Page 73 of Of Nine So Bold

“Maybe the pipsqueak isn’t human after all?” one of the henchmen offered.

Norbert punched him in the gut without a word.

Shaking hard, I pushed away from the ground on arms that felt as limp as the branches of a willow tree.

The guard smirked at me. “These brutes thought you were human?” He snorted with disgust. “You should be so fucking lucky.”

Anger swirled in my gut for his bigotry and the duke’s alike. “You have no idea how lucky I am,” I gritted out.

I was a man who’d found his treluria. Who would be damned if he didn’t see her again.

And who wasnothinglike anyof these bastards mocking me simply for how I’d been born.

If that wasn’t luck, nothing was.

The guard scoffed. “That so? Well, thatluckof yours means we’ve got a special assignment for you today. You and these brutes alike.” He raised his voice so the cavern could hear. “We got approval from the warden to start clearing out the collapsed western tunnels.” His stained teeth showed when he grinned. “And the runt is going to lead the way.”

18

GWYNEIRA

Every second we crept along the road left me on edge. Casimir had taken to the air a short while ago and spotted soldiers hiding in the forest several miles beyond where the poor Huntsman finally died. But that had been ten minutes ago. They may have moved.

To say nothing about all the other threats that might be out here.

“We still good?” Clay whispered to those up ahead.

Clearly I wasn’t the only one worried.

In the lead with Casimir and Byron, Dex nodded back wordlessly. Valeria and her soldiers waited behind them, hands on the hilts of their sheathed swords, ready to draw them at a moment’s notice. We’d left the horses behind several miles ago, just in case the animals made a noise at the wrong moment, and a few of her people had stayed to keep watch over the mounts.

But of the humans, there were so many fewer than before. It pained me. My stepmother’s Huntsmen and her spell in the forest had cost ussomany allies.

At my side, Ozias reached over, putting a hand to my arm in silent comfort. I exhaled slowly, appreciating the gesture,especially since I could feel his apprehension through our connection no matter how he tried to suppress it.

My stepmother had not only done damage. She’d also created wristbands that could block Erenlian magic. And what else might she have done? She wasn’t the only vampire in the world, obviously. Had she made something that would thwart Casimir’s and my senses too? Or what about weapons against creatures like Ozias or Roan?

My heart racing, I exhaled slowly, ordering myself for the thousandth time to stay calm. Stay focused. Worry wasn’t helping anything, and I needed to concentrate if I was going to keep myself and my allies alive.

Up ahead, Dex suddenly came to a halt with a brief warning gesture.

I slowed, craning my neck to see what caused him to stop.

A dead tree stood to one side of the road, its trunk split and blackened by a long-ago lightning strike. Casimir had paused before it, and he was eying the charred wood like it might bite.

“Are you seeing this?” he asked Byron.

While the scholar bent closer, Clay called in a low voice, “What’s wrong?”

Casimir’s brow furrowed with concern. “There’s something here, tucked within the tree.” He made no move to come closer to the trunk. “It wasn’t visible from the air.”

With another brief look at Byron, he murmured something I could only barely hear, even with my heightened senses. “Huntsman knew… warned us… might alert…”

I swallowed hard, guessing the rest. Whatever was there, the Huntsman had tried to tell us about a dead tree.

Maybe he’d wanted to warn us.

At Casimir’s words, Byron made a considering sound. Crouching down, he reached for something within his bag. Icaught a glimpse of a tiny nugget of ore in a sliver of moonlight before he tossed it into the gap in the split tree trunk.

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