13 EASY PREY
THE SECOND CREATURE rose from the loch.
Smaller than the first—yet faster.
Its eyes fixed on her the moment its head broke the surface.
Ailsa backed away, knife raised. Her arm trembled now, strength bleeding from it.
The cold focus that had carried her through the fight was fading. Each heartbeat stripped a little more of it away.
Her stomach tightened.
She was done for.
“Ailsa!” Dale’s shout cut through the morning.
He burst from the willows at a dead run.
For an instant, relief hit her so hard her knees nearly buckled.
Mud streaked his clothes, his face pale and wild—but his sword was already in his hand, his gaze locked on the shape climbing from the water. “Stay behind me.”
He moved between her and the loch.
Ailsa ignored him and stepped to his shoulder.
The beast came low and fast.
Dale drove left, drawing its head, while Ailsa went right.
Striking out blindly, she punched her knife into the soft place where neck met shoulder. The creature lurched, nearly wrenching her arm from its socket. Dale’s sword sliced down across its spine.
The body collapsed, and a hush fell over the loch-shore.
Ailsa stood there, lungs burning, her knife buried to the hilt. Yanking it free, she rounded on her bodyguard.
Dale stared back, chest heaving, sweat slicking his face. “That was close,” he panted. “You’re handy with a blade, but lucky for you, I—”
“Where the fuck have you been?” The words tore out of her.
His face stiffened. “On patrol.”
“All fucking night?”
“Aye.” He swallowed. “I wanted to make sure that the attacker was alone.”
“And you didn’t think to come back and check on me?” Her left fist balled at her side. Gods. She wanted to flatten the bastard’s nose.
He hesitated. “No. I thought the salt circle and the fire would hold until dawn.” He dragged a hand through his tangled hair. “Look, Ailsa. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left you that long.”
“No. You shouldn’t have.” She bit each word out, yet as she did, the heat bled out of her.
And as the red haze cleared, she took a good look at him.
Gods. He looked awful. His face had gone grey beneath the grime. A bruise darkened his cheekbone, and a long scratch cut across his temple.
“What happened to you?”
He grimaced. “Last night’s wee skirmish.”
“But you didn’t have that when—”
“It was dark,” he cut in. “You likely didn’t see.”
Ailsa stiffened. She had seen, but she wasn’t going to waste her breath arguing with him about it. Instead, she turned to the corpses lying on the stones.
In the growing light, she could see them clearly now—long pale bodies, black crosses running along their backs. Their heads were heavy and houndlike, their claws long enough to gouge stones.
A chill slid through her. “What are they?”
“Reedohran,” Dale replied.
The word meant nothing to her.
“Water hounds,” he added. “They rarely hunt alone.”
Ailsa looked from one Reedohran to the other.
A pair. Her chest tightened. They had come for her—and she had killed them. She remembered the crack of the branch against bone, and queasiness rose.
She’d killed two mates.
“Come on.” Dale broke the weighty silence. “We should move.”
His voice had veiled again, the apology gone. Whatever guilt he’d felt had retreated behind those walls of his. However, his carelessness had nearly gotten her killed, and she wasn’t going to forget that any time soon.
Jaw set, she limped toward the willows. Her knee throbbed from the fall. Every muscle in her legs protested. But she needed to pee. Badly.
Behind the trees, she crouched—and then froze.
Deep claw marks scored the willow trunk beside her. Fresh ones. Sap bled slowly down the pale bark.
So, she hadn’t imagined it. Something had watched her from the dark last night.
Ailsa emptied her bladder and rose to her feet, stepping out from behind the tree. A few yards away, Dale had just kicked dirt over the campfire and was moving across to Rùn. He was limping as well—heavily.
“Something was prowling around here last night,” she said, approaching him. His gaze snapped her way, and she pointed toward the trees. “Fresh claw marks in the tree bark.”
Dale turned, picking up the saddle and swinging it onto the stallion’s back. “Hardly surprising,” he muttered. “It’s Gateway tonight … the faerie world is waking up.”
She frowned. “All the more reason my bodyguard shouldn’t vanish into the night.”
His body tensed, and Ailsa waited for him to bite. For him to make excuses for himself.
