An Eye For An Eye

Quarante-Cinq

I still wasn’t sure how to feel about Jack. I understood that it was necessary to stop him being violent and if that was the only way they had found, there wasn’t much else he could do. It didn’t mean I liked it.

But Deuc had been honest with Jack when he had said he would research possible creatures, even if he did it the next day. He sat in the chair in his study while I searched the bookshelves.
“What am I even looking for?” I asked, staring at the endless books. There were so many, I doubted he had even read them all but it also wouldn’t have been surprising if he had.
“I’m not sure,” Deuc said honestly.
I sighed. “Wonderful.”

Spotting one of the books I had put on the shelf a few days before, I pulled it out.
“Could it be a Kanima?” I asked.
“I doubt it would be a Beta Kanima but it could be an Alpha one,” he said. He frowned. “But they’re bigger and a lot more conspicuous, someone would have reported a strange creature.”
“And they have masters, right?” I asked. I didn’t know too much about them, only mentions of them from Gerard.
“Yes, we’d have to kill the Kanima first if we have to kill the master, otherwise the Kanima just seeks a new master,” he said.

I slid the book back and turned to look at him. He sighed and shook his head. “It doesn’t seem right. They’re created by the Bite but… twisted, of sorts. Like were-jaguars.”
“Were-jaguars?” I repeated. There were were-jaguars?”
“Yes, another creature that results from the Bite going… wrong, I guess. Both of them are rare though, rarer than wendigos,” he explained and I just shook my head. I had heard of Kanimas before but I had never heard of were-jaguars before.
“Insane,” I muttered.

“It’s not going to be another werewolf, if I were to face a wendigo in a frenzy, I’d need Betas and my eyesight,” he said, sort of rambling to himself. I had the feeling he was irritated with his lack of eyesight again.
“What other creatures are there?” I asked.
He hummed. “We can rule out Banshees, they don’t have any additional strength or healing. I doubt our local witch wants anything to do with this, unless they want the wendigo fangs but… they’re not a fighter.”

“Local witch?” I felt a little stupid not knowing all of this. He had a book on witchcraft but I hadn’t really thought much of it.
“Yes, they keep to themselves, we don’t really have any conflicting interests,” he said as if it was normal. He paused and then added: “Did you know witches exist?”
I shook my head. “I do now?”
“They’re similar to druids but while druids use nature for a wide variety of things and tend to give advice, witches use nature to enhance their magic and heal people,” he explained and I just nodded. “We tend to not really need them and they can be dangerous. The witch that lives here, however, mostly likes to be left alone.”

Admittedly, I was a little disappointed as there was little chance of me meeting the witch if they liked to be left alone. But the fact that there was one living by us was amazing.
“Are there wizards?” He nodded. “And alchemists and stuff like that?”
“Yes, wizards tend to be a little more scholarly, there’s a fair few university professors that was wizards. And alchemists are basically magical chemists. There aren’t many of those, it’s a very skilled art from what I know. And because a lot of them accidentally destroy themselves.”

I stared at him for a moment and tried to figure out if he was being honest. I could hear his heartbeat, it was steady but that didn’t really mean much to me.
“Seriously?” I asked.
“Yes, there’s a whole supernatural world that’s hidden away, even from hunters and werewolves. In fact, the witch I know is fairly sure everyone just leaves the hunters to their werewolf hunting. Hunters that hunt everyone are rare.”
“But why? There’s magic and everything and they just hide?”

“Would you willing expose your entire species to hunters for the sake of some werewolves?” he asked and I bit my lip. I wouldn’t expose everyone just for the sake of a few.
“No, I guess I wouldn’t.”
“The only other werewolf I know to know about their little community other than my pack is Talia Hale,” he said. I wasn’t surprised that Talia Hale knew about them.
“And me,” I added with a smile as I walked over to him. “I feel a little special.”
“You are,” he said.

“And that book on witchcraft was actually on witchcraft?” I asked.
“Yes, written and bound by our own local witch, in case we need to deal with less friendly ones.”
“That’s amazing,” I whispered. There was so much I didn’t know about the supernatural that some of the supernatural didn’t even know about. I did feel special that I knew about it and I smiled wider. I would never have known any of this if I had stayed a hunter.

“I’m not sure what else it could be.”
“Maybe it’s another wendigo?” I suggested with a shrug. They had to fight among themselves at times and I didn’t really know any other supernatural creatures.
“Perhaps,” he sighed. Deuc looked a little irritated that we hadn’t figured out what had killed the two wendigos. “Maybe I should pay a visit to our local witch. They might take a look at my eyes too. As good as Dr. Deaton is, he doesn’t have magic. Neither does Marin.”
“Marin?”
“His sister, she’s our druid emissary. She’s good with advice and psychology but not… not so much healing,” he said and I just nodded.

I had a lot of information to take in. Magic people existed, like witches, wizards and alchemists and probably others. And they were keeping away from the hunters and werewolves to keep themselves safe. And Dr. Deaton’s sister was a druid that helped Deuc’s pack.

I think I needed a five minute break.