Night Hunter

by Cathy McDavid

  Gillian instinctively looked up, though she could see nothing.

  What the hell was happening? Was Nick all right?

  Suddenly, an inhuman shriek rent the darkness. It escalated in pitch and volume, then abruptly ceased, leaving only silence.

  Dead silence.

  Suddenly in a hurry, Gillian climbed awkwardly to her feet. It wasn't easy. She hurt everywhere.

  Attempting a few faltering steps, she cried, "Nick? Are you there?"

  No answer.

  She turned blindly around, only to run into a large, solid object. Skimming her hands over the top, she determined it was a wooden table or possibly a desk. She'd landed on the top of it, then rolled off onto the floor.

  Which meant the opening she'd fallen through must be right above her head.

  "Nick," she called again. "Please answer me."

  Oh, God. What if something terrible ... no, she wasn't going to think that way. Nick was the Huntsman and the chosen champion of the Ancients for a reason.

  But still only human. And the creatures weren't.

  Gillian tried to hoist herself onto the table. Her muscles and aching joints refused to cooperate, but her heart insisted she couldn't sit around and do nothing. After several more attempts, she still hadn't managed to swing her leg high enough to clear the top of the table.

  She remembered that Nick had told her to find a way out of the basement and, if he didn't appear within fifteen minutes, to call Charlie.

  Like hell.

  She wasn't going anywhere, calling anyone, until she knew for certain what happened to Nick.

  But what if the female creature suddenly came through the opening into the basement and attacked her? It had done exactly that in the crawl space. On top of the table, Gillian would be a sitting duck. In her bruised and battered state, she doubted she'd fend off the creature for long,

  "Nick! Answer me."

  "Hold on. I'm coming."

  Gillian's legs, weak to begin with, went out from under her, and she slid to the floor. Only when she tasted her own tears did she realize she was crying.

  "Are you okay?" she hollered in a choppy voice.

  "Yeah."

  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

  She heard scraping and bumping and then a heavy thud. He must be coming through the opening.

  Sniffing back her tears, she wiped her nose with the back of her hand and called, "There's a table or desk directly beneath the opening." Gripping the edge of it, she pulled herself upright and waited for her wobbly legs to steady. "The duct ends and Nick landed with a bang not two feet from her.

  Gillian yelped and stumbled backward, losing her balance and nearly taking another dive onto the cement floor.

  "Where are you?" he called, scrambling off the table.

  "Here."

  He found her, wrapped her in his arms, and held her tight. Wonderfully tight. Everything-is-going-tobe-okay tight. His embrace felt so good, her joy at learning he was alive so great, she didn't care that he'd broken his promise and let her fall.

  "What about the female creature?" she asked when he'd relaxed his hold enough for her to talk.

  "It's gone. Only one left now to worry about."

  Gillian didn't insist on details. She'd rather not know how the female creature had perished. All she cared about was Nick and that he was safe. They were both safe.

  "Are you hurt?" she asked.

  "A few cuts and scrapes. No big deal."

  She suspected he was minimizing the extent of his injuries. But then, he did have the help of the Ancients. Maybe they'd already intervened and healed him like they had her that night on SouthMountain after the first female creature's attack.

  "Did you find a way out of here?" he asked.

  "I didn't have a chance to look before you ... arrived."

  "Let's split up." Placing a hand on her shoulder, he nudged her away from him. "You take that wall, and I'll take this one. Feel along with your hands. Yell if you find anything."

  She disliked his plan for obvious reasons. "Can't we stay together?"

  "We'll cover more territory this way." Gillian didn't budge.

  He came to stand beside her. "It's been one hell of a night. For both of us. But we'll be out of here soon and back home." He stroked her hair, tucking one of the many wayward strands behind an ear. "We just have this one last problem to tackle."

  He said "this one last problem" as if it were no more challenging than locating a missing set of car keys.

  "What if there's no way out?"

  "There is. All this junk didn't simply appear one day. Somebody carried it through a door. And we'll find that door faster if we split up."

