Hunted (Scarlet Dawson Book 1)

by Nicola Chadwick

  One of the men hunched over at the bar looks up and eyes both myself and Aylesbury and then for someone that is extremely inebriated, he bolts from his stool like lightening. Aylesbury spins and grabs the guy’s jacket before he gets away. Pulling him back to us before he gets within a foot of the bar.

  He deposits the wretch back on his stool and we crowd around him so he can’t escape. “Look miss I ain’t done nuting wrong dis time I swears it.” The wretch looks at me his eyes pleading.

  I call him wretch because he’s wretched, he dresses like he’s homeless, sucking people in with his penny for the poor speech then he pounces on them and steels everything they have on them, he is one of the most pathetic felons I’d ever met.

  “Now Harry if that was true then why did you try to run when you saw us?” I said to him with a smile.

  “I swears it, I was just scared. You only ever come in’t here to take us down nick.” His speech was even more horrendous than usual due to the amount of alcohol he’d obviously consumed.

  Aylesbury let go of him and backed off a step then said. “Tell you what Harry you tell us when you last saw The Don and we will forget you tried to run off when you saw us because we all know you wouldn’t have run unless you’d been up to no good.”

  Harry sits back on his stool and lets out the breath he was holding. “That’s d’thing right there, no ones seen him for days, it’s a might strange an all. I wa meant to meet him here for drinks last night as usual but he never showed, we all figured you guy’s had picked him up for some crime or another.”

  “You know what he’s up to Harry?” I ask.

  “No he wa tight lipped about dis’ project, keeps disappearing then turning up a few days later. It’s not right ya know we’ve been partners for years but he’s keeping some-ting from me alright.” I look at Aylesbury and he confirms what I thought.

  “I’m sorry Harry but we’re going to have to take you in for questioning.” Aylesbury heaves him back off the stool and spins him around to cuff him.

  “I guess that means I’m walking home?” I say to Aylesbury as we usher a sullen looking Harry out of the bar.

  “Sorry Red.”

  “I’ve got to walk half way across town because you refused to bring my vehicle! My five seat truck! This is just typical. It’s a good job this stupid ass stakeout is over otherwise I’d be tempted to kick your freaking ass all over Port Vale.”

  Aylesbury crosses the road with Harry and heads into the mouth of the alley, he ignores my exclamations as I saunter in the general direction of my home. I hear his engine roar to life and speed off in the opposite direction.

  My mind drifts back to Aylesbury and the orphanage as I start the long walk home. Aylesbury has changed in the years between that day at the orphanage and on our first assignment together, he was the same nice guy he’d always been but there was definitely a hard edge to him now. You could almost see it under the surface waiting to explode out, so far though he was laid back and no one had managed to flip that switch, I wouldn’t want to be there when he did though.

  Chapter Three

  I walk through the park cutting out about two miles from my lovely long walk home. Port Vale was a great place to live and was at the centre of all the action. It was a fairly new city but some of the buildings had aged really quickly. The city itself had grown out of necessity when the tear in the Vale between the worlds had remained open. Gradually Homes where built, shops, restaurants and business followed and within about fifty years a whole new city had emerged.

  I live in the south side right near the edge of the city, which was quite close to Lycan territory. It wasn’t exactly the richest part of town but it also wasn’t the most squalid.

  After an hour or so of walking, I finally find myself on my street. I was in one of the smaller shopping districts almost every store front on the street was dark except for the few restaurants that were dotted about and the occasional light glaring from various apartment windows.

  The lights were on in the Pizzeria at the front of my building, they usually stayed open quite late, which was great for me, my one down fall was pizza so whenever the urge hit I could just pop in and treat myself to a slice or two... sometimes three.

