We all rushed out of the Suburban as the garage door closed behind us. The Wicklows were coming up to the front door, rushing inside to assist in whatever way they knew how. Eleanor used me as a crutch as we entered through the garage side door.
I helped El sit down on the couch, propping her leg up on the coffee table. She looked even worse in the well-lit room.
"Try not to move it, babe. I'll go get the kit."
I left her on the couch, sandwiched between Autumn and Clara, as I bounded through the house. I found one of the first aid kits in our supply closet by the laundry room, and then returned to Eleanor.
"We need to get your pants off so we can see the whole wound," I heard Clara say.
Jane, who was standing off to the side, came over and grabbed Eleanor's pants. Her fingers shot out sharp claws that shredded the fabric as she ripped the leg off El's pants.
"Let me see," I said as I kneeled in front of the couch. "Damn, that's deep," I said after seeing the oozing puncture.
"It almost looks…" Frank trailed off, looking at me with wide eyes. "Does that look infected to you?" he whispered.
He was right. The skin around the puncture held a strange color.
"I don't know… I've never seen anything like that barb before. It's too fast to be an infection, right?" I prayed and prayed in my mind. She had to be okay.
"Jane," Frank called to her. "Have you seen anything like this before?"
She came over again and looked at the deep, slow, oozing hole. She examined the puncture and observed the small black lines that looked like a malignant infection. She moved her face in close to my wife's leg and sniffed, short, rapid sniffs. She had an unsure look on her face, questioning. "I don't know… let me make a call," she said as she walked out the front door and onto the porch.
"You're going to be okay, Mom, don't worry," Autumn tried to assure her.
"It's okay, sweetie… we made it, we're okay," Eleanor said, hugging Autumn, trying to calm her.
"We didn't all make it," Autumn said, her voice shaky.
"I'm sorry, Autumn… we couldn't have known what was going to happen. That man… Phineas… was just too strong. Annabelle was too far in the center. I'm not even sure if Martin and Charles survived," I worried.
"We just left them there… what if she was still alive? What if he was…?" Autumn feared.
Clara tried to calm her down, placing her hand on Autumn's shoulder, "Honey, she was gone. You saw the fire just as we did. It would have been too much for even her. And… if that was Sam, there's nothing we could have done to help him that he couldn't have done himself. You saw him… he was…" She couldn't find the words.
"I'm so sorry, Autumn…" Eleanor spoke, shakily, through her pain, "I never wanted that for her, or Sam, even if he was… something."
Autumn interrupted them, "It's okay… we don't have to talk about it now." Her eyes went hard, jaw clenched, as she made herself go numb. "Let's just make sure you're going to be okay."
"She's right, El. Lie back and get some rest. We'll take care of your leg," I said.
It had been quiet in the house for a few hours. We cleaned the wound on Eleanor's thigh and then bandaged her up as best we could with the supplies we had. She was lying back on the couch, covered up with a big quilt to keep her warm and comfortable. Jane had run an IV into her arm and was pumping her full of some kind of antivenom. Her contact had told her about it over the phone earlier in the night. She left for a little while and then returned with the antivenom. It did seem to slow the spread, and I hoped it would be enough. I prayed harder to God than I had since we lost our son, Allen. She had to be okay. If not… I didn't know if I could survive it. I didn't know if I could be the strong father that Autumn would need. It was all too much. A lifetime of loss is what I seemed to be accumulating.
Autumn never left her mother's side. She felt like she couldn't let Eleanor out of her sight. She slept on the couch beside Eleanor, scared for her mom. We didn't know what the spike in her legs was, but it was out, and it seemed like Eleanor would be fine.
Jane had left through the trees behind the house to speak with her family. Something about Eleanor's leg gave her an uneasy feeling, even after using the antivenom, and she needed to talk with the elders of her family. The older ones that had become too weak in their age to stay alphas, but still powerful in knowledge. Frank, Clara, and I waited in the library, anxiously, for her return.
Eleanor seemed stable, not convulsing in her pain as she was in the beginning. As soon as she passed out on the couch, the house had calmed down, and we were able to think about everything else that had happened.