But he said nothing.
Darach urged Rùn into a hard canter, jaw locked so tight his teeth ached.
The cawing of ravens split the misty morning air, the sound vaguely mocking.
Everything was coming apart.
First the attack. Then the change. And this morning’s mess with the Reedohran.
Sloppy, all of it. Maybe taking Ailsa with him was a mistake. There was a reason why he kept others at a distance these days. He was a danger to the lass, a fact she was blissfully ignorant of.
He should have known the beast would rise. Stress always dragged it closer to the surface—fear, anger, blood in the air. The attack had been enough.
The moment the first warning tremor ran through his bones, he’d known.
So, he’d done the only thing he could. Run.
He could still picture the firelight shrinking behind him as he staggered into the dark. Thorn scrub tearing at his clothes. Boots sliding on loose stone as he half-fell down the gully. By the time he reached the bottom, the burning had already started under his skin.
He’d torn his clothes off with shaking hands.
Then it had taken him.
The pain always came first. Rending, burning, as if something was pulling his muscles and bones apart. And then the night had transformed. Every scent, every sound sharpened. He was aware of it all. The loch. The reeds. Small animals moving through the grass.
And the woman by the fire.
The pull toward her had been instant. Primal.
She was easy prey. Alone and with only a small blade to defend herself.
One rush from the darkness and her blood would have filled his mouth.
He’d fought it. Gods, he’d fought it hard.
Darach forced the memory away, his breathing ragged now.
Aye, he’d won that battle. He’d hunted something else instead. But he’d also abandoned his post. Ailsa had paid for protection, and he’d left her alone at the fireside.
Unforgivable.
Until now, the beast hadn’t affected his ability to do his job. A mercenary didn’t run from danger. He faced it.
And yet, when he’d returned at dawn, expecting to find Ailsa asleep by the hearth, she’d been fighting for her life.
Facing down a second Reedohran, wielding nothing but that thin-bladed knife. Blood on her hands and black eyes burning. She’d been quite a sight.
Darach’s grip tightened on the reins. Just as well she was a scrapper.
Still, it had been far too close.
If the Reedohran had reached her moments earlier, he’d have returned to a corpse beside a smoking hearth.
A bodyguard who abandoned his charge deserved hanging.
He wouldn’t make that mistake twice.
Then there was the other problem. The assassin.
Darach’s mouth twisted. No, Ailsa had guessed right. The man hadn’t been part of the mercenary band they were chasing. And he hadn’t been here for her, but for him.
Unfortunately, the assassin hadn’t been the first. Nor would he likely be the last.
Four others had already tried; the last had been a few moons earlier. She’d tried to stick a blade in Darach in the middle of the Inverwich market.
His brother’s work.
Darach’s gut started to burn then, every muscle tightening. Gods, he hated the fucker. Just the thought of him made the creature inside Darach snap and snarl. His attention had been diverted of late, but he hadn’t forgotten the promise he’d made himself years earlier.
One problem at a time though. First, he had to find the mercenaries, get Kayla back, and deal with the beast.
But his brother’s days were numbered.
How he was going to enjoy twisting the blade.
Reaching up, he scrubbed a hand over his face.
His ribs ached when he drew breath. The change always left him feeling as if he’d been beaten with clubs. It was an effort to keep his back straight.
Two sleepless nights. A shift that had wrung the strength out of his bones while the beast still paced inside him, restless and hungry. Lately, it had been harder to keep the leash tight.
His jaw popped as he ground his teeth.
A sharp ache lanced through his gums then, and his pulse lurched.
Not now. Not in daylight.
He had to stay in control, especially with Ailsa watching him so closely.
Her stare made him sweat.
She’d noticed the bruises on his face. The cuts that came with every change. Sooner or later, she’d demand to know what the matter with him was.
You’ll have to tell her.
The thought made his chest clench.
No. Not yet. He couldn’t risk that. Not until Kayla was found. Not until the tattooist fixed what had been done to him.
Leaning forward in the saddle, he urged Rùn into a gallop.
They’d only been on the road a short while when Darach breathed in a familiar scent, carried on a sharp breeze.
Smoke.
He pulled Rùn up short.