  She had to agree with his reasoning even if she didn't like it. "Fine. We'll split up." How bad could it be? So she'd step on a few mouse droppings and walk into a few cobwebs?

  He cupped her cheek in his hand and brought his mouth to hers. His tongue traced the seam of her closed lips seeking entrance. She sighed, opened her mouth, and leaned into his kiss. Her contentment was short-lived.

  In the next instant, Nick had left her side, and Gillian resigned herself to the problem of getting the hell out of the basement.

  It proved more difficult than she'd first imagined. Objects were constantly in her path. Boxes, crates, cartons, storage racks, and furniture. She wormed over and under, squeezed around and between each and every obstacle on the off chance someone had stacked something in front of a door or window.

  To keep her hopes high, she pictured herself having a long, scalding-hot shower, followed by a mug of Nick's cappuccino. No, wait. A shot of his Chevis Regal. That would hit the spot.

  Every minute or so Nick said something to her, and she answered. His comments were more conversational than anything else, leading Gillian to believe he was talking to her in an attempt to keep her fears at bay.

  It worked.

  "I found something," Nick called excitedly after about fifteen minutes of searching. "A window."

  "Great!" Gillian started walking toward the sound of Nick's voice. She traveled slowly, running into an obstruction every other step and having to cut around it.

  All at once there was a loud crash and the tinkle of glass shards falling onto the floor.

  "What happened?" Gillian threw caution to the wind and rushed forward, only to slam into a ... she had no idea what it was. A lawn mower maybe? Her big toe throbbed.

  "The window's small, but I think we can fit through it," Nick said. "You can, for sure. Watch your step," he warned as she neared. "There's broken glass everywhere."

  Fresh air poured into the basement. Gillian didn't think she'd ever smelled anything sweeter.

  The window turned out to be large enough to accommodate both of them but very high off the floor. They had to construct makeshift steps using an old coffee table, a trunk, and two boxes placed on top of each other in order to reach the window.

  Nick went first after clearing the last bit of broken glass away from the window with the rag he'd used to protect his hand when breaking it. Once outside, he pulled Gillian through the window. The sharp edge of the window frame scraped her stomach as he dragged her out, but she could not have cared less. The discomfort was minor compared to the delight of finally escaping the air ducts and the basement.

  Gillian stood next to Nick and brushed herself off. After a moment, she gave up. She'd need a power washer to rid herself of all the filth and grime covering her.

  "Where are we?" She glanced around.

  Nick was picking bits of glass out of his shirtfront and sleeves. "East side of the church." He inclined his head. "The parking lot's over there."

  "Are we going back inside to talk to Father Juan?"

  "Yeah, we probably should. He said he'd wait for us in his office." He grinned. "And I ought to put some money in the collection plate to pay for the broken window."

  "What are you going to tell him?"

  "The truth, more or less. We found the remains of some dead anima
ls, and that's what was causing the stench. I'll suggest they use fans to blow out the air ducts like in the old days. With the female creature eliminated, the stench should dissipate in a few days."

  Hand in hand, they began strolling toward the walkway that lead to the church entrance. Security lights on the back of the building lit their way and all of the parking lot, which was empty except for Nick's car. Father Juan, Gillian assumed, must live within walking distance.

  She was about to suggest they offer to drive him home when a small figure darted out from behind one of the trees and ran in the direction of the parking lot.

  Gillian recognized the boy immediately. "It's him." She shook Nick's arm. "The kid who was watching us the other morning at your apartment. What's he doing here?"

  "I don't know," Nick said, "but I'm going to find out." He sped off after the boy, who cut diagonally across the parking lot and headed in the direction of the alley where Gillian had met the old woman.

  Gillian chased after them. Her tired muscles, already pushed to their limits, were no match for Nick and the boy. They rounded the corner leading into the alley before she was halfway across the parking lot.

  She kept going, her run slowing to a jog and then to a fast walk, and reached the alley a good three minutes after Nick and the boy.

