The menagerie is void of students, as is the hallway outside it. I want to rest up a bit in the dorm before I have to head out for my time-wasting detention, so I point myself in the direction of the residence wing. I’m lost in my own thoughts when I’m startled by the sound of voices around a corner.
I recognize them immediately—Piers and his father, Mason. They’re coming closer, but I can’t make out what they’re saying. I don’t want to deal with them right now, so I slip inside an empty classroom while I wait for them to pass. Best to let them be, or else I might try to rip out both their throats. I wonder, briefly, if I’d get expelled or just put on probation.
“—why you’re even bothering,” Mason is saying, as they finally pass by.
“I’m doing just fine,” Piers retorts.
“Just fine is not good enough!” Mason shouts, shattering the quiet. “Honestly, boy, at this point I don’t know why you’re even trying.”
“I want to be a monster hunter.”
I lean up to peek out the little classroom window.
Mason stops and whirls around to face Piers. They’re right outside the classroom door, so I quickly shrink back into the shadows to avoid being seen.
“You can want something all you want,” Mason snaps. “But it’s obvious to me—as it should be to you—that you’ll never measure up. You’ll never be a hunter, Piers. You don’t have what it takes.”
Silence follows his words. I chance peeking out and see Piers hanging his head in front of his father, but his fists are clenched at his sides.
It’s pathetic.
“At least I don’t lie about what I’ve accomplished,” Piers snaps, so quietly that I can barely hear it.
Mason does not match his tone.
“That’s enough,” he roars. “You could never hope to do the things I’ve done.” He sighs heavily and puts one hand up over his eyes as he forces himself to calm down. “I need to get going. Just do better. And stop letting yourself get beaten up.”
And with that, Mason turns and leaves Piers standing silently in the hallway. I wait, watching him as he stands stock still, his gaze levelled on the floor. Finally, Piers turns and walks in the opposite direction.
I wait to make sure neither of them is coming back before sliding out into the hallway to make my way to my dorm. I feel the gears turning in my head. I can’t forgive Piers, but I can make him feel the pain I felt last year. A plan is forming. A plan to channel my anger into something less physical. A plan to keep myself from getting expelled.
A plan to give Piers what he deserves.
Chapter Six
We don’t get much more than a nod and a grunt from the hunter taking us along to check out the church. He’s tall and lean, and his graying hair needs a cut, as it’s growing into a shaggy mass past his ears. He wears a simple leather vest over a long-sleeve T-shirt and cargo pants, with only a couple knives and a coiled rope strapped to his belt.
We pile into his rather old car and drive past our own village, down through the winding roads for some time until we reach a second one. It’s much like the first—if even older and more run down. The people passing by our windows look like they’ve never even seen a telephone. They’re a part of the old world.
We don’t stop there.
Sawyer and I sit silently in the backseat as David drives us through more winding mountain roads. It’s dark when we finally see another small village, more like a hamlet really, which is just a cluster of houses and a small market.
The church we’re heading to is half a mile down the main road, sitting atop a hill overlooking the village proper. By the looks of it, it’s abandoned.
When we pull up outside, I notice that while the small graveyard next to it looks recently cleaned, the church itself is disheveled. The once-white paint is peeling to reveal the stone beneath. Stained glass windows have faded, and the plain ones have broken panes. The bushes in front of the entrance are overgrown, their branches reaching up the steps leading to the wooden door, which is off its hinges. There are old frescos on either side of the door, but they’re so faded I can’t make them out.
The hunter, David, shuts off the car, leaving the headlights on, and opens his door without a word. Sawyer and I glance at each other before following suit.
“Cross is broken,” David mumbles once we join him in front of the church. I follow his gaze upwards. The rounded bell tower rising above the little church does, indeed, have only half a cross. I shudder. Maybe it’s the dark of the night pressing in on us, but it seems like an omen.
“What do we do?” Sawyer asks.
David gestures toward the church. “Go on in. Take a look.” He pulls a pack of cigarettes out of one of his pockets. “Holler if ya see any demons.”
I stand frozen for a moment, wondering if he’s joking, but he slips a cigarette out of the pack and lights it up before wandering over toward
the graveyard.