The Sacrifice

He thought Lenore was something special.

He thought she might have been the one we had been waiting for.

He thought she was our only hope.

And now she was gone.

Fuck.

I tore up the stairs as well, finding the others gathered around, casting anxious glances at our leader as he paced, the change flickering in and out in its intensity, something wild to see.

"Aram and I will take off on our bikes, track the roads," Red suggested, ready to spring into action.

"It rained," I murmured, looking out at the droplets on the windows.

"We will go to the coven," Drex added. "Get another one."

"It rained," I said again, getting ignored. "Hey!" I yelled, making Ace turn, pinning me with his red eyes. "Ace, it rained," I told him, trying to make him understand, not sure how rational he was being in the moment. "Just around this area. Remember? On the way in, it was dry except down this street. She made it rain. She's somewhere and she was upset about it. It has to be the woods," I added, looking out the darkened back window.

"Go," Ace demanded, back to pacing.

I didn't need more than that.

I turned and I was running, vaguely aware of Minos breaking into the woods about the same time I did, but the two of us taking off in different directions.

I didn't think she ran away, not really.

She didn't want to have another member of her coven have to take her place because she was a chickenshit. Knowing her, she got a wild hair, and wanted to take a walk in the woods to remind herself of her home. And then she got lost. Or hurt.

Fuck.

Why was there an aching sensation in my chest at the idea of the latter?

It shouldn't have mattered to me if she was lost in the woods and wounded. If anything, it would have made her easier to find.

But it mattered.

I cared.

My heart was thudding against my ribcage at the idea of her being prone, and some predator coming upon her. Bear were especially ravenous this time of year, gearing up for hibernation. And while black bears didn't typically eat humans, you never really knew, did you?

I stopped a few yards into the woods, closing my eyes, taking a deep breath, allowing the anger at myself, at this situation, at something potentially happening to her overtake me.

The Change came upon me faster than ever before, horns tearing through my temples, talons shooting through my fingertips. My senses honed in, making the dark woods seem brighter, the sounds crisper, the scents sharper.

Inhaling deep, I found the lingering traces of ripe fruit, a smell I knew only belonged to Lenore.

Then I was running.

Following the creek at first, then inexplicably going uphill.

Where she thought she was going, I had no idea. I didn't pretend to understand witches. Maybe she had some kind of sixth sense about an animal in danger, or some fucking herb was growing wild that she wanted to pick, or some other shit. Who knew.

But doing stupid shit like that would explain how she got so lost so quickly, and was upset enough to make it start raining.

Sure, she'd grown up in the woods, isolated from everything. But those were her woods. She knew the trees there, the paths home, how to find food, and water, and protection. She didn't have any of those advantages here.

And if she got hurt on top of that, that would sure explain why the ground was sopping wet, my boots slogging through slippery, thick mud as I followed the scent of her deeper and deeper into the woods.

I was faster than she would have been, taking off at a dead run, but also being longer-legged, and more powerful, but she must have been walking for hours before she came to a stop in the spot I was closing in on, her scent stronger there, though not strong enough that she was still there.

As I got closer, though, my stomach clenched hard.

Because it wasn't just the sweet scent of fruit there.

Oh, no.

There was the coppery scent of blood.

"Fuck," I hissed, pushing through the last few yards, finding a downed tree and a human-sized imprint in the mud beside it.

She'd been laying there during the rain.

And then something had made her bleed.

Night vision nowhere near as good as my day vision, even with the Change, I reached for my phone, turning on the flashlight, and looking around.

I saw nothing for a long moment.

And then...

"Fuck," I yelled, raking my hand through my hair, forgetting about the talons, feeling them ripping across my scalp. But I barely noted the pain as my mind raced, and I tried to figure out my move.

Every ounce of me wanted to follow the bloody trail, wanted to find her, save her.

But a very small, still rational part of me understood something else.