Lunar Enchantment

Calling for Backup

I slipped away quietly while the chaos downstairs continued. Tip-toeing up the stairs, I pulled out my cellphone and dialed my mom.

"Hi, honey. How are you?" her voice came through.

"Mom! You have to come to grandma's. Like, yesterday!"

"Rory, you know we can't do that. We're not even in the country."

"I get that, mom. You don't understand. There is a Lunae in the town, and it's killing people! Now grams and all the adults don't want to let us out of the house!"

She took a deep breath, and I could hear her muttering something under her breath.

"I'm putting you on speaker. Your dad is here. Now, repeat that?"

"Okay. There is a Lunae. It came to town, I don't know when, it killed someone in my school. Now all of the adult Lunari are forcing us to not leave the house."

"Shit," dad muttered.

"We're on our way."

"But your dig?" I asked.

"I guess that's getting put on hold for now. We'll see you in a few days. Can you put your grandmother on the phone?"

"That's a no-go, Mum. She's trying to get Amber to stop crying."

"Oh, you have to be kidding me. See, this is why I said we should have just brought Rory with us. This is a nightmare now!"

"Not now," Dad hushed her. "We'll see you soon, honey. And listen to your grandmother. Don't leave the house."

I groaned as the call ended and slid my phone back into my pocket. Sitting on my bed, I just stared out the window. This turned out to be an even bigger mess than I thought it could ever be.

"Rory!" Grams yelled from downstairs.

"What?" I yelled back.

"Can you please come downstairs? We want everyone to stay together."

"I'm in my room."

"I get that, but please come downstairs."

I rolled my eyes and made my way to the kitchen to be with everybody. Amber's eyes were bloodshot, her mascara streaked down her cheeks. Aiden sat with his arms crossed, and Lauren had her head in her arms.

Nobody looked happy.

"You kids need to understand that we're not doing this to be mean or anything." Sarah rubbed her daughter's back, trying to keep her from hyperventilating. "We love you."

"So why can't we just leave? We can leave town. I don't want to do this," Amber sobbed.

"Stop it," I told her.

"What?" She looked at me wide-eyed.

"Amber, that's not a logical thing to do. Just run away? So that whatever this thing is can just track you down? Find you somewhere else?"

She just cried harder.

"Rory's right. We can't run away. But it's also not realistic to expect us to just not leave our houses!" Aiden added.

"It's not forever," his mom said.

"What if all of you kids stayed in one house?" Jake asked. "So that you're not alone, but you're also not exposed to the threat from the Lunae?"

"I mean, I can get behind that," Lauren mumbled from her arms.

"I guess. That's better than having an empty house all the time." Amber nodded her head.

"And where would we go?" I asked.

"You could all stay here," Grams said, pouring another cup of tea.

"Are you sure, Maggie?" Jake asked.

"I have plenty of room. None of the guest rooms are being used..."

"Um, about that. One will be in a few days."

Everyone turned to look at me.

"I might have called my parents."

Grams closed her eyes slowly and sighed deeply. "Let me guess. They're on their way."

I nodded my head.

"Oh, Rory."

The room fell silent as Grams processed the news about my parents on their way. I could almost hear the cogs turning in her mind as she weighed the implications.

"So, your parents are coming," Grams finally said, more as a statement than a question.

"Yeah, they're on their way," I confirmed, shifting uncomfortably under the collective gaze of everyone in the room. "They were going to shut down the dig for a little bit, I guess."

"Well, I suppose more hands on deck isn't a bad thing," Grams said with a forced smile. "We'll just have to adjust our plans accordingly, but I didn't want this affecting their work."

The atmosphere in the room shifted as the reality of the situation sank in. 

"We should fill them in on everything," Jake suggested.

"Right," Grams agreed. "Let's gather in the living room. We can all call them together."

As we moved to the living room, I could feel the tension rising again. 

"Rory, please call them. Put it on speaker."

I nodded and pulled out my phone, pulling up mom's contact and hitting redial.

"Rory? Are you okay?"

"Hi, Lizzy."

"Mom?" she asked.

"Yeah. Sweetheart. Listen, I have pretty much the entire council plus more in the living room. We're going to tell you everything that's been going on so you're prepared."

"You know we're on our way home?"

"Yes. Rory told us."

Grams took a deep breath and began recounting the strange occurrences – the sudden appearance of the Lunae, the attack at school, and the decision to barricade ourselves in Grams' house. My parents listened intently, the other end of the phone was silent.

My mom interrupted, eventually . "A Lunae in town... this is highly unusual. They're not known for randomly attacking people."

"I know, Lizzy. That's why everyone's so on edge. No one knows what's going on," she explained.

My dad, usually calm and composed. "We need more information. Does anyone know if anyone saw anything strange before the attacks? Any unusual behavior from people or animals?"

"Yes. Actually," I spoke up.

"What did you see?" dad asked. 

"At the festival. I thought I saw something in the woods. I couldn't make out what it was."

"Me too!" Lauren said suddenly. "Me too."

"We should investigate the woods. There might be a connection between these events and the appearance of the Lunae. Maybe they're drawn to something specific," dad said.

"Not until we get there though. We're stronger in numbers," mom added.

"Lauren and I can take you to where we saw whatever it is we saw," I said.

"Do you think that, if this Lunae, they are targeting us?" Amber asked. "Like, do they want to kill us?"

"I don't know." Sarah hugged her. 

"Maybe not you, per se, but maybe Lunari. They have to know that there would be Lunari children."

"But there is no way to discern a Lunari child from a human child," Sophie stated. "They're the same until they shift for the first time

"Maybe scent? Maybe we smell like you, so we smell like Lunari?" I asked.

"Maybe," grams pondered.

"Either way, everyone stay safe. We should be there in just a few days," mom said. "We love you all."

"Bye. Love you," I said as the line cut off.