The Mourning Woods - 03 (26 page)

But, oh, well. Pushing aside thoughts of Ed railing Sally like the dirty little bitch my brain insisted she was, I walked over to the cooler. I opened it and found that James was good to his word. It had been filled with pints of blood and a few ice packs to keep them cool. Awesome! Just what the doctor ordered, and I mean a sane doctor, not my buddy Dave.

I was reaching in for a drink when I heard a gun blast, and not just any gun. I know what a shotgun sounds like, and as far as I’m aware, Ed was the only person in the area with one. That wasn’t good.

I immediately headed for the door. What have you done now, Sally?

* * *

Thanks God for vampiric senses. Between the sound of the shot and knowing what Ed smelled like (and believe me, after several days in the car I got plenty of good whiffs of them all), I was able to immediately discern the general direction it had come from. I stepped from the hut and noticed several other vampires milling about, minding their own business, and pretty much ignoring the fact that someone had just fired off a twelve-gauge. Goddamn, vampires are assholes. Shit happens and they just sit around with their thumbs up their asses. And yet, I’m supposed to be on their side.

Oh, well, there would be plenty of time to kill them all later, mentally at least. For now, I had a friend in need. I left the clearing and raced off in the direction that my senses were telling me to go. I really hoped they were right. If not, I’d wind up lost in the Canadian wilderness, which isn’t exactly a small place. How fucking embarrassing would that be if they had to send out a rescue party for me...assuming they even came looking. But, enough of those thoughts for now, I needed to trust my senses and hope they (unlike almost everything else) weren’t purposely trying to screw me over.

A roar of anger from up ahead caught my attention. A moment later, a familiar ass-like scent came wafting to my nostrils, a Bigfoot. As I got closer, another sound carried to my sensitive vamp ears. It was Ed’s voice.

“Back the fuck up! The next one won’t be a warning.”

Uh oh! It was usually pretty hard to rile Ed up. To be fair, though, a half ton of giant gorilla about to kick your ass would most likely crack even the most stoic of veneers.

“
Defiler!
”

Oh, what the fuck did Ed do? Were he and Sally caught screwing on a Sasquatch burial mound? I'd expect stupid shit like that from Tom, but Ed?

I finally caught sight of a flashlight beam ahead: Ed’s, no doubt. I got closer and finally saw him. He stood beneath a tree, shotgun raised. A few feet away stood a massive (as if there was any other type) Sasquatch; and it did not look happy.

Both parties turned toward me as I came running up. I stepped in between them, probably not the smartest of strategies.

“OK, what’s the prob...,” I started to ask.

“
TLUNTA!
” the creature snarled and immediately swung a massive backhand at my head.

Thankfully, numerous ass-kickings at the hands of other vampires had given me at least some survival instincts. I managed to duck as a dinner-plate sized fist sailed over me.

“OK, that’s it,” Ed said, leveling the gun at the beast’s head. His heart was in the right place, but his brain had taken a temporarily siesta. I sincerely doubted he brought enough bullets to deal with the shit-storm of angry apes that would descend upon us if he killed this one.

“ENOUGH! We’re under truce here, so back the fuck up!” I screamed at the Bigfoot in a voice that almost sounded convincing. “As for you.” I turned to Ed. “Lower the damn gun before you get us all killed.”

Despite my tone to him, I wasn’t too worried about Ed shooting me, so I quickly turned back toward the creature. It had already taken one swing at me. No way was I giving it a freebie with my back turned. Fortunately (for me), I seemed to have gotten through to it. It took a step back, still angry, but at least it didn’t look like it was about to attack again. Reminding it of the truce had been the right course. Turd had casually sacrificed one of his own troops just to test the boundaries of the talks. He no doubt had imparted to his people that breaking the truce and causing an incident would get them thrown to the wolves...maybe literally.

“OK, that’s better,” I said raising my hands in a conciliatory gesture. “Now what is this about?”

“
Human defile sacred tree,
” it growled.

“Sacred tree?”

“
Ancestors buried beneath sacred tree.
”

I looked up. I’m no arborist. It just looked like another big, dumb, fucking tree to me.

“Is it just this tree?” I asked.

“
No. All such are sacred.
”

Okay, whatever the hell that meant. I turned back to Ed, a quizzical look on my face. “And you defiled it?”

“What? I had to take a shit.”

