Dark Champion (Flirting with Monsters #4) - Eva Chase Page 0,5

onto this mission—there were things I could do.

“Of course it matters,” I cut in with a voice louder and more forceful than felt totally comfortable. A twinge ran through my chest at the stricken expression that crossed the incubus’s face, but maybe it was time he listened to me for once. Sorsha was mine, and I was hers, and if there was a way to save her, I would find it.

I squared my shoulders and went on. “If Omen touched anything with his bare hands—or any other bare skin—he might have left an impression that could tell me where he was thinking of going. Do you remember whether he touched any spot on the walls or the table or wherever while he was talking to us?”

After he’d grabbed Sorsha, he’d had his hands full with her. The wreckage on the floor had mostly been caused by us colliding with objects around the room as he’d shoved us away. He hadn’t transformed into his hellhound shape until he’d been loping across the ground outside, my beloved slung across his back—

An even stronger jolt of hope rushed through me. I motioned vaguely to the others, including the night elf who’d remained huddled in the shadows since Omen’s violent frenzy. “Take a moment to think about it. I’ll have a better chance outside anyway.”

Out in the humid air that had collected under the thick clouds overhead, I hesitated for a moment. The ground was dry and covered with patches of yellowed grass and weeds—and a jumble of faint footprints, the soles of human shoes. Had Omen’s hellhound paws left a mark anywhere? He’d run off in this direction…

I hurried between the trees. He’d definitely shifted by the time he’d reached this spot.

There—scratches in the dirt where his claws had scraped the ground. I bent down and flicked my tongue through the air over them, tasting the impressions he’d left behind.

Images even more fragmented than usual flashed through my awareness. The feel of Sorsha’s slack weight on his back, the hellish heat coursing over his skin, the effort of his swift strides—and a tangle of resolve and regret. He hadn’t been happy about lashing out at us. That didn’t reassure me much. He’d done it anyway, so who knew what other awful things he might do next?

I couldn’t pick up any sense that he’d known where he was going. He’d simply wanted to be as far as he could get from us, far from the possibility that we might stop him. What if he hadn’t decided yet?

I shoved that thought away and prowled onward, stopping here and there to test other patches of disrupted earth that appeared to be caused by animal rather than human-like feet. The impressions I gleaned tasted mostly the same as that first one. No clear sense of direction other than to keep moving as quickly as he could. He hadn’t been heading for a rift yet, as far as I could tell. That was one small relief.

When I pushed myself upright after the tenth or so testing, uncertain whether there was any point in continuing as the trail got vaguer, Ruse stepped through the trees to join me. His hopeful look faded at the sight of me. “Nothing?”

My frustration at that fact prickled through me. “Nothing that would tell us where he’s gone. But… I don’t think he was heading straight to the Highest. He felt the weight of some responsibility toward them, but he was resisting it.”

“I suppose if she’s still in this realm and alive, Thorn does have the best shot of tracking the two of them down.”

A fierceness that surprised even myself erupted out of me. “He should have given us the chance to help. If he’d waited just a few minutes, I might have been able to tell him something that would narrow down his search.” I spun on my heel, unable to stop myself from glaring at the trees. “Omen should have given us a chance. We know her better than he does—he should have listened to what we had to say, not followed what the Highest told him. They’ve never met her at all!”

Ruse raised his eyebrows at my outburst, but when he clapped his hand to my shoulder, the gesture was gentle. “I agree with you, devourer. Unfortunately, I think Omen was also aware that the three of us have become awfully invested in our mortal’s happiness. If we’d had more of a chance to rally against him, he might not have