The Beast Across The Lake

Chapter 15

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Isabella

Rain coursed down violently against my windshield, mirroring the chaos in my brain. As I made my way down to Lost Reserve Cliff, I could not help but feel like I was making a mistake. I knew that I had to see him, it's been weeks but I couldn't rest, I could not move on without the clear indication that he was alive and well. Seeing him on his bike was not enough, I needed him to talk to me, explain to me where he's been for the past two and a half weeks.
And does he think about our kiss everyday, like I do?
Naive me to have been convinced that these weeks spent apart meant that I was slowly dissolving the memory of him. The truth is he was stuck on repeat in a constant episode of reruns in my mind. When I had finally arrived the rain was beginning to calm down. I parked my car closest to the cliff where I usually did and suddenly realized that I could not remember how to get to Caleb's place. I walked up to the edge of the cliff and peered at the pitch black cottage where Caleb lived. There were no lights and no signs to indicate that anybody ever lived there. I marched to my right and began hiking down, trying to recall the way to the hidden stairs. On Caleb's motorcycle it had just taken minutes , it was proving to be a much longer road now that I was on foot.

We came past this tree, I remember it because this is where Holden and I had sex....then we went this way....

I was thankful that the rain had decreased to be just a slight drizzle that I could hardly notice. I was more disturbed with the pitch darkness of the night. Although the moon was massive it hardly bid any light into the hovering trees that roofed Lost Reserve Forest. I finally caught sight of the hidden passageway that led to the stairs. Careful not to slip on the wet steps I darted down as quickly as I could, shaking away the fear of how deep I was in the forest, fuelled by the drive to see him and talk to him. Minutes later I was following a muddy path down to where the cottage was. His bike was parked on the right side of the cottage. I reached the front steps and knocked on the door.
Nothing.

"Caleb!" I yelled, the rain had picked up again and I was drenched. I raised two fists and slammed them against the door," are you here?"
The front door was locked and so I ran to the very back, balancing on the wet wooden boards and flung the back door open. Caleb was not inside, there was a mug of coffee that was still hot. He had been here recently, I thought.
His phone was also on the counter and so were the keys to his bike. I ran upstairs but he was not in his bedroom either.
Back outside, I began to wonder if maybe he'd gone on a walk and was making a brisk return now that it had started raining. I followed the only trail and noticed clothes on the ground.
The shirt he'd worn today, his socks, and his shoes.

What the hell is going on? Was he naked in the woods?

I followed the trail of soaked abandoned clothing, picking up what I could find. I must have been walking for around five minutes when I caught sight of something. It was a deer, torn wide open, guts out and displayed, spilled with rain water and mud on the forest soil. Eyes wide open and staring right at me, I could not help the gasp that escaped my lips. Hovering over the animal , jaw dropping with the blood of its victim was a creature resembling a mix of both wolf and beast. It was nothing that I could have imagined to exist. It didn't seem to have noticed me yet, too occupied with its meal, the pitch black beast bore a body that was two times larger than the biggest wolf that I had ever seen. Where it's mouth was supposed to be was instead a beak-like jaw that proffered forward with fangs that ripped through deer guts hungrily. Caleb's torn jeans were at the food of the beast. I  felt my heart drop below my stomach, I could have sworn that I left it on the soil when I struggled to take a step back slowly.
I tried to be as silent as I could, I took another step back and then another careful not to draw a noise to myself. As the power of cliche would have it, a branch had yielded itself right in the middle of my third backward step. I stumbled back, the sound of the branch snapping combined with the thud of me falling on my behind was surely more than enough noise to draw the beast to me. He lifted his yellow eyes and bore them into mine. They widened with realization and I suddenly could not breathe anymore. I let out a blood curdling scream, knowing that no one was here to save me. The beast has killed Caleb, and it was my inevitable doom to be his next meal.