“
Defiler!
”

Ignoring the agitated creature behind me, I asked, “Any reason why you chose this tree in particular?”

Ed’s response was a glare that said his opinion of my intelligence was rapidly dropping. “Not really. I’m not exactly a connoisseur of fine trees to take a dump behind.”

I sighed and said to the Sasquatch. “We humbly apologize. My friend didn’t know what he was doing. It was an accident.”

“
It is insult!
” it snarled. “
You come to Woods of Mourning, yet not learn of our ways. You spit upon my people."
(Well maybe spit isn’t the right word) He bared his teeth and then backed up another step. “
Turd will hear of this.
” He continued backing away. Within a few steps, he practically melted into the forest. Silence returned. It was pretty fucking freaky, like something out of
Predator
.

However, then Ed had to go and ruin the mood.

“So Turd will hear of my crap.”

I turned back to him. “Not funny, dude. Well OK, it is kinda funny. But not really.”

“Sorry. I wasn’t trying to cause any trouble. You know that.”

“Yeah, I know. Where’s Sally, by the way?”

“How the hell would I know?”

“I thought she followed you.”

“For a little while. But like I said, I had to take a dump. It’s not exactly a spectator sport.”

“I heard the gunfire and thought she was...”

“Was what?”

“Well, killing you, I guess.”

He smiled at that. “But what a way to go.”

“True enough. Oh, well, we should probably go look for her. Unless, that is, you’d like to take a shit on anyone else’s dead grandfather.”

“Fuck you, Bill.”

“Not tonight, I’m tired,” I joked then began to turn back toward where camp was (hopefully). Suddenly a thought struck me. I stopped, looked around to make sure no hairy eyeballs were watching us, and plucked a few leaves from the sacred tree.

“What are you doing?” Ed asked.

“I’m going to show these to James. Maybe he’ll know why they’re so special.”

“It’s not. It’s just a Maple tree.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”

“I had them all over my yard growing up. Trust me, I raked enough of them to know.”

“Hmm, so what you’re telling me is...”

“That these guys are a bunch of fucking retards.”

“Fair enough, although I could have probably guessed that already. I mean c’mon, their leader is named after what you just dropped on their ancestors.”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” I said, upon entering our ‘luxury suite.’ “You’ve been here all along?”

Sally looked up from where she was busy painting her toenails, and let out a sniff. “Where else would I be?”

“We just spent the last hour walking through the woods looking for you.”

“Oh. Well, I was here. I had some important business to take care of,” she replied, wiggling her toes.

“I can see that,” I replied snidely. “In the meantime, Ed and I were busy trying not to die.”

“I see you were successful. Good for you,” she said, going back to her feet.

“I assume you didn’t hear...” Ed started.

“The gunshot? Yep, I heard it. Thought it might be you.”

“And you didn’t come to help, because...?” I snapped.

“Well for starters, I’m not the designated babysitter. Secondly, I knew you would go and check it out. But most importantly, because I fucking
think
these things through before I go off half-cocked.”

That stopped both Ed and me in our tracks. We shared a glance, then Ed said, “Explain.”

“It’s simple,” she said. Suddenly she paused to switch feet. While she did, I began tapping the table with my fingers. “Don’t be impatient. If I rush, I’ll get streaks.” I was just starting to grit my teeth, when she started again. “As I was saying, it’s simple logic. Did you see any other vampires rushing headlong into the woods?”

“No,” I admitted.

“Do you know why?”

“Because they’re assholes?”

“Well yes, that’s probably true. No offense, Ed, but coming to the rescue of a human isn’t going to be at the top of their priority list.”

“None taken,” he replied evenly.

Sally continued, “But that’s only part of it. Remember, we’re the enemy here. Don’t think that we’re not being watched every second of the day. We go rushing off en masse and the apes are going to notice and respond accordingly.”

“But Ed was in...”

“Was he really? Ed, were you actually attacked?”

He thought about it for a second. “Threatened, yes - hence why I fired - but actually attacked, no.”

“That thing took a swing at
me
,” I protested.

“Exactly,” she replied, still giving her toes more attention than us. “You’re a vampire. Worse, you’re the semi-official vampire leader here - God help us all - their sworn enemy. Ed, however, is a human. The Feet aren’t particularly big on humanity, but they don’t put them on the same pedestal of hatred as they do us. Whatever he did out there, the fact that they didn’t kill him outright tells me they were only sending a warning.”