Page 63 of The Broken Aztec Princesses

I paused, unsure if I should keep going, but the idea that a baby might be in trouble wasn’t letting me give in to my fears. I finally pushed into a small clearing and gasped. Near the end of the clearing was a snow-white rabbit covered in blood. The cries coming from it as I approached confirmed the rabbit to be the source of the noise I followed.

I picked it up and cradled it to me. The poor thing panicked until it realized I was trying to help. It went still as I checked it over to see where the injury was. There were a couple of double punctures through its body, as if it was poked with a BBQ fork. A few of them were torn into bigger scratches, being the source of most of the blood.

‘Violet, where are you?’Chris’ voice pushed through the mind-link.

‘In the forest. There was a noise and—’A sudden rustling from behind startled me, and I squeaked. Shockingly, my shield slammed down very quickly.

“You shouldn’t be out here, Violet. There’s something in the woods.” Elim came out of the shadows and I relaxed a smidgen. But only a tiny bit, because didn’t vampires have fangs and leave BBQ fork indentations in their victims?

Yet the rabbit in my hands didn’t react in panic to him so I was hoping that meant he wasn’t who hurt it.

“What do you mean?”

“Something I’ve never seen before ran south when it heard you coming near. I was tracking it, but it’s so damn fast. I was afraid it turned around and came back for you.”

“Oh. I’m okay. Thank you for coming to check on me.” I answered, hoping he didn’t see the small blush I could feel on my cheeks.

“Is the rabbit okay? I can put it out of its misery,” he stated, coming closer to take the rabbit from me, but he hit my shield with some confusion.

The rabbit started squirming when Elim started feeling the edges of it, as if knowing he was coming to end its life. I considered lowering the shield, but this was the first time it’d stayed and I didn’t really know him very well. I also didn’t want him to kill the rabbit.

“What is this?” he asked.

“My shield. It’s a gift I have,” I explained.

“Neat,” he smiled, stepping back, and not taking offense. “Are you not afraid of the germs?” he asked, looking at the rabbit.

“Germs?” I asked.

“You said you were a germaphobe.”

Right, Bells’ lie this morning. I felt my face heat, and was trying to think of an explanation when a roar startled us both from the side. Titan jumped toward me, to protect me I was sure, but the shield was still in place and he collided with it, bouncing off it like he’d jumped on a trampoline. The poor wolf landed afew feet away with a yelp, but he scrambled up and ran to me regardless.

I knew it wasn’t supposed to be funny, but seeing Titan’s face being squished against my shield and knowing he hadn’t gotten grievously injured sent me into a fit of giggles. I lowered my shield as he approached more cautiously, growling lowly at Elim. Elim took a step back with his hands in the air, but he was trying his hardest not to laugh at Titan, too.

‘Are you okay? Why couldn’t I link you?’Chris asked as Titan checked me over for injuries, sniffing and huffing at the rabbit in my arms, which began to squirm as he got near.

‘I’m okay. Elim startled me and my shield came down. I have to remember to lower my mind-link block to use it, but it’d been so long since it worked that I didn’t even think about it,’I explained.

It worked a lot like Areli’s invisibility, except her scent also disappeared with her. Seeing that I was okay, Titan walked over to the nearest tree that contained tearaway clothes and he shifted back to human.

“What the hell were you thinking? It’s the middle of the night and you ran into the woods after a noise? What if you’d gotten hurt?” Chris yelled at me after he pulled on a pair of shorts.

Only the panic in his eyes kept me from slamming the shield back down to keep him from reaching me, but my jaw dropped at the fury in his voice.

“I tried to get you to come investigate, but you were too busy getting straddled by the women in the gym.” I glared back at him.

“You shouldn’t run off by yourself. Not many here know you, Violet. What if they thought you were a rogue or an intruder?” He counterargued, but I could see he’d lost a little steam at my accusation.

“There’s something in the woods, too. You definitely shouldn’t run in here alone. What are you doing up this early in the morning anyway?” Elim added, agreeing with Chris’ assessment.

“We were training,” I answered somewhat snappish because he’d agreed with Chris.

“At this hour?”

“I can’t be around people. This is the only way to train without the training area being crowded.”

“You always train at this time?” Elim asked.

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