Page 16 of Foxin' Around

Nodding, she wiped uselessly at the water streaming down her face from her hair. Her lips quivered with the cold, but she clenched her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering and nodded. “F… fine.”

The look he gave her was doubtful, but he didn’t challenge her. His head turned once more to the direction in which they were heading, his eyes narrowing speculatively as he sniffed the air again, an expression of frustration on his face.

“She is not here,” he muttered, and Krystal couldn’t tell if he was annoyed or relieved by that. It was quite possible, of course, that he didn’t know either. He rolled his shoulders and let his breath out in a loud huff. “Not much farther. The stench is getting thicker. He should be just up ahead.”

“Right,” she mumbled, and she gave her arms a brisk rub. The shawl she wore was soaked through. She should have had the forethought to grab her hoodie. She was freezing. “Lead the way.”

Let’s get this over with.

Chapter

Thirteen

Syrix took in her pale face, but he nodded in agreement. His poor, determined little mate was trying to be brave. His hand curled into a fist, his claws sinking into his palm in irritation. The damn lamia was once again distressing her. This could not go on much longer.

Reaching behind him, he followed the path of her crossed arms and entwined his fingers with hers, drawing her hand into his. The silent reassurance was not much but her hand tightened around his, gratefully clinging to him. Through her hand, he felt a small amount of tension running through her release from her arm, and she allowed him to lead her deeper into the woods.

She did not speak, and nor did he. They walked silently in grim respect for the dead. And all the while, beneath his glamour, his fox ears swiveled, listening, and his nose twitched as he subtly sniffed the air. The scent of the lamia was quickly fading within the rain, leaving behind only the bittersweet bite of blood in the air and the scent of wet flesh mixing with the smells of dirt and greenery. That smell grew stronger as they walked toward its source, and the strands of long fur on his head prickled.

The smell of dead lay heavily there, and he squeezed Krystal’s hand in warning as he tipped his head to the bushes directly ahead of them.

“It is just over there,” he said quietly.

“Okay.”

It is one word and yet it bit into his heart just how much fear and dread it carried. Fear for herself and fear that the body that they might find belonged to someone she loved. He prayed that it did not.

Jaw hardening, he pushed through the branches and briefly closed his eyes in dismay as he held the branches out of the way for her. He swallowed and he opened his eyes to squint down at the human remains staring back at up him as Krystal joined him at his side. His sensitive ears picked up the shudder of her breath and the silent, choked sob. He bowed his head. It was truly a horrific sight, one that he did not wish his mate to be exposed to or be forced to endure. The male lay strewn on the forest floor, his torso torn apart and separated into pieces, the broken bones exposed from where he was split and torn apart, his meaty internal organs streamed across the ground like gruesome confetti—little confectionary sweets thrown to the crowds throughout much of human history. The male’s head, however, was skewered on a thick, broken branch, blood streaming from between its lips and the sightless holes where his eyes had once been. Very gently, Syrix turned her away with a murmur of apology.

“Was it—” he began, but she brushed the tears from her eyes and shook her head.

“It’s no one I recognize,” she said quickly. “No one in my family, anyway, and no one I recognized from the neighboring properties—though it has been a few years and admittedly someone could have sold their cabin since then, prior to the Ravening.” She stared helplessly down at her hands as she drewin a deep breath. “We… we should probably bury him anyway. It is the right thing to do. I… I think there might be some shovels back at the cabin. We can go fetch them and bring them back before she returns.”

“I do not think she will return tonight,” he soothed. His jaw clenched as he glanced back toward the remains, the splatter of blood on the leaves mingling and washing away with the rain. “This was a clear message left for me. She is toying with me and letting me know that she is not afraid to hunt and kill in my territory.” His upper lip curled back from his fangs. “It is a challenge to her sick game.”

Krystal’s free hand gripped his forearm urgently, bringing his attention back to her so that he turned toward her attentively, his head bowing so that his brow brushed the top of her head.

“Maybe we should just go,” she whispered. “Don’t play her game… just run.”

He smiled, his heart warming at her plea. She wished to flee with him. Certainly, she would just brush it off as her selfish desire for self-preservation that made her wish to keep him close to her, but he saw more than that. She was reacting instinctively, speaking whatever came to her mind and heart. In doing so, she revealed far more of herself than perhaps even she realized. If only it were so easy to just take her and run.

He shook his head regretfully. “If only I could. If I felt that we could escape that creature’s hunt, I would have already carried you away from here and disappeared with you. But a lamia is not like other monsters out there. Once she has begun her hunt, she will not abandon it, she will pursue us, and she swift. That you managed to elude her for so long is truly miraculous, but I do not think you will be so fortunate a second time.”

She sighed heavily and took a step closer to him, her small, soft body leaning into his larger frame. “So, we can’t go anywhere. We can’t run.”

“It would be fruitless, and we would be in a position where we would lack the safety our home provides,” he replied honestly. He shook his head. “I would not have imagined that she would linger so and set herself in a position of such opposition. Usually, predators like the lamia are cowards who hunt where the best opportunity lies. The protection of these woods should have deterred her,but even though it has not, it is at least keeping us safer than we would be out there.

“Yeah… you’re right. Nowhere out there will be as familiar and safe for us.” She straightened and scrubbed at her face with one hand before peering up at him through reddened eyes. “I really don’t want to give this place up without a fight, anyway.”

“I suspected not,” he agreed, and the corners of his mouth hitched with grim amusement. “You battled me far too hard to walk away so easily.”

Krystal greeted his observation with a small, valiant chuckle that was nothing short of love’s arrow directly to his heart. “That’s a tactful description of events. Hell, if I didn’t know any better, I would say that sounds suspiciously like admiration.”

Drawing back slightly, he skimmed his fingers along her jaw, his thumbs brushing her chin momentarily before tipping her head back so that he could look down into the oceanic depths of her blue eyes, wet with tears.

“Why would it not be admiration?” he replied. “This female before me is bold and possessing a great and courageous spirit.”

“Not to call you a liar or anything, but said female is shaking in her boots, doing everything she can just to hold her shit together,” Krystal pointed out dryly.

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