The Hunter

by Theresa Meyers

  “No. I’m fine.” He lied.

  Just running her hands over his impressive chest made her fingers, and far more unmentionable places, tingle with awareness. “You’re going to need salve on—”

  He moved so quickly his kiss cut her off mid-comment. His lips were hotter than the air around them, and his clever hands slipped around her back, then dipped lower, cupping her bottom and pulling her into him as his tongue delved deeply into her mouth, starting a sensual slide against her tongue. Invisible sparks flew along her skin everywhere they touched.

  Lilly’s knees started to soften, refusing to hold her up. He grunted, and she realized she was pressing hard against the very cuts she’d been cleaning, hurting him and dampening the front of her gown in the process. She abruptly pulled back. “Sorry. Sorry,” she said softly.

  Colt pressed an index finger to her tender lips, making them ache for another kiss. “Shh. You don’t have any reason to be sorry.”

  “But I hurt—”

  He pressed harder with the finger and locked his vivid blue gaze deeply with hers. “You don’t have any reason to be sorry.”

  Not yet. Lilly pushed him and the unwanted thought away. “We’d better get you patched up and find that cave before it gets dark.” And before I do something we’ll both regret.

  He reluctantly released her and stayed stoic as she materialized her jar of healing salve and applied it to his chest.

  “If this stuff works as well on these cuts as it did on the whip burn, I won’t need stitches.”

  She smiled at him wanly. The thought of having to stitch together his flesh, more of him being hurt enough to need it, did not do good things for her stomach.

  “Could you get me the fresh shirt in my pack?”

  Lilly dug into the pack and found the shirt and something else far more interesting. A little black velvet drawstring pouch. Definitely not something a man such as Colt would normally have just hanging about. With quick, efficient subtlety, born from too much practice as a child, she loosened the drawstrings and peeked inside. A set of crystals she’d never seen before were nestled inside the black velvet. She snatched out the shirt and the little velvet bag with one smooth movement. Perhaps it was the survival instinct bred into her, but a little insurance never hurt when you were going into situations where the balance of power might tip out of your favor. And right now she was far too dependent on Colt.

  She held up the shirt so that he had to turn to slide his arms into the sleeves, and the moment his back was turned she tucked the velvet pouch under the voluminous folds of her bustle.

  “Feeling better already,” he said as he buttoned his shirt. He picked up the pack, secured the buckle and strap that held it together, and heaved it over his shoulder. “Ready to find that cave now?”

  “No,” Lilly said, “I’m ready to find the Book.”

  Colt gave her a wide grin. “We’ll have a better chance of finding it before dark if we split up. You take the upper half of the gulch and I’ll trek farther down.”

  Lilly glanced up the narrow canyon. If she was going to be climbing over rocks and mucking about in a stream, she needed a change of clothing. She glanced back to make sure he was out of eyesight farther down the gulch before she materialized a pair of the buckskin pants she’d seen China wear. Lilly tucked her hand into the front pocket and her fingers met the smooth softness of the velvet of the pouch, the long thin nails, and the curvy bit of copper wire. Good, it was all still there. She’d never worn pants before, and they seemed a bit confining and hugged tightly around her hips and posterior.

  Across the small creek, trunks of mesquite trees the size of Colt’s waist crisscrossed the gulch, wedged against the rocks and twisted and cracked against one another in a big tangle. Lilly climbed the snag, finding it much easier in the pants, and noticed the worn pale line that etched the rocks three feet above her head, marking the last time floodwater had filled the canyon. There’d been a lot of force to push these trees from their roots.

  She climbed over a few boulders, pausing to wipe her forehead on the sleeve of her shirt. It was cooler in the gulch and the water made a pleasant sound as it splashed over the rocks, but this was still the desert. The air was dry enough to make her lips tight and parched. She sidled down the opposite side of the boulders and found herself at the end of the gulch, facing a wall of almost solid dry rock. This couldn’t be it. Where was the water in the stream coming from?

