A Nature of Conflict (The Redemption Saga Book 3), page 21
“Good to know,” she said, helping load their bags in. “How long is this drive?”
“Forty-seven hours,” Jasper answered.
She cursed several times.
“Yeah,” Zander agreed. “All of that. But we’ll finish one of our mission objectives on the trip, so at least it’s not a total waste. It’ll add time to the trip, though.”
“IMAS is really always like this?” She couldn’t believe it.
“Yeah,” Jasper confirmed.
Sawyer pulled out a cigarette and walked about ten feet away to smoke so she didn’t bother Zander and Jasper. Vincent walked over only a minute later, smoking his own. Elijah found them before they were finished and had one as well.
“This all sucks,” Elijah mumbled.
“Amen,” Vincent whispered.
Once the drive was started, they all knew there was no going back. Sawyer sat in the front of one of the team’s two SUVs, five hours in, trying to just get back to sleep. It was a non-stop drive, so she would take over for Vincent at the eight-hour mark. Zander and Jasper were switching in the other one, while Elijah and Quinn didn’t have to drive at all. Quinn because he couldn’t drive, Elijah because he was making sure their inventory was ready for the twelfth time.
At the eight-hour mark, everyone got twenty minutes out to stretch their legs. Sawyer had gotten no sleep. She and Vincent smoked and switched.
Another eight hours. Another smoke and switch.
Sawyer was able to get four hours of sleep this time. She would have gotten more, but she was able to jerk herself awake, out of another nightmare. Those were starting to get on her nerves.
The mood was somber. She and the guys didn’t talk. Elijah slept in the back for a good portion of the drive as well, or doodled in the sketchbook she wasn’t allowed to look at.
“Are you sure I can’t look? You never share it with me,” Sawyer asked for the fifth time.
“Positive. My sketchbooks are private.” Elijah didn’t sound amused, but no one on the trip was. It was too damn long and too damn hot.
“He’s quite good,” Vincent told her, yawning. “Very good. He’s crafted art pieces before. Designs them in that sketchbook then makes them in his free time at the house.”
“I haven’t seen any of those either,” she replied. “Come on, Elijah. Share something with me that isn’t weapons.” She didn’t have an artistic bone in her body. She could appreciate art but wasn’t an artist.
“No,” Elijah groaned. “But if I lose it, grab it. It’s important to me.”
“Why bring it on the trip?” She frowned at his comment.
“Something to do,” he explained. “Plus, if I see something but can’t get a picture, I can sketch it out later. It could be helpful.”
“Like Stevenson’s ring,” she remembered.
“Exactly.” He ended the conversation by saying nothing more, and she stopped asking.
She thought about him for a minute, pouring over his sketchbook behind her. He looked so concentrated, so intense as he sketched whatever he was working on. The flirty goof of a cowboy was so intent on what he was doing.
Like he had been sharpening her daggers for her.
“Thank you,” she whispered out to him. That had meant a lot to her, and she hadn’t told him yet. It was like a weight she didn’t have to carry, knowing her blades were good for a fight. He’d covered her for it, did the work for her.
“For?” He looked up, confused.
“Getting my blades ready for the mission,” she answered. “I haven’t said thank you yet so…thank you.”
“Of course, little lady.” Elijah gave her a smile that she could only describe as a little shy, which struck her as odd. He wasn’t shy, not at all.
At twenty-four hours, they went off the beaten path towards the unnamed village in the rainforest. At the twenty-eight hour mark, Sawyer was driving again. Vincent and Elijah were both asleep when the message came through.
“Village is only twenty minutes ahead.”
Fucking Petrov had goddamned telepathy.
Sawyer reached over and hit Vincent on his thigh. He jumped and frowned. She repeated the message. He was blinking to wake up as he reached back and whacked Elijah hard enough to make her wince.
“Village,” Vincent mumbled. “Coming up.”
“God, I hope this isn’t bad news.”
It was.
