9

Two weeks later, there was another attack. Dad called the police and the fire department. They would have to help everyone because the ghouls were attacking the whole kingdom at once. Mom and I went to fight.

    Several men and women were fighting too.

    I had to get a few ghouls away from Mom because most of them knew her and wanted to attack her.

    Mom protected me a few times.

    The police and the fire department arrived and everyone was needed because about fifty ghouls attacked this one neighborhood.

    Ghouls outnumbered humans twenty-to-one in general.

    Mom and I got two ghouls away from a couple with two kids.

    The family ran.

    Mom and I fought the ghouls.

    Then, we fought three more.

    Mom broke the neck of one ghoul.

    I broke the neck of another ghoul.

    The third ghoul tried to bury me in snow.

    Mom tackled him.

    Another ghoul came.

    Mom fought them while I got myself out of the snow that had buried my legs.

    I was cold, wet and uncomfortable.

    I wanted nothing more than to change into warm clothes, but I had to keep fighting first.

    I noticed that Christian had arrived.

    One of the ghouls fighting Mom turned to me.

    Mom and I managed to break the necks of the ghouls.

    Christian stabbed two ghouls with syringes filled with potion.

    The ghouls melted.I got a ghoul away from a teenage boy.

    When I’d seen it attacking the boy, I’d panicked and run there as fast as I could.

    I killed the ghoul.

    Mom got a ghoul away from a woman and killed it.

    Christian got a ghoul away from a man and his cat.

    Mom and I stood back to back and fought off the ghouls that attacked us.

    Some ghouls retreated after we beat them up.

    We killed others.

    The ghouls scratched us with their claws.

    They tried to bury us in snow many times, but we managed to avoid it this time.

    Christian cast spells to get rid of a lot of snow that had partially buried people, buildings or houses.

    The ghoul leader was giving instructions throughout the entire battle.

    He attacked people too.

    Either they got away or someone protected them.

    The ghoul leader approached Mom and me.

    He hated Mom.

    He hated me more during every battle because I also caused problems for him.

    Sometimes the ghouls targeted me specifically like they did with Mom.

    “You have no right to fight ghouls because we are the smarter species,” the ghoul leader growled at Mom and me.

    “It doesn’t matter,” Mom responded. “What you’re doing is wrong.”“I will destroy you because ghouls have more knowledge than humans.”

    We didn’t respond to that, but we didn’t show any fear.

    We thought there was a chance we could handle him.

    We had handled ghouls before, even though he was the strongest.

    He was angered by the fact that we were not terrified and started yelling about how he had a right to kill us and how he would.

    I could tell he wanted to win this battle between the three of us.

    He attacked us!

    During the fight, we were able to predict some of his moves.    

    He was able to predict ours less often, but more often than the other ghouls did.

    He wanted to convince himself and us that he could win.

    I thought Mom might know that too, since she had a history with him.

    He tried to bury us underneath snow.

    He ordered the remaining ghouls to attack us.

    There were seven of them because the others had run away or been killed.

    Christian helped us fight them off with spells and potions.

    We fought for a long time until we were able to kill five of the ghoul followers.

    Every time we killed a ghoul, the leader fought harder than he used to.

    Then, he got tired and couldn’t fight.

    Another ghoul died.

    The leader hated us even more.I knew he would try again and would never stop trying because he wanted to have power over humans. And he wanted to beat us specifically, since he hadn’t been able to kill us yet.

    The leader decided to retreat with the remaining ghoul.

    I was relieved.

    Mom pulled me into her arms. We were shaking because we were tired. Mom, Christian and I went to the hospital. Dad went with us. My parents were more uncomfortable around each other than they were the last time we had to go to the hospital. Dad sat next to me, not Mom. From the looks on their faces, neither of them knew what to do about the other one.

    The police couldn’t fight the ghouls. They could only help people who were hurt or buried in snow after the ghouls left. They couldn’t before because the agreement forbade that. They couldn’t take statements or arrest the ghouls because the ghouls were allowed to do whatever they wanted for being the smarter species. No one liked it, but because of the agreement from thousands of years ago, we had to accept it.

    The firefighters, men and women, saved a lot of people and their pets.

    Some of the people from the neighborhood helped others get to the hospital. They also saved people and animals.

    I had saved several people. So had Mom and Christian.

    I thought it was weird that the agreement that was supposed to be for the good of the kingdom was now making it okay that the ghouls were constantly attacking the kingdom. They killed people and they destroyed the kingdom. I wished I could stop that. The agreement was supposed to bring peace. But if the ghouls had more knowledge than the other species, that made them the smarter species and there was nothing we could do about it.