Free Shadowborn by Jocelyn Adams Page B

been set, they will not stop until your soul is in their possession.”
    I made a yeah-yeah gesture with my hand. “I get it, Gallagher. A bunch of invisible guys coming to kill me, blah, blah, blah. What the fuck else is new. Can we go now?”
    “We need to return to Dun Bray and make plans.”Worry deepened the creases on Gallagher’s forehead. If they went any deeper, they’d press on his brain.
    My father came to stand beside me. “I agree. This is a grave situation. We had anticipated they would annihilate the humans or possibly one of the smaller races, but not you.” A shudder traveled the length of him. “Goddess, not you.”
    “Planning when we know nothing is pointless,” I said. “What’s the number one rule when dealing with a hired gun?”
    “Take out the money,” Nix said. “Kill the one who hired them, and the hit goes away.”
    I smiled at him, glad he’d returned to his happy, focused self. “The cute one gets the prize.”
    Liam grunted a curse. “Were you listening to Gallagher? Because of your little encounter just now, you just became irresistible to them. Do you really think Alastair cares about anything other than hunting you at the moment, whether someone is willing to give up another soul to them or not?”
    Good point. Damn. I shrugged, unwilling to give him an inch. “Either way, we need to know who hired them and why. We proceed with caution,” I said in hopes of appeasing the others. “Keep the Light burning at all times until we get into the realm of the elves.” And hope to hell I didn’t inadvertently start a war with them, too.

8
    The instant we stepped into the woods, my vision wavered. The sounds of the Goddess’s creatures became tinny and distant as if we’d fallen into a void between our world and another.
    “Why do you greet us armed?” a mellow voice said. I rubbed my ears, uncertain where the voice came from; it drifted from every direction at once, as if the forest itself spoke.
    “Everyone extinguish your Light,” Gallagher said. “Forgive us, master elf, but our queen was just attacked by the Shadowborn. We mean you nor your forest any harm.”
    “If that is true, then how does she stand before us now?”
    Us? How many were out there? One by one, we all reabsorbed our energy, leaving us in a complete white-out. Not snow or fog but … nothing. Creepy .
    “The Goddess lends me her sight.” I scanned the woods but couldn’t have seen a troll wearing blaze orange if it stood two feet away. “I saw the shadow coming for me.”
    Silence stretched on long enough that I turned and looked at Donovan. He gave me a raise of his shoulders with a hell-if-I-know expression.
    “Elder Alogason is most anxious to meet this Lila Gray. None has survived a Shadowborn hunt.” A whisper of fabric marked the elf’s movement, but white nothingness still dominated my sight. “You will find your medallions farther along the trail. Put them on and wait for us.”
    “Why does he always say us?” I squinted at the white mist gathering around my sneakers.
    “The elf tribes think of themselves as one with the forest, one unit with multiple minds,” Gallagher said. “Like the Sluagh, only far more sophisticated.”
    “Insult one and you insult all, right?”
    “That would be correct.”
    “Perfect.”
    Moonlight blinked over us again, and the mist evaporated. The five of us trooped down the passage that opened before us in the trees as if they’d stepped aside to let us by. The remaining forest sounds ceased all together. Our footsteps were the only noise above the heavy silence.
    Instead of hanging from a tree or offered by a hand as I’d expected, the medallions floated midair in front of us. Each had a leather rope with a dull gray metal pendant hanging from it. A different symbol adorned each one, etched into the surface of the charm.
    I turned to Gallagher, avoiding Liam’s stare. “They want us to wear iron?”
    “It’s for their own protection. This was