[We'll find her, Alpha,] Alistair said.
Stone nodded, holding back a groan of pain in his chest. It came from him, rather than Aubree, and he felt for the thread of her emotions but found only the tightening sensation of fear and anxiety. Knowing that she was still alive, and still human, he took a deep breath through his mouth and looked around them. [We need to cover more ground.]
Alistair nodded in agreement before taking off to the left.
Stone moved as silently as he could down the main stretch for five minutes before taking one of the pathways to the right. The humans couldn't have taken Aubree too far from the entrance. Surely, wherever they hid her had to be close by. Any deeper into the sewer tunnels would have been difficult for them to carry her.
A rustle of movement echoed down the passages, causing Stone to pause in his tracks and listen for its source.
[Got one,] Alistair said. [She was clean. Not a trace of Aubree or the other human scents on her. Not even Carina.]
Stone turned and started heading in Alistair's direction. [Did you see where she came from?]
[Yes, sir,] Alistair said with a note of triumph in his voice. [She came out of a hidden doorway in the wall.]
[And?] Stone glanced down passages as he moved, sloshing the water around him noisily.
[You won't believe me.]
Stone grit his teeth. [Tell me.]
[There's a ladder going down a deep hole. I can't see the bottom, it's too dark.]
This was the break he'd been hoping for.
Forget about moving silently through the sewer, he picked up his feet and began to jog through the disgusting water. [Where are you?]
[Near the entrance, actually,] Alistair said and began to whistle to help Stone find his location.
Indeed, he was near the entrance when Stone found him. Third passage on the left from the entrance, and fourth on the right.
The stench of vampire blood filled his nostrils as he approached and he reverted to breathing through his mouth again as his eyes took in the disembodied limbs spread out across the passage. A head of thick, black hair oozed blood out at his feet as he paused in front of the hole in the wall.
Smelled like a newborn.
"How did we not see this?" Stone asked in a low voice as his eyes examined the brickwork of the gaping hole.
"Simple." Alistair reached into the hole and pulled back what looked to be a brick door on hinges that fit perfectly into the hole. It wasn't actually brick, but rather wood painted to look identical to the old brick walls. The stench of the sewer water blocked out the smell of the wood and it was too dark for anyone without trained eyes to notice the minuscule difference in texture. There were two chinks in the wooden door and when Alistair pinched them between his fingers, he turned them like a doorknob and easily fit the door back in its place. Turning it back, counter-clockwise, he pushed it back open to reveal the gaping hole.
Stone cursed. It was as Alistair said. Simple. So simple, and yet so easy to overlook.
"After you, Alpha," Alistair said with a dramatic flourish of his hand.
Grunting, Stone climbed through it and down the iron ladder, much like the ones found on the back of old buildings in the downtown core.
[Stay up there until I find where this goes,] Stone told him.
YOU ARE READING
Heart of Stone (Parts I & II)
Werewolf[COMPLETE] Some bonds can't be broken, even in death. -- He couldn't endure another heartbreak. "Accepting her would be a mistake," he said. "She's a human. I can't afford to have her blood on my hands." Gwen looked away, and he knew she saw the ima...
