Shadow Hunt

by Melissa F. Olson

  Jesse choked out a laugh. Shadow had just taken over a pack of bargests.

  But there were two still missing. He looked around. The gunfire had ended, and the Los Angeles group within Scarlett’s radius were now fighting hand to hand with the members of the Wild Hunt, led by Kirsten and Hayne. At first it’d been chaotic, but now they were clearly focused on a single objective: getting the Luparii off their hellhest. Eight of the riders were already down, and five of those were clearly dead on the concrete riverbed, with little streams of black-looking blood trickling toward the tiny channel of sluggish water. The remaining three witches on the ground had abandoned their guns and were fighting with swords and fists.

  Jesse saw that a half-dozen of Kirsten’s witches were focused on the riderless hellhest, who seemed disoriented and confused. Several of them were reacting violently, but a few of the witches must have been horse lovers, because Jesse saw a couple of women standing in front of one of the beasts with her hands up, talking in soothing tones.

  Finally, he spotted the last two bargests. They were creeping around the sides of the channel, headed for Will, who was shouting orders to some of the werewolves prowling the edge of the riverbed. His back was turned to the bargests.

  “Will!” Jesse yelled, and the werewolf alpha turned around just in time to see the nearer bargest leap for his throat.

  Then there was a flash, an agonized noise from the bargest, and the creature backed away from Will with its tail tucked between its legs. The other bargest tried to pounce, but Will extended what looked like a short metal pole, about two feet long.

  A cattle prod?

  Jesse stared, his mouth open, and Will shot him a grin. “I’ve had to get creative over the years,” he shouted, shocking the first bargest who’d attacked as it came in for another round. Will backed up until his shoulders hit the side of the bridge support, and he was able to fend off the two bargests without much trouble. Eventually the cattle prod would run out of power, though.

  The other four bargests streaked down the channel to his aid. Shadow looked completely in her element: confident and sure and in control. Jesse wished Scarlett could see it.

  He crouched down again to check on her. Her eyes had closed, but he could see her breathing. “Scar?”

  When she didn’t move, he turned on his phone flashlight and gently used his thumb to raise one eyelid. “Shit!”

  Her eye was bloody.

  Jesse had actually seen this before. Years earlier, Noah had gotten a concussion doing stunt work, and ended up having a subconjunctival hemorrhage, meaning the little blood vessels in his eye had burst, and blood became trapped between the eye’s clear cover and the eye itself. Jesse had seen a couple of cops end up with the same thing: once after a boxing match and once after taking a punch from a suspect.

  But Scarlett hadn’t been in the fight, and he was pretty sure she hadn’t hit her head.

  He checked the other eye—that one was clear. “Scarlett?” He bent closer to her. “Scarlett, honey, wake up. Talk to me.”

  Her lips moved, and he put his ear next to her mouth to hear. “Not sleeping. Trying . . . to hold them.”

  Jesse looked up. The fight was still raging, although nearly all the Wild Hunt riders had been pulled off the hellhest. That was something, anyway.

  But Scarlett was scaring him. Jesse reached into her pants pocket and took out her phone, a new one she’d collected at Dashiell’s mansion. He was relieved to find that Abby had found the time to transfer all her contacts. He scrolled through and found Sashi’s phone number.

  It took a few rings for a sleepy voice to come on the line. “Scarlett?” Then: “What’s happening? It’s so loud.”

  “It’s Jesse Cruz,” he shouted, plugging his other ear. “Something’s happening to Scarlett.” As quickly as he could, he described the Wild Hunt and the burst blood vessels in Scarlett’s eye.

  “She’s hypertensive,” Sashi said immediately. “Her blood pressure’s rising. Tell her she needs to calm down and relax.”

  Jesse rolled his eyes. “She can’t do that! If the riders turn spectral, they can’t be killed.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you!” Sashi sounded upset. “She’s too stressed. If she keeps it up, she’ll lose the baby. And she could die.”

  “Shit. Call you back.” Jesse hung up the phone and looked around for Shadow. If he couldn’t get Scarlett to stop pushing, Jesse would have to find a way to reduce the pressure.

