Wicked Hungry (19 page)

“Call Carolina,” Jonathan says. “Promise her anything. Just get them back.”

“Right,” I say.

She’s in my contact list now, so I thumb down to “Carolina” and push the button. But it doesn’t ring. It goes immediately to voicemail.

“What do I do?” I ask my friends. “Leave her a message? Text her?”

They shake their heads.

“Hang up,” Enrique says.

I hang up.

Jonathan just stares at me.

“What?” I ask him.

“You just going to stand there, man?”

“What am I supposed to do?” I ask.

“Meredith kissed you — she’s like one of the most popular girls in the school, and she kissed you. No offense, Stanley, but we are kind of like outcasts, and she kissed you right in front of the entire school, and now you don’t know what to do? You’re just going to stand there while she—”

“While she what?” I snap.

“Let’s just let our imagination run wild,” Jonathan says. “Let’s see, while she gets kidnapped? Turned into a zombie? Or a werewolf—”

“Jonathan,” I say. “Shut up.”

“Or how about while she gets eaten by a vampire? Or maybe while she gets turned into a vampire? But why stop there? Maybe she’ll be possessed by something from that gateway? Or what was it Enrique’s great-grandmother mentioned? Human sacrifice?”

My hands clench into fists, my teeth grind together, and I feel and smell the change all around me.

“I said shut up!” I growl, but Jonathan is already quiet. A single horn note blows, far off in the distance.

Across the street, far to our left, three of the zombies tentatively step into the street. And they don’t pull back.

Not only that, but my phone is buzzing. I look down.

There is a text message from an unknown sender.

“THE CEREMONY IS ABOUT TO BEGIN.”

J
onathan grabs the phone out of my hand and reads the message. “‘The ceremony is about to begin?’” he says. “I have a nasty feeling about this. Who sent you these messages?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. It says ‘Unknown Sender.’”

“I need to go tell my brother,” Enrique says, and walks out of the room.

“Hello, the zombies?” I say, but he’s already gone.

I’m left with Jonathan, staring out into the night.

“You don’t think this house has any of those sigils on it, do you, Jonathan?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “Nope,” he says. “The house itself is totally unprotected.”

“How about yours?” I ask him.

“I penciled things all over around the doors and windows. Had to be real careful so my brother Carver didn’t see me. If I’d known he was in this
brotherhood
thing, I would have asked him to
help
me.”

“Never mind that now,” I say. Do you think you could put sigils on the doors here and on my house? We need to keep those zombies away.”

Jonathan looks uncertain. “It’s got to be harder in the dark, and what will your parents think if they see me?”

“By now my parents will be out trick-or-treating with Josh.”

“And?”

“They always trick-or-treat over by my aunt’s house. She’s outside of Lansfeld. They’ll probably stay there until Josh conks out. So we should have a few hours, at least.”

“All right,” says Jonathan. He pulls out a book and starts looking through it, then nods. “Yes.”

“Can you do it?” I ask him, looking across the street. The zombies that have stepped into the street have backed up, back on the sidewalk. Hurrah for Karen! She must have chalked up a storm on the street.

“Yeah,” he says. “At least on the outer doorways. We’ll try to make a perimeter that they can’t get past.”

“Do it now, then,” I say. “And I’ll watch your back.”

But before I can follow him outside, my phone is buzzing again.

I look down. Another text message.

“THE GATEWAY IS ALMOST OPEN :)”

Outside, Jonathan scribbles faint symbols around the doors and windows of Enrique’s house in the dim light of the streetlights. We could use the flashlights that Andres gave us, I suppose. They would certainly light up everything well enough. But wouldn’t they attract the wrong kind of attention?

Next to Enrique’s garage, I catch sight of a tub of sidewalk chalk.

“Dude,” Jonathan hisses at me. “Keep an eye out.”

I glance back at the zombies. More of them are trying to get around the sigils.

“I found some sidewalk chalk,” I whisper to him.

“Great,” he says. “Make a bunch of stars and smiley faces.”

“Ha ha,” I say. “Is this any time for jokes? They’re crossing the street.”

“I’m serious. It’s a minor warding sigil. It’s all I can teach you in the time we have.”

The zombies have found a way across, it looks like. Half the group is shuffling down the street to where a lone shambler is crossing. The other half still waits across the street. Watching us.

