Blood Land, J.R. Lawson [electric book reader .txt] 📗

she was about to do, but he knew he couldn’t very well get out of the way this time due to his foot being trapped under the fallen tree.

“Kari, don’t!” A voice shouted from nearby.  Both Kale and Kari turned their heads in the same direction in response. It was Jay standing there.  Kale only felt hopeful at his sight for a split second until he then realized Jay was alone.  Nora wasn’t with him.

“He killed him!! He killed Aaron!!” Kari screamed as she wept.  Her face had pure agony written all over it and she shook as she stood there.

“I know, but you know what Dagon said.  He wants to be the one to do it.  You and Aaron shouldn’t have been trying to kill him anyway.  Those weren’t your orders.” Jay spoke very straightforwardly as he walked toward Kari.

“But…but….” Was all Kari could get out between sobs.

“Go back to the house, Kari.” Jay now sternly instructed.

“I…”

“Go.  Now.”

Kari let out a few more sobs before then giving Kale the most horrible stare imaginable.  He could almost feel the hatred coming from her gaze.  However, she didn’t stay long and soon reluctantly spread her wings and took off.

Kale continued to lay there, his foot still in horrible agony as he looked up at Jay. “Jay…” he started to say but Jay cut him off.

“I’m sorry, Kale she’s already at Dagon’s,” Jay responded as if he could read his mind.

“No, please…please, Jay…” Kale found himself begging his friend.

“I’m sorry.  I can’t do anything about it now,” Jay answered as he just looked down at him with a somewhat cold expression. “But you can try to get her back.”

“What?” Kale asked.

“If you want her…meet us on the night of the next new moon at the place that’s the most important to you.  Dagon will be waiting with her.”

“Wait…Jay…what—”

“That’s all I can say.  I’m sorry.”

Kale didn’t have much of a chance to ask anything else because Jay immediately raised a fist and punched him right in between the eyes, causing him to instantly, and painfully, black out.

 

CHAPTER 47

 “KALE?”

Kale stirred a bit at the noise.

“Kale…wake up…”

“Uggh….” He let out a soft groan as he began to open his eyes.  They felt like lead as he lifted his lids and looked at the blurry view in front of him.

“Kale…are you alright?”

Soon, the fuzziness in front of him dissipated and Caroline’s face quickly came into view.  It was then that he attempted to sit up only to feel an immense pain in his skull.

“Oh god…” Kale groaned as he held his head, “What the hell….”

“I was hoping you could answer that for me,” Caroline then said as she put a hand on his shoulder, helping him sit up.

Kale now looked around him.  He noticed, to his surprise that it was now daylight out.  He then found himself shivering a bit as he also realized just how cold he was.  It only took him a few moments to finally remember what had transpired the night before. “Nora…” he softly uttered to himself.

“Where is Nora?  What happened, Kale?” Caroline asked again.   Kale heard a slight urgency in her tone.

“He got her….Jay…got her…” he said as he looked past Caroline at the snowy trees around them.  All he could do was stare out into the scenery around him as he thought about all that had just happened to him the night before.

“So you did find her?” Caroline asked him.

Kale, however, rather than answer her, glanced over at his foot, which he suddenly remembered had been practically crushed by the falling tree.  Except, now it was no longer under the large trunk and he involuntarily moved it a bit and then instantly cringed at the pain it brought on. “Gah!” he cried out slightly, “How did you get me out from under that tree?”

“I just rolled it off of you.  I don’t have to constantly drink blood to be strong, remember? Are you going to tell me what happened?” Caroline sighed as she answered.

“How did you find me?” Kale just asked.

“Well, when you didn’t come back all night after going to fetch Nora I got worried, so I sniffed you out and found you here, passed out in the snow. Now, tell me what happened!”

Kale looked down for a moment.  He held his head again as he felt the blood rush to it slightly, causing more pain and throbbing.  He sighed before then speaking, “I did find Nora.  She was at her old house.  She’d…gotten stronger…all on her own.  I’d gotten her to agree to come back with me.  But…Jay, Aaron, and Kari found us.  I did everything I could to keep them from getting her…”

“I can see that…” Caroline cringed slightly at the grotesque scene that was still behind Kale as she spoke.

“But…” Kale continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted, “I couldn’t…”

“It’s o.k.  You haven’t hunted in a while; it’s not your fault,” Caroline interjected again.

“I was weak!  I never felt more helpless in my life.  I failed her.  I fucking failed her!” Kale now shouted, slamming his fist into the snow beside him in frustration.

“You can’t blame yourself!” Caroline tried to console, “They are stronger than you on a good day.  It’s o.k.”

