The three made their way to the stash of tools they’d placed in the knot of a tree earlier in the morning. The tools should help them mirror the tracks of a red back, a revenant and a hularna.
Clark would be the red back for this exercise and Shea would be the decoy.
“Good luck,” Shea told Clark.
“You too. Somehow I think you’re going to need it more than me.”
Her grimace said she agreed.
They each pressed the stamp in the ground and then set off in opposite directions. The sign they left would be the trackers’ first test.
“Why did you make Clark the red back?” Trenton asked as Shea left some scratches waist high on a tree.
“Who do you think they’ll assume is the real target?” Shea asked.
“You.”
“Exactly. Clark is perfect. If they try to read our foot prints, those who aren’t sure will pursue me. Those who do know how to read signs will pursue Clark.” The object of this game was to test the competitors’ knowledge and tracking skills, in addition to their endurance. Most Trateri knew how to track, it was something they were taught as children since much of their diet consisted of what they hunted. There was no way Shea and Clark would be able to completely erase their presence. This was their way of evening the odds.
Shea set off at a run, heading to the next place where she’d leave another sign. Trenton kept up with her easily. Together the two of them moved through the forest, stopping only when they needed to set the next sign. Shea alternated between the revenant’s tracks and the hularna’s. She broke off stems and bent branches, sometimes laying a false trail before backtracking.
An hour had passed before she heard the first sounds of pursuit. There was a loud curse as one of the contestants stepped into a briar patch she’d led them through. She grinned. That would teach them to pay attention to their surroundings.
She moved off at an angle from them, not wanting to be caught just yet. The game was still early and Clark hadn’t blown the horn to say he’d been caught.
“You are diabolical,” Trenton remarked after Shea left a false trail pointing into a nest of stinging thistles. The flower’s petals would leave welts and rashes on any unsuspecting victim that chose to brush against them.
Shea shared a smile with him as she backed away from the nest, careful not to brush up against any of the yellowish, green petals.
“I learned from the best.”
“This may end up backfiring on you,” Trenton said with a skeptical glance at the stinging flowers. “He will not be happy when he catches up to you if he has welts and a rash all over. He might even find a nest to throw you into.”
She shot Trenton a grin. “If he’s arrogant enough to get caught in this, he deserves what he gets.”
She’d decided she liked this game. Liked outwitting Fallon and making him chase false trails. The only way it would be better is if she could ditch Trenton and do this alone. He made their trail a little too easy to spot.
She stared at him in thought.
“Oh no, don’t even think it. You’re not ditching me.”
She sighed. Such a stickler for the rules.
She wiped her hands on her pants and gestured for him to continue. He started to turn and Shea bent to grab her print-making tool. A whistle sounded in the air. Shea threw herself to the side. An arrow sailed over her head and thunked into the trunk of a tree barely a handbreath from Shea.
Trenton spun, drawing his sword at the same time. Another arrow whistled through the air. Trenton deflected it with a swift movement. “Get up. We need to run.”
Shea leapt to her feet, darting past Trenton and behind the cover provided by upraised roots that were as tall as she was. They raced through the trees, giving little thought to where they were going. Shea ran, knowing any moment an arrow could land in her back.
She weaved through the trees, zigzagging to and fro. Trenton crashed through the underbrush beside her.
The sound of pursuit followed them. Shea tripped, falling down a bank and rolling into a stream bed. She pushed herself half upright in the water.
Where was Trenton? He’d been right beside her. She was alone now. They must have gotten separated.
She took her time getting up, keeping her movements soft and silent. There was a rustle in the bushes behind her. Shea slid through the water, keeping low, until she could press herself against the bank. She waited with bated breath as footsteps came closer and closer.
They paused right above her head. She didn’t dare move for fear that it would attract attention. After a long moment, the footsteps retreated.
Shea released the breath she was holding and leaned forward. Her game of hunting had suddenly become all too real.
She’d have to apologize to Trenton and Fallon the next time she saw them. After all the grief she’d given them regarding their insistence of having a guard on her at all times, she finally saw what they had been saying.
She pushed herself away from the bank, pausing to glance over it. Nothing moved in the forest around her. She’d have to chance it. She couldn’t stay here. Eventually her hunter would backtrack and find her. Her only chance was making her way back to the encampment and finding help.
She didn’t even have a weapon to defend herself with. She’d been stupid and left it behind, thinking that it was unnecessary for the game. Trenton was probably going to have a lot to say about that when they met back up.
For now, she needed to be quick and quiet. She could do this. It was no different than evading a beast. Granted, this beast walked on two legs and was highly intelligent, but he didn’t know the forest like she did, and he lacked the superior senses of a true beast.
Yes, she could do this. She refused to be ended by a coward with an arrow, shot in the back like prey.
She ran down the stream bed, hiding her foot prints in the water in case her hunter did come back. After a fair distance, she scrambled up the bank and across the forest floor.
She stopped on an exposed boulder and listened. The human senses were powerful if one knew how to use them. Shea had been taught to listen and feel with more than just the tangible.
Her senses told her something was off in the forest. The animals had gone silent and the air had a menacing, oppressive feeling to it. It was still and quiet, not even the branches in the trees rustling with wind as the world waited, watchful. Shea’s back itched as if someone was watching her.
It could be her attacker, or it could be someone from the game. That had been the purpose, after all—hunt the beast until they caught it. She hadn’t heard any sign of pursuit in the last few minutes, but Fallon, in particular, could be tricky. Either way, it was probably best to avoid whoever was after her. She couldn’t be sure if they were friend or foe.
She slipped off the boulder and moved silently over the ground, her senses tuned to the world around her.
There was no movement, but the forest felt ominous—like there was something waiting in its depths, something that meant Shea ill.
She rolled into some underbrush and slithered across the ground on her stomach.
A rustle in the branches alerted her that she wasn’t alone. Something was behind her. If it was the shooter, she needed to get out of his line of sight. Regroup and see if she could slip away unseen.
She waited, every sense tuned to spot her hunter. There. The branches of a small tree just barely moved. Could be the wind but the branches around it weren’t moving.