“Kralen,” she whispered, and put a hand on his arm.
“I see it,” he told her.
“What do you want me for?” Emily asked the man.
“We’re bounty hunters. Seems you’re wanted for kidnapping.”
“The Encala,” Kralen whispered.
Emily nodded.
“We have no business with you,” the man said to Kralen. “So just back off and let us have the little gal.”
“No,” Kralen told him. “You’ll have to come through me to get to her.”
“How many are there?” Emily asked, glancing behind her.
“Fifty”
“How many can you take?”
“Maybe all of them. Depends on how well they fight.”
“The Taser then?”
Kralen sighed, “Except for that.”
“Hand her over and no one has to fight,” the man said.
Kralen growled and blurred forward before Emily could stop him. She turned when she heard footsteps behind her and drew the gun, “Get back.”
“You can’t shoot us all,” a woman said from behind her. The woman grinned and took another step forward.
“I can take some of you out,” Emily said, and pointed the gun at the tall, blonde woman.
“For the price on your head, it’d be worth it.”
Emily screamed when she felt arms wrap around her. She struggled to get free as she heard the bloody screams of Kralen’s victims.
“Let me go!” Emily yelled.
“No way, Sweetheart,” the man holding her said.
Emily pulled the trigger on her gun and shot him in the foot. He screamed and fell backwards away from her. She took aim and was able to shoot three of the approaching men before her gun jammed. Spinning quickly, she ran back towards Kralen, but stopped when she saw no one along the trees that once held most of the mortals.
“Kralen!?” Emily yelled, and turned to face the eight mortals left.
“You don’t have a gun anymore. Might as well come with us,” a woman said, grinning.
***
Chevalier slowed down in the Humvee and looked across the Interstate, “See that?”
“Yes,” Kyle said, spying the broken down fence.
He drove through the Interstate’s median, followed by Silas and Mark in Kralen’s Ford F450. They took off over the broken fence, following the massive muddy tire tracks that all headed in the same direction.
“This has to be them. This is right where Kralen said they were,” Kyle said, carefully scanning the trees.
“There,” Chevalier said when he saw Emily’s Jeep surrounded by dune buggies.
“Damnit,” Kyle hissed, and then got out. He looked around the trees, and then yelled for her.
Silas stopped the Ford and got out of it, followed by Mark. Mark walked over to a group of bodies and knelt down, “These are mortals. They’ve been shot mostly. This one has a broken nose.”
“Not these mortals up here,” Silas said from just south of them. “These are heku kills.”
“Elder?” Kyle said, and handed him some papers from one of the dune buggies. He had Emily’s shoes dangling from one hand, “They are bounty hunters. The Encala put out a price on Em’s head.”
Chevalier growled and crumpled up the papers offering $2.5 million for Emily caught alive.
“Maybe they got her,” Kyle whispered.
Chevalier shook his head and scanned the trees, “No, she’s afraid, but not captured… More a frantic panic kind of afraid.”
“So she’s out here in the forest.”
Chevalier nodded.
Mark yelled from almost a quarter of a mile into the trees, “Elder!”
Chevalier, Silas, and Kyle blurred to Mark and saw Kralen unconscious at his feet.
“Is he alive?” Kyle asked, and knelt down.
“Yes, he was electrified,” Mark said, and motioned to a gas generator.
“Stay with him,” Chevalier said as he and Kyle blurred back to the Jeep and began to follow Emily’s trail deep into the forest.
Kyle opened his phone and sighed, “No signal up here.”
“Go back to the road. Call in the Ratliff and Kimber Covens to come help,” Chevalier ordered, and kept following Emily’s trail.
Kyle nodded and headed back for the Interstate.
***
Emily slowly made her way up the face of the small cliff, using her fingers and toes to grasp the nearly flat surface. Her gun was tucked into the back of her pants and she was frantically moving further away from where the mortals attacked. Now she was afraid of the police, too. She’d killed numerous of them to get away, and figured the Encala wouldn’t be far behind them.
She finally managed to pull herself up onto the top of the cliff and rested for only a few moments before continuing deeper into the trees. Her feet were bloody and painful as she ran through the dense forest.
In a small clearing, she glanced around quickly and pulled out her cell phone, then sighed when she saw it had no signal. Looking around, she got her bearings and again headed south. She knew the Encala were after her, and she also knew they would bring enough that she couldn’t ash them all without risking falling unconscious.
***
“They’ll be here within the hour,” Kyle said when he caught up with Chevalier. He looked around when he caught not only Emily’s scent, but the scent of fresh Winchester blood on the forest floor, “She’s hurt.”
Chevalier nodded and touched a blade of grass. He brought his hand up and looked at the blood on his fingers, “Not bad, I think… but still bleeding.”
“It’ll be dark soon,” Kyle said, looking up at the sky.
“I can smell rain, too,” Chevalier said, and walked up to the face of a cliff. He looked up the sheer rocks, “She climbed this.”
They both turned when they heard footsteps and saw Silas, Mark, and Kralen coming up behind them.
