Page 8 of The Tree of Spirits
“Don’t worry. We’ll save Marlow.” I massaged my pulsing, pounding temples. “Lead the way.”
She brought me deeper into the forest, down a trail overgrown with branches and weeds and far, far too many spiderwebs.
And then I saw the blood. So much blood. Crimson drops dripped from the leaves. Bloody footprints stained the cracked ground.
There was so much of it that I didn’t even need Wolf’s guidance anymore. All I had to do was follow the trail of blood.
CHAPTER 3
IT'S WHAT HEROES DO
Wolf trotted along beside me. Her dark ears drooped with melancholy. Her sharp eyes shone with determination.
“We’re going to find Marlow,” I told the dog. “We’re going to save him.”
She let out a gruff bark in response.
Caution compelled me to pause at the edge of the woods, and it was a good thing that I did. Something sinister lay past the hidden safety of the trees. It looked like a military base.
A sturdy fence formed a tight circle around the compound. Another fence, larger and further out, surrounded the field just beyond the compound. The grassy area in between the two fences was large enough for a few cows, but there weren’t any animals that I could see. It was empty, a kind of no man’s land.
What I did see were seven—no, make that eight—armed men inside the compound, all dressed entirely in black, their faces masked.
“They’re not Watchers,” I whispered to Wolf.
She gave her head an inquisitive tilt to the side.
“The uniforms are all wrong,” I explained. “They look cheaper, less bulletproof than the Watchers’ uniforms. And they’re missing the finer details.”
Wolf barked.
“Shhh,” I hissed at her. “We need to be stealthy.”
Her next bark was quieter, almost a whisper, so I guess she’d understood.
“Is Marlow in there?”
Wolf whispered another bark.
“And those people, those men in black, they took him?”
She whimpered.
“They hurt him?”
She growled.
“We’re going to get him out of there,” I promised her.
Wolf’s ears perked up. She took a step forward.
“Wait.” I cut her off before she left the cover of the woods. “Not like that. It’s not safe. Those men aren’t the only ones guarding the gate.”
My eyes had just caught a flicker of movement. Large, lumbering bodies were bumbling around, trapped inside the no man’s land between the two fences. The first two had just come into view. My gaze traced the black, tattoo-like veins on their pale skin. Their beast-like bodies. Their blood-red eyes.
“Cursed Ones.” I released the breath I’d been holding. “But what are they doing?”
“Guarding the compound.”