Behind him, Ailsa’s arms loosened from his waist at once, as if she was glad of the excuse not to touch him. “What is it?”
He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he scanned the road ahead before his gaze traveled east to a hill. A faint grey ribbon drifted into the pale sky above it. “A camp.”
Nudging Rùn off the road, he angled the stallion up a slope between gorse and stone until the ground flattened. There, he drew his horse up and swung down from the saddle.
“Watch your back,” he told Ailsa as he moved off.
A moment later, he heard a ‘thud’ as her boots hit earth.
The clearing smelled of ash and damp earth. A ring of stones held the remains of a smoldering fire. Walking across to it, Darach crouched and stirred the ashes with a twig.
The embers still glowed.
“They didn’t put it out?”
He glanced over his shoulder to see that Ailsa now approached. Her face was wan and strained in the morning light. Her gaze veiled as she glanced nervously around. “No,” he replied. “Whoever camped here left in a hurry.”
His belly tightened then, his exhaustion sloughing away. This had to be the group they were following. Their quarry was still ahead, but not by much.
He straightened up and began moving through the clearing. A broken strap lay in the dirt beside a discarded ale skin. More signs that they’d moved on fast.
Ailsa followed him, although he noted that whenever he halted, she hung back.
She didn’t trust him, not after he’d vanished into the night and left her alone beside the fire.
Fair enough.
He wouldn’t trust him either.
Pushing aside an unwelcome pang of self-recrimination, Darach hunkered down near the edge of the camp, inspecting tracks. The ground was churned here. Boot prints were everywhere.
Ailsa stopped next to him. “Kayla?”
“Aye.” Darach peered closer, spying heel gouges and drag marks. One of the men had gone down hard.
And there—dark streaks in the dirt.
Blood.
Ailsa murmured an oath.
Darach’s gaze narrowed as he appraised the marks with a practiced eye. Not a pool. No heavy splatter. “Don’t worry, it wasn’t fatal,” he said finally. “If they’d killed her, there’d be more blood than this.”
“She fought them?” Ailsa’s voice caught.
“Aye, she’s tough,” he said ruefully. “Let’s hope she doesn’t push them too far.”
Cold washed over him then, cutting through the glibness of his comment. If she did, he was fucked.
Ailsa cut him a scowl. “Well, I’m glad she’s resisting them … she might escape.”
Darach made a non-committal sound and rose. Stepping away from the footprints and blood, he continued to search the area. Moments later, something else caught his eye: scratches in the dirt at the base of a nearby birch.
Dropping to a crouch once more, he leaned in.
Another triple spiral—calling to the Gods for help—but there were other designs as well. A spiral crossed by jagged lines and smaller curls branching from it. Sigils, although unlike the triple spiral, he didn’t understand this message.
“Ailsa.” He beckoned her over. “Can you decipher this?”
The scuff of boots followed, and then she was crouching next to him. Leaning in, she peered down at the marks, and then her breath caught.
He frowned. “What?”
“That spiral is another call for aid.” She then pointed to the slashing lines beside it. “And these warn of violence.”
Darach nodded grimly. Aye. That much was obvious.
“And this—” her finger hovered over a crooked line cutting north through the spiral “—means ‘The Uplands’.”
His gaze lifted. From this hilltop, they had a vantage point of the land rolling north. Loch Lethe glittered into the horizon, but beyond, the land would grow rocky and wild. Hard country to track men through.
Breathing a curse, he stood up. “They’re not going to make this easy.”
Ailsa rose too. Her eyes burned now, although something glittered in their depths. Hope. For the first time since leaving Farnoch, her shoulders lowered slightly.
“No … but they can’t be far.”
“They’re not,” he replied, crossing to Rùn. “If we ride hard, we’ll catch up with them before nightfall.”
He swung onto the saddle, ignoring the protest in his bones.
A scent hit him without warning then. Warm fur, crushed grass, and sweet, hot blood. Rabbit. His head turned before he could stop himself, his nostrils flaring.
Gods damn it.
Forcing the growling beast down, he held a hand down to Ailsa.
She took it, though he marked her slight hesitation before she did so.
Rùn surged forward as soon as she climbed up behind him, and they were off—down the hill and back onto the road.