Reaper's Word

Chapter 14: So Close

Isaiah moved down the hall and Beta came toward him. He stopped his nose going up and his ears perked up in a very canine manner. ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

"Hear something?"

‘A voice, female.’ Beta's mental voice said. Isaiah came toward him curious. He didn't hear anything. However he thought that perhaps there was a soft click of a door. Beta moved toward a door not ten feet from him. Isaiah opened it with his mind for him.

Beta went in with an easy stride and by the time Isaiah came to the door he had a black canister of some kind in his mouth. It smelled of Clair, the room did. She'd been in here and not long ago, minutes. He glanced around, she must have heard them and left quickly. Which told him there was a passageway in the wall in this room he didn't know about. She must have left in haste leaving this behind.

He opened the canister and moved to the large glass table in the room. He looked inside and saw paper. Her favorite pastime and he was interested to see what she had drawn this time.

"What do we have here?" He asked and Beta gave a whine and mental question.

"Drawings." He answered Beta's question for him. He was in dog form right now. It was just after sunrise and the sky was cloudy so the light didn't bother him so much yet. Not in this form. He pulled out the three drawings. The top one was of the house.

He touched it. He could barely remember what it looked like he'd been inside so long, but this looked very close if not perfect. He moved it to the side and froze, not breathing as he saw the next one. It was him holding the silver knives, his arm extended. Anger was plain on his face. The muscles in his arm defined and the blade just an odd blur in the air. He moved it away and he found that he didn't really

care for the fact that she seemed to be able to watch him without his knowledge. That she was doing it constantly and she was avoiding him so well.

He looked at the floating glass. His eyes were closed in this picture unlike the last one where his eyes were solid black. Where the fuck was she hiding that she could see these things? He turned to look around the room. He moved toward the wall. There was a passage here and he knew it. He wanted to find it and look around them.

He felt the wall but it was unblemished, nothing to tell him that it would open. He moved along it looking. He took a deep breath, her smell was here so close but it ended at the wall. She'd become scared and that made her scent disappear. What a unique defense mechanism. It made him question her capabilities, but he'd had his hands on her. She didn't give off a psychic vibe, what a disappointment.

He stared at the picture and then to the mirror tapping his finger against his chin. His eyes were solid black but it wasn't anger he was feeling suddenly thinking. The eye color always happened with extreme emotions. No it was desire, he wanted what he seemingly could not have. It was starting to drive him insane. She was always so damn close yet far away it would seem. He just wanted to catch her and play with her. It was hard to decide if he wanted to just end this cat and mouse game with her, or let it keep going.

"I'm not sure that I will have much time to play with her when I catch her." He said to Beta who blew air out of his nose. He was thinking that perhaps they should wait to catch her till after the moon. It was only five days away, but Isaiah wanted. So he would take. It also meant that he personally had three days before the change started and his memory seemed to suffer.

"There are fifteen left in the house. We will leave them all for the change. I want to catch her before that happens, understood?" He gave a head bob and left the room. Isaiah walked up to the mirror looking at

his reflection and then put a finger to it. There was a passage here, and he was going to get into it. His intuition told him the mirror was one way.

The glass cracked and then shattered to the floor, there was a space in the wall here, the mirror wasn't full length but he lifted his leg up and managed to get into the crawl space putting the mirror back together so it would mend faster.

"Sorry." He said when he felt a slight annoyance, and pressure from the house.

"You are helping her." There was no answer and he clenched his jaw. He moved down the passageway and out into the hall. He went to every room he knew she had seen him in, drawn him in. Two had one way mirrors. Isaiah knew he'd heard her that night in the hall. Was she just following him around?

That made a kind of sense, she had to be monitoring his movements so she could learn to avoid the places he frequented. He hadn't seen her near the piano room and those that surrounded it since the dance. He hadn't scented her either. Then again she seemed to have a natural defense that made her near invisible. It had happened before with a human, but not so well as it did with Clair. He just walked slowly down the halls but no sign of her. Of course, so he stopped thinking.

He stood looking out a window as light flakes fell down the grounds were covered with the white snow. He was thinking about different things and the one occupant who was extremely elusive to him. Which was curious, he was trying to decide just what he was going to do about this. Good entertainment was hard to come by lately. However his ability to deny himself what he wanted was really hard too.

Maybe one task when he caught her the first time. Then let her run again, the last catch well that one wasn't going to be a nice one for her. That was probably a good way to do it. The most amount of entertainment while still getting what he wanted. There was a whisper of movement to his left, but he'd been aware of the approach long before.

"If you throw that at me I will not take kindly to it." He said, turning his head to see a man standing there holding a large blade. His grip on the knife was like a death grip. He clearly meant harm but it wasn't going to kill Isaiah. He read the man, they could play a game. See if this one was as witty as his favorite hidden human. Most likely not.

"Do you have good aim?"

"Not bad." Isaiah looked in the man's mind. He did have good aim. He could also do a few interesting things with a blade too. Well if he couldn't have what he most wanted, then he'd have something else to occupy his time.

"I'm looking to be entertained. I'll make you a deal if you wish. A chance to live past the next five minutes." The man cleared his throat. The man didn't like hiding and running. He wanted to kill Isaiah or die trying. Guess which one was most likely? The thought made Isaiah smile.

"Does it include those things? You made a promise to Jeff then one of those things got him. Right outside the room." The man's voice was gruff and had the edge that a smoker did to it.

"I'm feeling charitable at the moment. One day free of the four of us."

"Okay." He said, the man was grubby looking with a beard. Isaiah moved toward him.

"Follow, and don't get any ideas. It'll just piss me off. If you want to know what it's like to have every bone in your body broken before you die then be my guest and try to stab me in the back." He motioned and the man followed him. They both knew the man wasn't going to get away. The human was tired of it anyway. If he’d come to search out his death, Isaiah was not going to deny him. Isaiah’s eyes slid black with a smile.