by Logan Jacobs
“No comms units?” Danira asked Kal.
The dwarf simply shook her head. “We won’t be close enough to the van to get a solid signal, and there aren’t any towers out here,” she explained. “So we need to stay close, and keep your weapons ready, just in case.”
Danira nodded, and adjusted the gun in the holster on her side. Ariette and Kalista both grabbed the hilt of the swords sheathed at their waists, and Maaren’s fingers tightened a bit on the handle of her axe.
“Alright guys,” Maaren took a deep breath as she stared into the forest. “Let’s go.”
“How do we know where we’re supposed to go?” I asked curiously. “Are we just going to wander around until--”
Maaren clicked her tongue. “Milton, Milton, Milton,” she explained. “I’m a trained Unseelie hunter. I have a very keen sense of direction.”
“You heard the lady, onward and upward!” Kalista cried out.
The dwarf began to march forward behind Maaren, kicking her knees up to her stomach with each step. She almost looked like a character from an old army cartoon.
“Kal, you’re going to tire out your muscles doing that,” Ariette pointed out.
“Tire them out,” the dwarf responded as she winked at us over her shoulder, “or make them so they become like the trees?”
“What?” Ariette replied with a chuckle as the rest of is crunched over the leaves and followed Maaren. “I don’t even think that makes sense.”
“Solve the riddle, Ari!” Kalista cried out, and her voice echoed through the trees.
Right above me, a bird took off with a rustle of leaves and a loud squawk.
“How long do you think it’s going to take for her to stop talking in riddles?” the blonde elf muttered next to me.
“A while,” I chuckled as I gazed around at the brilliant greens and reds of the forest.
The sun shone down through the leaves in stripes of bright light and patterned the ground beautifully. I listened closely and began to pick out the different sounds of the forest. A far off woodpecker, the buzz of bees as they pollinated a bright pink flower that grew from the root of a giant tree, the rustle of leaves as animals ran about, and the crunch of sticks and dead leaves underneath our boots. Save for our footsteps, it was almost like the forest was completely alone in its natural state. It was a far cry from the hustle and bustle of Jefferson City.
“A penny for your thoughts,” Ariette said sweetly as she looped an arm in mine and stroked her thumb along the back of my hand.
“It’s beautiful here,” I answered. “That’s all. Just appreciating nature.”
“That’s worth a penny,” she chuckled, “but I’m afraid I’ve got to write you an IOU. I didn’t bring any money.”
“I’ll keep you to your word,” I told her.
I glanced over at the elf and saw her blue eyes were wide as she took in the forest in all its glory. A ray of sunlight hit her porcelain skin and made her look ethereal and unreal, as if she was surrounded by a glow. Like the sun was in her.
Suddenly, there was a large rustle from above. “I don’t think you’re supposed to be here,” a stern voice growled from somewhere in the canopy.
My team froze and gripped our weapons.
We weren’t as alone as we thought.
Chapter Ten
The moment I tilted my head upward, a human-looking figure dropped down from above and tackled me to the ground. Both of us tumbled across the foliage, and something impossibly hard struck me in the back of my skull. The faceless shadow jumped off my body just as I felt the warm rush of hot, wet blood spread through my hair. My vision went blurry for a moment as my team leapt into action around me.
Ariette drew her sword, and there was a clash of metal on metal as she took on one of the attackers. Over the rush of blood that pounded in my ears, I could hear Maaren as she hollered something, but I couldn’t tell if she directed it at us or our enemies. Black started to close in on my vision, and I knew I needed to stop the blood flow, and fast.
I took in a deep breath and called on my Hand. Then I turned my magic inward and halted the flow of blood from the back of my skull. My vision returned, and the yellow twinkle of stars dissipated as I forced the blood to clot and seal the wound. I may not have the Fae healing the others did, but my quick patch job would do until this fight was over.
“We take them alive!” a musical, high pitched voice yelled out. “The King will want to see these Seelie scum!”