  Several of the lanterns had gotten kicked over, and he couldn’t find her in the chaos. He brought two fingers to his lips and whistled hard. “Shadow!” he hollered. Maybe ten seconds went by before she appeared at his side—with a line of panting bargests behind her like a dogsled team from hell. She’d converted all five.

  “Scarlett’s in trouble,” he told her. “I have to help with the fight, okay? Can you watch her?”

  Shadow turned her head around, some sort of unspoken communication passing between her and the other bargests. Instantly, they all hurried to form a circle around Scarlett, facing outward. There was some part of Jesse that longed to take a picture to show her later.

  Instead, he got to his feet and ran down the channel, pulling out his Glock. From what he could see as he waded into the chaos, the Los Angeles side appeared to be winning, but very slowly. Three Luparii witches, including Petra fucking Corbett, had come to Aldric’s aide, and were fighting Dashiell, who—holy shit, Dashiell could fight?! He was currently human, but he whirled and spun around the Luparii’s sword strikes, knocking Petra down with an open-handed punch to the throat, kicking another calmly in the knee. The third, male witch was hanging back, looking for an opening so he could catch Dashiell off guard, and Jesse recognized the guy who had first shot Scarlett. He raised his own Glock and fired a round at the man’s head.

  The Luparii member crumpled to the concrete channel, and Dashiell looked up, surprised. He nodded his thank-you and turned back to Petra, deflecting an overhead strike with some sort of flashing blade. He wasn’t using a gun—he’d been paranoid about hitting his own people in the fray. Dashiell didn’t exactly spend a lot of time at the range in human form.

  But Jesse did. He looked for other openings in the chaos, and realized that all the witches still on their hellhest were easy marks. No chance of accidentally hitting the LA people. He put down three of them before one of the Luparii members figured out who was shooting and came for Jesse.

  Jesse started to line up the Glock—but he hadn’t heard the Luparii witch coming up behind him. She kicked the weapon out of his hand with her thick work boot and danced away, her hands up like a boxer. Jesse started to reach for the Beretta in his other holster, but she darted in first, landing a quick jab to his solar plexus before he could move away. Even as a human, she was fast as hell. She ducked his next swing—aimed at her head—and danced sideways. He got his elbow up to block her next punch, but it had been a trick. She’d wanted to get close enough to grab the Beretta out of his holster. Jesse fumbled to take it back, but she was quicker—and her movement had put her between him and Scarlett. With a gun. The woman smiled viciously and lifted the handgun, pointing it at his head. Jesse braced himself.

  And then the most bewildered look came over the witch’s face. She dropped the gun, and sort of half-heartedly tried to reach over one shoulder. Instead, she flinched again and dropped to her knees, finally falling forward.

  Only then did Jesse see the three throwing knives sticking out of her back. And just beyond, Scarlett, standing and swaying in the middle of a circle of bargests. Blood was trickling out of her nose. She gave him a woozy smile and crumpled.

  Chapter 46

  Despite the pressure in my radius, I managed to struggle to my feet long enough to stop Jesse from being shot by a mean-looking female Luparii. I made a mental note to tease him about letting someone steal his gun . . . then I was falling back down, and I figured I probably wouldn’t remember it.

  I managed to sort of catch myself o
n my hands and knees, rather than face-plant. I was dimly aware that there were other bargests near me, but they weren’t even looking at me, and I figured if Shadow was cool, I was cool. At some point my undershirt must have torn, because the Kevlar vest felt itchy and constraining. I wanted so badly to unstrap it that it was probably good I needed my hands to support myself. I lowered my butt to the ground.

  I looked around as best I could, with a huge part of my mind focused on my radius. The fight was starting to wind down, but it wasn’t over. The Luparii witches on their hellhest kept coming to Aldric’s defense, and any number of our people had fallen near his hellhest’s feet and been dragged to safety by the others. Two of the vampires were running around with honest-to-goodness squirt guns, trying to shoot tranquilizers into the hellhest’s mouths.

  The squirt guns had been Jesse’s idea, and it seemed to be working: four hellhest were down, and I could see one actually swaying.