  Lilly tramped back to the flowing water and followed it to a spot between the boulders. Two large rocks had fallen together, forming a narrow triangle big enough for her to pass through if she crouched a bit. Beyond the rocks were only bushes.

  “Find anything yet ... yet ... yet?” Colt called out to her. His words echoed off the rocks. A stream of cooler air slipped around her legs, chilling her calves above her booted ankles. It smelled of damp earth and musty underground air. Lilly pushed past the bushes to find a large opening in the rock.

  “It’s here! At the end of the gulch,” she shouted. Colt’s footsteps became louder as he doubled back in her direction and came scrambling over the boulders.

  His eyes widened with appreciation as he glanced at her change of clothes, making a shiver of awareness zip up her spine.

  “We’re close now, I can feel it,” Colt said, the excitement in his voice vibrating in the air like the buzz of the cicadas.

  “Close, but not there yet.” Lilly pushed the bushes aside and held them back. The wash of cold air sent chills racing over her skin. The cool dampness of the cave seemed both refreshing and ominous in the desert air.

  Colt’s brows bent down as he looked at the trickle of water coming from the mouth of the cave. “Not more water,” he grumbled.

  She tried for levity. “Weren’t you the one who said it couldn’t be any worse than the last cave we were in?”

  He glanced back at her with a heated stare that said her attempt had failed. “What was I thinking?” Colt pulled off his pack and fished out the coil illuminator and gave a resigned sigh. “Shall we?”

  “After you,” Lilly replied.

  Colt chuckled, but it had a nervous timbre to it. “You just want me to go first.”

  Considering she was still in pants, and he’d likely be paying attention more to her assets than the cave, Lilly nodded, placing her hand on his broad back. “Absolutely.”

  Chapter 19

  They plunged into the darkness of the cave with only the coil illuminator for light. The stale, damp air washed over them, smelling of mildew and neglect. Colt stepped over the thin stream of water trickling through the center of the floor, taking care with his footing since the pack on his back threw off his balance slightly.

  “Where to now?” From the slight tremor of her hand on his back, he could tell she was scared.

  “Working on it.” He tilted back his hat slightly and ran his hand across the rough surface of the rock near the entrance, doing a tactile and visual search. His fingers found it before his eyes did. Hewn into solid bedrock was the Legion’s symbol, a triple cross, three increasingly larger lines stacked horizontally over a single, long, vertical line. A sense of triumph bloomed in his chest, sending sparks of renewed energy out through his veins. “Eureka!”

  He quickly brushed away the dust and cobwebs, his fingers lingering on the indents of the image as he shone the illuminator on it. A hard lump lodged at the base of his throat, making it difficult to swallow. Had Pa made this mark before he taught his three sons about their heritage? True, there were other Hunters in the United States, all trained out of the same piece of the Book. But considering his pa was the one charged with guarding it, there was every chance that he’d been the one to make that mark to reveal this place to be a Hunter’s design. And he’d found it, not Winn or Remy. Him. The one they didn’t want to become a Hunter.

  “Did you find something? Let me see,” Lilly asked as she pressed closer, gazing over his shoulder. The sweet, seductive scent drifted off her warm skin. Climb
ing down the side of the gulch had been torture enough, and they were closer to the Book than they had ever been. Colt turned swiftly, cupping her smooth cheek in one hand and kissing her soundly, reveling in this feeling like he could take on the world and win.

  She stared at him with wide eyes. “It’s a sign you’re supposed to kiss me?”

  He chuckled, running his fingers over the mark once more and tugging his hat down firmly on his head. You couldn’t exactly call a Hunter giddy, but he was damn close.

  “It means we’re on the right track. This is the place.” He was talking faster than normal, but the energy, the drive to press forward now that he knew they were on the right track, couldn’t be ignored.

  “How ca—”

  He held up a hand, cutting her off. “Trust me. I know. Watch your step. If Pa hid it here, there’s probably a few traps. Hunters don’t leave anything unguarded, especially something as important as this.”

