Duel Nature (13 page)

Grim surged to the surface and I shot ten
feet forward of where I had been standing, now staring at the thing
behind the tree.

Seven feet tall, and bone thin, it stood
naked staring back at me. Huge orange eyes took up much of a
sunken, stretched face that was defined by a grotesquely distorted
mouth full of needle pointed teeth and long ears held close to its
skull. Its skin was ash gray and stretched tight across the body
like a drum. Sinew and muscle twisted and writhed under the taut
flesh like snakes in spandex, moving even as it stood frozen
watching me. Long filthy hair dangled around its shoulders, greasy
and matted, filled with twigs and leaves. It had no sex that I
could see, although I didn’t try to real hard to find one. The
arms, long and spindly looking were tipped with four inch long
black claws.

My appearance had shocked it, that was easy
enough to read in its body language, but it didn’t stay that way
for more than a second. It flashed forward coming straight at me as
fast as anything I had ever seen. As fast as Tanya, as fast as an
Elder vampire. Grim took me low and to my left a half pace, my aura
bladed right arm swinging at its long thin right leg. Surprised
again by my move, it nonetheless managed to jump high enough to
avoid losing a limb. Its leap took it twelve feet up the side of a
big maple where it clung like some elongated goblin. A flick of my
Sight showed a greasy blackness pooled around it, telling me it was
demonic in nature.

My left side was pressed up against a thigh
thick ash tree, leaving me one less direction to move when it
sprang in my direction. This time it screeched as it flashed
through the air, and the cold, calculating Grim part of me noted
two answering screeches from deeper in the forest. Its speed was
awful and it took every bit of my own to move out of its path. My
left arm had encircled the ash tree and when I moved, the aural
blade running the length of my forearm sliced through the trunk
without resistance. The thing hit the tree, the tree leapt off its
stump, the angry screech changed to shock and my right fist punched
it in the back of the head. In slow motion the heavy log hung
suspended, horizontal to the ground, the demon thing clinging
upside down and shaking its head. My punch should have killed it,
although it did stun it long enough for the tree to slam down on
the ground, the monster pinned underneath. Time sped up to normal
and the forest was quiet for a short second. Then the tree was
shoved violently into the air, rising ten feet up. The monster
hauled itself out from below and bolted into the woods, screeching
the whole time. Two more answering cries echoed out of the forest.
The sounds of its lightning fast movement died away and it was
gone, all in the time it took for the fallen log to resettle to the
forest floor.

“Making friends with the local wildlife?”
Tanya asked from behind me.

“I have no idea what that thing was, but it
should have died right there!” I replied, turning to see Awasos in
bear form and my vampire standing a few yards away.

“Sounded like two more just like it,” she
commented.

“Tanya, it was as fast as you,” I said. “And
tough!”

“What did it look like?”

“Tall and cadaver thin, with gray skin. Like
a skinny seven foot tall basketball player who hasn’t eaten in a
month. Long claws, pointy teeth, orange eyes and a demonic
essence,” I said.

“Awesome,” she said, sounding remarkably like
Lydia.

“That’s creepier than the monster,” I said,
shuddering at the thought of two spikey haired little vampires
tormenting me.

She grinned then glided through the woods to
the big maple, studying the talisman and the bark around it.

“Looks like it started to pick apart the
Blair Witch thingy,” she noted.

Moving up beside her, I saw what she meant.
The little stick figure was held together with vine and twisted
fibers. Those twists of vegetation were now ripped and slightly
shredded looking, although the talisman still held together if only
by a strand or two.

“Looks like someone was trying to disarm the
alarm, so to speak,” I said. Awasos sniffed the ground under the
fallen ash tree and growled deep in his chest.

“Let’s go get the alarm makers,” Tanya
said.

***

An hour later found us back at the tree with
Quinby, Garth and the twins. Also along for the merry ride was the
mystery wood stacker, whose name was Tom. Apparently he was a
general handyman sort who had worked at the resort even before the
Boklunds had bought it.