  Some of the Luparii witches must have tried to run, because there were three naked people trading punches with Luparii witches on the ground. I figured the werewolves had leapt at the riders trying to escape my radius, turning human as they did. I hadn’t even felt the change. It had probably been pretty awesome-looking.

  I noticed with grim satisfaction that Petra Corbett was lying on the ground, unmoving. I couldn’t tell from a distance, but I was pretty sure she was dead. I didn’t even care how it had happened. Dashiell, meanwhile, had stopped fighting Aldric long enough to help Hayne, who was holding on to the reins of one of the hellhest as it gnashed its teeth at Kirsten. The creature finally settled down, and Dashiell immediately turned back toward Aldric, who was snarling and kicking at his hellhest, trying to head under the bridge and escape in the other direction. I watched Will step into his path and then—

  “Scarlett?” Jesse had dropped down by my side, his guns back in their holsters. Why did he sound so worried? “You’re bleeding, sweetheart.”

  I looked down at myself, confused. I hadn’t been shot—well, not anywhere the vest didn’t protect me. Then a couple of bright red drops hit my shirt, and I realized they came from my nose.

  “I called Sashi, she said it’s high blood pressure—if you don’t calm down, you could lose the baby,” he said.

  I felt the pressure on my radius ease up some more, but I wasn’t sure how much longer I could hold it anyway. That was too much to say out loud at the moment, though, so I held up a finger to Jesse and took stock of my radius. The bargests and hellhest were still buzzing at me, but only four of the Furious Host remained.

  I zeroed in on Aldric. Will had done something to cause Aldric’s hellhest to rear up, and I watched Aldric slide off the hellhest’s back, landing on his feet with a nimbleness that seemed strange for a man his age. Then he pulled and brandished the sword, Durendal, and I suspected it was helping him somehow, or maybe protecting him.

  No, not the sword. There was something else on Aldric’s person. The thing I’d sensed earlier.

  The scroll.

  I looked at Jesse, who bent close to hear me. “Aldric has the scroll on him,” I whispered. “It didn’t short out, but I think I could destroy it.”

  He nodded and stood up, running toward Aldric. I looked at Shadow. “Help him?”

  She looked from me to the other bargests surrounding me, and I could see her decide she needed to stay and keep them in line, just in case their loyalty to her wasn’t absolute. Shit.

  Jesse pulled one of his guns and aimed it at Aldric, but the shot hit him in the back of the Kevlar. Aldric snarled and swung around to face Jesse, which left Will an opening to jump on his back, choking him. Aldric roared and swung the sword up, but I could practically see him decide not to swing it—he would risk burying the magic blade in his own shoulder. While he was distracted, Jesse tried to shoot him in the head, and when Aldric ducked the blow, Jesse shot him in the leg instead. It collapsed, causing the Luparii leader to go down in a tumble, with Will still clinging to his back. Jesse had been smart enough to stop a good fifteen feet from them, where Aldric couldn’t swing the sword, but that meant he couldn’t get in another shot without possibly hitting Will. I stood up and staggered closer to them, pulling a knife out of my belt.

  Even on the ground, Aldric would not let go of the sword. He rolled sideways and swung it at Will, who instinctively put up his left hand to protect his head—and the blade sliced clean through his forearm, just below the elbow. Will’s hand dropped with a meaty sound. He cried out in pain and felt back on his butt, cradling the stump.

  “No!” I bellowed. Suddenly, the pressure of keeping everyone in my radius seemed to lift, as my range exploded outward with my emotions. Kirsten’s humans-go-away spells began popping all around us, and a bunch of werewolves turned human again. I didn’t even notice. I was trying to crawl toward Will.

  Jesse turned to look at me when I yelled, and behind him I saw Aldric’s face light up with an idea. He might be losing this battle, but he could at least take out Will—and possibly run away in the chaos.

  “You. Will. Not,” I screamed, and without any thought at all, I raised my right arm and pointed the flat palm at Aldric.

