Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Six)

out as a falcon, so I considered my alternatives as I closed the distance between us. If I swooped down on him and changed to human, he might be able to get a lucky shot into me despite my training. I needed a quick kill. Dropping onto him as a sea lion was obviously a nonstarter, and horses are not generally known for their mad assassination skills. I did have a jaguar form, but it was problematic for me. It came with an extraordinary sense of smell that triggered uncontrollable sneezing fits—at least, it had the first time I tried it. I hadn’t taken the form since shortly after my tattoos were complete. I’d been too afraid to smell all those horrible things again. What if I turned into a jaguar, all snarly and toothy, and just sneezed on the guy instead of slaying him? He’d shoot me for sure, and that would be such a stupid way to die.
    But I had done some reading on how jaguars hunt. They had a surefire kill move, and I was fairly certain I could pull it off if I didn’t think about it too much.
    The guy looked up over his shoulder and I saw the infrared goggles. I dove in response, assuming he’d take a wild shot. He didn’t; I’m not sure he spotted me. I threaded my way through the canopy and then leveled out underneath it, gaining on him fast and still maintaining some altitude above him. He was changing directions, little jukes here and there to try to fake me out. That wasn’t going to happen. He might be a trained soldier, but there was no way he could hope to be fasterthan me as a falcon—or as a jaguar, for that matter, or even in my normal form juiced up on the earth’s magic.
    I pointed myself to a spot ahead of him and folded my wings in tight against my body, gaining speed as I dove and keeping silent. I quietly opened my beak to its full extent as I approached the top of his head and shifted to a jaguar an instant before landing heavily on top of him. I rode him down to the ground, my jaws clamped around his skull, and bit down as hard as I could. He screamed and shot the gun once, a spasm of his finger more than anything else, and died with his blood filling my mouth. He twitched a few times, and that, coupled with his blood and brains on my tongue, freaked me out. I shifted to human and couldn’t control my revulsion: I spat a couple of times, felt the chunks of brain pass my lips, and then vomited right on top of his body. It was so much worse than sneezing. I crawled away as soon as my stomach gave me half a chance.
    Threat neutralized
, I told Oberon.
    
    He still hasn’t moved or said anything to you?
    
    Something lurched in my stomach again, and I suddenly felt cold. I heard a tiny voice wail,
no no no
, but there was no one else around to make those sounds but me.
    You didn’t say that before!
I scrambled to my feet and pelted back toward the meadow, leaving the sniper’s body to rot.
    
    Wait. What does he smell like?
    Oberon held his head low, his ears and tail droopingas he paced worriedly around a still form. The wailing voice that said
no no no
got louder.
    
    Oh, gods, I hope you’re wrong too
.
    The enormity of what had happened began to catch up with me. Leif’s warning of an ambush had been legit—it just hadn’t manifested itself as vampires, the way Atticus had thought. I reached Oberon in the next few seconds and my throat tightened at what I saw. Atticus was sprawled on his right side, blood pooled underneath his head. His eyes were open and unblinking. The entry wound near his left temple was a small black hole, not red or a bruised purple. A small black hole.
    I knelt next to him and put a finger underneath his nose to see if he was breathing. He didn’t appear to be, and I felt no puff of air on my finger. I searched for a pulse on his neck but found nothing. I tried his wrist. I put my ear down to his chest and hoped I could hear something over the voice saying
no no no
. All was still. And though these indications were all of a kind and pointed to a terrible conclusion, the worst for me was that Oberon was plainly visible, and so was Atticus. They had both been running in camouflage and Atticus had been the one to cast it.
     Oberon asked.
    A small black hole. No