  “You Hunters are an odd lot, you know that, right? Suspicious, paranoid loners.”

  Colt grinned at her. “Better odd than dead. I take it you haven’t run into many Hunters you actually like.” He skimmed his hand along the rocky walls, smoother than the walls in the Dark Rim Mine. A result of being a natural cave instead of one hacked and hewn out of the rock by man. That didn’t mean he liked it any better. Both had the potential to be hazardous to a Hunter’s health.

  “Can you blame me?” she answered. “They tend to dispatch Darkin first and ask questions later.”

  The shush of their footsteps echoed in the cave, as did the steady, rhythmic plink of drops into the small creek that seem to take up the middle of the cavern floor. This wasn’t just collected dampness from the cave. Somewhere there was a water source. Colt grimaced. He wasn’t looking forward to finding out exactly where all that water was coming from.

  He moved the bluish stream of illuminator light around, looking for any kind of trip wire among odd natural shapes in the rock. The stalactites and stalagmites that dripped down from the ceiling and speared up from the floor seemed to join together in a thick, stone, harp-like arrangement. But what he was looking for was the unnatural, unmistakable signs left by other Hunters. Something beyond just the mark at the entrance to indicate they were headed in the right direction. The musty, metallic scent of the cave was growing stronger the deeper they went.

  “You and your brothers have more charm than most Hunters I’ve come across.” Her voice echoed in the confined space, and she walked very close to his side, careful to keep her footsteps in the circle of the light.

  “You sure it isn’t just because we’re the Chosen?”

  “That only adds to your reputation,” Lilly said. A brief flash of white in the light let him know she was smiling.

  But Colt was only paying her half a mind. The sound of bubbling water pricked his ears and made him stop. He swung the light in the direction of the sound. About fifteen feet overhead, a smooth round opening twelve feet across was cut into the rock. Water poured down from the edge of the opening in a constant small supply, like an enormous drain, creating the creek down the center of the tunnel.

  The illuminator was fading fast. In the waning light he searched for another incised mark in the rock or a Hunter’s symbol that could serve as either a lead or a warning. They couldn’t afford to be careless. One wrong move in this cave and neither of them might see daylight again. Clack, clack, clack. He shook the illuminator and the light increased some, but not nearly enough. At this rate he estimated they might have an hour of light left, if that. Then they’d be dependent on whatever light source Lilly could create, or be left in the dark.

  “Do you think we’re supposed to go up there?” Lilly asked, a slight tremor to her voice.

  Everything within him resisted the idea. With the diameter of that opening, all kinds of water could easily flow through there. “The tunnel turns right up ahead, let’s keep going and see what’s there first.”

  They walked on, turning the corner, and found themselves in a large, dead-end room with a vaulted ceiling. It looked like the interior of a mausoleum, the rock of the cave chiseled straight and smooth. It smelled like one too. Earth, dank moisture, decay, and metal. Colt held the illuminator higher and stepped closer to the nearest wall. Lilly’s steps slowed and she tugged on his sleeve, making the light jiggle and dance. “Colt—Look!”

  “Hard to miss.” A large bronze door at least ten feet tall and streaked with verdigris was set into the solid stone.

  Colt’s hands shook. This was what he’d been waiting for, working for. He had to be close to the Book now.

  This was the easy part.

  Except it wasn’t. Of course it wasn’t. What about this quest had been easy? Not a damned thing. Because there wasn’t just one giant, verdigris-encrusted door facing him as he swung his light about the oddly shaped turret-like room—there were five.

  It was a given that four out of five were traps of some sort. Beside the door frame of each was a small rectangular slot cut into a rock. It was big enough for a hand. If one didn’t mind having a hand cut off, he thought. He couldn’t rush this. He had to be methodical, cautious, and smart.

  One at a time.

  Lilly wasn’t nearly as suspicious. “I bet the lever to open it is in there.” She reached forward.

