Chapter 4
1797 Words
4
The arrow hit the stone bench at an angle just to my left.
“Get down!” I yelled as I dove at Lillian and shoved her to the ground.
We ended up a tangled mess of limbs on the hard stones, but we ducked just in time. Two more arrows hit where we just sat and bounced harmlessly off the stone bench. I pulled Lillian onto her knees and shoved her towards the far side of the fountain.
“Move!” I shouted.
We crawled on hands and knees to the far side of the fountain where we hid behind its low stone wall. I chanced a look over the wall and saw nothing for a few moments until a branch in one of the trees moved. The leaves shook and I caught a glimpse of a shadowed foe.
“Erik!” I yelled to the men inside the house.
The pair rushed out the doors, but they were forced to jump to either side of the door to avoid more arrows. The men crawled their way to protection. Erik peeked out from behind a thick-trunked tree.
“Stay there!” he ordered me.
“Ya think?” I bit back.
Alan and Erik each grabbed an impromptu shield. Lillian’s mate snatched a weathered shield from a nearby statue, and Erik commandeered a narrow, curved stone from the path near him. The pair made their way along either side of the forested walls of the garden towards our nearly-invisible foe. The arrows kept flying until the ground behind the protected men was strewn with the remains of broken shafts.
They were within ten yards when the tree violently shook and a shadow dropped onto the ground. The figure was covered in a thick cloak that hid their features, but I caught a hint of a square jaw with a small scar near the chin. An empty quiver of arrows was strapped to their back in their hand was a bow. Our attacker rushed into the trees with abnormal speed and soon disappeared out of sight. Our mates turned away from the fleeing person and hurried over to us.
“What the hell are you doing? Go after him!” I ordered them.
I heard a soft sniffle beside me and Lillian launched herself into Alan’ arms. She clung to him and sobbed into his chest. “W-why? Why would someone try to kill us?” she sobbed.
He wrapped his arms around her and shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Erik stood close beside me and pursed his lips. “But we will find out,” he promised.
“And we’re going with you,” I insisted.
He shook his head. “No, you two are inexperienced in the hunt. You would only slow us down.”
“So we what? Wait for our beloved mates to come back in one piece, or as pincushions?” I challenged him.
“You will wait,” he ordered me. Erik nodded at Alan, who in turn pulled Lillian from his chest and to arms length.
“We will return,” Alan promised her.
She smiled and nodded her head. “I’ll wait for you.”
Alan leaned forward and pressed their lips together in a passionate kiss. I blushed and turned away to give them some privacy. My eyes fell on Erik who also watched the loving couple. His eyes held interest and some envy. I stepped to his side and elbowed him in the ribs.
“We don’t have time for that mushy stuff,” I whispered to him. “We have a bond-breaker to find, remember?”
He gave a nod, but still didn’t seem satisfied with my words. “We need to leave,” he reminded Alan.
Alan broke their kiss and wiped a tear from Lillian’s cheek. She smiled and nodded her head. “Go on before the trail is cold.”
The men class their shields to themselves and raced off after their prey. They were soon out of sight, and I grabbed Lillian’s hand and pulled her after them.
“Come on or we’re going to lose them,” I told her.
“But we’re supposed to stay here,” she reminded me.
“Yeah, and act like damsels in distress? Hell no, this isn’t that type of romance novel, now come on before we lose them,” I persisted.
I pulled Lillian into the trees after our foe and friends. The forest was wet from the lake environment so we could track their footprints in the wet soil. The tree limbs clawed at our clothing and the roots tried to trip us. The canopy above our heads blocked out most of the sun and cast shadows on the thick bunches of bushes. The air was heavy with moisture and there wasn’t a sound except our feet pounding the ground and the cries of the few far-off birds.
A bright light in the trees ahead of us told me we were nearing the end. The trees thinned and we rushed out onto a rocky wasteland. Before us was an outcropping of dark stone that jutted out into the air, and below that lay a desolate beach. Large boulders and small stones littered the ground, all having come from the belly beneath the worn outcropping. The area was shaped like a bowl where the sides curved upward and created an unsteady path by which someone could go on either side of the outcropping and climb down into the bowl. The rocks stretched for fifty yards before they hit the waters of the lake, or rather, the waters hit them. The waves crashed against the rocky coastline and deafened the beautiful sounds of the forest.
Unfortunately, the edge of the outcropping lay only ten feet away from the end of the forest. Lillian and I stumbled forward towards the steep drop with a sudden stop. I grabbed Lillian about the waist and, for the second time that day, threw us both to the ground.