Quinby examined the shredded talisman for
several moments before looking first at her husband then her girls.
Finally she looked our way, her expression sour.

“You seem to be right,
Mr.Gordon. This one was close to falling apart,” she said, her
voice still showing anger at me, but now mixed with fear. Waking
the Boklunds and explaining why hadn’t been smooth or easy. We had
spent almost forty minutes convincing them that Tanya wasn’t going
to attack them and that the whole story of the monsters was real.
Oddly, it wasn’t the monsters themselves, but the part of my story
when I had mentioned fighting one of them that met the most
disbelief.. Quinby had been certain I was lying as no one could
fight one of
them
and live. But the part about the stick figure being pulled
apart had scared her enough to accompany us back into the woods in
the dark.

Tom, the handyman, had appeared fully dressed
and armed with a Mossberg shotgun with a three D battery flashlight
duct taped to the barrel when we all trooped outside. Garth carried
a big double bladed ax and the three women just wrapped a couple of
their wooden bead necklaces around their hands. My Sight showed
deep pools of black around those strands of string and wood,
indicating that they would likely be much more effective against
the monsters than the ax or the shotgun.

“So, Mrs. Boklund, what are these things?”
Tanya asked, quietly.

Tom answered first.

“My people, the MicMac, call them Cheenos.
The local tribes around here would call them Wendigos.”

“Wendigos? Don’t they come from cannibalistic
humans?” Tanya asked.

“That is the legend,” he agreed with a short
nod.

“They have mostly avoided us, but lately
they’ve been around more and more. But the wards always kept them
away. Now they are trying to break through. I’m not sure what can
stop them,” Quinby said.

Her husband had been studying the ash tree I
had cut, rubbing his fingers on some of the really nasty looking
black goo that was stuck underneath the tree trunk. He glanced my
way, then looked back at the stump of the tree, the one that was
cut so clean it looked like it had been sanded and polished.

“They’re demonic?” Tanya asked, her face
pointed at Quinby and Tom, but her eyes glancing sideways at
me.

“The legends of my people say that Cheenos
have hearts of frozen ice and that they take in the souls of those
they kill,” Tom said.

Quinby glanced his way then spoke her own
piece. “They are drawn to supernaturals more than regular humans.
Our magic has kept them at bay, but when Jake arrived last month
they became bolder, more interested,” she said. “Some of my sister
witches here in Hiawatha feel that they prefer to prey on weres and
possibly other supernaturals.” She looked at Tanya as she said the
last few words.

Tanya snorted, her message clear. She was no
one’s prey, although sometimes mine as I was hers. She smiled at me
as I thought that.

“I think they have invited demons inside
them, but haven’t been forced out for whatever reason,” I said,
thinking of the greasy black aura of the one I fought had had.

“So a newly bitten werewolf shows up and they
start swarming about,” Tanya mused.

Quinby, who was watching both Tanya and I
with distrustful eyes suddenly spoke. “Who are you people? Why are
you here?”

Tanya swiveled in place to face her head on,
her movements smooth and liquid.

“What do you know
about
my
people?”
she asked in reply.

“You are vampire…Darkkin,” Quinby said, her
eyes tight with worry and fear. The twins were watching this
exchange with tense postures and my Sight showed pooled blackness
in their hands.

“Yes, true enough. You know the name we call
ourselves. Do you know of our society, our laws?”

“Just that you are ruled by a coven of very
old vampires.”

“It’s quite a bit more structured than that.
Kind of a cross between a monarchy and a corporation,” Tanya said.
“Chris, Awasos and I are a Rover team. We investigate mysteries and
solve problems. If Darkkin break our rules, we are jury, judge and
executioners for them. One of our biggest jobs is to keep our world
away from society at large.”

“What brought you here?” Erika asked, but her
sister answered first.

“The Dogman sightings,” Britta guessed.

“Yes, Britta, the Dogman. See, the local
werewolf population considers this forest off limits, yet suddenly
there are sightings of what we thought was a werewolf, which turned
out to be Jake. We were asked to investigate.”

