The Hunter Page 0,34

another one will. Believe me, Jenny: I'm going to make you mine-entirely-before you finish the Game."

Jenny wished she could think of something more mature to say than, "In your dreams!"

"No-in yours," he said. "And remember, you're not alone here."

Jenny heard a scream.

"That's Audrey," she said. "That's Audrey! Something's happening to her!" When he wouldn't release her hand, she jerked it out of his.

Then she saw his eyes-and what she saw there froze her.

"You know," she whispered. "You're doing it-to get back at me."

"I warned you," he said. The screaming was still going on. "Do you want it to stop?"

Evil, she thought. Absolute evil. Cruel, capricious, and dangerous as a cobra. I won't forget that again.

"I'll stop it myself," she said, her voice soft but fierce. "I told you I was going to win this Game. And I am. And I will never give in to you."

She threw the silver rose at his feet.

Then she was running for the sound of Audrey's screams.

Elves rushed at her as she plunged out of the sandcastle room, but she veered sharply and got by them. Audrey's screams were getting clearer and clearer. Jenny saw a gap in the nearest red wall and ducked into it, and suddenly the screams echoed all around her.

She saw Audrey sitting and Dee standing in front of her. She stumbled the last few feet to collapse beside them.

"What's wrong?"

Audrey was half sitting, half lying against the gypsum-encrusted wall of a small cavern. Her features were contorted with horror-and when Jenny turned she saw why.

She would have thought that after all she'd been through, she would be inured to weird creatures. But these things-these things were-

"Oh, God, Audrey, what are they?" she choked out.

Audrey's fingernails bit into Jenny's arm. "They're draugar. Living corpses. They've come for us. I-" She turned away, retching.

They smelted like corpses-the sickly-sweet odor of decay. Some of them had bloated bodies. Some had leathery skin, fallen in and wrinkled. Some, to Jenny's horror, had skin that was sloughing off.

One had thick fingernails turned brown by time and grown into long, dangling spirals. The nails clattered together, making a sound that raised gooseflesh all over Jenny's body.

They were completely blocking the exit. Jenny didn't know how she'd gotten around them to reach Audrey, but there was no getting out again. They were closing in from all sides.

"When I tell you, run for the door!" Dee said.

"What door?"

Dee pointed and Jenny turned. Beyond the nearest draugr on the right was a wall-and there was a

door in it. A Gothic door with an arched top, painted blue.

"Okay?" Dee shouted. "Get ready for it!"

She had been standing with her left leg back, knee bent, all her weight on it. Her right leg was so bent that only the toe touched the floor. It made her look like a ballerina, but it was called the cat stance-Dee was always trying to teach Jenny kung fu stances.

Suddenly she kicked, her right foot snapping up flat to strike the draugr under the jaw with her heel.

With a dry crack the draugr's head fell backward -all the way backward. Its neck was snapped.

The terrible thing was that it kept walking. Head resting on its own shoulder blades, blundering the wrong way, it kept walking.

Jenny let go and screamed.

"Get up!" Dee shouted to them. "Now, while I've got them distracted. Get out of here!"

Audrey remained frozen. "We can't leave you-"

"Don't worry about me! Just go! Jenny, take her!"

Jenny obeyed the tone of command instinctively. She hauled Audrey up by her houndstooth jacket and pulled her to the door. She wrenched it open, and they both fell through.

It slammed behind them before Jenny could stop it. She and Audrey looked at each other in dismay.

And then they waited.

They waited until a sick feeling in Jenny's stomach told her Dee wasn't going to come. Audrey was crying. Jenny tried the door handle. It wouldn't budge.

"It's my fault," Audrey whispered.

One of you probably won't make it....

The door flew open. Dee charged through, slammed it behind her, leaned on it. She expelled a great gust of air.

"That was close," she said. "But I've been dying for a fight, and it was a good one."

She was glowing with exertion and the joy of battle. She looked at Audrey.

"Well, aren't you a mess," she said.

Audrey's glossy auburn hair was hanging around her face; her spiky bangs were plastered damply to her forehead. Her cheeks were flushed and wet, her hands and legs scratched and scraped. Her cherry lipstick was gone.

Face inscrutable,