Page 123 of Hunted in the Shadows
A dead siren was floating on the tide, mere feet away from Rhett’s limp legs. She had feasted before death. One of Rhett’slimbs was bloody but salvageable. The other looked beyond saving—ravaged to the bone. Swollen, crimson marks marred his symmetrical face—my marks, I thought with barely subdued pride.
Rage made my chest tighten as I watched Cain saw through the zip tie with a pocket knife. He clapped his hands on Rhett’s face, reviving him. Although Rhett was groggy, he was quick to come to his bearings, those wicked blue eyes darting from point to point. Sheer fucking willpower and adrenaline could be the only explanations for his ability to snap out of the shock of his injuries.
“Up, boy! Get up!” Cain rasped as he helped Rhett lean on him, setting sights on the truck—far too close to where Sylvia was caged.
The buzzing of wings caught my ear.
Cliff heard it too, throwing out an arm to stop me from pushing right into the two enemy fairies as they flew into view. They were angry, grieving—I could see the way they looked at the corpse of the siren before unleashing a torrent of fire and searing lightning toward Rhett and Cain.
Rhett didn’t hesitate. With shocking clarity, he leaned hard against the truck and yanked Cain in front of him, using him as a human shield. Cain’s screams choked off as he charred, the stench of it cloying the air. His body crumpled, and Rhett sank to the ground, unable to support himself on his ruined leg. The front of his clothing was charred from the attack, skin angry red beneath.
He groped behind him for something—Sylvia was less than a meter away behind the truck, just up the slope. He was dragging himself along the ground, his legs scarcely usable. His roar of agony with each inch gained was raw and animal.
I snapped back into movement. I knew what I had to do.This time, I didn’t care if Sylvia watched. I wouldn’t hesitate. I would kill Rhett to protect her—to protectall of us. But as I charged, Rhett finally reached the slightly ajar passenger door. I thought he might try to climb in and peel off in the truck, but he groped inside desperately and withdrew something that froze me in place.
His flamethrower.
“Holy fuck,” Cliff breathed beside me, staggering further out of Rhett’s path, keeping to the shadows of the trees.
Horror licked up my spine as Rhett squeezed the trigger with a roar. Flames erupted in midair. He was so far gone from the tentative control he had wielded all those years ago in Oregon. Now, Rhett was using no strategy, no aim—just setting everything ablaze. The two fairies who’d killed Cain jolted backward.
Rhett forced himself to stand with a heave of tortured effort, dragging what remained of his ruined leg behind him, squeezing the trigger nonstop to blow the flames further, catching more trees and underbrush in his path. Exposed bone and shredded muscle left a dark trail as he moved—and his scream of agony became a war cry.
Several fairies dove toward the flames—fire affinities, I realized, trying to bend the inferno away from their midair position. For a moment, they were successful—wrangling the fire the way stallions could be broken.
But another shrill cry pierced the air, small and agonized. One of the other fairies was consumed in the blaze and plummeted from the air. This broke the fire affinities’ concentration, just for a second. It was enough. Rhett’s flames surged forward. More fairies crowded toward him on the offensive, wielding every affinity I’d ever heard about. Lightning singed Rhett’s chest, burning him. He sank to the ground, too far away to lean on the truck now.
He kept his weapon aimed upward, unrelenting. Two more winged bodies dropped, and I couldn’t watch anymore. Thewildness in Rhett’s eyes was manic, his face aglow and shining with sweat.
He wouldn’t stop. He’d burn this whole fucking place down to get what he wanted—Sylvia, us, the Velorian compound.
Now, a voice in my head barked.Run, now!
I exchanged a look with Cliff, his steely resolve mirroring mine. We tore behind the bed of the pickup truck, out of Rhett’s line of sight as the heat from his flamethrower burned at our backs. My leg screamed with every step, but it mattered less when Sylvia came into sight.
Relief hit me like a wave. She was still in the cage, her face pallid and her arms caked in dirt. Small rivets were clawed into the earth near the iron bars. She had been trying to dig her way out—to no avail. She was seated in the center, looking sick and paler than I’d ever seen her, but she wasalive.
“Sylv,” I breathed, wrenching the cage off of her, tossing it aside.
I could’ve sworn color rushed back into her face the moment she was freed. But she wouldn’t look at me. Her gaze skirted around us towards the water, and I realized she was still hoping to glimpse the gemstone. My throat closed. I wished I could comb the entire bayou with her to find it. Its loss stung—more collateral damage.
“Come on. We gotta go,” Cliff said, scooping Sylvia off the ground.
I was silently grateful for his initiative, unsure if I could bring myself to touch her right now. Not when she bore that vicious look when her eyes skirted toward me—like she was dreaming of driving a knife of ice through my ribs. For a brief, irrational moment, I thought she would; I thought she might conjure spellwork to attack me now that the iron no longer quelled her magic.
Sylvia’s wilted silence somehow stabbed even deeper.
Cliff took the wheel of the truck, finding the keys were still in the ignition. Sylvia sat on the dashboard as he peeled out of the clearing, tires grinding on the uneven terrain. The rising sun flashed through the tree line, making my eyes ache. Gradually, branches dripping with iridescent, gemstone-altered flowers and fruit morphed into ordinary leaves, dark and bearded by moss.
“Don’t look, Sylv,” Cliff said. “Don’t look back.”
Facing the backseat, her gaze was already vacant. I followed her stare. Through the back window, pinpricks of wavering light glinted in the fire—burning fairies. Her own kind. Bodies of sirens and hunters lay scattered along the shore. Fire caught along the underbrush, clouding the world with smoke.
26
Sylvia
Iwondered if he was coming.
