The Night Curse (Book one)
Chapter 22 The Hunter

The clocktower looms over me as I wait in the crowded town centre. I left father in bed. He isn’t strong enough for what is about to come, but a letter waits for him on his nightstand.

Kennith and Peter appear, like soldiers on a battlefield, as noon chimes through the streets.

“Ready?” I say, quick off the draw when they reach me.

Kennith slaps my shoulder with brute force. “The sleep seems to have done you some good.”

I glare at his lingering palm, attempting to simmer my burning hate for him. He drops his hand, only to use it to open the inside of his jacket. Two pistols are cradled in holsters on either side of his hip.

“One is for you, my boy,” Kennith drones, and I fight to keep my face neutral. I know how to shoot. Many times, I’ve had to kill an animal to either put it out of its misery or stop an infection from spreading across the farm. But never have I turned a gun on a human before.

“So where are we heading,” Peter quizzes, his gaze pulled towards the passing civilians.

“I thought we’d try the outskirts of town. There were a few buildings closed, but they’ll be open now.”

Kennith narrows his eyes and wrinkles his brow. “Last time I checked, I gave the orders, Harlow.” A fake smile spreads across his jaw. “But you do make a good point. My men have exhausted the centre, we need to spread outwards.”

“Your father not joining us?” Peter sniggers.

“He’ll only slow us down.” My footsteps thud into the earth as I lead the men towards The Dawnforge.

*

The wind blows my hair into view. I push it out of my face and see the blacksmith’s sign swaying with a carved rising sun, just like Mia had described.

We’d checked out a bakery and textile warehouse first, as I didn’t want to replace Austin too quickly. Locating him needed to feel happenstance.

The door is open. Clanking metal and hissing steam echoes like whistling within a cave.

The smell of iron, sharper than a bullet, fills my nostrils as we stride inside. The noise is deafening. The heat unbearable. A blacksmith whacks a curve of white-hot steel and then plunges it, screaming, into a bucket of water.

We slip into the back, and Kennith passes me a pistol, as he nods towards two gentlemen. Both their faces are smeared with oil, but their eyes are pure purple. Peter raises his gun first, and we follow suit, treading towards the men whose faces now stare, wide-eyed, at us.

“Where is Austin Elworth?” Peter snarls loudly.

One of the men reaches behind him, drawing silver from a sheath on his belt.

“No you don’t,” Kennith yells and then fires.

I barely hear the blow of the pistol over the sounds of the workshop, but the strong, acrid scent of sulphur punctures the air. I whip my head to the man, who is now lying on the floor, grunting in anguish.

The other man sets off running while bullets fly. Kennith and Peter chase him around the corner, but I’m still silently approaching the fallen Dreamwalker. There’s red oozing from his neck. A gargle of blood bubbles on his lips, and his violet eyes whirl in their sockets. He coughs and splutters. He’s worse than any animal that I’ve euthanised, but even when he begs for me to shoot him, I can’t. The pistol trembles in my hand, tauntingly.

Boom.

Blood and brain explode in my face. The gunshot rings in my ears. I turn towards where the shot was fired and see Kennith glaring at me, his pistol smoking with gunpowder.

“Come on,” he shouts. “This way.”

I cut through the workshop, wiping my face with my shirt. I look down at the smears of red and the pistol in my hand.

Peter’s bellowing snaps me into focus. He’s pointing to a hatch door, another Dreamwalker lays at his feet, lifeless and still. “Down here.”

“I’ll keep watch,” Peter informs.

Kennith and I take turns climbing down the hatch and into a damp basement. It’s dark and ice-cold.

“Austin!” I roar.

There’s a rattle of chains, a scrape of metal. Blindly, I follow the sounds.

“Harlow?” he squeaks. My brother’s voice, as if he’s a boy once again, but my brother, nonetheless.

I am on my knees, groping the cold floor until my hand grabs something firm. A leg.

I follow the length of his leg, towards his torso, his shoulder, and his wet face. “Austin,” I breathe, relief coursing through my veins. “I’ve found him,” I yell.

Austin breaks into sobs. Kennith approaches with a candle, and it is then that I see the state of him. The wetness on his face is blood, both dried and fresh. His face is swollen and barely recognisable. He’s laid in his urine, and the shackles have bit into his ankles and wrists so deep that they’ll likely leave scars for life. But I’ll take scars over death. We have him. We have him.

“We need to break these bonds, and get him out of here,” I say.

Kennith is quiet next to me. His gaze focuses on Austin. “You know, if it wasn’t for your brother, Austin, we might never have found you.”

There’s a change in the air. The shift in Kennith’s tone twists at my stomach.

“I had my suspicions, and even gave you a chance to redeem yourself—tried to get you to see sense.”

The portraits flash into my mind’s eye. The information Kennith divulged pulses in my head.

“What’s going on?” Austin asks, the dryness of his throat telling with each stiff word.

Kennith ignores him and carries on berating me. “But when I saw you just now, unable to replace it in yourself to kill a Dreamwalker that may harbour your own brother.” Kennith spits on the ground, and my vision turns dizzy. “I knew you were changed. Either your mind has been altered boy, or you’ve grown weak for their kind. Whatever the reason, it doesn’t matter.”

Click.

Hard metal claps my wrists. I snap my head and see Peter behind me, handcuffs around my hands. Painfully, I try and fail to pull free. “What are you doing?”

“If you’re not with us, you’re against us,” Kennith mocks in my ear, saliva dribbles down my lobe. “It’s the slammer for you, boy.”

Peter howls. “Poor Frederick gains a son, only to lose one.”

Austin strikes the metal chains against stone. Over and over. “No, Harlow would never turn on his own. Please, you’ve got it wrong.”

“We’ll let the Queen be the judge of that,” Kennith retorts and then a searing jolt punches my jaw and blackness descends.