by E.J. Stevens
I grit my teeth and pasted on my best smile. I needed to work on my diplomacy skills; might as well start now. I was determined to succeed in this assignment, whatever it was.
I would not fail.
The area around the bank of elevators was thick with harried travelers. Ignoring the ache in my back, I leaned forward and punched the down button for good measure. The sooner I completed my mission and proved myself to the Guild’s hierarchy, the sooner my return to Harborsmouth.
I may not have roots, the Guild itself was my home, but I had friends in Harborsmouth who would need me soon enough. For months now tensions had been rising between humans and the paranormal community, but it wasn’t until the night before my transfer that I learned the truth.
War was coming.
Lost in thought, I’d approached Master Janus’ office to receive my punishment for Hans’ injuries. But even distracted, I’d hesitated before knocking on his door. Hushed voices, tight with restrained anger, argued and so I’d done what any good Hunter would—I pressed my ear to the door and listened.
Master Janus and an unknown man were already in a heated discussion over what course of action to take based on new intel. I’d missed the beginning of the conversation, but one thing was clear. The Hunters’ Guild suspected that both vampire and fae leaders were amassing strength and mobilizing their supernatural armies in a deadly game of chess. Hunters were the knights and humans the pawns—and Harborsmouth was suspected to be the center of the game board.
When the voices ceased talking, I’d silently retraced my steps and reentered the corridor that lead to Janus’ office with heavy footsteps, and a heavy heart. I didn’t know when the game would commence. Immortals are nothing if not patient. But accepting my orders to leave Harborsmouth had been the hardest thing I’ve done as a Hunter.
War was brewing and, though the battle may not begin for months, years, or even decades, I swore that I would find a way to return to Harborsmouth so that I could use my sword to defend my allies, my Guild, and the innocent citizens of the city. Years ago, I promised myself that I would never let the Franks of the world win. Soon after that promise, I took an oath to become a Hunter and defend humans from rogue paranormals.
I vowed to protect the innocent from the monsters, be they human, fae, or undead, and I took my promises seriously. Sometimes that goal was all that kept me going. Life as a Hunter wasn’t easy. I’d taken Guild masters for parents, my fellow Hunters for brothers and sisters, and I’d married the mission—body and soul. There was no room in my life for deep friendships or romance, which is why my actions after learning of the coming battle still managed to surprise me.
I was loyal to the Guild. They rescued me, gave me a life with purpose, and the opportunity to avenge my parents’ brutal deaths at the hands of rogue vampires. But when I’d heard of the coming battle, there was someone I had to warn. Ivy Granger had proven herself to be a natural defender of the city of Harborsmouth.
Too bad she wasn’t human.
Although the Guild sometimes bent the rules for exceptional paranormals, like in Jonathan’s case allowing a shifter to enter our ranks, most Hunters were prejudiced against the paranormals we fought. It was easier to kill if you saw the world in black and white. But Ivy was one of those gray areas. She was half human and half fae, and she didn’t follow anyone’s rules.
I knew that the Guild wouldn’t sanction officially bringing Ivy onboard, but someone had to warn her of the coming battle. My phone had been confiscated and it was too risky to use Jonathan’s—I couldn’t risk the Guild tracing the call. Good thing I had a trick or two up my sleeve.
Counting on Ivy’s psychometry, the ability to read the psychic imprint left on objects, I’d stabbed my left hand and created enough pain for a strong impression and left Ivy a message. Leaving that message went against protocol, but that was only the first reckless thing I’d done. I was still kicking myself for the second.
I’d gone to Jonathan Baldwin, a friend regardless of how many times I’d turned him down or how much we got on each other’s nerves, knowing that he was the one person I could trust to deliver my message to Ivy. But when he’d seen the gash on my hand, the one I’d used to invoke enough pain to create my message, something bewildering happened. Jonathan had stroked my palm, asking if I’d received the injury while training, and with his other hand he’d pulled me close and kissed me.
I don’t think he had been thinking straight so close to the full moon. Perhaps, he just meant it as a simple goodbye kiss. But I’d pressed him against the wall of our tiny dorm room and kissed him with the passion of all the pain, excitement, and worry that raged inside of me.
It had been a mistake, something I’d repeated over and over until I’d stepped on that plane to Belgium. I never should have kissed Jonathan. Not because he was a werewolf, but because I didn’t care for him in that way. It hadn’t been right or fair of me—I’d crossed a line that never should have been crossed, and fled the country like a coward. It didn’t matter that I was leaving because of my orders. It still seemed like a betrayal.
The time apart would probably be good for us both, but I would return to Harborsmouth for the coming battle. I needed to complete my mission here in Belgium and get back to the States, before it was too late.
My stomach twisted, making me regret eating that salad. The red, downward pointing triangle above the steel doors couldn’t light up fast enough.
The metal doors to my right rattled open, revealing a large glass box. I melted into the crowd and slipped inside, surveying my fellow riders and the passing floors beyond the glass. At the basement level, I exited with a group of students my age. With my backpack, skinny jeans, and biker jacket I fit right in.
