The Hunted

Thirty-Seven

Red

"Can you tell us what happened?" Red asked gently.

They were sitting at the kitchen table in the packhouse. Henry sat at the head of the table, Red on his left. Facing Red were Elizabeth and Adrian. Beside him, her hands wrapped around a mug of tea, was Juliet.

Once the silver cuffs had been removed, she'd begun to heal slowly though Dwayne had come to bandage the female's wrists with a salve to expedite the healing process and eliminate some of the pain. He'd taken care of some of her other ailments – lacerations made with silver knives and the wolfsbane poisoning that had depleted her strength this past week.

Amanda had been dispatched to look over her niece and now she, Lucy, and Annalise all relaxed within the confines of Annalise's bedroom in the packhouse. Red didn't think that the Luna would be letting her daughter out of her sight anytime soon.

It was clear that Annalise had been through a trauma. Not just physically but mentally as well. She didn't remember being stolen from her room or how it had happened. Annalise claimed that she'd left her room to speak with Blake who she'd seen wandering through the forest on patrol. Blake had walked Annalise back to her bedroom and helped her get back inside the house via the window. Yet a few moments after Blake had left, Annalise had been struck on the head after turning to head back to her bed and that was where the child's recollection faded. There was nothing else until she'd woken up in a vehicle being driven by a human man with Juliet passed out next to her.

"Hunters," Juliet started and her voice cracked. Henry lifted his head to listen and watch but he didn't release his hold on his daughter. "I was on patrol with Toby but had to Shift to my human skin because I saw a fae female on the outskirts of the territory, just beyond the wall. I went to talk to her and then she disappeared."

"Her name is Branwenn," Red explained. "Her mother's grandmother created the wards around Sanguis Ridge. It's blood locked so Lavinia is the only one who can do it. Her children are adopted but it seems like they've decided to try and take down the wall anyway."

Juliet's eyes widened and swallowed thickly. "By the time I'd Shifted back, Toby was in a panic because Annalise was missing. He'd followed her trail to just outside the wall but I told him to go back for reinforcements because I was faster and could try and catch up with Annalise but I was ambushed. The hunters – they shot me with a wolfsbane dart and then I blacked out.

"When I came to, I was in a dark room – chained with silver bonds. It was cold and damp, definitely underground. Annalise was there and they—"

Hiccupping sobs burst from the female's mouth. Red rubbed soothing circles on her back. Juliet took a few deep breaths and managed to say, "They taunted her and laughed when they used their blades to cause her pain. And then one of them...He told the others to pin her down while he took a silver scalpel and cut the word 'monster' in her arm."

Henry's hand clenched the table, the wood creaking beneath his hold, as his mouth settled into a firm, hard line.

"Then they brought Phillip and Chandra in a day or two later," Juliet continued and her voice grew small. "Things got worse after that."

Red didn't think that Juliet would be able to tell them more than that. What the experience was and what she saw. So he only asked, "And Blake? She didn't know you were there?"

"I don't think so. There was one man who looked like her. They had the same eyes. He kept saying that he thought she'd like the surprise when she got back. After everything she'd been through, he thought she'd enjoy killing some 'werewolf scum.'"