a stomping ground for the Underworld’s rejects. Changing the topic, I asked, “How did you even find me? Nobody knows that I hang down by the tracks?” He was quiet for a moment, then replied, “Well, I stopped back by the trailer to check on you, but your mom said you

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were gone. It wasn’t hard to figure out where a girl like you might go to get away.” Once again, he pulled up to the curb of Westminster, and this time he said, “I’m going to watch you walk all the way to the door, and I’m going to be waiting here. So don’t even think about leaving till school lets out.” “I know you’re being a good guy, and making sure I go to school is very honorable, Charlie.” I looked over at him. “But sometimes, you really suck.” He was still laughing as I shut the door to the car. I wanted to slam it, but, I decided at the last minute not to. Charlie was a good guy, despite his forcing me to go to the one place I hated above all others. Defiantly, I trudged through the halls of Westminster High, daring any teacher to try and make me go to class. Charlie didn’t say I had to go to class, he just said I couldn’t leave. Unfortunately, sixth period classes were just letting out, and a barrage of sneering preppies filled the hall. Getting to my locker, I let out a sigh of despair. I could have been hanging out with Drake right now, instead of rubbing elbows with the Stepford spawn. “You’ve got some nerve showing up here, Maverick,” the voice I loathed most in the world said to me. I turned around to see Mal, and his merry band of douches coming down the hallway, each of them looking like they got in a war with a paper shredder. “So do you.” I let out a chuckle. “I mean, you look…ridiculous.”

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His lip pulled back in a snarl, and he started to come towards me. But at that exact moment, Spike happened to be walking through, and the two boys collided. Spike, obviously the smaller of the two, bounced off Mal like a rubber ball, and the bigger boy yelled, “Watch where you’re going, Loser!” Reaching out to steady Spike before he crashed against the lockers, I stepped towards Mal. “Back off, creep. This isn’t a dark street where you can do whatever the hell you want!” With most of the student body watching our tête-à-tête, Mal had no choice other than to walk away, but the look on his face told me he didn’t see this conversation as being over. Waiting till he was around the corner, I turned to Spike. “You okay?” He nodded his thin face, surrounded by, well, spiky brown hair, and his brown eyes opened wide like saucers at my notice of him. Shrugging, I turned back around to my locker, wishing I could climb inside of it and pout till school was over. “Um, Ash?” I heard a soft voice say. Looking back, I saw that Spike was still standing behind me, and it was him who’d called my name. I thought I might die of shock. “Yes?” I asked, trying not to sound too intimidating. “I think you dropped this.” He held up a woven leather band so I could see it. “Oh, my bracelet.” I took it from his trembling hand. “I don’t even remember putting it on…Thanks.”

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He nodded again, this time giving me a little smile, and then hurried off in the opposite direction that Mal had gone. I looked down at the bracelet, trying to figure out when I had put it on, and how I could have lost it. Coming up empty, I shrugged it off. Taking a whiff of the air, I smelled it coming. Hai Karate. And it was coming in quickly. Scrambling to grab my bag, I started making hasty steps in the direction of the fresh air. “Not so fast, Miss Maverick!” “Crap.” Principal Wrecker, and his bald head, was coming straight towards me. “I’m surprised,” he said. “I didn’t expect to see you for at least another month.” He came to a stop in front of me, crossing his tweed-coat covered arms, complete with little leather patches on the elbows. I had to fight the urge to comment on the coat. It was like wearing a sign that said, ‘Make witty barb now.’ “I like to mix things up,” I replied. “Hm.” His nostrils flared. “Well, get moving. Class is starting right about…” He pointed his finger up in the air, and just as he gave it a flick, the bell rang. Shaking my head, I said, “I’m not even going to point out how incredibly lame it is that you can do that.” Scuffing my heels as I walked, I headed around the corner. After taking a look back to make sure he wasn’t watching, I veered left into the girls’ bathroom. There were forty-five minutes of school left, and I wasn’t going to spend them behind a desk.

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As I hoisted myself up on the sink counter, I remembered it—the last time I wore that bracelet. It was the day I went to confront my favorite stalker, and consequently, the day I was attacked. So how did Spike find it? Forty-four minutes later, I was marching back through the hall and out into the light of day, just in time to see the squad car pulling away from the curb. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie. Although my ribs were certainly feeling better, lugging around my bag was a little bit of a chore. I thought back to the weird ‘Use it’ dream, and wandered what the hell it all meant. Why did the dirt make me feel warm? I mean, that’s just wrong. Although…I am a witch. “S’up?” Stalker Boy said as he joined me, no doubt stalking me till I was out of school. “What can you use dirt for?” I asked, still deep in thought. Taking a moment to process my seemingly random question, Drake said, “Well, it’s great for growing things and burying people. Why?” “Nothing.” I shrugged. “Just this weird dream I had.” “Like?” “I was in this forest, sitting in the dirt, and a voice told me to ‘Use it.’” Looking over at him, he was wrinkling his eyebrows. “Definitely sounds witchy,” he replied. Nodding, I said, “That’s what I thought. But what does it mean?”

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“No clue. Witches use dirt for a lot of stuff. It’s odd that you had a dream about using it though.” I couldn’t have agreed with him more. “I wish I wasn’t so behind on this whole witch-thing. Other witches my age probably already know how to do cool stuff like kicking jerkass.” “Yeah,” he said cautiously. “But if you had been raised as a witch, we’d be clawing each other’s throats out right now, instead of hanging out.” The mental picture of us fighting wasn’t one I liked. Not that I didn’t think I could take him. “There she is!” a boy yelled, snapping me back to the moment. Together, Drake and I turned around to see who it was. Of course, it was one of Mal’s boys. Didn’t they ever just get tired of being jerks! Mal and the rest of the Abercrombie mafia were joining the boy, and Mal had the same malevolent sneer that he used right before kicking me in the face. It dimmed when he noticed that I wasn’t alone. “Who’s this?” he yelled. “Your pimp?” Next to me, Drake rolled his eyes. “You’re right, he is a douche.” I couldn’t say that I wasn’t more than a little glad that I was standing next to a vampire. I didn’t look forward to getting beat up again. “Doesn’t matter,” Mal replied to his unanswered question. “We can beat up two trashies just as easy as one.” His boys let

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out appropriate grunts and ‘yeah mans’ to show off their alacrity for violence. “Didn’t you learn your lesson the last time you tried to beat me up?” I asked, crossing my arms. “Sure did.” Mal smiled. “Don’t get drunk first.” They started to move in towards Drake and I, each with blood-hungry smiles. My heart was starting to pound faster, but Drake on the other hand, looked bored. “Ready to go?” he asked me. After nodding to him, he said, “Good, me too.” With my own human eyesight, it was near impossible to notice his figure go blurry, and before I was finished blinking, he was back in focus, standing in exactly the same spot. But one by one, the jerks started falling over, knocked out cold. Raising an eyebrow, he said, “I hope none of them had concussions before now. It’s not good to have a concussion, and then be hit really hard on the head—or so I’ve heard.” After realizing what he meant, I gave him the biggest smile I think I’ve ever given. “Nice.” He shrugged it off, and we kept walking as if the Oaf Squad hadn’t bothered us. “So what do witches use dirt for?” I asked. “Just about everything.” Sarcastically, I replied, “Oh, that’s not vague at all.” He laughed. “It because it’s an earth element. Witches rely on the four elements for channeling their powers, and dirt is earth after all.”

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“Hm,” I mused over that. “But why would I need to use it?” “Beats me.” He scuffed his boots along as we walked. Slowly, the rhythm of our feet started to match each other’s. I got lost to the beat of it, and before I knew it, we were standing in front of his trailer. “What are we doing here?” I looked up out of my trance. “Well,” he smiled slyly. “I need a…snack, and I figured you might want to hang out.” I crossed my arms, “When you say snack, you mean…” “From my fridge,” he replied, rolling his eyes. “Just making sure.” He held the door to his trailer open, and I climbed in. The newness of it still caught me off guard, and I wished that I could stay here forever. Here, it was clean and smoke free. And I had somebody to talk to that I actually liked, albeit a blood-drinking stalker. I stretched out on the sofa, and Drake headed over to the small, stainless-steel fridge and retrieved a bag of blood from it. I watched with morbid amusement as he stuffed a bendy straw into the small opening of the bag and took a sip. “Good?” I asked. He finished taking a long swig, and smiled. “De-lish. Wanna try?” He hefted the bag in my direction. “Maybe next time.” I shook my head and leaned back into the comfy sofa. On the small table next to it, I saw something that got me excited, and scooted over to it. “Does that thing

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work?” I pointed to the slender, laptop peeking out from under a piece of paper. “No,” he joked. “I just keep it around cause it’s pretty.” “Do you have internet?” My anticipation was mounting. “Yeah, why?” He finished his snack and cleaned up his mess before pulling the laptop out from under the paper and handing it to me. “Research.” My fingers were already twitching with excitement as I lowered them over the keys of the laptop. I got out to the internet, and went to the only place I could think of to begin my research: Google. First, I typed in Witches and hit enter. “That’s way too vague. You should narrow it down,” Drake said, from over my shoulder. I hadn’t even been aware when he sat down next to me. “Thanks, professor, but I got it.” I angled myself so that he had a hard time reading the screen, and I felt him let out breathless laugh. Instantly, I became acutely aware of the fact that our legs were touching, and he was leaning ever so slightly into my shoulder. Clearing my throat, I asked, “Do you mind?” “Not at all,” he replied, without making an effort to lean away. “I’m quite comfortable.” “I’ll bet you are,” I muttered under my breath, and clicked a link for something called Coven. “This looks interesting…” He leaned in closer to see what I was talking about, and I felt his hair brush my cheek.

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“Mm,” he said. “I’ve heard of them. They’re like Wicca, just not as well known.” “So they worship the devil, stuff like that?” I started exploring the site. “No, nothing like that. They’re more into nature—that sort of stuff.” “Nature?” I raised my eyebrow. “Like dirt?” “Ah,” he sighed, “Now I see where you’re going. Try clicking that.” He pointed to a link that said The Elements. After following it, a screen came up that said, Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and I clicked the picture of a mountain—it had to be earth. The article that followed described all the different meanings that earth held. Some talked about the energy that the earth contained, and how it could be channeled. And even further, it said that that energy could be used for healing purposes, rejuvenation, and strength. “Huh,” I let my head fall back against the sofa. “Healing, rejuvenation, and strength…” Drake pulled the laptop from my lap and set it on the sofa next to him before putting his head back too. “Well, you are pretty beat up. Maybe you’re supposed to use it to heal yourself.” “True. Or maybe to get strength so when I find those jerks, I can beat the sh—” “Hey,” he interrupted. “I already did that for you. So, the only thing left is for you to get better.” He poked a finger in general direction of my ribs, and shooting pain flared up. “Ouch!” I punched his shoulder. “Jerk.”

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He shrugged. “Just pointing out the obvious.” He stood up from the couch and took my hands then tugged me up. “Come on. Let’s go find some dirt.” “Really?” I asked. Genuine amusement took over me. “Absolutely. You are a witch after all. What if that website is right and you can heal yourself?” “Don’t get your hopes up,” I warned. “Remember, I’m as powerful as a turnip.” He gave me a confident grin. “Guess we’ll find out.”

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FIVE

“This way.” Drake led me in the direction of a clearing with a bunch of birch trees. “There’s tons of dirt here.” “I can’t believe we’re doing this. I can’t believe I’m doing this!” I shook my head vehemently while he pulled me along. “Drake, nothing is going to happen. I’m a turnip—good for nothing. I probably don’t even have any power, and so they dumped me off in this sucky town.” “You don’t know that,” he said over his shoulder. “Besides, how would you explain your mom?” “I dunno. Maybe she’s not really my mom—just someone who was told to pretend to be my mom! How else could she be related to me? I mean, if I’m a witch, wouldn’t that make her one too?”

He pulled me out of the way of a gnarly tree root before I could trip on it, and said, “Not necessarily. Maybe your father was the one with the powers, and she’s just a human. I’ve heard of that happening before.” “Oh.” I started to get lost in my own head, thinking of scenarios where my father was some sort of warlock and for some reason unknown, he had to leave me and my mother— well—maybe just me. “Alright,” he said. “Dirt.” He pointed to the ground, which, as he indicated, was all dirt. “What do I do?” I looked from him to the ground. “What were you doing in your dream?” He cocked his head to the side. “Well,” I said, getting to my knees. “The voice that was talking to me said, ‘Use it’ and pushed me to the ground. Like this.” I was now on my hands and knees. “And then I started feeling warmth.” “Okay.” He crouched down so he was at my level. “Try concentrating on that.” “What good is that gonna do?” I debated. “I don’t know!” He flung up his arms with a laugh. “You’re the witch, not me.” I let out an annoyed huff, and closed my eyes. “Fine. I’m concentrating on dirt. Gross dirt. Dirt that’s probably staining my pants as we speak—” “Ash!” he snapped. “Focus.” I rolled my eyes at him, which he couldn’t see since they were closed, but it made me feel better anyway. Deciding to

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go along with what he said, I started concentrating. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was supposed to be concentrating on, so I just concentrated on concentrating. My mind started to blank out, and a weird sort of weightlessness came over me. “Are you concentrating?” he asked, unsettling my state of being. “Shhh!” I hushed him. It took a moment, but I was able to get back to the blank state again. I felt like I was so close to being able to do—well—something, but it was just beyond my reach. I focused and focused to the point of being frustrated. “Well, well, well. What do we have here?” A rough voice snapped me straight out my state. It sounded like a smoker’s voice—definitely not one of Mal’s goons. The sounds of twigs snapping and leaves being stepped on all around Drake and I started to fill the air. Drake’s cool hands grabbed me around the shoulders and yanked me up from my kneeling position. “What is it?” I asked in a frantic whisper. “Don’t talk,” he warned me. His eyes were deadly serious. Finally, the figure belonging to the voice sauntered into view. His shoulder length, dishwater blond hair was stringy, and he had the stubble of several days without shaving. But his abnormally pale skin told me that it had been longer than a few days since the last time he’d shaved. “Gray,” Drake said, taking an infinitesimal step in front of me. His posture started stiffening into an almost predatory position, causing my arms to tingle with goose bumps.

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“We’ve been looking for you, Drakey,” Gray said in a playfully deviant voice. “Took Ace weeks to pick up your scent.” “Damn right it did!” Another man emerged from behind a tree. He had crazy piercings all over his face and a blue, spiky mohawk. His skin was also unnaturally pale. “Kilo thought maybe you’d finally picked a fight you couldn’t win. Ain’t that right, Kilo?” The mohawk boy looked across the clearing where yet another man—a massive one at that—was joining the party. No wonder they called him Kilo, he probably weighed one. “What do you want?” Drake spun us in a slow circle so that he could see all three of them. “No.” Gray smiled. “Not what I want. It’s what Dorian wants. You remember Dorian—tall, long hair, hates to be disobeyed.” Drake’s jaw clamped down like a steel trap. “I thought you would,” Gray laughed. “You can tell him I’m not going back. Not now—not ever,” Drake growled. The three of them started closing in on Drake—and me. “The thing is,” Gray announced. “He’s not asking. He’s telling. And you will go back.” For the first time, the scary vampire seemed to notice that Drake wasn’t alone. “Mm, who’s your friend, Drake? Or is she just dessert?” “Looks tasty!” Ace licked his lips, and his eyes focused directly below my chin. In a flash, he turned into a blur of wild blue and black—coming straight for me.

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Drake rolled me to his other side, and made a blur of his own just as Ace would have collided with me. A loud smacking sound cracked through the air, and Ace was sent flying backwards until he careened into a tree and toppled to the ground. When he got up, his shoulder was sticking up at an angle that wasn’t normal. He gave it a quick wrench, which followed with a popping sound and it went back into place. He gave Drake a wicked look and said, “I was only going to have a taste. Besides, it’s not nice when you don’t share.” He looked over at Kilo. “Come on, Kilo, what do you say we make him share?” Kilo let out a bellowing chuckle, and flashed us a smile of filed down, pointy teeth. I’d hate to see what his real fangs looked like. Both he and Ace went blurry again, and I couldn’t help but clench my teeth together. There was no way that Drake could fight both of them off while protecting me. Drake must have known this, and grabbed me by the waist. With strength that frightened even me, he sent me flying up in the direction of a tree branch, where I landed in a sitting position—he had good aim. From here, I could see three crazy blurs moving around below me. The big white one—Kilo—and the small blue one—Ace—were circling Drake’s black blur at a rate so fast it hurt to watch. From the sidelines, Gray was laughing at the mayhem. I wanted to stake him, but settled with throwing my heavy boot at his face. I wish I’d thought it through a little longer, because after wiping the mud from his face, Gray looked up in my direc-

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tion, and there was a terrifying look in his eyes. I would have traded him for a thousand drunk Malcolms any day. “You shouldn’t have done that, little girl.” He started taking long, malevolent strides in my direction. The two other thugs had Drake cornered and there was no way he was gonna get to me. “Aw, sh—” I started to cuss, but I was droned out by a familiar howling sound. All three thugs stopped what they were doing to look in the direction it had come from. “Been making hairy friends?” Gray called up to me. Giving him a smile that looked more like a snarl, I replied, “Not unless you include yourself.” “Feisty.” Drake used the distraction to his advantaged and slammed a preoccupied Ace into another tree before flipping Kilo onto his back. Ace was on his feet in no time and back in pursuit. Gray was just approaching the bottom of my tree when another ripping howl sounded out. “You better run!” I yelled down to him. “The last jackass that messed with me got his ass handed to him in a sling by my hairy friend!” “No offense, doll face, but mutts don’t scare me.” He slammed his hand into the tree with shattering speed, creating a hand-hold, and did the same with the other hand. And steadily, he started making his way up to me. “You don’t seem alarmed by our…differences,” he called up. “Does that mean that Drake’s been running his mouth like a bad little boy?”

