1

The crew raced in Lorenzo’s direction. Angie, as the highest-level human, was the fastest. She was followed by Damon, then the remaining members of the group. Like Lorenzo, she decided not to equip her weapon until she needed it, wanting to stay as aerodynamic as she could. Having lost sight of the Grimalkin hunter minutes before, she watched for movement in the trees.

Even though she planned to spend the rest of her life with Damon, Angie was ready to lay down her life for the young girl. She wasn’t alone in that sentiment. Almost everyone in her group would do the same. But they hadn’t seen what the Dryope had done to Miguel. She had, and she couldn’t let that happen to Kylah.

The movement in the trees was gone now, and she realized that Lorenzo had outpaced her. She kept running but was disconcerted by the development. She looked up at the trees. Well, I’m not a Grimalkin, she thought, but I am at level 56. That’s got to count for something.

She vaulted for the nearest tree and climbed up the trunk as quickly as she could. Angie didn’t have the advantage that Lorenzo had with his claws, but her years of experience as a Marine helped her scale the tree swiftly. As she clambered up the bark, she checked her stats.

Angie (Level 56)

RACE: Human

CLASS: Hunter

HP: 285

HPR: 3.8

MP: 144

MPR: 3.68

STRENGTH: 245

CONSTITUTION: 190

DEXTERITY: 262

INTELLIGENCE: 181

WISDOM: 184

ENDURANCE: 189

XP: 2306

Her strength and dexterity stats dwarfed anything the rookies had. So how much of their speed and agility comes from their Grimalkin race? she wondered. Probably a lot. He did outrun you, after all. Angie just hoped she could jump from tree to tree without crashing back to the ground.

She reached the top and spotted Lorenzo. He was two football fields ahead of her. And to the west, the Dryope was fast approaching. Angie jumped for the next tree.

2

Lorenzo waited until he was within a hundred feet of the Dryope before equipping his Nagamarrow sword. The Boulder still coasted behind him. The beast had seen him coming but hadn’t adjusted its course. Now he could see Kylah, and his heart sank. She appeared to be dead. The young girl hung limply from one of the monster’s tentacles, and he saw that her head was bloody.

For the first time since his jaunt across the forest, the now heartbroken Grimalkin hunter misjudged his footing and fell below the treeline. His shoulder smacked hard against the thick limb of a redwood. It stopped his descent, and he managed to hang onto his sword.

He climbed up the tree and resumed his pursuit, feeling anger swell inside him—against the creature, and against the god he believed in. He wasn’t sure how he would reconcile the girl’s death with his faith. You can deal with that later, he told himself. You’re not certain she’s dead. And if she is, that beast is gonna pay.

Lorenzo jumped over the last tree, closing in on the behemoth, as the Dryope turned to face him. In midflight, he whipped the Boulder at the monster. The marble ball tore through the rest of the surprised Dryope’s left side, compounding the damage Harper had inflicted earlier with the same spell. Its shoulder and arm exploded in a spray of gray wood.

Lorenzo landed on the monster’s right side and drove his sword into its neck, but the blade jammed in the grayish-brown wood. He tried to pull it out, but it wouldn’t dislodge, and he knew he couldn’t waste any more time.

As he queued up another Boulder spell, the Dryope grabbed him and smashed him against a thick tree trunk. Lorenzo screamed. He fired the Boulder, aiming for the monster’s left leg, but missed.

Under the behemoth, he noticed that the blood on Kylah’s face had come from a series of perforations on her cheek. I need to check on her. He scrambled across the tree, but the Dryope drove a pointed tentacle through his chain mail and into his back, pinning him. The pain was greater than anything Lorenzo had ever felt, then like a switch turning off, the pain vanished.

The creature leaned down and faced the injured hunter. With its tentacle still buried in his flesh, the beast extended its thorns. Poison entered Lorenzo’s bloodstream and clouded his mind. As his vision blurred, he thought he saw Kylah move.

The beast purred at him, but to the semiconscious Italian, it sounded like an insect buzzing. “I will add you to the birthing,” the Dryope cooed.

3

Angie watched Lorenzo’s battle with the Dryope, frustrated that she couldn’t reach him and help. However, she still had one advantage: the monster hadn’t seen her. And although she was slower than the Grimalkin hunter, Angie quickly got the hang of leaping from tree to tree. Boosted by her higher stats, she could jump a good twenty feet.

