I am not what you call a normal teenage girl. My dear friend, Willow Herona, is a warlock whom I met when she asked me to write her biography by showing up in my house at two in the morning. We speak often so that I can get her input on my transcriptions, and once she asked to meet in person. I said sure. There, I was introduced to her little brother Magnus, and Magnus’s partner Marc who are both prominent characters in her story. At the end of the visit, she gave me a few gifts that I could use to get myself out of trouble: a tin of Memory mints that make you forget things, a necklace with a little glass ball that becomes a Portal when you smash it, and magic glasses cleaner that allows me to see through glamours.

The glasses cleaner became my favorite gift right off the bat. I never realized how many fairies, sprites and hobgoblins made their home in my little town! Some of them became my good friends, and I became a recipient of the extensive fairy gossip.
One of my favorite sprites, Veronica, passed a friendly warning to me last October. Recently, there had been two murders in the area of girls my age with their throats torn out. It had been credited to wild dogs, but Veronica assured me that it was, in fact a feral vampire in bloodlust. Feral vamps are vampires that have become slaves to their hunger. When not in bloodlust, they sleep. She proceeded to tell me that I should not go out alone, particularly since the clouds had been covering the sun for more than two days. If I ever saw a person with red eyes, I was dead.

Of course, being a fifteen year old girl who knew everything, I discarded this dire warning. That same October, the weather freaked out and we had snow, hence the previously mentioned clouds. Shortly before Halloween, my friend Audrey and I planned on going to a Halloween party and were making our costumes as Clary Fray and Isabelle Lightwood at her house. I had spent all day there and we decided to go for a walk in the woods behind her house.

Audrey’s family owns lots of land behind her house, some planted with pine trees, and some left natural for her father to hunt in in. The old stand woods in the snow were beautiful, like nothing we had ever seen, considering this was only our third time seeing snow. Her dogs following us, we walked until we were well away from the house, feet crunching the snow. Suddenly she smacked my arm and pointed up the trail.

Standing there, looking rather lost, was a very handsome, very tall man in his late teens. He was wearing a T-shirt, jeans, boots, and a leather jacket. It looked pretty nice on him, but I wondered if he was cold. Immediately I noticed that there were no footprints leading to that spot. Curious, but not quite bad. Yet.
“One of your dad’s friends hunting?” I asked her.
“Does he look like a hunter?” Audrey gave me a look, “And Dad’s not supposed to have anyone hunting here when we’re alone.” I frowned and started to say something, but then the young man came up the trail to us.
“This is private property,” Audrey told him firmly.
“Yes, I thought as much,” the young man said, running a hand through his perfect hair, “I was out walking and I got very lost. Could you perhaps show me to your house so that I might find my way home?”

Just then, Audrey’s dogs, Moonpie and Bullet trotted up. They saw the man and made a point of standing between us and him, growling. The man laughed.
“Such charming little animals,” he smiled brightly. Warning bells went off in my head. Heck, the fact that some random man was on my friend’s property set off bells.

Now deeply suspicious, but not showing it, I pulled out Willow’s glasses cleaner and polished my spectacles carefully. Audrey continued talking to the man, changing the subject to the weird weather.
I put them back on and resisted the urge to scream and run. The man was deathly pale, face streaked with blood, long fangs protruded from beneath the colorless lips and he had the hungry red eyes of a vampire in bloodlust. He turned and smiled at me and I fought the urge to retch. Instead, I forced myself to smile back shyly, and tugged on Audrey’s coat.
“We’re in trouble,” I whispered as quietly as possible in her ear, “When I give the signal follow me and run like a bat out of hell. Do not let go of my hand. I have a plan. Now act like I said something funny.” We both giggled.
“Something interesting?” the man smiled again. I shook my head bashfully.
Audrey made small talk while I worked on my plan. The trail was lined with trees and I had my Portal necklace from Willow. We could run until the turn in the trail, I would throw the Portal against a tree and we would jump through, hopefully with the dogs behind us. If the vamp didn’t over take us immediately. It would have to be last second….
“Perhaps we could go down to the house now?” the blood streaked vampire asked, “It’s getting rather chill outside.” Like he could feel heat and cold.
“I’m not sure that would be such a good idea,” Audrey said, squeezing my hand tightly. I squeezed back. Wait.
“Oh?” he cocked one eyebrow, “You’re sure?” His demeanor had gone from easy to threatening.
“Yes,” I said firmly. He bared his fangs in a terrifying grin.
“Bad plan,” he growled as he lunged.
“RUN!!!” I screeched, and Audrey and I ran for our lives.
The vamp hit the ground where we had stood, and rolled to his feet behind us. As we rounded the corner, I ripped off my necklace and threw it at the tree. A Portal opened in front of us as we jumped into it, the dogs behind us. I looked back, and my last sight was of the vampire lunging and snarling at his escaping meal.
We landed in the middle of Audrey’s living room, hard on her wood floor, dogs on top of us. I jumped to my feet. Cellphone. Cellphone. I dove for my bag on the couch and started digging and pouring things out. I faintly heard Audrey screaming at me.
“SARAH! ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?! WHAT WAS THAT THING?!?!?” Audrey shrieked at me.
“A vampire,” I breathed. She was almost sobbing and I could feel tears on my face as well.
“Well what are we going to do about it?” she whimpered, sounding frustrated as well as scared.
“Call in the professionals,” I half smile and hit speed dial three.
“Hey Red! How ya been?” a familiar voice answers on the other end of my phone.
“Oh, you know,” I laugh nervously, “Having the ever loving crap scared out of me by a feral vamp in bloodlust. The usual.”
“What?” Willow the warlock asked seriously, “Red, are you all right?”
“I scraped my knee when we leapt for the Portal, but other than that, yeah,” I nod, “My friend might be scarred for life.”
“No s**t,” Audrey glared at me.
“Is the vampire still out there?” Willow asked.
“That’s why I called,” I sigh, finally getting my breath back, “He may have followed us home.”
“I’ll be there in two,” Willow replied and hung up.

In one minute thirty seconds, Willow appeared in front of us, stepping out of a Portal. She smiled at me, looking relieved. Her golden curls were pulled back behind her head and her gold eyes had sunglasses covering them, her black coat and black boots contrasting with her gold features. She touched my cheek gently and then hugged me.
“Thank the Mother, you’re all right,” she sighed, “And your friend?” she looked at Audrey. “Hi, I’m Willow Herona. I’ll be taking care of your vampire.”
“He’s not mine,” Audrey protested, scowling. Willow laughed.
“Good point,” she smiled at her, then turned to me. “Point me in the direction of the vampire and do not leave this house until I get back or I will kill you and bring you back to life just to kill you again.” I saluted and point out towards the woods. I put my hands in my pockets as she left and locked the doors behind her.
“Your friend’s pretty cool,” Audrey smiled slightly, still pale. “And how did we get here? You just threw that thing and then…”
“I’ll tell you,” I nod, pulling a little tin out of my bag. “But how about a mint first?”