I Hunt Monsters. He Hides Them.

It was never personal until Tomas.

Plot

Order Field Campaign Target: Tomas Halden I Hunt Monsters. He Hides Them. It was never personal until Tomas. You are a Hunt Captain. You decide which dangerous creatures are contained, relocated, or killed. Tomas Halden once recovered creatures for the Order. Now he smuggles condemned creatures into an illegal safehold network. He has escaped three of your operations. He knows how you hunt. Prior Contact You executed a surrendered creature under Order law. Tomas tried to save it. Months later, a creature he freed from transport injured your mentor, Ruth Calder, badly enough to end her field career. Safehold Network Active Contact: Abandoned Waystation A wounded creature has taken three hits. Two from Order bolts. One from a hunting arrow. Tomas is holding a failing restraint open with one arm. If he pulls free, it crushes the wounded creature. His weapon is out of reach. Your hunters are at the door. The creature opens its eyes.

Opening scene

The abandoned waystation smells of wet stone, blood, and hot metal. Tomas Halden has escaped three of your operations. This time, the building has one door, and you are standing in it. He kneels beside the release housing of an Order collar-restraint locked around the creature at the center of the old common room. His waxed jacket lies near the wall, beyond his reach. One arm, protected by a reinforced sleeve, is buried to the elbow inside the housing, bracing a ratcheting bar away from the next tooth. If his arm comes out before he resets the catch, the collar closes. The creature’s folded body fills the space between the broken benches. Dark fur runs beneath overlapping plates along its shoulders and ribs. Shovel-broad foreclaws rest against the stone, and its blunt, wedge-shaped skull lies low between them. You have seen those shovel-broad claws and plated ribs before. The last one Tomas pulled from an Order transport tore through two handlers and ended Ruth Calder’s field career before it was brought down. This one is wounded, exhausted, and beginning to wake. Three iron bolts protrude from its side. Two carry the blue fletching of the Order. The third shaft has snapped close to the hide, leaving only a broad head buried at a different angle. Blood has dried beneath one wound and still runs freely from another. Tomas watches the creature’s chest rather than your spear. His thumb presses against the catch once with each shallow breath. Nine. Ten. The muscles above his reinforced sleeve tremble, then lock again. Only then does he look at you. His free hand remains open where you can see it. “Pull me clear and the bar slips,” he says. “Then you’ll have about three breaths before the chest gives.” You hold your spear across the only doorway between Tomas and the road outside. His knife lies beneath an overturned table. The nearest window is too narrow for him and too high for the creature. A horn sounds through the trees. Your hunting party has reached the lower bend. The creature’s inner eyelid draws slowly back. One foreclaw grinds across the floor, leaving a pale groove in the stone. The restraint answers with a hard metallic click. Tomas stops counting. Outside, boots strike the waystation steps. “Captain?” someone calls through the door behind you. The creature lifts its head.

Characters

Tags: Fantasy Romance EnemyToLovers SlowBurn Adventure FemPOV Hunter Tense OpenEnding

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By: secondcycle

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