I blinked and found myself staring at the foggy woods as I listened to the conversation like my head was under water. I didn’t know what the hell was happening to me. Why was my head foggy and spinning?
“I will stay with them,” Hlíf said softly.
“Where will we take them to stay until we come back? We can’t separate again. The more of us with the females, the safer they are. And where the hell do we start with hunting down the fuckers?” Slátra said.
“We’rewomen, not females,” Harper huffed.
“Women. Females. It’s the same thing,” Slátra said, holding an eye roll if I’d ever heard one.
“I can protect them on my own. I may be recovering, but I’m not weak like a child,” Rune said, annoyed.
I blinked when I thought I saw a shadow moving between two trees, but when I squinted my eyes, I didn’t see it anymore. It was one of those tricks again that my mind did in the dark.
But my gut told me it wasn’t a trick and something was out there.
Shadows.
Something about shadows was important. It was at the tip of my tongue and itched my brain, but I couldn’t think what it was.
A question popped into my head that went back to their discussion about who was after me. I drew my eyebrows together and looked at Hegnan.
“How do they know it’s me?” I asked, staring at Hegnan. When he glanced at me over his shoulder, he drew his eyebrows together. Everyone went silent, trying to follow my off-topic question. I turned to Rekja, who had his hood up hiding his face. He’d been quiet the whole time, and I assumed he wasn’t a talker. But when I looked at him, I felt the weight of his eyes on me. “Are they passing around posters or flyers of what I look like so they all know who they’re looking for?”
It was silent except for the sounds of the night and huffs of the horses. I didn’t look away from Rekja as I waited for his answer. I’d always gotten the feeling his eyes were sharp and never missed anything, and I was sure he didn’t miss the nervous, quick shift of my eyes away from him before I looked back at him. The weight of his stare unsettled me because it was like he could see everything.
“They have a copy of a picture of you they hang everywhere that’s on parchment. Mainly in the taverns the wrong crowds go to,” he answered, his voice smooth, and his accent thick like the others.
My breath shuddered out of me.
They had posters of me like I was an outlaw in the Wild West.
How did they get a picture of me without me knowing?
My face fell while my heart raced until it became painful. When I raised my eyes back to Rekja’s hooded face, he gave me a slight nod, like he knew what conclusion I came to.
The person who broke into my apartment had taken a picture of me that I didn’t realize was missing. It was so simple and small. Something that blended in with everything else and I didn’t ever pay attention to.
I turned forward and glanced around, catching Rune watching me with his eyebrows drawn. I lowered my gaze, ashamed and so embarrassed.
I was so stupid. I should’ve told him when I had thought about it that morning. It was my fault. It was all my fault. If I had told him, it could’ve saved lives.
“Do we stay here and hunt, or do we go somewhere that’s safer for the females?” Hegnan asked, starting up the conversation again where I had interrupted.
Slátra made a noise at the back of his throat in protest. “We stay,” he groaned.
“I don’t know about you guys, but I’m good with going somewhere safe rather than being dragged along for a fight that could end up badly,” Harper chipped in.
I blinked and glanced at Rune, who had a faraway look. He needed to sleep. I felt awful that he had to ride his horse while still recovering with little to no sleep. Our link was still blocked as he refused to let me feel whatever he was feeling. I knew deep in my bones whatever he was going through was a lot, and it was bad.
Something from the woods grabbed my attention. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. It raised the little hairs on the back of my neck and made my stomach and chest tight until it was hard to breathe.
There was something or someone there watching me. It wasn’t just my imagination and my eyes playing tricks. I couldn’t see it yet, but I knew it was there.
I bunched my eyebrows together and parted my lips as I struggled for a breath. I couldn’t look away from a spot, and in that same moment, the horses snorted and growled as they sidestepped away from the woods.
The men called for their horses to calm, and I barely heard Harper as she made a comment about how we didn’t have to look for trouble because it found us. Rune called out to me, sounding far away as I hyper focused on the one spot where I knew someone was but couldn’t see them.
Fog thickened quicker than normal, making the creepy woods scarier and more ominous. The way the tendrils snaked out reminded me of a horror movie.