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I tried edging farther out on the branch, but it started creaking in a way that didn’t bode well for me. Gray was within arm’s reach of me, and he smiled a devilish grin before raising an eyebrow. “I’ll be gentle, I promise.” My skin was crawling at the notion of his greasy hands touching me. I would have rather fallen to my death than have that happen, so, after taking a deep breath, I jumped. For a second, cool air whipped up into my face and I felt weightless, and then the next, I was inhaling a mouth full of hair. Blecch. I assumed it was creepy dude, but when I opened my eyes wider, I saw a head of long, black hair that flowed down into a mohawk. My hands were resting on ginormous, strong, black shoulders that flexed to absorb the impact as we hit the ground. I was sitting on the back of the garoul! “Ahh!” I flung myself off of the wolf-thing and started crawling backwards. Its large golden eyes watched me for a second and then darted up to where Gray was snarling and snapping. Apparently, mutts did bother him. The garoul let out another deafening growl, and lunged for him. His razor sharp claws sunk into the vampire’s shoulders and wrenched him from the tree. In return Gray’s face went all scary, like Drake’s had the day I met him, and he sunk his teeth into the garoul’s meaty arm. The two clamored to the ground in a snarling mess, and began their own dangerous game of blur tag. Drake hadn’t told me that garouls could move as fast as vampires could. Remembering Drake, I spun around to where he was fighting off the other vampires, and saw that he was holding

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his own against them—that was—until Kilo managed to get a hold of him. Drake may have been thousands of times faster than the massive vampire, but Kilo was probably thousands of times stronger than Drake. This wasn’t good. I had to do something! But what? Use it, my own thoughts echoed in my mind. The crunching sound of Ace whamming a punch across Drake’s face smacked me back into reality. If I didn’t act quickly, there would be no Drake left when this was over I remembered what the Coven website had said about the earth element and how its energy could be channeled. Maybe if I could use that energy, I could do something to help Drake. Throwing myself back down onto the ground, I dug my hands in till they were fully submerged in dirt, and tried to get back to the blank state. It was a little hard with all the snarling, crunching, and yelling going on around me, but I told myself to focus. Come on, come on, come on, I urged my mind to work. If anything happened to Drake, I would go back to being alone…it would be worse even. Drake was…well, he was important to me. I couldn’t lose him! Anger surged up in me at the thought of these thugs taking him from me. I wanted to kill them for it. My anger seemed to grow and take on a life of its own, becoming something I didn’t even recognize as belonging to me. The power of it began to burn in my veins—it wasn’t warm like it had

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been in my dream—it was scalding, enough so that a shattering scream burst out of me. It felt like liquid lava flowed through me, not blood. I forced myself to focus on the anger, and directed it towards the ones I wanted to hurt. I wanted to open my eyes—to see—but the pain was paralyzing me. All I could do was think—think and scream. After an eternity of burning, the pain stopped. Disappearing almost as fast as it came, in its wake it left behind the reminiscence of it searing touch. Minutes passed before I was able to feel anything again, and slowly I was able to determine that I was laying on my back. Around me, everything was silent, deafeningly so. The sound of feet moving over the leaves tweaked my ears to attention, but the feet were hitting too often to be human—or vampire. Then, they stopped completely, only to be replaced by the sound of slower steps, these were definitely human. “Ash?” a voice called to me, it was soft on my ears. “Ash, are you alright?” Fingers pressed to my neck, where one might check a pulse. When they pulled away, an arm scooped under my knees and another behind my shoulder blades—I was being picked up. I wanted to push the arms away from me, but I felt sluggish, weak. I wasn’t really aware of what happened after that, but I did remember being set down onto something soft. Finally feeling strong enough, I opened my eyes. It took a moment for my vision to clear up, and when it did, I could

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see the roof of a car over me. I slowly sat up and saw that my legs were dangling out the open door of the backseat of an expensive SUV. It looked familiar but I couldn’t remember where I’d seen it before. “Ash?” the gentle voice called again—Wait! I knew that voice. The sound of feet hitting pavement came around the car, and then I saw him. Spike. “Spike? What are you doing here?” I started to rub my throbbing temples. Every part of my body hurt. It was a different hurt than when I’d gotten beat up—this one went deeper—like it ran through my veins. “Well.” He shrugged nervously. “This is my car.” “Oh.” That’s where I’d seen it before—at school. “Are you okay? You were passed out.” He took a careful step towards me. “I think so,” I mumbled, still trying to remember everything that had just happened. Then it all hit me like a ton of bricks. Drake, the fight, the garoul—all of it. “Oh God! Drake!” I forced my sore body to jump out of the backseat, but as soon as I stood up, my knees buckled right out from under me. “Whoa!” Spike reached out to steady me, and helped me to sit back down. “You don’t have to worry, they’re gone— those guys.” I felt my heart sink like a lead weight. “That was exactly what I was afraid of.” So whatever I had done back there, it was all in vain. They’d gotten Drake anyway.

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I looked up at Spike who was watching me with gentle brown eyes, and I noticed that his spiky hair seemed to be seriously out of place, and his clothes were dirty and wrinkled. His shirt was off, leaving only his white tank. On the upper part of his arm, just below his shoulder, was a perfect set of teeth marks—big teeth marks. The wound was swollen and bleeding—and very familiar for some reason. My mind worked over-time, trying to piece everything together—starting with the bracelet Spike had returned to me. There was no way he could have gotten that bracelet unless he had been in that dark street the night Mal attacked me. And there was only one other thing in that street besides Mal, his thugs, and me. And now, Spike had a bite mark in the exact spot where Gray had sunk his teeth into the garoul. “Oh God.” My voice came out in a choked whisper. “Ash.” He bent down so that he wasn’t standing over me. “Ash, you can’t tell anyone about this.” His eyes were pleading with me—there wasn’t even the slightest trace of the deadly wolf-monster that had attacked Gray. My world was doing flip-flops on itself. Over the course of a few days, everything I thought was real was now complete crap. I was surrounded by all the mythical monsters from the movies and TV shows I’d made fun of. When I didn’t respond to him, he gave my shoulders a light shake. “Ash?” I looked up at him with new eyes. “I won’t tell anyone. I promise.”

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He nodded, and that same nervous smile came back. How was this nervous boy, who got bullied and pushed around, capable of being a fearless wolf-thing? It made absolutely no sense! He could beat Mal and his gang up with his little pinky, and yet, he let them boss him around. He seemed to understand what I was thinking, and said, “I haven’t always been this way. It only started recently.” “Let me guess, your seventeenth birthday.” I started to pull myself up again, he reached out to help. “Yeah, how did you know?” “I got a weird birthday present of my own. Apparently, I’m a witch.” “Oh yeah,” he replied. “I almost forgot about that.” “What?” His casualness caught me off-guard. “Did everyone get the freak’n memo except me!” He let out a small laugh, “No. I can smell it on you.” “You too?” His eyebrows knit together. “What do you mean?” To answer his question would have meant to talk about Drake. And at the moment, I wasn’t able to do that. “Nothing. Wanna give me a ride home?” “Yeah, anything,” he answered in a flash while helping me towards the front of his car. As he steered the car off the side of the road, I caught myself staring at him—really staring. “What?” He sounded self-conscious. “I was just wondering where you put it all.” “Huh?”

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“You know, all your wolf muscle. When you’re in wolfmode you’re like five times bigger than you are now.” “Oh.” He relaxed. “I’ve wondered the same thing myself. My dad says I’ll eventually get bigger.” “Your dad? So he knows about you?” I found it weird to know that a parent could be in on a secret as cool as this. “Yeah, he’s…like me.” “He’s a garoul too?!” I found myself leaning towards him with bulging eyes. Man! The Spikafalaus family was hiding some serious skeletons in their walk-in closets. The car came to a slamming halt. “How do you know what we’re called?” “Oh, um, internet—Google mostly,” I lied. “Oh.” The car started up again. “You can’t talk about it— at all. My dad, he would go berserk if he knew you and I were hanging out, and especially if you knew about us.” “What? Why?” I asked with a defensive tone. “He knows what you are, and…well—” He tried to think of a way to phrase his response. “Let me guess,” I interrupted. “Garouls and witches don’t get along.” Gaw! Could the Underworld be any more antisocial! He gave me a sad smile. “Unfortunately. But you’re not like the stories I’ve heard about witches. I mean, you could have done something to stop Mal and his friends when you were in that street, but you didn’t. Why?” “I can’t. I don’t know how to use my powers. I didn’t even know I was a witch till a few days ago.”

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He nodded, “Makes sense. But how did you stop those vampires then?” I shook my head, searching for answers of my own. “I have no clue. I just…did it.” “It was really cool.” He smiled. “Yeah, well, it hurts like a mother! My bones feel like charred toast.” He let out a laugh that was surprisingly pleasant to hear— even made me want to laugh. As he pulled up in front of my trailer, I gave him an amused look because I realized I hadn’t given him any directions. I guess I had developed more than one stalker. Man this was crazy! “I followed you home that one night,” he explained sheepishly. “Uh-huh,” I said slowly, skeptically. “How many other times did you follow me?” He looked away. “A few.” “Well, I guess since you saved my butt twice, I’ll let it slide. But next time you feel like following me, give me a little hint. Okay? I’ve got enough stalkers right now.” He gave me a troubled smile. “Yeah.” I was about to slide out of the car when I stopped and leaned over to Spike, placing a quick kiss on his cheek. It surprised us both. “That’s for kicking Mal’s ass.” His cheeks went rosy, and he tried to hide a big smile. “See ya around.” I gave him a wink and shut the door behind me.

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SIX

Getting inside, I found Mom right where I left her, passed out on the couch. Bob was asleep next to her, and the infomercial channel was playing on the TV, selling some product that promised to give a person “Buns of Steel.” I gave the power button to the TV a tap on my way by, and shut myself in my room. I couldn’t even take a shower to wash off all the dirt because there was no water. Life sucked. I fell into bed and didn’t even bother to take my shoes off…shoes…Didn’t I throw one at Gray? Yet both were firmly on my feet. Spike must have put it back on for me. A small smile crept over my lips at finding out the surprising identity of my furry guardian. But the smile vanished as

soon as I remembered my stalker guardian—and that he was gone. Where would those goons take Drake, and who was that Dorian dude that Gray was talking about? I wanted him back, Drake that is. I had spent my whole life in this rotten town without anyone I could call a friend, and when I finally get one, creepy dudes from his past come and steal him from me. It wasn’t fair! An unfamiliar prickling feeling started to tickle my throat, and then moisture started rolling from my eyes. I was…crying. I don’t think I’d done that in a long time—not since I was a little girl and I would cry myself to sleep at night, wishing for my dad to come and take me away from this miserable life. I swiped the tears away and felt the dirt that was caked to my face smear under my fingertips. Damn dirt. Didn’t do me any good when I needed it to—only burnt the crap out of me. How was that possible anyway? And why? Rolling onto my side, I tried to push all the sad thoughts out of my mind. I had to be a stone wall. I couldn’t let the absence of a particular, hot, stalker boy make me feel, well, sad. Or lonely. I’d lived my whole life alone—I could do it again. More tears started to roll down my cheeks. Damn it! Click…..clack…..whap! Something was hitting my window, and getting harder each time it hit. I sprung up from the mattress, and whipped my head in its direction. The shadows of little round objects colliding with my window were illuminated by the full moon.

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Getting up, I went to the window and used my sleeve to clean away the grime so I could see. When I saw the maker of the noise my heart did a humongous flip in my chest, and I snatched my bag from the desk before dashing back out through the living room. “Drake!” I pounced on him, gripping him in a tight hug. “How did you get away from them?” I heard his laugh deep in his chest, where my ear was currently pressed to, and he said, “Whoa. Careful or I might get used to this.” I realized that it wasn’t my M.O. to go around hugging people—or show emotion—so I cleared my throat and gave him a little shove away from me. “Well?” I waited for an explanation, secretly singing praises the whole time. He was giving me a confused smile. “What do you mean? Don’t you know what happened?” “Well…they took you, didn’t they?” Letting out a scoff, he said, “Uh, no. Not even close.” He took another moment to look at me, seeming completely amused…and in awe. “I can’t believe you don’t know.” I was starting to get annoyed. “If you don’t let me in on the riddle, stalker boy, I’m going to get angry. Now spill.” He laughed again, and took my hand to lead me way from the trailer, and pleasantly, back towards his. “Well, I was getting pretty worked over by Ace when I heard you start screaming and I thought that Gray had gotten you. But I saw you kneeling on the ground, and…” “Yeah?”

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“It’s hard to describe.” “Well, try. I’m not a patient person.” Although I sounded peeved on the outside, on the inside, I was beaming with happiness—but he didn’t need to know that. He shook his head slowly. “It looked like some sort of special effect from a movie,” he described. “But it was like all of your veins were…glowing, and it was coming up from the ground.” My jaw slacked for a moment. “Glowing?” “Mm-hm. And then Gray and his gang all started screaming too. From there I was able to beat the crap out of them without even trying—chased them clear across three time zones to make sure they got the message.” We reached his trailer and he opened the door for me. As I stepped up into it, I was lost in thought. “So, whatever I did, it worked?” I still couldn’t believe it. “I’ll say. They were whimpering like little wussies!” He shook his head as he laughed at the memory of it. “What were you concentrating on?” I cringed, to ashamed to admit it. “Come on, Ash, you’ve gotta tell me.” “It’s embarrassing.” I crossed my arms defiantly. He let out a sigh. “I won’t laugh, I promise.” I debated for a minute, and when I looked up at his dark cerulean eyes, it made it hard to say no. “I was…I was angry at them for trying to take you away from me, and…I wanted to kill them.” I said it all in one hurried breath so that maybe he wouldn’t hear how pathetic it truly was.

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He did. “Oh.” It seemed to catch him off-guard, and he went to sit on the couch. “That’s…” “Sad, I know,” I crooned and collapsed next to him. “No…” He shook his head, and started to say more, but stopped himself. I could tell he was picking a new subject when he said, “They probably didn’t die because they’re already dead.” I couldn’t tell if I was relieved he changed the topic, or if I was disappointed. But, being me, I didn’t show any weakness. “Damn semantics.” I snapped my fingers. “Next time I’ll concentrate on garlic.” He laughed. “Or maybe fire.” “Wrong element,” I corrected. “Ooh, someone’s starting to sound like a real witch.” “Don’t hold your breath. I’m not even sure I was controlling what was happening—it was scary.” He got quiet, then said, “Well, I’m glad that you did it, otherwise, I…I wouldn’t be in a happy place right now.” I turned my head so that I could look at him, and asked, “Who were those creeps anyway?” He ruffled up his hair with his hand. “You have your nightmares, and I have mine.” He stood up and went over to a cabinet and pulled out a towel. Tossing it to me, he said, “Here. You need another shower.” “Gee, thanks, Mr. Sensitive,” I growled. I wanted to make some witty comment about his appearance, but even after

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having the crap beaten out of him and chasing goonish vampires across three time zones, he still looked impeccable. Jerk. I was about to close the bathroom door behind me, when he said, “Wait.” He went blurry, and a millisecond later, he was standing in front of me with clothes in his hands—my clothes. “So you don’t have to put those dirty ones back on.” “Did you get these from my room?” I asked with an accusing eyebrow. “Yeah. So?” “Hm. So you don’t have to be invited in first?” “No. Does that scare you?” He cocked his head to the side and gave me a chillingly sexy smile. “Of course not.” I snatched the clothes from him and shut the door. After starting the water for the shower, I let myself smile. It went from ear to ear, and if anyone ever saw me, I’d never live it down. I emerged from the bathroom a while later, completely dirt free. Drake had also changed his clothes, and was sitting on the sofa surfing the internet. He looked downright homey…for a vampire. “Well,” I said, nervously patting my hands on my thighs. “I should probably be going home. We humans have to sleep.” He looked up from his laptop. “So do we vampires.” “Good to know.” I started to head for the door, but he beat me to it, and started to walk me back through the trailer cemetery. He didn’t have to, but I was glad he did. Somehow, I’d become accustomed to having my own personal stalker.

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“So…you wanna come over tomorrow?” he asked, avoiding eye contact. I had to look away too, just in case I decided to smile, “Um, yeah that sounds good.” A crunching sound that came from my left disturbed my embarrassingly girlish daydreams, and then it was followed by a low snarling sound. My other stalker—the hairy one—came around a mashed up trailer, taking long, lean strides on all fours. His mohawk seemed to be standing on end, and his lip pulled up over his teeth. His entrancing, golden eyes were steadied on Drake, and it was clear he wasn’t thinking happy thoughts about my vampy companion. A shudder went through Drake, and his shoulders hunched into attack position, as an equally dangerous snarl escaped him. NOT GOOD! “Hey!” I tried to stay calm. “You two need to take a few deep breaths and get over your bad selves.” I started to step into the middle of them, but I didn’t feel confident that that was a good place to be. “Spike.” I looked at the garoul. “This is my friend Drake.” I looked back at the vampire. “Drake, this is my friend Spike.” “Friend?” Drake repeated in a skeptical voice. “I thought I was your only one.” “Shut up.” I snapped at him. If he wasn’t careful he’d have two wild animals to deal with. “Now, will you two stop growling at each other?”

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A familiar nervous laugh that sounded a little like a bark came out of the garoul. Spike must have been laughing. And just like that, Drake’s defensive posture relaxed, and he was back to normal. “So does this mean we have to take turns stalking you?” he asked, sarcastically. Spike let out another small bark, and nodded back towards the preppy part of town. “You’ll have to speak up dog-boy,” Drake teased. “We don’t speak canine.” “Drake.” I frowned at him. “Be nice.” It was odd being the one to care about manners. Normally, I said to hell them. But Spike was different. He was kind, and one of the few people who cared about me, or was it that he was one of the few people I cared about. Stepping forward, I asked Spike, “What it is it? Do you have to leave?” He nodded and his shaggy black hair shook with him. I found it weird that Spike had brown hair when he was in human form, but when he was a garoul, it was black—he turned black. “Okay.” I gave him a smile. “See ya later.” He gave me a wink, and made his own black blur back towards the direction of town. I was going to get seriously jealous of all these people who could blur, while I couldn’t. “Now I know why Gray wasn’t able to mess with you,” Drake said from behind me. “So how does it feel to be surrounded by creatures of the night?”

