“A village?” Nira repeated. “Which way?”
“The way we’ve been heading,” Ava answered. “Can’t be more than four miles.”
“We’re nearly there,” Nira said with a grin. “I’ll bet you they—”
I held up my hand to quiet her, and she stopped short. Something wasn’t right… “Ava,” I whispered, suddenly tense, “did you see anything else while you were up there?” Even Haunt knew it, because she finally rose from where she’d been sleeping, and sauntered over to us with her head down and her one ear shifting with caution. “Something big?”
There was a heartbeat out there in the woods. I could feel it, and it was huge.
“Dragon big?” Rhien asked, eyes wide as she scanned the empty forest.
I shook my head, because it wasn’t quite that big, and focused on the direction of the pulse while I grabbed the dagger from my waist. Nira took the hint and untied her bow from her saddle, while Ava did the same and drew her sword. Haunt let out a rumbling growl as the beating got closer, and the horses shifted with fright, but there was no sound in the woods—not the crunch of a footstep that there should be from something so large, not a warning sound from a bird. In fact, it had grown so eerily silent that I could hear all six heartbeats. Four were thudding with fear, one was familiar and deep, and one was slow and steady and powerful. Whatever was out there, it was too large to risk fighting.
“Mount up,” I breathed.
No sooner had we reached for our saddles than there was a deafening roar, and the biggest bear I’d ever seen came crashing out of the foliage, stopping thirty feet away to rise onto its hind legs and roar again. It was no shorter than ten feet, with teeth the size of my longest finger and claws twice that, and our horses took off faster than I could blink.
“Stop!” I shouted at the animal, but though that splitting crack went down the front of my skull, the bear let out such a furious rumble that it shook the ground beneath my feet. I couldn’t control it, and my face paled.
“RUN!” Nira screamed, fitting an arrow into her bow and letting it fly, immediately turning to sprint.
Ava and Rhien ran after her as the arrow pierced the bear’s shoulder, but it was so large that all that seemed to do was make it angrier. I wasn’t waiting around to get mauled. I knew it was stupid, I knew we could never outrun a bear, but I turned and sprinted as fast as my legs would carry me, hearing the crashing of paws behind me. Haunt was at my side, and though she could’ve passed me easily if she’d wanted to, she matched me pace for pace.
But the bear was right on our heels, and getting closer. A split moment later, Haunt pivoted around to meet the beast face to face, with such momentum that she slid backward through the dirt before getting the leverage to spring. She launched forward, just missing the swipe of a massive paw and sinking her teeth into the side of the bear’s neck. I skidded to a halt. I couldn’t leave her.
“Kiena!” Ava shouted from up ahead.
Before she could even stop, I commanded, “Keep running!” And though I could see the reluctance on her face, she obeyed.
The bear was whipping side to side to try and fling Haunt off of it, and the next swing of its upper body threw her into the nearest tree. I spark jumped before the bear could turn on her, landing directly on top of it. It felt the weight of me and reared, and I managed to slam my spark-filled hand down onto its back before I plummeted off and to the ground. The beast wheeled on me, twitching as the sparks shot through it, but it was far too large for the amount to have been fatal. It raised one massive paw, preparing to strike me when Haunt leapt through the air.
She clamped down on the bear’s arm, and it snarled as it raised its paw high into the air, bringing it down with as much force as it could. As it slammed Haunt into the earth, I spark jumped again, landing behind the beast and grabbing its leg with both hands. I sent out as much lightning as I possibly could, and though the bear roared and trembled with convulsions that should’ve killed it, it stayed standing. It turned on me with a heavy swipe that caught the back of my armored shoulder, throwing me six feet sideways so that I hit the ground hard.
Just before it could charge at me again, Haunt recovered. As she landed on the bear’s back and began tearing into it with her teeth, I stood, and I sprinted after where my companions had disappeared. There was a yelp from behind me, but I could no longer stop to check on Haunt. If my magic couldn’t kill this beast, then I didn’t know what could. I flew over the dirt, hearing the thunder of the bear’s paws pick up after me, but I couldn’t see Ava and Nira and Rhien. I didn’t know where they’d gone.
I was about to call out for them, to beg for help or tell them to get as far away as they could, when Rhien popped out from behind a tree. She grabbed me by the neck of my armor and whipped me sideways, throwing me back to pin me against the trunk. “Gidreshnap,” she muttered with an intense look of focus, and then she pressed her finger to her mouth, telling me to be silent. It was nearly impossible with the crashing that got closer and closer, and I almost screamed when the bear slid to a stop right at our side. The last place it had seen us.
I could see Nira and Ava on the other side of it, backs to a tree just like I was, but the bear couldn’t see them. Or us. It was huffing and panting, each breath carrying the low rumble of a growl. It was only two feet away, close enough to reach out and touch, but whatever Rhien had done, she’d made us invisible to it. I couldn’t resist waving one hand to test it out, but she caught my hand in mid air and froze, making us both so still that she barely managed to shake her head at me in warning.
The bear’s head turned toward us, as if I’d almost alerted it to our presence. It sniffed the air, leaning forward and getting so near that I could feel the warmth of its breath, and the breeze of it tickled my hair against my neck. It stood back on its hind legs, letting out another deafening roar that made me close my eyes with a terrified wince.
“Lost them?” called a male voice.
I opened my eyes to see a man running toward the bear, but no sooner had he spoken than the bear began to shrink. It changed just as Ava had only minutes before, until a large man with dark brown hair and piercing green eyes was standing in its place. He was a shapeshifter, and they both appeared to be about our age.
As the second man, with light brown hair and brown eyes, reached him, he grabbed at the arrow Nira had put in his shoulder, grunting as he ripped it out. “They shot me,” he growled. There were other tears in his tunic, and wounds where Haunt had bitten him.
“I’d have shot you too,” laughed the other one. “Come bursting out of the woods like you did. No tact.”
“They’ve got magic,” said the bear man, pulling off his shirt to examine the rips and holes. “We should head back and grab some of the others.”
But now that he’d taken his shirt off, I couldn’t keep from staring at his chest. At the dragon pendant dangling there from the chain around his neck. It was made of the same dark metal as the one I was wearing, but the stone was a shiny black that reflected different colors every time the sun hit it. I looked at the other man, finally noticing that his pendant was hanging outside his shirt. The same dragon, but with a red gemstone curled in its tail.
As they turned to leave, I reached up and pulled my own necklace over my head, holding it out even though Rhien tried to stop me. “Wait!” I shouted. It broke the spell, and the men turned, one lighting a flame in his hand while the other looked ready to turn back into a bear. Haunt recovered and reached us at the same time, and bounded in front of me, baring her teeth. “Wait,” I pleaded, gesturing at them with the hand I was holding my necklace in. “Haunt, stop.”