Chapter 45 Might be the hunters?
By the time Evyths' eyes opened, she found herself bound with thick, professionally knitted ropes.
Her eyes searched from corner to corner, trying to absorb the strange environment. The first thing that her gaze caught was delayed drops of water between a rock that hung threateningly in the corner and bizarre writings and carvings on the wall. They meant something, but she wasn't educated enough to reach or recognize them.
But a symbol stood out for her. It was complicated and large, yet it had two arrows piercing a heart.
She concluded it was a cave.
Right ahead was flowing water from a fall that served as a silver curtain.
The swooshing sound of water gushing nonstop filled her ears; the ground was damp and muddy. The cave smelled like smoke, wet sand, and something… evil.
“Goddess! H—how did I get here?” She asked herself, the rest of her words slurred.
She could remember perfectly that she was being chased by Valerio the moment that he couldn't control his demons—his true nature. And suddenly, she missed a step and fell right into a pit filled with water.
And now, the reverse was the case. She was bound like a prisoner again; she had almost forgotten what it meant to be tied up because Valerio had made her feel safe.
Even if she was tied or imprisoned, who could it be? And why?
While she tried to absorb the situation, someone clad in a heavy, faded cloak and leather gloves and shoes busted through the water, and the next two men did the same thing, unhinged. UnbridledEvyths skipped two beats at a time; the men were looking feral and beastly. They looked like even if they could eat her, they wouldn't be satisfied.
They had menacing tattoos on their arms and faces; their hair was low-cut and had different shades of color.
Her eyes traveled to the long, sharp knife in each of their hands; the blades glistened, almost blinding her. Evthys instantly averted her gaze, scared that she might just die from staring at the three gigantic men with evil eyes.
What had she done to be so unlucky in her life? She wondered.
“It's a dog,” one said to the others. He was on the left, scrutinizing Evyths with his eyes. “I smell it, but it is appealing to perceive,” he added, and the others nodded.
Judging from their looks, they may be the hunters that Valerio had spoken about with his officials.
One gave her a pointed look. “Why did she stray then?” The one on the right said. “Her kingdom is far off, tons of miles away from here,” he added.
The one in the muddled huff instantly said, “She wasn't alone, definitely. Her face smelled strange; she could be with the bats…”
Their debate went on and on, making Evyths go ballistic in her head, fear tearing her worlds apart.
After some minutes of cursing the vampires, they turned to her at once.
The one in the middle seemed more aggressive given his heinous looks. He drew closer to her, pulling her by the hair and tilting her face to meet his evil gaze.
“Where are you from?” He asked, his breath smelling like dead meat. She swallowed hard, forced to perceive his rancid breath.
Everything remained silent, not wanting to speak. She assumed that if she spoke, they would press more information out of her, and she would rather not be the reason the vampires were attacked because she loved Valerio, and he had been very kind to her, unlike everyone else. Most.
“Cannot talk?!” He yelled as Evyths whimpered fearfully, shaking her head.
“Leave the thing, Draco; she is threatened by you, and perhaps… she can’t talk…” the one on the right interrupted.
The man released Evyths and turned to his partners, “It is pretending. If it can't talk, I'll force it.”
“You won't force it,” the one on the left charged. “We have to report to the master before he starts looking. We’ll leave it here until dawn; we will return to check it again. It is bound; it can't run from us… I don't think it is swift in water… it can’t jump from the top of the fall…” he explained, earning their agreeable nods.
“Fine, we should go then. King Hugo would be happy to hear that we caught a dog,” the aggressive one said.
With that, they rushed out of the cave, through the flowing water that served as a curtain, as it appeared to be. Evthys breathed out, trying to calm her jumpy nerves, her teeth gnashing in her mouth, her fingers shivering nonstop. Her heart raced twice the number of times she realized that she had been tied. The thought of those men being hunters or hybrids, like the vampires called them, disoriented her. If they were truly so, she knew that she would die.
At the same time, she wondered if Valerio had been looking for her. Had he calmed down? Did he mean to bite her or mark her? If it were so, he wouldn't have pleaded with her to run away from him. She was scared to death; she didn't know what else to know or how to go about it.
Literally, she waited for death patiently.
“Please, dear goddess, save me!” Evyths continued to pray a silent prayer within her, tears soaking her cheeks second after second.
Evthys fiddled violently with her fingers to untie herself; the more she tried, the more her wrists hurt, and the rope tightened. All her efforts crashed to the floor, leaving her at the brink of losing every hope.
Sometimes later, when Evyths woke up from a short, forceful nap, her eyes opened only to find someone seated on a stone strong enough to carry their weight.
She licked her arid lips nervously, her lids fluttering with uncertainty. It was the aggressive one among the three men from earlier.
Her heart dropped when his gaze caught her staring. He had been roasting meat next to her; no wonder it felt warmer, she told herself.
Evyths' tears rolled down her cheeks before she could say anything. Her words crippling in her mind, just the thought of what he would do to her fretted her.
“Now that you're away, I'm—let's have a talk,” the man began, his voice fierce and clear.
He chewed the meat, crushing the bones loud enough to scare Evyths. He truly does want to scare me, she thought.
“I am not friendly, you know that by now. You are an enemy, and you've fallen into the wrong hands—the same hands that would squeeze the life out of you,” he threatened, his voice thundered as if it wouldn't destroy the rocks and the cave that hung within a fall.
“I followed your scent, scoured the forest, and I found something to eat interesting,” he began in the same menacing manner. While Evyths cursed her existence, he pulled out a pair of royal sandals from beside him. Instantly, she recognized those; they were hers. She has left them in the forest while she tried to run for her life.
“With the look in your eyes, they seem familiar…” he snapped. Evyths nodded scarily, almost invisibly.
“Now, your sandals aren't the problem here, but the smell of a morgue and blood is beyond it. I smelled blood under your sandals; it brings us to one thing… you have ties with our sworn enemy,” he said, unfazed and deadlier with each gaze in his dark eyes.
Evyths knew that it was a dead end; they had figured that she was with a vampire. Not even her silence helped the matter; it only fueled their curiosity, using their best expertise. If anyone was skilled at fetching scents, even of sweat, then it was Draco.
“Here's what we will do,” he interrupted her edgy thoughts, fueling the fire of fire in her, her heart beating faster than ever, shivering at every word that he spoke.
“Lead me to Ravencroft!”