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“Mm.” I tapped a finger to my chin. “I think I like it. Well, except for those three thugs that attacked us.” He shrugged. “I just hope dog-boy is trustworthy—ow!” I had punched in the arm for calling Spike dog-boy. “Excuse me, I meant to say Spike. I’m still your number one stalker though, right?” He gave me a playful smile. “Of course. You’re irreplaceable.” I let my shoulder bump into his as we walked along. The truth was, I had been serious. Drake was irreplaceable, and in so many ways it wasn’t even funny. He was my stalker. We approached the steps of my trailer, and he gave me his usual, butterfly inducing smile. “So, tomorrow?” “Tomorrow.” I nodded and went inside. Looking back as I shut the door, my stalker was gone, but not far I suspected. I thought about going right back outside and saying, “What the hell. Let’s just start hanging out right now!” But the way I was wobbling on my feet—I probably wouldn’t have made it long.

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SEVEN

I woke up the next morning to the sound of Mom and Bob having a screaming match, causing me to smile unabashedly. Maybe this time he would make her mad enough that she would kick him out. After dressing with pep in my step, I was actually glad to come out of my room—and just in time to see a bottle fly across the living room in Bob’s general direction. But since Mom had probably drunk the contents of the bottle first, her aim was way off. “Asshole!” she yelled at Bob. “Oh, come on, Les,” he said, taking small steps towards her. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

I crossed my arms and enjoyed the show. “Yes you did!” “No. I just meant that it would be nice to see you looking dressed up once in a while, that’s all.” His comment must not have helped because another bottle went flying. “Uggh! You’re no prince yourself, jackass!” I had to stifle a giggle. From what I could surmise, Bob had, no doubt, commented on my mom’s appearance and she didn’t like it. I was about to pop some popcorn and snag a seat on the couch to watch the rest of their fight, but the sound of an engine revving caught my attention It sounded new—too new. Most cars in our neighborhood looked like they belonged in a junkyard. I collected my bag and headed for the door. My jaw nearly dropped when I saw Drake, sitting on a sweet, black sportbike. Seeing me, he gave it another rev. I threw back my head and let out a thrilled laugh. “Ohmy-gosh! That. Is. Awesome!” I quickly descended the steps of my trailer and went over to him, admiring the sleek bike— and its sexy rider. “Wanna go for a ride?” He cocked his eyebrow mischievously at me. “Abso-frick’n-lutely!” He tossed me a matching black sport helmet. “Safety first.”

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I didn’t care that it messed up my hair as I shoved it on, and swung a leg over the bike. Even though we weren’t moving yet, I already felt the rush of adrenaline hitting my veins. I snuggled up close to him, wrapping my arms around his surprisingly muscled waist. “Is it still considering kidnapping to take a minor over state lines?” “I think so.” “Good. Let’s do it.” From where I was peeking over his shoulder, I could see the corner of his mouth pull into a smile. “Hold on tight.” The bike let out a monstrous snarl, and we were blasting down the road. We blazed through the one and only traffic light this town had to offer, just as it was turning green. Off to the side of the road, I saw a familiar squad car waiting for traffic violators. Charlie. As we flew by him, grossly over the speed limit, I waved over my shoulder. I was sure this would cause him to choke on his donut. The siren started up, but he didn’t come after us—must have figured he couldn’t catch us. After a few seconds, Sunnyview became a spec in the side mirrors of Drake’s bike—my first taste of freedom in seventeen years. Glorious freedom. “Where are we going?” I yelled to Drake over the road noise. “To have fun!” he yelled back. He cranked up the gas and the bike seemed to go even faster—something I didn’t think was possible.

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We rode and rode, and eventually, highways lined with lush green trees turned into highways surrounded by deserts. But even from miles away, I could already see the glittering city of sin starting to loom up, like beautiful mirage. I let out a laugh. “Vegas!” In my arms, I felt Drake chuckle at my excitement. When we finally reached the strip, the sun was starting to set and the rush of where we were started to take over me. The crazy dancing lights of casinos beckoned us forward into a world of pleasure and indulgence—I had never been so excited. As if he had done this before, Drake whipped the bike into the valet area for the Luxor, and said, “We’re here.” I took a moment to fully process what was going on before hopping off. “Not that this isn’t great, but what are doing here?” After I took the helmet off my hair fell in crinkled curls around my face, which I quickly scooped out of the way. “Gotta pay the bills,” he informed me with a smile. “What, so you gamble?” Getting off the bike, he gave me a devious smile. “Not quite.” We were only standing there a few seconds when a man with a Luxor vest on came up to Drake. “Hey, man. Long time no see. Here on business?” Drake threw a look at me before answering, “Sort of.” Drake tossed him the keys to the bike and said, “Take care of her for me?” I hoped he meant the bike.

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“Yeah, no prob.” The man gave the bike a lustful look. “Hope you don’t mind if I take the scenic route to the parking lot.” “Just don’t scratch it,” Drake warned. “Oh, and…” He pulled out an envelope from his pocket and cast a wary look around before handing it to the man. “The usual.” Giving him a conspiratorial grin, the man replied, “You got it.” “Great. Don’t be late.” After the man sped away on the bike, Drake looked at me. “I hope you’re not tired from all that driving, because we have a long night ahead of us.” “Lead on,” I gestured to the entrance of the massive pyramid hotel. I was secretly thrilled by what he could mean long night ahead of us. But I was also curious about the envelope…and what was he doing here on business? Part of the thrill of being at a hotel in Vegas, with Drake, disappeared when he strolled right past the check-in counters. When I started to lag behind him, because I was so busy looking around the massive lobby, Drake came back and grabbed my arm to pull me along. Even still, I couldn’t help but drag my heels so I could see everything. “Come on, Ash. You can look later.” He tugged a little harder. After some walking, and a lot more gawking on my part, he led us to the entrance of LAX, the coolest looking club I’d ever seen in my life! As soon as I saw the massive gothic entrance, I felt at home.

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He took us past the massive line, and people started yelling and cussing at us—guess they don’t like cutters. At the door the bouncer, who had a familiarly pale complexion exchanged fist bumps with Drake, and ushered us in, causing more cussing to surge up from the waiting partygoers. Ha ha. Inside the club, we descended the grand staircase, which emanated a cool blue glow. On the lower level there were so many bodies crammed together on the dance floor that dancing didn’t even look like a possibility, but arms were flailing up in the air, matching the beat of the music. In the mayhem of all the reveling, it was hard to keep from being bumped into or stepped on, and I felt two, strong, cool hands clamp on over my shoulders. “Stay close to me!” Drake yelled over the blaring music. He guided us over to the bar, also packed with people, and told me to stay put while he talked to one of the bartenders. But staying put was a little hard when the people around me jostled and ebbed me further and further away from him, like a wild current of bodies. I ended up a good twenty feet away from him, and lost in the mix of the dance floor with no simple way of getting back to him. Every time I would see some room open up for me to go back, another person would quickly fill it up. Hands rested back on my shoulders, but these were sweaty and hot—not Drake’s. The owner of the hands, a tall, drunk man, started to rub up against me in a way that made me want to punch his lights out. I gave him a shove to push him off, and he laughed. “Come on, baby! Have some fun with me!” He pulled me

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back up against him, and while he may have been drunk, he was still stronger than I was. “Back off, creep!” I yelled, sending an elbow into his gut. “That’s not nice.” My violence only seemed to turn him on, and he started to grope a very private part of my anatomy. I was about to ram my shin into his junk when I felt myself being spun around—too fast to be normal. Drake was standing in between me and the creep, and got so close to the creep’s face I thought their noses would touch. “Hey, man, I didn’t know she was taken.” Creepy man looked like he was about to wet himself. Drake stared him down until he backed away and made retreating steps in the opposite direction. “I thought I told you to stay there,” Drake said, turning back around. Some of the seriousness he had regarded the man with was still on his face. He didn’t wait for me to answer before pulling me off the dance floor. Somehow, the crowd seemed to flow around him, making it easy for us to walk right off. “Tell me you didn’t bring me here to dance?” I yelled. “This place is pretty, but it’s too crowded!” “No dancing.” He shook his head. “Something a little more exciting.” Taking us towards one of the darker corners of the club, he pulled a black, velvet curtain back to reveal a black arched door which almost seemed to disappear into the wall. He gave it three knocks, a pause, and then two more knocks. A second later the door opened, and an even burlier

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bouncer than the one at the entrance was standing in the doorway. “Drake,” he said with a deep bass voice. “I’ll let them know you’re here.” The bouncer stepped aside so we could enter the dark, arched hallway. Low-lit, torch lights protruded from the walls giving everything a mysteriously dark aura. “Come on,” Drake whispered to me, and put his hand on my back to guide me forward. The music from the club on the other side of the door disappeared completely when the bouncer shut the door behind us, making a shiver run up my spine. Where was Drake taking me? We continued down the hall, all the way to the end, where there was only one way to go: left. From there the light got darker, and in some places disappeared completely. “You scared?” he asked. He should have known better than to ask me that question. “No.” “Good. They’ll smell it if you are.” Great. Now I’m creeped out. He let out a laugh as if he’d just heard my inner dialogue. “What?” I asked. I could hear the smile in his voice. “You’re scared.” I sent a quick elbow into his chest. “I am not. Just wigged out.” “Don’t be. You’re not the one they’ll be focusing on.” “Who’s they? And will you quit with this mystery crap and tell me what we’re doing here.”

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“Nope. I like it when you don’t know what’s going on— it’s very amusing.” As we neared the end of the second corridor, the sounds of cheering and shouting started to get louder until it was dull roar. I looked to Drake for answers, but it was too dark to see his expression. When the corridor finally ended, it opened out into a miniature arena. All along the sides were bleachers, filled with crowds of people standing and hollering towards the center of the arena, where there was a large cage. Bright lights dangled down from the ceiling over the cage, illuminating its inhabitants—two men beating the bloody pulp out of each other. The larger, scarier, of the two men delivered a crushing blow to the other’s face, causing him to slam down onto the gray mat of the cage floor and the shouting from the crowd to get even louder. “Ouch.” Drake winced. “He’s gonna feel that it in the morning.” I looked at him like he just walked out of a space ship. “Where the hell are we?” “This,” he gestured to the arena, “is the Fight Club.” His eyes glistened with the pride one might have for their favorite child. “You’re kidding? Like that movie with Brad Pitt.” “Sort of, except, we’re not sociopaths.” “Oh that’s comforting,” I scoffed.

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He laughed at me, and tugged me down the metal steps into the arena and around the cage, where a ref was smacking the mat to count down the knocked out man. We went up another set of steps into a roped off area were several men and a woman were gathered around a table, each having the same ethereally pale complexion—like Drake’s. None of them seemed to be too interested in the fight. “Drake!” the woman chirped, jumping up from her seat to give him a hug and a kiss on the cheek—I raised my eyebrow at her. “Hey, Cherry,” Drake replied. Cherry! What the hell kinda name is that? “Who’s ya friend?” she asked with a Jersey accent, looking at me from under long, heavily mascara covered lashes. “This is Ash.” He pulled me forward so I was on display. The two men sitting at the table each gave me appraising looks which made my skin crawl. “Nice to meet ya, Ash. I’m Cherry.” She wrapped her arm around my waist and pulled me forwards. “This is Tony and Jerry.” She gestured to the men. “But just ignaw them— they’ya no fun.” I found her accent amusing. I looked back to Drake, but did a double take when he wasn’t there. “Oh, don’t worry about him, suga. He’s probably gone to get ready,” Cherry explained, pushing me into one of the chairs at the table. “Get ready?”

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“Well, you know? For the fight.” Cherry lit up a cigarette and took a puff. Her bright red lipstick left stains on the end of it. I looked out at the cage, and realized what she was saying. Drake had come here to fight. Hadn’t he said that he won his Airstream in a fight? I wasn’t sure if I was impressed or disturbed—maybe a little of both. “So he fights for money? Against humans? Isn’t that like cheating?” Jerry—or was it Tony—gave a grunt. “Honey,” she said, clamping a hand down on my arm. “We don’t talk like that heeya.” She cast her eyes around—at the human occupants of the room. “Sorry.” I pulled my arm out from under her chilly hand. “Sometimes I forget that not everyone is in on the deep dark secret.” “S’okay.” She gave me a perky smile. “We all had to get used to it. But you—you’re not one of us. Drake’s takin’ an awful big risk bringing you around.” Risk? What was she talking about? Surely he wouldn’t get in trouble for having a human friend. A witch on the other hand, not so much. I was sure that if his friends knew what I was, they wouldn’t be so welcoming. He had said that vampires and witches didn’t get along. I quickly began to have irrational fears that I might spontaneously start bleeding and then they would smell my Essence.

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“Anyway,” Cherry’s voice distracted my paranoia. “Drake doesn’t cheat…much. He fights against others like him. Damn good at it too.” She shook her head with a laugh and took another puff. “So, they fight here?” I gestured to the cage. “In front of humans?” I lowered my voice as I said the last word. “Yeah.” She shrugged like it was not big deal. “Don’t the…people notice a difference?” She exhaled the smoke in a slow breath that made it curlicue in the air, and smiled. “Oh, there’s a difference, honey. It’s what gets the meat suits to bet their entire paychecks on the fights. No offense,” she added, noting my undoubtedly human complexion. “None taken.” I shrugged—I wasn’t all human. “Hey, Cherry?” I asked, looking down at the cage as they pulled the incapacitated boxer out of it. “Yeah, honey?” “Who’s Dorian?” Her blood-red fingernails dug into the table at hearing his name and she fought to contain herself as her face came close to morphing into her vampire face. She obviously didn’t like him either. When she had regained control, she asked in a dead voice, “Where’d you hear that name?” “From a goon named Gray. He came looking to take Drake back to Dor—him.” I stopped myself from saying his name, just in case it might set her off again.

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A shiver ran down her spine. “Honey, alls I can say is that if Dorian is looking for Drake, the smartest thing you can do is stay out of his way. You’ll live a lot longer.” She reached over towards the men and grabbed Jerry’s drink and downed it in one gulp before shaking her head a little. Whoever this Dorian dude was, he had her seriously freaked out. Before I could ask her anything else, a sick rock song came on, and all the people in the bleachers stood up and started cheering. Grown men were acting like kids in a candy store as they jumped up and down, pumping their fists in the air. They started to chant something that I couldn’t make out, but I think it was something like, “Ripper.” A titan sized, man-shaped piece of muscle came out of a darkened hallway and jogged towards the cage, loud grunts ripped out of him and the veins in his face bulged out so much that they seemed to be ready to burst. That must be Ripper. I looked over at Cherry, she was smiling a wickedly delightful smile as she passed a folded piece of paper to a man who took it and hurried off towards the hallway where Ripper came from. The pounding music seemed to get even louder and so did the chants from the crowd just in time when a slender, pale boy with contrasting dark hair jogged out from the same hallway. It was Drake. With his shirt off, I could make out some serious muscle tone, but next to Ripper, he looked like Gumby. I could only hope he was as flexible as the little green dude, otherwise, Ripper was gonna tear him to pieces.

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“Is he kidding?!” I stood up from the table, ready to go and yank him out of the cage. My stalker couldn’t go getting ripped to shreds—he wouldn’t be able stalk properly. Cherry put a forceful hand on my shoulder, and pushed me back down. For a dainty looking thing, she was strong. “He’ll be fine. Just sit back and enjoy.” Enjoy! Enjoy watching Drake be killed? NOT LIKELY! Of all the stupid, arrogant, suicidal things! What the hell was he thinking! Even if Ripper was a human, which he wasn’t, I still would have been doubtful of Drake’s ability to take him out, but as a vampire, Ripper was gonna wipe the floor with Drake’s stupid ass. Two men came out and sealed the door to the cage shut, and locked it with a padlock the size of a fist. Inside the cage, Drake was bouncing from foot to foot and shaking out his arms. Ripper, on the other hand, only seemed to be practicing his grunts and flexing his peck muscles. Disturbing. The bell clanged and the two started to revolve each other. The look on Drake’s face was pure ecstasy. At least he’d die happy. Ripper let out a grunt that could’ve passed as a howl and rushed Drake like some sort of bulldozer, causing a lull in the cheering so people could concentrate, but at precisely the last millisecond Drake jabbed to the side and delivered an elbow into Ripper’s back as he passed. The noise from the crowd soared to a roar and Ripper collided against the wall of the cage.

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Drake was back in the center of the cage jumping lightly on his feet. “Come on, big boy,” he jeered with a confident smile. I found myself smiling and promptly rolled my eyes. Ripper, despite looking like an oaf, learned from his mistake and hunched down low and began to circle inwards towards Drake, each step bringing him slightly closer. Preparing for contact, Drake hunched down too, bringing his hands up to the level of his nose. One of Ripper’s meat hook-like hands grappled Drake on the shoulder and pulled him forward. Going with it, Drake spun into it, and Ripper was able to get both arms around him and started squeezing. “Geez!” My hands made a vice grip on the ledge of the table as Drake let out a shout. Since his hands were unavailable, Drake used his head, literally. He threw it forward and slammed it backward into Ripper, whose head flung back and blood gushed out of his nose. Thankfully, he lost his grip on Drake, who darted out of the large man’s reach. “Yeah!” I jumped out of my seat with my hands in the air, but quickly snatched them back when Cherry let out a giggle. Ripper was still a little discombobulated and was staggering back and forth. Drake took the opportunity to pound a fist across his face, but Ripper was expecting it and caught his fist, wrenching him forward and then delivering a crushing kick into Drake’s chest. The force of the blow sent Drake flying backwards into the chain-link wall of the cage where he bounced off of it and hit the floor with a sickening thud.

