Barely Winging It

by Tigertalez

  Enzo shifted, leaving his clothes where he found her cell. He followed the scent trail, tracking the scent to the challenge arena. Fresh tire tracks marred the moist dirt. The others caught up with him as he was still sniffing around the tire tracks. The group tracked together, following it to the main road. At that point, they couldn’t go further in their shifted forms, so everyone ran back to the house.

  As Slate ordered a search of the property, in case the kidnappers backtracked somewhere and were hiding on the property, Enzo grabbed his cell and shut himself in his room.

  Telling his best friend, and alpha, that his sister was kidnapped cut his heart like a razor. And it happened on my watch, too. After he hung up with Alphy, he ran downstairs and dished out the orders Alphy had gave him.

  “Got it!” Ryker shouted. “I found where Damon and his guys are staying.”

  “Text me the address. Slate, get your team. We’re moving out.” The men had already geared themselves up with how best they could be, and headed out to the location. It turned out to be a house that was empty, on a heavily forested property.

  The team used hand signals before shifting and creeping up to the house. But before they even got close, Enzo smelt blood. Fuck, please don’t let that be Havana’s, his heart pleaded. Her scent was minute, but it was there.

  They were in two teams, one for the back, and one for the front. Peter and Marek broke down the doors, and the shifters ran past, into the building. What greeted them was bodies and blood. What the hell?

  Peter entered and examined the bullet riddled corpses. “This one’s Damon.” Everyone had been sent a picture of him, so Enzo didn’t doubt the vampire’s word. “Their bodies are still warm.”

  Everyone sniffed around and tried to piece together what had happened.

  “Enzo, there’s a dart in here,” Slate shouted from a room.

  Enzo trotted to the room and sniffed the dart he held. It had Havana’s scent on it. A growl escaped his lips. He shifted.

  “She was here. From the looks of it, Damon and his thugs were staying here, and I recognized the scent of two of them as the ones from outside the barn. They took her, but who took her from them, and why?”

  “I don’t know, but none of Damon’s men have guns. They’re all shifters. But whoever did this had to be human. It’s a bit hard to tell with the smell of blood and gunpowder so strong, but if you smell outside, you can sometimes catch a whiff of it.”

  Enzo growled again. “I hate mysteries.”

  He caught Slate briefly raise a brow at him before schooling his features and heading out of the room. Smart lion. Now’s not the time to bring up my secret admirer.

  Everyone headed back to the alpha house as fast as they could. Enzo called Ryker and relayed the information along the way.

  The house was busy with pack members since everyone was called in to count and be kept safe. He headed straight for the office. “Ryker, have you found anything?”

  “I’m searching for anything that matches Havana’s description. There’s one that sounds really creepy. An emergency flight plan was just put in from the little local airstrip. They claim to have a sick girl that sounds exactly like Havana. But I can’t be sure.”

  “Where are they taking her?” Matteo asked.

  Ryker looked down at his monitor. “It’s an airport in Toronto. Hold on.” Ryker clicked on his mouse and typed on his keyboard. After a few moments, Enzo could see his brows scrunch. “That’s so weird. That pride alpha, Tony Smith, just booked a private flight out from that same airport. It’s scheduled to leave in like ten minutes after the one from here lands.”

  Ryker continued to tap and click. Slate, Enzo, and Matteo all looked at each other. “That’s too big of a coincidence,” Enzo coldly stated.

  “Uh, guys, I just looked up the guys on that the local plane. It was weird that I couldn’t find them originally, but after digging, I found them.” He turned the laptop, and everyone looked at the monitor.

  “Oh fuck!” Enzo, Slate, and Matteo all said in unison.

  “Matteo, take a team, now!” Enzo shouted as he called Alphy.

  “Yeah, Enzo, what d’ya got?”

  Enzo could hear the plane’s engines. “Fuck, I hope you’re close. Long story short, we are pretty certain she’s being smuggled on a craft scheduled for takeoff at the local airstrip. I have guys speeding over there, but I don’t think they’ll make it in time. Ryker wants me to relay the strip’s position.” He continued to tell them everything they had learned.

