Huntress Clan Saga Complete Series Boxed Set: Books 1-6

by Jamie Davis

“No, they stopped when you left, but what you said about the Fae makes sense now. Someone broke into your apartment and took the egg. They got the spear from Taylor’s workshop, too. Juni mentioned a couple of Fae patrons acting strange in the pub earlier in the evening, but we never found out who they were. They must be connected.”

  The egg was gone? Quinn’s heart sank. Everything was tied to it. “When did the egg and the spear go missing?”

  “Three days ago. Why?”

  Quinn nodded. “The day before, the Fae showed up here for me. I guess they figured out that the egg was ready to hatch, and they needed me for some reason.”

  “The egg is hatching? That’s the reason for all this? Quinn, you need to start telling me everything.”

  “I can explain more when you pick me up.”

  “I’m not far from you. I’ve been hanging around, trying to find out who burned the cabin down. The locals don’t know much about it, or they’re not telling a stranger.”

  “I’m pretty sure there are still Fae trackers around, Clark. We have to be careful. I’m heading to a convenience store off the exit south of the lake. Can you get there?”

  “I know where it is. I can be there soon.”

  Quinn drew on her connection to the mountain and judged the trail to the rest stop. “It’ll take me about an hour cross-country to get there. I’m turning my phone off in case they can track it.”

  “Be careful.”

  Quinn hung up and shut the phone off, then slid it into her duffel bag and slung the bag across her back. She pulled up her map overlay and expanded the view until she could see the interstate. It might actually take more than an hour.

  Darkness had started closing in, so Quinn muttered, “Damn it, I need to see.” The forest around her lit up as her night vision mode kicked in. She scanned the overlay for any new blank spots that might indicate trackers nearby. She saw a few likely places, but they might also be open ground with no noticeable features. She didn’t have time to examine them closely, and this far from the mountain, the level of detail was much lower. She’d try to angle around them.

  Quinn drew down her stamina bar and boosted her speed, then set out. She loved running, and being able to go this fast through the forest exhilarated her. She leaped fences and raced through fields, neighborhoods, and parkland. By the time she arrived at the edge of the woods near the highway rest stop, it was just over an hour after she’d left Terrence’s land.

  She crouched in the brush amid the trees and scanned the area. There was no sign of trouble, but Terrence had warned her the Fae could mask their presence. Her HUD map showed only the highway and buildings around her, none of the telltale red dots she’d expect from sighting known enemies nearby. Quinn turned from searching the trees and looked at the cars in the parking lot. She didn’t see Clark’s, but the far side of the building and parking lot were hidden.

  Quinn started to circle around to check the other side but stopped when the faint crackle of a foot on dry leaves, coupled with the sudden chill of her Huntress amulet, warned her someone had come up behind her.

  Spinning, Quinn drew her Bowie. She almost turned in time. A body slammed into her, carrying her to the ground as a humming whir buzzed past her head.

  Quinn twisted and tried to stab at her assailant.

  “Quinn, stay down,” Clark hissed. “They have crossbows leveled at you.”

  Relaxing, she looked at the quivering bolt stuck in a tree trunk right where her head had been.

  “I’m good. Get off me.”

  Clark rolled to the side.

  Quinn pulled up her HUD map. The whole area around her was now blank. She lowered the display and asked, “How many are there?”

  “I saw two moving this way from the parking lot. That was when I figured you must be close.”

  “That bolt came from behind me, so there are at least four of them. Terrence said they travel in pairs.”

  “Who?” Clark asked. He waved his hand. “Never mind. We’re sitting ducks here. We need to move.”

  “At least they don’t have guns like the ones that attacked the cabin.”

  “Fae don’t like guns. They probably brought them to handle the dragon.”

  Quinn glanced around, trying to spot the trackers. “Let’s split up. You go right, and I’ll go left. Let’s see if we can turn the tables on them.”

  Clark nodded and rose to a crouch. As he started moving away, he blurred out and became lost in the shadows. Quinn nodded and whispered, “Mist,” dipping into the shadows herself. The trackers weren’t the only ones who could hide.

