Page 55 of Faun Over Me

“Too easy,” Troy rumbled.

Avery lurched to her feet, spinning around and swinging the lamp. Glass tinkled as the broken bulb collided with an overly muscled shoulder. She wrenched it free, using her momentum to swing again, this time higher. He caught the body, wrestling it out of Avery’s grip. Her shoulder screamed in pain, she screamed in pain, and Troy laughed. He tossed the lamp aside, moving his bulk between Avery and the door.

“I thought you’d give me another chase, Elizabeth.” His voice was still slick and smooth, but there was a snarl to the words, a bestial roughness as though he’d been shouting for hours and was now trying to speak. “This is much better. They’ll find your corpse, bloody and mangled, in the one place Mac Murray promises human children will be safe from us.”

He advanced, crowding Avery into the tiny space. Moonlight danced over swells of muscle, allowing her glimpses of his hulking form: a bulging thigh, knobby, hairy fingers that sharpened to claws, and scraps of cloth hanging from his shoulders and torso.

“What are you?” she breathed, unable to make sense of what she was seeing. A tremble built in her limbs, and bile rose in her throat.

“What do you think, little girl?” He stepped fully into the moonlight, giving Avery just a second to take in the long snout, with lips curled back to reveal terrifying fangs. Bone stretched over the length of his snout and brow, his face a wretched skull with keen yellow eyes burning in the low light. “Inhuman.”

Troy lunged, teeth snapping. She jumped back onto the camping cot, arms thrown out, and pressed her back against the wall. Fangs closed over empty air where she’d been standing, and Troy straightened. His nose twitched as he breathed deeply, exhaling with a lusty sigh. “Your fear smells delicious, little girl.”

“Stay back!” She swept an arm through the air.

“Or what?” Troy laughed, advancing. “Where’s your little faun, Elizabeth? Where is your pet inhuman to keep you safe?” He cocked his head, feigning listening. “That’s right, she isn’t here. It’s just you”—he set one paw-like foot on the edge of the cot. The frame groaned beneath his weight, and Avery whimpered—“and me and the moonlight.”

Metal creaked, Troy launched himself at Avery, and she jumped to the side. The wall gave way to nothing, and she barely had the time to process Troy’s pained yip as she collided with the ground outside. The window rattled in its frame, wood cracked. Avery scrabbled onto her hands and knees, feet catching in her skirt as she tried to stand. Cursing under her breath, she gripped the fabric in both hands and lurched to her feet.

Howls shattered the night, pushing Avery’s frantic pace. She followed the trail for a few yards, darting into the woods and onto another trail and another, leading Troy as far from the camp as she could. Branches scraped her arms, thorns shredded her skirt, but she ran. Ignoring the shouts rising from the camp, barely audible through her own heartbeat pounding in her ears. Another howl rent the night, this one closer—far too close. She slapped a hand over her mouth to keep from screaming and pressed her speed.

On the trail ahead, a fallen tree blocked the path. Vaguely, Avery was aware of where she was—that this was the tree that had fallen in the storm. The tree on the trail where she’d first met Cricket, who had been chased to the camp by a monster.

By Troy.

But the only clear thought in her mind was the memory of a splintered hollow cloaked in shadow and shrouded in the scent of decaying oak. She scrambled over the trunk, slipping down the other side. Splinters and bark flayed her palms, and another howl had her scuttling into the hollowed trunk, hugging her knees and biting her arm. Listening for any footstep, any hint of where Troy was, how far away he was.

Where is he? She rocked in place, too afraid to close her eyes. Where is he where is he where is he?

23

Cricket

Lavender and wintergreen hung heavy in the humid air, choking Cricket with each rasping, sawing breath. She pulled the neck of her shirt up, attempting to filter the perfumed musk through the fabric, and followed the scent along Elkwater Run.

It had grown stronger as she descended the last ridge, and once she hit the creek feeding into the larger stream running through the camp, the stench became unbearable.

A chorus of howls rose over her harsh breathing, bleeding through the thick night and pushing Cricket onward. Fury drove her every step, powering her through the ache in her legs and the blinding pain in her ankle.

She dropped into a creek and waded through calf-deep waters cold enough to help her forget the pain, but all too soon, she was clamoring out the other side, hands slipping on mossy roots and dislodging loose stones.

She was never going to run after this. Hells, she would be lucky even to be able to, and if she could, she would never run again for pleasure, that was damn sure. Easing into a jog, she clenched her jaw so hard she thought her teeth might crack. The ache in her legs she could deal with. The sharp twang and pinch of strained muscle and tendon she could ignore. But her hoof …

Gods, she wanted to ignore it, but it was all she could think about. If she thought about Avery and what those howls meant, she would start panicking, and then she’d start crying, and then she’d be useless. But if she thought about the pain—about the wicked snap she’d felt after falling on the western face of Barton Knob, the sound of it like dry twigs snapping in half; if she thought about the feel of splinters driving into the pad of her hoof, she could keep going.

Her hoof was going to slough off, that much she knew. An injury like that? No way it hadn’t damaged the tissue underneath. Until it regrew, she’d be stuck with that damn crutch again, hobbling around the camp or Green Bank or wherever she ended up. But until it sloughed off, she could press through the pain, let it stoke her anger, and fuel her body enough to get to Avery.

She leapt over a gully. Her good hoof landed in an unseen divot on the other side and, arms flailing, she tumbled and hit the ground, tucking somewhat into a roll. Her shoulder hit a rock, ivy tangled around her legs, and she crashed against a tree stump. Bark and leaves tumbled around her. She lay in a daze, blinking away the sting in her eyes.

Get up.

Gods, she was so close, and the scent was so strong.

Get the hells up.

Lavender and wintergreen, the musk of male. Close enough, heady enough, that when she rolled onto her side and pressed her hand to the forest floor she could taste the Georgia Man on her tongue.

You’re so damned close. Get. Up.

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