A Hunter By Any Name (3 page)

So here I was left with a dilemma on where to stash my stuff. I am a big fan of not being predictable so in the end I decided to do something I had never done before. I decided to leave the weapons in the vehicle and come back for them. But first I found a self-serve car wash. I pulled up next to the vacuums and got busy. I put on the white gloves and vacuumed and wiped down every inch of the Equinox. While I was wiping the dash I took off the bobble head cat and put it in my purse. I also peeled off the cat stickers on the dash and stuck them together in a ball and put them in my purse as well. I also kept the pink alarm clock and put that in my purse as well. When I was done on the inside I threw away the leftover wet wipes and then washed the outside spotless.

I left the white gloves on and drove to the residential neighborhood I had spotted earlier in the day. I drove around until I found a street with a lot of vehicles already parked on it. I grabbed the purse out of the front seat and locked the doors. Then I took off the gloves and tucked them into the purse. As I walked down the road I saw at least two houses throwing parties. Perfect. No one would question an out of state vehicle parked on the road.

It was getting to be somewhat late in the day before I got to the small used car dealership. But that would work to my advantage. The salesmen would be pushing to hit their end of month quota and irritated at working a holiday weekend all at once. They would be more than happy to sell a car to a women paying full price in cash and look the other way when she drove it off the lot with no tags or insurance.

One hour later after I had flirted shamelessly with a young car salesman I left the lot in a 2006 dark Blue Honda CR-V that cost me $6000 plus a $100 bill slipped to the car salesman for a temporary plate. I put on the white gloves when I turned down the street where I had parked the Equinox. I pulled up next to it and used the key fobs to open both hatches. I got out and quickly threw the few things left in the Equinox into the CR-V and closed the hatch to the Equinox. I grabbed the license plate on the Equinox and ripped it off. Double sided carpet tape was a very handy invention. I threw the keys to the Equinox on the ground and hoped someone found them and took it for a joy ride before disposing of it somewhere else.

As I drove away from Grand Junction Colorado I was on high alert. This was the trickiest part of my resupply and the most critical.

I still had not yet completely given up my old identity but had started to collect items that would be a part of my new identity so for the next couple of hours my past and present self would be linked.

To fully understand why this was dangerous you need to understand magic. The Goddess is the producer of magic. The Goddess is female and she loves everything and everyone fully and completely, until you piss her off. The quickest way to piss her off is to harm something she loves. That is why the number one rule in magic is the Law of Threes. Everything you do will come back to you times three. Also, because The Goddess is a female entity she is motivated by relationships and spirituality. She cares who you are and what makes you who you are.

Once you understand these things then you can find the loop holes in most magic spells.

The loop hole in any Tracking Spell is that it tracks what makes you who you are. Your essence, being or spirt if you would like to call it that. If you change what makes you who you are and what is important to you then you change who you are in the eyes of the tracking spell. So even though the tracking spell uses a physical piece of the person you are tracking, like a hair, if that person changes who they are then the magic can no longer “see” them.

Right now my past self and my new self are linked. So a tracking spell fueled by a physical piece of me from North Carolina could find me. I suspected that I had enough new belongings that when the spell got close to me it would link to them and continue to track me even once I got rid of the rest of my old self.

That is why this part of my resupply became critical.

Any one from North Carolina that was hunting me could still find me with a tracking spell. Then if they happened upon me now I had enough new items that they could continue to track me to where I was going.

There was also a second reason why this stage was critical. I needed new ID’s.

When I was 19, I spent two long days in a little jail in Nevada because I had no ID. They finally released me after running my prints through all the criminal data bases they could think of. I came up clean thank The Goddess. But after that experience I learned the value of ID’s. I am not so sure my prints would come back clean anymore. I try to be as detailed oriented as possible and not leave any prints but there were too many hunts and dead Wizards in my past now to be certain.

To complicate matters there are only five people that I could trust to make me a set of fake I.D’s. This was one area of my life in which I was predictable but I saw no way around it. There was five places that I visited with regularity. I just hoped that they didn’t keep records and they never got busted. The closest one to my current location was in Albuquerque New Mexico. Miquel in Albuquerque took cash and didn’t ask question. That was where I was headed now.

I drove the smallest back roads I could find and headed south toward New Mexico. When I was in the middle of nowhere I found a dirt path the led off the road. I drove down the dirt path until I was out of sight of the road. I parked the CR-V. As I got out I grabbed my purse and the license plate that had belonged to the Equinox.

