Lost Vegas Series

by Lizzy Ford

  “Burn me!” Marshall’s exclamation snapped Arthur out of his confusion. “How big was the bear that did this?”

  “It was not a bear,” Arthur replied. He dug his heels into the horse’s belly to keep it from shying and rode past the gruesome sight.

  “What do you mean not a bear?” Marshall demanded. “A mountain lion the size of a gorilla?”

  Arthur did not care to explain what it was, or how he knew, to anyone, least of all Marshall, who trailed him like a lost puppy. The path through the forest was winding, narrow and overhung with branches. On the way towards the plains, he had the time to maneuver around obstacles. With urgency fueling his actions, Arthur only grew frustrated when smacked by a snow-laden branch or forced to move around a small pond he had barely noticed two hours before.

  His doubt a skinwalker – as scary as it was – was any match for a small army began to fizzle when he ran across the next line of scouts. This layer of defense contained five men – all brutally mauled and discarded without any of them appearing to have drawn a single weapon.

  Arthur did not stop. Before he reached the final layer of defense, he glimpsed the campfires through the trees. He glanced at the bodies making up the third layer of security around the camp but hurried onward, his eyes trained to his destination. No sounds of fighting came, and no alarms were raised.

  His heart skipped a beat then began to race even faster as he thought about Warner.

  When Arthur broke through the forest into the meadow where the majority of his men were camped, he halted the horse and stared.

  No one stirred. Mauled bodies littered the entire area while campfires continued to burn brightly. The horses were safe in the makeshift corrals at one end of the clearing, and the tents still stood where they had been erected.

  Arthur dismounted, once more caught in a surreal state, this one brought on by shock. He walked through the dead, unable to comprehend how one skinwalker had done all this, and how a meadow of trained soldiers were unable to stop the creature. At least these men had been warned; many of them were clutching weapons in death. Blood soaked into the snow, frosting the meadow in red sludge that clung to Arthur’s boots.

  His eyes fell to the tent near the center of the encampment that he shared with Warner. Barely able to breathe through his tight chest, Arthur walked towards it, his stomach twisting in anticipation of what he would find.

  “Ah, Sayed,” he murmured when he drew nearer. A trusted friend from youth, Sayed lay near Arthur’s tent, as if his friend had thought to come to his defense when the skinwalker attacked. “Ever the good soul.” He had been slashed through and lay with his weapons in hand.

  Arthur knelt and closed Sayed’s eyes, thanking him quietly as he did so. He owed the dead man one life debt and might have owed him two, had he been present for the attack. Arthur could not repay him, but would visit his family upon his return and offer up whatever service or payment he could.

  Dread and sorrow were heavy in his stomach. He rose and moved on, seeking the one face he was terrified of finding.

  No body lay outside his tent. Unlike the other tents, which had not been touched, the skinwalker had slashed through both sides of Arthur’s tent. Arthur peered into it. Warner’s weapons and overcoat were inside, though the man himself was not.

  Arthur knelt by the footprints beside his tent, trying to remain calm enough to make out what happened. Judging by the size of the paw prints, the skinwalker had taken the form of a great cat potentially larger than a horse. Warner’s boot prints were beside the skinwalker’s; he had challenged the creature, as Arthur knew he would.

  Blood was on the ground, though it was impossible for Arthur to guess whose it was. The paw prints turned into the bare footprints of a man staggering away for several steps before they transformed once more into those of a great cat.

  Warner had somehow managed to stun the creature no other man could stop. Proud, concerned, and distressed by the idea he would find Warner’s body nearby, Arthur trailed the paw prints towards the next tent, where the creature attacked other members of the Shield. He turned away and retreated to his tent and this time, followed Warner’s boot tracks. They went in the direction of the corral before becoming jumbled among the prints of others.

  What had happened next? Arthur closed his eyes and called upon his tracking skill to determine if Warner survived. He steadied his breathing, which had grown erratic, and focused on finding Warner.

  Without a token to convey the direction his target had gone, his tracking magic presented him with an image instead. Warner had continued onward to the corral and then beyond, moving southwest. Arthur’s ability could not tell him if Warner escaped on a horse, but it did tell him the skinwalker eventually left camp and headed southeast.

  Warner was alive, or had been, when he left camp, and the skinwalker had not seemed interested in following him, or he would have taken a different course.

  Arthur sighed, relieved. If any man could withstand a monster, it was Warner. Wiping his face, Arthur began walking again, searching for survivors among the dead. He circled the camp, checked the forest edging it, then returned to his horse.

  From what he could see, only his tent was attacked, and no horses or wagons or supply trunks were disturbed. Why, then, had the creature sought out the army? And why had it spared Arthur and Marshall after stalking them to the plains? Did it seek someone or something here? It did not seem possible for there to have been time for the creature to determine if who or what he sought was present. He had entered camp on a rampage, slaughtered everyone within minutes and left no survivors. Was this carnage indiscriminate?

  Marshall stood nearby, features pale and mouth agape, while Arthur wracked his thoughts for an explanation based on what little he knew of the mysterious skinwalker from his dream.