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The crowd ate it up, but I wanted to start pulling my hair out. Ripper let out a pleased grunt and hoisted his fist into the air to rile the crowd even more, before taking sinister steps towards my stalker boy, who was still lying on the ground. “GET UP!” I shouted to him. Drake put his hands on the mat to push himself up, but Ripper drove the heel of his boot into Drake’s back, and he crashed back down onto it. Ripper smiled to the crowd. Again, Drake tried to get up, and Ripper watched him struggle with a pleased expression. As Drake sat back on his knees, Ripper swung his fist through the air and Drake was sent flying towards another wall of the cage, blood spattered out on the mat where his face hit it. “That’s enough,” I growled, standing from my seat. I wasn’t going to sit by and watch Drake get pulverized into ground beef. Though I wasn’t any match for Ripper physically, I had other means of taking him down. I just needed some damn dirt! I’d fry the skin right off of Ripper’s bones if I had to. Who cared if I revealed I was a witch to Drake’s friends, I could take them too if it came down to it! Cherry was standing in front of me before I could get around the table. “You really shouldn’t get so worried, honey. Drake’s done this hundreds of times.” Though her voice was lax, her posture told me she had no intentions of letting me pass. “He likes to toy with them,” she added. “Toy with them? What?” I crinkled my eyebrows. A loud burst of cheers drowned out the deafening music and both Cherry and I looked down to the cage. Drake was

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standing over a rolling Ripper and the bell clanged, signaling the end of the fight. He put his foot on top of Ripper’s chest to play up the crowd. Blood trailed from a cut over his eyebrow and slithered its way down his face, making him look like some sort of crazed angel. When he was done showboating, he met my glare and gave me a wink. A man in black entered the cage and hoisted Drake’s arm into the air, declaring him victor. I was still reeling from missing it. How had Drake beat the crap out of Ripper? It didn’t seem possible. “Told ya, honey,” Cherry trilled, stepping out of my way. “If you’ll excuse me, I have some winnings to collect.” She descended the stairs from our booth, and as she passed by the stage, she stopped to congratulate Drake by pressing another red-lipped kiss to his cheek. If she kept doing that, I was gonna start disliking her. When she was done, she kept going towards the hall where that man had taken her piece paper before the fight…she must have placed a bet for Drake to win. Huh. A slew of people from the crowd rushed to the bottom of the stairs by the cage to congratulate Drake, all giving him pats on the back and telling him how awesome he was. It’s a wonder his ego wasn’t the size of a continent. He saw me standing there and gestured with his eyes for me to wait for him by the entrance to the hall where Cherry had gone. I stood there a moment longer, eyes locked with his, before giving in and going to the hall. So many different things were running through my head. I wanted to smack him for

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fighting in the first place, and I wanted to hug him for winning the fight, then I wanted to kick him for pushing me to the point of almost revealing myself in front of his friends. Nobody should have that much control over my emotions! Nobody! After his adoring followers departed to go and watch another fight, he was finally able to come over to me. With a towel, he was dabbing at the cut over his eyebrow, which already looked like it was starting to heal. He had on a smug smile, as if he expected me to be pleased with him. Gaw! Arrogant much? “That was…” I paused for the words. “Yes,” he urged. “The most STUPIDEST thing I have ever seen!” My anger reared up and I gave his shoulder a thwack. “What the hell is wrong with you?!” He was about to answer, but someone called his name, and the man with the valet vest was coming down the hallway. “Sorry, man. My shift ran long. Here.” He handed a fat envelope to Drake. “That was amazing by the way! I can’t believe he didn’t see that coming! Anyway, I’ll see ya around.” He gave Drake a friendly pat on the shoulder and took off back down the hallway. As if he hadn’t been interrupted, Drake said to me, “I told you…gotta pay the bills.” He hoisted the envelope in the air. “The Airstream has to get gas somehow, and blood bank contacts don’t work for free.”

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I was putting the pieces together. “You…you bet on your own fight?” “Shh.” He pulled us into the dark hallway. “It’s not allowed, so I work with Greg. He gets a cut, and I get to pay my bills. Not to mention have some fun.” I rolled my eyes at the “fun” bit. “Who has fun getting their stuffing beat out of them?” He shrugged casually. “Men. Mostly we like doing the beating though.” “Idiots,” I let out under my breath while shaking my head. “Say what you want, but this idiot just made enough green to support himself for the next five years…if I didn’t like to buy expensive toys.” He flashed me a crooked smile before backing away. “Hang here for a moment. I gotta go get the rest of my clothes. My attention was then brought to his most-definitely uncovered chest, which now that I was closer, seemed to have a lot more muscle than earlier. Before drool managed to escape my open mouth I clamped it shut and leaned back against the wall. “Take your time.” I listened to the sounds of his boots hitting the floor as they got farther away, and when I was sure he was far enough, I melodramatically thunked my head back against the concrete wall and closed my eyes. If I was going to be a stonewall, I’d have to avoid at all costs staring at or daydreaming about any part of Drake’s anatomy that didn’t have fingers. With my eyes closed, I began to realize how tired I actually was. Driving halfway across the country to watch my…stalker

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have a top secret, definitely illegal, vampire cage match inside one of the coolest casinos in Las Vegas could really take its toll on a girl. As if I’d already fallen asleep and was dreaming, images started to play on the inside of my eyelids. The nighttime lights of the strip flashed and sparked, but my main target was a large, shiny pyramid with a white-blue beam of light coming from the top of it and going straight into the sky. The thing I was looking for was inside the pyramid—I could smell it. Normally, I didn’t smell things in my dreams, but this was like one of those dreams where you don’t smell anything but you know that you’re smelling something—like when you can’t make out the faces of the people around you but you know who you’re looking at. Whatever I was smelling was pulling me towards the Luxor, and I had a desperate need to find it. Jetting into full blast, the lights of the strip turned into a bright stream of light as I passed them. The only thing that remained the same was the scent of my target. A second later, I came to a gusty halt in front of the grand entrance of the Luxor, but the trail of my target’s scent was taking me somewhere else. I followed it to the valet area, and past the check in counter. For some reason, a feeling of relief came over me when the scent led away from the counter—I wasn’t sure why. After a moment, I recognized where I was going. I was taking all the same hallways that Drake had taken to get us to-

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wards the club, only this time, it was my target’s scent leading me. The line for LAX was way worse than it had been when Drake and I came in. I hung back, waiting for the bouncer, who wasn’t the same vampire that had let Drake in, to start inspecting a group of women. With his attention elsewhere I sped through the opening in between the doors, but with my speed, I wasn’t too worried about anyone seeing me. The scent trail went down the staircase and towards the bar, then…back out into the dance floor— “Ash!” Drake’s voice interrupted me. His hands were on my shoulders and he was shaking me. His moody eyes were trying to bulldoze their way into mine from his serious stare. “What?” I pushed his hands off and stood up, although, I wasn’t aware of when I sat down. “What the hell was that?” he asked in a hushed, thoughsomewhat hysterical voice. He hooked an arm around my elbow and led me out of the hallway and back towards the entrance to the fight club. Another fight was taking place in the cage, but these fighters were human, and really bloody. Uggh. “What was what?” I massaged my temples to sooth the twinges of a headache that was arising. “You,” he replied. “You practically went comatose in the hallway. I was calling you for several minutes but you wouldn’t wake up.” He ran a distressed hand through his hair. “Awe, you’re concerned about me. That’s so cute!” I trilled in a fake, Barbie voice. “Ash,” he snarled.

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Fixing my face back to its normal scowl, I replied, “I dunno what that was. I just got sleepy. It happens.” I took the metal steps two at a time till we were back in the dark corridor that led towards the club. The darkened image of the hallway in front of me was briefly replaced with one of people swaying and dancing inside of the club then switched back to the dark hallway. My feet momentarily forgot how to function properly and I tottered to the side. Drake caught a hold of me, looking worried. “Ash?” I straightened myself and started walking again. “I’m fine.” As I walked, I could feel his eyes on me like heat lamps. “Do you have to stare?” “Yeah. Do you always have to act so tough?” “Yup,” I answered without giving any thought to it. He let out a frustrated scoff and started to walk faster so that he was slightly ahead of me. For some reason, I smiled. The thought that I could make Drake get upset was…nice. The sight of a peeved Drake disappeared and I saw hands reaching out towards a thick, black curtain. They were my hands, but, they weren’t my hands—they belonged to a guy. The curtain was pulled back, revealing a black door—the door to the dark hallways that led to the fight club, but the door didn’t have a doorknob. I looked back out at the club to see if anyone had noticed me, but everyone was too busy partying to notice me, besides, the corner I was in was too dark. They were somewhere on the other side of this door. I could smell them.

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The sight of the door cleared up into the familiar sight of Drake’s darkly handsome face. He was looking at me with that same worried expression, and once again I was on the floor. “What happened?” I asked, pulling myself up. “You just collapsed.” He helped me up and kept his hands on my shoulders like he was worried I might fall over again. “Tell me what’s going on, Ash.” Up ahead of us, I could see the black door to the club and it helped me to remember what I had seen. “Someone’s at the door. They’re looking for somebody in here…” “What?” Drake wrinkled his eyebrows and bent down even lower so he was on my level. “What do you mean?” “I…I don’t know.” I put my hands to my head. “I kept seeing things, I thought it was just a dream or something, but…I don’t think so anymore. I think…I think I was seeing what somebody else was doing.” Looking up to him, I waited for him to crack up and call me crazy. He stood up straight but kept his hands on my shoulders. “What were they doing?” “What?” I felt the shock of disbelief hit my system. He actually took me seriously. “Well…first they were on the strip, but they followed a scent to the Luxor, and then down to the club, and…to the door. They don’t know how to get in though. And in the last vision—or whatever it was—they were looking for a ‘them.’” I reminisced over the trail the person had followed, and things clicked into place. They followed our entrance into the hotel, and all the way to the club.

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Then to where I was at the bar and then on the dance floor and lastly to the secret door. “Oh my God! He’s after us!” “He?” Drake’s ear perked up. “It was a he? You could tell?” I nodded. “Yeah, by his hands.” A low growl built up in his throat and his grasp on my shoulders tightened. “You think it’s Gray?” I asked, guessing at his irritation. “Mm,” he nodded. “Stay here.” He did his best not to snarl at me as he started prowling towards the door. What could I expect from a vampire? “Drake, no. You saw what happened last time.” I ignored his demand and put myself in front of him. “What if he has back up?” He nudged me to the side with on strong hand and continued. “He won’t do anything in public.” “Doesn’t really reassure me.” I latched onto his arm—he kept walking. “Drake, stop!” He stopped, but regarded me with a chilling scowl. “I can’t do anything here…to protect you. There’re others like you and they’d know what I am.” I urged him with my eyes to listen to me. “Can’t you just ask the others for help?” “No,” he growled. “Not if it’s Gray. Nobody would risk crossing—” He cut himself off before he could finish. “As for you, I don’t want you to do anything besides hide. Most likely, if it Gray, he’s figured out what you did back in Sunnyview and he’s here for you just as much as me. You’re not safe anymore, Ash. So let me handle this.”

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We both stared each other down, him hoping I would listen to him, and me hoping he would listen to me. I blinked first. He knew what I meant and began heading towards the door. “Drake?” I called out. He turned around slowly. “If you…if something bad happens to you, you should know that I won’t just stand by. I’m not built that way.” He smiled, almost deviously. “I know. That’s why I won’t let anything happen.” My stomach was cramping up from the anxiety of having to watch him get closer to the door. Who knew what was on the other side, or what would happen once he opened the door. Could I really just stand here and watch? No. My lips pulled into a defiant pout and I quietly started walking behind Drake. He could probably hear me, but he didn’t turn around. “Stubborn,” I heard him grumble under his breath. Even though I was on edge, I still couldn’t help but smile to myself. When he put his hand on the knob of the door, I sucked in a breath and held it tight, and he turned it slowly. His shoulders were already curling into their predatory hunch, and a low hiss exuded from his lips. With a strong flick of his wrist, he wrenched the door open so hard that it swung back and slammed against the wall that formed the dark passage. Before I could make anything

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out in the doorway, Drake blurred, creating a gust of wind that blew my hair up into the air. My knees bent into attack position and I held my hands out defensively, prepared to fight whatever came through that door. I felt the air from Drake’s blur swirling all around me and it felt like I was at the eye of a hurricane. “What’s going on?” I yelled to him when I couldn’t take it anymore. The wind died down, and my hair looked like some sort of rat’s nest as loose strands settled back against my cheeks. I pushed it out of the way and spun around to see what I had missed. Drake was further down the hallway, and in his grip, he had a boy with brown, spiky hair pinned up against the black wall of the passage. “Spike!” I yelled out, running towards the two of them. “Let him go!” I shoved Drake off of him. “So this is what dog-boy looks like without his shag,” Drake backed up, but not much. “Not what I expected.” Spike’s hand flew to his windpipe, where Drake had been smashing it, and he let out a hoarse cough. “I was worried about you, so I followed your scent,” he explained to me with a ragged voice. “Everything is great here, Fido, so you can trot on home,” Drake clapped a hand on Spike’s shoulder and started edging him out of the hallway. “Don’t be a jerk.” I punched Drake’s shoulder before gently setting my hand on Spike’s arm. “Are you okay?”

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“Yeah…” he took time to clear his throat again, “I’ll be fine. Are you…okay?” He cast a nervous glance at Drake and then our gothic surroundings. “Oh…yeah.” I looked at Drake who was eying my hand, which was still resting on Spike’s arm. He looked ready to chew Spike’s arm off, so I quickly pulled my hand back. “Drake had some things he had to take care of so he brought me along. I didn’t even think about you…” I trailed off when I saw the smile of delight my statement brought to Drake’s lips. Jealous much? I had to admit, I loved every millisecond of it. “Next time, I’ll call you so you can come with us,” I finished. Drake’s smile evaporated into thin air. Taking the lead, Drake led us out of the overpopulated, club and out into the grand hallways of the Luxor. “Gotta give it to you, Spot, you’re pretty brave for trying to find Ash in a place like this.” He drawled over his shoulder. It piqued my attention. “What do you mean, a place like this?” Drake looked over me to Spike, “She can’t smell ‘em like we can…” When he looked back at me, a languorous smile rested on his lips and trailed all the way to his eyes. He wrapped a cool arm around my shoulders and pulled me close to him so he could whisper to me. Mostly, I think he was putting on a show in front of Spike, but I wasn’t complaining. “This casino,” his eyes swept all around him, “it’s owned by vampires. What you can’t smell with your human senses

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are all the thousands of vampy scents hanging in the air.” He paused to wait until we were past the front desk, and continued once we were out in the valet pick-up. “As you’ve learned, the beings of the Underworld don’t get along very nicely…your friend took a big risk going into a vampire haven to find you.” I looked back at Spike with proud eyes. Drake interrupted by saying, “It was also stupid and unnecessary.” He unwrapped his arm from me and went over to the valet station. Even though he was cool to the touch, he had kept me warm from the night air, and at his absence, the offending air swirled in around me, making me shiver. “He’s right, you know,” I said to Spike as we waited. “What you did was stupid, you could’ve gotten hurt.” His honey brown eyes dropped to the pavement, upset. I could have handled that look on any other person, but with Spike, I didn’t like to see him upset. I crossed the two steps that separated us and put my hands on his shoulders. He looked up at me and I smiled. “Thank you.” A smile returned to his lips, and his cheeks went rosy. The roar of a familiar engine filled my ears and I turned to see the boy that Drake had given the envelope to come flying into the drive through. He screeched to a halt in front of Drake and tossed the keys to him. They exchanged a few words before the boy took off again and Drake mounted the bike. From where he was, he would have had to yell for me to hear him, so he just motioned to me with his head before revving the engine to life.

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“See you back in Sunnyview,” I said, turning back to Spike.” “Yeah,” he let out quick breath and watched as I joined Drake on the bike. He stood there watching until Drake whipped the bike out of the drive through and onto the strip. Before we got too far away, I turned back to see if he was still there…he wasn’t.

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EIGHT

Predawn light was just barely starting to peak up over the horizon when Drake and I flew by the “Welcome to Sunnyview” sign. We’d left the casino several hours ago, and had made good timing, but I could feel all of my stamina flooding from me with each passing minute. “Will your mom be awake?” he asked over his shoulder. “Probably not, why?” “Didn’t want you to get in trouble for sneaking in so late…or should I say early.” The thought of having to go back to the trailer was like a vapid nightmare after the most exciting, exhilarating dream

ever. Pouting, I rested my chin on his shoulder. “I don’t want to go back there.” He was quiet for a while, before saying, “Then don’t.” I let out a mix between a chuckle and a scoff. “And where am I to go? The yards?” “No.” He shook his head. Cautiously, he added, “You can stay with me.” I nearly choked on my own spit. “What?” Maybe it had been the road noise playing tricks on me. “Did you just say I could stay with you?” He shrugged—too bad I couldn’t see his expression, then I’d know if he was messing with me. But, Drake didn’t mess around with things like that. “Okay,” I said with a tight, nervous breath. “I’ll stay with you.” Too quickly, he responded, “You don’t have to if you don’t want to…” Equally quick, I replied, “Well you don’t have to offer it if you don’t want to…” “Who said I didn’t want too?” “Who said I didn’t want too?” “Huh?” “What?” I squinted through confusion. “So do you want to?” he asked. “Do you want me too?” I countered. “Ash!” he pulled the bike off to the side of the road. “Answer the question!” Frustratedly, I tugged off my helmet, “You first!”

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He inhaled an exasperated breath, “Yes, I want you to.” My heart nearly melted into a puddle of gooey, romantic mush. “Then…I want to too.” “Fine, it’s settled.” “Fine.” Without any further conversation, he revved back onto the road and didn’t stop till we were in front of his trailer. All of my gumption started to fail me and a large lump started to build up in my throat. Silently, we stood on the steps while he unlocked the skinny door of the Airstream. I could feel my palms starting to sweat from anticipation…or was it nervousness? In the trailer, we both sort of just orbited around each other, wordlessly, until he finally said, “You can have the bed. I’ve got a few things I wanna look up on the computer…and I need to eat.” I guess that answered the question I had about sleeping arrangements. “Right…well, goodnight.” “Goodnight.” Our eyes met just as I was getting ready to turn for the bedroom, and I got stuck in his gaze. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was seeing when I looked in his eyes, but somehow, it didn’t matter. Just looking into them was comforting. How girly. I shut the small door to the bedroom, and barely had room to walk in front of the double bed. Tossing my bag on the side of the bed, I started to unbutton my shirt. Thankfully, I’d worn a tank today, so I’d be comfortable sleeping.

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Drake’s room was decorated like the main area of the trailer, with dark wood meeting up to stainless steel panels. Next to his bed, a shelf that was attached to the wall served as his bedside table. On it, there was a small digital clock and a silver necklace with a cross, like he had taken it off before going to sleep. I crawled into the bed and reached over to run my fingers over the chain of the necklace and then the cross attached to it. “Hm.” So, I guess crosses didn’t bother him. Were any vampire myths real? Maybe that’s why they were called myths instead of ‘vampire truths.’ The sun was just starting to turn the sky a shade of dark blue topaz as I looked out the small window of his room. I wondered if Mom had even noticed I didn’t come home… Probably not. One of these days, I was gonna walk out the door of the trailer and never go back. What would she think then? Would she think anything? Nestling back into the black pillows of Drake’s bed…Drake’s bed, wow…I closed my eyes and let myself relax. Here, I felt…safe, at peace.

