does that mean? What did you see with your life hoodoo?” he questioned, seriously tempted to use the wind to eavesdrop for him.
“None of your business. And don’t go enlisting the wind to help you either, Knox,” she reprimanded him.
Knox tried to look innocent. “How did you know that was what I was thinking?”
“Please,” she said, returning to her digging. “You’re an open book.”
If I’m such an open book, how come you can’t see how much I want you? Knox silently asked. He was gearing up to talk to Dawn again when a familiar cold swept through his body. Jumping to his feet he saw Dex do the same, as well as several other chadens.
“What is it?” Dawn asked, looking concerned. She was immediately surrounded by her four paladins.
“I feel something …” Knox answered absently, searching the garden for signs of danger.
“Dad?” Kai questioned, his sickle out, moving swiftly to his side with his brothers.
Knox couldn’t see anything but there was no denying his feeling of unease – and recognition. Something was there. Something insidious. Something dangerous. Something sick, Knox thought. “Clear everybody out,” he yelled to anyone and everyone who would listen.
Ryker was already on the case, hustling Max away with the rest of her paladins. Mordecai tugged a protesting Dana away, and other wardens were swooped up by their paladins. Soon, the only people left in the pretty half-finished garden were Dex, Knox, and the triplets. At least he thought they were – until Dawn spoke.
“Is it a sick paladin?”
Knox spun around, “What the hell are you still doing here?” He glared at her knights, “Get her out of here.”
Dawn crossed her arms over her chest, her paladins not even twitching. “They obey my orders, not yours. And if there is a sick paladin, I will deal with him.”
Knox scoffed in disbelief. “You will deal with him? You’re a Life Warden, Dawn. Your powers are passive. What are you going to do? Sing him a song? Leave. Now.” Knox wasn’t trying to be a prick; he was simply worried about her. Especially when the feeling of darkness spread across the fresh lawn, a shadow building from the tree line.
Dawn pursed her lips, looking pissed, but there was also a flash of hurt in her eyes. “Good to know what you really think of me,” she said. “Do I need to remind you that I outrank you? And have you forgotten I have been working with the sick paladins ever since the first case? I am the expert here. Not you.”
“Oh really? Pretty sure being a walking stick man filled with hunger and hopelessness for fifty years as I tried to consume my brethren and defiled my element gives me an advantage,” Knox snarked.
“Will you two cut it out?” Dex demanded. “Sheesh, I had no idea the sexual tension was so bad between you.”
Knox was about to refute the comment – vehemently – when not one but two paladins staggered out of the trees, causing Knox’s inner radar to go haywire. Like Dex, and all the other chadens he assumed, he had a connection with the infection. Like recognised like, he supposed, and the two men were definitely infected. They were thin and dirty and their clothes were torn. They weren’t wearing any shoes and their eyes were hollow and listless. They were by far the worst infected paladins Knox had seen since all the wardens had been cured of the chade virus. There had only been a handful of paladins showing signs of the degenerative disease since the big battle, and Nikolai and Max had dealt with those swiftly. Although, Knox acknowledged, Dawn had been learning and doing all she could for them as well. But these paladins must have been lost somehow, they obviously had been living outdoors – perhaps even since the fight all those months ago.
‘No wonder they look so far gone,’ Kai’s voice could be heard loud and clear through the bond.
“What’s the plan?” Kellan asked, sickle at the ready.
“Incapacitate,” Knox was quick to say, pity filling him as he looked at the two listless men. He knew they were only driven by their infinite hunger now, but he stepped forward and tried to talk them down, nonetheless. It was the least he could do.
“We are going to help you, okay? But you need to stay still.” No response, and no indication they comprehended his words. Knox looked at Dex, receiving a small nod of encouragement. “Can you understand me?”