I quickly noted the location of potential exits as we made our way to the ticket offices. There were stairs and escalators leading down to the basement sublevel from each of the four corners of the cavernous train station. Each set of stairs was marked with a platform number and voices and the rumble of trains echoed up the stairs from the platforms below, but the station was currently empty of people except those of us disembarking the elevators.
As we approached a glass wall, a glass panel slid open with a swoosh of air and we joined the lines of people at the ticket counter. I stepped to the side, giving myself a moment to scan the crowd. Pretending to tie my boot laces, I let my gaze flit through the room and to the corridor beyond the glass walls.
Except for a man in a business suit waiting for the elevator, everyone was in line to buy their tickets. So where was my Guild contact?
I stood and stretched, shifting the backpack and ski bag strapped to my back. I turned to leave—maybe they were waiting on one of the train platforms?—when a young couple brushed past me in a hurry to catch their train.
“Pardon,” the man said, jostling my shoulder.
He kept walking, but his girlfriend offered an apologetic smile.
“Sorry,” she said, bending down to grab a magazine that hadn’t been there a moment before. “You dropped this.”
“Thanks,” I said, turning the magazine over in my hands. The magazine was Hunting and Fishing, of course. These had to be my Guild contacts.
“Good hunting,” she said.
I nodded and turned my attention to the train schedules on the board above the ticket counter. I waited three minutes, giving the Hunters plenty of time to leave, and then I exited the ticket office. I found the nearest bench and opened the magazine, as if I had time to kill before my train. Inside I found an envelope containing a train ticket, a Bruges city map, two knives, a length of wire with both ends wrapped in leather, a cell phone, and a dossier on the most notorious paranormals in West Flanders.
It looked like I wasn’t being assigned to Brussels after all. I was heading to Bruges—and my train was leaving in twenty minutes.
I wound the wire around my wrist, careful to keep the leather against my skin as I made a bracelet out of the garrote. One knife went inside my bo
ot and the other into a jacket pocket, along with the dossier. Pulling my backpack onto my shoulder, I grabbed my ticket and headed for the stairs to my platform.
The lights flickered as I descended and I kept my arms loose at my sides, glad that I’d taken the stairs instead of the stuttering escalator. A cool breeze chilled the air and I frowned. Waiting passengers pulled their jackets close and huddled on the platform below, probably thinking the cold air was the result of the fast moving trains.
But I knew better.
A pale woman approached the edge of the concrete platform. She paused to wipe her face with the sleeve of her jacket, then crouched down, grabbed the platform with both hands and climbed down to the tracks below.
No one tried to stop the woman. No one gasped or called out for help. They couldn’t see the woman stumbling along the tracks, because she was a ghost. The other passengers’ lack of reaction was one hint that the woman was already dead. The other clue was the fact that I could see the graffiti on the opposite wall of concrete through her body. The spirit had enough energy to manifest the illusion of a body, but ghosts aren’t perfect.
Her body was transparent, even to my eyes, and when a phantom train came a moment later and cut her in two, she disappeared. Her mangled body was laying on the tracks, and then it was gone. At the moment of her “death” the lights flickered. I looked back at the bench where I’d first seen the woman and sure enough, there she was, already steeling herself to approach the tracks.
I sighed and looked away. Suicides are the worst. They’re almost always caught in a loop, cursed to relive the moment of their death, over and over again.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to wait long for my train. With a swirl of grit and hot diesel fumes, my train arrived. I quickly climbed the ladder-like steps and took a seat away from the few other passengers. I tossed my backpack onto the seat facing me, to deter anyone else from sitting with me, settled the ski bag holding my sword across my lap, and pulled the dossier from my jacket. I smoothed the pages on the small table and frowned.
My train would be arriving in Bruges before noon, but my orders were to arrive at the local Guild hall at six thirty. That gave me over seven hours to kill. Rather than cooling my heels waiting for the meeting with my liaison with the local Guild, I turned the page for details on my assignment.
It wasn’t pretty.
Over twenty human bodies had been found floating in the canals of Bruges over the past two weeks. According to these documents, a culling of the large tourist population was not unheard of, but not on this scale. The average missing person rate was one or two per month, but things had escalated to nearly a dozen per week—and then there were the bodies.
If you’re a paranormal who’s smart enough to prey on tourists for years, maybe centuries, without getting caught, why suddenly start leaving evidence? The bodies didn’t make any sense unless, perhaps, there was a new monster in town. Not that Bruges needed any more violent paranormals taking up residence.
I rubbed a hand over my face and scowled at the list of known enemies in the vicinity. There was no shortage of suspects—just my luck.
Chapter 4
“Startling a sleeping Hunter was a good way to get dead.”
-Jenna Lehane, Hunter
“Wake up beautiful,” an accented male voice whispered in my ear. “This is your stop, is it not?”
My body reacted before the words had a chance to sink in. Having a stranger in such close proximity while dreaming about vampires, ghouls, water hags, grindylow, and rusalki was a recipe for a broken nose, or manslaughter. Luckily for the good Samaritan, he was already stepping away or he would have received a knuckle sandwich for his troubles—and a knife in the spleen.
Startling a sleeping Hunter was a good way to get dead.
