Due to her ability to merge with any organic and biological network, Camellia was completely tuned to the entire area she claimed. When she couldn’t find a hidden threat, she expanded her search, using the mycelium beneath the ground to see outside her garden. She found the men camping. There were two of them. Hadn’t the owls and wolves reported three men?
Camellia puzzled over that discrepancy. She couldn’t reach out to any of her sentries because if she was right, and one of Whitney’s supersoldiers was close, he might feel the surge in energy that accompanied her “talking” to the owls or wolves. It wasn’t really speaking, more like pushing images into their heads, but she had established herself as the nucleus in a vast network of communication in the forest, and the creatures were used to interacting with her.
She needed to get close to those two men and ascertain if they were enhanced—if they were Whitney’s supersoldiers come to take her back—or if they were innocent hikers or hunters. It was impossible to tell from this distance. Moving meant possible detection. She considered the risks. Perhaps it would be better to move the mycelium closer to the surface right beneath them. The underground network could give her a better feel of their energy. Making up her mind, she tapped into the natural grid and sent the command.
She was very aware of the two men sitting close to the fire. She knew one was feeling ill and drinking water continually. The other man was looking after him and acting as a sentry, occasionally getting up to peer over the rocks surrounding them to ensure they were safe from any wild animals. Although they were close to the fire, they weren’t facing it directly. Just that small detail made her uneasy. A trained soldier would know not to look directly into flames at night if they wanted to keep their vision.
Her uneasiness increased without warning. Why? Both men rose and moved to the rocks, sitting on them, rather than on the ground. The taller of the two wrapped a blanket of some kind around the sick one and then faced out toward the forest alertly. Was that what made her so uneasy? She took a deep breath, inhaling the scents around her. The air was free of fragrance, giving her the ability to smell an intruder if he was close.
There was nothing but the fresh scent of the forest, the soil and exotic flowers she was familiar with and could catalog. Juniper? Cedar? She inhaled again to see if she could actually isolate those two scents and track them outside or inside her garden. The red cedar was common in the forest, but she’d never really isolated that scent. And juniper? Spruce? There were spruce trees. Why were the tree scents so much more prominent to her all of a sudden? Was it because she’d brought the mycelium so much closer to the surface and it was connected to the trees, trees she was unable to see?
She frowned, trying to puzzle out what she was missing. It was strange that her mind didn’t want to leave the puzzle of the tree scents. She found the faint aroma exhilarating, almost intoxicating. It was as if the scent seemed to sizzle along her nerve endings. That was weird, because it wasn’t moving along the network so much as actually affecting her body’s nerve endings. Still, she had discipline, and she forced her mind back to the puzzle of the two men camping in the circle of boulders.
They had been sitting quietly near their fire, both on the ground until she had given the command to the mycelium network to come up closer to the surface where she could read the two men. They had moved right after she gave the order. Directly after. Within moments. Almost as if they heard it. Was that even possible?
Camellia replayed the moment in her head. She had a good memory, and she stored data like a computer might. The taller one was restless, but he didn’t appear to be tuned to the network. He seemed as if he was looking into the forest for anything that might be threatening them. The other man, the sick one, had his head down. Both had reacted at the same time just after she had issued her command to the mycelium, the sick one coming to his feet and the taller man turning immediately to help him get on the boulder. Their movements were coordinated. Smooth. Too smooth. That sent up another red flag. Icy fingers of dread raked down her spine.
Neither looked as if they had tapped into her networks, but something had tipped them off to get off the ground. She was absolutely certain of it. That meant . . . Her breath caught in her throat. She did her best not to react. That had to mean she wasn’t alone on her own network. Someone else, the man hunting her, the man smelling so faintly of juniper and spruce, had tapped into both her networks. It was the only way he could have known to warn them. If he was inside her garden, it meant he was capable of being part of the Middlemist Red Camellia network. So much a part of it that he wouldn’t raise alarms.
She didn’t think Whitney had access to the plant. She’d taken the one from his laboratory, and there just weren’t dozens of others lying around. There was a specimen in London, in the Duke’s conservatory, and the other in New Zealand, but would Whitney risk an international incident to steal a plant from either location?
Oh, dear God. Fear clawed at her throat. At her lungs. Would Whitney truly risk an international incident? He was an evil bastard who bought orphan girls to torture and use like lab rats. He’d planned to breed them like livestock. What wouldn’t he risk to get his experiments back?
For a moment she couldn’t breathe. If he had enhanced one of his supersoldiers with the Middlemist Red, that meant the soldier could be right there in her garden with her and she wouldn’t be able to detect his presence.
Camellia tried desperately to calm down so she could think. She had always known it was possible—even probable—that she would be found. She just thought it would be much later. Much, much later. She had an escape plan. More than one. But none of those plans had included escaping from someone with the same talents she possessed. That didn’t mean she couldn’t use what was already in place. She might have to modify a few steps, but she’d always been flexible. And she’d always been lethal. Unlike some of the others, she had no problem defending herself or any innocent.
It was possible she could use the two men sitting on the boulders to distract the hunter. He had warned them. She hadn’t seen a lot of real camaraderie among Whitney’s supersoldiers, but that didn’t mean that one or two of them couldn’t actually feel real loyalty for one another. It seemed as if the tall man cared for the sicker one. She had cultivated weapons from the fungi to aid her should she need them. She would hate to use them so soon and tip her hand, but this might be her only chance to get away.
She knew the hunter had no more idea where she was than she knew where he was. He was a phantom, concealing himself in the mist. She was the same. She didn’t dare move now. She remained very still, but she inhaled and exhaled, keeping her breath steady, her heartbeat matching that of the earth. Very softly she initiated a slight tremor in the ground just under the rocks where the two men were seated, throwing them sideways.
You hurt my friends, Jeff will burn down your garden and everything in it.
His voice was low, a sound that moved in her mind so intimately, stroking like a caress on her skin when it should have been an abrasive intrusion. While the words were a clear threat, the delivery and tone made her shiver, igniting every nerve ending in her body. That voice poured into her the way water and energy filled the Middlemist Red’s vein and carried energy and nutrients throughout the plant wherever it was needed. She needed. She’d been empty until that voice filled her.