I spun around to find the owner of the voice. Just a few feet from me, removed from the fighting, stood a tall, statuesque elf. She had brilliant red, curly hair and eyes so golden they almost looked fake. But the slight blue tinge to her skin gave her loyalties away.
Somehow, we’d stumbled into Unseelie territory.
“Didn’t I kill you already?” the same creamy voice asked from a few feet behind me.
I whipped around and saw a lanky elf with dark blue skin and white hair. He held a dark metal sword in one hand, and he rubbed the other over the flat side of the blade as if he petted a dog and not a weapon. His eyes were a very pale gray, and he wore dark jeans with a tight white t-shirt and leather boots. He advanced toward me slowly and carefully, the way a lion stalked his pray.
I took one step back as I called up the familiar tingle in my Hand and felt out his blood. “It’s gonna take a lot more than that to kill me, tinkerbell,” I hissed.
My team spread through the woods as they each fought a foe. There was an Unseelie for each member of my team, almost as if they’d been watching us and had planned for this attack. I could hear the crack and snap of leaves and twigs, and the clang of metal on metal as they all fought vigorously. A few feet away, I heard the snap of a lightning bolt.
The Unseelie target was watching me, waiting for me to make my move. Unfortunately for him, I was already making it.
I focused in and felt the strong gush of blood in the man’s veins. Before he had a chance to get any closer, I commanded the blood in his legs and torso to freeze up. My hand began to vibrate, but then it stopped. It was almost as if something had reached out and grabbed ahold of every cell in my hand and squeezed it until it stopped moving.
“Edora!” I heard Maaren cry out in between grunts of effort.
I had no idea what the hell my friend meant, and I didn’t really have time to care. My opponent inched closer as a twisted smile spread across his face, the smile of someone who thought he had the upper hand.
“How’s your Hand treating you?” he mocked and held up his own appendage. “Power of Augmentation. I can stop your magic with a single twitch of my fingers.”
“But can you stop my bullets?” I snarled as I raised my gun into the air and shot off a few rounds.
The Unseelie’s gray eyes went wide for a brief moment, and then his dark sword flashed in front of him. He dispelled my bullets with a flash of sparks and a loud clanging noise, and then he lunged forward.
I sidestepped his attempt, and the Unseelie’s weapon shot past my right side. Before I could fully reorient myself, my opponent lunged at me once again with his impressive speed. His arm came down swiftly as he tried to slice me with the sharp blade, but I was too quick for the Unseelie. I ducked under the arch of his weapon, wrapped my hand around his wrist, and punched him hard in the gut. The evil elf collapsed forward with a strained cry, and I used his momentum to bring a knee straight to his groin. He released his grip on his sword, and I used the opportunity to wrench it out of his hand.
Unfortunately, the elf was quick to recover, and he managed to spin around and land a solid roundhouse kick to my side. The impact of his kick rammed me into a tree trunk, and my upper bicep smacked the rough bark hard. Droplets of blood beaded on my skin where the bark had torn it open, and my bruised muscles screamed in agony. I would have a deep, purple mark come morning.
“Just surrender already, human,” the Unseelie sneered as he withdrew a dagger from his waistband.
“Edora, would you liste
n to me?” Maaren cried out again, and I briefly glanced over in the direction of her voice.
The Unseelie took advantage of the diversion and came at me with his arm pulled back, ready to throw a haymaker. Just before his blow collided with my head, I ducked down, and he swung at air. The Unseelie spun forward, and I threw back the sword in my hands, ready to slice out his innards.
“Strike team, halt!” a musical voice screamed out.
The Unseelie man pulled back abruptly. He continued to sneer at me as he walked back and leaned against a nearby redwood tree. The elf crossed his arms over his chest and tapped his foot impatiently, but he didn’t come any closer.
I tightened my grip on the dark gray sword. This had to be some sort of a trick. Surely there were more Unseelie who were about to swoop in and make our lives a living hell. Right?
“You guys, it’s okay,” Maaren’s voice finally called out through the trees. “This is an old … I know her.”
