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  LUNAR BOUND

  (SKY BROOKS WORLD: ETHAN BOOK 4)

  Emerson Knight

  McKenzie Hunter

  Contents

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  MESSAGE TO THE READER

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  McKenzie Hunter

  Lunar Bound

  © 2019, McKenzie Hunter & Emerson Knight

  [email protected]

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author/publisher.

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  ISBN: 978-1-946457-02-8

  CHAPTER 1

  I brushed a fern from my path, glancing at the forest floor for signs of the creature’s passing. Steven did the same, some dozen feet to my left. Josh followed behind me, making a bored attempt at wariness. He drew the boxlike metal carrier across his body, took the handle with his other hand. Custom made and reinforced with steel bands, the carrier was designed to house a creature the size of a small dog, only much stronger.

  Josh eyed the carrier with suspicion. He felt his magic would be enough to contain the creature. When it came to magic, my brother tended toward overconfidence, more so since he’d been taken and held by the witch Samuel. That was the first time in Josh’s life that he’d felt truly helpless. Since then, he’d become even more obsessed with increasing his magical prowess.

  “You really think the belocka is here?” he asked, doubtful.

  “Quiet,” I hissed, glaring.

  He took a long stride to crunch a pinecone beneath his boot.

  Steven glanced between my brother and me, but said nothing.

  The creature was an elven creation, a dark, stealthy thing designed long ago to hunt and kill their enemies. The elves once prided themselves on the monsters they created. Eventually, pride turned to embarrassment. In a bid to erase their sinister history of experimentation, the Makellos, the so-called elven elite, banished their creations to the Dark Forest in Elysian.

  A powerful curse turned the forest into a prison.

  A few weeks ago, that impregnable curse had been broken. Evil, vile, dangerous creatures spilled out into the world. In their hubris, the Makellos had never planned to deal with a mass escape. Scrambling, Liam had no choice but to turn to the pack for help.

  He had no idea it was the pack that had broken the curse. To say it was unintentional wasn’t entirely accurate. We’d used the Clostra, one of the powerful, protected magical objects, to break a witch’s curse on Sky. We’d no idea what the ramifications would be, but our need was great. As it turned out, the spell didn’t remove one curse, it removed them all, everywhere.

  For that, there were consequences still unfolding.

  There was also opportunity.

  The pack owed a debt to Liam. Weeks ago, one of his creatures had been smuggled out of Elysian and infected Kelly, the pack’s nurse. She’d been an unintended victim. In our quest to save her, Liam had given us access to the Dark Forest, a rare courtesy. In exchange for our help now, that debt would be forgiven. More importantly, Liam had information that I needed, information that could help protect Sky.

  My arm brushed against the tranquilizer pistol holstered at my hip, a custom design with a three dart clip—an expensive piece of equipment for special circumstances.

  “In the last week,” I whispered, “two hikers have disappeared on this trail.”

  The police hadn’t reached the same conclusion. So far, they considered the two disappearances unrelated. The first, a college student about Steven’s age, had left his car parked in a lot on the other side of the park. Thanks to Stacey, my legal assistant and expert hacker, I knew the student had texted his roommate that he’d failed his exams and was afraid to tell his parents. To get his thoughts together, he was going on a walkabout in the park. He’d looked up the park trails, specifically the less-traveled Northern Loop. My guess, he intended to circumnavigate the entire forest. According to my sources inside the police department, I knew the police considered the student a runaway. They were dragging their feet, expecting him to return at any moment.

  The other hiker was a young mother that lived in a nearby community. According to her husband, she’d gone out on her usual morning jog, zigzagging around their neighborhood, but never returned. After the police discovered the wife had recently confronted her husband over an affair, he’d become their prime suspect in a murder investigation. They were currently looking for her body beneath the foundation of a house his company had just built on the south side of Chicago. After cracking her cloud-based browser history, Stacey found the wife had recently researched the Northern Loop of the park. She’d probably gotten bored with her usual route and wanted more time away from her husband.

  Both had come to the park, took the very trail we paralleled looking for signs of their passing, or demise. So far, nothing. Josh didn’t share my confidence, but it was the best lead we had.

  “If the belocka was here,” Josh stressed, “I doubt it stuck around. Striking here a third time would be foolish.”

  The secluded trail wasn’t popular, but the trickle of foot traffic was regular. People often came here to be alone. It was fertile hunting ground. If the belocka was careful with its kills, it could hunt in these woods for some time before it drew too much attention.

  My brother’s doubts were understandable. He didn’t think like a predator.

  A pall settled over him, weighing on the silence between us. He’d been gloomy lately, irritable and short tempered. Cognizant of my occasionally overbearing concern, I’d not asked the obvious question: What the hell is wrong with you? I had some idea, but this wasn’t the time for a brotherly chat. I hoped Josh shared my sensibility.