“I don’t know what I’m more afraid of,” Jonathan whispers, as he scribbles furiously. “Those zombies, the vampires, Enrique’s parents seeing me out here, or...everything else.”

There’s a drawn-out howl from not that far away. It’s not human. It’s not a wolf. It’s a cat.

A familiar cat.

There’s another howl followed by what sounds like a scream. And laughter.

The hackles go up again on my neck. In fact, the hairs stand up on my entire body. Adrenaline pumps through my veins, my hands form fists, and my teeth clench. “Dude,” Jonathan says. “That’s what I get for saying I didn’t know.”

I can’t even nod. There’s another scream, farther away, and Jonathan whips his head around. “What’s going on? Where are they?”

Because the zombies are gone.

The scream comes again, and Jonathan looks back at me. “Man, you okay? You don’t look so good.”

“Just...fighting...the change,” I growl through clenched teeth, which seem to be growing longer and sharper second by second.

My phone buzzes then with a
third
message.

“HEY MURDERER, I HAVE YOUR CAT.”

Cold sweat forms on my forehead. I look down the street. It must be Zach, but where is he? Where are they all?

“Just a few more seconds, Stanley,” Jonathan says. “I’m almost done here.”

That’s when the lights go out with a big
boom
.

In the silence following it, in the full dark, I hear laughter.

“Oh no,” Jonathan says. “Not a power outage. Let me just do one more sigil.”

“Screw the sigils. They’ve got my brother’s cat.”

In my pocket my phone buzzes. But out there, in the full dark, they’re rejoicing. Adrenaline fills my veins and for a moment I control the change, channel power into my muscles. The flashlight is hard and solid in my pocket, and I pull it out.

But I don’t turn it on yet. They’re in for a nasty surprise. They deserve one.

Suddenly Enrique is with us, quiet, dark as night. As sharp as my eyes are, I still can’t see him. But I can smell him, feel his presence. Then he’s touching my shoulder with an outstretched hand.

“Stanley, you all right?”

“Enrique, they have Max.”

“Max?”

“My brother’s kitten.”

“The sacrifice,” Enrique whispers.

“We’ve got to get him,” I say.

“Dude, it’s not a sacrifice. It’s a trap,” Jonathan says.

“It’s my little brother’s kitten,” I say, snarling. “Come on, let’s go.”

“Go where?” Jonathan says. “Can you see anything?”

“Use your senses, not your mind,” Enrique says. “Bring out the animal inside you.”

“What are we, Jedi warriors?” Jonathan asks. “Give me a break.”

“Stop squabbling and let’s get out of here,” I say. I can smell Max’s fear out there, close by.
Wait a minute — is it getting closer?

“No need,” Enrique says, looking out at the street. “Because they’re headed this way.”

Shuffling forms approach us in the dark. I try to focus on them, but that doesn’t help — Enrique is right: I need to use my animal senses. The only way to see them in this dim light is to look at them like a wolf. The change begins, but I control it, my hands growing just a little, my nose moving outward into a snout.

It hurts, but I’ve got to get to Max.

The change stops, and I can smell the zombies approaching our chalking. They stop then, and Zach curses. I can just make him out now. And in his arms there is a writhing bundle.

Max.

The cat’s smell hits me like a slap in the face, the smell of his fear and pain. But not just that. He’s wet himself in fear. Rage fills me and my snout moves further out, my canines grow in my mouth as I grind my molars together.

In the dark, Max’s eyes meet mine. For a moment he stops struggling in his captor’s arms and just stares at me. Then he makes this weak, plaintive meow, and my heart breaks.

I’m already moving to leap when Jonathan grabs one of my arms, holding me back. “No,” he says.

I pull away, but Enrique grabs me, too.

What’s going on? Have I been betrayed? Have Jonathan and Enrique joined them?

“Let me go,” I growl. “Now.”

I hear Zach laughing as Max scratches at him. Zach squeezes him, and I want to knock my friends down and jump at him.

“
La luz, menso
.”

Huh?

“The secret weapon.”

Of course. Our
secret weapons
. I almost forgot. With my snout almost fully out, my hands sprouting claws, has my brain turned wolf, too? I’m still holding the flashlight with long, hairy fingers.

“On the count of three,” Jonathan says.