I narrowed my eyes, assessing whether the man was an enemy. I let out a breath as I realized the fact that he was here during broad daylight, which ruled out the undead. He also didn’t have the storm-on-the-horizon feel of the fae. The guy appeared to be human, though a bit eccentric. His garish, puke green scarf and ridiculous feathered hat made him look the fool, but he had broad shoulders, a slender waist, and strong, capable looking hands.
He was also gaping at me like a merman out of water.
I blinked at his startled expression, adrenaline rapidly washing away the last vestiges of sleep. Oh, right, I still had my fist in his face. I just hoped he was too distracted by my fist to notice the knife in my other hand. I relaxed my fist and ran a hand through my hair as I hastily slid the knife into my jacket.
I looked around methodically, taking in details as cold sweat trickled down my back. The train wasn’t moving, the digital time display at the front of the carriage claimed it was nearing eleven o’clock, and there was a wooden BRUGGE sign outside the window. I was in Bruges, but not for long.
I was about to miss my stop.
The guy who I’d just tried to stab was now in the aisle waving me toward the exit. I grabbed my bag from the seat, fingers fumbling with the straps as I slung it over my shoulder. The adrenaline was already wearing off, leaving my movements slow and stiff. He punched a button beside the door to the next compartment and disappeared.
I hurried down the aisle, struggling with the long ski bag that held my sword. An announcement in Dutch continued to loop as a chime sounded a warning. I lunged for the door as the train began to move forward, but my muscles were tight and my body was heavy with fatigue. I wasn’t used to sitting for hours on end and the long plane ride and cat nap on the train were catching up with me.
In the adjoining carriage, holding the door open and begging me to hurry, was the guy with the hideous scarf. He looked like he wanted to help, trying to encourage me forward with an earnest look on his face. I made a decision and reached for his hand.
“Get me out of here,” I said.
He froze for a moment, brown eyes going wide, then squeezed my hand and pulled me forward. We raced down the aisle, ducked into one of those dark, connecting sections of train that seemed to sway with each pounding step and then we were bursting out onto the concrete platform.
I dropped my backpack to the ground and sighed. I wasn’t winded—I was used to a regiment of daily endurance training—but I felt my cheeks warm as if I’d been running all day. I cleared my throat and rubbed the back of my neck.
“Well, that sucked,” I said. “But thanks, um…sorry. I didn’t catch your name.”
“Alistair Ashborn,” he said, winking and flashing me a conspiratorial smile. “But since you’ve given me the most exciting morning I’ve had in years, you can call me Ash.”
“Jenna,” I said, a grin tugging at my lips.
Damn, Ash’s smile was contagious.
“Welcome to Bruges, Jenna,” he said, waving his hat in a flourish. “I do hope you stay awhile. I have a feeling there’s never a dull moment with you around.”
He could say that again.
Chapter 5
”In my experience, evasion was second only to lies as an admission of guilt.”
-Jenna Lehane, Hunter
The moment I crossed the busy road outside the train station, entering the tranquility of Minnewater Park and passing the threshold into the old city center, bells began to ring.
“The city is rejoicing at your arrival,” Ash said with a wink. “Looks like I’m not the only bloke happy that you’re here.”
I rolled my eyes, ignoring the way his words made my skin flush. It was a warm day. That was all.
“I’m sure you say that to all the girls who try to punch you in the face,” I said.
“You’d be surprised, love,” he said.
I licked my lips and looked away.
“So,” I said, waving a hand at the approaching body of water. “Is that Minnewater Lake?”
Ash was playful and foolish and frivolous, but he did seem to know his way around so far, and I could use a guide. I had hours to spare before my appointment with the local Guild liaison. Maybe
Ash could help provide the necessary on-the-ground intel that I needed. I could successfully complete my mission faster and more efficiently if I learned the lay of the land.
“Ah, yes, Minnewater Lake,” he said. “It translates roughly to, the Lake of Love.”
Okay, maybe that wasn’t so helpful, though the name might explain the large number of ghosts in the vicinity. The tree lined banks of the lake shimmered with spectral activity. I shivered and focused on the footpath, ignoring the flickering image of a man jumping off a nearby bridge.
The gravel path was split into two sections, marked clearly for bicycle and foot traffic. As we walked, a group of men and women rode toward us, filling the bike path to our left. The person in front of the tour group was talking so loudly that I nearly missed the sound of a bike approaching us from behind.
I spun as the bike clipped Ash, not even slowing down as it did so.
“Watch it!” I yelled, shaking my fist at the cyclist. I turned to Ash, who was bent over, a scowl on his face. “Are you alright? God, that asshole practically drove straight through you. How could he not see us?”
“Bad luck is all, love,” he said.
Yes, if it hadn’t been for the tour group taking up the bike path, the cyclist may never have veered onto the footpath. Speaking of which, every damn tourist was now ogling us like we were some kind of sideshow attraction.
“What are you all looking at?” I asked, hands on my hips.
“Are…are you alright, lady?” an overweight man asked.
“Me?” I snorted. “I’m fine, but my friend is pretty banged up no thanks to you.”