  Watching her step, Quinn brought up her HUD and engaged enhanced recon mode. A sixty-second clock started counting down. It should be enough time to get behind their assailants without being detected.

  She picked up her pace under cover of the spell, moving silently despite the dry leaves of the forest floor. Thirty seconds later, she stood by a tree staring at the backs of two black-clad Fae trackers.

  One held a crossbow leveled at the spot where she’d been hiding moments before. The other had a curved sword in his hand. Both wore dark masks to conceal their features and carried pistols holstered at their sides. They probably hadn’t used them here since they’d be heard by someone at the convenience store.

  Checking her timer, she had fifteen seconds left to cross the thirty yards between her and the two trackers—just enough time to put her hasty plan into motion.

  Pushing off from the tree, Quinn charged at the crossbow wielder. He was the closest of the pair.

  Even with her recon mode engaged, he must have sensed something because he spun and snapped off a shot that scored a burning graze across her neck.

  Ignoring the flash of pain, Quinn dove at the man as he swung the spent crossbow at her head. She ducked under the swing and lunged with her knife, taking him in the chest.

  Her Bowie sank in to the hilt as she rode him to the ground. The life already drained from the almond-shaped violet eyes behind the black leather mask. She pushed herself up and spun to meet the other attacker.

  Quinn got her bloody blade up just in time to parry the downward slash from the curved sword.

  The other masked tracker snarled and called out in a language Quinn didn’t know. She hoped Clark had dealt with his pair and that there weren’t others close by. There was no time to search in the middle of a desperate battle.

  Quinn jumped backward to avoid a follow-up blow. The guy was as fast as she was, even enhanced with her stamina boost. He also had the advantage of a longer reach, both in arm and weapon.

  Circling each other, Quinn tried several moves, but none of them scored a hit. Luckily, she fended off the incoming attacks.

  She risked a quick look around for Clark. A clash of steel on steel to her left meant the Hunter was still engaged, so she was on her own.

  Deciding to try something else, Quinn grinned at her attacker. “You should have brought more people. My guess is at least two of you are down, and my friend’s about to finish off the other one.”

  “I am more than enough to take you, Huntress. My mistress no longer needs you alive. Your death will serve her needs just as well. Then the youngling will be free to imprint upon another.”

  “Filippa needs to stop obsessing about that egg. It’s going to get her killed by the time I’m finished with her.”

  “You won’t be there to do anything about it.”

  There was something familiar about the Fae’s voice. She’d heard it before. Dodging an incoming lunge, she tried to remember who it was. She hadn’t met many Fae and had only listened to a few speak.

  Her thoughts distracted her enough that she missed seeing her assailant reverse his attack, switching it into a riposte. The tip of the sword caught her above the knee, cutting open her jeans.

  Cursing under her breath, Quinn staggered back, limping as she fended off a series of follow-up blows. The Fae laughed, which fueled her anger and drove her to fight harder.

  In a desperat
e move that Clark would have scolded her for had he seen it, Quinn let one of the slashing lunges come in by her feigned parry.

  The tip of the sword cut into her side, but she twisted away before it went too deep. The move gave her the opening she needed. She reversed her false parry to chop down at the exposed wrist holding the extended sword.

  The magically enhanced Bowie cut almost all the way through muscle and bone.

  The curved sword flew from the useless hand, and the Fae tracker cried out in pain.

  Quinn didn’t wait. She drove forward despite her pain and injuries, taking advantage of the unarmed attacker as he fumbled with his off-hand to pull the pistol free.

  She kicked out, using the attack to knock him further off-balance, and followed up with a punch at the leather-masked face. The blow knocked him to the ground.

  Quinn dropped on top of the struggling Fae, straddling his waist with her knees. She wanted to question him, but he’d managed to pull the pistol out and brought it around toward her head.