As the Dryope continued to lean over and inspect Lorenzo, Angie closed in on the beast. She had readied her Boulder spell and planned to fire the rock right through the monster’s lowered head. Once she was within one hundred meters of the behemoth, Angie stopped. It still hadn’t detected her. This is going to be perfect, she thought. Then a piercing screech came from her left. She fired the Boulder. The veteran didn’t let the sound distract her, but the mother beast looked up and saw the projectile coming.

It veered to the right, but Angie guided the marble ball, compensating for the Dryope’s movement. The rock collided with the top shell of the monster’s head, which exploded in a burst of wood. The beast dropped Kylah. As it fell backward against the treetops, the tentacle that had impaled Lorenzo withdrew from him with an audible and sickening pop. Angie saw his limp body being pulled upward with the tentacle, then bouncing against a crown of branches.

Angie fired another Boulder as the behemoth flailed against the trees. Right between your legs, you fucking bitch, she thought. As she directed the spell, she heard more screeching, much closer this time. The marble rock smashed through the beast’s waist. Angie turned to her left. Racing across the treetops were the two Dryads that had retreated from Harper’s group. They leaped over the remaining trees and slammed into Angie. Plummeting through the webbing of branches and limbs, she landed hard on the soil fifty feet below and was knocked briefly unconscious.

With vengeful deliberation, the Dryads removed her helmet and splint mail armor. As the veteran hunter came to, the two monsters set upon her, and she screamed as their timber fangs sank into her flesh.

4

It seemed, at first, like a dream. Kylah was back home, and it was a bright, sunny day. She was lying on the hammock that hung between the two elm trees in her backyard. Rays of yellow sunlight poked through the gaps of the leafy canopy.

And, as usual, she was alone.

Nevan was working the weekend at Cloud Nine again. When it came to that company, there was always some emergency. He had apologized and told her she could order in food. At least she had that to look forward to. A movie and her favorite pad thai dish would ease her loneliness that evening. But for right now, she was idling the afternoon away, paging through a book and enjoying the sun as it warmed her skin.

She sipped the lemonade she’d retrieved from the fridge and stopped reading for a moment. She listened to the water trickling through the adjacent ravine a few yards away. It imbued Kylah with a peaceful feeling.

She watched as a dragonfly descended from one of the elm leaves above her. Its iridescent wings sparkled like a prism in the sunlight. It fluttered downward and landed on her stomach, just below her halter top. She giggled as its tiny legs tickled her skin. Then the dragonfly lifted off and drifted toward the ravine.

Kylah took a deep breath, but then her serenity was disturbed. She heard a rustle in the grass and leaned forward, searching the yard. A snake was slithering from the water, across the lawn and toward her. Kylah groaned. Please don’t ruin this beautiful day, she wished, but the serpent kept coming.

She sighed and threw her book at it. The creature swerved and sped at her. As she scrambled out of the hammock, her right foot got caught on the canvas fabric and she faceplanted into the fresh-cut grass, jarring her neck badly.

She rolled away from the snake as it coiled, then struck. From its gaping mouth, four fangs gleamed in the sunlight just before they punctured her cheek. Kylah screamed as she fumbled to her feet with the serpent still attached to her face.

She pulled on the snake’s body, but the snake remained clasped to her cheek. As Kylah staggered toward the bungalow she shared with Nevan, she saw a set of hedge trimmers leaning against the terrace door. She ran for them, hoping she could use the blades as a weapon.

Then, unexpectedly, the serpent unclenched and fell from her face. She watched as the serpent slinked back toward the ravine. Kylah touched her cheek and felt blood slime her fingertips. She could feel the punctures on her skin. There were more than four of them and that didn’t make any sense.

The Dryope, she thought hazily. The Dryope did this to me. Not the snake. It’s the—

A beast roared in the distance. It was a sound full of rage. The house in front of her melted away. Then the grass changed to the verdant leaves of the treetops and Kylah knew she wasn’t home.

Kylah opened her eyes and realized that she had landed on her neck against a thick limb. As she pushed herself off, her neck and broken arm screamed and throbbed. She saw the Dryope now. The gigantic beast was critically injured and lay flat on its back, held aloft by the trees of the forest.

She detected movement to her right and saw Angie briefly before the veteran disappeared below the treeline along with two Dryads. Kylah turned back to the fallen Dryope. Consumed with rage, it continued to thrash against the trees. As she queued a Fire Bullet, Kylah limped toward the behemoth, clutching at the tree limbs with her one good arm. Half of the monster’s torso, waist, and head had been obliterated. The beast struggled to rise from its vulnerable position. Its remaining tentacles grasped blindly at the surrounding trees.