  I walked into the alley at the side of the Pizzeria. As usual it was fairly clean no one bothered much with the alley as it ended not too far in, so I never noticed strange people lurking or the trash piling up. I walked over to the entryway, a sign at the side of the door proclaimed 1 – SIA (Scarlet Investigation Agency), 2 – awaiting tenancy. 3 – Scarlet Dawson. Unlike other apartment buildings you didn’t need to get buzzed in to enter, most people thought it was unsafe and that was why number two was empty, I thought it was easier.

  The entryway had a tiled mosaic floor with two dark wood doors, one that lead off to the Pizzeria, only the tenants and owner had key’s, the other door opposite was to my office. On the left a staircase lead up to apartment two, then another identical staircase lead up from there to my apartment. It was nothing special but it was the only real home I’d ever had.

  Tonight though I wanted to get down to business I really needed to file the reports from my latest case and if I didn’t do it soon I’d get a hefty fine which would seriously cut into my finances. I grab the mail from my deposit box at the side of the door and head into the office. It was a fairly big space for just one person, the floor matched that from the entry way and the walls were dark wood with the occasional scenic picture hanging. There was a big ornate fireplace which I refused to block up, I loved the vintage look it had. So I stuck two sofas in front of it, a rug and table and made it into an area where I could informally sit with clients. There where also two desks one facing the door at the back of the room and the other faced the fireplace, I sat at them both depending on how warm the office was or what paperwork I had out. Filing cabinets where dotted around and a door lead off to a small kitchen and bathroom area.

  I sit opening my mail when the door opens and in walk two Fae Guards, they spread out and look around the room while I just sit and gape at them weighing up whether the letter opener I held would do any damage if I threw it at the one closest to me. Once they were satisfied they stood by the door and two more Fae entered. They were both more or less identical, the only difference being one was female the other male. They both had blue hair so dark it was almost black, their ears distinctively pointing upwards and poking through their shoulder length hair. Their faces were both elven and pale but the male’s had a harder edge to it making him more attractive than pretty.

  They wore traditional Fae outfits, both had on leather boots, tight fitting leather trousers, the male had on a sleeveless leather tunic and the female had on a long sleeved tunic, both in the same shade of burnt red brown. These guys would stick out like a sore thumb walking around when the streets were full.

  Speaking of which what in the Hell were they doing here at this time of night. “Sorry I’m closed, you can come back tomorrow when I’m open for business.” I say dismissively, a strange feeling slowly settling in the pit of my stomach.

  The male Fae walks forward and after inclining his head in a bow of sorts addresses me. “I am sorry Miss Dawson, I am afraid we cannot do that.” His voice was arrogant and held no discernable accent.

  I get up and walk around to the front of my desk, holding my arm out and gesturing to the door. “Sir you will do anything I ask you to do, as the owner of this business I ask you to leave immediately.” I smell trouble.

  He takes another step forward. “As I said before we cannot do that. Now before you make maters worse for yourself, I would like to introduce both myself and my sister. I am Prince Bryn of the Seelie Royal Court, and this is my sister Princess Bronwyn.”

  I actually stand there with my mouth open words escaping my usual repertoire of sarcasm.

  They both bow and then he carries on addressing me. “Now Miss Dawson, my sister and I are in need of your help.”

  I put my hands on my hips in a
defensive stance. “I will have to decline your cry for help, I don’t take Fae clients, perhaps a specialist in Fae investigations will be more up your alley.” I try my hardest to sound serious, but all I hear is attitude. If he didn’t get it already he would from that, I hate the Fae even though I am part Fae. After all you can’t pick your ancestry.

  “You mean you would deny your own kind help when they are in need, well that’s not very Fae of you Miss Dawson is it?”

  I look down and see that my hair was still definitely dark and not red, so how in the Hell did he know that I was part Fae?

  As a hybrid I could shift into all three of my base forms Wood Nymph, Fae and Human. When I am in my Human form I have very dark almost black straight hair that comes to the bottom of my shoulder blades, dark blue eyes and all my other features stayed the same, My ears even stay the same when I shift to my Fae and Nymph forms, they were slightly pointy but more or less Human, most people just thought I had some immortal somewhere in my ancestry.

