“Smoke could,” Jordan argued. Their voices buzzed at my ears like annoying insects. My attention span was dangerously thin at the moment, split between my worries over Kane and the reality in front of me.
I studied the edge of the Leftovers. We’d stopped several yards away. There was a chilly breeze, but it was coming from behind us. As it blew into the sparsely forested area near the Leftovers, the wind cut off suddenly when the breeze hit the forest. It should’ve made a whistling sound, but it was like the trees had an invisible forcefield. It unsettled me.
Evans crossed her arms, her brow furrowed as she thought. "This situation reminds me of what we did with the annoying vlogger. Could we use someone as bait?"
"We have to watch out for one another," Kane said. I wished he would shut up for just a moment. I cared about him, but it was hard to concentrate on both the mission and Kane. My heart yearned to know where he was, but my brain screamed to concentrate on the task at hand. It was a tug-of-war competition for my attention.
"It's an idea… as long as we can prevent another kidnapping." I didn't want to lose anyone, least of all my siblings.
"Jordan could be great bait. He's loud and grating," Jessie said with a smirk as she elbowed her twin. Yeah, that’s not happening.
"You're the two newest members," I said. "It's better to use someone more experienced."
Jordan scoffed. "What's-her-face wasn't exactly a soldier, was she?"
"But I was there to escort her away," Holt said, backing me up. I was thankful for that. Jones watched me with a heavy gaze. Since I’d stopped the twins, it might look like favoritism. If I chose someone like Jones or Evans, he might accuse me of attacking them. Colin was the best shot we had, and if it came to shooting the monster as a last resort, it would be best if he was in position to attack, so he wasn’t an option. Holt was a good choice, but if anything happened to me as leader, he was the one I wanted to put in charge. It would be better if I played the bait, to keep my team safe while using their skills to the highest capability.
I had to take a risk.
"I'll do it," I offered. Irritation coursed through me underneath it all. It was so hard to juggle everything. I missed when fights involved just running to attack whatever my captain pointed at. Now, I had to deal with team politics and my responsibilities as a leader, on top of hearing voices. How the hell did Lyra do all this, on top of juggling a relationship with a vampire? I might have attempted to call her, if she wasn’t too deep into her mission… but then I might just confess that I was hearing Kane's voice, and she might call Hindley to sic a Bureau crisis counselor on me.
Wherever she was, I hoped she was doing better on her mission than I was on mine. Maybe she would find Kane before his voice drove me absolutely insane.
14
Lyra
Our debut mission as Callanish was going down in flames… or going down in trees, really. I stared angrily at the bark in front of me. There was so much of the same velvety bark everywhere that I could spit. At this point, the forest was mocking Sike and me. We’d wandered around until early afternoon, with no sign of the others or the plane.
“I’m almost positive we passed that exact tree stump two minutes ago,” Sike muttered behind me. I paused and studied the mortal stump with him. He tilted his head to the side. “Yeah, it’s got a funny little knob on the left side. I remembered because it’s the shape of an aquatic wildling’s tail.”
Creepy. So, we’ve been walking in a circle, somehow, or the trees are following us. I kept back a complaint, which was more of a frustration about our unsettling situation. It wasn’t Sike’s fault that the forest was being tricky, but I was hungry and irritated. He could only sense auras and darkness—creepy moving forests were beyond both of us. Worry gnawed at my stomach, along with hunger pangs. Why couldn’t I have fallen with the food supplies? God, I hoped somebody picked up the food rations before we went down.
I stepped over a fallen trunk with mushrooms growing on it, wishing I had taken that extra forestry survival course at the Bureau back before I met Dorian. They wouldn't have covered the edibility of supernatural mushrooms, but it would've been better than nothing. Zach had always been better at identifying things on hikes and wilderness missions than me. I missed him, even now.
"Let's try left this time," I told him, not wanting to come across that stump again. I shivered, unsettled at the thought that the forest might be trying to sabotage us. We were intruders into the Leftovers, which now existed as the world's most messed-up ecosystem.
Sike gave me a grunt of approval, distracted by his scanner. He was getting good at it, even if the device only liked to work half the time. It was currently working for us, but I didn’t want to jinx it by mentioning that. The trees were suspiciously still and quiet as we moved through them. We should've heard the buzz of some immortal insects, but those creatures seemed to come and go in the Leftovers. All the normal animals had fled this area. They were smart enough to stay away, but we don't have a choice.
I glanced at Sike over my shoulder. The Leftovers were frightening because of how little we knew about them. "Do you think the Leftovers could ever go back to some kind of normal?"
"Maybe. Or at least maybe the Leftovers might stabilize to be more immortal than mortal, in terms of plane properties. It seems