I cleared an area of dried grass with my foot and sat down on the ground next to it with my legs crossed. I set the license plate down in the middle of the clearing. I dumped out the contents of the purse in my lap and then placed the purse on the license plate.

Next I picked up each item from the purse and thought about what it meant to me and how it defined me before I placed it on the pile. There were 5 shades of pink lipstick because I only wore pink lipstick but a girl had to have options. The pink alarm clock so that I could start each day with a bright flash of pink. Pink was girl power. There was the phone with the cat stickers, the bobble head cat, and the ball of cat stickers from the dash because I loved cats. I wanted a Himalayan cat someday. There was the tube of concealer with sunscreen. I didn’t like my freckles and did my best to conceal them. Plus, I was worried about my freckles becoming darker with sun and used sunscreen religiously.

Last I placed my Social Security card and Driver’s License on the pile. The Driver’s License declared my name to be Hanna Peterson. Hannah was 27 years old and had been born on Oct 7
th
. Hannah was also an organ donor.

Then I picked up the small container of hair spray and lighter that was left on my lap. I sprayed the hairspray and lit the lighter catching the hair spray coming out of the can on fire. I turned the flame toward the belongings that defined who I was catching them on fire.

I chanted my spell over and over again while I watched the fire burn.

Fire Fire All Powerful and Consuming

Burn Burn with all your might.

Burn the items I sacrifice to you

Consume the items in your path.

Consume the items that define me.

Consume my identity.

When the fire died down the items had not been completely destroyed but the spell had worked its magic. I felt a loss that left a void in me. I was no one.

I got into the CR-V and drove off into the night.

When I got close to New Mexico I found a major highway and stopped at an exit with a dollar store. I bought a set of screw drivers, beef jerky, two bananas and a Red Bull. I ate and drank as I drove to New Mexico trying to fight off my need to sleep and keep my energy up. At the first exit into New Mexico I did a U-turn and headed north again. I drove until the first rest stop. It was 11:07 pm and dark. I parked and went to the vending machine. I bought a Coke and lots of chocolate, a Twix, a Snickers, and a Three Musketeers. I needed a sugar rush big time to keep me awake for a few more hours. Resupply was almost done and then I could crash.

I started to look for the Equinox before I caught myself and walked to the CR-V. I took out a large flat and phillips screw driver from the package I had just purchased. I pocked them in the back pocket of my jeans and chanted the concealment spell to keep them out of site. Then I sat on a picnic table with my feet on the bench and started to eat and wait.

The wait was not nearly long enough. I only got to drink half of the coke, eat my Twix and half the Snickers before a car with New Mexico plates pulled in. A middle aged couple got out and headed toward the bathrooms. I knew I only had a few minutes before they came back. I grabbed my food and threw it in the trash can. I went to the back of their car and crouched down. I grabbed the flat screw drive and before you could say
Bob’s Your Uncle
I had me a New Mexico license plate.

I got in CR-V and drove off before the couple got back to their car. I would put the plate on sometime before Albuquerque. One good thing about fake ID makers, they expected their clients to show up unexpectedly in the middle of the night, especially this close to Mexico.

I woke up and held still examining everything around me for a few minutes. When I was satisfied I sat up. I had to think for a moment before I remembered where I was. I was at a motel outside of Oklahoma City. It was a dive but only dives took cash without question. Looking around the motel room my stomach churned at the dingy dirt and grime around me. I would have preferred to sleep in the CR-V but I knew I was going to crash hard. I had only gotten eight hours of sleep during the last four days and I was beat.

Thankfully, last night Miquel had taken me pulling a knife on him in stride. I was very lucky he had been close when he shook me awake so I had instinctively gone for the knife. If he had been further away I would have pulled the sword. A knife he took in stride and just assumed I had it tucked in a pocket. A sword would have been a horse of a different color. I had been waiting in a chair for him to get done making my ID. The chair was a plaid Lazy-Boy recliner. I had not reclined it but it was still sublimely comfortable none the less. I am ashamed to admit I fell asleep.

So that led me to the decision for a motel room. I knew I was going to crash hard and I wanted and needed the added protection of walls around me.

Normally, it only takes me one night and two days to do a resupply. But this time, with the holiday weekend I felt like I had more time and had stretched things out too far. I had been careless and lucky I had not gotten in trouble. I vowed to do better from now on.

