Page 18 of Wonder (Wonderfall #3)

I stood over Lyall’s decapitated corpse, exhausted and heartsick. I’d hoped to follow him back to the others, but the opportunity was gone. Eight years of tracking vanished Wonders, and I’d have to start all over again.

“Go on home now. Tell everyone not to walk anywhere alone for a while. There are more of them, but I can’t be sure where they are.”

The teenage shifter—some sort of deer—nodded fervently and rushed away down the walking path to the nearest village.

I wiped my short sword off on Lyall’s shirt, then put it back in its scabbard. I searched his body for anything to tell me where he’d been or was going, but I only gained some money and a decent knife.

His connections would tell the others he was dead.

There was a small possibility they’d come to find out what happened, but it was more likely whoever was here would evacuate and move.

I’d learned enough to understand they worked in small teams, taking Wonders and the occasional magic carrier captive from different areas to avoid creating a detectable pattern.

I drained the body of as much blood as I could, then I left it where it was and climbed the nearest tree to wait.

If dawn came and I hadn’t seen any sign of the luchd-òl fola, I’d bury the corpse.

I’d start my search all over again, visiting the nearest decent-sized town to see if anyone was talking about strangers who’d left suddenly in the night.

One dead, twenty-eight left alive. No sign of Prince Nicol.

No sign of my mate.

I didn’t let myself cry.