Everyone had slowly eased into the library as we spoke about what we saw. Even Autumn had moved from Eleanor's side, trying not to wake her as she heard our words. She needed to know what we all saw in the chaos.
"Do you think that that thing was Sam… the Sam we knew?" Frank asked in disbelief. "I didn't get a good look at it with the way I was frozen in that witch's spell."
"It was him," I answered. "I saw his face. His eyes… they were solid black, but it was him."
"How is that possible?" Bartley asked.
All of the other Wicklows looked very confused.
Patrick asked, "I thought people couldn't be brought back from the dead. They have to be turned before they die, right?" He looked at Autumn, "I thought you shot him right in the heart with a silver broadhead?"
"I did," Autumn answered angrily.
We all nodded; that was the general consensus in our world. Vampires, werewolves, and any kind of supernatural had to be still living when they were initially turned. If the heart stops before the transition is complete, they'll die. It happens a lot when vampires try to convert someone after they have fed on them too much. There's not enough blood for the heart to pump.
"He should be dead," Patrick stated.
"Actually, there are ways…" Bartley said grimly.
"What do you mean?" Wayland asked from the corner of the room, quietly.
"Witches, sorcerers, and the like can reanimate the dead. It's called Necromancy. It doesn't happen often, and it takes tremendous power to do so. A power that only a few beings in this world possess. You're essentially reaching out and pulling a soul back into the world and then jamming it into a body, unwillingly. Even still, they aren't able to be who they once were. They're usually nothing more than shells of their former selves. If that was Sam, he didn't seem to act that way. He also couldn't have as much strength if his soul were fighting to escape a dead body that it was being forced back into."
"I've never heard of that before…" I questioned my friend's words.
"Neither have I," Clara joined in.
Bartley let a laugh break his serious face, "Of course you haven't. Sometimes the best way to stop something is to forget that it exists. Our family burned all of our diaries that contained information about necromancy after the Grimwoods were banished, that is."
"The Grimwoods," Frank asked, "they were into necromancy too?"
"Some… yes, and many other dark paths. This was one of the many reasons that they were banished from our joined families. However, there are a few texts that refer to their practices. They have been passed down through our generations, so the eldest of our family will know what kind of threats they, and other clans, could pose."
"But Sam wasn't that way," Autumn stated, getting everyone back on subject.
"Yes, you're right, sweetie," Clara responded, "he wasn't like anything described in our bestiaries."
"Then how was he there, if he was dead? How could he have survived that crossbow bolt, and then be there fighting that chimera?" she asked emotionally. She couldn't process what had happened and what we had seen.
"I don't know, Autumn," Clara said softly. "Maybe we were wrong, and he survived that night on the roof… somehow. He was obviously a lot stronger than any of us thought he was."
"Did anyone see anything else after he showed up?" Frank asked, hoping someone else had information. I did.
"Flashes, everything was fast, violent. It was hard to focus on one thing before something else happened. But he was… transforming into something else. He didn't slow down, and he wasn't scared. He knew what he was doing," I said. "When we all turned back and started firing on them, did you see the chimera? He hid out of sight from the bullets. Sam didn't. He let them rip into him like it was nothing. It… wasn't him anymore. He was so big… so…"
"Ominous," Bartley added to my statement. "The whole area felt different when he transformed. Like… we'd all be killed by that thing."
"There was no fear in him," Frank said. "He knew exactly what he was doing."
"Exactly how he was since that first night we met him," Wayland offered.
"So, are there more of these things out there?" Jane asked aloud. "More like him?"
Frank spoke, "He looked way too powerful. Look at how that chimera handled two older vampires, and Sam fought him toe to toe. If there were more of him, I think someone would have noticed by now. At least write something down… somewhere."
I nodded, "Maybe that's true, but maybe they don't leave survivors. No one to tell of their existence."
"Dad… are you sure it was him?" Autumn spoke lowly, hoping for a misunderstanding. She cared for Sam, but she didn't know what it would mean if he was… that thing. She saw the monster, but she couldn't believe it was him.