¢ Midday sun was pouring through Drake’s window. A ray of it landed on my hand, sprawled across the top of the mattress, and started to warm it up. It took a moment to remember why I was in Drake’s bed, but steadily my memory came back to me. If I hadn’t been

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sitting in my tank top, on Drake’s bed, I would have thought that I had dreamed about being taken across state lines, on a motorcycle, by the hottest stalker I’d ever seen, then entering a club in one of Las Vegas’ hottest casino’s, followed by witnessing an illegal vampire smack-down! But no, it was all real. I pulled my shirt back on and started buttoning it up as I headed for the door. When I opened it, I saw Drake, shirtless, sitting on the couch with a cup of blood. He had the laptop propped over one knee and was reading it intently. “Morning,” he greeted me without looking up. “Sleep good?” “Uh, great.” I did my best not to gawk at his gloriously exposed abs. “What ya lookin’ at?” He glanced up from the screen. “News—crimes mostly.” “Okay…” I wrinkled my face. “That’s not disturbing at all.” He laughed and rolled his eyes. “It’s how I keep track of…my kind.” The way he referred to other vampires, it sounded like he despised them. “Most vampires migrate to cities with higher crime rates so they can go undetected easier. I like to go to cities with the lowest, so I can go undetected by the other vampires.” “Oh.” The longer I thought about what he said, I got disturbed. “You’re not leaving Sunnyview are you?” My hands balled into tight, anxious fists. He, no doubt, noticed and gave an easy smile. “Not today or tomorrow, but I can’t stay here forever. One day, I’m gon-

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na have to find another town.” He nodded to the laptop, and added, “I have to be prepared.” “Well,” I settled next to him on the couch, “when that day comes, give a girl some notice?” I tried not to sound too pathetic. “I have a feeling you’ll be the first to know when it’s time for me to leave,” he replied, closing the laptop. For the first time, he seemed to realize that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He looked down at his lean torso, and then lazily over to me, assessing if his appearance affected me at all. I did my best to look bored with him. As he stood up, his chiseled chest came into full relief and I was forced to look away or start blushing. It was the reaction he had been hoping for, because he chuckled before going back to his room. When he returned, his chest was covered by an attractive black shirt. “Dog boy stopped by, well, it was more like prowled by.” “Spike? He came here? What did he want?” I asked, perking to attention. “Dunno. He just sniffed around the trailer and then took off. I’m guessing he was just checking on you.” A small smile played on my lips as I sat quietly on the couch. “You like this kid, don’t you?” he asked, sounding a little less cocky. “More than you like most people.” “Yeah.” I shrugged. “He’s messed up like me and you. And he’s cool…not like the other preppies. Don’t forget that he saved my ass from getting pulverized by Mal and company.

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“That’s what I keep reminding myself,” Drake said in a low voice, turning towards the kitchen. “I’ll tell you, Maverick, you sure know how to get yourself into a sticky situation—being best friends with a bloodsucker and a dog boy.” “I’m a witch, though,” I added. “It comes with the territory.” “No,” he turned around, “it really doesn’t. If you were a real witch, one of us would be dead.” Although he was smiling, there was a grave air to his tone. For a second, I got a little miffed about not being considered a real witch. Hadn’t I saved his bacon with my crazy witch skills? Well, maybe my powers weren’t that great yet, but they were definitely powers! “I guess it would take a reject to know one,” I retorted. “What?” he asked, raising one eyebrow. “If you were a real vampire, then again, one of us would be dead as well. And if Spike was a real garoul…you get my drift. None of us are normal, Drake—well, none of us are normal beings of the Underworld.” “This is true,” he conceded, putting his cup of blood back in the fridge. When he finished, he came back over and plopped down next to me. “So, what do you want to do today? Cliff dive, parasail, climb the Andes? After yesterday, nothing is too big,” he joked. “I wish that were true,” I grumbled. “But, actually, I have to go home.” “Home?” he asked skeptically.

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“Yeah. As much as I wish I could just let go…I still…I still feel responsible for my mom, you know? I don’t trust her boyfriend… I’m just gonna check-in and grab some clothes. Should only take an hour or so.” I headed for the door and stopped when he called my name. He was pensive for a moment, before continuing with a smirk, “Try not to get yourself into any dangerous situations while you’re out.” “Who? Me? Danger?” I pointed a finger demurely back at myself, before having a laugh and leaving.

¢ My boots crunched up the gravel path of my trailer’s ramshackle driveway. The hinges of the old rusty door screeched as I pulled it back, and the usual clouds of smoke were surprisingly absent inside of the dingy trailer. That’s odd. I stepped further inside, and was even more surprised when I didn’t see either of the two permanent couch potatoes in their normal place of rest. When I saw that my bedroom door was ajar, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. How dare they go through my stuff! I practically kicked the door out of my way, while breathing flames. My mom was standing over my catawampus desk…with one of my sketchbooks in her hands. She brusquely pushed her stringy hair out of her way, and asked in a rather severe, sober tone, “What is this?” She

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flipped the sketchbook over towards me, and I saw a sketch I had made of Spike in his garoul form. Although, at the time I made the sketch, I didn’t know it was Spike. In the corner of the page, were other sketches of Drake, in vampire mode of course. “Give me that!” I lurched for the book, but Mom pulled it out of my grasp. “Tell me what this is!” she demanded, still, her voice didn’t belie any trace of being intoxicated. “I don’t have to tell you anything,” I replied in a snarl, moving around her to start collecting clothes. She watched me start to pack, and then asked, “Where are you going?” “Away.” She was quiet for a moment then said, “Good. You need to leave.” I dropped my bag on my bed and threw a look at her with enough contempt to kill a horse. “Sorry to have been such a burden!” I shoved my clothes in hard enough to risk punching a hole in the bottom of the bag. “I’m sorry, baby.” She came to me and took my wrists in her hands, they were cold and clammy. “It’s just better for everyone if you go.” I wrenched my hands away from hers. “Better for you and Bob, you mean. Well, don’t worry, I’m sure when more bills go unpaid and the pantry runs out of food, he’ll be more than willing to get off his ass and get a job! You two deserve each other!” My clothes were shoved in, and I yanked the zipper to

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close the bag. Words were becoming so bitter in my mouth that I couldn’t even say anymore. I snatched the sketchbook from her hands with speed that would’ve impressed Drake and pushed past her. Her jaw was firmly set, and her eyes were tight and guarded. Neither was normal for her. Normally, she was just too out of it to even make expressions, or stand upright. Where was this sudden change coming from? Good riddance! I had collected my small, but healthy stash of money that I’d earned while working at the grocery store. I’d kept it hidden in a secret compartment of my desk. With the savings I had, I could survive long enough to find a job in another town. There was no way I was sticking around Sunnyview! At first, I started to walk back towards Drake’s trailer, but…why? Why was I going to run back to him? Sure, he had a way about him of bringing out the good side of me, but, what could he offer to me at this, my most aggravating hour? He could offer a place to sleep and decent company, but at what cost—staying in Sunnyview? My wits? Or even my humanity? If anything, the encounter with my mom only reinforced the one thing I’d told myself ever since I could remember: Don’t depend on anyone but yourself! I came to a defiant stop and turned a one-eighty, leading away from Drake’s. I had to stand up and take care of myself. It was what I always planned on doing anyways. A month ago, if my mom had said what she’d said, I would have

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marched right out that door and straight towards the highway—no hesitation. With every step I took, my conviction grew. I was a smart, tough, kick-ass girl. I didn’t need some guy to make me feel safe at night, no matter how fast he could blur. I had almost reached the lonely stoplight of this wretched town when a siren sounded. Charlie. Instead of stopping like I always did, I kept walking. The tires of the squad car crunched as they passed over rocks on the road, and Charlie pulled up next to me as I walked. The passenger window rolled down, and he called, “What are you doing, Ash?” “I’ll give you three guesses,” I replied. “Did the Werner kid mess with you again?” he asked. I mimicked the sound of a buzzer and said, “Wrong-O. Two more guesses.” “Bob?” “Close, but no cigar. One try left.” “Your mom then.” “Ah, he’s got it folks! Tell him what he’s won!” I clapped and gave a fake smile before it was replaced with a frown. “She kicked me out.” The car stopped so Charlie could process what I’d said and I left him behind as I trudged further towards the highway. “Ash, wait!” he yelled, pulling up with me again. “You can’t just go running away. You can stay with me and my family.”

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Shaking my head, I replied, “As nice as that would be, Charlie, I don’t think that would work out. If you want to be taken seriously in this town, you don’t wanna be associated with the likes of me… Besides, I can’t stay in Sunnyview, it’s too…too painful.” I turned away from the car so that he got my point and picked up the pace. “Ash? Ash?...Ash?” I ignored him. “Don’t do this, Ash,” he tried again, but to no avail. The car and I slowly kept moving towards the highway, from which I could hear the sounds of cars flying by. I dared a quick glance back at Charlie, and he was fretting his lip while lost in deep thought. When he pulled out of his thoughts, he said, “I didn’t wanna do this, Ash, but you’re leaving me no choice.” He pulled the car over so that it cut in front of me, and then he got out. In a serious tone, he asked one more time, “You’re sure you won’t reconsider?” “Very,” I replied while crossing my arms over my chest. My answer caused him to painfully wince, and he started to reach for the cuffs from his belt. “Whoa!” I exclaimed, bewildered. He was taking this protective bit just a little too far. “You’re a minor, Ash, I can’t just have you running off and getting into trouble.” He started to come around the car and towards me. “What are you charging me with? Huh? I haven’t done anything worth meriting an arrest!” A smug air rolled over me.

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“Actually, by my watch, it’s 1:12 and that means that you are committing truancy.” He held up the cuffs so I could see them clearly. “Now, do I need to put these on you, or will you come willingly?” No. NO! I just can’t escape this freak’n town, can I?! I was subconsciously aware of the sound of a motorcycle coming towards us as I considered the statistics of me being able to outrun Charlie. The motorcycle came to a stop in front of Charlie’s car, and a boot clad Drake got off of it and sauntered towards me. Great. Running away would have been easier to accomplish if people weren’t there to witness it. “What’s goin’ on?” he asked, looking between Charlie and me. His eyes quickly assessed the bulging bag that hung from my shoulder, and his dark eyes flashed with realization. “You’re leaving?” “I was,” I muttered. “Not anymore thanks to the Gestapo over there.” I flicked my hand in Charlie’s direction. Drake gave a tight nod with a serious face, then, he slowly walked up to Charlie, so close that their chests nearly touched. Charlie started to puff up from Drake’s inappropriate proximity, but Drake said, “Look at me.” Caught off-guard, Charlie’s eyes met Drake’s and the two of them stood silent for the longest time, neither one looking away. It was like this for about a minute, and then Charlie blinked, as if coming out of a daydream, and he turned and got back in his car, not even giving me a second glance. The squad car pulled away and hung a U-ey back towards town.

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My jaw was hanging open as I looked from Drake to the car. “What the hell was that?” Drake waited till the car was out of sight, and then his whole tight façade failed, and he started to lag to the side. I quickly rushed forward to steady him. “Compulsion,” he answered, “a neat little vampire quirk.” He rested his arm over my shoulder until after I had helped him over to the bike so he could sit. “It’s a bitch to do though.” He bent forward, putting his head in his hands, reeling with visible exhaustion. So, he made Charlie leave? With his mind? Not only was my stalker hot, but he could control people with his thoughts! Holy crow! After catching his breath, he looked back up at me. “Why?” I knew what he was asking about, and didn’t really want to have to explain it. My awed expression changed to a more dower one. “Look, there’s a lot you don’t know about me, Drake. And there’s a lot I don’t know about you… But trying to pretend like what we’re doing is fine—it’s only going to cause problems down the line. This whole flirty, stalker-thing was cute, but, it’s time to get back to the real world. And in our real world, vampires don’t protect witches, and witches certainly don’t let vampires get close to them. We’re just fooling ourselves.” “That’s bullshit.” He stood up even though he was obviously fatigued, his dark blue eyes were fierce and focused on me. “In our real world, you would never go along with something just because it’s what everyone else does. You would

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give the middle finger to anyone who tried to make you do what you didn’t want to do.” He stepped closer to me, the resolve in his voice gaining momentum. “And as far as not knowing you, Ash, I know all I need to for now. I know that despite how strong you think you are, you’re just as vulnerable as everyone else, and that sometimes, you need to be taken care of…and…I know that I want to be someone who takes care of you, so screw anyone who doesn’t like it.” We were only a foot apart—he didn’t make any attempts to touch me. “But I can’t do that if you runaway.” I crossed my arms, as was habit when I felt threatened—a defense mechanism. It was like, if I shielded my heart, somehow it wouldn’t get hurt. I wanted to trust Drake, but everything I’d been ingrained to feel, told me to push him away. So, I took a chance and ignored those feelings. “My mom kicked me out of the trailer, I have nowhere to go.” Unbidden, stinging tears started to build in my eyes. I fought to keep them from falling. “I can’t believe she really did it, I mean, she’d always threatened to kick me out, but I never thought she’d actually do it.” The first tear started to roll down my cheek. I quickly wiped it away, but it only cleared the path for another tear to fall, and another. A tight, hard feeling in my chest started to broil, and I suddenly felt so weak. Was this always how it felt when you let someone in? Drake was quiet, but with one fluid movement, he pulled me into his arms and held me firmly against his chest. He wasn’t warm, he was more like the underside of the pillow

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when you’re overheated—cool and refreshing. His chest was still, no rising or falling, or if there was, it was so slight I didn’t notice it. I was still too low to try and pull away, being held tight seemed to make all of my sucky feelings dull. After a minute, I knew I should have pulled away, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. He didn’t pull away either. Slowly, my arms snaked around his waist and my fingers laced together behind his back. I found that I could put all my weight against him, and his strong vampire muscles held us firmly upright. It sort of reminded me of a memory I had of my dad when I was really little. I had fallen off of my tricycle and scraped my knee. My dad’s strong arms cradled me and made me forget all about the pain. Sadly, I couldn’t remember what my dad’s face looked like, only the way it felt to be held in his arms. Finally, I felt strong enough to let go, and I pulled back. “Thanks.” He nodded and looked down at his feet before returning his eyes to mine. “What will it be? Are you gonna run away, or are you gonna be the girl I know you are?” I was quiet for a long time, thinking. Then, when I had made my decision, I purposefully strode over to his bike and grabbed the helmet—my helmet—from the back. Drake watched me with a proud smile that started to peak at the corners of his mouth. His smile made me glow inside, but of course, I didn’t let on.

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Putting my free hand on my hip, I asked expectantly, “Are you coming? I haven’t got all day to stand around you know.” He let out a chuckle that sounded like music, and confidently joined me, swinging a leg over the bike. I followed suit, and he started the bike, the purr of which was almost comforting to me. “Ready?” he asked. I inhaled and exhaled deeply. “As I’ll ever be.” This was a big step for Ash-kind. It was the first time that I’d let somebody help me, truly help me. I was glad it was Drake. Drake took the long way back to the trailer cemetery, and we passed Charlie in his cruiser. He didn’t even look up as we went by. Instead, he kept his hands firmly on the steering wheel and stared straight ahead of him, like some sort of zombie. “What did you do to him?” I asked over the loud engine of the motorcycle. “Told him that he couldn’t see us and to go about his usual business.” Drake must have seen my concerned expression because he quickly followed that up with, “Don’t worry, it’ll wear off. I just didn’t want him trying to haul you away somewhere that I couldn’t get to you without making a scene.” “Stalker,” I mumbled under my breath. He had heard my remark with his vampy hearing because he chuckled a little then pressed the bike for more speed. I wrapped my arms tighter around him and hunkered up

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against him, letting my eyes close and the rhythm of the bike’s engine guide my thoughts. We got inside the Airstream and I kicked my boots off and headed for my favorite spot on his comfy white couch. “You gonna tell me, or do I have to beat it out of you?” he asked, leaning against the small kitchen counter. He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrow at me, the tiniest hint of a smile peeked at one corner of his mouth. “I don’t know.” I leaned back and tucked my legs under me. “Are you referring to why I was walking down the road, or why I was kicked out of my home?” “Both.” He shifted his weight to his other leg. “Well…” I considered where to start. “When I went home, I found my mom going through my stuff. She found one of my sketchbooks…” I stopped to replay it in my head. “Yes?” “And she saw my sketches of you and Spike—when you’re all—” I made a ferocious face to demonstrate how he looked when he was all vamped out. “I see.” He slowly bobbed his head up and down as he said it. “And this bothered her?” I rolled my eyes. “What doesn’t bother my mother? She wanted to know what it was, but I pretty much told her to piss off. She saw me packing to come back here, and she told me that it was a good thing, and just like that, gave me my walking papers. She didn’t even seem drunk either.” My jaw started clenching at the memory of it.

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Before I got too caught up in my head, Drake asked, “What about the other part? The part where you were walking down the road—away from Sunnyview?” This question was harder to answer. There were so many hidden questions wrapped inside of it. One being: Why were you leaving me? “What do you want me to say, Drake?” I looked up into his dark eyes with a crass expression. “How ‘bout the truth.” The almost-smile went straight and his eyes got even more intense. “So what, you’re mom kicked you out, it happens to a lot of people. What I want to know is why you thought you had no one in this small pathetic town that you could go to? No one you trusted? Huh?” My nails dug into the cushion of the sofa. “What are you, a shrink? I have emotional baggage. I don’t always have thought-out reasons for why I do the things I do.” He rolled his eyes at my lame excuse. “That’s shit and you know it. You had a reason for walking away and not coming to me. What was it, Ash? What were you really running away from?” “Do we have to do this right now?” I tried not to look away from his eyes—that would mean that I was weak. He inhaled a deep breath, although the oxygen was unnecessary, and pulled his eyes away. “No…no we don’t.” I let out the breath I’d been holding and allowed my eyes to fall from his face. Crisis averted!