“It is not fucking o.k.!” Kale yelled again as he looked Caroline dead in the eye. “I had her….I had her…..” he now began to lower his voice a bit and Caroline could almost hear a quiver in it as well as he spoke. “She was with me.  After a week of looking for her…she was finally with me.  We were flying home….and then…just in a fucking instant….she was taken from me.  She was taken and this time I couldn’t get her back…”

Caroline gently put a hand on his shoulder again as she looked back at him sympathetically. “Kale…” she soothed, “Dagon isn’t going to hurt her.  If anything he’s going to pamper her.  He wants her to like him.  We just…have to come up with a plan…and go get her back.  I’m sure she’s at his place.  I know where it is, I know how to get there—”

“No,” Kale cut her off, “Jay said…before he knocked me out, that if I want Nora back, Dagon wants me to meet him at the next new moon at the place that’s most important to me.”

“Alright well…where is that?”

“My dad’s fairground.  That’s got to be it.  That’s the only place that’s been important to me that Dagon could possibly know about.  I’m guessing he wants a proper fight.  Jay made it sound like he wants to be the one to kill me now.”

“O.k…well…that makes sense seeing as he wants it to be on a new moon.  But it is still a little over a week away.  That gives us some time to come up with a plan and get stronger.  At least there’s that,” Caroline said.

Kale nodded. “I just still can’t believe they got her….”

“Hey,” Caroline spoke gently again, “I promise we’ll get her back, o.k.?  It’ll be alright.”

“Do you think she hates me?  For not coming to get her this time?”

Caroline felt almost astounded at Kale’s question for a moment before she answered, “No.  No, I don’t.  I don’t think she blames you at all.  You know Nora.  She wouldn’t think that of you.  She knows you’ll come rescue her.”

Kale just silently nodded, not looking at Caroline.  Then, after a few silent seconds, he eventually began to attempt to stand up.  Caroline noticed and immediately began to help him up.  Kale winced slightly at the sharp pain in his foot and tried his hardest not to stand on it much.  Caroline stood next to him and put his arm around her shoulder to help him walk.  The two of them started slowly toward the car Caroline had driven to where they were.  As they went, it was mostly quiet, that is until Kale spoke up, “So, before Dagon’s brood found us…Nora got the chance to tell me something…”

“What’s that?” Caroline asked.

“That she had gotten her ability already.”

Caroline glanced over at Kale briefly in surprise before she responded, “Really?  She did?”

“Yeah,” Kale answered, “But it’s not healing…”

“What?!” Caroline now asked in astonishment.

“Yeah, it’s communicating with animals.”

Caroline stopped their walk for a brief second as Kale had finished his sentence.  She looked him dead in the eye with a slight confused expression as she said, “Communicating with animals….are….are you sure?”

“Yeah…why?” Kale could sense the curiosity in her voice.

“Nothing…it’s just…that’s….really weird.”

“What, is it not a common ability?”

“No…I mean…I’ve never seen it come up before...”

“Maybe it’s another rare one.”

“Maybe….”

Finally, the two of them reached the car and Caroline proceeded to open the passenger side door and help Kale into the seat.  After she had, she paused a moment before shutting the door.  She thought to herself for only an instant before then looking back down at Kale and then asked, “Kale?”

“Yeah?” Kale replied as he looked back up at her.

“Did you…see Nora do this ability?”

“No.  She just told me about it.  She told me about how she had tried to heal this little bird only she couldn’t and instead she was able to talk to it.  That’s how she discovered it.”  He looked at Caroline’s somewhat confused and thoughtful expression for a second before he then said, “Why?  What is it?”

Caroline shook her head a bit to clear her thoughts before she answered, “Oh, nothing…just…thinking…”

“Do you think…”Kale then said, “Maybe Dagon won’t want her now…since she doesn’t have the healing ability?  I mean, he’s still going to want to fight me, that’s for damn sure.  But maybe he at least won’t feel the need to keep Nora.  Maybe at least…she can be free of him?”

Caroline shrugged slightly as she answered, “It’s possible.” It was then that Caroline decided to finally shut the passenger’s side door and walk around to the driver’s side of the car.  She thought to herself as she did.  Thought about what Kale had said about Nora’s ability.  How strange it was that it was an ability that she had never heard of before.  Perhaps it was, as Kale said, a rare one.  However, Caroline was doubtful.  She had another hunch about it, but she decided to keep it to herself.

 

***

 

It was in the meantime that Nora sat, alone, in a small room.  She had perched herself on the small twin bed against the back wall, her feet planted on the floor and her knees together.  She had her hands resting on her lap and she shivered occasionally, still being cold from the night before.  She spent her time of solitude to think to herself about her situation.  As she looked around her at the small room, she deduced that it had once belonged to Caroline, her assumption based on its decoration being similar to the way her house had been.  It was then that this particular thought made Nora sad.  She realized that she probably would never see that house again even if she, Kale, and Caroline got out of this eventually.  She also hoped Kale was alright.  She knew of course, that since she wasn’t bleeding that he was still alive, but she still prayed that he hadn’t been hurt too badly.  She had seen what shape he was in when he had come to find her and how