  “Oh fuck! That’s a whole lotta different kinds of bad if it’s true.” Alphy’s voice betrayed his alarm.

  In the background, he heard Bronya’s voice. “There it is.”

  Alphy’s voice was urgent. “Force them down! They have Havana!”

  Everyone in the room listened as Bronya taunted the other pilot. A crashing sound drowned out most of the sounds, but Enzo could easily make out Alphy’s order to Nix and Gale’s whimpers.

  The roaring sound of wind added to the loud banging and cracking and the plane’s engines made it impossible to hear anything. “W—e—c—n—they—dow—s—f—d—” The words that filtered through the phone were broken. Then they heard screaming and unintelligible yelling, followed by a loud crashing, then silence.

  “Hello?”

  Beep beep beep.

  Enzo looked down at his cell and saw the connection was lost.

  Chapter Ten

  Dultyn wasn’t finished waking from his roost when he smelled her. She had been to see him again. But as he opened his eyes, he was disappointed that she wasn’t still there. Still, her scent was rubbed all over his body, and he could tell she had placed herself in his arms as he had hoped. What did she think when she looked up into his face that he hoped portrayed his love for her? He desperately wished he could have seen it.

  “Hey, ‘grats, man. She came back. So you gonna mate her tonight?” Bogdan asked.

  “Hope so. To tell you the truth, I was hoping she would be here when I woke up. Something must have come up.” He pushed back his feeling of disappointment and tried to think of a reason she wasn’t there.

  “Huh, she left her stuff here, so maybe she was planning on coming back,” Stelios said.

  Looking to where he indicated, sure enough, Dultyn saw her new laptop and her drawing things. That would have normally made him feel much better, but something felt off. He felt anxious. “Let’s head in—”

  “Dultyn?”

  Dultyn recognized Rushod’s voice coming from down below. The creak in the boards indicated he was climbing the stairs. “You guys awake?”

  “Yes.” The three headed to the stairs to meet their packmate.

  “I’ve been waiting down below on guard. I was told to tell you when you woke up that there’s been an emergency. You need to report right away to Enzo. He’s in the house.”

  Dultyn moved swiftly down the stairs and out of the barn without asking for more information or even to check to see if his buddies were following. They were really family to him, so he knew them well enough to know they were there.

  Dultyn thought it looked like the entire pack was congregated at the house. The yard around the garage was crowded with cars. Inside was busy with people, and the atmosphere brought back unpleasant memories of his days during the war. Everyone gave him a wide berth as he charged past. He didn’t need to go far. Enzo was in the living room shouting off orders to someone over the phone. Seeing him enter, Enzo disconnected the call and faced him.

  “Dultyn, we need you three to help in a search and rescue. Prepare yourself for what I’m about to tell you and wait until I’m done before saying anything.” Dultyn could feel the tension from the severity of whatever the situation was. He felt the heat from his two brethren behind him as he listened. “Havana was abducted today, but the shifters who took her were killed by another group who then stole her from them.”

  Enzo’s voice kept him focused. It was all Dultyn had to keep him from going craz
y, and he knew whatever the shifter had to say was important, and could possibly lead to the safe return of his mate. He didn’t want to waste time on useless emotions like panic.

  Enzo continued. “They tried flying her out, but Alphy had Bronya fly them back instead of driving. They came across the plane just as it was taking off and followed it, forcing it down. Both planes crashed, but we don’t have any wings. Everyone here is land bound. Fuck!” Enzo paused to take a breath. “There’s so much territory to cover. All I can say is it was about a fifteen minute flight, give or take, and the starting point was the small airstrip here in Bancroft. They started on a northern ascent but turned south southwest. I need you three to fly over the area.”

  Dultyn guessed if Bronya was with Alphy, then they must have gone to Toronto about the deal with a plane.

  “Dultyn,” Enzo added. “Gale was in the plane, too. Nix shifted and flew out, but we haven’t heard from him. No doubt he won’t leave his mate if she’s hurt. We don’t know how many for sure were in the other plane, but they filed four total. I want each of you to take a cell. Ryker rigged them with tracking, so wherever you are when you find the planes, just call Slate or Matteo and we can hone in on the location without wasting any more time.”