I kept my eyes pinned on the elf as a frustrated scowl spread up his face. Finally, he let out a frustrated sigh, shrugged, and turned to walk toward the voice of who I assumed was his commander.
I cautiously lowered my sword and followed. My breath was heavy, and I became aware of the dull ache in the back of my head as the adrenaline slowly dissipated from my body.
I stomped a few dozen feet more until I came upon Maaren. She stood in the middle of a small clearing and faced down the red haired Unseelie elf, but her axe was down by her side. A stout dwarf was inches away from the red-haired elf, heaving heavily and audibly. Danira, Kalista, and Ariette all emerged from the thick foliage as they cast suspicious glances all around.
The red haired elf was breathtakingly beautiful, in a strange sort of way. I got a much better look at her now that I wasn’t in the midst of a battle, and she was stunning. Her golden eyes were almost cat-like in appearance, and her pupils were even a little bit ovular. They were larger than any eyes I’d ever seen on an elf or human, and the yellow orbs took up an inordinate amount of space on her face. Her skin was such a pale blue that it would be easy to mistake her for a Seelie elf in the right light, and she was covered with freckles. The elf’s wild red curls shot out of her head, completely untamed, and fell over shoulders clad in a tight white t-shirt that revealed her full bosom and slim figure. She wore a sword strapped to her denim clad hip, and her hand rested on its hilt, ready for battle at any moment.
The rest of her crew were tall, male Unseelie elves. That is, aside from the squat, fat dwarf. There was the one who had fought me off, and three others who looked identical to one another. They shared the same dark brown hair and light blue eyes, and they all stood equally tall. Each one was wearing a ratty brown t-shirt, and they each had a massive, dark silver sword attached to their hip.
“I’m so sorry for the misunderstanding,” the Unseelie woman finally said in that musical voice. “I truly am. But you must understand we don’t take very kindly to strangers in our territory.”
Instinctively, our two groups separated into sides across the clearing. My team gathered on one side, and the Unseelie on the other, which left Maaren and the woman in the middle.
“Uh, Maaren, are you sure we shouldn’t have Milton just tear the blood from these guys?” Kalista asked suspiciously. “I think he’s strong enough now that he could totally do it.”
“I’m sure, Kal,” Maaren chuckled. “They aren’t a threat to us.”
“Actually, my dwarf friend,” the redhead pointed out, “Milton couldn’t use his Hand even if he wanted to. Boone here would just stop him.”
“Hand of Augmentation,” the elf who had been fighting me added.
“Sorry we attacked you,” the redhead continued. “I didn’t recognize you, Your Highness.”
Maaren grimaced at the title, but she still nodded in agreement.
“That’s alright, Edora,” she replied. “Last time you saw me, I looked decidedly less blue.”
“Didn’t you wonder why we had an Unseelie with us?” Ariette demanded, and I could tell she was extremely annoyed. Her braid had come unraveled in the fight, and dirt was smeared over her cheek. She definitely wasn’t a happy camper.
The redhead just stared at Ariette and tilted her head like she was a contestant in a beauty pageant. She had full lips that formed into a perfect pout, and her golden eyes dragged up and down Ariette’s body in a way that only a queen bee could pull off.
“No, I didn’t,” she finally said snarkily. “I’m not really in the business of wondering. We’re in the business of eliminating threats, and you five looked like you were a threat.”
“Of course you are,” Ariette muttered as she rolled her eyes. “What if someone had been killed?”
“I don’t ask questions anymore,” the redhead spat. “Your kind never ask the Unseelie for clarity. You just kill us on the spot!”
“Because you’re breaking a sacred treaty!” Ariette cried. “We weren’t breaking any sort of treaty here. You’re not following protocol.”
“Protocol?” the Unseelie scoffed with a laugh. “You think I give a damn about protocol? My tribe is out here in these woods, trying to survive! Protocol be damned.”
“Well,” Maaren piped up in an extra cheery voice that was very unusual for the hunter, “we should just be going then. Give my regards to my father.”
“Maaren, can I talk to you for a second?” I requested gently.
