Page 41 of Coerced

“Okay, Jax, thank him and let him go,” I said.

“Raise your hand over your head so he can flap his wings for take off.”

I did that and waited a few seconds, but the bird didn’t move. I looked over at Jax, who shrugged.

“I released him. He’s staying on his own accord now.”

The bird turned its head and looked me dead in the eye. We stared at each other for a full minute before the falcon blinked and made a squeaky call.

“Uh, are you gonna be here long?” I asked, and the others laughed.

“Hold up!” Jax said. “He wants to know if you’re going to get rid of the bad ones further up the mountain. He doesn’t like them because they’re scaring away his prey.”

“Bad ones?” Clem and I spoke at the same time.

“Hellhounds. Lots and lots of Hellhounds. Down in a ravine.” Picking up a twig, Jax started to draw a map in the snow.

“Good. Tell him those are what we’re here for,” I said.

“Then he wishes you good hunting and asks that you leave none alive.”

I stared into the bird’s eyes again and a dark grin spread across my face.

“He understood that, Kerry.” Jax seemed amazed.

“Of course he did,” I snorted. “One predator to another.”

The falcon took off and was back in the air in seconds, and I watched as he became a smaller and smaller dot in the sky.

#

We followed Jax’s map further into the mountains. After about three miles of hiking, we came to a rocky area, and I inhaled, then followed my nose. Gemma went with me as I walked over to a wide, flat boulder and knelt next to it. She helped me brush away the vines and leaves, and we found a circle of sigilla worked into the rock face.

I recognized enough of them to know something was wrong.

“Clem?” I called.

“Yes, I see it.”

“What?” Gemma seemed to know something was up. “What’s going on?”

“This is a summoning circle, but it don’t look right. Hey, Travis!” I could see him frowning before he even reached us. “What do you think?”

“Infernal sigilla mixed with Angelic? How odd.” He started to take off his backpack. “I’ll need to work at this for a little while.”

So I called Maddy and told her to guard Travis while he looked around and we kept on the scent. She nodded, drew an arrow, and laid it across her bow string.

“I’ll catch up in a minute.” Clem took a knee by the circle, his frown intense.

I threw up a hand in acknowledgement, then led the rest on. We traveled maybe half a mile before I came to a dead stop.

“What is it?” Jax looked around the area.

“A Diabolical scent, but it’s old. Almost nothing is left now. It’s coming from over there.”

I pointed to a hillside, and we went over and looked around. It wasn’t long before Tara found a small cave. I stuck my head in and took a deep breath, then wished I hadn’t. I jerked out of there real quick.

“Yep.” I spat a couple of times, even though it didn’t really help. “Something Diabolical stayed here for a while.”

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