  “How long have you known?” he muttered, emphasizing his disappointment with an accusatory look, like I’d just cut him to the quick. I knew I’d hurt his feelings. The Ducati Monster 1200S I’d bought him was meant to soothe his anger. What the hell says sorry more than an eighteen-thousand-dollar motorcycle? The gift had done its job, for just over a week.

  I sighed, debated whether to answer.

  Steven had drifted farther away, his attention fixed on a game trail.

  “Claudia informed me after my grandmother’s death,” I admitted.

  She’d handed me a death sentence.

  Unanimous agreements among the supernatural factions were extremely rare. Only a true threat to us all could bring the factions together. The powerful magic of the dark elves—delivering death with a touch—had posed such a threat. The factions, the pack included, had responded with genocide—survival instinct at its cruelest.

  The dark elves were supposed to be extinct. They weren’t.
br />   Unbeknownst to me, dark elf blood ran through my veins, passed down from my father’s maternal lineage. He’d died when I was young, and my grandmother, the last surviving member of his family, had carried the secret to her grave. I couldn’t blame her. Had her identity been discovered, all of the factions would have joined once again to kill her, to kill me.

  As a child, I’d known my grandmother to be distant, cold, unaffectionate. I knew now that she lived in fear of her magic. I knew that horror firsthand. At her death, I’d inherited the dark elf magic in a fiery rush. Before I could gain a modicum of control, I’d nearly killed Sky with it.

  I looked to Josh, grateful for once that we were only half brothers. We shared the same mother, but had different fathers. He’d been spared my curse.

  “Claudia knew as well,” he confirmed, throwing glances around the forest to hide the hurt. “Of course she did. That’s quite a secret to keep. Do you blame her?”

  There were layers to that question. “It wasn’t her secret to tell. My grandmother tried to tell me at the end, but she’d waited too long. She’d lost too much of her mind. Once she’d died, the secret became Claudia’s.”

  “I could’ve helped you deal with the magic.”

  “There was nothing you—”

  “Don’t.” He glared at me, a hot warning.

  He was right. When it came to magical abilities, my brother was second to none, but there were other considerations.

  “You know why I didn’t tell you,” I growled.

  “To protect me?” He rolled his eyes. “You need a new song, Ethan. That Sesame Street record is worn out.”

  He knew damn well that anyone harboring a dark elf would be punished, probably killed. The moment I’d told him my secret, he would’ve been bound to reveal me. He was bound now, but without the magic to give me away, the risk of discovery was negligible.

  Ridding myself of the magic had been key.

  “So you turned to Sky instead,” he continued. “You put her life at risk. You’re a hypocrite, Ethan.”

  My lips stretched into a grim line. “The Aufero was the logical choice.”

  The magical orb was one of several objects of power. Their origin was a mystery. Even the Mouras Encantadas that protected them—handing down the responsibility from generation to generation—had no memory of how they had come to their duty. We’d recently learned that Sky was a Moura. Her birth mother had carried the Aufero into hiding. After her murder, the object had gone missing. Somehow, it had ended up in the hands of a witch.

  The orb absorbed magic.

  Marcia, the leader of the regional coven, had gotten her hands on the orb, used it to punish any witch that she felt was a threat to her. She hadn’t willingly parted with it.

  “The orb’s magic was available to Sky. I didn’t have time for you to figure out how to use it.”

  I knew firsthand that the orb was capable of defending itself. Josh might well have injured or killed himself in the process. Now that it had absorbed my dark elf magic, the orb was more dangerous than ever. Whenever Sky tried to use the Aufero’s magic, it came close to killing her.

  Another problem to solve.

  “Ethan—”

  Josh paused. His nose wrinkled at the noxious smell delivered by the shifting breeze. I’d already caught the scent, dismissed it as a nuisance until he said, “I didn’t think there were skunks out here.”

  There weren’t.

  I stopped in stride, sniffed. There was something else layered in the scent. Not a skunk at all. Steven had already noticed. I gestured to the east, signaled for silence. Josh abandoned his earlier petulance. Magic flickered around the fingers of his free hand, ready at a moment’s notice. He was all business now, crouching slightly in anticipation of an attack that could come from any direction.

  Steven, already ahead, continued warily. Josh fell in behind me as we tracked the scent away from the trail.

  As we moved through dense brush, where anything could hide, I was reminded how little information Liam had shared about the belocka, even less than he’d shared about the other creatures we’d retrieved for him. In their rush to erase history, the elves kept no record of their former creations. All he could tell us was that the belocka was a top-tier predator. Liam had demonstrated its modest size with his hands.

  “So a toy poodle,” I’d commented.

  He hadn’t appreciated the comparison.