“What happened?” Chevalier asked. It was obvious that Kralen was upset with himself.
“The Ferraris began to box us in, so she put it into 4-wheel drive and took it off-road. They had dune buggies full of mortals waiting though, and we were trapped,” Kralen explained. “I headed off to fight the larger of them, and was hit with 17 Tasers. All I remember was the sound of gunshots.”
Mark sighed, “That’s all he knows. They must have taken him away from her before hooking him up to the generator.”
“Elder…” Kralen started.
“It’s not your fault,” Chevalier told him. “Just help us find her, she’s hurt.”
Mark looked up the sheer face of the cliff and touched a bloody footprint on the rocks above his head, “It’s her feet. She’s not wearing shoes. I’m going to start gluing shoes on that girl.”
Silas didn’t hesitate before starting up the cliff carefully, followed by the others. They easily maneuvered up the rocks to the top and looked around.
“Emily!” Kyle yelled, and waited to hear anything.
“How far of a head start does she have?” Mark asked.
“I’d say three hours,” Kralen told him, and looked around. “Here’s her scent.”
The heku headed off, following her scent to the south.
***
Emily finally sat down to rest. Her feet were slowing her down and it was starting to get dark. Rain began to fall and the cold drops almost instantly soaked her clothes. She looked around as she wrapped her arms around herself to keep warm.
Deciding she’d rested enough, she stood up and limped off toward the east. After an hour of moving, she smelled the familiar scent of decay and covered her nose, then followed the smell to a bloated Elk lying at the bottom of a ravine.
“Damnit, this is gross,” Emily said, and kicked the belly of the elk, which broke open, sending rotten entrails out along the forest floor. She cringed and reached her hand into the decaying Elk and brought out a handful of gelatinous, smelly slime.
***
“Gah, something’s dea
d,” Kyle said, and covered his nose.
“Kimber move off to the west, Ratliff to the east, and we’ll keep heading south,” Chevalier told the large group of gathered heku. “Make sure you keep your capes visible. If she doesn’t see green, she may turn you to ash.”
“Let’s go,” the General from the Kimber Coven ordered, and his group of 45 heku headed off to the west.
“Elder?” the General from Ratliff said.
Chevalier looked over at him.
“Come see this. It’s kind of odd,” he said.
The Council City heku followed him over to the dead, decaying Elk.
“What’s so weird about that?” Dustin asked, looking down at the entrails. Dustin had brought the rest of the Cavalry out to help scour the mountains for Emily.
“This isn’t a natural break,” the General said. “I’m guessing his stomach was forced open and look, there’s a handprint of his blood on this tree.”
Chevalier walked over and looked at the little handprint. He smelled it, and then held his hand up beside it, “She’s masking her scent.”
Mark sighed, “Great.”
Kyle looked around the clearing, “Silas, go tell the Kimber Coven that she’s masking.”
Silas nodded and blurred away.
“So she’s headed east,” Dustin said, and looked into the trees.
“Not necessarily. Emily’s very resourceful, and has a lot of survival skills. I don’t think she’d keep a steady path in any direction,” Kyle told him.
“Ratliffs out!” the General said, and the 31 heku from the Ratliff Coven began trekking east through the trees.
Dustin turned quickly when they heard a wolf howl to the south of them, “Damnit.”
Kyle sighed, “I’ll take Silas and Kralen to take care of those wolves. She smells like rotten flesh. They are going to find her before we do.”
“Go,” Chevalier growled.
Dustin watched them go and then started moving to the south, followed by the rest from Council City.
***
Emily looked up at a crooked pine tree. She grabbed a hold of one of the branches and lifted herself up high into the tree. It was too dark, and she wasn’t able to see the ground anymore. It was still raining and this tree had a thick top, so she decided to climb up to get some rest, away from cold rain and sleet.
Once she was up high up and found a comfortable branch to sit on, she took out her gun and dropped the four spent bullets onto the forest floor below her. She grabbed more rounds from her pocket and reloaded it. After finding a little branch covered in pine needles, she started to clear out the barrel, to see if she could find out why it jammed.
Voices caught her attention and her heart pounded in her chest. She strained to see below her, and finally caught sight of four dark silhouettes moving quickly toward her. She knew they were heku. No mortal could move that fast, especially in the dark. She drew her knees up closer and prayed silently that the branches would keep her out of view.
“Here,” a gruff voice said, and she saw one of the heku bend down to pick up the bullet casings. He looked back at the others, “We’re on the right track. You’re right, she’s masking her scent with a dead animal.”
“She shouldn’t be that hard to track then.” Emily’s eyes grew wide when she recognized William’s voice.
“The others are on her trail too,” a heku woman said from beside them.
“I hear them, they aren’t moving any faster than we are though. There are too many scents out here to track her easily,” William said. Emily sat back against the tree, afraid if she could see them, that they would be able to see her if they looked up.
“Damn wolves are on her trail,” the woman said when a howl sounded from the distance.
