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“KEEP YOUR VOICE DOWN. We’re on your side.” A young man standing on the wooden steps cautioned Aubrey, his voice sharp. He glanced down at Jane, who was sitting upright with her arms wrapped around her knees. “At least, I think we are. Jane?”
Jane coughed and reached a hand up to the big bruiser standing next to her. Aubrey guessed he must be the behemoth who’d pummeled them to the ground moments before.
To Aubrey’s amazement, he smiled at Jane as he helped her to her feet. Everything appeared to have been forgiven.
“This is the Runner I was sent to intercept after the Mission went down.” Jane coughed and spat on the ground, either not noticing the instant tension around her, or not caring. “We were scanned and barely made it out of the safe house. We took the sewer route out. Now answer me this. Why and how are you here, Amos?”
Amos? Aubrey’s curiosity was piqued, looking up at the man on the stoop. The same one Snake Lady told me about?
Whatever answer the man she called Amos might have given was lost in the crashing sound from within the café. An older man, standing behind Amos in the doorway, whirled around with lightning speed.
It was already too late for him.
An inhuman hand seized him by the neck, lifting him off the ground. A red light bathed his agonized face, and the Tracker flung him down. Aubrey heard his choked cry as he landed, tearing at his own throat in desperate agony.
This time, she found her voice in blinding terror, as the circle of red light rushed out of the darkness. The creature kicked the body of its latest victim out of the way, and lunged toward them, jerking to a shuddering halt in the doorway.
Aubrey saw the long-bladed knife embedded in its upper body. The knife’s handle had caught on the doorframe, jolting the forward progress of the Soul-less to a momentary standstill.
As Amos vaulted over the railing to escape, the behemoth with the baritone voice uttered a roar like a charging bear, pounding up the steps toward the Soul-less. A large hunting knife, twin to the one embedded in the thing’s chest, was in his hand, raised high above his head as he rushed the back door.
“Kill it before it blows!” Amos leaped forward, his own knife drawn and ready.
He knows, Aubrey’s rational mind informed her, as her terrified screams echoed in the alley. The Soul-less—he knows how far they’ll go to kill their target. To kill me.
The woman who’d helped her earlier was now dragging her away from the conflict, shielding Aubrey with her own body.
The Soul-less managed to heave through the doorway, impaling itself further on the first knife. Its maniacal determination, coupled with its lack of expression and the infernal red circle of light, was terrifying in its own outlandish, inhuman way.
The big man met the Soul-less as it broke free of the doorframe, bringing his knife down in a punishing arc, with force enough to sever the maniacal creature’s head in one motion.
Except—it didn’t.
The knife clanged into the thing’s neck, the sound of the impact reverberating in the alley, and stuck there.
Blood erupted from its neck in an oily fountain, but the blow failed to kill it. The Soul-less continued to push its way out of the building, its red-encircled eye fixated on Aubrey.
“Don! Get out of there.” The ragged shout came from a man on the far side of the back porch. Like the others, he held a long knife in his hand. Aubrey hadn’t noticed him earlier. He was younger than the rest, probably close to her age.
Instead, the behemoth named Don planted his feet for a better stance, and with another enraged roar, pivoted away from the door. Both of his hands clasped the handle of the knife he’d driven into the Tracker’s neck, and he used the weapon as a lever, catapulting the creature over the railing and into the alley.
The Soul-less hit the graveled surface with a heavy thud, arms and legs flailing.
Aubrey spun around and the woman beside her grabbed her by the hand. Together, they fled, running as fast as they could, Jane only a pace or two behind.
She caught Don’s voice again, an unfamiliar note in his roar. “No, Stephen, don’t . . .”
In spite of her fear, Aubrey looked back. The younger man on the far side of the porch—he must be the one called Stephen—leaped onto the Soul-less as it lay on the ground, struggling to rise.
Aubrey’s mind sluggishly reasoned he intended to finish the job Don started.
Don’s knife was stuck in the creature’s neck, and the other blade remained embedded in its chest. Yet its red-rimmed eye stared at Aubrey with malevolent hunger.
The Soul-less strained to reach her, its clutching hand a demonic claw.
Instead of attacking, Stephen flattened himself over the Soul-less, curling his body around its head. Aubrey caught a glimpse of the sickened expression on Don’s face as he whirled and threw himself into the café.
Everything was moving in and out of focus. Dazed, she realized Amos held a sobbing Jane upright beside them.
The full impact of the last few days caught up to her, and she blacked out.