  With only a split-second to act, Quinn shoved her blade into the Fae’s chest, using all her might to twist it as it sank into his heart. He spasmed and lost his grip on the pistol. It fell to the ground beside him as he brought the hand over to grip at the hilt of Quinn’s knife jutting from his chest.

  She pulled the mask free and her eyes widened.

  It was Zephyr.

  “You weren’t sent by Filippa. Aurora’s behind this. Why? She’s my friend.”

  “If the youngling hatches,” Zephyr gasped between clenched teeth, “it only matters who imprints at that time. The dragon won’t bond with anyone else, ever. She has to kill you to free it to bond with her.”

  Aurora’s betrayal of what Quinn had assumed was a friendship irked her. She leaned into the hilt, twisting the blade again. Zephyr let out a gurgling gasp.

  Quinn brought her head close to the pointed ears as the life faded from his body. “I’ve killed you, and I’m going after your mistress next. You can wait for her in hell.”

  Zephyr’s lips moved as if saying something, but she never knew what. He died before answering her threat.

  Quinn jerked her Bowie free and staggered to her feet. She didn’t hear any more fighting in the woods around her. Hopefully, that was a good sign.

  “Clark, you out there?”

  He stepped out of the shadows and walked forward. He had a fresh wound on his cheek. “You all right?”

  Quinn pressed her elbow to the cut to her side to hide it from Clark. “I will be with some rest. I figured out who’s behind all this.” She nodded at the nearest body. “That’s Zephyr. He’s Aurora’s man. She’s got the egg. We need to retrieve it before it hatches.”

  “When’s that going to be?”

  Quinn shrugged. “I don’t know anything about birthing dragons. It could’ve already happened for all I know. As long as I’m alive, though, that dragon is connected to me. We need to get it back.”

  “Come on, then,” Clark replied. “The car’s over here, and I’ve got a few things in the trunk we can use to patch us up before we get on the road.”

  Quinn nodded and limped after him toward the convenience store parking lot. They had to get back to Baltimore before it was too late.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Quinn didn’t realize how tiring the last few days had been until she sat down in Clark’s car and started the long trip home. As she slept, her mind was filled with fitful dreams about the egg and an ominous sense of overwhelming dread.

  When Clark parked outside of O’Malley’s, she woke with a start, her hand reaching for her Bowie. The last thing she remembered from the dream was a massive yellow and black reptilian eye staring at her. She gasped and twisted her head, sure it was nearby. The vision seemed so real.

  “Easy, Quinn,” Clark soothed, putting a hand on her shoulder. “We’re home. You’re safe now.”

  “Something tells me we’re not. The dream I just had… I can’t remember all of it, but it left me thinking that something awful is coming. If we don’t manage to stop it, many people are going to die.”

  “What did you see?”

  “An eye,” Quinn replied. Clark raised an eyebrow and she continued, “A big eye with a vertical slit pupil like a reptile’s. Everything else from the dream is a blur.”

  “A big reptilian eye. Maybe a dragon’s eye?”

  Quinn shuddered at the thought as soon as Clark said it. “It was huge. It’s not the dragon from the egg since it was too large, but the egg is important. I remember that much.”

  Clark opened his door. “Let’s go inside. We can talk to the others about the dream, and everyone will want to see you. We all feared the worst when I couldn’t find you at Gil’s.”

  Quinn nodded, trying to put the disturbing dream out of her mind. She kept thinking there was something she was supposed to remember, but when she tried, more of what she recalled slipped away.

  She nearly fell down when Taylor plowed into her, wrapping her arms around her best friend.

  “Quinn, I swear, don’t ever do that again. If you have to go dark, warn me so we can set up a secret way to communicate.”

  Quinn hugged Taylor back. She’d missed all of them, especially Taylor. “I promise, T. All I can say is, I couldn’t call you first. I had no time and ran away in my underwear when the Fae trackers hit the cabin.

  Naomi stood behind Taylor. “Clark mentioned them when he told us you’d contacted him. We wondered if they might be behind the thefts we had here, too.”