“That could be those bloody Powans though,” another strange heku growled, and walked up with the other Encala.
“Damnit, where did she go?” William hissed.
“Split up, let’s see if we can find that dead animal scent again,” the man said, and Emily could hear footsteps as they left the area.
She finally allowed herself to breathe normally and peered over the branch toward the ground. One Encala was left behind, the one holding the bullet casings. Emily waited a few minutes, so the Encala could move further away, and then she turned the heku below her to ash and quickly scrambled down out of the protection of the tree.
Feeling around the base of the tree for moss, she found north and took off quietly toward the south west.
***
“Chevalier!” Kyle gasped. “There are ashes over here.”
Chevalier blurred to his side followed by Dustin, Mark, and Silas. Kralen was still following one of the wolves to see if the indigenous predators could find her. The Elder stopped and bent down by the ashes. He picked up the four bullet casings and slipped them into his pocket, then touched the ash and brought some to his nose.
“The Encala are out here looking for her,” Chevalier growled.
Kyle nodded, “I’m picking up a trace of them off to the south.”
“And the east,” Mark added.
“West too,” Silas said, and joined them by the tree.
“So they split up to find her,” Chevalier said, and looked up into the tree. He reached up and grabbed a high branch, easily pulling himself up into the dense pine tree, “She’s been up here.”
“She’s probably trying to find a safe place to rest and get out of this rain,” Dustin said, and looked around. “Maybe we should call in Powan.”
“Do it. Now that the Encala are out here, it changes everything,” Chevalier told him, and looked around the small clearing.
Dustin blurred away to make the call.
***
Emily moved slowly, inching tree to tree, and checking carefully around her with each move to make sure she wasn’t walking into the Encala. The rain had stopped, but a cold wind blew in from the north and she shivered in her wet clothing. She could see her breath in the dark night, and concentrated so she could hear everything going on around her.
A dark mass came into view and she checked around and then headed for it. She smiled some when she saw the wide opening to a cave hidden behind thick aspen and pine trees. She got onto her stomach and squirmed under the branches to get inside and was finally able to sit down and relax a little.
Emily pulled her arms into her wet t-shirt to try to warm up some, and leaned back against the cold cave wall. Her eyes slowly adjusted and she could see that the cave went further back into the mountain and she could hear the sound of rushing water from deeper inside. She jumped when she heard the howl of wolves and began to wonder if Powan was with her on the mountain.
***
Mark and Silas blurred quickly through the dark trees, following a heku they spotted that was running from them. Silas was a little faster than Mark, and slowly began to catch up to the red clad heku. Their movements were silent, and not even the animals noticed their passing. The Encala wove a strange pattern though the trees as he tried to lose the Equites.
For over an hour they chased him, gaining slowly as their rage fueled them. Just outside of a clearing that led to a large lake, Silas finally managed to tackle the Encala and they immediately blurred into a vicious fight. Mark joined in quickly and the two Equites were easily able to subdue the Encala and pin him to the ground.
“Where is she?” Silas growled.
The Encala glared up at him, “You’re not going to get her. She has our Elder.”
Mark’s grip tightened on his neck, “Tell us.”
The Encala shook his head, unable to speak.
Silas looked toward the lake, “They don’t have her.”
“I figured,” Mark said, and broke the Encala’s neck. He stood up and sighed, “We’re too far off. She couldn’t make it this far.”
“What do we do with him?”
Mark looked down at the Encala as he healed, “Kill him.”
Silas nodded and tore the Encala’s head from his
body, and then tossed both the head and the body into the lake.
“Let’s split up and head back,” Mark told him. “You take northeast and I’ll go more toward the west.”
“On it,” Silas said, and disappeared from the clearing.
***
Emily jerked awake when she heard footsteps outside of the cave. She was shivering violently and her teeth chattered as she reached for her gun and peeked out under the trees. She saw the paws of wolves and breathed a sigh of relief. Sliding out of the cave, she stood quickly and watched the wolves move closer to her.
“The Encala are out here, too,” Emily told them.
One of the wolves lowered his body to the ground and began to growl deeply, his sharp teeth showing in the moonlight.
Emily gasped and took a step back as the wolf pack slowly came towards her.
“That’s not a Powan,” she heard from behind her. She glanced briefly and saw a strange heku off in the trees behind her. The moonlight was bright enough that his red cape stood out against the green trees.
Emily raised her gun into the air and shot once, sending the wolves running off into the trees. When they were gone, she turned toward the heku.
He grinned, “Before you even consider turning me to ash… think about how much longer your weak human body can take this cold. You’re freezing to death. I can smell it.”
Emily’s eyes narrowed, “I’d rather freeze to death than return your Elder.”
He took a step towards her, “I can warm you up, Baby Girl.”
Emily sighed, “What’s up with that crap anyway? I’m about as tired of getting hit on as I am of getting smacked around.”
“You’d love it.”
Eternity of Vengeance (Extended Edition) : Book 7 of the Heku Series Page 12