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I’d already opened up to him so much today, I had a limit! Pouring out all of my heartfelt emotions was way passed the limit. What was it that he wanted to hear anyway? Did he want to know how I felt about him, or what? He kicked his boots off as well and padded over to the fridge, pulling out a bag of O-neg. After sticking a neon green bendy straw in the opening, he grabbed a remote off the counter and pointed it towards the front wall, where a TV clicked on. “Satellite,” he said. “I get over a thousand channels.” “Nice,” I commented, pulling a pillow towards me and cuddling up into a comfortable nook in the couch. Drake grabbed the other end of the couch, and we spent the rest of the day that way—in comfortable, safe silence. I liked that he was the kind of person that could have an argument with me and five seconds later still be cool. It was what I needed, since I seemed to get into a lot of arguments. We were six episodes into a CSI marathon when a tapping sound rapped on the door. Drake rolled his eyes lazily towards me, “S’for you,” then rolled them back to the TV, not seeming disturbed in the least. “Please,” I scowled, “don’t exert yourself on my behalf.” I pulled up from the comfy couch and noted the way my bare feet felt on his plush carpet as I crossed to the door. Drake was too lost in the show to have even heard my grumblings, and surprisingly, I found myself amused at his level of interest in the show.

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Pushing the skinny door open, I instantly felt a smile come to my lips when I saw Spike and his spiky hair standing in front of me. “You’re here.” When he saw me, he took a big breath of relief. “What’d you expect?” I stepped down to his level and shut the door behind me. “Well, some of the kids at school were saying they saw you walking towards the highway.” “I hate small towns,” I grumbled under my breath. “It was nothing—just something I had to deal with, but it’s over now.” He nodded, and then gestured back to the Airstream. “Are you staying here?” “Yeah…for now.” I shrugged. “Oh…” He took time to process it. “Does that mean that you and your mom…” His voice trailed off when he saw my expression. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.” I reached out and touched his shoulder. “You’re not. I…I’m just a little grouchy when it comes to her is all.” “I know the feeling,” he said in a bold tone. “Oh? You have mom issues too?” I raised an eyebrow, surprised. “Not quite. It’s more like dad issues.” “Ah,” I nodded. “‘Cause of the garoul thing?” “Sometimes. He seems to think I can’t make any decisions for myself and that he knows everything that’s best for me.”

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“Mm,” I cooed in agreement. “You’re right, he sounds like an ass—” I bit my tongue. “I mean, he sounds…tough.” He laughed and kicked a soda can that littered the ground. “I think you had it right the first time.” A genuine laugh rolled out of me and caught me off guard. Who knew that Spike could be so…so cool? All these years he’d been right in front of me, but I’d put up so many walls that I couldn’t even see him behind them. A couple of weeks ago being a preppy, in my book, made you spawn of the devil—but now, I wasn’t so sure. Although, Mal and the others—definitely spawn material! “Thanks for coming over and, you know, checking on me and all,” I said, feeling somewhat sheepish. Expressing sincerity was not my thing. A big smile lit up Spike’s face, becoming infectious and making me smile again. “Sure,” he said, “anytime.” We walked a little ways down the road and he asked, “Will you be here when I come over tomorrow?” He wasn’t being sarcastic—in fact, he seemed quite serious. “I don’t know,” I answered. A worried expression slid over his face and I reached out gently punched his shoulder. “But don’t worry, I’m sure if you wanted to find me, you could sniff me out.” He let out a soft chuckle and said, “Yeah, I guess I could.” He was still smiling at me when he cocked his head to the side and a grim look took over his boyish face. “What is it?” I asked, looking around for signs of trouble.

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“My dad, he’s calling me.” There was a grudging edge to his voice, making it sound dark and so not-Spike. “You can hear him from here?” He nodded. “I should go before he comes looking, but I’ll come find you tomorrow.” Giving him one more smile, I watched him blur into the night—feeling my blur-envy once again. Man, what I could do if I could blur! “How’s Scooby-Doo?” Drake asked over his shoulder as I re-entered the Airstream. He had stretched out since I’d been gone and was now taking up the entire couch. “He’s fine,” I answered sharply, shoving him out of my spot. “And if he’s Scooby, then you’re Shaggy.” “Only if you’re Velma,” he replied, suggestively wagging an eyebrow at me. Re-cuddling in to my spot, I rolled my eyes. “Like I’d ever be Daphne!” “I don’t know,” he said with a smile. “As I recall, she could kick major monster-ass.” “Mm, yeah, but Velma was always the brains of the operation. She could whip Daphne’s or any monster’s ass any day.” “Oh, I see,” he said leaning forward towards me, getting so close I felt his cool breath brush up against my cheek. “How do you think she’d kick my ass—you know, since I’m a vampire and all?” “Easy,” I answered, leaning closer to him as well. “She’d distract you long enough to formulate her plan.”

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“Yes,” he urged, “and how would she distract me?” There was an irresistible smile claiming his lips and making it hard to focus on this oddly flirtatious conversation. “She’d make sure that you were so completely focused on something right in front of you that you’d never even see her plan falling into place.” In a very uncharacteristic move, I leaned forward so far that Drake had to start leaning back to keep our foreheads from meeting, as well as other things. He’d leaned back as far as he could and I was practically lying on him, although I doubted he could even feel the weight of me. He smile grew wider and he tucked some of my loose hair back while pulling my face closer. His cool fingers made me over-alert to his touch, yet it made me feel warmer than it should have. “Yes, but what if this distraction she was using was simply part of my plan, and that she was the one who wouldn’t see it coming.” My lips were getting dangerously close to his, and I was acutely aware of every lingering centimeter in between us. He started to lean forward so that the space in between us would be filled, but the touch of his cool skin started to wake me up. What was I doing?! This was Drake after all—my Drake, my stalker—I…I couldn’t do this with him, not now. He was right, I’d gotten so distracted in distracting him that I never even saw this coming. I’d fallen right into his delicious trap and I wasn’t sure I wanted to be rescued from it. “Drake,” I tried to protest, but he kept moving closer.

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The chill of his pale lips was cooling my warm lips down when he suddenly stopped and pulled back, practically throwing me off of him. I watched, completely baffled as he stood up and reached for the remote, turning the volume on the TV up. “Breaking news,” exclaimed the newscaster on the TV. “Four unidentified victims were found dead early this morning outside a truck stop on Route 112—just four miles from town. Police officials are ruling the deaths homicides, but no further information has been provided. Stick with us throughout out the evening to learn more on this tragic story. For now, I’m Cynthia Pike and this is Channel 3 News.” If it were possible, I’d of thought that Drake had gone three shades paler. His jaw was in that familiar locked position he made when he was about to battle. “Drake,” this time my voice was filled with alarm, “tell me what’s going on.” “Get your stuff,” he said in a flat tone, pulling me off the couch and towing me to my bag and shoving it into my hands. “Why?” I asked in vain, because he just ignored it, further tugging me out the door. “Would you just stop for a moment!” I yelled at him, yanking my wrist from his firm grasp. “What the hell is going on!” “I need you to go home—just for a while.” His dark eyes were penetrating mine like a blade. “I need to go somewhere, and I don’t want you to stay here alone.” “Go somewhere? Go where?!”

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“That’s not important,” he replied, taking my wrist once again. “Well, it sure seems to be important!” I dug my heels in to resist, but it was futile. “DRAKE!” I yelled out in rage. He stopped and turned to face me again. “What?” “You’re gonna tell me what’s going on, or I’m gonna…gonna do something.” “Do something?” he asked, sounding unconvinced. “Yeah, I don’t know what, but you know I’ll think of something to do that you won’t like. So you better just tell me now.” He stared me down, debating whether I was right. He finally made up his mind and said, “I’m going to that truck stop.” “What—why?” “Because,” he looked around us, “I…I think it might be Gray and the others.” My heart jumped in my chest at hearing their mention. “Gray? But I…” “You beat them once, yes, but they don’t give up that easy. I need to go and make sure it’s not them and I don’t want you to be near my trailer while I’m gone.” “Why?” I felt like that’s the only word I knew how to say. “Because, my scent is too potent here, and that’s what they’ll be looking for if it is them.” “Well, you’re not going anywhere without me!” I exclaimed. “You saw what happened the last time they ganged up on you. You need me there.”

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“No,” he replied defiantly. “You’re not going. Last time we got lucky, I’m not risking that this time.” He started pulling me again. When he stopped, he manhandled me onto the back of his bike and then haphazardly put the helmet over my head, stifling my complaints. “I’ll only be an hour at the most,” he said after stopping at my old trailer and forcing me off the back of the bike. “Please, don’t do anything stupid while I’m gone.” I didn’t have time to argue before he left in a roaring cloud of dust. I watched the red tail light of the bike get further and further away till it disappeared. “DAMN IT!” I hollered, wanting to slam my fist into something. I settled for kicking an old terracotta pot with nothing but dirt and dead roots inside of it. It shattered and its clumped contents flew everywhere. “Love’ll do that to ya—make you want hurt something,” a regretfully unmistakable voice broke the quiet. Bob was leaning in the opened doorway of my trailer. A cigarette was resting in between his lips and he exhaled a thick cloud of toxic smoke before taking the deathstick in between his spindly, dirty fingers. My disgust for him was plain on my face as I started for the door. “Shut up, Bob.” At the moment, I didn’t really care about setting him off. I was so angry I felt like I could take him out with my little finger. He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Ooh, someone’s a little pissy, aren’t we? That time of the month again?” After I’d gotten past him and was stomping towards

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my room he asked, “Didn’t your old lady kick you outta here?” I spun on my heel and gave him a look that could almost kill. “Don’t get me wrong,” he added, “I don’t care if you’re here or not. In fact, I think it’s great having you around, but I think your mom’s just a little jealous if you ask me. I mean, she’s getting up there—not as thin as she used to be, or as pretty.” He stepped closer to me, looking me hungrily up and down in a way that made my stomach lurch. “But you, mmmm-mm!” He took one more step and I growled, ‘”Don’t come any closer to me.” “Or what? You’ll call for your pale boyfriend. He’s obviously not too worried about you if he could take off like that. Actually, it seemed like he was trying to get as far away from you as possible.” “Shut up!” My lip pulled back over my teeth in true snarl. “Ah, don’t worry, the women in your family are good, he’ll come back for more. Too bad you won’t be here.” That last little bit came out of left field. What was he talking about—me not being here? He saw my confusion and said, “You didn’t really think I was hanging around here for your mom did you? Ugh, you did! That’s okay, I can see why you’d think that,” he motioned down to his horribly dirty clothes and unwashed body, “I had to blend in.” He snapped his fingers and what seemed to be clouds of darkness slithered in from the opened win-

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dows of the trailer, cloaking him in their black vapors. As the clouds departed, his clothes were now made up of a sharp black button down and obsidian colored jeans with steel toed leather boots. His greasy hair had transformed into a sculpted mane of dark brown hair. “Ah, that’s better!” he cooed, admiring his outfit. My warning bells were whistling and whirring like mad inside of my skull. This-was-not-good! I was either losing my mind, or I just witnessed Bob do…magic! “Who the hell are you!” I raised my hands up in front of me, although I wasn’t quite sure what I could do with them. “Who am I?” he asked in a cocky voice. “I’m the one who found you—the last Maverick, but you can call me Balthazar.” “The last what?” I shook my head, really confused. “Don’t tell me you don’t know!” he bellowed jovially. “Wow, no wonder it took so long for anyone to find you. I mean, it’s kinda genius—not telling you would make it easier to hide you. Gotta give it to your ma, she’s one smart lady…or she used to be.” The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. “Used to be? What are you talking about?!” There were too many puzzles being thrown at me at the same time. “You’ll find out eventually, but for now, it’s time to go.” He started to come towards me, extending his hand to reach for me. I side-stepped and avoided his hand, saying, “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

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“Yes, princess, you are.” A determined expression came over his usually drunk face. His features seemed more defined now, almost vulture like. His claw-like hand snatched out again, this time getting a hold of my shoulder. “Let go of me!” I yelled, clawing out at his face. My nails snagged along the side of his cheek, drawing blood. He wrenched his hand back, clasping it to his bloodied cheek. “You’re gonna regret that, little girl.” “No, I don’t think I will.” I locked eyes with him, both of us calculating our next moves, like a duel of sorts. The anticipation grew to an uncontainable level—one of us had to do something. I decided it should be me. Faking to my left, I doubled back to the right. He’d fallen for it and had started to go in the wrong direction, giving me a few seconds head start. I bolted for the door, trying my hardest not to scream. My fingers grappled with the ancient handle of the door, fighting to get it open. Bob—Balthazar— whoever-the-hell-he-was caught up to me and wrapped his arms around me, trapping my arms against my chest. “Don’t be a bad girl,” he grumbled in my ear as I fought to get loose. “Go…to…hell,” I said in between each blow I delivered with my heels to his legs, each one causing him to stagger a little. “I will,” he replied out of breath, “but I’m taking you with me. Now hold still.” His grip tightened around me and he started to say something in a language that I didn’t understand. He said it over and over again, like a chant. The more

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he said it the more passionate he got. I became aware of the change in pressure around us, like gravity was trying to crush us into the ground. Expanding my chest to breathe got harder and harder. Using up the last reserve of my strength, I kicked out at the wall of the trailer, slamming both feet into it and creating enough force to knock us backwards. Bob’s chanting was disrupted by it as we both crashed into the old, metal dining table. The suffocating feeling immediately vanished, leaving me gasping for oxygen. He grumbled, picking himself up and coming for me again. I kicked a fallen chair into his path and he tripped on it, hitting the vinyl floor of the trailer with a smack. “Little shit!” he yelled out. While he was trying to stand back up, I had gotten to my feet and to the door once again. This time it opened without a problem. I exhaled a breath of relief as the night air hit my face. My breath turned into a scream when I felt the roots of my hair being ripped out. Bob had caught up to me, yanking my hair to draw me back. I swung out with an angry fist to knock him away and yelled out, “SPIKE! HELP!” He was my last hope for getting away—since obviously I wasn’t doing so hot on my own. I couldn’t believe this was even happening, or that my stalker wasn’t here to save me…again. “Shut up!” Bob got an arm around my waist and clamped another over my mouth. My feet kicked wildly his shins, but he didn’t let go of me. Bob started the chanting again, and

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the crushing pressure returned. After several seconds, I could almost imagine the gravity sucking me out of Bob’s arms and to some other place. The more pressure that was applied, the less I felt like I was still touching the ground. A sharp, stabbing pain in my forearm shocked me back into reality. Bob’s arms were ripped away from me—or was I being ripped away from Bob. I heard Bob shout out in anger, but when I could finally see clearly, I was lying on the ground, and a large black dog stood in between me and my slimy kidnapper—except this dog was extraordinarily large, not even like a dog at all. Spike. Spike let out one of his most ferocious snarls yet, and Bob blanched from it. His eyes were cold and dead as he regarded the garoul with true loathing. My hands instinctively moved to the ground around me, taking up handfuls of lovely, lovely dirt. Bob saw this and snarled. “Don’t think I won’t use it!” I threatened. His angry eyes stayed locked with mine, but he began his chant again. I waited for the horrible crushing feeling to return, but it didn’t. An eerie red haze surrounded Bob, and his voice started to sound like it was getting farther and farther away. The haze thickened to make a blood red cloud that swallowed him inside of it, and as the cloud evaporated, it took him with it. Spike lunged for the air where Bob used to be, snapping and snarling, but there was nothing to snarl at. Bob had vanished into thin, red air.

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My hands, which had clenched around balls of dirt relaxed and I fell back on to the ground, exhausted and bewildered. What the hell had just happened? Why had it happened? Where was my mom? Who was Bob-Balthazar? What the hell did it matter if I was the last Maverick? And most all, where was Drake?! “Ash! Ash, look at me! Ash!” Spike’s frantic voice came from over me. He’d changed back to his human form and was hovering over me with a concerned expression. His warm hands lifted my sore arm and he said, “Ash, I’m so sorry about this, I-I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just didn’t know what he was doing. I had to get you away from him. Oh, God, you’re bleeding a lot! I’m gonna take you to the hospital!” “What?” I asked, somewhat out of it. “What do you mean?” I started to sit up, but he had to help me finish, for some reason I was so tired. Spike’s worried eyes were focused on my arm—the arm that currently hurt like hell. “I—I tried to be gentle but, I was so panicked. I think I hit an artery.” It took forever to make my eyes move down to my arm, even my sight was going sorta blurry, but I could still see enough to make out the crimson liquid coating my sleeve and draining down over my fingers. There was an awful lot of it— more than was good, I bet. “Oh,” I said, sounding amused. “That was you?” He looked like he wanted to jump off a cliff. “Yes. Ash…Ash?” His eyes bulged in dire concern. “ASH!”

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Somehow, I’d lost the ability to hold myself up and had fallen back on the earthy ground. Pain didn’t seem to be a major issue at the moment. In fact, everything felt dull—dull and peaceful. Was I dying? Was this what dying felt like? Huh. Who knew? “Ash!” Spike’s voice sounded even more distant and hazy than I’d remembered it being before. His blurry form was once again hovering over me. One floating thought managed to make its way to my heavy lips, and before my eyelids forced themselves shut, I whispered, “Dirt.”

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NINE

Soft snowflakes floated down from the gray sky. One landed on the tip of my nose, only lasting for a second or two before melting. More started to land on my forehead and cheeks, making cool pools of water after they melted. I stretched out my arms, sliding them though the snow that had collected on the ground like a blanket. It didn’t seem as cold as it should have been, considering that I was wearing a mini skirt. I was even more confused because it was too early for snow in Sunnyview. I sat up expecting to see my dilapidated trailer in front of me, but there was nothing but trees—perfectly white trees with thin, leafless branches. I recognized this place instantly. I was back in that weird, dream field. I hadn’t been here in a long time.

“Hello!” I called out to the trees. “Remember me? Ash!” No answer. “Of course not,” I grumbled, standing up and dusting off the snow. I was clapping my hands together to remove any excess snow when I caught sight of my arm. The sleeve of my shirt was perfectly intact, with neither holes nor blood stains from when Spike had grabbed me with his teeth. Pushing back the sleeve, I inspected the healthy, flawless skin of my arm—no bite marks. It was like he’d never even bitten me, or like the scramble in my front yard had never even taken place. “Looking for something?” a voice asked—the voice, the one that called to me the first time I came to this place. But now it was less ethereal more…real. “Over here.” My attention was brought to an attractive man wearing a gray fleece sweater and brown corduroys standing next to a particularly large tree. He had slightly long, dark brown hair with matching dark brown eyes. If I had to guess at his age, I would have said thirty-five-ish. “Who are you?” I asked, getting slightly defensive. He held out his hands in a calming gesture. “A friend.” I eyed him skeptically and then scanned around us for other strangers. “Well, friend, do you have a name?” He gave me an oddly reassuring smile and answered, “You can call me James.” Stepping away from the tree, and towards me, he asked, “Do you mind if I come closer?” He nodded towards my fists, which I currently had held up in front of me, fighting-style. “Oh, uh, I guess,” I replied, slowly letting them drop to my sides.