  He surveyed the decimated camp once more before taking his horse’s reins. The urgency had faded, though his emotions had not yet processed the savagery around him. He could not stop thinking about what came next, of Warner and Tiana in the hands of the skinwalker.

  “What kind of animal did this?” Marshall whispered, stricken.

  “The kind we dare not meet,” Arthur replied. He mounted his horse, eyes facing the direction Warner had gone. “Mount up.”

  Marshall faced him, astonished. “We cannot leave the bodies without a proper burial. Some of these men were almost our equals.”

  “If we wish to survive, then we need to move fast and not stop until we reach the friendly villages near the city or the city itself.”

  Marshall stared at him.

  “Ghouls, unfriendly natives and whatever did this stands between us and our destination. Do you really wish to alert any or all of them to our presence by remaining or burning a hundred bodies?” Arthur pressed. “We were both trained to lead. Think like a leader.”

  “You mean for me to think like a Hanover and leave our contemporaries to be eaten by animals and their belongings stolen by scavengers!”

  “Very well. Then think like a Cruise. What is the name of the last man to survive the wilderness alone?”

  Marshall flushed. “Charles Cruise.”

  Arthur waited for his rival to make a decision. Marshall was not stupid; once his emotional outburst passed, he would understand Arthur’s logic. In any other situation, Arthur would not care to wait for Marshall to decide or bother waiting for him at all. However, in the five hundred year history of Lost Vegas, only one man had escaped the dangers outside the city, and his group had started with fifty refugees. The odds of surviving were better, if Arthur had at least one companion.

  While his hands shook from suppressed emotion, he mentally forced himself to look to the future and his own life. His father would not have flinched at the sight of blood and death, let alone paused to wish his fallen friend farewell. Arthur was aware of this, just as he was aware there was no one to judge him, unlike every action he undertook in the city. Marshall was too preoccupied by the massacre, and any other witn
esses to Arthur’s failure to act in a manner similar to his father’s were dead.

  Aside from their lives being at risk, if he did not return to the city, his sister would be in danger from the same creature that destroyed his camp. He had already seen this in a vision.

  Arthur also had a secondary motive for leaving quickly, one he dared not share. Warner was out there somewhere in the forest, alone, and missing the gear he needed to protect him against the elements. If they rode fast, they might encounter him before he froze or worse, ran into one of the dangers standing between them and the safety of the city.

  Dazed, Marshall looked around the clearing, his gaze resting on the tent bearing the lion crest. He strode to it and crouched. Rooting through the pockets of a slain soldier, he pulled something from the body, studied it, and pocketed it.

  Arthur leaned over and grabbed the reins of Marshall’s horse. He nudged his gelding forward, after Marshall, pulling the second horse with him. If he looked too long at the dead, his sense of honor would compromise his plan. Marshall was right about the men deserving a proper pyre, but Arthur’s focus was on preventing the loss of more life rather than grieving those who were gone.

  Arthur kept his eyes trained on either Marshall or the corral to the southwest, tense and waiting for the sense of otherworldly danger to return.

  “Come, Marshall. You cannot help the dead now. They are better off where they are, as spirits in the sky.”

  Marshall stood and then rubbed his face hard, as if unable to wipe away the sight before him. “We need to warn those friendly to us and the city. A beast this large must be stopped before it hurts more people.”

  Arthur neither cared about others being hurt nor objected to Marshall’s reasoning. Traveling alone was a death sentence; if they were together, they stood a greater chance at making it home.

  Marshall mounted his horse. Arthur wheeled his towards the southwest and Warner and carefully made his way across the meadow, not wishing to cause further harm to the bodies of those he had known.

  Pausing at the corral, each of them harnessed two horses to take with them and then left the gate open, so the others could run free.

  Arthur darkened the torch as he moved into the forest. From the direction of the buffalo herds, he heard the familiar shrieks of the Ghouls. They were far enough not to concern him for the moment. But what happened tomorrow night? Or the night after? And if the Ghouls found Warner first?

  One day at a time, Arthur, he lectured himself. Above all, he had to maintain a clear head and judgment unimpeded by emotion, if he were to see the two people he loved most again.

  Chapter Ten

  Tiana did not speak to Aveline again until a full four and a half days after her meltdown. Time had never passed so sluggishly for Aveline or been filled with such a lack of activity, and she found herself eating constantly as a means of staying occupied.

  If the Hanover girl had it in her to be spiteful or vengeful, Aveline would have chalked up her silence to passive aggressive attempt to punish her for the mirror incident. But Tiana was neither of those, and Aveline heard her cry too often during the days of silence to assign malice to her actions.

  Tiana was devastated, and nothing Aveline said helped the distraught girl recover.

  Aveline downed the last bite of a berry filled pastry that had become her favorite since she discovered them in the kitchens. She grimaced, about to remark aloud how boredom would drive her into obesity or insanity by spring, when Tiana spoke at last.

  “I had a dream about you last night,” she murmured.

