Night swamped the forest, sending chills down my spine countless times as my best friend Johnny and I trekked through the seemingly endless swirling fog, concealing looming trees and roots for us to trip over in the shadows. Johnny was bobbing his head along to some new song, the sound blasting through his ear buds.
A wolf howled somewhere in the distance and I grimaced, regretting having agreed to let Johnny drag me through the forest in the middle of the night. I reached over to where Johnny was to grab his arm before I lost him, but there was only air to greet my cold fingers. I felt my heart quicken as I spun around in a panic. Johnny was nowhere to be found.
"Johnny!" I yelled. A bush quivered behind me and I jumped, spinning around. A luminous pair of bright green eyes stared at me from between the branches of a shadowy bush. My breath caught in my throat and I stared back, paralyzed with fear. They blinked and then they were gone.
I breathed a sigh of relief, but terrifying thoughts began to fill my mind. What if that was the wolf I heard? What if it got to Johnny?
"Johnny!" I screamed again.
"Rachel! I'm stuck!" Johnny yelled from back where we had been walking a few minutes before. I turned and stumbled over a protruding root in my haste to find Johnny. I found him a few feet back, his oversized backpack lodged high in the branches of a tall oak.
"Johnny, why did you need to bring such a big backpack," I sighed, running over to him in relief. I refused to show my fear in front of him. I didn't want my optimistic friend to worry. "I thought I lost you!"
"Rachel, everything I own is in here! I couldn't leave anything behind!" He said, attempting to pull his backpack out of the tree. "And you were gone when I got caught, I couldn't see you." I rolled my eyes and grabbed his hands in my shaky ones, pulling as hard as I could. I only had a bag half the size of his, and IT was annoying.
"The last thing I wanted to do is spend a night in a forest alone with you and your stupid backpack," I grunted, straining to pull his back pack out of the tree.
We both fell as it tugged free and tumbled down a small slope, falling through a spider web as we fell. We landed in a panting heap at the bottom. The wolf howled again and I stiffened underneath him. Johnny peeled the spiderweb off his face, seeming unbothered by the howl.
Johnny hopped back up, breathing heavily. I stood up, pulling my long brown hair out of its ponytail since it was already falling out.
"Come on Johnny, we should figure out how to get back to town," I whispered, looking around for the green eyes. Johnny ignored me and pointed down into a valley beneath us instead. A large fire was burning in the centre of a small town, and people were slowly walking around it. Some of them were on fire, I noticed in horror. They were slowly dismantling the buildings, and I looked on in confusion with Johnny.
A blazing trail of burning people was being lit through the forest. Johnny grabbed my arm and shook it excitedly.
"That's totally awesome," he exclaimed, heading down the hill towards them. "We should totally follow them!"
"No, we should not- Johnny!" I yelled as he ran to the bottom of the hill into the village. "What are you doing?!" I hissed when I caught up to him. He was watching the whatever-they-were carry away the wooden building frames from behind a partly torn down shop. "Come on, lets go before they see us. We need to get back to town, they're on fire for god's sake!"
"Naw, we should totally follow them! They might lead us to a town we can stay the night in!" Johnny said, completely ignoring me as he followed the last group of 'people' head out with their building pieces.
I opened my mouth to object, but we did need a place to stay, and we had no idea how to get back to town, so I followed him slightly hesitantly through the woods after the fiery figures. We walked for what seemed like half an hour, the trail being lit by the fiery people? We accidentally found the underground tunnel the things were walking through that Johnny tripped into. Eventually, we stood in front of a humongous castle, our mouths open wide in shock. The large stone castle loomed menacingly in the dark sky, only lit up by a few small fires burning brightly in the windows. Johnny pulled out his phone and snapped a picture.
"I wonder who built this place!" Johnny exclaimed. "It's not on any maps of Transylvania, and it would usually be found in a tourist attraction site!"
"What does it matter Johnny! Come on, lets go in," I said, rubbing my arms a bit as the air became colder. We jogged towards the main door and pushed ourselves in, Johnny's backpack first. And then we turned around.
Huge, soaring ceilings were intricately carved, and long flowing staircases leading to the upper levels. Elevators lined the side walls and little golden details were everywhere, on walls, elevators, and the chandelier hanging from the ceiling. However, everyone there was dressed in hyper realistic monster costumes.
"Whoa," Johnny exclaimed, looking around excitedly.
"Costume party?" I asked jokingly, before something slammed into us, pushing us back through the door and around in circles. We both let out an "oof" as we were slammed into the golden doors. Johnny and I looked up, and I nearly screamed when I saw the vampire, but then I remembered that it was just a costume party. I think.
"Who are you! How did you find this place!?" He yelled as we spun around about six times, the door a blur of spinning gold.
"I'm Jonathan, and this is my bff, Rachel." The vampire was still staring at Johnny, and I was really starting to doubt that this was just a costume party. "We were mountain climbing and we heard this story about this really creepy haunted forest, and who isn't going to go to a creepy forest. And then we saw some dudes that were on FIRE so we followed them and they led us to this totally cool castle. You meet so many awesome people in the youth hostels," Johnny said, smiling. "Hey speaking of awesome, that cape is killing it! Is there, like a costume party here?"
The vampire looked horrified, mumbling something before grabbing Johnny and I and pressing us tightly against his chest. He was very cold, and his torso felt muscular and firm. I blushed at bit at my closeness to the guy.
"You have to leave," he said, running out of the spinning front doors with us. "Oh no."
A jumble of voices commenced as the vampire ran around with us still pressed against his chest.
"Dude, seriously, what's up? It's kind of hard to breath under here!" Johnny shouted, his voice muffled.
"Drac, hey Drac! How'd it go with-" the rest was cut off as 'Drac' slammed a door, finally dropping us onto a cold stone floor and pulling mine and Johnny's bags off us. Johnny started talking about the closet as Dracula, I'm assuming is his name, unzipped my bag.
"Hey! Get out of my stuff!" I growled, trying to push him away, worrying about him seeing the pack of underwear I unfortunately decided to stick at the top of my bag. He growled without looking at me and turned around to look at Johnny, unzipping his backpack now. I zipped my backpack up and glared at the guys back.
"Woah! There's even complimentary dust pans, they look like skulls!" Johnny exclaimed, oblivious to the vampire digging through his bag.
"Quiet, you fool!" He snapped, digging through Johnny's bag and throwing things everywhere. "What weapons are you keeping in this container? Your pitchforks?"
