Annie Hayden's Arc

Chapter 16 of 27

The stranger was gone, but his warning stayed. Annie sat by the small fire and fed it kindling. Kaelen dug through the saddlebags on the stag. He pulled out a rough wool blanket and draped it over her shoulders. Then he spread two more on the cave floor for sleeping. He turned back to the bags and searched for food, his jaw tight, his eyes down. "Who was that?" Annie asked. Kaelen said nothing. He would not look at her. He kept his hands busy in the bag. "Kaelen, who was that? And what was he talking about?" "Keep your voice low," he snapped. "Too many things know we're here already." Annie set her jaw. She had driven off that hunter herself, without burning her arm. She had earned an answer. "I held my fire against him. I didn't ask you to save me. So talk." Kaelen stopped digging. He sat back on his heels. The firelight caught the dark crystal on his forehead. For a long moment he only watched the flames. Then he spoke, low and flat. "His name is Vael Shadowmere. He's a scout. He finds warm things and marks them for his master." "What master?" "I don't know his name. No one does." Kaelen's voice dropped further. "But I know what he collects. Bonded creatures. Firefoxes, ice-stags, panthers with sense in their eyes. He takes the beast and cages the soul tied to it." He looked at the fox curled against Annie's leg. "You're carrying exactly what he wants. A firefox and a warm girl who feeds it. That's why they're hunting you. Not the flower. You." Annie's stomach turned cold. "Then this whole time. The panther. Vael. It was never random." "No." Kaelen met her eyes at last. "My father hunted these creatures for a hundred years. He knows the master's trade better than anyone alive. If anyone can shield you, it's him. That's why I brought you to him. Not just for training." Annie pulled the blanket tighter. The pieces fit now, and she hated the shape they made. She was not a lost human stumbling through a strange forest. She was prey with a price on her, chosen the moment the fox bonded to her. "Then I can't wait for the storm," she said. "I need that vessel. I need to be strong enough that no master wants to cage me." Kaelen nodded slowly. "At first light, we climb. We show my father the book. And we tell him about Vael." Annie looked into the fire. Yesterday her goal was to spare the fox's life. Now it was larger and harder. She had a hunter's master to outgrow, and only borrowed magic to do it with. She lay down on the blanket and did not sleep. She listened to the wind and counted the hours until she could climb.