Page 232 of Shadowblood Souls
When I spot the gleam of the flashlight again, we’re only a couple of blocks away. The figure holding it is beyond our view.
We creep closer with even more care. My ears pick up the scrape of footsteps moving away from us down the cross-street.
Andreas stops me with a hand on my shoulder. “Let me take a look,” he says under his breath.
He vanishes from view, as neat a trick as the way the shadowkind can merge into the shadows. I wait in a darkened doorway, grappling with my impatience, as he must venture after our potential targets in his invisible state.
A minute later, he reappears next to me.
“It’s them. Some of them. I counted seven, spread out along the street, but one guy talked into a radio, so they’re in contact with others. They’re patrolling, looking into all the buildings.”
Satisfaction sweeps through me. “Good. Then we’ll just have to give them some bait.”
They think we’re in hiding, on the run from them. That we’re too scared to face them head on.
The truth is, we just needed a chance to turn the tables and get the upper hand.
I backtrack, seeking out an ideal site for our ambush. After prowling up and down a few streets, I come across a parking lot behind a bar that’s closed for the night.
The backs of the surrounding buildings close off the rectangular space, the only entrance and exit a short lane onto the street. The bar itself has a rear second-story patio with a thick stone wall undulating along its border.
Now we just need to lure the bastards here.
I motion to the patio above us. “Get up there and wait for me. I’ll bring them around. We want to gather as many of them as possible before I start taking them out. Once they’re in, if they look like they’re aiming to leave, flood their heads with enough memories to keep them confused.”
Andreas nods and reaches for a window ledge to help him scale the lower part of the building.
The training the guardians put us through wasn’t a total waste. I hope someday they find out we put it to use cutting down monster-hunters rather than monsters.
I slip out of the parking lot and glance up and down the nearest street. There’s no sign of our targets, but I know they aren’t far from here.
I train my attention on a statue fixed to the roof of a building on the corner. With a shove of my power, it cracks off its ledge and plummets to the ground.
The cracking thud of the stone form hitting the pavement echoes through the night. I pull back into the mouth of the lane and watch.
It’s less than a minute before footsteps pound close enough for me to hear. Several uniformed figures charge into view down the street.
They gather around the fallen statue, glancing from it to the roof with tensed poses and guns in hand. One of them has something that looks like a glittering net slung over his shoulder, whatever the hell that’s for.
Definitely not normal soldiers. I have a sneaking suspicion that those shiny bullets they fired at us—and into us—were made out of silver, not lead.
The hunters fan out again to search the street. One of them speaks into his walkie talkie.
Good. Bring more of them this way.
With a nudge of my ability, I send an empty pop can rattling across the sidewalk just a few feet from where I’m standing.
The nearest figures jerk around. I let out a curse I muffle badly and take off down the lane, deliberately letting my shoes smack the asphalt harder than they need to.
Hushed hollers pass between the hunters. They rush after me, the sound of their pursuit mingled with more crackling of radio static as they call for backup.
That’s right. Let’s get everyone together now.
Every murderous prick who nearly slaughtered the woman I would die for.
I sprint into the parking lot and throw myself toward the patio using the same route Andreas took. He bobs up from behind the surrounding wall to give me a hand up.
We duck down again behind the jutting chunks of stone just as the first men race into the parking lot in pursuit.
