The Witch and The Hunters

CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR

Page count: 10

"We won't let anything happen to her," Dean said quietly, whilst Hermione sat beside him in the passenger's seat, her leg bouncing nervously and her eyes watching out the window as they approached their destination of their motel.

She turned her head to look at him. "I wouldn't be as bothered if it were one of the other girls, but Chloe...She's different. I actually like her, and if I were ten years younger, I could easily see myself being friends with her. She reminds me a lot of Ginny and Luna. She's got Luna's innocence and kindness and Ginny's confidence and fire. She doesn't deserve this, none of them do."

"I know, and that's why it's our job to stop it before anyone else gets hurt. We'll get cleaned up, have dinner and head to the school. Sammy and I will take care of the spirit and you can stay with Chloe and keep an eye on her. We know the spirit's after her, but we don't know when it'll strike. If it knows we're here to stop it, it'll stop at nothing to get to her."

"If I have to, I'll use my magic to protect her. I can always alter her memories once this is all over," she replied.

"Er, guys, we have a problem," Sam spoke up from the back seat.

"What?" They both asked.

"Brenda Combe was cremated."

"Of course she fucking was," Dean grumbled. "Why is this never easy?"

"You have the worst luck in the world," Hermione replied, lifting her hands to her temples to starve off the headache. "We need to figure out what the spirit's attached itself to as soon as possible, and that could be anything."

"Well, we know that all the deaths have occurred on or near the school grounds, meaning the spirit can't go further than that, so we're looking for something that's remained on the school grounds since the suicide," Dean spoke.

"But it still could be anything," Hermione sighed.

"It still could be anything," Sam agreed. "Is there anything you can do to help us find it?"

She bit her lip in thought and they remained silent, allowing her time to think. Dean pulled into the motel parking lot and they all exited the car and headed to their room, where Hermione slumped down on the bed and put her head in her hands.

The brothers sat at the table in silence, waiting for her to come up with a possible solution that would save them a lot of trouble.

Fifteen minutes later Hermione looked up and both Dean and Sam perked up at seeing the look on her face. She looked hopeful. She found her beaded bag before she dug around inside of it, and much to her relief she found an old compass that used to belong to her father. She hadn't even realised she still had it, but it was going to come in handy.

"What've you got, Glinda?" Dean asked.

She showed them both the compass in her hand, seeing their confused looks in return.

"I may be able to cast a Locator Charm on this compass, so that it will lead you straight to the item we're looking for."

"That's great," Sam said relieved.

"The only problem being," she interrupted and he deflated. "We don't know what we're looking for. Ghosts have different magical energies, as I'm sure you know, and it'll be too difficult for me to tap into that to allow the compass to lead you straight to the item, but we need the energy reading in order to activate the Locator Charm."

They both frowned. "Meaning?" Dean asked.

"Meaning we need to connect the spirit's energy to the compass."