We reached the bend in the road that we’d studied on the map. In person, it was as unremarkable as before.
Thanks to the fog, the gray daylight didn’t make it any easier to see into the brush. The hill Willard had pointed out on the map could have been just off to the side of the road, and I never would have known. An entire mountain could have been there.
I pulled out the metal key artifact. It seemed faintly warm, but I couldn’t tell if that was a hint that we were close to whatever door it unlocked, or if my own body heat had warmed it in my pocket.
When I stepped out of the Jeep, the fog wreathed my legs so densely that I couldn’t see my boots. I grabbed my weapons and walked around to the other side of the vehicle to peer into the woods, both with my eyes and with my sixth sense. According to the map, the cleared-and-then-not-cleared hilltop should be to the south.
The damp air smelled of wet foliage and decaying leaves. I sniffed for the scent of a fire burning or anything else that might have suggested someone lived out here. But I didn’t smell, see, or sense anything out of the ordinary.
Until a distant roar rolled through the forest, the eerie not-quite-natural sound lifting the hairs on my arms.
“Cougars don’t roar,” Willard noted.
“If it’s the same feline that mauled that person, it’s had a busy well-traveled night.”
“If it really is a tiger—and nobody’s survived being visited by it yet, so we don’t know—normal ones will travel ten to twenty miles to hunt in a night. I don’t know about magical ones.” Willard checked her rifle before pulling her pack out of the Jeep and slinging it over her shoulders.
“Is this the portion of the trip where you regale me by reciting encyclopedia entries?”
“The tiger is the largest extant cat species in the world, can weigh up to six hundred and sixty pounds, can leap thirty feet in a single jump, can eat eighty-eight pounds of meat in a day, and prefers to sneak up on its prey and ambush it from hiding.” Willard eyed the mist-blanketed woods around us. Hiding spots were aplenty.
“Consider me regaled. What’s extant mean?”
“Not extinct. Don’t you read any books when you’re not busy killing people?”
“Of course. I just finished a re-read of The Last Unicorn.”
“That’s a kids’ book.”
“It’s a classic for children of all ages.” As I slid a fresh magazine into Fezzik, I decided not to mention that I owned the entire Harry Potter collection in hardback.
A clack came from behind me, and I jumped, my heart rate springing to double-time as I imagined tigers ambushing us from the trees. It took me a moment—and another clack—to realize it was the cub pawing at the window. Intent green eyes regarded me through the glass.
“Your cat either wants to come with us or has to pee,” Willard remarked.
“I don’t think she does that.” Though I was hesitant to let her out, lest she run off and get in trouble again, I also didn’t want her to destroy the Jeep if I kept her in there against her wishes. Aside from my love for intact seatbelts, I had to consider that we might need to make a fast getaway later.
“Then she truly is magical. I have a cat, and her litter box needs changing regularly.”
It was hard to imagine Willard cuddling up to some pet at night. Though some house cats were aloof and independent, so maybe that was a perfect fit for her.
“Does that mean you need to hurry home ASAP to clean it?” I asked.
“The neighbor is watching her, but yes. She’s a vocal handful, and I have to pay handsomely to get people to take care of her.”
The cub clacked her claws against the window again.
“A handful, huh?” I opened the door so my furry princess could bound down into the mud. She splatted a paw into it, spraying murky water onto my jeans. “Hard to imagine.”
“Pets are demanding.” Willard almost smiled.
Maybe cats were the thing we would bond over out here.
She pointed into the tall trees to the south. “The hill should be that way.”
The roar of the tiger drifted to us again—from the south.
“Goody.”
“Tigers are also supposed to be nocturnal,” Willard said. “Maybe we’ll get lucky, and it’s bedding down for the day.”
The gray sky above us, only vaguely visible through the fog, barely fit the definition of daylight. I doubted even a vampire would be forced indoors at this level of illumination.
The cub headed into the woods. To the south.
“It’s moderately disturbing that your cub is eager to unite or reunite with the killer that’s making that noise,” Willard said.
“It’s possible she’s on the trail of something else.”
“I doubt it.”
“Let’s hope the killer, if it truly is a feline, will think kindly of us for walking with one of its own kind.” I grabbed the backpack I’d used to carry the cub earlier, in case she got tired and wanted a ride.