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He cautiously moved closer, going to a small pile of twigs and branches. Kneeling down to the pile, he started to rub his bare hands together, creating friction. My eyes practically came out of their sockets when I saw his hands start to glow like the embers of a fire and he blew into his moving hands, creating a flame inside of them. Gracefully, he released the trapped flame on the branches, which caught quickly and built up to a small fire. “There,” he said with a smile, “now we won’t catch cold.” “You—you can do magic?!” I shuffled closer to him, kneeling across from him in front of the fire. “Magic?” He looked up at me, confused. “Oh, this? Yes, of course. Can’t you?” “Well, sort of, but not like that—I mean, I don’t know how.” He shook his head nonchalantly. “Don’t worry, you’ll get the hang of it. It’s hard not to.” As he held up his palms in front of the flame to warm them up, the warm light from the fire illuminated his face—it seemed familiar to me for some reason, like a memory that I couldn’t place. “Do I know you?” I asked. He gave a shrug. “I don’t know, do you?” I tried to sort through the slush in my mind, searching for his face, but couldn’t find it. “I don’t think so,” I replied, “but I feel like I should. Are you the one who told me to use the dirt?” He laughed, “Yep, damn hard job too. Trying to get you to listen is probably the hardest thing I’ve ever tried to accomplish.” Crossing my arms in a pout, I retorted, “Well maybe if you’d have just come out and talked me like a normal person I would’ve listened better.”

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“I wanted to,” he said, “but you were still too new to your powers—your connection to this place wasn’t strong enough. Obviously you’ve gotten stronger.” There was a chuckle in his voice as he finished. That brought up a good question. “This place? What is this place—where is this place?” “All in good time, Ash, but for now, that’s my little secret.” “Well, at least tell me, am I dead?” I remembered what it was like right before I closed my eyes. It was like going to sleep, but times a thousand. “Do you want to be dead?” Surprisingly, I had to think about that. Did I want to be dead? Most days, I would have said, ‘Hell yeah!’ but now, with Drake and Spike, and being a witch, I had something worth wanting to live for. “No, I don’t think so.” “You don’t think so?” James asked, raising an eyebrow. “I mean, no,” I repeated more assuredly. “No, I don’t want to be dead.” He smiled. “That’s more like it.” “What does me wanting to live have anything to do with whether I’m dead or not?” I asked, becoming slightly annoyed. “Well, everything.” He took a branch and started poking at the other branches in the fire. “If you want to live, that increases your odds quite a bit, but if you didn’t, well, I don’t really need to explain it.” “So, I could still be alive?” “Yes.” “But I could also be dead?” His eyebrows tugged together in a furrow. “Yes.”

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“How will I find out?” “You’ll either wake up…” James looked up from the fire and into my eyes, “or you won’t.” “What!? So, you’re saying I could be stuck here forever? With you?!” I stood up, needing to move. “I’m not that bad to be around,” he replied, shaking his head playfully. Getting serious, he added, “But, yes. If you’re dead, you’ll stay here until…until eventually you’ll give up and fade away.” “Give up? Fade away?” My eyebrow rose dangerously high. Neither of those scenarios worked for me. “Nuh-uh. No. NO!” Waving my arms to the expanse of white trees around us I said, “Dead or not, I’m getting the hell outta here!” James had a small, relaxed smile as he watched me start stomping through the snow and into the thick of the trees. I would get out of here, even if I had to walk all the way back to reality. He didn’t make any attempts to stop me or to call out. Instead, he just continued to poke at the twigs in the fire. Fine, I didn’t need his help anyway. Letting out a grunt, I turned completely away from him and knocked the reaching branches of the trees around me out of my way. They quickly slapped back, so it was a dogged effort. “Damn it!” I cursed when one branch in particular got a swing in at my cheek. “Aghh!” I started beating the branch senseless, unnecessarily so—it was a tree after all. When I was done, I had to take several heavy breaths before continuing on again. This was going to take a long time if I had to beat down each tree that got in my way.

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Countless minutes later, I had hacked and smacked more branches, climbing and tripping my way through the crazy white forest. It seemed to be a never-ending process, until I saw a break in the trees. “Ah, thank God!” I exclaimed, stepping out of the crowded brush into the open space, dusting off more snow. “Not likely,” James’ voice said casually. I did a double—triple—take to my left, where I saw James sitting at the same small fire that I’d left him at. “How—didn’t I—weren’t you?” I scratched my head, looking from James and then back over my shoulder, unable to process this conundrum. Looking up at me, he shook his head like he knew better. “This isn’t a real forest, and no matter how far you walk, you can’t just leave. Not until you’re ready.” Stomping, like a little girl, I snarled, “But I am ready to leave! I wanna go back—now! There’s stuff I have to take care of, and I can’t do that if I’m hanging around here for all eternity!” James shrugged slightly and gave the fire one final poke before standing up. “Well, you don’t have any choice at the moment, so you might as well do something useful.” “Oh, yeah? Like what?” I crossed my arms while a sour expression was taking over me. “Practice,” he replied, his face was glowing with an inner excitement. “And I’ll help you.” Putting my hand on my hip, and leaning onto one leg, I rolled my eyes. “What? You mean, like, practice magic? Here?”

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“Mm-hm. You said yourself that you’re not very good at it, and since you’re not going anywhere soon, you should take this time to get better. Don’t you think?” I looked down at my feet while biting my lower lip. He made a good point…but why couldn’t I leave? I needed to get back to Spike and Drake. Oh God! What if Drake needs me and I’m not there to help him! Who knows what he ran into when he went looking for Gray and the others. “Fine, I’ll practice,” I replied in a low voice. “But just till I figure a way out of here.” James nodded, as if he didn’t believe I could find a way out, but was giving me the benefit of the doubt. I’d prove him wrong. Stepping closer to me, almost within arms’ reach, he asked, “So what do you know about magic?” He crossed his arms in a relaxed posture as he waited for me to answer. “Um, well, I know that we get our magic from the four elements. Earth, Air, Fire, and Water.” After nodding slightly, he said, “Close, but not quite. We derive our magic from our Essence, the energy that flows through us. This same energy flows through the four elements, making them malleable to us.” Taking small steps in a circle around me, he continued to explain, “Some elements are easier to control than others. Air being the easiest, then Fire, followed by Water, and lastly, Earth. To control them, you have to understand them. Trying to control an element without knowing the consequences can be…painful.”

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“Tell me about it,” I added sarcastically, remembering how I got charred using the dirt while trying to save Drake from Gray and his posse. A knowing smile played on James’ lips, but he didn’t iterate on it. Instead he continued with his lesson. “Each element holds secrets, so to say.” “Secrets? Like what?” I leaned forward, slightly interested. “Well, as I had been trying to teach you before, Earth holds the power to heal. It also holds the power to harm.” Before he could go on, I interrupted him, “How did you know that I needed to be healed?” “Now, that is one of my secrets.” Without giving me the chance to argue, he plunged back into his teaching, “Air is a very sneaky element. When you master it, you can use the air to listen to conversations taking place miles away, or you can send messages over it.” “Like a radio?” “Exactly. After all, radios use airwaves.” He looked pleased with my observation before saying, “Fire is harder to master than Air, but comes with quite a few benefits.” He nodded to the crackling fire behind him. “That, for one. If you’re ever in need of warmth, you’ll always have it. It can also be used to fuel strong emotions, like hate, anger…love. Mostly, Fire is used as a tool or a weapon. Water is much the same. You can also use it to create a neutral atmosphere or to dull the emotions. If you master Air and Water, you can create Ice—Ice is a great weapon.” His expression glazed over as he reminisced. “So, you’ve used it as a weapon before? To fight?” He quickly snapped back to attention. “Yes, but that’s—”

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“Another secret,” I finished for him. “You sure have a lot of secrets, James.” He laughed and said, “I was going to say that fighting is not why you should learn to master the elements. Although, knowing them will help you if you ever have to defend yourself.” “Defend myself from what?” I asked, although I’d already encountered several reasons for needing to defend myself—human and not human. “Vampires, demons, other witches, thugs. Does that sound about right?” He had an eyebrow cocked as if he’d read my thoughts about all the scumbags I’d had to fight off recently. “Yes. How did you—” “We all come in contact with these threats, Ash—I can call you Ash can’t I? Or do you prefer Ashley?” I cringed at hearing my full name. “Ash, and only Ash.” He smiled and continued, “In our world, it’s inevitable that you will have to defend yourself at one point or another.” “Our world—the Underworld?” “Yes. That doesn’t mean that we live in a hellish, fire scorched pit. It just means that our world is hidden from the world of humans. Can you imagine the chaos if humans at large knew about our alternative way of being?” I imagined what an ass like Mal would do if he knew about my witchiness or Spike’s furry alter-ego. Images of a bazooka toting Mal came to mind. “Not good,” I answered James’ question. “Mm-hmm,” he agreed softly. His dark hair fell into his eyes, and he casually scooped it back, causing me to really look at him. There was timelessness about him, like…like he was young and old at the same time. Soft, nearly invisible wrinkles spanned out

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from the corners of his eyes, giving him a mature edge without making him look too old. James clasped his hands together and said, “Now that you know a little bit about each of the elements, let’s try using one— Air to be more exact.” I stuttered a little before replying, “You want me to what? I-I don’t even know how to use my Essence or whatever. I—” “Ash,” he cut off my rambling. His wise face was smiling at me serenely, and he inhaled a slow breath, urging me with his eyes to do the same. I wanted to argue, but there was no point. I was stuck in the middle of nowhere with nothing better do to. So, I took a matching deep breath, trying to clear my head. “Good,” James replied. He turned to face the fire, pinning his dark eyes on it. “Now keep your eyes on the flames…good. Feel the wind on your face, and feel it getting stronger…” My eyes stayed on the fire as I waited to feel the wind he was talking about. I expected it to be uncomfortable and chilling, but as it began to tickle my cheeks it was soft and cool. “Focus the wind on the fire and extinguish it.” “How?” I asked, pinching my eyebrows together with strained effort. “The same way you made the wind, with your thoughts.” Several minutes passed with no changes. The soft wind was starting to get colder and harder, but it wasn’t affecting the fire—just me. “It’s not working,” I complained. “It will,” James replied, “you just need to stay focused. Clear you thoughts of doubt—doubt is the quickest way to block your Essence.”

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I tried pushing my doubts out of my mind, but it they were like seeds that had taken root and started spreading. Traces of doubt and fear coated each thought. “This is stupid!” I exclaimed, wiping away the perspiration that had started collecting on my forehead. “You’re not keeping your mind clear,” James informed, as if I didn’t know that. He stepped in front of me, blocking the fire from view. “What are you thinking about, Ash? What’s distracting you?” My lips broke the tight line they were held in so that I could answer, “I have to get back. My friends could be in trouble…and my mom.” I had been trying not to think about the fact that Bob was actually a demon, and that my mom was missing. Together, that made a bad combo. Something could have happened to her—he could have done something to her, and even though I hated her, I…I still, you know, loved her. And I’d kill any scumbag that thought he was gonna hurt her, even if he was the ugliest demon on the planet. James put his hands on my shoulders, giving me a light squeeze. His eyes were sympathetic as he said, “I know, but that’s out of your hands right now. If you can’t focus on this, you’ll never be able to help them anyways. You need to learn to master your powers if you really want to help your friends and family. And you need to learn to control your emotions, they’re a direct link to your Essence.” I nodded, feeling less chaotic, but still worried. He had a point. If I couldn’t learn to control my Essence and my powers, I would never be any good to Drake, Spike, or my mom.

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James stepped back so I could focus on the fire again. I started to lock my attention on it. A thought popped into my mind, and I stopped so I could look back at him. “James?” “Yes?” He looked worried, like I might have lost my cool again. I waited a moment before asking, “What are you doing here? Did you die too?” Before he answered, the fire let out a large pop and the flames flared up wildly before dying back down, forcing my attention away from James. When I looked back to hear his answer, he was gone. “Great,” I mumbled, “another secret.” Kicking snow up with my feet, I went to the log by the fire and took a seat on its rough surface. Was it possible that James was a witch who’d been killed, and now he was trapped here for all eternity? Would the same thing happen to me if I was dead? My hands clenched together as anger rushed through me. I couldn’t be dead! I just couldn’t! I had too much to take care of! At the same time my anger flared up, the fire started to grow. The wavy, orange flames started burning darker and the glowing embers on the ground shifted as the flames got bigger. Intuitively, I unclenched my hands and took a deep breath, letting the heavy emotion ebb away, and as it did, the fire slowly died back down to normal. “Fire – check. Three more to go.” James said, he had reappeared and was leaning against one of the large white trees, looking quite pleased. “What do you mean?”

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“I mean, you just learned the basics to manipulating Fire.” “I didn’t learn anything. I just got angry.” I shook my head as I spoke, still feeling some of that anger. “And then you calmed down when you noticed the fire growing. Your emotions—your Essence—controlled the fire. Now you just need to learn to do it without having to get so angry. Once you can do that, you’ll be a master of Fire—very hard to do.” I could feel my frustration growing. “I don’t even know how I controlled it in the first place! I was angry and then I wasn’t.” The fire started spitting out small sparks with each word I spoke, like it was feeding off of me. It made me curios. “AHHHH!” I shouted at the fire. It mimicked me, by flaring up, snapping and popping like crazy. “Still don’t know how you controlled it?” James asked. He leaned off the tree and joined me on the log. “I just made it grow is all, that’s not controlling it.” “It’s a start. And it’s a hell of a lot better than when you couldn’t do anything at all. Don’t you think?” He had me there. “Maybe.”

¢ “Okay, now, take a breath and send it directly at the flames!” James cheered. After several hours of him trying to explain how to control Air—and several more hours of me arguing with him—I’d managed to created a ribbon of air that followed my every thought. I could make it dance, and twirl, and zig, and zag—it was so fun

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I almost got distracted playing with it until James reminded me to put the fire out. “Alright—here goes nothing!” In one fluid movement, I pushed my palms outwards in the direction of the small fire and the ribbon of wind flew right for it. The moment the windribbon hit the fire, I heard a whooshing sound, and a large plume of gray smoke went up into the air. “I did it!” I exclaimed, making a small leap into the air. “Very nice,” James commented, circling the remains of the fire. “Now bring it back to life.” My smile dropped, and I let my shoulders slump. “Are you kidding me?” “Nope. Come on, do you wanna leave or not?” Pouting my lips, I replied, “Yeah…but—” “Then get over here and build me a fire,” James cut me off. He waited until I was standing next to him, then said, “It’s just like building the stream of air, only now you’re creating energy for the flames.” “You make it sound so simple,” I grumped, kneeling down to the smoldering logs. “It is simple. Don’t think about how hard it is, or how you don’t know what to do. Just…do it. Your Essence will take care of the rest.” “Just do it…” I mimicked, sounding James-like. “We’re not all Jedi-masters you know. The force is not with me, dude.” James rolled his eyes impatiently and moved closer to me—too close. He started to reach for my hands and I gave him a scathing look. “May I?” he asked.

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I debated intensely for a moment before nodding infinitesimally. “I guess.” He wrapped his hands around my wrists and pulled them down close to the logs so that my palms were maybe three or four inches away from the charred wood. “Your hands are great for channeling—like how you made the wind move forwards when you moved your hands.” He waited to make sure that I understood before going on, “When I wanted to start the fire earlier, I pictured the flames coming out of my hands. Your Essence will make it happen—you just have to be open to it. And don’t be scared of it.” “Picture it coming out of my hands?” I repeated, sounding morbidly uncomfortable with the idea of flames—hot flames— coming out of my skin. “Yeah, there’s nothing to be scared of.” “Don’t argue,” James replied. I started to open my mouth, but James quickly shushed me. “You can do this, Ash. Now, focus.” Slightly annoyed, I forced my eyes down to my hands, which looked so…not-fireproof. I started to cringe and look back at James, but he shook his head at me. Fine. I might as well get this over, I thought. James let go of my hands and sat back to watch. “Don’t fight it.” I didn’t want to fight it, but having flames come out of my hands wasn’t something I normally wanted—so telling myself that it was a good thing was slightly difficult. Do it for Drake, and Spike…and Mom, I tried to bolster myself. I could just imagine the goofy, proud grin that Drake would give me if I showed him that I could wield fire…and I

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could imagine burning the shit out Gray, and Ace, and Kilo, and Bob, and whoever-the-hell-else wanted to mess with us. Just seeing those creeps’ faces in my mind sent my anger on a spike, and a small flame, barely noticeable, shot out of my palms. But instead of being a normal orange, it was red. I looked to James for acknowledgment but he was furrowing his brows. “No,” he said, “that’s not what I told you to do.” “What do you mean?” I asked, slightly demanding. “I made a flame…or did you not just see that?” He shook his head. “No, your anger made a flame, not you. I want you to learn to control you powers, not the other way around.” Although James was right, I crossed my arms and asked, “How do you know that I didn’t control that flame, huh?” “It was red. Red flames are the most powerful, but they’re the most unstable. It’s pure anger and rage—the two most uncontrollable emotions. Orange flames are a balance of emotions and Essence, and…” he stopped, although it seemed like he had been about to say more. “And?” I pushed. “And, you should focus on blending your emotions and your power together. That’s what makes a truly powerful witch.” I got the feeling that wasn’t what he had really been about to say, but I didn’t comment on it. “This is all too complicated,” I groaned. “It’s like, I have to feel it to make it happen, but if I feel it too much then it’s wrong. How the hell am I supposed to do anything?” James let out a soft laugh and said, “I felt the same way when I first started learning.” He held his hands over the logs and con-

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tinued, “When I first began using my powers, I wanted to rush and make the magic happen as quick as I could, which meant that I was using my emotions to fuel the power.” A scorching, angry red flame burst out of his hands and shot straight down into the charred logs, catching almost immediately. “When all I really had to do was take my time, and let the magic build on its own. And then…” the flame in his hand calmed down to a comfortable orange color, “it would happen.” “You make it look easy…it isn’t,” I argued. “You’re just too impatient,” he replied. “Slow down, take your time, it’s not like you’re going anywhere any time soon.” He looked around us at the forest, which might as well have been a jail cell. “But that’s the problem! I have to go back! Now! I don’t have time for these games! I don’t have time to slow down!” James’ relaxed face turned into one resembling disappointment, and the flames in the fire died almost immediately. “Then I can’t help you, not if you’re unwilling to learn.” He stood up, and looked down at me for a second before walking off. I hadn’t really expected him to just leave me here, but he did. And after what felt like hours, he didn’t come back. Panic started to make its way into my mind. “James!” I called out into the trees for him. “James! James, look, I’m sorry. I didn’t meant to get all bitchy…please come back…” I waited, and waited, but James didn’t answer, or come back. The panic started to grow, and after several more hours, at least I think it was hours, the panic started turning into anger. How

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could he just leave? How could he just give up like that? Especially when he knew that I had to get back to save my friends. But then again, I reminded myself that he was just a stranger. He didn’t know me. He didn’t care about me. Why would he have any reason to help me? That was when the desperation started to settle in. I was stuck here, maybe forever, and there was no visible way for me to get back to my life. And…there was always the possibility that I didn’t really have a life to get back to…that I could be dead. A tight, frustrated scream came out of me as I kicked the logs of the extinguished fire. They were charred enough that they broke upon impact with my boot, making an ashy mess…sort of like my life. I slowly lowered myself onto the snow-covered leaves that blanketed the ground and balled myself up. For the first time since being here, I could actually feel the cold, but I didn’t have enough left in me to care about it. As I closed my eyes, I wished that I was back in Drake’s trailer, snuggled on his couch with him and watching re-runs. As simple as it was, that was probably the happiest memory I had. How did things get so messed so quickly?