  Clipping the device to the belt of his loincloth, Dultyn turned and headed to the door. Before he exited the house, something accrued to him. Looking around and not seeing what he wanted, Dultyn turned and darted up the stairs and made his way into Havana’s room. Opening the door, he paused and looked at the picture hanging on her wall. She took the time to hang it.

  The warmth in his chest turned to a grieving ache. Grabbing the blanket off the top of the bed, Dultyn quickly headed back down the stairs and outside, spreading his wings and taking flight without stopping. Hearing the alert on the cell he received, he looked at the message. They were the directions to the airstrip. Clipping back onto his waist, he angled his wings and beat them through the air at his fastest speed.

  Dultyn and his brethren couldn’t fly much in the city when they lived with the vampires, but since they moved here, they flew every night on patrol. His wings easily carried him to where the small airstrip was located. The other two had waited for him before taking flight, so they reached the location together, but once there, they split up, heading in three different directions.

  Avoiding homes wasn’t too much of a problem, but as much as he wanted to find his mate as quickly as possible, he needed to slow enough to avoid being spotted. If he was discovered, it could directly affect Havana, too. Nothing was more important to him than she was.

  Clouds were gathered heavily and began to lightly rain. The water collected and rushed off his wings as they moved him through the weather. He held the blanket closer to the underside of his body, keeping it as dry as he possibly could. Her scent wafted around him, soothing him in the search that threatened to ground him sick with fear and grief. Or worse. He was barely holding on to his control over his rage at her abductors.

  Dultyn’s eyes were designed to see in the dark, even in dark heavy weather. He didn’t struggle to see many details as he flew over the trees, lakes, rivers, and swamps. Suddenly Dultyns stomach lurched with the thought that maybe they landed in the water.

  No!

  He wouldn’t think like that. Still, Dultyn flew closer over the water and breathed in the air. He couldn’t scent anything unusual, and he didn’t see any kind of wreckage, so on he flew.

  Dultyn’s wings remained strong as he flew. He stopped with every movement, to identify the cause. Every one of them was one animal or another, but none them were bear or falcon.

  After forty-five minutes, Dultyn spotted the tips of trees broken off. His heart leaped into his throat in hope. Giving his wings another heavy beat to speed his momentum he didn’t take long before coming across a plane. The wings were torn apart, and the propellers on the nose of the craft were gnarled and bent.

  Dultyn drew his wings and angled his body, diving down to the scene. Ten feet from the ground, Dultyn flicked out his wings and flapped them hard, coming to a controlled landing eight feet from the plane in the rut in the earth the plane’s fixed wheels created. Sniffing the air, he cautioned his steps as he approached. The scent of his mate was here, but wasn’t lingering, like she had been here but wasn’t now.

  Dultyn could hear a heartbeat and see a shape slumped against the door. Growling low, he stepped forward and peered through broken glass, to see inside the plane. Aside from the one male unconscious in the front, the rest of the plane was empty.

  Unclipping the cell, he called Matteo. “I found the plane Havana was in, but she’s gone. There’s one human unconscious in the front, but the rest of the plane is empty.”

  “It’s a huge start. Ryker is pulling up the location. Got it. I got a team just minutes from you. We were close. I’m having Bogdan and Stelios contacted. Can you scent which direction Havana and the others went?”

  Dultyn made his way around the craft to the other side. His species was best for their strength, toughness, and sight in darkness, so though his scent was far better than a human’s, it wasn’t enough to follow the scent trail too well. At least not in the pouring rain. “I’m not sure.” He hated having to admit that. He hated anything that was a weakness keeping him from helping his mate.

  “It’s all right, we’ll find them. Hold tight, I don’t want you to let that human have a chance to get away.”

  Dultyn growled his irritation. He knew Matteo’s logic was sound, but without knowing where his mate was, he had no patience. His adrenaline pumped heavily in his system.