I had ended up in Oklahoma because I had come from the north and back tracking was a good way to get killed. There wasn’t too much land left in the US to the west of New Mexico, and none to the south, so that had left east. I had brought my box of Personal Bathroom Stuff and my map in, locked the feeble door lock, chanted an alarm spell that would wake me up if anyone entered the room, and crashed for 7 straight hours. It was now 10 am Monday morning and check out time was noon. I needed to get busy because I had a lot to do.

First I took a shower. The bad thing about dives is they don’t have any travel shampoo like I have seen in TV shows. Thankfully, this dive at least had one small bar of soap and two towels that smelled like bleach even though they were still stained. I died my hair with hair coloring and stained the towels some more. I was mixing things up and had chosen a light blond color for my hair. I had never resorted to being blond before which is why I had chosen that color. I had realized I was becoming too predictable by always choosing brown, black, or red hair color. Otherwise, I think I could have gone my whole life without being a blond. But then again I would have liked to have gone my whole life without knowing about wizards too but that ship sailed a long time ago.

When I was done I dressed in the same clothes as before. What can I say? I think I am finally developing a thick skin when it came to clean clothes.

Finally, it was time to make a decision. Well it wasn’t time for me to make a decision per se but it was time for a decision to be made. I positioned the map against the head board of the bed. I grabbed the dart, stood at the end of the bed, closed my eyes and let the dart fly. When I heard the thump I opened my eyes. It landed on Greybull Wyoming. Nice. That would be a good 20 hour drive.

Now that my old self was completely gone I would find the drive very relaxing. I bet there were some good tourist destinations in Wyoming. Wasn’t the large cliff with the presidents in Wyoming?

Next, came the big decision. Oregon or Michigan.
Come on Oregon. Don’t let me down dart of destiny
. I chanted as I stepped back, closed my eyes, and let the dart fly. When I heard the thump of the dart hitting the map I opened my eyes again. Shivers ran up my arms and I got goose bumps. Normally, the dart would land somewhere in the middle of my two choices and I had to decide which one it was closer too. However, this time the dart was leaving nothing to interpretation. The dart had landed right in the middle of the lower of the mitten shaped state.

Great, just great. Nice job dart.
I thought bitterly to myself.

I gave a resigned sigh. The Goddess had spoken loud and clear. Arguing wouldn’t bring anything but heartache. I sighed again fully committing myself. I was going to Michigan by way of Greybull Wyoming and a bunch of back roads. When I drive to a new hunting grounds I NEVER go straight there. I always let the dart decide one major destination. Then I just meander down back roads trying to stick to major straight roads at the same time avoiding interstates. Each night I stop at a park, go for a run, eat and then sleep in the vehicle.

It very economical way to travel but that was not the deciding factor that made me choose that way to travel. I just had to look around the hotel room I was standing in to remind myself why I didn’t like staying in dives. They were dirty and I was constantly afraid of bed bugs. All the nicer hotel chains required credit card to be on file to cover any possible damages. I had never had a credit card.

Secondly, I don’t like eating at restaurants. They are just too crowded and I have to constantly be aware of all the people around me. Plus, it seemed like I had a natural talent for running into wizards everywhere. Worrying about if you are going to end up in a spontaneous fight for your life with a wizard is just bad for the digestion.

So I bought food from a grocery store instead. State parks usually have fire pits or those little grills. Stew meat works the best for grilling on a stick. Plus, no dishes! Not that I have ever worried about doing dishes since I have been fifteen and had watched my mother and father die.

My mind instantly flashed back to the night I had woke to a handsome man standing over my bed. He had soft hair that was long for a man and hung down around his face as he leaned over me. His skin was clear and looked like it would be silky to the touch. My fingers twitched wanting to touch his prominent cheek bones and to run along up into the silky skin up into his hair. At first I thought I was having a “special” dream that were all too common at that point in my life with the teen hormones racing through my body. That was until he shoved a rag in my mouth to gag me and silence my screams. He had used duct tape to tape the rag in place and bind my hands and feet.

He threw me over his shoulder and carried me to the living room before sitting me on the floor next to my mother and father who were already bound and gagged. It had been just like a scene from a horror movie as he drew satanic symbols on my mom’s spotless hardwood floor with white chalk. He placed my father in the middle of a large pentagram before killing him, draining his blood and tracing the symbols with his blood. The whole time he chanted in Latin. Then he had placed my mother next to my father’s body. He killed her and repeated the ritual.