“The two-natured avoid these woods because of
the Cheeno,” Tom said from his crouched position where he was
studying something.

“That is what we are thinking as well. The
weres never explained why Hiawatha is off limits but I think its
because they fall prey to the Cheeno, who because they are demonic,
can sneak up on weres,” Tanya said.

“But not you?” Quinby asked.

“Not us,” Tanya agreed.

“What about him?” Erika asked suddenly,
pointing at me. “He’s not a vampire!”

“No, he is not,” my vampire agreed, looking
at me with a smile. “He is much more special than that!”

It was my turn to snort. “Yeah, like short
bus special according to Lydia,”

Tanya laughed, catching the Boklunds off
guard.

“My Christian doesn’t take himself too
seriously, but be assured that everyone else should.”

“We have another problem,” Tom said from his
spot on the ground. “Grizzly bear, huge one,” he said, pointing at
a track.

Everyone crowded around a perfect dinner
plate sized track from Awasos right hind foot.

“Don’t worry about that. That’s not a
problem,” I said trying to avoid what was sure to come next.

“How can a giant grizzly suddenly popping up
in a forest that hasn’t held grizzlies for hundreds of years not be
a problem?” Garth asked, darkly suspicious.

They all looked at me expectantly. I glanced
at Tanya who arched one eyebrow while our personal link fed me her
feelings.

“Fine, because they’re witches but I don’t
like it,” I replied to her unspoken thoughts.

“Sos, go ahead and show them buddy,” I said
to the giant wolf by my side. He met my gaze then swiveled his head
to face them, his form shimmering and expanding. I held my spot,
although I was suddenly crowded by a furry half ton of bear.

“Holy fuck!” Erika exclaimed, falling back a
step.

For a split second, no one else made a sound,
then Quinby spoke. “Erika! Watch your language!”

“No, she’s right,” Garth said. “Although I
would phrase it ‘what the fuck’?”

Quinby shot him a look but otherwise said
nothing.

“He is a were-bear-wolf,” Tanya said, sliding
her arm around the giant neck that was level with her
shoulders.

“Awasos is ‘bear’ in Abenaki,” Tom said, a
shocked look on his face.

“He is quite unique,” I said. “Now, how many
of these Cheenos are there?”

“I don’t know for certain. Two or three I
believe,” Quinby said.

“Three!” Erika chimed in. Her mother gave her
a look. “What? I’ve seen three different sets of tracks,” the
blonde girl said defensively.

“What do their tracks look like?” I asked.
Only a small section of ground near where I had met the Cheeno was
soft enough for tracks and it was filled with prime grizzly
footprints.

“There are some this way,” Erika replied,
shining her flashlight into the woods toward the next talisman
location. There seemed to be about fifty or so of the little stick
figures in the perimeter around the resort. Together they formed
what Quinby had termed a Ward, which seemed to be like a witchy
force field or something. Britta pulled a newly made talisman from
her jacket pocket and used it to replace the shredded one. The
three witches held hands and sang a song in what I guessed to be
Swedish (my only reference for that language was the Swedish Chef
on the Muppets Show). Then Erika led the way through the woods
although I sent Awasos out to provide a security screen in case the
Cheenos were still around. A look from Tanya and we silently agreed
for me to move up on point while she fell back with Britta, who was
trailing the group.

We traveled several hundred yards through the
woods, following an arc around the property till we came to another
of the little wooden men tied to a big white pine. The base of the
tree was soft and tracked up with extra-long, super skinny
footprints. Like very thin Bigfoot tracks tipped with claw
marks.

“How do the legends say these things form?” I
asked Tom.

“Men or women whose hearts harden against
others are usually at the base of the stories that I know. They
kill and, at some point, eat the flesh of man. Their hearts freeze
solid and they become Cheenos,” he said. “Usually they have
retreated into the wilderness for many years before they are
transformed.”

Garth spoke up. “The Wendigo legends have
been generally thought to be warnings of the dangers of
cannibalism. They all take place in the northern lands where long
winters have sometimes resulted in severe food shortages and
ultimately, cannibalism,” he said.