"I'm sorry, Autumn, but yes. I saw his face before he changed. He was the monster that we were looking for." But I had to say, "But I don't think he was the threat we thought he was."
"He told me…" Autumn said softly, shaking her head.
"What did he tell you, honey?" Clara asked, trying to pry the information out of the emotional Autumn.
"I told him that we knew he wasn't telling us everything, and he could trust us," she replayed the conversation in her mind. "He asked me what I would do if I found out something about him; something that would change everything…" Her eyes teared up.
Autumn shakily eased down into a chair in the library and bowed her head, staring at the floor. Her hair dangled in front of her face, masking her tears from us. Patrick sat down beside her, placing his hand on her shoulder, unsure of what he could do or say in the situation. I was shocked by his empathy. Then again, he never liked Sam. This was probably just for Autumn.
"It's not what you think, though. He wasn't some mindless beast," Wayland spoke from the corner.
"What do you mean?" I asked for the group.
"He knew what he was doing. I could see it. I saw the people he went after. He was inches from Mercy, but he kept just out of range of Annabelle. He knew who he was hunting. I think it was still him, fully in control of himself; even if it was so chaotic," Wayland offered. "Plus, if he were a monster, why did he show up? Why did he intervene in a situation that could end in his own harm? He came for a reason. He came for Mercy and Phineas."
"I didn't see that," Clara said in confusion. TI was all too fast and chaotic.
"He knew who he was after…" I said silently to myself. Then I whispered, "He came with a name." I thought back on Charles' story.
"That's why he was never scared…" Frank realized. "He had no reason to fear the things we fought, not with that kind of power hiding beneath the surface. That first night with the vampires, that time out at Jane's house," he nodded to the werewolf. "He wasn't scared of you at all."
"But what was he?" Bartley asked.
There were a few moments of silence before anyone spoke. We all had so many new questions that no one could answer.
"The bestiaries…" Autumn said, finally looking up from the floor. "He read through them constantly… it always seemed like he was doing more than reading, like he was looking for something… specific," she suggested. "Maybe he didn't know what he was…"
"So…" Wayland thought for a moment. "After all of that time with him… this is all we know?"
My brother-in-law seemed ashamed of himself. Wayland always seemed to pride himself on seeing things others didn't, but he, just like the rest of us, had nothing.
"It sure seems that way," I said.
Just then, Jane looked at her buzzing phone and quickly sprang into action. She said nothing as she hurried into the living room beside a sleeping Eleanor. We all followed her out with multiplying questions. I was the first to ask her anything.
"What did they say?"
"Turn the lights on and let's get her up," Jane said in a rush.
She looked worried, which scared the shit out of me.
"What did they say?" I asked again.
Frank ran to the switch and snapped the lights on. When the light filled the room, I almost had a panic attack. Eleanor's face was so pale she almost looked like a ghost.
"It's not good, Carter," Jane said apologetically as we knelt around the couch.
"El… El… are you okay?" I grabbed her shoulders and shook her awake.
Her eyes slowly pried themselves open. "What… what's going on?" she asked tiredly.
"Let me see her leg," Jane ordered.
She forced herself in and pulled Eleanor's sweatpants down to see the wound. As soon as her skin was visible, we saw large streaks and slashes of black, infection-like coloring inside her skin. It started at the wound on her leg and branched out down to her foot and all the way up to her chest.
"What is this?" I asked in a panic.
"Venom," Jane responded quickly. "Eleanor, I need you to look at me. I need you to keep your eyes open."
"I'm too tired…" Eleanor spoke slowly. Sweat beading down her forehead and around her eyes.
My head was pounding in rhythm with my heart. My adrenaline was coursing through my veins, terrified of what was happening to my wife, to Autumn's mother.
"El, look at me," I spoke loudly to her.
"Can you do something? Don't you know what it is?" Frank asked Jane.
"The barb looks like the stingers of a Manticore. It's unmistakable. That's why I left, I didn't think that it could actually be from that man, but I had to be sure. I checked in our bestiaries and compared them to the drawings my father put in there."