  “Easy, Dultyn, we’re going as fast as we can. We’re trying to beat the humans. They started searching for them about the time you left. We’ve managed to find a way to slow them down, but it won’t last long.”

  The sound of wings flapping caught his attention. He turned to see Nix land several feet from him and begin his shift. The cold heavy rain wash down his dark skin as Nix stood before him. Dultyn reported. “Enzo, Nix is here.” Dultyn wordlessly handed him the phone, which Nix quickly took.

  “Enzo, this is Nix. The girls are hurt but they should be all right, but Alphy shielded them during the crash and is hurt pretty bad.”

  Dultyn’s heart hurt for his friends as he continued to listen. He could still hear the beta on the other side of the line.

  “Fuck! All right, how far away are they from Dultyn’s position?”

  “Maybe a quarter mile south southwest.”

  “All right, keep the phone with you, and we’ll track it to your position. We’re sending instructions to the other two gargoyles. Help is on the way, so head back and guard over them. The enemy is still out there, and they still have Havana.”

  “Understood.” After Nix shifted back into his avian form, Dultyn held the cell for him to clasp in his talons, then leaned away as Nix took flight.

  Waiting was nerve-racking. Time felt like it was going too slow as he waited for help. Every minute he waited, was that much longer his mate was being taken away from him. Finally, soggy clops of hooves clattered towards him just as the flapping of wet wings sprayed their wetness on the plane as Bogdan landed.

  Behind Bogdan, he spotted two elks bounding towards him. One had a waterproof pack strapped on his back. The other elk shifted when he was close enough. He recognized Henry, Katie’s dad.

  “Good work, Dultyn.” Henry grabbed some rope from the pack and tied the human’s hands. He also put a neck brace on him and ordered the other shifter to guard him until others arrive. Then he started sniffing for the scent trail.

  Grabbing a phone from the pack, Henry called Enzo. “Ok, the scent trail is heading southeast. I have the human tied up and in a neck brace, as per Seamus’s orders, and Gus is watching him until reinforcements arrive. What are your orders?”

  “Go after them. Get Havana back at any cost.”

  After hanging up, Henry put the cell in Gus’s pack then turned to the two gargoyles. “Stelios is with
Nix, helping with the alpha and the girls. We’ll use Bogdan’s cell. I’ll shift and follow the trail, and you two fly and follow me. Keep an eye out for dangers.”

  Henry’s shift didn’t take long, and soon Dultyn and Bogdan were flying above the forest, looking down into the dark surroundings, watching the graceful elk bound through the brush. Every now and then he would stop and sniff around before bounding on again.

  Dultyn flew ahead slightly, scanning around for any signs of anyone. After fifteen long agonizing minutes, he spotted movements. Signaling the others, he flew closer to investigate. Two humans were hiking through the brush, and one of them had someone slung over his shoulder. With his enhanced vision, Dultyn easily recognized Havana’s form. He growled and narrowed his eyes. He could see her dark hair pouring down towards the ground, drenched from the cold rain. Her soaked, limp form jostled as the male manhandled her. Growling, Dultyn was unable to wait any longer. He dove into the trees, landing with a heavy thunder that vibrated through the ground.

  Both men jumped in surprise. Dultyn could see the fear on their faces. Taking a deep breath in, drawing in the smell of his mate, he roared out and lashed with his claws, slicing through the hand of one of the abductors who tried pointing a gun at him. The man’s cry of pain wasn’t heard over the roar in Dultyn’s ears.

  A gunshot sounded, and pain blossomed through his chest. The shot came from the human still holding his mate. Not looking at his wound, Dyltun grabbed the shooter by the neck and squeezed until he heard the snap of his neck. Dultyn’s free hand wrapped around his mate as the dead body fell into a heap onto the ground before him.

  Looking up, he saw the other human had moved away but was now currently guarded by Bogdan while a naked Henry was on the cell. Dultyn held his freezing cold mate tightly to him. She remained limp as he wrapped the blanket around her, grateful he’d thought to bring it. He didn’t like how shallow her breathing was, and as drops of rain hit her face, she didn’t flinch.