AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We searched the area quickly. Anyone watching the video feed would have no idea what we were doing. As we looked for any sign of fae magic or some clue that Zoe and Crew had managed to get Mika out, I worried that Kira might be right. Could Mika really be dead? Torn apart by some awful creature? I’d considered him a friend. He was a guy I could have seen joining my unofficial pack.
“I don’t see anything,” Kira huffed.
“Neither do I,” I said. “What’s our time look like?”
Kira glanced at her bracelet. “Less than twenty minutes.”
“We’ve got to go. We’re running out of time to find your monster.”
Kira cast a glance around again, zeroing in on the hunk of wolf leg lying at the edge of the plateau. “But what about—”
“We can’t worry about that now. We have a mission to accomplish. We can think of other things when that’s done.”
She looked drained beyond belief, but she stepped toward me. “Okay. Yeah. Let’s find it.” Her voice was hollow and full of regret.
Taking her hand, I led her back into the forest, forcing myself not to look back at the remains of what might have been Mika. I could hold out hope. It was all I knew to do. There had to be a chance he’d made it.
Chapter17
Kira
Wyatt dragged me along, and I let him. I could barely keep my legs moving because of the dark thoughts swirling in my head. All that blood and torn body parts. Had that been Mika? If another contestant had died, I didn’t know how I’d ever forgive myself.
A thousand different things rambled through my mind as we ran. Should we have tried sooner? Should we have tried to stay with him in the jungle? Had he not been focused on the dangers because he’d been too excited to get out? Dammit, I hated feeling this way.
After a few minutes of self-pity and sadness, I buckled down. We had fifteen minutes to find my creature and get back. No amount of introspection and hindsight would bring Mika back if he had died. Right now, I had to focus on what Icouldmanage. Wyatt was still alive, and I needed to stay focused and do what needed to be done to keep it that way. Even though I’d been fired, I was and always would be a Tranquility operative. One thing that had been drilled into us in training was that if one member of the team went down, the rest had to go on and complete the mission. There’d be time to mourn afterward.
“This way,” I said, pulling Wyatt’s arm as I finally managed to catch the scent.
“You sure?”
“Yeah, I’ve never smelled anything like it before.”
Taking the lead, I pushed my body to its limits, sprinting faster than I could ever remember running in my life. As powerful and athletic as Wyatt was, even he lagged behind me as I hurried to get to the creature.
I sensed rather than saw the vampires explode from the underbrush. The things were too emaciated and weak to have a chance at catching me. I passed them and made it twenty yards ahead before I skidded to a stop, turning to see if Wyatt was okay.
Wyatt, at a dead run, spotted the two vampires, reached out, and snapped two branches off a tree. Without breaking stride, he slammed the makeshift stakes into their chests and leaped over their tumbling bodies. He never even slowed down.
“Damn,” I muttered. That had been impressive.
“Are we close?” he called as he quickly joined me.
I nodded and pointed down a small vine-choked ravine. “I think it’s down there.”
Wyatt glanced around and shook his head. “We’re really far from the mansion. This is almost as far out as the volcano, just on the opposite side of the island. We need to hurry. It’s gonna take every second to get back in time.”
“Get a move on, then. Might as well see what this damn thing is.”
Moving cautiously but quickly, Wyatt pushed through the vines and hanging tree branches. A cave was set back on the side of a hill. The foreboding black entrance yawned open like a gaping black maw, ready to swallow us. It gave me a moment of déjà vu. It wasn’t exactly like the cave Wyatt had found me in all those years ago, but it was close enough to send a chill up my spine.
With time ticking away, we moved in less cautiously than we normally would. Typically, we’d check the perimeter, scent the area, then proceed into the cave slowly and with calculated precision. But with the time constraint hanging over us like a curse, we rushed in. Only the years of training made Wyatt and I slow to a fast walk rather than a full run.
The scent hit me first. Stronger than ever now, but it still made no sense. I smelled the mineral scent of a vampire, the muskiness of a bear shifter, and the wet-mud smell of a kappa. There were hints of other creatures as well. Had we somehow stumbled into some warren where multiple beasts nested together? That was almost too outlandish to consider.
We managed to get almost fifteen feet into the cave when the thing I’d been sent to hunt staggered out of the darkness. Wyatt and I froze. I’d assumed whatever Von sent me to hunt would be bad. Now that I witnessed what waited for us, I had a moment of worry that my brain was shattering. It shouldn’t have been possible, yet here it was, walking toward us. A nightmare made real.
The cameras floated to the cave’s ceiling, giving us a clear look at the monstrosity before us. It was like a bunch of beings and creatures had been thrown into a blender and made into an abomination. The back and haunches were thick and humped, covered in the brown hair of a grizzly shifter. It walked bipedally, standing upright. Further down, the fur gave way to the mottled lizard skin of a kappa, but the feet were humanoid. The toes were tipped in thick, wolfish nails.