Sawyer didn’t notice when they drove in, not immediately. As the convoy rolled into the village, everything was quiet. It was mid-afternoon. People should have been around, coming out to see them, to find out why they were being bothered.
“It’s a ghost town,” Elijah whispered.
Sawyer’s anxiety sky-rocketed. She stopped the SUV and they got out slowly. She pulled a dagger, as soldiers raised their weapons as well. Everyone was on edge. This wasn’t right.
She and Vincent walked together to a shed that some would call a house together.
The smell hit her five feet away.
Vincent gagged.
“Oh god,” she mumbled, covering her mouth.
“They’re all dead,” he whispered. “Everyone who lived here.”
Sawyer didn’t answer, only kept moving forward to the home. She peeked in slowly and closed her eyes to the sight. “Four bodies,” she whispered to him. “In here.”
“We have bodies in this house,” a soldier called out.
“Bodies here too!”
“These look fucking eaten on!” Another soldier.
“Quinn?” Vincent called out.
Sawyer moved away from the hut and back to the SUV. Her stomach rolled. The drive had taken a toll on her. She hadn’t been ready for this. A hand touched her shoulder softly and she looked to see Quinn giving her a sad expression.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine. Just the smell hit me hard.”
“It does that,” he agreed.
She straightened up as she watched him move away. Surrounded by the death, he was different. Something about his walk was confident. Not in his normal defensive and tense way, but looser. He leaned down and grabbed a handful of soil, holding it close to his nose. She watched in confusion as he sniffed it, focusing on it. “She was here,” he whispered.
Everyone went silent.
“Repeat that, Special Agent Quinn?” The colonel looked terrified and angry.
“She did this. Her magic is soaked into the soil. These people stood no chance. They’ve been rotting here since they dropped communication. I would suspect that some of the villagers won’t be accounted for. There’s no need…” Quinn dropped the soil. Sawyer watched him continue to walk and looked down. He wasn’t leaving footprints behind him. He was using his earth manipulation to make them disappear.
She continued to look around, noticing that none of them were leaving footprints. She pushed her foot into the soil and pulled it back up. The soil reclaimed the spot immediately, wiping evidence of her away. She put that out of her mind and put her foot back down. She could ask Quinn about it later.
“Fertilizer for their land. Meat for their animals,” Vincent whispered.
Sawyer’s stomach rolled again. “Why?” she asked quietly.
“I think everyone is wondering that,” Elijah mumbled, walking over. ”Give me a cigarette.”
Sawyer thought that sounded like a splendid idea. They all lit up and followed Quinn to the center of the village.
The colonel approached them quickly.
“What the fuck is this? Why would a Druid do this?” he demanded, and Sawyer only shrugged.
“We can only hope Quinn has some sort of answer,” Vincent told him softly. “He doesn’t give up his secrets without need, so we’re a little blind too.”
“God damn it,” the colonel growled.
“Quinn?” Elijah called out his name. Sawyer could hear the concern in his voice and related.
Quinn turned to them and sighed. “I’m going to bury the bodies,” he told them simply. “Then we’ll talk.”
“All right, buddy,” Elijah called out.
“Do you need help?” a soldier asked, walking to Quinn. “We have the manpower to get it done in a few hours.”
“I don’t need it,” he answered.
The ground beneath them rumbled. Sawyer had felt power like this before, when she’d gone and pissed him off with the books. This didn’t feel unleashed though, or aggressive. This was calm. Someone yelled, and Sawyer looked in the direction of it with Vincent. She watched as a body sank beneath the earth.
He was burying them all without their help.
It ended in a minute. “There,” Quinn whispered.
Sawyer walked to him and touched his shoulder gently. “Are you okay?”
“No. We can’t leave now,” he answered. “Everyone, attention on me!” he yelled out. Everyone was already paying attention to him. “The Druid that did this will do it again. We need to hunt her down and end it. We’re camping here for the night and we’ll leave at dawn. Keep a watch rotation at all times. She will notice we’re in her territory. We need to hope she doesn’t come for us before we go to her.”