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TEN

The world around me was once again…normal. No weird white trees, no snow, no James. My boots were standing firmly on the dirt ground in front of my trailer. I had nearly started jumping for joy when I noticed that the trailer looked like it had been abandoned. The old door was swinging back and forth with the wind, and it was completely pitch black on the inside. It hadn’t looked like that when I blacked out from Spike’s bite. Spike… Wasn’t he here when I passed out? Turning in a slow circle, I searched for him. “Spike! Are you here?” I stopped turning when I noticed something on the ground, a dark, damp spot. As I moved closer to it, I real-

ized what it was… My blood. This was where I had been lying when I died—I mean passed out. “SPIKE!” I yelled louder, standing up from the blood— there sure looked like there was a lot of it. “It’s me, Ash! Where are you?” I half-expected Spike’s wolfy alter-ego to come galloping up to me out of nowhere and then things to be peachy, but Spike never showed. Where could he have been? I stood there for several more minutes, waiting for something…anything, but after nothing happened, a daunting feeling came over me, like something was seriously not right. “Oh God, Mom…” I breathed when I remembered what Bob had said about her. Running for the trailer, I dashed in through the creaky open door and ran straight back for her room, which was empty. What if she’s…what if she’s dead? I wasn’t prepared for the emotions that soared up with the possibility that my mother was dead. For all of my life, I’d thought she was some sort of terrible person—terrible mother—but after what Bob had said about her hiding me from people like him, I wasn’t so sure she was terrible. And now, she was in trouble…or worse. The sound of the trailer door slamming against the side of the trailer sent me into a frenzied state of alarm. Maybe Bob had come back!

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I had just started to creep towards the closet in Mom’s room when a black blur came speeding into the room, making its stop only a foot away from me. “Drake!” I exclaimed. “Oh thank God!” I started to throw myself into his arms, when I realized that he wasn’t even looking at me, nor acknowledging my words. His dark eyes were searching the room, not unlike the way I had just done several minutes ago. He scanned the bed, the window, and then looked right over me towards the closet. “Drake?” I asked unsure. For the first time ever, I saw an expression of panic and worry cloud up Drake’s face. “I’m right here!” I yelled at him. “Look, ME, here!” I tried jumping up and down, waving my arms at him, but he didn’t seem to notice. It was like I was freaking invisible! Straightening his shoulders, Drake forced on a determined look, and left the room in his usual black blur. “No!” I yelled. “Come back here!” I started to run after him, not really expecting to catch up with his blur, but was extremely surprised to find that I was running right behind him—almost effortlessly. Immediately, I stopped, feeling freaked out. “What the hell?!” I looked down at my legs, which looked like the same legs I’d had for the last seventeen years of my life. A horrible, horrible realization dawned over me as I groaned, “No, no, no, no, no…” There was only one explanation for why Drake couldn’t see me, or why I was able to keep up with him…

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I was a ghost. I was dead. If there had been blood running through me, it would have run cold. I couldn’t believe this was it. This was the way my pathetic life ended—no happy ever after, just one less piece of trailer trash in the world. That’s what the preppies would say when they read my obit in tomorrow’s paper—that is if anyone ever finds my body… “ASH!” Drake yelled. I looked up out of my dreary revelation and saw him kneeling in front of the trailer. His eyes were roaming in search of something—me. There was this hopeless look on his face, like he’d just lost something that he couldn’t replace. When he heard nothing but silence, he dropped his eyes to the ground, looking at the dark patch in the dirt. I went to him, kneeling close by. This close, I could see the nearly translucent freckles that patterned Drake’s cheeks…I’d never noticed them before. It made him seem somewhat more human to me. He trailed his fingers through the darker patch of dirt and brought them up to his nose, inhaling the scent that clung to them. He identified the scent almost immediately, and grimaced at the scent of the blood—my blood. This was where I had…died. Drake was still for the longest time, his chest didn’t even move. It was like someone had hit a pause button on his remote. The expression on his face was the expression of a dead person…completely lifeless.

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“Drake…” I tried reaching out to touch his shoulder, but my fingers never came in contact with him, they just brushed through him. All I could do was watch him, and feel worthless…worthless and angry. Why was I being made to go through this? Wasn’t being dead enough? Why did I have to watch my friend fall apart? Drake’s deadened expression started morphing. His eyes began to look crazed…dangerous. I didn’t like it. His hands curled into fists that appeared to be clenched so tight the skin around his knuckles would rip apart. “Hey!” I yelled, “Whatever you’re thinking about…just forget it!” He didn’t hear me. Flying into a stance, Drake let out a very un-Drake like snarl. A shudder ripped through his body and his shoulders locked into a hunched, menacing position. He bared his teeth, which grew into long, pearly razorblades. His pupils dilated to an unimaginable size, nearly swallowing up all of the whites of his eyes. Even his skin seemed to go paler. This spelled trouble…of mass proportions. “Drake, don’t!” I commanded, practically bringing my nose level to his. He blurred into the distance, but since I’d turned into Casper, I was hot on his trail. “DRAAAKE!” I hollered. I didn’t think he would’ve listened to me even if he could have heard me. The look on his face screamed, “I’ve got nothing to lose, and I’m a bit psychotic!”

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We veered around rusty trailers, wove through trees, and blasted through neighborhood streets…all the way into preppy territory. Where was he taking us? When he finally stopped running, it was at a four-way stop in front of Pleasant Drive and Serenity Court…the preppiest of the preppy neighborhoods. I knew this because last year I was part of a group of trashies that egged every house that sat within a quarter-mile radius of this spot. I especially enjoyed egging Mal’s house…and his car. Drake let out another beastly snarl, which made me want to punch him, and then he tore off up Pleasant Dr. I almost wondered if he was going to Mal’s house, but he blazed right on past it…too bad. I wouldn’t have minded releasing Drake on Mal while he was in this state. He passed all of Mal’s friends’ houses too, and continued further into the preppy inner sanctum. Eventually there were only a hand full of houses left to choose from: the Mayor’s, the Mayor’s ex-wife’s, Big Dan’s—he was the local BMW dealership owner, and the Spikafalous’ residence. My nerves shot through the roof when Drake headed for the Spikafalous’ mini-mansion. “What are you doing?! STOP! Don’t be an idiot!” All I could think of is what might happen if Drake went in there, fangs at the ready, and tried to start a fight. It wasn’t Spike’s fault I was dead—well—it was, actually…but he didn’t mean it! And, oh God, what if Spike’s dad was there and he went all wolfy… Drake would get torn to bits! Was

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this some sort of psycho-suicide mission?! If that wasn’t totally stupid, I might have been a little flattered. “You!” Drake growled. His jet black, insanely eerie eyes were dead-set in front of him, right where Spike had been coming around the side the house. Thanks to his wolf-enhanced ears, he heard Drake perfectly from where he was. He froze mid-step, like a deer in the headlights. “D-Drake?” Drake’s hands were shaking enough to make me think he’d just downed enough Red Bull to fill a semi. He had to curl his fingers into fists to control them. “What did you to do her? I could smell you there…with her blood.” Spike’s doe-eyed look grew into something resembling terror. “You-you don’t understand—” “Then explain it. Now.” Drake said in a tight, dark voice, stepping purposely towards Spike. The whole time his eyes seemed to be assessing the boy, calculating his targetpotential. “Back off, Drake,” I warned, not really giving a damn whether he heard me or not. “She was attacked…I tried to help her, but…” Spike’s voice cut off. Within a nano-second, Drake crossed the lawn and came within inches of Spike’s face. “But what?” Spike drew his eyes up to Drake’s and hesitantly replied, “She got hurt.”

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Drake latched onto the collar of Spike’s shirt with both hands and wrenched the boy towards him. His voice came out as some sort of demonic snarl, “Where is she?” A hesitant look came over Spike, like he didn’t want to tell Drake. In response, Drake gave him a thorough shaking and threw in a terrifying growl, just for good measure. “Drake!” I snapped, slamming my fists on his back, which accomplished nothing since my hands went straight through him. Spike allowed Drake to manhandle him, but only briefly. His slender form disappeared out of sight, and out of Drake’s hands, only to reappear at the edge of the house. “Follow me,” he whispered, somewhat begrudgingly. Both Drake and I stood motionless with our jaws hanging open. I knew that Spike had mad-skills when it came to getting around, but I had no idea he was that fast. He practically made Drake’s speed look lame. Drake must have been thinking the same thing, but he snapped his jaw shut and blurred up to Spike. Spike led him back around the house, in the same direction he’d been coming from when Drake arrived. I followed the two of them, grimacing. All it would take was one wrong word and Drake would be thrashing at Spikes throat, and then Spike’s dad would hear them and come out and start thrashing at Drake’s throat! And I would just be invisible, impotent. We were still walking along the decorative stone path that cut through Spike’s backyard when a slight tingle ran through me—like anticipation…

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“She’s over there…but you probably already smelled that,” Spike said, pointing towards the back part of the yard that was overpopulated with tall pines and towering oaks. Drake’s upper lip curled with derision. “You put her out there?” Spike tried not to cower under Drake’s fiery gaze. “I didn’t want my dad smelling her. He—He wouldn’t understand. You being here isn’t going to help either…you smell like—” “I smell better than you do,” Drake cut him off. He didn’t wait to see Spike’s reaction, jetting off towards the trees. Spike bit his lip nervously and followed. “I hate being invisible,” I mumbled before getting into a run. Why couldn’t I have had super-ghosty powers that allowed me to just appear wherever I wanted to? Because if I did, I’d just make myself appear where Drake went. He was good half-mile away by now, and following him around was exhausting to my patience. “Ahh!” I screeched in mid-jog. Out of nowhere a tree had appeared in front of me, and I had to throw myself to the left to avoid going through it. Although I had no reason to fear running into it, I was still having a hard time adjusting to being matter-less. But still, that tree hadn’t been there a millisecond ago… “Ash? Ash!” I heard Drake exclaim from behind me. I turned around, somewhat mystified as to how he got behind me when he’d originally had a head start, but my curious thoughts abruptly dissipated as soon as I saw it…a paler version of myself splayed on the ground. Her—my—cheeks

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were so white, I had no doubts about whether I was alive or not. I stepped closer, just to make sure it really was me. Sure enough, I spotted the heart-shaped freckle just under my chin that was most certainly mine. It almost looked like I was sleeping, but the fact that my chest wasn’t rising cancelled that out. One of my hands was draped over my chest, and the other was resting on the earth, fingers dipped into the dirt. Damn dirt. It wasn’t going to do me much good now. Drake stood over my body for a several seconds, not believing what he was seeing. Finally his knees gave out from under him, and he collapsed next to me. He started to reach for my hands, but couldn’t bring himself to finish. “Drake, I—” Spike had started to come forward, but Drake shot him a murderous glare, so he stayed back. “You should leave,” Drake said to him, turning back to my body, “you’ve done enough.” Spike glanced down at my pale form hesitantly, like that was the last thing he wanted to do, but he turned around anyway. He’d already taken several steps back towards his house when I saw his shoulders square up. “No.” He turned around, looking determined. Drake’s jaw clenched. He slowly stood up, facing Spike. “I said, leave.” The determination in Spike’s face grew. “No.” A dangerous smile crawled onto Drake’s face. “Then I’ll just have to make you.”

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“Oh crap,” I muttered to myself. This was what I was afraid of. There was nothing I could do to make these idiots cool off. They were just going to rip the stuffing out of each other…and for what?! To prove which one of them was the toughest! “Idiots!” Since there was nothing I could do to stop them, I kneeled down by my body, wishing I’d just disappear…for real. Drake and Spike were still staring each other down. There were subtle changes going on with Spike’s shape, like his muscles were growing—he was growing. Unlike Drake, Spike’s skin started getting darker. He must have been turning into the garoul version of himself. Under normal circumstances, watching Spike turn would have been cool, but this time, I hated it. I hated that he and Drake were different from other boys. Human boys could beat the crap out of each other, yeah, but these two would rip and shred the crap out of each other…and one of them was immortal, making the odds total shit. “No more waiting,” Drake growled, referring to Spike’s unnatural changes. He started to lunge towards the other boy. Spike still looked somewhat human. His skin was the color of charcoal, as was his hair, but his shape still looked…Spikelike. He started to charge too. I couldn’t bring myself to watch this. I slammed my eyes shut and instinctively grabbed for my body’s limp hand, like someone might grab the person next to them in a movie theater when a scary part comes on. “STOP!” I yelled, squeezing

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my body’s chilled fingers between my ethereal ones. It was odd that I could actually touch, and feel, my body when I couldn’t touch anything else. I found myself waiting for the sounds of snarling and clawing, but it never came. I opened my eyes, confused, and saw Drake and Spike centimeters—no millimeters—away from each other. Both of them were staring, eyes wide, at my body. “Do you—” Drake started to say. “Hear that? Yeah.” Spike finished. His garoul qualities had started retreating, and the human qualities came back, leaving him a normal boy once again. Did they hear me? I looked from Spike to Drake, questioning my sanity. “Can you hear me?” I called. Neither of them responded, but they were both still staring with amazement at my lifeless counterpart. Drake was the first one to come running towards us, a small glimmer of hope was shining from behind his black eyes. “It’s weak,” he said, “but definitely there.” Spike nodded with agreement and joined Drake. “What?!” I exclaimed. “What’s there?” “It’s gotta be the dirt,” Spike said, marveling at me—my body. “What?” Drake asked. Spike dipped his face downwards to avoid Drake’s glare, and replied, “Well, before Ash…you know…she said something… Dirt.”

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The news hit Drake like a brick wall, making him appear slightly pissed. He gave Spike a shove and said, “You idiot! Why didn’t say something about this sooner?!” He sprung up from his kneeling position, clawing the ground like a madman. “Well, I—I…” Spike stuttered, watching Drake with a confused expression. I was doing the same thing. We both watched Drake rake his fingers through the ground, loosening the earth with each swipe until there was several large piles of…dirt. He stopped, but only to grab large handfuls of the dirt, which he used to start covering my body with. “What are you—what are you doing?!” Spike shouted, moving to brush the dirt off. Drake blurred into his path, baring fangs. “Don’t…” My breath caught nervously as I watched Drake and Spike squaring off again. Couldn’t they just get over themselves? Why did every little thing have to set them off? More importantly, what was Drake doing? “Ash,” said a voice I never thought I’d hear again. Its smooth tone effortlessly pulled my attention away from the boys. “I’m over here.” I looked in its direction and saw James. He was coming towards me from a dark patch of the woods, like he was strolling out of a dream. I shook my head to make sure I wasn’t seeing things, but when I was done, James was still there. He was giving me a

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look that went along the lines of, “You’re in so much trouble.” “How did…What’re you doing here?” I asked, getting to my feet. In the background, I could still hear Drake and Spike arguing. “Funny,” James said, “that’s what I was going to ask you.” I thought about that for a moment, and drew a blank. “I’ve got no idea. I was just…here.” “That’s what I figured.” James gave a knowing smile. “Come on, we don’t need to be here for this.” His eyes darted back to Spike and Drake, whose argument was getting even louder. “But…” I started to argue even though I wasn’t sure I really wanted to. Hanging around to watch Drake bury me wasn’t something I was sure I could handle. “It’s okay,” James said, “let it go.” He held out his hand to me, letting it hang patiently in the air. My eyes drifted back to Drake…then Spike, both of them were fighting for me in one way or another, but how could I fight for them? I was a ghost. There was nothing I could do if I stayed. And I couldn’t stick around for this—the crummy end of my crummy life. Most of all, I couldn’t stick around to see either of my stalkers hurt the other, and by the looks of it, it was headed in that direction. As I placed my hand in James,’ I continued to watch my friends, but they started to fade away—I started to fade away, for good this time. As James led us to wherever it was we were

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supposed to be, I did my best to capture an image of them, but remembering them angry wasn’t what I would have liked. James squeezed my hand for assurance. The gesture seemed to trigger an internal leak inside of me, more like an internal explosion. Tears that I’d never thought I was capable of making started falling from my eyes, and led to sobs which built up to the point of being uncontainable. “Shh,” James whispered, pulling me into a hug. “It’s gonna be all right, Ash. I promise.” I leaned against him for support, still sobbing, and was surprised at how comforting it actually felt to be hugged. It had been forever since anyone had tried to comfort me. For some reason…it was also familiar. Like this had happened before… I looked up at James with new eyes, feeling completely and utterly flummoxed. He noticed my expression and asked, “What is it?” I shook my head, still reeling, and then replied, “It’s you…you’re here.”

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