  Finally. Aveline looked down from the ceiling she had been staring at. Her back was to the wall beneath the window, which gave her the ability to see most of the room, except for the depths of the closet and bathroom. With her weapons cleaned, and her daily exercises finished, she had been trying to determine how to spend the unbearably long hours stretching between lunch and dinner.

  “A dream or one of your visions?” Aveline asked warily. She dared not mention the mirror incident for fear of driving Tiana to tears or back into her closet. She was anxious to move on from the unexpectedly horrible attempt to help Tiana feel more confident about herself.

  “Some dreams I know to be dreams, and some visions I am certain are of the future. But often, there is a vision or dream too disconnected from what I know of the world for me to determine which it is.” Tiana shrugged. Her eyes were on the veil she was embroidering. She had not smiled since the mirror incident, either, and had barely eaten. “I saw you but did not understand the circumstances.”

  “What happened?”

  “You were outside the city with two men I have never seen before. They were … are or will be … it can be confusing.” Tiana sighed. “Friends. They are your friends.”

  “What were we doing?” Aveline asked, intrigued.

  “You were agitated and worried. I think you were looking for me.”

  “You weren’t there?”

  “Your necklace was dark.”

  Aveline touched the timepiece dangling from her neck. Tiana’s was bright, given their proximity.

  “One of them was named Rocky,” Tiana added. “You never spoke the other’s name.”

  Aveline dropped the pendant, gazing at Tiana in uneasy surprise. Witnessing the furniture lifting off the floor at random times was less unnerving than Tiana’s even stranger ability to glimpse the future.

  Rocky’s alive. At least, in this version of Tiana’s vision. Aveline almost sighed at the revelation she did not end up causing her friend’s death. Unwilling to discuss Rocky, who was trapped in prison, pending Tiana’s murder, Aveline searched her mind for a series of events that would allow Rocky and Tiana both to live. When she came up with no such scenario, she focused again on Tiana. “What else?”

  “There was not much to it.”

  “What about details? Was it light or dark? Were we dressed for winter or spring?”

  Tiana paused in her sewing, pensive. “It was dark and cold but not winter. There was no snow on the ground but I could see your breath.”

  “Just three of us?”

  “That I saw, yes.”

  Aveline tapped her fingers against her kneecap absently, thoughtful.

  “I have seen this Rocky person before,” Tiana said. “If you know him, then perhaps the other dreams are real, too.”

  “What other dreams?”

  Tiana began embroidering once more. “I see him when he visits. He has come here daily for the past four days. Maybe he searches for you.”

  “It’s not possible!” Aveline said with more emotion than she intended.

  Tiana tensed.

  With effort, Aveline quieted her voice. “How can you know this?”

  “I know nothing with certainty. But if you know he exists, and I have never seen him before, then is it not possible he may be waiting for you where I see him?”

  “It would be sheer madness, if so.”

  “How are you so certain he has not come?” Tiana asked, perplexed. “How can you doubt his presence here and yet believe my ability to see fragments of the future?”

  For once, Tiana made absolute sense. Aveline snapped her mouth closed. Karl had told her Rocky was in prison, but what if her friend found a way to escape? What if Karl had negotiated his release early? Was it possible she worried about Rocky, when he was completely safe? She did not doubt, if he were released from prison, he would find her.

  “Where is he?” Aveline asked, standing.

  “In my dream, he waits by the southern entrance and stops every fourth slave who passes him. I cannot hear what he asks them, but each one of them shakes his or her head, and then moves on.”

  Before Tiana had finished speaking, Aveline was at the door. She left her ward secure in her room and raced through the Hanover’s apartment, barely able to contain her excitement.

  Ten minutes later, she reached the bottom floor of the great pyramid and hurried to the slave entrance she had never had a need to visi
t. When she reached it, she stopped just inside. The door was propped open, allowing the scents of the city and chill of winter to enter.

  Rocky was not there. She waited and paced, venturing out into the cloudy, cold day briefly to observe the immediate area, in case Rocky had chosen to wait outside.

  Disappointment sank into her. Rocky was nowhere in sight. Had Tiana’s dream been wrong? If so, how could she know about him at all?

  “Aveline.”

  She turned at the familiar voice. Jose, the assistant to the madman with the electric trees, stood nearby in his cloak, as if he were leaving for the city. His warm eyes and wide smile mesmerized her before she had a chance to blink.

  “I meant to visit,” she blurted out before she could stop herself. “But … duties.”

  “I rarely leave. When you wish it, you are welcome to visit,” he replied.

  Why did his gentle response leave her cheeks warm? Aveline tore her gaze away from him, not liking how abruptly unaware of her surroundings she became when she saw him. With him standing before her, she could see, hear and smell only him. If an army of Shield soldiers approached, she would not notice them until after they had subdued her.

  “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “My master has had one of his coughing fits. I go to fetch herbal tea to help him,” Jose replied.

  “They have tea in the kitchens.”

  “He insists upon a tea a single merchant in the entire city sells,” Jose said.

  A smile slid free as Aveline recalled the eccentric man in the basement. Mohammed was better off with Jose than with her as an assistant. She would be nowhere near as patient with the madman as Jose appeared to be.

  “You are waiting for someone?” he asked, glancing past her.