Sawyer’s heart dropped.
“The second village?” Colonel Fischer asked, his arms crossed.
“Is probably just like this. It would be a waste of time to go north, find it and then start the hunt for the Druid that did this. Both villages are in this Druid’s territory. That we know. Now, others could live here, but I’m hoping it’s only the one who did this.”
“Why would she do this?” the colonel continued his questioning.
Quinn sighed. Sawyer didn’t like it. It seemed tired and the mission had just gotten off to a brutal start.
“Druids have a tendency to go mad,” he began softly. The team already knew some of this. Sawyer crossed her arms in a protective fashion. She felt uncomfortable. Something about the way he was talking made her uncomfortable. “The area has been totally invaded by humans, who cut down the trees, poach the animals. Sometimes…sometimes Druids get angry about it, sometimes they disconnect with humanity and fight back against invaders. This is the result.”
Sawyer didn’t like that he made it sound unavoidable. As if they always went crazy and killed dozens of people.
“If there is a diplomatic solution, it will have to be one to stop us from driving Druids to this point.” Quinn waved his hands around to point out the village. Sawyer felt it was unneeded. They all caught his meaning. “But right now, the best course of action is to go out and put this Druid down. Probably the second one too.”
“How do we tell one Druid from the next?” another soldier called out. Sawyer thought that was a very good question.
“We won’t, or at least not very well,” Quinn called back, just as loud. “Their magic all feels the same. It’s not unique among them, not like one of us. We all feel distinct to each other. There are some differences in the Druids, but they are very minor. Calmer Druids will have a calmer feeling over all, while wilder Druids will feel wilder. This one? She feels wild.”
“How do you feel it?”
“I’m strong enough to, and I know what to look for,” Quinn answered. “As we grow closer to her home, where she lives constantly, you’ll start to as well. It’ll feel like magic just hanging in the air, and it will grow more concentrated. As you start to feel, we’ll know we’re nearly on top of her home.”
“How do we know when she’s close?” Sawyer asked.
“I’ll let you know,” he told her. “I can’t feel her right now. She’s not close enough to us. If she were to use more of her power, I would. I will. That will be how we track her. Eventually, sometime over this night and tomorrow, she’ll use her magic for something and we’ll move in that direction. I’ll be able to give everyone here a warning if she’s close as well. No worries.”
“Hence why we follow your rare orders,” she muttered. “Okay.”
“You heard him, war dogs,” the colonel called out. “Set up camp!”
“Yes sir!” they all answered.
Sawyer winced at the volume. Too fucking loud for the middle of the goddamned jungle. “We’re sleeping in the vehicles,” she bit out, walking back to the SUV. She looked at the cigarette she was holding. She’d stopped smoking it and it had burned out. She pocketed the butt and lit another. She was taking a long drag when Zander leaned on her side.
“You don’t have to stop. I just needed to be near something normal,” he whispered.
“Okay,” she replied, taking another puff. Jasper ended up on her other side. Quinn watched them all, while Elijah talked to Vincent, both still smoking as well.
“All these people,” Jasper despaired. “So many of them.”
“I hope it was quick,” Sawyer added.
“It was,” Quinn told them. “Most were strangled by vines in their beds. Those who were unlucky enough to wake up and find out what was happening…they died to animals. Some were probably bit by snakes. Depends on what this Druid most associated with.”
“What do you mean?” Zander asked.
“My mother associated with wolves. Another Druid had an affinity for foxes. Some love snakes, some have no favorites and deal with everything equally. They do have some personal preference and that changes how they work. Some let the animals around them work things out on their own and only deal with the land itself, the plant life.”
“To think Druids are just Magi with some fucked up powers,” Sawyer mumbled.
“Legends are like that.” Jasper groaned. “You know what really gets me?”
“What?”
