But she didn’t come through. Hunt took his chance and channeled his energy, trying to pull off a powerful spell. With all of the energy at his fingertips, he snapped, drawing a tremendous amount of pain to his arm. Hunt let out a yell and dropped his sword.
Emma jumped out of the smoke, slamming into him and pinning him to the ground. She raised a hand to strike, and hesitated for a moment. Hunt gritted his teeth in pain, as his arm burned from the failed spell. The talisman which had burned his fingertips had stopped the spell.
“Go on, do it!” Hunt said to her, staring at the Werewolf.
She hesitated, looking at his hand. “What happened to you?”
“You’re going to kill me, no?” Hunt asked, realizing that she had straddled him, pinning him underneath her. “Get it over with.”
Emma shook her head. “You’re a Hunter.”
“You’re a Werewolf.”
“You’ve killed my kind,” Emma argued.
“And you’ve killed mine, a lot of mine.”
She shook her head. “Look, right now, you’re not my enemy. Garret is coming after me, and since you stood up to him, he’ll be coming after you. We have the same enemy.”
“Get off me,” Hunt grunted.
“Not until we’re done talking,” Emma affirmed. “Looks like you can’t pull off some of your tricks due to this injury here.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“Sure, but you won’t survive against Garret,” Emma continued. “I can help you if we run into him.”
“I won’t,” Hunt replied, considering what she had said. Garret had a lot of his little demon dogs running through the tunnels, and it was only a matter of time before they would find him. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, she was right. The injury wasn’t going to let him do anything that needed a lot of energy. Hunt wouldn’t last a minute face-to-face with Garret.
“Deny it all you want, you know I’m telling the truth.” Emma paused, shifting her features back to her human form. For a moment, Hunt didn’t mind that such a beautiful woman was on top of him. She looked around the tunnel. “I have no idea where I am, and I’m here to find someone.”
“Sounds like your problem,” Hunt replied. He didn’t want to help her, or have anything to do with her.
“You help me find a way out of these tunnels, and find the person I’m looking for, and I’ll protect you from Garret.”
“He almost killed you,” Hunt argued.
“But I’m still your best chance. At least you might be able to run away if I go up against him.”
Hunt smirked. “Fair point. Who are you looking for?”
Emma got off of him, stretching out a hand to help him up. “I can’t be sure you won’t stab me in the back, but I need your help. My pack and I were trying to find Garret. Ever since we last saw him, he has been in hiding. But we’ve not been able to track him down for weeks. Someone told me I’d be able to find a tracker down here. Someone who can find anyone, no matter where they’re hiding.”
“Who told you that?” Hunt asked, raising an eyebrow.
“A close friend who wouldn’t lie to me, so I’m sure they’re here. I just need help finding them,” said Emma. “You know anything about this person?”
Hunt scratched his chin. “I’m the person you’re looking for.”
Emma stared at him for a moment and then took a step back. Her face showed shock at the realization that she had almost killed the person she had come all this way for. She pushed her hair away from her face, staggering off to the side as she took a breath, trying to calm herself.
“Shit, shit…” she whispered.
“Yeah, it happens,” Hunt replied. “Nearly getting killed is all in a day’s work.”
“I wouldn’t normally go that far,” Emma replied, and then stopped herself. It was easy to tell that she was holding back, keeping things from him.
“Well I’m glad you didn’t,” Hunt finished, looking around the chamber they were in. “Considering how spaced out theselights are, and the age of these walls, I’d say we’re pretty deep underground.”