The hunter spun quickly and lunged toward me, like she desperately wanted an excuse to move out of Edora’s gaze.
“What’s up?” she asked, and the fake cheer started to reach an uncomfortably strange level.
“You sound like you sucked in a bunch of helium,” I murmured to her. “Are you okay?”
“Oh yeah, totally good,” she responded. “Never better.”
“Okay,” I said slowly, but I didn’t completely believe her. “Do you think we could talk to your dad, maybe? About the Phobos? Way back when we met, you said he’d have the answers to all my questions about the Unseelie. Clearly we’re close to his territory. ”
“I did say that,” she sighed. “And he would. He might not be happy about meeting the human who has his son’s hand, though. He’s a tad ‘old-school,’ just so you know.”
“I’ll be okay,” I assured her. “But if that’s too much for you--”
“No, no, if it’ll help us stop the destruction of the entire world, I can stomach my dad for a few hours,” she said quickly. “Just, don’t leave my side, okay?”
“You got it,” I replied, and pressed a gentle kiss to her soft lips.
Maaren pulled back after a moment, and I saw her normal self return to her bright green eyes. She sighed deeply, but didn’t look away from me.
“Edora,” she called out as she stared at my face like she wanted to memorize it, “we need to see my father.”
“Are you sure?” the Unseelie asked hesitantly. “I mean, last time you--”
“I’m sure,” Maaren answered, and her voice took on a very regal tone that I’d never heard from her before.
For the first time, I saw a king’s daughter, not a rebellious hunter.
“Take us there, please,” she asked once more, this time a bit more forcefully.
“Woah, you want to go into Unseelie territory?” Ariette demanded as she glared at Maaren. “You know they’re our sworn enemies, right? Well, except for the Phobos currently, but that’s beside the point.”
“They won’t hurt us,” Maaren assured her. “I’m the … ”
The hunter stopped for a moment and looked like the words she was saying were making her ill.
“I’m their princess,” she finished with a deep sigh.
I was a little uneasy about an adventure through Unseelie territory myself, but it would be worth it if we could get any information from the king.
“How can you be sure of that?” Danira demanded. “The Seelie and the Unseelie have been at each other’s throats for thousands of years.”
&nbs
p; Maaren inhaled deeply and looked at each of them for a long moment. It was sort of strange, to see the normally quiet and light hunter act like a queen in command, but it was in her blood.
“Do you trust me?” the Unseelie princess asked seriously.
“Of course we trust you,” Ariette pointed out. “It’s them we’ve got a problem with.” She hooked a finger to point to the other Unseelie, and Edora rolled her eyes.
“We can hear you, ya know,” the redhead called out. “We may have blue skin, but we’re not deaf.”
“Oh, I am fully aware,” Ariette responded snarkily.
“Guys, if the king can help us in any way, don’t you think we should at least give it a shot?” I asked my team. “Give it an hour. If it doesn’t help, we’ll leave and continue on.”
“Why do you want to see him so badly?” Ariette asked us.
“Because if anybody knows who the Phobos leader is, it’s him,” Maaren said firmly, “and that little tidbit of information could do us good in the upcoming battle.”
Kalista shrugged almost immediately. The dwarf was always willing to go with the flow and see what happened. Ariette and Danira shared a long look of caution, but then the older commander sighed heavily and turned to the Unseelie.
“You do anything funny at all, and I will make sure the entire Seelie army sees it as breaking the treaty and an act of war, got it?” Danira grunted.
Edora pursed her pink lips, tilted her head, and then mussed her curls with a shrug. “Follow me, then,” the Unseelie elf said as she turned to lead the way through the forest.
Two members of her team immediately went to her. The other two waited until my team had started to go and dropped in behind us. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled when I saw them make their move, and I stayed on high alert. The Unseelie were our enemies after all, and I wasn’t too comfortable with two of them behind us and out of sight.
“Last time you what?” Kalista whisper-yelled to Maaren as we passed through rays of sunlight that flitted through the forest canopy.