  He grasped her slender wrist. “Don’t!”

  She hesitated, her fingers less than an inch from the dark opening, and sent him a frowning glance over her shoulder. “You have another suggestion for opening the door?”

  Her eyes tracked the direction of his gaze and she crossed her arms, cocking her hip out to one side, her left eyebrow rising slightly. “Don’t tell me you are afraid of the bugs that might be crawling about in there?”

  He grunted. “Hardly. I think it’s a false door, and possibly a trap.”

  She glanced at the door and back again at him. “It looks normal enough to me. How can you tell it’s false?”

  His brows pinched together, his gaze darting to the different images around the door, trying to make sense of it all. “The insignias are all wrong.” He pointed to the three insignias molded in relief, one on either doorpost and one on the lintel above the door. “They’re out of order. In Hunter lore the eldest brother of the medieval knights, Cadel, who took the last third of the Book, was the lion of the Legion. Its greatest defender. See that lion head? It should be on one of the side posts, not at the top.”

  “But if he was the eldest, and the leader, it would make sense he was at the top, wouldn’t it?”

  Colt shrugged. “It’s possible. But if they were in birth order he’d be on one doorpost or the other, not on the lintel over the door.”

  He peered closely at the other two images standing out from the metal door frame, rubbing his stubbled cheek in deep thought. “That one to the right, the raven, is the symbol for the youngest brother, Haydn. He took the middle portion of the Book to the edge of the known world.”

  “Then what is that one?” Lilly asked in curiosity. “It certainly doesn’t look like any animal I’ve ever seen.”

  “That’s because it’s a palm tree.” Amusement laced his tone. “That’s Elwin’s. He was the peacekeeper between the other two. He took the first third of the Book. As close as I’ve been able to find, he took it to southern Europe, but lore loses track of it after the age of the explorers.”

  “So how do we know which order they are supposed to be in? Birth order?”

  That sounded logical enough to Colt. “Let’s try oldest first.” He took the illuminator and swung the light about the square walls of the room, each inset in the center with a tall bronze door. Around each door the symbols appeared in a different arrangement. “We have to choose the one with the right combination.”

  Lilly went with him to inspect the images surrounding each door. It was time-consuming, and he grew impatient as the light of their coil illuminator grew even dimmer. But this was too important to screw up now. He took his time to compare the ima
ges on each door. And when he was done, he went back and did it again. And then a third time.

  Every ten minutes or so he gave the coil illuminator a shake. And every time, while it revived, the light was just a little less bright and stayed illuminated for a shorter time.

  “Well, which one is it?” she asked, her tone slightly exasperated.

  “I think it’s this one.” He handed Lilly the light and cautiously reached into the opening beside the door, feeling blindly for a lever. As Lilly had predicted, the whole space came alive with movement of things creeping and crawling over his skin. Finally he found a lever the size of his thumb, but the opening of the slot was too narrow for his forearm to move forward any farther, so he grasped the lever with his fingertips, and pulled. The sound of gears grinding rumbled somewhere behind the wall. He pulled his hand out and shook off the assortment of insects, then put his hand on the center of the door and pushed.

  With a screech of unused metal, the door swung abruptly inward. The footing beneath him seemed to crumble. A pit too deep to see the bottom of yawned before him in the meager light of the illuminator. His arms flailed as he tried to find something, anything, to grasp and stop his fall. His fingers slid along the smooth metal of the door frame, unable to find purchase. Lilly dropped the coil illuminator and grabbed him about the waist with both arms and dug in her heels. They teetered backward and collapsed in an inelegant heap, Colt on top of Lilly, on the dry rock floor, his holstered gun bruising his hip and his hat tumbling off into the dirt.

  He rolled off her. “Are you hurt?”

  Lilly moaned, but sat up on her elbows, the glow from the coil illuminator uplighting her face. “I’ll be fine once I get my breath back.” She rubbed her ribs. “You’re heavier than you look when you’re on top.”