“Ah,” said Asil. “That Ben.” Then, with a fine tension in his voice, he said, “If it has harmed our Anna, kill it.”

“I would be grateful for any advice you might have toward that end,” said Charles. “Sherwood Post failed to kill it. And the witches of Wild Sign think it’s immortal.”

“Is that all?” Asil said. “A wise man once told me that the only way to kill something immortal is to remind it what death is.”

“Suggestions?”

Asil sighed heavily. “Alas, that wise man died before he told me more. Killed himself. Your da is bringing the sword he killed himself with.”

“Jonesy’s sword?”

“Yes,” Asil confirmed.

Charles felt the first hint of optimism. That sword had already killed one immortal being; it might be well suited to killing another. Bless his da for farsightedness.

“ETA?” Charles asked.

“He wasn’t sure. He’s flying into Bend, where the Alpha has a helicopter.”

“Fortune favors the foolish,” murmured Tag from the driver’s side. Then “Blast” as both he and Charles realized that they’d overshot the turnoff.

Charles disconnected and helped Tag spot where Anna had left the highway as they crawled past the area a second time.

“Here,” he said, pointing to where two tracks broke the sod off the highway. It wasn’t any kind of official road. It looked more like a trail that off-roaders had built.

“Yeehaw,” Tag said as they left the pavement. He showed his teeth in a hunter’s smile. “This should be fun.”

Charles helped guide while he thought about how to kill the Singer if his da didn’t make it in time. As far as he was concerned, this second attack—third?—on Anna had signed its death warrant.

* * *

*

HE GOT THE Suburban stuck—high-centered on a rock. Anna was pretty sure she’d heard the oil pan go. Certainly she smelled motor oil as she got out.

Run, something inside her urged.

She knew she could outrun Zander in the dark, even on the side of a mountain that he appeared to be quite familiar with. She didn’t know where that confidence came from. She’d quit track in elementary school in favor of private violin lessons. She wasn’t . . . shouldn’t be in shape for a race in the forest.

She looked down and had no trouble seeing the hard muscle on her arms that looked as though she’d been in training for the Olympics or something.

She deserved an Olympic medal.

She waited for the strange thought to go somewhere. When it didn’t, she continued to take stock of her oddly alien body. She’d never been the kind of girl who obsessed about being in shape. But this wasn’t just her arms. She could feel the strength in her legs. When she reached up to touch her biceps, she encountered hard flesh.

For an instant she smelled pine and felt the snow give under her as she ran in joyous abandon.

While she was still processing that, Zander’s hand wrapped around her upper arm just above her own. Relief washed over her. She was safe with him.

Run.

CHAPTER

12

It started to rain. A light pattering rain at first, blown a little by a breeze. But it wasn’t long before the rain was pelting down and the wind was blowing so hard that Anna had trouble keeping her hair out of her face so she could see.

“Are you cold?” Zander asked, concerned. “You should have brought a jacket.”

She pulled the now-wet flannel shirt around her protectively. “I’m fine,” she said. And it was true. Though the rain was cold, it didn’t seem to be chilling her as she would have expected.

“In Montana,” she told Zander, “a storm this late in the fall would probably be a snowstorm, not a rainstorm. A little rain won’t stop me.”

And then she wondered why in the world she’d been talking about Montana. She’d never been to—

She had a sudden vision of looking at a magnificent snow-covered landscape, unfolding below her in shades of blue. Of the cold biting her nose and the snow squeaking under her snowshoes, sounding a little like bedsprings.

She stumbled to a halt. Bedsprings.

“Stop lollygagging,” Zander said, smiling as he tugged on her arm. “We’ve got a few miles to go and we’re only going to get wetter.”

Zander seemed to have trouble seeing their path through the night-dark woods, stumbling over rocks and roots that Anna had no trouble with. She scrambled up a steep place in the trail, and waited at the top while he found his own path up.

“The last person I took up here was part mountain goat, too,” he complained cheerfully. “I’ve spent my life climbing mountainsides, and you show me up.”

She shrugged because she didn’t have an answer for him. She hadn’t done anything more athletic than marching band, but this hike didn’t feel as difficult as it looked. The few times she’d slipped as they climbed up wet rocks, she’d had no trouble catching herself. It felt like she’d suddenly turned into Spider-Man. But that made no sense.

If she’d been totally comfortable with him—and she felt bad that she wasn’t—she would have teased him about being slow. She didn’t know the elevation. Maybe it was lower than home and that was giving her an oxygen boost.

They emerged at last into an area that was a natural amphitheater, complete with seating that looked as though it had had some human help.

She stopped when she realized there were musical instruments scattered around the amphitheater.

Like sacrifices.

It went against every instinct she had to leave instruments to the mercy of the weather. Instruments were precious things. She broke away from Zander’s chosen path to see if she could rescue any of them.

Zander grabbed her arm again in a way that she was beginning to resent and tried to jerk her away. She stiffened, and when he pulled, she stayed where she was, skidding a little with the force he used when she did not yield.

He stopped, took a breath. “Come on,” he said, and she felt the effort he used to gentle his tone. “I’ve a dry place we can rest up in.”

That false gentle tone made her plant her feet like a Missouri mule.

“Stop trying to drag me,” she said. And then, with gritted teeth: “Get your hand off my arm before you lose it.”

He met her eyes and took a step back, frowning. “I thought your eyes were brown.”

They were. But she didn’t care what color he thought her eyes were.

“Look,” she said. “This has been a fun hike and all, but I think I am done. You go on.” She needed to go back to that hotel by the river, the one they’d driven by, so she could sit on the rock and watch the river, waiting for . . .

She pulled the flannel shirt up to her face, not wanting to bury her nose in it with Zander looking on. But the smell of musk and mint and home was still there, rising from the damp cloth.

“Sorry,” he said, and this time he meant it. “I am soaking wet, and even if you’re not cold, I am.”

There was a flash of lightning, and reflexively she started counting seconds—one thousand one, one thousand two . . . Thunder rumbled exactly at five. “That’s a mile off,” she said.

“Too close to stay out here,” he told her. He held out his hand—and she heard music, though he wasn’t singing. It came from the ground beneath her feet and shivered through her reluctant body, bringing with it the understanding of what she was doing here. That this was where she needed to be, with Zander.

She looked at his hand and couldn’t remember why she’d left him standing like that. It was rude. She took his hand—his was cold.

“You are warm,” he said, sounding startled.

“I told you,” she said.

“You did indeed,” he agreed. “Come this way, Anna mine.”

That was wrong, she knew. But she didn’t want to be offensive and tell him that he was mistaken. She didn’t belong to him. She belonged. Belonged to . . .

She was sitting on a rock overlooking the river and felt his approach.

She would go to that rock when she and Zander were finished hiking, she decided. And her shoulders relaxed with that decision.

They walked another half of a mile, but they traveled now on an actual trail.

* * *

*

TAG HIT THE Suburban with the Land Rover. The Suburban gave way with a crunch and shriek of bending metal.

“Sorry,” he grunted.

Charles didn’t care about the damage done. They had lost signal ten miles before and he had begun to doubt that they were even on the right path. The sight of the Suburban through the trees had been welcome. He understood why Tag had punched the accelerator so they were going too fast to stop in the loose and muddy ground.

Even if the Rover had been destroyed—and he suspected it wasn’t even dented, given the resiliency of old steel—it had already taken them as far as it could.

He jumped out of the Rover and into the cold rain. The Suburban’s hood was warmer than the ambient temperature, but not by much.

“We’re an hour behind them,” he told Tag. “Maybe a little more.”