  In my Fae form, the form which most people hate, I had deep red hair and with my pale creamy complexion and almost colourless grey eyes, I looked quite scary. Then in my Nymph form, my more dominant form, I had blonde wavy hair that was streaked with all the forest Greens you can imagine, My eyes were bright green and I had a tattoo of an ivy vine that wound its way from the sole of my foot around my left leg, over and around my body and then wrapping down my right arm finishing on my hand. It was very life like and had a mind of its own, thankfully it was an evergreen I dread to think what it would look like if it lost its foliage in the fall. While it was a tattoo it was still a living part of me and changed and grew as I did.

  Most Hybrids had just the one form but the only magic I appeared to wield was that my forms were distinctly separate from one another which was an extremely rare trait apparently.

  “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now if you have finished wasting my time, it’s rather late so you need to leave.” I walk over to the door and hold it open for them but none of them move.

  “No Scarlet, may I call you Scarlet? I have proof that you are Fae.” He holds out a clear glass ball.

  In Faerie, because of all the natural magic, electronics didn’t exactly work so usually a crystal or glass ball is placed strategically in a room and spelled to pick up certain things, they were basically security cameras. I didn’t know if they had any other uses in Faerie but I had seen them used this way before at The Guild office that mirrored ours over in Faerie.

  He waited for me to close the door and walk back over to my desk. “You have piqued my curiosity Your Highness.” My voice dripped with sarcasm.

  “You can dispense with the formality’s Scarlet, I plan on working quite closely with you.” He smiles and places the glass ball on the desk, motioning for me to look into it.

  The clear glass becomes smoky and then an image forms within the smoke spreading until only that image fills the glass. I groan when I see myself red hair whipping around my face as I looked behind me, my attention then turned back to the book I was browsing through.

  I look back up at Bryn as he decided to speak to me. “As you are aware Scarlet breaking into the Fae archives is highly illegal and I’m sure that your superiors at The Guild would love to see this little, how do you say over here... ah yes recording.” His smug smile really ruins his technically good looking features.

  “I don’t respond well to blackmail, so if you’re asking for my help I suggest you try a different approach.” I was in so much trouble if The Guild saw that, it might have happened when I was more obsessed with finding my relatives, but The Guild wouldn’t see it like that.

  Don’t show them you’re bothered, I smile back at him.

  “We would have rather you just took the job without us having to use blackmail, but if it comes to it we will use the crystal. We will however still pay you triple your going rate, half now and half on closure of the case.”

  Whatever the job, I could use that kind of money and it wouldn’t do to have that glass ball falling into the wrong hands. Thankfully the Fae’s magic only stretched so far, you couldn’t duplicate or reproduce an image recorded in glass or crystal so if that was all the evidence a person had and something happened to that evidence... I smile again, this time genuine

  “Throw in that glass ball and you have yourself a deal. So long as you understand the nature of my business, I won’t do your dirty work, I strictly concentrate on locating objects or people. If I fail to locate whatever it is you wish me to locate then I will only charge eighty percent of the original fee.”

  “We have an accord then Scarlet.”

  I motion for the two Fae to sit at my desk. “So then Bryn what exactly is it you need me to locate.”

  Bronwyn pulls out a picture from her pocket and hands it to me. In the picture is a teenage girl who looks to be about sixteen, she has the same black/blue hair as the two Fae in front of me and looks similar but not as identical as Bryn and Bronwyn, she’s obviously a relative.

  “You want me to find the girl?” I ask.

  “Yes she is our sister and we cannot locate her anywhere.” Bronwyn replies.

  “Can I take a copy of this picture for my files?”

  “You can keep that picture, we have more.”

  This was going to be hard work, usually when people came in wanting me to find something or someone for them they literally throw as much information as they can at me. I guess I’ll just have to ask the right questions. “Can you give me the details surrounding her disappearance? If you leave out anything important it may mean the difference between me finding her or not.”

