Alex Standall's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Alex Standall came to Mystic Falls to catch a killer, and this morning the town decided the killer was him. He stood at the edge of the woods behind his rented stone cottage and watched three neighbors cross the road toward him. They walked slow, shoulders squared. One held a phone up, filming. Another carried a length of pipe against his leg. "They found her by the creek," the pipe man said. "Right behind your place. You show up two weeks ago, and now this." Alex kept his hands loose at his sides. He knew how this looked. He was the newcomer, the stranger with no cousin to vouch for him and no church pew to sit in. The bodies had started before he arrived. He'd come here hunting the thing that made them. But he couldn't say that. Nobody says they moved to town to hunt a monster. "I was asleep," Alex said. "I've got nothing to do with your creek." "Convenient," the man said, and stepped closer. A voice cut across the yard. "He was with me." Everyone stopped. The voice came from the tall flowering tree beside the cottage, a cluster of peach blossoms and orchids and dark evergreen. A black and red cockatoo sat on the highest branch. A thin silver chain hung at its throat with a small stone. It tipped its head and looked straight at the pipe man. "Twelve years I've watched this valley," the bird said. "Longer. I saw what took that girl. It walks on two legs when it wants to. It is not this boy." The filming neighbor lowered her phone. Her mouth hung open. The pipe man swayed back a step. "That thing talked," the woman whispered. “The legend of the bird is real…” another spoke up flabbergasted. They’d heard stories of the bird who can talk, but never in their lives has the bird been seen by human eyes… not until now. "Ask the Hensley family what they buried in their cellar," the cockatoo said. "Ask why the mill closed the year the first hunter vanished. You want a stranger to blame because the truth lives on your own street." The pipe clanged onto the grass. The man backed away, eyes fixed on the bird. The three neighbors turned and hurried down the road, not speaking. Alex heard a car door slam and an engine start. He let out his breath. Then he looked up at the branch. "Okay," Alex said. "You just cleared me, and you scared them worse than the pipe did. So what are you?" The cockatoo dropped down and landed on the porch rail. Up close the little stone at its throat glowed faint purple. "Mystic," the bird said. "Named for the mountain. I've been in these woods longer than the town has stood. I know what you're hunting, Alex Standall. I know its name. And I know why the people here would rather hang you than hear it." Alex crouched to eye level. "Then start talking. Because now the whole town knows my face, and the next body puts a rope in their hands." "Then we move fast," Mystic said. "Bring your coat. The truth is buried past the tree line, and it doesn't wait for daylight."