Death Lord

11

The moment I closed my eyes, I was sucked directly into sleep. I couldn’t have fought it if I’d tried.

I

stood in the forest, in the familiar Montana wilds where my pack called home. I looked around, frowning. This wasn’t where I’d fallen asleep, was it?

I took a step toward the stream flowing near my feet, where my brothers and I had often splashed as children. When had the direction of the water changed?

The rest of the forest was as dark as night, but I could see the sun in the sky up above. Something was clearly wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I frowned, looking back down at the water. Had it always been that dark? I could have sworn I’d watched fish swim in the clear water many times before.

“Eira…”

I looked around, trying to see who was calling my name, but the forest around me was deserted. I turned back to the stream, trying to figure out what was happening and why everything felt so...off.

The voice spoke again, a low, raspy whisper that sounded like something directly from a horror movie. It was clearly female, but not immediately recognizable. “Eira…”

“Who’s there?” I turned away from the creek, following the general direction of the sound, but no one was there. I couldn’t see or smell anyone, but the sound of my name being eerily whispered drifted back to me again.

I spun around as the sound suddenly changed directions, my claws out and ready for a fight, but I was still alone. The eerie weather was really doing a number on me. I dropped my hands, shaking my head and letting out a small huff of laughter at my own paranoia.

A hand closed around my shoulder and I jumped half a foot into the air. A scream escaped my throat, but the sound got choked off when I looked down at the long nails dripping with blood digging into my shoulder.

I wrenched my shoulder away and spun to face the owner, my heart pounding out of my chest. She was dressed in all black, with snakes instead of hair, and a glowing red aura surrounded her. Her face remained indistinguishable, like no matter how hard I looked at her I couldn’t quite get her features to stick in my mind.

“Eira,” she whispered once again and it sounded like a death rattle from this close up. I shuddered and narrowly resisted the urge to brush my shoulder off. I still felt the ghost of her hand on my shoulder. “You have much anger in you.”

“No s**t,” I muttered, although I was feeling a lot more fear than anger at the moment.

“We can help you channel it,” another raspy voice said, as a second woman stepped beside the first one. She looked identical to the other woman, except with a green aura around her. “We know you seek vengeance. We can help you find it.”

“How?” I looked between the two of them, wondering who they were, and how they possibly thought they could help me.

“Come to us,” the first woman hissed, holding her hand out in a beckoning motion.

“We have what you need,” the other one said.

She pointed to something behind me, and when I turned around, the world whooshed and I had the distinct feeling of falling forward. I gasped, trying to get my footing, but it didn’t seem to matter. The next moment everything coalesced into something solid once again, and I came to a stumbling halt. I gritted my teeth, closing my eyes and trying to stop my head from spinning.

When I opened my eyes again, I drew in a sharp breath. If I knew the clearing by the stream like the back of my hand, this was the exact opposite. I’d never been here before, and I’d certainly remember it. A huge roller coaster stretched above my head, the metal twisting and turning, but it only took a glance for me to realize it was abandoned. Vines grew on the skeletal structure, the metal was rusted in many places, and the entire concrete base was covered in graffiti art, layered over like people had been coming here for years to mark their spot.

I started walking toward an old arcade, with broken machines and more graffiti. No one was around and torn flags rustled in the wind, while abandoned carnival prizes lay abandoned and faded. The entire place gave me the creeps, and I wondered what had happened here. Where was everyone?

Somehow I was dead center in an abandoned theme park. I’d never seen it before, but it was distinctive enough that I figured I could find it again once I got out of this… whatever this was. I looked back at the roller coaster, trying to seal it in my mind. Remember this, I told myself.

I continued walking until I stumbled upon a large body of water. It faded into the hazy distance, and I couldn’t tell whether it was a large pond or an actual lake. I squinted out at the horizon, and then looked at the half-dead grass under my feet at the bank.

Something was moving in the water. I peered down, trying to get a closer look at it, and then the surface erupted. I jumped back with a scream, stumbling on the uneven ground. From the roiling surface, the two women rose like some sort of eldritch creatures coming to suck the life out of me. I let out another scream and took a few more stumbling steps back.

The women reached for me, their limbs moving weirdly, as if they were puppets on strings that were being jerked in an inhuman way. “Come to us,” the one with the red aura hissed as she lunged forward, as if she planned to attack me.

I turned around to run, trying to get away, but I couldn’t move, my feet suddenly rooted to the ground. I opened my mouth to scream again, but it was sealed shut.