  I was already really in tune with my radius, and I immediately felt the buzz of his magic—not just the Luparii witch powers, but the concentrated magic of the Furious Host that was currently possessing him. Fairy magic, quite possibly. I studied that magic for one heartbeat, because it was big and scary and nothing I’d ever played with before, and then I pulled on it. I called it toward me.

  This was more or less what I’d done each of the times I’d “cured” someone of being a vampire or werewolf. Usually I called it into me and then let it dissolve away, like sand through my fingers, but this time the magic was too strong, too big. I wrestled with it for a moment, trying to let go of it, but it was like letting go of something you’d accidentally superglued to your hands. I couldn’t stop feeling, tasting, the Wild Hunt magic, and it was twisted and wrong, an intricate structure built on the corpses of sacrifices. But I couldn’t let go.

  My body started to shake, and I vomited green-tasting . . . something.

  Then there was a tearing, and everything went still. The last thing I saw was Jesse standing over me, holding two pieces of torn parchment paper.

  Chapter 47

  “Shh! I think she’s waking up.”

  “Scarlett? Sweetheart?”

  I felt feverish, but a cool hand smoothed sticky hair off my forehead. I caught a smell of Armani cologne and oranges and felt myself smiling. Jesse.

  My eyes opened, and I processed the most immediate and obvious new information: hospital room. I was in a fairly plush private room—someone had obviously pulled strings—with Jesse in a chair on one side of the bed, holding my right hand. There was an IV in the other one. Sashi stood on the left side. She looked exhausted, her hair mussed, her clothes wrinkled. The first time I’d cured someone of magic, I’d lost my powers for a few weeks, but to my surprise, I could feel Sashi in my radius.

  Holy shit. I was getting stronger.

  Although it really didn’t feel like it at the moment.

  “Hello again,” Sashi said when she saw me looking.

  “You came back?” I croaked, in a voice that had obviously not been used for a while.

  She smiled. “I never left. When Jesse called the night of the fight, I was at a hotel in Burbank, crying my eyes out. Didn’t want to fly home like that.”

  It started coming back to me. I’d sent Will out to talk to Sashi.

  Will.

  I tried to sit up, but I didn’t do more than lift my head an inch, and even that was exhausting. “Will?” I asked instead.

  A peculiar look crossed her face. “He’s alive,” she said.

  I looked at Jesse. “The baby?”

  “Also alive,” he assured me, and I breathed out a sigh, my numb body somehow filling with relief. “You had a seizure in the riverbed, and by the time we got you to a hospital, you had a pretty serio
us fever. The doctors were worried,” Jesse added. “But they’ve been giving you fluids around the clock.”

  My eyes drifted to the IV in my left arm.

  “They did an ultrasound about two hours ago, and the heartbeat was going strong,” Sashi put in.

  “You guys heard the heartbeat?”

  Jesse grinned. “It was amazing. Fast, like a tiny locomotive.”

  I smiled, then their words caught up with me. Sashi had said the night of the fight. That was late Sunday night. “What day is it?”

  “Tuesday afternoon,” Jesse said. “It’s . . . well, there’s a lot to catch you up on.”

  Sashi checked her watch. “I should get back to Will’s room.”

  “He’s here? In the hospital?” My brow furrowed. Werewolves didn’t go to the hospital. They didn’t need to, for one thing, and for another, they’d be identified as medical anomalies. “Why?”

  She glanced at Jesse. “Scar,” he said gently, “when Aldric was going to kill Will, you took his magic.”

  “Yeah . . .” I sort of remembered that part.

  “Will was kneeling just behind him. You took his magic, too.”

  I blinked at him for a long moment. I’d . . . what?

  My first thought was that “curing” Will would prevent him from ever being able to grow his arm back. And that was on me. Tears pricked my eyes. “I’m so sorry!” I wailed. “I didn’t mean to!”

  “It’s okay,” Sashi soothed. “Scarlett . . . he’s human now.”

  I stared at her, uncomprehending, and then finally I understood.

  Werewolves can’t heal injuries sustained before they become werewolves, so there would be no going back for Will. Even if he went through the change again, he would only have three legs, and that would make him too slow and weak to be alpha. There was no reason not to stay human.