As the Dryope roared and screeched furiously, Kylah checked her mana. She was down to zero. Screaming with her own rage, she thrust the fireball at the Dryope. In a brief moment of awareness, drawn out of its rage by some primitive instinct, the monster turned toward the young girl and the onrushing projectile. Its tentacles flashed in the path of the fireball but were pulverized into a rain of splinters. The blast annihilated the rest of the mother beast. Fragments of its shattered body jettisoned across the forest. Kylah ducked as the remains of a leg spun toward her like a boomerang. It sheared off the top of the tree she was standing in before skipping across the woods wildly.

Kylah fell into a cradle of redwood branches as the smell of raw wood enveloped her. She closed her eyes, clutched at herself, and started crying uncontrollably.

5

Damon heard Angie screaming from somewhere ahead in the woods. His heart filled with dread at the sound of her pained cries, but then she started grunting and yelling. She’s not incapacitated, he thought with relief. She’s fighting back.

As the orc general crashed through the thick forest, he tried to pick up his pace, but he was already running flat out. Limited by my damn stats, he thought disgustedly. He burst through a dense wall of entangled saplings and landed twenty feet from Angie and the two Dryads attacking her.

“Leave her the fuck alone!” he shouted as he equipped his hammer, ready to pound the wooden creatures into oblivion.

The Dryads’ cobalt eyes bulged as they saw the stampeding orc. They released Angie then vaulted for the trees.

Damon jumped and threw the hammer at them, but the creatures were already halfway up a Douglas fir and he missed them entirely. He landed on the dusty forest floor and rolled onto his back. He saw the Dryads scurry to the treeline as he turned to Angie. She wore only her canvas undergarments and had deep gouges across most of her body.

“Where are you hurt the most?” he asked.

She shook her head and gestured at a four-inch wound running across her ribcage. “I’ll live,” she said, then nodded toward the trees. “It’s Kylah and Lorenzo we should be worried about. They’re up there somewhere.”

6

The rest of Damon’s group arrived a few moments later with Armando and Rachel in the lead. While the healer rushed to Angie, the remaining members tried to locate Lorenzo and Kylah from the ground. Zahra heard the young girl’s sobs and climbed up the tree to comfort her.

Meanwhile, Lorenzo wasn’t making a sound. Damon told Armando and Vlad to pick a tree and climb to the top. From there, they spotted the Grimalkin hunter, who lay motionless at the top of a redwood. The orc and mage scaled that tree and saw that Lorenzo was unconscious. They checked his hit points. As they watched, his HP dropped from 15 to 14. Vlad cast Mana Heal on the injured Grimalkin, draining his mana pool. The spell recovered 2 HP for every 5 MP. That left Lorenzo with 41 HP, but it continued to decrease. They stared at the hole punched through the back of his chain mail. It was slick with blood and the size of a fist.

“Dat is very close to his spine. We should not move him,” the Russian suggested.

Armando agreed. “Rachel, can you come up here?” he shouted down.

The blonde healer attempted to scale the tree, slipping many times. While Vlad grew impatient, Armando climbed down and helped her to the top. Rachel knelt at Lorenzo’s side. “You were right not to move him.”

The injured Grimalkin hunter lay on his stomach, breathing shallowly. Rachel noticed that he had involuntarily urinated through his canvas underwear and onto the branches below him. She stood up and looked at the two orcs. “This is very serious,” she said. “We have to go back down and talk to the veterans.”

7

“He’s suffered a traumatic spinal cord injury,” Rachel said, then turned to the two veterans in the group, Angie and Damon. “Has anyone on your team had an injury this severe?”

Angie shrugged, uncertain why the healer was asking. “We’ve had a lot of broken bones. Zack and Harper both had punctured lungs.”

As Zahra and Kylah climbed down from their tree, Rachel went on. “I ask because I’m not sure how much of an effect these healing spells will have. How long did it take Zack and Harper to recover?”

“One or two days,” Damon answered.

Zahra and Kylah joined the group and were informed of Lorenzo’s condition. As Rachel was technically a zoologist, Zahra, the only nurse in Damon’s crew, climbed up the tree to examine the injured Grimalkin hunter. She returned moments later and glanced at Rachel. “I bumped up his hit points. You’re right about your assessment of the injury.”

She turned back to the group. “Without X-rays, a CT scan, or an MRI, we won’t know for sure, but it’s a fairly safe diagnosis at this point.” She paused, then went on. “As Rachel alluded to, we don’t know how the healing spells will work with this as you haven’t dealt with a catastrophic injury like this before.” She placed her hand on Kylah, who was wrought with guilt and began sobbing again. “Look, we have to be very quick here. He needs to be stabilized. His condition will only worsen until then.”

