Fire Touched (Mercy Thompson 9)

He paused, this time looking down at the path we were on. He turned a little to the left, a steeper climb. “Never follow a path while you’re in Underhill,” he told me. “The only things here that make a path are things you don’t want to meet.”

The hill was steeper than it had been, steeper than it looked.

“He talked to me about it first,” Aiden said. “But I didn’t believe him. Underhill was just where we were—like Caledonia or Ulster, right? Willy could make up things, too—he was the best storyteller. I thought he was making up a story right up until he died and proved himself right.”

For all that he’d said it was a long time ago, Aiden’s breath was shaky. “Underhill can’t kill, not directly. But if she wants you dead, you die. Sometimes quickly but usually slower. She can’t feel pain, so it fascinates her.”

A cold wind blew down my neck just then. “Aiden,” I said, “we’re on a path again.”

We walked—and now Aiden wasn’t the only one who could feel something following us. I felt as though if I turned around, I would see someone. When I did, there was no one there—except the ghosts.

Underhill was a haunted land. Most ghosts I’ve been around—and I’ve been around a lot of them—haunt places where people might be found. Churches, homes, stores—places like that. The ghosts that I’d been seeing were tucked into hollows under trees and hiding under branches. All of them were children. One of them had been following us since Aiden had started talking about the children he used to run around with. I wish I could believe that it was the ghost who was watching us—but his regard felt desperate, as if he thought we might be able to save him.

The watcher who made my shoulders itch, that one was not desperate, just . . . predatory.

But the ghost was worrisome, too.

“I think it might be smarter not to talk about dead friends while we are here,” I told Aiden. “Can you tell how much farther?”

“Not far,” he said. “But I thought that was Underhill watching us, and it wasn’t. I think we should move faster.”

He broke into a jog that I kept up with easily—one thing I do very well is run. I could have maintained that pace for hours. Knowing that Adam was behind us was the only thing that kept me from looking.

Normally, running is the last thing I would do when I thought we were being pursued. But Aiden had survived this place for a very long time, and he was, as Jesse said, our guide.

We topped the rise and found ourselves on a flat, broad plain with waist-high grass. The wind whipped through the grass and sent the few stray hairs that had escaped my braiding this morning straight into my eyes. A huge old tree stood in the middle of the plain, and about thirty feet up the thick trunk, there was a tree house perched where the trunk split into three.

“Run,” shouted Aiden, heading for the tree at full speed.

Adam hesitated, looking behind us—but there was only the endless plain. If there was something hidden in the grass, the wind disguised its passage.

“Don’t ignore your experts,” I told Adam. “Run.”

I bolted, catching up to Aiden in ten strides. The kid could run—but I could run, too, and my legs were longer. Beside me, Adam followed at an easy lope.

Aiden ran like a sprinter, head back, arms and legs pumping as fast as he could. Ahead of us, I could see that, though there were hand- and footholds carved into the side of the tree, the first ten feet were smooth.

“I’m going to go ahead,” I told Aiden. “When I get to the tree, I’m going to make a foot pocket of my hands. I want you to step into it, and I’ll toss you up.”

He nodded, and I threw myself forward, imitating Aiden’s very good technique. Adam stayed with Aiden. I spun when I reached the tree, letting the trunk on my back eat up the excess momentum. I laced my fingers, and Aiden, not slowing a bit, stuck his boot in my hands and I tossed him up. He landed on the tree like a spider monkey and scrambled up.

Adam braced on his hind legs, and I put one foot on his chest and used that as a step stool to get my hands up high enough, and I climbed as quickly as I could, because Adam wasn’t going to start up until I was all the way.

Aiden waited on the crude little porch in front of the tree house, his back against the wall, breathing hard through his mouth, sweat dampening his shirt. He smelled like fear.

“Come on, come on, come up,” he chanted. “What’s taking him so long?”

“I’m up,” I shouted, scuttling over the edge of the porch on all fours.

With the howl of the hunt in his throat, Adam sank his claws into the trunk and climbed the tree with the grace of a jaguar. Werewolf shoulders are built more like those of a bear or a cat. It meant that they were excellent climbers.

Aiden opened the door of the house and waved his hand at me. There wasn’t room on the porch for all three of us, so I wasted no time getting inside. Adam came in after me and Aiden after him, shutting the door firmly and locking it.

Something hit the tree and rocked it.

“You lost,” Aiden yelled. “Go about your business.”

Something roared, and I had the feeling that my ears weren’t picking up the whole thing—as if some of that roar wasn’t just sound. Skittering sounds came from the walls and the ceiling. There were no windows in the tree house and part of me was grateful. Whatever was making that noise sounded like a thousand rats or something with a thousand legs. Most of me hated hearing a threat I could not see.