Free Scent of Valor (Chronicles of Eorthe #2) by Annie Nicholas

ground not too gently.
    He looked up at his vampire brothers on the wall. “Send for my armor and sword. Gather the horses. We’re riding to Temple lands now.”
    “That’s not necessary. We’ll track down the cowards ourselves.” Ahote turned as if to leave.
    “And your pack, who’s holding them together during this time of grief?”
    The hunter hesitated. “No one. We can’t find Kele’s body. I’d hoped to find her here.”
    “Are others missing?”
    Ahote glanced at the other shifters, then at Benic. “Yes. What does this mean?”
    “I’m not sure.”
    The gates opened and his squire arrived with his things and his horse. Benic tossed on his worn chain mail and strapped on his sword. His vampire guards joined him.
    As they rode behind the running shifters, he explained what had transpired. Someone had come to his land and stolen his shifters. Under vampire law, wild shifters were not protected, but on Benic’s land those shifters belonged to him.
    The ride to the Temple crept at a snail’s pace. He pushed the horses and shifters both at a hard stride until they crested the hill and the Temple’s stone walls glared between the trees. Reflexively, his fangs sprung free. Blood had recently been spilled there. He smelled it in the soil, he tasted it in the air. Benic stopped his horse and dismounted in fear of disrupting any evidence under the new spring growth. His men did the same and spread out.
    The shifters had already removed the bodies. Damn it. “How many were killed?” They probably tramped all over the land and destroyed any indication of who had the balls to trespass on his land and poach.
    “Both mating parties agreed to the alpha couples and three hunters each. We found six dead.”
    “So six were taken.”
    “Seven.”
    Benic jumped. A deep-seated fear still echoed in his body at the familiar voice.
    Sorin, alpha of the Apisi, a hunter so great he’d sneaked past Benic’s guards and the Payami hunters, rose from the underbrush that should have been too sparse to hide such a frightfully large shifter. “Peder left my lands yesterday to come here. He never returned.” Sorin held out his palm where a tiny sharp dart lay. “I found this in the mountain pass.”
    “That’s not mine.” He hated the way his denial tumbled out so fast. Ever since Sorin had stalked him on these very lands, then used him as a pincushion for his own sword, the silver shifter had haunted Benic’s nightmares.
    “I know.” The alpha’s response rumbled like a rock fall. “It bears the scent of a different vampire. One who is not among your guards.”
    Benic forced the tremble in his hands to stop and took a deep breath. Sorin had had enough time to smell all his guards before showing himself? He’d never ride these woods in ease while this shifter lived. “I had nothing to do with this attack.” He spoke plainly so both Sorin and Ahote would be assured of his honesty. To survive this day, he must reek of truth.
    “Then who?” Sorin handed the dart to Ahote, who sniffed it.
    “My best guess is poachers.” Benic made note of where each of his vampire guards stood. As soon as Sorin had made his presence known, the warriors had circled around the shifters slowly.
    Suddenly, both shifter males’ heads swiveled north as the wind changed. Growls rose among the hunters.
    Benic drew his sword as his guards moved in formation around him. “Who is it?”
    “Yaundeeshaw,” Ahote whispered.

Chapter Nine
     
    The wheeled cage rocked back and forth repeatedly over the rutted road. Peder’s stomach rolled. If he’d had anything in his gut, he’d have lost it, but the vampires only gave them sips of water. Barely enough to keep his thirst at bay. Ahead of them menaced clusters of tall buildings, which extended as far as his eye could see. He twisted back around and memorized landmarks they passed so when he managed an escape, he could lead Kele home.
    She leaned next to him, against the metal bars that