“Druids are born to regular people, other Magi normally, like everyone else. They just…got unlucky, or lucky depending on how you look at it. Their powers manifested, and they are Druids and that’s it. Think about being their parents, too. Their daughters just run off into the woods. That’s it, and there’s no stopping it.”
“Just like any other Magi,” Zander said, sounding pissed. “They’re the ones who decide to go live in the woods and forget they’re fucking human. Not many Magi go out and do shit like this.”
“Zander is right,” Quinn declared. Sawyer didn’t like the angry expression on his face. “It is their decision. Their powers manifest like all of us, in their teenage years, and they decide they are better than humanity. They choose to leave. They choose to cut themselves off and separate from the world. They choose to be monsters like this. If this bitch hadn’t killed off this town, I wouldn’t hunt her down. I was hoping she didn’t. I don’t care about farmland. Humans need to just accept their losses sometimes, but this is too far. These people were mostly non-Magi and innocent. Too bad this bitch probably thinks she’s a god.”
Sawyer raised her eyebrows at the sudden hostility. It shouldn’t have surprised her, but it was still a little shocking. He’d been calm and patient when they arrived, and now he was furious.
“God?” the colonel seemed shocked by Quinn’s hostility as well.
Quinn snarled. “I won’t say every Druid considers themselves that way, but it’s my experience that they feel they can do as they please,” he explained. “Everyone should get some good sleep tonight.” He walked away from them all. Sawyer watched him go, hoping he would be okay.
She didn’t notice Elijah walking to her with a bag until he spoke. “Food. Mostly snack type items for us to keep our energy up.” He held it out and she reached in. She pulled out three granola bars and shoved two in a pocket, eating the third quickly.
“You okay?” she asked him softly. She felt like she was asking everyone that.
“Could be better,” Elijah admitted. “Want to talk about anything?”
“Not really. Lots of people are dead here, and we’re about to track down a Magi who has decided to use her…gifts to do it. Druid or not, this isn’t acceptable. I’m worried, a little scared, but I’m glad we’re here to do this.” Sawyer took a deep breath. “Seeing this, I’m glad we’re here.”
“I almost agree with you,” he agreed.
They spent the rest of the evening making sure they ate and they all had places to sleep comfortably. Elijah would be taking over the entire backseat of their SUV, Sawyer and Vincent deciding to take the front seats. The soldiers had tents, but the team weren’t in the mood to do that and had the space in their vehicles. It earned them some teasing from the war dogs, though.
“Jasper,” Zander called out.
In the dark, Sawyer chuckled. They both needed to get some sleep. She didn’t know why they were still wandering around.
“What?” Jasper groaned loudly.
“Make sure to take your leg off. Sleeping with it on will give you a rash.”
“I know, jackass,” he snapped. Sawyer was in a fit over it. Zander was telling Jasper what to do? The planets must have aligned.
“Both of you just sleep,” Quinn snarled. “You’ll distract the patrol.”
“You sleep too, Quinn,” Elijah yelled out.
“Fine.”
Sawyer heard doors slamming and was still chuckling ten minutes later. A small bit of humor in the horror of this mission. She liked to think that when the world was going to hell, a laugh was needed.
Vincent reached over and put a hand over her mouth.
“You, too,” he whispered sleepily.
Sawyer was in another nightmare. The trees around her weren’t the ones of the rainforest, but rather, the woods near one of Axel’s homes. She was out there with several members of the Ghosts. She wore her mask to protect her appearance. They had no idea who the woman in all black was except that she was Axel’s Shadow.
A body was dropped in a hole. Not one of hers. This was someone they killed, someone they had considered a friend. He’d tried to get out, and they had killed him for it. She was there because Axel wanted to remind her what running meant.
She walked silently back to the large house with Axel. The others just got in their own vehicles and left. She pulled her mask off, the liquid magic of it reforming into the solid mask.
He was in a bad mood and she knew it. Once they were alone, he decided to let it out.
The first blow took her by surprise. It sent her to the floor.
“Sawyer, fight back,” Jasper called out.