“Considering that tigers see primates as delicious meals, that seems optimistic.”
The cub paused, her silver glow visible in the fog, and looked back at me. Waiting?
“Are you going to lead us to the right spot?” I closed the door softly, afraid sound would travel in the still night.
“Merow?”
“Are you going to lead us to our deaths?” Willard asked.
“Merow?” The cub turned, tail swishing behind her, and trotted deeper into the woods.
“Comforting,” Willard said.
I shook my head and followed the cub. Even though Willard’s description had reminded me how badass tigers were—and magical tigers were presumably more so—I was more worried about the enemy we didn’t yet know. A tiger hadn’t been the one to order Michael kidnapped.
14
The cub led us through the trees, stopping frequently to wait for us. Between the tangled undergrowth, moss-carpeted logs, and the perpetual fog, we couldn’t advance as quickly and quietly as we would have liked, but Willard didn’t slow me down, nor was she any louder than I. Usually, my half-elven feet lent me an advantage when it came to stealth and agility, but she must have had more than intelligence training in her years in the army.
We were both slow compared to the cub. She’d gotten a second wind when she’d jumped out of the Jeep, though the way she flopped down on her side whenever she was waiting for us to catch up worried me. Her aura, which I relied upon to track her, had grown less noticeable in the time we’d been together. Weaker.
When a magical being died, its aura disappeared. I tried not to think about that happening.
A howl floated through the woods, the sound of a wolf’s call. Another wolf answered it from the other direction.
They were on either side of us, perhaps a half mile away, though the intervening trees and sound-muting fog made it hard to be certain. The same fog made it difficult to tell if there were any prints out here besides those of small animals. It bothered me that we hadn’t found a road or at least a trail heading to this hilltop. If ogres had truly come this way, with Michael draped over one of their shoulders, they should have left signs of their passing.
“Wolves and tigers,” Willard muttered. “Misty Loop Lane is a damn menagerie.”
“Don’t forget the ogres and the castle.” I let my free hand stray to the pocket where I’d tucked the key. Did it seem warmer than it had at the road? I wasn’t positive.
“I haven’t. Are we still following the cub? I can’t see or hear her.”
“She’s just ahead. I sense her.”
Willard didn’t comment on my claim, but if she’d been working in the office long enough to become well versed in the magical, she would know magical beings could sense magic.
Up ahead, the trees thinned, and a path finally came into view. As we stepped onto it, a zap of energy raced along my nerves, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up.
“Did you feel that?” I whispered as Willard joined me.
“No.”
The cub sat in the path, as if waiting for us to decide which way to go. I wished I knew. We couldn’t see even twenty feet down it either way. I checked the map on my phone to verify what my sense of direction was telling me, that it ran roughly parallel to the road rather than inward like a driveway.
Wolves howled again, closer this time. And more than two of them. They sounded like they were on the path and heading toward us.
“I think we might have crossed a border and stepped on a magical tripwire,” I said.
Another howl came from down the path in the opposite direction. The sound of heavy breathing floated across the forest. There was no doubt that the wolves were coming.
“Back to back.” Willard lifted her rifle, tucking the stock into the hollow of her shoulder, and turned to face in one direction.
“Right.” I drew Fezzik and pointed it in the other direction.
Had I been alone, I would have used my charm to camouflage myself, but that would have left them all focusing on Willard. I also would have opted for Chopper, since the sword wouldn’t make noise and announce our arrival to everyone within two miles, but maybe it didn’t matter. Whoever had set that magical tripwire knew we were here.
A touch at my shin distracted me. The cub was resting her paw on my legs, claws retracted, and looking up at me with concerned green eyes.
I bent and swooped her up and put her into my pack. There was just enough time to level Fezzik again as the first set of eyes came into view. They glowed like red beacons in the fog, and my senses told me that the approaching wolves were magical.
“Firing,” Willard said, a second before she did.
Would her weapon do anything against magical foes? I didn’t know.
I aimed right between the eyes streaking toward me as the furry black canine solidified in the fog. More than twice the size of a natural wolf, it jumped as the weapon cracked, somehow anticipating my shot. My bullet sailed under it.
It thudded into another creature behind it that wasn’t as fast. A second set of eyes blinked out, but only for a second. The wolf never cried out, and they kept coming.