  Bryn moves to sit on the edge of his chair and said. “We are this side of Vale on a sabbatical of sorts, looking into business acquisitions and trying to relax away from home, our sister Brook is fifteen and decided to come and stay with us for a while. I believe she said before she came that the pressures of court society where getting to her and she wanted to experience life like a Human teen. She’s been with us for several weeks and has made some friends, we tried to give her as much freedom as possible because we know what it can be like at court. She started seeing someone and a few days later she disappeared, she’s been gone a week now.”

  “If she’s been gone a week why haven’t you gone to the authority’s”

  “We can’t risk our mother finding out we have lost her youngest daughter, she is not tolerable at the best of times.”

  Great so basically if mummy dearest found out her daughter was missing and I couldn’t find her for any reason then my head would be on the chopping block and knowing the Fae that could be a literal chopping block not metaphorical.

  “Who was this guy she was seeing? Have you spoken to him or asked any of her friends where she might have gone?” I pull out a note pad and pen and start to jot down a few things that might help me locate Brook.

  “One of her female friends told us she was dating a Daniel Montego, but other than that none of her friends seemed to know anything.” Bryn replies.

  “Can you give me the names of her friends, I’d like to double check with them, no offence but you might not be asking the right questions.”

  Bryn gives me the names of two girls and the name of a club they frequented with Brook.

  “So I believe we said half payment now the rest on completion.” Bryn reaches into his pocket and pulls out notes in large denominations.

  “I would also prefer to take the glass ball now as well.” I say reaching for the crystal ball that still sits on my desk.

  Bryn and his slightly odd and silent sister Bronwyn ease out of the chairs, Bronwyn heads through the door with the guards.

  “I apologise for my sister she is a little shy.”

  “That’s okay I’m not offended.”

  “Can I ask that you keep either me or Bronwyn up to date on your findings?” He asks passing me a card with their numbers on.

  “Of Course.” I reply scanning the number
on the card.

  Bryn walks over to the door but stops just short of walking out, turning he says to me. “You know you’re very attractive but when you’re in your Fae form you’re irresistible.”

  He walks out then leaving me to stare at the door. I feel like I should shout to him some sarcastic response but my shock at the comment stops my brain functioning. Instead I gather up the cash and stow it in the safe that was hidden under the floor boards in the bathroom. A strange place for a safe but there wasn’t any windows in the bathroom and it was a fairly big room. It used to have a bath and shower in but I had no use for them so I ripped them out and had a safe fitted into the space below the floor boards. Also as a licensed investigator and a Guild Hunter I could carry a sword or any another weapon of my choice, so I also kept a few spare swords and daggers in the safe too.

  It was funny, not that long ago a sword would have been an archaic choice of weapon but now swords were a lot easier to carry than guns and for some reason because the Fae and The Demons favoured the sword, guns had become obsolete. Also beheading an immortal was a sure fire way of them actually staying dead. I’d personally never fired a gun so I couldn’t really tell the difference. It was strange how much of an impact the Fae had on this side of the Vale.

  Once I’d packed everything away I headed upstairs to bed, everything else would just have to wait until I got a few hours’ sleep.

  Chapter Four

  The next day I awoke to the feeling that something was wrong; I could basically understand why Bryn and Bronwyn wouldn’t want to raise their mothers suspicions by telling her that her daughter is missing but surely The Guild would be able to approach the matter a lot easier than I would, I also had to file an initial report with The Guild’s Private Investigation branch, I suppose I could keep the names title-less but they still chanced someone recognising their names.

  I headed down stairs after a quick shower and change. As I walk into my office I felt the strange sense of foreboding again, I quickly dismissed it and logged onto the interweb. I honestly don’t know how Hunters over in Faerie coped without technology, the World Wide Web is our biggest archive and it’s all a few keystrokes away. Over there you have to troll through endless scrolls and parchments, hell it was archaic.