“Whoa!” I yelled as we tumbled onto the hard, unforgiving rock.
We rolled along the ground for a few yards and stopped just short of the edge. Well, most of us. My feet dangled into the abyss of nothingness and flailed wildly in the air. Lillian stood and helped pull me away from the edge. I rose to my shaky feet and peered over the edge. The cliff had a sheer drop of twenty yards and at the bottom lay piles of broken rock from countless years of falling rubble.
“That was a close call,” I commented.
Lillian looked around us and bit her lip. “But where are Alan and Erik?” she asked me.
I shrugged. “I don’t know, but I know they’re not down there. I don’t see anything except- wait. I think I see something.” I dropped to my knees and crawled to the edge of the outcropping. Lillian followed my example we both leaned over the edge. Far below us, among the rocks, were our mates. In front of the sheer wall and staring at something we couldn’t see.
“Hold my legs,” I told Lillian.
She blinked at me. “What? Why?”
“Because I want to see what’s down there, now hold my legs,” I insisted.
I didn’t give her much chance to argue as I began my slow crawl over the edge.
“Sophie!” she yelped. She dove for my legs and clamped her hands over my calves. “Sophie, this isn’t a good idea!”
“Of course it’s a good idea. Well, unless I fall,” I told her as I pushed my abdomen over the edge.
My suicidal acrobatics gave me a better view of what lay beneath the outcropping. I saw that the two men were looking at small mouth of a cave. The jagged rocks of the island created a menacing look for the mouth, just as they had for the last one. This opening, however, was hardly big enough to fit one person at a time.
“Did he go in there?” I called to them.
The pair whipped their heads up, and Erik glared at me. “I told you to stay there!” he yelled back.
I folded my arms across my chest and shrugged. “You should know me better by-hey!” The rocks beneath my waist crumbled beneath my weight and I fell towards the ground far beneath me. Lillian’s hold on my calves loosened and I slid between her fingers, but she managed to grasp my ankles. A few loose rocks rained down on me. I tilted my head up to face her. “Pull me up!”
Her teeth ground together and her face was red from the exertion. “I-I can’t!”
I returned my attention to the men. “Watch out below!” I shouted.
Lillian’s weak hold slipped, and so did I. I plummeted to the jagged, rocky ground. Swift movement from the rocks caught my attention, and a second before I hit the unmerciful stones a pair of strong arms scooped me away from danger. My quivering body shook against the strong, hard chest of my mate.
I looked up into his stern face with a quivering smile. “Next time I’ll remember to bring the bungee cord.”
“You are dangerously reckless,” he scolded me as he set me on my shaky feet.
“You forgot stupid and stubborn,” I added. My legs wobbled and I clung to his chest for balance. I glanced up and saw Lillian’s white face peeking over the edge. My heart sank. I’d terrified her with my stupidity. “I’m okay, but I think you should take the stairs,” I called to her.
She nodded her head and disappeared from sight. In a moment she reappeared along the steep, rocky incline of the hill. Lillian stumbled and slid down the rocks, and Alan helped her down the last few feet. She raced over to me and wrapped me in a strong hug.
“I’m so sorry! I wanted to hold you, but I couldn’t!” she sobbed.
I smiled and wrapped my arms around her. “It’s fine. You did your best.” I pulled her to arm’s length and wiped away a few of the tears on her cheeks. “Besides, I’m not exactly light.” I turned my attention to the two men. “So what’s the story here? Did the guy go into that cave?”
Erik raised an eyebrow at me. “You know it was a male?”
“Because I saw his chin. It was blocky. Besides-” I waved my hand at the ground, “can’t you guys tell it was a guy? You know, by using your super sniffers?”
Alan Shook his head. “No. The person is masking their scent with wolf’s bane. Every werewolf is allergic to it, and to sniff it would mean a sneezing fit for several minutes.”
“Well, the guy had a chin like a guy so let’s just go with that. Now what do we do?” I asked them.
“We will do nothing. You and your friend will remain here while Alan and I entered the cave and follow this assassin,” Erik instructed me.
I gestured to the area around us. It was devoid of any large rocks and trees. “So you want Lillian and me to stay here and hope there aren’t two of them?”
Erik pursed his lips. “Very well, you can come but once inside you will obey orders. Understood?”
I grinned and saluted him. “Yes, sir!”
- Writer
