Chapter 14

~Alistair~

“Nemesis. Oh! Nemesis, where are you?” I yelled, moving forward.

I knew she lived in a tree, but it had been years since I had last visited her, and I didn’t know the exact tree she lived in anymore, as the whole place was surrounded by tall trees.

I walked around in circles, and found it hard to tell which tree it actually was, even though werewolves were supposed to have a good memory. I couldn’t remember the place at all, or maybe, it was because I wasn’t focused.

Instead of paying more attention to my search to find out the true location of Nemesis, in order to ask her what had gone wrong, and why the Beast of Vengeance was alive and was about to kill everyone living in California, when it had vanished into thin air a few years ago; I was also checking my phone every minute to find out if Eliana had been so kind to respond to any of my numerous messages.

After she had left the previous night, I could not stop thinking about her, and I missed her so much. However, I knew the Beast of Vengeance was going to appear again, as wolfsbane hadn’t been the solution to killing him, but had succeeded in making it weak and powerless for a little while.

Thankful that the Beast was a creature of the night, I had gone as soon as the sun came up to see the goddess of retribution and vengeance, Nemesis. I had tried getting Eliana off my mind, but even on the run here, all I could think of was her. Not only was she not responding to any of my text messages, she was also not picking up my calls.

I hated being in such situations. If she was done with me, I needed to know. I didn’t want to keep guessing what was on her mind, and I didn’t want to be left in the dark. I needed to know what she thought of me, and where exactly I stood, so, I could move on with my life if that was what she wanted.

“Eliana, please, give me a call. We need to talk,” I said, after my call had gone straight to voicemail, for the hundredth time.

I heaved a sigh, convincing myself that I had done all that I could possibly do to get Eliana to talk to me. Right now, a beast was on the loose, and there were innocent people that were going to die if it wasn’t stopped.

I decided to concentrate on exactly what I had gone deep into the forest I hadn’t been in ten years for. I made my claws manifest, and my eyes reflected a glowing bright red colour, as I went deeper and deeper, the memories of Nemesis' tree, suddenly coming back to me.

I stopped at the stump of a tree, whose head appeared to have been cut off. That was when I remembered. It was this very stump she lived in. I tapped it thrice, and waited for her to speak. I had never seen her, but I had heard her voice, which echoed, sending multiple vibrations in the forest, as well as sent chills down my spine.

After a brief moment of pregnant silence, she showed up. Although she couldn’t be physically seen by no ordinary being, one could feel her presence, which was akin to a soft breeze, whenever she was around. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your presence?” I heard her say, with that echoing deep and authoritative voice she possessed, that made me tremble.

“Greetings, Nemesis. You know why I’m here. The Beast of Vengeance has come back to life, and I came here to find out why,” I said.

There was another awful moment of silence, and I turned around, as I felt her spirit move in circles. She then laughed hysterically, “You said the beast has come back to life? How is that possible when the beast never died?” She asked.

“What do you mean by the beast never died?” I retorted, puzzled.

“Ten years ago, when you and the beast met, did you see it die? Did you?” She questioned again.

My eyes twitched, as my mind flashed back to the incident that had taken place between the beast and I. “I didn’t see it die. I saw it disappear,” I replied.

“Exactly, Alistair, Exactly! The beast disappeared, but didn’t die. He has appeared again to hunt you and every other person who stands in his way, because Alistair, you have offended someone,” She said.

“What do you mean by that?” I inquired.

“You heard me right. Back then, it worked, because you didn’t cause anyone pain, but the beast has appeared because you caused someone pain. You offended someone, so, the remedy has been revoked,” She explained.

I was at a loss for words. “Is this about Eliana? I didn’t hurt her...”

“...but you have it in mind to hurt her. Didn’t you save her life, just to destroy her in the future?” She asked, cutting in.

“How are you sure I wasn’t going to change my mind about taking revenge on her family through her? I like her now, Nemesis. You can’t just judge me for something I haven’t even done yet,” I argued, in a loud voice.

She broke into another hysterical fit of laughter. “You will do it, I already know you will. This is however, not about Eliana. It is about the other woman,” She said.

“What other woman? Jenny? It’s not compulsory for me to feel the same way she feels about me, is it? I may have hurt her by telling her that we’re just friends, but I didn’t deliberately hurt her, did I?” I asked, even more confused than I was before.

“That is not the offence you committed, Alistair. The offence was you killing her wolf pet, against her wishes. Not only did you hurt the poor thing by bringing an end to its life prematurely, you also hurt Jennifer by getting rid of the only thing she had ever had as a pet,” She said.

I scoffed. “That thing was a beast. He kept inflicting injuries on her...”

“She didn’t mind...”

“I did mind though. I saw it pounce on her, about to tear her face with its claws. I had to get my gun and bring its madness to an end,” I explained.

“You did all you did against its owner’s will. Irrespective of your intentions, you offended somebody, and you knew already that she was going to be hurt by that decision you took out of your own free will, and that action of yours awakened the beast,” She said.

For a moment, I was speechless. I didn’t know what to think, neither did I know what to say. I couldn’t believe that my offence was trying to save my best friend’s life, and I didn’t know what the goddess now wanted from me.

“So, what should I do? How can I atone for my sins? How can I get rid of the beast?” I asked.

“You can do the same thing you did before. Lure the beast into attacking someone who has never done anything to offend anyone...”

“That has proven to be a temporary situation. There is no one without sin. Even if I get a pure and innocent child as bait, someday, that child will grow up and hurt or offend someone. I need a permanent solution, Nemesis. I need to kill the beast,” I said.

“Then, find a way to do that,” She said.

“And why do you think I’m here? Isn’t it obviously to find a way to do that?” I asked, in a rhetorical manner.

“Oh. I thought you were here to have a little chitchat with me,” She retorted, sarcastically. “Don’t seek my help, Alistair. Seek the help of a hunter,” She said.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

There was no response.

That was when I noticed that the leaves started fluttering again, and the forest wasn’t still anymore. I didn’t feel her presence as the breeze was gone; she had departed.

“Nemesis! Nemesis!” I yelled, but even as I did so, I knew she wasn’t going to show up again.

If she thought she had given me a solution, then, she was wrong. She could have just told me the real deal, instead of going through circles, and still giving me nothing. I couldn’t believe I had ran fifteen miles, and had come here, just for this.

My phone suddenly began to ring. How we got network in the forest, I’ll never know. My heart leaped for joy, as soon as I saw the caller ID show that it was Eliana who was dialling my number.

That was when it hit me. Nemesis has said that I should seek the help of a hunter. Could it be that I should seek the help of Eliana, who was from a family of hunters? All this while, I had been too focused on the fact that Eliana now knew who I was, but I forgot that somehow, she had managed to know that wolfsbane could be used to weaken a werewolf.

Once, she had told me that she knew all about her parents' business, as they had taught her about all she needed to know at a young age. What if they had also informed her that they were hunters? Was that why she wasn’t even afraid when she had seen me and had boldly just gotten close to the Beast of Vengeance and sprayed the powdered wolfsbane in its eyes?

I stared at my phone as it rang, wondering whether or not to pick the call. I had perceived Eliana as a very innocent and gentle person, different from the rest of her family, but if she was also a hunter like them, who did nothing but search for supernatural creatures for no good reason, then, she wasn’t that innocent; and if she wasn’t, then maybe Nemesis was right when she had said she already knew I was going to hurt Eliana.

Maybe I was going to hurt her in the long run, even though I had been having a change of heart, because I couldn’t let anyone who hunted my kind to go scot-free.