  We knew nothing about the creature’s hunting habits, how it might defend itself.

  Over the next half hour, we moved slowly. Each time the scent receded, we backtracked, started over. We were getting close when Steven emerged from a copse of trees ahead, signaled for me to stop. Josh and I knelt, wary as Steven hurried toward us at a crouch. He knelt next to me, gestured to the copse.

  “There’s a woman on the other side, following the same trail,” he whispered. “She’s armed. Shotgun over shoulder, pistol on her right hip.”

  “Hunter?” Josh asked.

  Steven nodded. It seemed Liam was hedging his bets.

  Anticipating my next question, Steven added, “It’s not Ann. I’ve never seen this one around.”

  Sean and Ann were the only hunters based in the area. Neither was competent. Somehow Sean had built the better reputation, though I found him slovenly, not to mention arrogant. He was also an idiot. It seemed Liam had made the same assessment, brought in someone from outside Chicago.

  Steven continued. “About sixty yards on the other side of that copse is a meadow. She’s tracking there. Green camo works in the trees but stands out in the tall grass.”

  “Wait here,” I whispered. Josh grunted, but I didn’t wait around for the rest of his complaint. Crouched, I hurried to the copse, followed Steven’s tracks to the other side. Peering through the trees, I saw her in the center of the meadow, staring down at the ground. Her back was to me. She wore green camouflage pants and a shirt. A black ponytail hung from the back of a matching baseball-style cap. The shotgun slung across her back looked military. The pistol at her hip was in an open holster, allowing for a quick draw.

  I knew by the scent in the breeze that she was walking in the wrong direction. All I had to do was let her wander off, then muddle the tracks in the meadow, but she realized her mistake. I remained perfectly still as she turned, scanning the ground as she started back toward me. The bill of her cap hid her expression, but it was clear she had lost her trail, was backtracking to pick it back up.

  I needed to talk her out of her hunt. The threat of violence might work, but I didn’t want to have to look over my shoulder for the rest of the day. Money could grease that wheel. I always found cash made the threat go down easier. Sky wouldn’t approve. I could see her frowning in my mind’s eye. Be nice. I scowled.

  “Don’t be alarmed,” I said aloud, moderating my tone to sound as unthreatening as possible.

  The motion of her draw was smooth, fast. The pistol was in her hand in less than a second, pointing in my direction before I’d even revealed myself. She was good. She was also alone, or she’d have signaled her partners.

  “Easy,” I said. “I’m going to stand up.”

  She glanced to either side, then gestured with the pistol barrel for me to rise.

  I did, slowly, keeping my hands up near my shoulders.

  “We’re here for the same reason,” I declared. “I just want to talk to you, see if we can come to some sort of arrangement. I’m going to walk toward you, just far enough that we can talk face to face. There’s no need for this to get complicated.” I sucked in a breath and started forward.

  Her shoulders tensed. I could feel her glare on me.

  “You’re Ethan Charleston, Beta of the Midwest Pack,” she said, disappointed. She raised her pistol, aimed at my head.

  I felt the surge of Josh’s magic to my left, like an angry shout into the void.

  “No,” I shouted for his benefit, but too late. A force of magic ripped the pistol from her grip, threw it a dozen yards away.
The hunter reached for her shotgun. A band of silver magic clamped around her shoulders, pushed down, pinning her arms to her sides. Another band appeared lower, binding her wrists to her hips. Her nostrils flared. She glared at me with narrowed chocolate eyes.

  I recognized her then. The last time I’d seen her, those eyes had been staring over the barrel of a shotgun, not a pistol.

  Shit. The situation just got complicated.

  “Josh!” I growled.

  He walked out of the copse of trees, triumphant. Beside him, Steven gave me a frustrated look. His fingers tapped and turned at his side, signaling, Unexpected. I brushed my anger aside with a sigh and turned to meet the hunter’s glare.

  “Tonya,” I said. “Still working with McClintock?”

  Her lips tightened into a thin line.

  I gestured for Steven to take her shotgun. As he walked around her, she gathered herself as if to fight. All she had to work with was her hard head and her steel-tipped combat boots.

  Josh warned her, “I could bind your legs and immobilize you completely.”

  She growled, gave each of us a look meant to kill, but relented as Steven drew the shotgun from its sheath. At my direction, he tossed the weapon into the grass several feet away.

  I cautioned her, “Don’t make this harder than it has to be. You’re hunting the belocka.”

  “I have as much right to carry out my contract as you do,” she snapped. “You’ve no right to interfere with me.”

  That was rich, coming from one of McClintock’s followers. He’d always prided himself on what he called the hunter’s code, but that was just bullshit. The old man played hard, and he played to win. Getting between him and a bounty was going to have repercussions.