  Lights from the church, though distant, provided sufficient illumination for Gillian to see. She might have screamed at the terrifying sight unfolding in front of her if her aching lungs could draw in enough air.

  Cadamus-it could be no other-stood over the bloodied body of a woman. Gillian recognized her and became instantly sick to her stomach. It was Amaia, the mother with the missing daughter who'd come into the sanctuary looking for Father Juan.

  In his arms, Cadamus held a young girl, unconscious or dead, Gillian wasn't sure which. His wings were fully extended, his teeth bared, and his eyes burned with an animalistic glow. He stood only five feet tall, but his wings and heavily muscled body gave the impression of someone-something-much larger.

  For a moment, Gillian was transported back in time to the night of her mother's death. She'd awakened for an unknown reason and crept down the hall to her parents' room, planning to sneak into bed beside her sleeping parents. Instead, she'd found Radium, crouched over her dead and dismembered mother-and her father missing.

  Radium's eyes had burned with the same animalistic glow as Cadamus's did now.

  Dear God, it couldn't be happening again.

  "Put her down," Nick said, his voice low and lethal.

  Gillian turned. Her attention focused exclusively on Cadamus, she hadn't noticed Nick until he spoke.

  "Nick, what are you doing?" Her hand flew to her mouth and she staggered backward when she saw that Nick held the boy by the hair, his grasp ruthless.

  "Whatever happens," he said from the side of his mouth, "don't interfere." Twisting the boy's head at a severe angle, he pressed the tip of the ritual dagger into the boy's neck, right where his jugular vein pulsed. "I repeat," he told Cadamus, "let her go."

  The boy's eyes were huge, and he trembled uncontrollably, but he didn't cry out.

  "Don't hurt him," :Gillian whimpered. "He's just a boy."

  "Shut up, Gillian."

  Her mind struggled to make sense of a situation that defied reason. Nick wasn't a killer. He was a good and kind man ... and sticking the tip of the dagger into the boy's neck so hard that blood trickled from a tiny wound. Suddenly light-headed, she reached for a nearby fence post.

  "Listen to your mate," Cadamus growled.

  His voice, coarse and guttural, sent a wave of shivers crashing through Gillian. A memory of Radium surfaced, one she'd apparently repressed all these years. He'd spoken to her father before he escaped through the bedroom window. What was it he'd said?

  A mate for a mate.

  At first, the words didn't make sense to Gillian. Then they did. Chilling sense. Radium had killed her mother because of her father's part in exterminating the female creatures.

  "Let her go." Nick's eyes never left Cadamus. Nor did his grip on the ritual dagger waver. "Or the boy dies."

  Cadamus hissed and lifted the girl higher. "You think I care what happens to the human child?"

  He flapped his wings, their movements slow and oddly graceful for something born in the deepest corner of hell. Dirt and small pebbles flew through the air, powered by the gusts of wind his massive wings generated, and striking Gillian in the face and on the arms.

  "Then you won't mind if I slit his throat wide open," Nick said.

  "Do with him what you must, Huntsman." Cadamus rose up in the air, stopping to hover when he reached a height of ten feet. He held the unresponsive girl by the wrist and dangled her over Nick's head as if she were a treat and he a dog. "And I will do with this one what I must."

  Gillian watched, wishing there was something, anything, she could do.

  Cadamus flew higher. Fifteen, eighteen, twenty feet off the ground. Suspended above them, he looked even larger and scarier than he had on the ground, while the girl looked smaller and more vulnerable. Light from the church reflected off his dark, scaly skin, turning it an incandescent silver. Wind from his great wings pummeled Gillian, and she was forced to shield her face against the assault.

  But she didn't dare turn away. She couldn't.

  As loathe as she was for Cadarnus to abscond with the girl, she was equally loathe for Nick to hurt the boy. Yet one, if not both, of those dismaying possibilities was inevitable.

  Cadamus floated above Nick, taunting him with the limp girl hanging from his grasp. Nick didn't respond. He continued to press the ritual dagger to the boy's throat, his stony expression void of emotion save for a commitment to carry through with his threat.

