Page 32 of Reaper Unhinged

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Whispers filled the air, and then the hairs on my arms stood to attention. We weren’t alone.

“Who’s there?” Uri demanded.

One of them,a lilting female voice said.

Here?a male voice replied.

Again.

It’s been a while.

Too long,the woman said.

Then maybe we should play our song?

Foreboding bloomed in my stomach just as the haunting notes of a melody rose up in the air. The foreboding morphed into panic, then terror as primal instinct blared a warning.

Keon stared at me, shaking his head. His mouth moved, forming words I couldn’t hear.

“Don’t listen!” I cried out.

He covered his ears, and behind him, so did Uri. The tune was muted now, barely there.

I jerked my head in a let’s-move gesture. Keon nodded, but Uri was a few paces behind him, expression dazed. His hands slowly slipped from his ears.

“Uriel. Don’t—”

He dove off the path and into the fog.

“No!” I made to run after him, but Keon grabbed me around the waist, pulling me to his chest.

He yanked my wrist, forcing me to unplug one ear. “It’s stopped. Although I don’t think it was for us anyway.”

“They wanted him.”

“Yes.”

“We have to go after him.”

“No.”

Had I heard him right? “What?”

“We came here for the power source. We have to stay on mission.” He grabbed my hand and tugged me away from the edge of the trail.

“No.” I twisted my hand out of his grip. “We don’t leave a man behind.”

“We don’t have time to go chasing after him and whatever has him,” Keon said. “In case you’ve forgotten, we’re on the clock. Tick. Fucking tock.”

He was right, of course. We had to put the greater good first. I had to focus on the mission.

You’d let your friend die? Tut, tut.

I shook my head slightly. That voice…

“We leave now,” Keon said.

I couldn’t let my friend die. “And ifI’dbeen taken, what then?”

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