Page 117 of Hunted in the Shadows
“What’s the last thing you remember?” I asked.
Cliff shook his head, gaze darkening, and I knew his memory was as foggy as mine after that first sip of wine.
“Those little assholes roofied us,” Cliff muttered.
A sudden noise pulled our attention back toward the water, making all three of us freeze up. The moss-covered structure quivered slightly. Ancient vines slithered away from the roof, creating an opening. Fairies began to emerge, iridescent wings flashing golden in the rising sun. In the branches around us, aflock of startled birds flew off as though they could sense the fallout to come.
Cliff and I scrambled to our feet. The deer fled.
“Ay, coño,” I breathed. My entire body and mind ached—but this wasn’t over.
Then, I heard it—the distant wailing rising from beneath the water.
The clamoring voices echoed, hungry and furious. My heart skipped a beat as ripples dotted the water’s surface. Sirens—dozens of them. With the protective ice barrier shattered, it would be less than minutes before they flooded the water.
I threw a look to Cliff and Sylvia, scanning them. We were exposed.Sylvia was as pale as a sheet, still trembling as she watched in a horrified daze. Two handguns and a few iron blades remained between Cliff and me. The rest of our arsenal was stowed in the trunk of our borrowed car, over a mile away.
All we could do was run.
We started toward the tree line. Outrunning an angry horde of fairies seemed impossible, but at the very least, we could get out of the sirens’ earshot. My heart sank at the realization that the water ran in every possible direction around here. If a siren could escape the outpost and make it here, there was no telling how easily they could catch up with us on the way to the car.
Noise came from within the tree line, making us falter. Engines revved and shouts echoed.
“You hear that?” one of the voices called. “It’s coming from over there!”
The familiarity of the voice made my skin crawl.
Rhett.
Normally, a pack of hunters would be a godsend, but with Rhett at their head, any safety would be temporary. We scrambled to the nearest underbrush and found cover behind too-vibrant leaves—affected by the proximity of gemstones. Headlights brighter than the dawn pierced through the trees.
Half a dozen vehicles came into view—pickup trucks and SUVs suited for the soft ground.
“Don’t look ‘em in the eyes, boys!” one of the hunters called out as he leaped from the passenger’s seat of a truck. “Just burn them all.”
Others hastened out of their vehicles—familiar faces from the outpost, rushing to meet the onslaught of sirens and fairies.
Cliff huffed. “Had to be a matter of time before they tracked us down.”
“Hey—they’ll keep each other occupied,” I muttered. “Let’s go.”
We snuck around the back of the vehicles and caught sight of spare weapons ready for the taking.Along the shoreline, I could hear the fight exploding—gunshots and crackling magic, the smell of singed flesh filling the air.
Cliff handed Sylvia to me and reached into the open trunk of a Jeep to grab a sawed-off shotgun. No sooner than Cliff had his hands on the weapon, two figures rounded the corner.
Two hunters, armed to hell.
“Everett!” one of them shouted. “He’s here! Over here!”
We had no time to react as a third hunter joined the duo—and they all pounced for Cliff. I would have lunged into the fray at once, but with Sylvia in my grasp, I hesitated a second too long. Cliff was overpowered, pushed against the side of the Jeep as zip ties were lashed around his wrists, binding his arms behind his back.
“Get your fucking hands off me!” he shouted, resisting viciously.
I staggered back behind the pickup truck, frantically looking for a safe place to lay Sylvia before I could rush to Cliff’s aid.
“Let me go!” Sylvia, still shivering, tried to elbow her way free of me. “What are they doing to him? Let me help!”
“No,” I hissed. “You can’t even fly right now! How do you expect to—”