After he had finished the ritual with my mother time had seemed to slow down as the wizard stalked toward me. I knew I was next. In the same instant that I realized my time had come the glass from our large livingroom window had shattered inward.

An old man with the wrinkly scared face and long gray hair pulled back in a sharp pony tail followed the glass into the room. Then time resumed its unending march at it’s relentless pace. The battle had been beautifully poetic. A fact that never lost its irony to me.  The old man and the wizard danced around each other in a fierce battle. The sword that the old man swung through the air cut through the spells that the wizard shot in his directions sending burst of lights showering out and away from the sword. In the end the old man had won, just barely and at the ultimate price.

The wizard had shot a spell at the old man and it had snuck past his swinging sword to hit the old man squarely in the chest. The old man paused and looked down at his chest stunned knowing what the outcome would be. The wizard let himself get cocky in his victory and had started to turn his attention back to me. The wizard realized a fraction of a second too late that the old man had come back to his senses with just enough time to launch one final attack. The old man swung the blade and the wizard’s beautiful blond hair swung around his face as his head fell to the floor and rolled before hitting the TV stand.

The old man stumbled over and knelt down next to me. He drew out a knife and cut my hands and legs free. Then he thrust had thrust his sword and knife into my hand. “Leave,” he had ordered me in a weak but forceful command. “There may be more wizards around and they will attack you. My car is parked down the block. The black Chevy Impala. Keys in the ignition.” The man’s scared hands pushed at me before he slumped down the rest of the way to the floor. I remained frozen staring down at his dead body for a moment before my body had finally listened to his command. I stood up to flee when a hand with only half of a pointer finger had snapped around my ankle.

I am still not sure why it had not terrified me but it hadn’t. Instead I calmly looked down and met his hard steel gray eyes. “Learn to fight. Weapons in the trunk. But first lose your virginity. There is nothing more powerful than a virgin sacrifice” Then his head had rolled to the side and his open eyes glazed over.

To this day my mind fought with my memory of the event. My memory said he had come back from the dead to give me the last command to learn to fight but that reality scared me. Why was it so important that I learn to fight that it motivated him to come back from where the dead went? The weight of the responsibility that me fighting was that important scared me so I tried to make myself believe that he had never been dead. I am still working on convincing myself of that fact.

The old argument brought me back to the present and I realized I had been standing staring at my reflection in the mirror. My light brown eyes had the same cold hard gaze as the old man’s eyes had that night. It was a look of someone that knew and fought evil all too often. It was a look of someone that lived each day with the only goal to survive.

“Well if you want to survive another day then you had better get your ass in gear and get moving.” I said out loud to my reflection. Thankfully it didn’t answer.

I grabbed the Ziploc bag Miquel had put my driver’s license and social security card in and opened it. When I saw the state on my driver’s license a shiver went through me. When Miquel had asked me what state I wanted the driver’s license to be in I told him I didn’t care that he could just pick one. The Goddess had been working overtime because Miquel had made me a Michigan driver’s license.

The name on the driver’s license was Samantha Ryan. Samantha was 26 years old. I thought about the name for a second before I told myself a story about Samantha Ryan.

Samantha was the youngest child. She had 3 older brothers, all of whom were Engineers. Samantha was a tomboy and had grown up chasing after her brothers and spent her summers camping with them. Samantha had gone to college at Michigan State University. She had studied Business. After college she had moved in with her boyfriend, Paul. He had attended Michigan State University and had an engineering degree like her brothers.

Samantha had thought they were happy until Paul had told her that he wanted to move out. It had come as a surprise to Samantha but now she was happy they had broken up. Paul had been allergic to dogs. Samantha loved dogs. Samantha wanted a Rottweiler. She didn’t wear makeup and she only wore Chap Stick. Samantha liked to do Mud Runs for fun. She dressed in flannel shirts, jeans, and t-shirts.

I looked into my eyes in the mirror and told myself the story again.

I am Samantha Ryan. I am the youngest child. I have 3 older brothers. They are all Engineers. I like camping and hiking. I studied business at Michigan State University. My boyfriend Paul who I had been living with just broke up with me by saying he wanted to move out. The next day while he was at work I packed up all my stuff and left. Just as well. He was a jerk that was allergic to dogs. I am going to get a Rotty. It will be a girl puppy and her name is going to be Elsie. She is going to do Mud Runs with me for fun.

I looked down at the driver’s license and saw myself. I was Samantha Ryan. I needed a backpack to carry my ID in. No way was I carrying a purse.