  Quinn nodded. “They were. I discovered that much before the last one died. At first, I thought it was Filippa, but it turned out to be Princess Aurora behind the attacks.”

  “That is a surprise,” Miranda remarked. “She’s always been so friendly.”

  “I think she had to. After all, I had her dragon egg. Once it became clear the dragon was preparing to hatch, she couldn’t wait for the year to end. She had to get rid of me so the egg could bond with someone else.”

  “If the egg’s hatching, it’s the first in over two hundred years,” Naomi said. “I’ll have Joshua check the clan records we left with him, but I think that’s right. It also is believed to portend ominous events.”

  “Are we surprised?” Quinn asked. “Ominous things on the horizon is what we’ve been dealing with for months.”

  She laughed as she said it, feeling more nervous about what was to come than anything. It was her way of dealing with all the stuff she’d been through. Quinn pointed to an open round table amid the other patrons in the pub. She needed food; she’d had nothing since eating breakfast at Terrence’s that morning.

  The group sat down, and Quinn waved to catch Juni’s attention.

  The waitress nodded to let Quinn know she’d seen her, finished taking another order, and came right over. “Good of you to decide to come back to the land of the living.”

  “It wasn’t all that bad,” Quinn told her. “I did work up an appetite, though. Is the kitchen still serving dinner or just late-night bar snacks?”

  “What did you have in mind? I’ll see if the cooks can do something extra.”

  “A pizza-burger platter with extra fries.”

  Juni laughed. “Oh, that’s easy. I’ll get them right on it.”

  After she left, Clark said, “With Aurora behind the break-ins and the attack on Quinn, we have to be extra careful how we deal with things.”

  “Why?” Quinn asked. “It’s not like she was all that careful with me. She sent assassins after me and burned down a friend’s house in the process. I want to get some payback.”

  “What Clark means,” Naomi said, “is that Aurora is highly placed, and not just in the supernatural leadership of the city. She is connected with the human leaders here, too. She will be well protected, especially when she discovers you’re back in town.”

  “I guess that means going over there and storming through the front door isn’t an option.”

  Naomi shook her head. “Not if you
want to come out alive. She’s made it plain, based on what you’ve said, that she’s out for blood. In fact, she needs it at this point.”

  Quinn’s hunger and exhaustion were getting the better of her, and she didn’t see where her mother was going with this. “Okay, the front door is out. What do you propose?”

  “Let me check around,” Naomi said. “I seem to remember there’s an event coming up for the city. It might be one of those things she’d have to put in an appearance at with some of her followers. That could be our opportunity to go to her home and get the egg back.”

  Quinn asked, “Why did she go to all that trouble to get the spear, too?”

  Miranda said, “My guess is the two are now connected in some way, or Aurora has some other use for it. The spear is a powerful artifact in and of itself.”

  “Great.” Quinn let out an exasperated sigh. “I went away to learn about wild magic, and we’re back at square one again.”

  When no one answered her, she looked up.

  Taylor had frozen in her seat beside Quinn. She gripped the Huntress’ arm and pointed at the club’s entrance.

  Quinn followed the pointing finger.

  Filippa and Aurora stood inside the door.

  Clark picked up on her stare and turned to see who it was. Quinn tried to get up, but Clark grabbed at her shoulder and pushed her back into the seat. “This is neutral ground, Quinn. Start a fight in here, and Paddy would have to kick us out of our arrangement.”

  “They broke in and stole from us,” Quinn said. “How is that neutral ground?”

  Clark shook his head. “We can’t prove it was them, and burglary is different from violence to a person.”

  “That’s a distinction I’d like a legal opinion on,” Quinn said. “It seems a little nit-picky to me.”

  “Nit-picky is what the law is all about,” Naomi pointed out. “Plus, the supernatural courts are run by the Fae, so you’d be fighting an uphill battle.”

  Taylor laughed. “Of course the court is run by them, just like they run everything else.”

  Taylor stopped talking as Filippa and Aurora came over to their table.