Her laughter followed him. “It’s only a sweet.”
“A what?” he growled suspiciously.
She grinned at him, her eyes crinkling with silent laughter. “They are hard meringue dusted with sugar. It just has a loud crack when you eat them. And the skulls over there are made of sugar, and the severed fingers and eyes over there are sweet dough that we fashion into treats and decorate to make them appear disturbing. It’s just meant to be fun and enjoyable.”
His mate chuckled as he gave the grisly bones in the bag a suspicious look. They were sweet? He found it hard to believe, but now that he was looking at them closely, he saw that they were slightly lumpy and too thick to be proper finger bones. She jostled the bag, making them clatter.
“Are you sure you don’t want one?”
“I do not like sweet things,” he muttered. His gaze flicked up to her, and he smirked. “They cannot compare to the flavor of my mate’s cunt anyway. That is my preferred treat.”
Color rushed into Robyn’s cheeks, and she drew the strings on the bag tight before attaching it to her belt.
“Say that a little louder next time,” she grumbled, stalking ahead of him in a fit of annoyance.
He grinned as he trailed after her, though his ears continued to twitch at the sensation of being watched.
That feeling did not go away either. By the time they left the town, he was more certain than ever that they were being followed by someone adept at disguising themselves. Ashul slowed and gave the field nearest them a discreet look. There were a few orange gourds that had been forgotten in the harvest peeking out from beneath withered leaves that had somehow clung to the vine despite the drop in temperatures.
Where was it?
A short distance away, an overstuffed form hung from a pole that moved with the breeze. It vaguely resembled a person but not enough to confuse him. Still, it was an eerie shadow over the empty fields.
“It’s just a scarecrow, Ashul. Come on, it isn’t much farther now to the monastery,” Robyn murmured at his side.
His gaze flitted down to her and returned suspiciously to the fields. They were nearing the edge of another expanse dotted with trees, leaving the farmlands behind them, but he was not foolish enough to believe that it offered them any safety. Whatever was following them could have attacked any time but was waiting, tracking them. He had little doubt that it would hold off its attack until it could gain a better vantage point among the trees than it would have in the open.
“Something follows us,” he growled, and his mate cast a pointed look in his direction.
“You’re sure?” Her brow furrowed as she squinted at the farmland.
He nodded and scowled as his sharp eyes roved over distances far beyond human sight. Clearly whatever followed them was cloaking themselves in magic. Although certain magic did not work on his species when it came to controlling their perceptions—for which reason the glamour his mate would have tried would likely have not worked on him—he wished that he had bothered to learn a little magic so that he might at least send out a seeking spell to narrow down where it might be.
Robyn’s hand closed around his. “Let’s go. Whatever it is, it’s not going to reveal itself. There is a chance we can get to the purified grounds of the monastery before it catches up with us. If there is something haunting us, the protections should turn away those uninvited.”
Ashul grimaced but nodded again as he stepped closer to his mate, his body crowding hers protectively. “We go then.”
He did not have the heart to tell her that they would not make it to those grounds in time. Whatever it was, it was biding its time, but it would attack… and soon.
ChapterTwenty-Three
Ashul was acting twitchy, and that unnerved Robyn more than his whispered revelation. Not that she was taking the fact that they were being followed lightly. That there was someone out there managing to keep themselves unseen even from a drow and bone creature alike did not set well with her. Her mate’s eyes never stopped shifting over their surroundings alertly and he regularly peered behind them as if expecting something to drop upon them at any moment. Even Deroxas was seated above them vigilantly since they entered the tree line rather than scurrying in the trees above them.
Although she didn’t feel a presence in the way she would if it were the clamoring souls of the dead or some passing wraith, there was a new heaviness in the atmosphere. The trees quickly thickened to form the barrier between the town and monastery—at the town’s insistence—but the woods they entered lacked its usual buzz of life that should have been there even at that time of the year.
She shivered, watching the woods as they hurried through the trees. The worst was not knowing what followed them. Her baser instincts wanted to run for the safety of the monastery’s lands, but reason kept her from breaking stride as they kept their steady pace as if unaware of its presence. Without knowing what pursued them, they needed the edge. The attack was inevitable—the question was merely when.
Ashul protectively pressed in close to her. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end as she felt a shift in the air seconds before her mate suddenly swept in front of her with a snarl. Robyn stumbled to a halt, her senses straining. Somehow, their enemy had circled around them,
“Show yourself, creature!” her drow growled as he lowered into a defensive position.
“A creature, you say?” an echoing voice queried.
Laughter rolled over them and she scowled. There was something disgustingly familiar about it that pricked her memory. There was an intentional rustle of movement, the pursuer no longer attempting to keep its movements quiet. Her eyes shot to the thick mass of trees slightly to the right from where the laughter came. There was a ripple of movement, and her eyes snapped to it just as three skeletal warriors rushed from the trees, swinging their swords wildly in front of them.
She scowled as she drew her power around her. There was no doubt in her mind now. This was no random hunter. They were being pursued by one of her own.
Raising her hand, she smashed forward with a spell to obliterate the dead. Her ears rung with the sound of a loud toll and the nearest skeleton rattled, its bones collapsing in on it as it crumbled to dust. A sharp breath left her as she stared at the remains in surprise.