We hurried away after the sight–it looked like it was straight out of a thriller film. My partner kept bugging me that we hadn’t taken any photos of what we saw. The whole thing had shaken him up, he just couldn’t seem to shut his running mouth about ‘kelpies.’ If I hadn’t been there with him, I would have called him delusional. But we both saw it, it was real.

To save the town from intense fear, we didn’t let anyone know exactly what we saw, but we did write in the paper that there was danger in the lake. We had three too many disappearances to work out, and a potential case of the supernatural.

Elena approached me a week later, telling me she had already spoken to my partner but he didn’t want to listen to her.

“I study all sorts of folklore. Vampires, fairies, griffins. . . I write on it all.”

“That’s a peculiar topic to specialize in. I already know the name of what we may be seeing; kelpies.” I gave her a cautious glare.

“We can get rid of them.” She shoved her notebook in my face, but I quickly pushed it back.

“How? Do we tame them or something?” I chuckled sarcastically.

“You’re supposed to capture its bridle or, if in human form, its necklace.”

“Human form?”

“They can take the form of humans, obviously. Nearly every creature can.”

“I apologize for not being a teenage girl who studies make-believe.” With a roll of my eyes, I leaned on the wall.

When she opened her mouth to speak, I looked over at an unfamiliar young man approaching us. He was lanky, covered in baggy clothes, and he looked like he was on two hours of sleep. Elena gave him an eyebrow raise and he spoke to us,

“Can I help you with getting rid of them?”