The Dark Wind

Chapter 9

Chapter 9

The phone call came while I was sitting on the rooftop above Anneson’s building. I’d easily found my way to his apartment, but no one answered the door, so I figured he was still out. It still struck me funny how Drake seemed ready to give up Anneson’s address to me. Something must have had happened between them, for I knew Drake. He would rather die than surrender the location of where his students and apprentices to us nightstalkers. He would rather have himself gutted than let us know the locations of his apprentices.

The night was quiet, the air slightly chilly, as I stared up in the full moon that hung above me. Like yesterday, it gave the soft, gentle glow that touched my face like the touch of a lover’s hand. The sky was clean of clouds; for I had called for the clouds to blow away.

My silence in the night, marred occasionally by cars driving past, was broken when my phone vibrated against my lap, blaring out the beautific melody of ‘Swan Lake’ by Tchaikovsky.

“Dru.” I sighed into the phone, lying flat on my back on the ledge of the rooftop. There had always been a fascination within me with lying on the ledge. I could just roll off, and fall to my death. Maybe it was the fact that I was so close to death, just barely touching it that fired adrenaline in my blood. Heck, there were deckchairs up here on the rooftop, but I preferred the ledge more than anything.

“Jin says to meet you at the last bell. I didn’t really get what he meant.” The puzzlement in Faith’s voice said it all, but all I could do was laugh.

Trust Jin to follow to olden ways of time. Coming from the nightstalker living in Japan, he was awfully outdated.

“Two hours before sunrise, call me. Is there anything else you might want to tell me? How goes the repairs in the Dark Wind? Cole any trouble for you?”

“I just returned from Japan. Jin held me back with lots of question. You can bet everything you have now that I’m still shaking. How can you even stand to be around that nightstalker for so long?” The truthfulness in Faith’s voice struck me funny. I remembered how I used to ask the same question to one of Jin’s servants, and got laughed at in return.

“Practice, dear, practice. Pray tell me; have the Dark Wind been turned upside down by our little friend yet?” I couldn’t help but let my voice ring with the laughter that laced my voice.

Faith returned the laughter, but I could still hear the chilled humor.

“Cole? Yeah, he was arm wrestling with Rand when I returned. He turned two tables upside down, and broke another two. Care to drop by for a look?” There was hope in her voice; something Faith rarely approached unless she really wanted it. All through her words, I could feel a weird tone in her voice, like she was pressed for something.

I sighed heavily into the phone.

“What’s wrong now? Own it up, Faith. You know I can hear you quivering here.” I joked lightly, though we both knew I could not hear her shivering even if she was doing it obviously before me.

She hesitated, and I suddenly became very aware that her background was quiet. As in totally, midnight-in-forest-without-crickets quiet. Normally, the Dark Wind would be small-occasional-chattering quiet. There could be mutters and whispers, and when Cole was around, there would be loud guffaws of laughter, or cheers from the gathering nightstalker crowd as they cheered Cole on in arm wrestling.

But tonight; none of it came through the phone while Faith hesitated to find words.

“Um… The Hunter is here. He demanded to see you. He…… seems angry.” The last sentence was spoken in a way that sounded like a weak question, which was probably unnerving, since Faith was never one who mashed up the truth.