"Manticores haven't been around for ages. How is that possible?" Bartley asked.
"Phineas," she answered, "it's the only thing that makes sense. Chimeras can take on the abilities of different creatures once they devour them. Somewhere along the line, he must have claimed a Manticore and taken on its power. It looks exactly like the drawing from our bestiary."
"Okay, so how do we fix her leg? This shit looks like it is spreading fast," Frank asked, his panic showing.
Jane's expression broke me. Then her words felt like a knife being stabbed into my heart. "Manticore venom is fatal to any kind of creature."
"What…" I choked out. "What are you saying?"
My panic scared Autumn. She was looking to me for strength, and she just saw mine falter.
"Carter… I'm sorry. There's nothing we can do."
"Mom!" Autumn sobbed. She pushed through everyone to get to El.
"Sweetie, what is it?" Eleanor spoke quietly through her haze.
"Get up, Mom, you have to get up," she began crying uncontrollably.
I felt my eyes start to well up with tears, and my throat felt tight like I was being choked. My jaw was clenched so hard I thought my teeth were going to shatter.
I grabbed El's hand and sat next to her, leaning towards her face, "El… look at me." I barely got the words out.
She struggled to open her eyes but finally connected with mine, "Carter, what's wrong? Did something happen?" she asked. "Is everyone okay? Where's Allen… is he alright? Is he home yet?"
I started crying harder, matching the intensity of Autumn's emotion. I clutched Eleanor's hand as tightly as I could and held it to my chest. She wasn't in her right mind. The venom was decimating her from within. She expected to see Allen… but he was long gone.
"Yes, sweetie. Everyone is okay," I assured her. I wanted her to have peace in this moment.
"Good. Can we just… stay here…" Her words were getting farther and farther apart. It seemed harder for her to string sentences together.
Then, I saw the black lines of poison thickening around the neckline of her shirt. I could actually see the venom spreading in her veins. I could see her dying.
"Sweetie, look at me," I begged as her eyes faded in and out.
"Carter… I'm so tired…" she repeated herself, weakly.
The room was silent, but I felt like the world was collapsing all around me.
"Mom… please, no…" Autumn whimpered.
"Autu… It's okay… I just need to close my eyes… just for a few minutes."
"Mom…"
"El…
Her head leaned over on the couch where she lay. I felt her hand go limp in mine. My heart felt like it stopped beating.
It didn't happen… it couldn't. I let off my grip on her hand… then Eleanor's hand slipped out of mine and fell down the side of the couch to the floor. She never moved.
"Eleanor…" I begged.
"Mom…" Autumn sobbed.
"Eleanor… El, honey, please answer me…"
There was no answer, only silence.
About an hour had passed, and no one left the room; no one said a word. Autumn had finally stopped crying. I stopped crying. We sat in silence, in sorrow, and rage.
Eleanor's body lay motionless on the couch, not moving an inch since I let go of her hand. I hadn't touched her since I let her go. I was scared to touch her, to feel the life gone from her body, from the body I knew. She was right in front of me… but nowhere near me. She was gone, forever.
"Dad…" Autumn said. As soon as she spoke again, her sobs returned to full force. "Mom's gone."
I burst into tears again. The tears were hot. It almost felt like blood pouring down my face. I grabbed Autumn and pulled her in tight, scared to let go like I might lose her too.
"I'm so sorry, baby… I'm so sorry," was all I could say. I kept saying it over and over again.
Autumn kept repeating the same thing, "What do we do… what do we do?"
I looked down at my wife's body and fell further into despair as I held my daughter. My legs gave out beneath me, and I collapsed to my knees. Autumn followed me down to the ground, kneeling in front of her mother. I couldn't wait, I had to touch her one last time. I reached out and moved my shaking hand to Eleanor's face.
Autumn placed her hand on her head, running her hands through her mother's hair. She broke down even further, and so did I.
Everyone moved in on us and knelt down around Eleanor's body. Everyone was emotionally scarred and defeated. They all reached out and grabbed one another, trying to find comfort from the pain.