  This can't be happening.

  Yet it was, and Gillian could do nothing to prevent it. She was a trained psychologist. Her method of helping people was to talk with them. Clearly, neither Nick nor Cadamus was in the mood for a discussion.

  Cadamus dipped suddenly and swung the girl in front of Nick's face.

  "I grow weary of :your games, Cadamus." Nick raised the dagger as if to strike the boy.

  "No!" Gillian shouted and lunged at Nick, prepared to put herself between the ritual dagger and the boy if necessary.

  She didn't have to.

  Without warning, Cadamus released the girl. She tumbled downward on a collision course with the ground.

  In the next split second, Nick shoved the boy aside and dove for the girl, his arms fully extended. The boy ran-not away from Cadamus but straight toward him. At the same instant Nick caught the girl, Cadamus swooped down and snatched the boy.

  The last thing Gillian saw as they disappeared into the night sky was the boy clinging to Cadamus's neck and Cadamus's arm locked protectively around him.

  "Gillian!" Nick called.

  The weight of the falling girl had knocked him to the ground. He lay in the dirt with the girl on top of him.

  "Take her," he said, his voice wheezing, his breath short. The entire left side of his face was scraped and bleeding.

  "Is she alive?" Gillian asked.

  "Yes."

  She couldn't lift the girl, who was surprisingly heavy for one so thin. Instead, she pulled the girl off Nick and settled her as comfortably as possible beside him. When she was done, she glanced over her shoulder at Amaia. It was probably fortunate the young girl wasn't conscious to see her dead mother. Gillian knew firsthand a child never really got over the experience.

  "I'll call nine-one-one." Gillian reached for her cell phone.

  "No."

  "Nick. She needs medical help."

  "She's fine." He rolled onto his side, then sat up. "How can you say that? She's unconscious. Dying for all we know."

  Taking several deep breaths, Nick stood and reached for the girl. "Let's get out of here."

  "Get out of here?" Gillian stepped back and glared at Nick as if he were a stranger and not the man she'd spent the last few nights with.
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  "Hurry."

  "What about the girl's mother?" She flung her hand in the direction of Amaia. "We can't just leave her."

  "It's too late. There's nothing we can do." Nick gently lifted the girl in his arms and cradled her against his chest. Still breathing hard, he set out for the parking lot at a brisk walk.

  "Where are you going?" Gillian trotted after him. "Home."

  "Home? My God, Nick. What the hell is wrong with you?"

  He didn't answer.

  "You held a knife to that boy's throat.

  "I was never going to hurt him. It was a bluff." "A bluff," she shouted. "Are you insane?" "It worked, didn't it?"

  "Cadamus took the boy." "He won't harm him." "And you know this how?"

  "He wanted the boy. Why else would he have given me the girl?"

  They'd reached his car. Nick shifted the girl to one side and dug in his pocket for his keys.

  "You can't take her, Nick. You have no right." "I have every right."

  Gillian grabbed his arm and swung him around to face her. An amazing feat considering how much stronger he was than her.

  "I won't allow you to leave with her. I'll call the police and report you for kidnapping if I have to." Even as she said it, Gillian wondered if she really could make such a call. What reason would she give the police for them being there? Surely not that they were inspectors from the city. And what if the police blamed them for Amaia's death? Stranger things had happened. To her father, for one.

  And yet, they couldn't just take the girl, could they? "She needs medical attention," Gillian pleaded.

  "She needs to be taken to a hospital, her family located and notified."

  "This girl is the next Huntsman." Nick opened the car door while balancing her with one arm. "And she's going home with me."

  Another female was dead.

  Cadamus didn't have to read the boy's mind to learn of it. A sudden decrease of pheromones in the atmosphere was the first indicator. His inability to make a psychic connection the next.

  For the second time in almost a week, the Huntsman had destroyed Cadamus's mate mere hours, mere minutes, before he reached her. He would not allow a third time.