“Keep your eyes shut,” I growl. “You can smell them, anyway.”

They relax their grip as they realize I’ve come to my senses.

“One, two, three,” Jonathan says.

I bring the flashlight up like it’s a blade, flicking the switch as I move it through the suddenly brilliant air. It burns my eyes through my clenched lids.

If you think zombies can’t feel anything, you should hear how they scream.

My ears ring with their cries, the pain pounding through my skull, but they’re fleeing into the night. I want to howl up at the moon. I can feel its pull up above me. I bring my head up, but something grabs my arm. I snarl.

“Stanley?”

It’s Jonathan, next to me.

“What?” pen my eyes, slowly.

The street is deserted.

“What happened?” I ask.

Jonathan shakes his head. “Dude, they ran.”

Enrique is shaking his head. Then he catches sight of me. “What happened to you?”

I bring my claws up to my face, touch my snout and razor teeth. I breathe in deeply and my face recedes, my claws retract, turn back into nails. It’s not fun. It’s not easy. It’s not painless, but I need to stay human, if just for a little while.

“I...changed,” I say, finally. “Just a little.”

“We noticed,” Jonathan says.

“And Max?” I ask. “Where is he?”

They just look at me.

“They didn’t—”

Enrique shakes his head. “He got away. I can smell him. He’s far away from them. We can track him if you like.”

“If he smells the beast in me, he’ll just run, won’t he?” I ask, looking at them.

“I don’t know,” Jonathan says. “Is he afraid of you?”

I nod, sheepish. “I kind of wanted...” I’m too ashamed to finish my sentence.

“What, to bite him?” Enrique asks.

I nod. “But right now, when Zach had him, we locked eyes for a moment.”

“The enemy of your enemy is your friend, maybe?” Jonathan says.

“Yeah,” I say. “But now that he ran away...”

“You don’t think he’ll come if you call him?” Enrique asks.

“I think he’ll run away if he even smells me.”

Jonathan clears his throat. “I think Stanley’s right.”

I look at him. “Do you think Enrique would scare him off, too?”

Jonathan shrugs. “Dude, I really don’t know. On the one hand, they’re both cats.”

“And on the other,” I say, “Enrique is like ten times as big.”

Jonathan nods. “I guess we’ll just have to track him, but not get too close.”

“But first we need to find Meredith,” I say.

My phone vibrates in my pocket.

I pull it out.

“THE GATEWAY IS NOW OPEN. :)”

“This gateway... You don’t think...” I say. “I mean, with all the digging for the mall?”

“Dude, I don’t know what to think,” Jonathan says. “And all those new vampire friends of Karen’s have to be coming from somewhere, too. They can’t all be students. They know too much.”

My phone buzzes, again.

“THE RIDERS RIDE FORTH.”

“You got an enchanted cell phone there or what, Stanley?” Jonathan asks.

“I don’t know. I got a message from Zach a little bit ago,” I say. “Now I’m worried about Max. And Meredith.”

“And we promised to keep an eye on Carolina,” Jonathan says.

“We need our stuff,” I say.

Enrique points to the backpack on his back. “Everything’s in here.” He smiles. “Including extra flashlights and an extra pair of shorts.” Then he hands Jonathan and me our backpacks.

“Shucks, Enrique,” Jonathan says. “That was sweet. You didn’t have to pack for us.”

Suddenly, I smell something. Not Max. I hope he’s far off. He has to survive this, and if we don’t find him soon, I’ll never forgive myself.

But now I have no time to think. Out there in the dark, something moves.

“They’re coming back,” Jonathan says.

“Let’s get them, then,” I say, holding up my flashlight.

We walk toward the approaching shamblers.

W
e set our flashlights on high beam, but the shamblers seem unfazed now. That’s when I realize there’s something funny about them.

They’re wearing sunglasses. In the dark.

And they move fast — not as fast as me and my friends, but there are more than a dozen of them and only three of us. Before I know what’s happening, they’ve shambled into a circle, surrounding us.

Zach stands in front. “It’s almost showtime, boys,” he says. “Are you ready for the big detox?”

He’s obviously crazy. But at least he doesn’t have my brother’s cat.

I have to look on the bright side, especially as we’re surrounded by spastic zombies. Zach, though, just stares at us, quiet and still. Why am I more scared of him than of all the others?