She surveyed each member. “Everyone, take your undergarments off. We’re going to need that fabric.” While the veterans got started, the newer members looked at Zahra, dumbfounded. “I’m not fucking kidding. Get that clothing off!”

Once the underwear and bras were gathered, Zahra ordered Vlad back up the tree to perform healing spells while she addressed the group. “We need to build a stretcher and immobilize his spine.” She nodded to the three orcs in the crew. “You guys, start chopping eight-foot lengths of wood. Preferable three to four inches thick.”

She turned to Angie and Rachel. “I want you to collect long strips of thinner branches, but they have to be flexible, the kind that can be weaved around the thicker wood.”

The group went about their tasks and soon returned with the wood. As Zahra directed him, Armando laid the thick wood lengthwise and ran the thin branches across its width. Finally, they yanked the vines from the area and tied the wood as securely as they could.

Zahra pulled the strapping from her leather brigandine armor and instructed Rachel to do the same. “We’ll belt him in with these when we get up there.”

Damon and Silo grabbed the ends of the stretcher and waited for more instructions, but Zahra shook her head. “Just one orc. I don’t want your combined weight bringing us down.” She gestured to Armando, who, while very muscular, was the slightest of the three orcs. “You come with me”—she surveyed the remaining teammates—“Rachel and Angie, you’re coming with me too.”

Zahra called Vlad back down while Armando grabbed the stretcher and started up the tree. The other three women followed him.

8

When they reached the top, Lorenzo was still unconscious. The four members clung to the limbs while Zahra determined how to get him out of the tree. “It’s a problem that he’s on his stomach, but I don’t think it's worth the chance turning him over up here.”

She pointed at a set of branches that were partially holding the injured Grimalkin’s weight. “I’m going to pull on that and hold his body up with my other hand,” she told Armando. “When I do, I want you to slide the stretcher underneath him.” She pulled the branch, and the orc wedged the stretcher under Lorenzo.

Zahra exhaled. “Keep him perfectly still. Don’t let that thing move an inch.” She turned to the other two members. “Armando’s got his top half. Now we position his legs onto the stretcher.”

Rachel and Angie each grabbed a leg while Zahra balanced on the beam below him and supported his waist with both of her palms. “Now slowly,” she whispered, and they moved his body small increments at a time.

Fifteen grueling minutes went by as their muscles strained and sweat trickled down their skin. Finally, they shifted his body as carefully as they could onto the stretcher. While Armando held it upright, Rachel and Zahra padded the sides of Lorenzo’s neck with the team’s undergarments, which were fashioned into small pillows. With the leather strapping from their brigandine armor, they tied him to the makeshift stretcher.

Then Zahra gazed at Armando with deadly seriousness. “We climb down as one unit and keep him horizontal the whole time You will have to bear the brunt of this.” She turned to Rachel and Angie. “We’ll have to support him, too. Keep one hand on a limb and the other on the stretcher.”

Zahra asked if they were ready, and the members said they were. Then they proceeded carefully back down to the ground.

9

Thirty minutes later, they reached the forest floor and Zahra called over the other two orcs. “Grab an end,” she huffed. “We’re exhausted.”

Damon and Silo held the stretcher while the four members collapsed.

Once they were able to continue, the two healers checked Lorenzo. He hadn’t woken up the entire time he was lowered. As they started healing him, Zahra turned to Damon. “In a normal world, if a recovery was even possibly—and that is not guaranteed—it would usually take six months to a year.”

He gasped.

“So, he isn’t moving for a while,” the nurse from San Antonio continued. “He’s going to have to be removed from his duties and will need to be cared for. Where’s the closest place we can shelter him?”

Damon took a moment to think about the options. “My guess is we’re closer to the village than the cave or the huts. And it would be the best place for him anyway.”

“Can we get there by nightfall?”

The orc general assessed the healer. He knew what the answer had to be. “Yes.”

20

After patching his wound, the group built a second stretcher and used it to turn Lorenzo over, positioning him onto his back.

“He’ll breathe better that way,” Zahra said.

The teammates glanced at her skeptically. They had seen how labored his breathing had become.

Damon checked in with Harper, and the two team leaders called off the search for the DNA. “We’ve recovered enough anyway,” the orc general grumbled to his crew. “We can always come back and continue from this point.”

Lorenzo remained unconscious. Kylah appeared to be taking his demise the hardest, knowing that he had helped save her life.

Damon’s group moved north while the sun was still blazing in the sky. They hiked with a renewed energy and pace, eager to get Lorenzo to a stable environment.