Kane has another victim

*Kelly*

'Someone's here,' Eli says in the mental link, and then everything goes silent, which can't be good. But all I can do is wait until he can talk to me again.

I look around again, and realize how nice this hotel once was. The furniture is made of solid oak, and it looks like someone spent a lot of money on every detail, from the bedding to the beautiful art that now hangs askew on the walls.

They probably spent too much money, and that's why it was abandoned. But what is important now is not the building's past, but how we can escape from it.

I look out into the hallway, and when I don't find anyone, I slip stealthily towards the room where I had left Trevor. Whoever these people are, they're not watching us individually, but apparently the entire floor has guards on each side. I've been testing the windows in each room, and so far, none of them open. I guess they didn't want guests falling out of the windows at this old resort.

I've been up and down this entire floor, and they're not holding Eli here, so they must have special guards with him. It's obvious that he's the ET1, so that makes sense. But if I can't get out of any windows here, and they're watching all the exits, I'm not sure how we'll get to him anyway.

“It was silent,” Trevor says when he entered.

“I know,” I say. —And I don't like it at all.

"I'm sure you just need to concentrate," he says.

"Probably, but I'm still worried," I say. —Her hand is in very bad condition.

Trevor nods. "Any luck with the windows?" he asks.

-I do not say. —There is none that opens; they are all just nice windows to look out at the forest, which I admit is a great view.

“I've never heard of this place before,” he says. "But he was probably pretty nice back in the day."

The door opens, and we both turn to look, ready to shapeshift, but it's just the other warriors who came with us to find Eli — Brent and Sean.

“Shit, they scared me,” I say. —Could they have knocked?

They both nod and sit on the chairs. “No luck,” Brent says. There's a fire escape, but you have to get to the stairwell, and they have two guys guarding it.

“Well, there are four of us,” I say. -So what is the problem?

"None, except we're all generally hurt, and what they injected us with is making me dizzy," he says.

“I have to admit I'm sorry too,” Trevor says. —But we need to get to ET1 Eli. We didn't come all this way to rescue him just to lose him again.

“Okay,” I say. —But we need a solution. So, two guys are guarding the stairs. I saw only one on the other side, but that's just on our floor. I'm not sure how many guards there would be on the rest of the staircase.

"Well, I'd rather fight two I'm sure of than one after another," Sean says.

I have to agree with him. "So what are these guys like?" I ask.

“Like they're hungry,” Brent says. —I'm pretty sure all of these people have been here for a long time. You'd think there would be a lot of game around here, so I don't know what's up with that.

"They're stupid rules." I heard her voice before she even started to enter the room, as the boys had left the door ajar.

We all prepare to change shape, but when we see her, we realize that she is just a girl, maybe sixteen years old. I relax a little but remain alert for her and approach her, looking through the door to make sure she doesn't have backup from her, which she doesn't, so I close it behind her. We don't need any more surprises.

"What kind of rules?" Trevor asks.

"Stupid," he replies. —Rules that say only hunters can hunt, for example. We're all perfectly capable of switching and hunting for a meal, but ET1 Pete has it in his head that we all need special duties.

“I didn't identify any of these guys as an ET1,” I say.

“That's because it's not,” she says.

“The renegades wouldn't have an ET1 anyway,” Trevor says.

The girl frowned and stared at him. "We are not renegades!" she shouted.

“It's okay,” I say calmly, not wanting to upset her further. She's clearly too young to be sent to check on a group of prisoners by herself, so someone here isn't treating her very well. I thought about what Eli told me about the girl they had sent with him. She must be the same girl. —So, they are a pack. What is the name of the pack?

“Stone Creek Pack,” he says, pronouncing the E in Creek like it's an I. “This is our territory, and ET1 Pete got mad because you kept pas...ing by like we were nothing.”

"ET1 Pete..." I say. —You say he's not an ET1, but you call him that?

The girl nods and looks like tears are about to form in her eyes when she says, "His cousin was ET1 Andrew." They killed him.

My heart skips a few beats, wondering if our captors have weapons.

"They came here and took him, dragged him to a tree and killed him!" he says, and then the tears flow. —It was my dad.— She falls into a chair and puts her face in her hands while she sobs.

"Are you the ET1's daughter?" I say softly. She nods, then I continue, “Who did that?”

The girl looks at me, and a change has occurred in her; Her eyes are glas...y with tears, but I can clearly see the anger in them. “Kane,” she says softly.

"ET1 Kane killed your father?" I ask. -Because?

"I don't know," he says. —She was just a puppy. But I remember clearly when her blood splattered everywhere.

I pull up a chair next to her and put my arm around her. “I'm so sorry that happened to you, dear,” I say. -What's your name?

“Heather,” he says.

“Heather, it's a pretty name,” I say. —I'm Kelly, and this is Trevor, Brent, and Sean. We're not here to hurt anyone in your pack. We came to rescue my brother from someone who had him several miles from here.

"Your brother?" he asks, his sobs subsiding. It was clear that no one had spoken kindly to him in years.

“He's the one you healed,” I say. —He really appreciated your help, too. You did a great job.

"Do you mean that the bad ET1 is your brother?" he asks.

I shake my head. “He's not bad,” I say. "And he should know." I grew up with him.— I smile at her, and she smiles back weakly.

"Then it can't be bad," he says.

Trevor and the others have walked away, sensing that the girl needs time to talk to a woman. So they sit across the room, trying to look as unthreatening as possible. That's a challenge for Brent, who is over six feet tall and quite muscular, being one of our best warriors. I can also sense that the girl and her pack—if that's what it really is—need some serious help. We'll have to help her, but we're running out of time to get to Kamila.

“Heather,” I say. —We really need your help here. You see, we have a common enemy, and we don't have much time.

"Common enemy?" he asks.

Seat. —ET1 Kane.

Her eyes open and she wipes the last trace of tear from her cheek. —Are you going to fight ET1 Kane?

-If I say. —And we need to do it quickly. He has someone hostage whom we love very much, and we need to rescue her.

-To her?

I nod again. —Yes, she's a female, and she's going to have babies any minute, so we need to get to her quickly. Can you get us out of here? I know you need help, and I promise we'll come help you as soon as we're done dealing with Kane.

“I've heard that before,” she says, sinking back into her chair, looking dejected.

"Did someone promise to help before?" I ask.

She nods. "ET1 Kane," she says. —But then he and my dad argued about something, and he killed him!

“I'm so sorry about that, Heather,” I say. "But we're nothing like that horrible ET1 Kane."

“I know,” he says. —It's just that they might get hurt and not come back if they're fighting him.

“We'll be back,” I say.

And i mean it. Whatever is happening with this girl and her pack, they desperately need someone powerful to step in and handle things. Sure, this is a luxury hotel, but it's been a long time since it was replenished with supplies, and this Pete person seems to have lost his mind, yet they're stuck with him as their leader.

She looks at me for a while like she's trying to figure it out, then takes a deep breath. "I know where your ET1 is," she says. "I'll take you to him."