Dragonbond by Morgan Lee Clasper

Author:Morgan Lee Clasper [Clasper, Morgan Lee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780473509316
Publisher: Morgan Lee Clasper
Published: 2020-01-25T22:00:00+00:00

Hunter’s Way

“I think I found them,” Jess whispered.

She crouched in a cluster of bushes, muscles tense and brow furrowed. She strained to see through the foliage. Faint voices reached her ears.

Markus came to crouch beside her. His cloak trailed on the ground, giving glimpses of his knife as it rippled. “About time.”

“Knew it would pay off.” Jess gave him a punch on the shoulder. “And you thought we lost them!”

“We don’t know it’s them yet,” Markus replied. He left the bushes and darted closer.

Jess followed. She noted the countless marks that gave the Frostreavers away—broken leaves, scuffs in the snow. The further she went, the more they swelled. She swore under her breath. “There’s a lot of them.”

The forest thickened, a wall of feather-leafed bushes stretching across their path. She didn’t need to part them to know what waited on the other side.

“So it’s settled,” a voice said. “We wait here until our time to strike.”

Jess’s pulse quickened. Part of her urged her to part the bushes and get a glimpse of how many Frostreavers there were, but she forced herself to stay still. Can’t be careless.

“Do we have the resources to wait that long?” another asked.

“I planned for that ahead of time.”

There was that voice again. It made a shiver run down Jess’s spine. It sounded smooth yet laced with venom. She risked parting the bushes enough to peer through.

Frostreavers sat in a wide ring. The closest was a dozen paces. Her heart stopped for a second, but she relaxed as she realized they were facing away. Arrows lay in the snow beside them—barbed for hunting game—and axes sat embedded into treestumps nearby. A few frostfeathers, which she recognized from her hunting days, perched on their shoulders.

Markus exchanged glances with her. Jess held a finger to her lips, then motioned for him to follow her.

“And how long must we wait here? Suppose they don’t arrive?”

“They will,” the voice replied. Jess strained to see who it belonged to. “I’m not one to leave things to chance.”

Jess reached a cluster of smaller bushes that let her glimpse further into the camp. Her eyes came to rest on a tall figure with scar-riddled arms.

Theron. Jess hesitated. Theron addressed the Frostreavers, pacing as he did so.

“We have enough land to pitch your tents, and it's secluded enough we won’t have any visitors.”

“And if a hunter was to stumble upon us?”

Theron paused. “You know the answer to that.”

Something in his words made Jess’s skin crawl. She retreated a few paces into the forest. Markus joined her. “What do we do? I don’t like the look of so many of them.”

Jess nodded. “Whatever they’re doing, it’s big. Wilf was right.”

“What do we do now?” Markus checked over his shoulder. The talking stopped for a second, but when they continued, he relaxed.

“We gotta know why they’re doing this,” she replied. “We can’t go back to Wilf empty-handed.”

“If they see us—”

“They won’t.” Jess flashed him a sudden smile. “We’re too good for that.”

With her instincts on high-alert, she crept back to the edge of the camp.

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