Page 51 of Marked

Squatting down, I ran my hands along the pine laden ground. It was damp, and the saturated dirt hinted that a pool of fluid had formed here recently, a pool of blood.

Nala’s blood.

My familiar whined.

I reached out and scratched her behind the ears.

“This is where Nala was shot,” I explained to Ace over my shoulder. It was about as much as I could say, given the absence of visible evidence.

“There’s a notable lack of dead bodies,” he said.

I straightened and pointed to my left. “They were over there.” I pointed at another spot. “And there.”

“I’m assuming from their absence someone must’ve moved them?”

I nodded. “Or more than one person. Those archers weren’t small. It would’ve taken time and effort to move them.”

“It has been days,” Ace said, scratching the stubble on his chin. “You shouldn’t be so surprised.”

“Right.” I frowned and looked around again, hoping some sort of secret message with all the answers would fly out of nowhere and smack me in the face. “They had time to move the bodies, but they had to know where to look. So either they travelled this route often, or they did have a spotter.” And the worst part—the part I didn’t speak out loud because it was now phaaning obvious—there were more of these rogue hunters. We had confirmation I hadn’t killed them all.

“Why go to all that trouble?” Ace asked. “Unless their identities gave something else away. Did you recognize them?”

I shook my head and wiped my hands on my pants before straightening. “Not a single one. Their clothes looked different than ours, too.”

“How so?”

“Different cuts and materials. Even the colour was different.” Perga and Wast hunters tended to wear black or mahogany brown leathers. “They wore green wool and light tan leather.”

Ace walked over to one of the spots I had indicated and knelt. “They went to a lot of trouble to get rid of the evidence. They didn’t want us to identify them.”

“Or they belonged to a group who cared enough to bury them.” I pursed my lips. How could a group this large go undetected in the forbidden forest for so long?

He shifted and his gaze swept the ground in front of him, searching. “Do you have enough to track them?”

Instead of answering right away, I walked over to the edge of the forest and considered the directions the hunters must’ve come from to attack me. The cleanup crew did a fantastic job, hiding the bodies and their own tracks, but they hadn’t thought to cover the tracks for the hunters’ arrival to the area.

Nala trotted over and sniffed at the ground and pawed the dirt aggressively. I leaned over and considered the thick brush. Small, broken twigs and shrubs caught the light.

Perfect.

Did I have enough to track them? A smile spread across my face. “Absolutely.”

Turning toward the shrubs, I leaned down and checked the footprints. “This way.”

Nearing winter, the forest sounds were more solemn than the constant buzz and drone of insects in the summer. The crickets had grown silent over the last few days, now too cold, and the migratory birds had long left the woods. Instead, eerie stillness settled over the forest, punctuated by the croak of a raven, a flitter of wings or the sharp snap of twigs and branches under Ace’s feet.

We walked in silence through the bushes until we came upon a small trail cutting southwest to northeast through the forest. No more than a deer path, trampled grass, squished moss, and upturned dirt marked the passageway.

I knelt to examine the tracks made by heavy boots. They were multiple sizes, which indicated more than one hunter. These had to be from the same men who’d attacked me and hurt Nala.

Based on the shape of the prints, the tracks came from the northeast and headed southwest toward the field. I was on the right track—pun intended. Straightening, I brushed my hands on my dark leather pants.

“Tell me something, Mouse,” Ace’s deep and gravelly voice made me jump in surprise. “I get that you were angry the queen ordered you to have a partner, but you’re also angry it’s me. This is personal, and don’t bother trying to tell me otherwise. Years ago, you would’ve stumbled over your own feet for the opportunity to be my partner.”

“Because I had a little girl crush on you?” I scoffed.

“We may have been young when we met, but you were twenty when I left. Hardly a little girl, and hardly a simple crush.”