Change of Darkness (The Change Series Book 3) by Jacinta Jade (best new books to read txt) 📕

the thoughts of the great feline during the excitement that was sure to be ahead.

Those same instincts, however, saved her.

Still waiting on the signal from Marxi that they were drawing close, Siraay came full upon a Resistance sentry crouched by a tree before she realised what the oddly shaped object before her was. And while one half of her mind was still identifying that there was a threat, the other half was already reacting.

She leapt smoothly, making the barest whisper of noise as she launched herself off the ground, the sentry standing and turning to look over his shoulder at the slight rustle of undergrowth.

It was all she needed.

His throat now exposed as he looked towards where she had been, the full weight of Siraay’s feline body landed on his chest, pinning him to the tree behind him and slamming all the air out of his lungs. She wasted no time and sank her canines into his throat, ripping through the tissue and muscle with one snap of her jaws.

As blood spurted from the wound and the male made a weak grasping motion towards his throat, she leapt upwards off his body and into the branches of the tree above, climbing and running along the next branch even before the male’s body had finished sliding, lifeless, to the ground.

Her attack had been swift enough that he hadn’t even had time to draw breath to scream, and now Siraay made her way through the treetops, her jaws dripping blood. Although it was more slow going, traversing the treetops afforded her much more cover, especially now that she was coming into the range of the Resistance sentries.

Her balance was excellent as she ran lightly along the branches, leaping from tree to tree, and her feline hearing detected the quick steps of two different sized beasts approaching at pace from behind her—Drosni and Lifron.

There was no way for Siraay to warn them of the sentries that were stationed in the area—she would have to hunt quickly.

When she reached one tree that bordered a clearing, Siraay slowed as she worked her way through its branches and paused when there was just the thinnest bit of cover between her and the open space.

Unfortunately, the wind was blowing against her, leaving her no hope of smelling out the sentries in the growing dimness. Drosni might be better at that in his cripwof form, but Siraay’s eyes could make up the difference.

She started scanning, examining the now shadowed terrain around her from right to left, looking for odd shapes, shadows that were darker than the surrounding area, silhouettes, and things that seemed unnaturally spaced together, or too evenly spaced.

Yet none of those things gave away her next target—instead, it was the shine off something metallic that caught Siraay’s eye. Carefully turning on her branch, she leapt down from her tree, landing just as Drosni and Lifron came running around a clump of younger saplings.

The heckles of the cripwof rose and the tail of the blirrus became stiff as both Drosni and Lifron saw her standing there but the pair promptly settled again when they realised who it was—the only person it could be.

She growled softly at them, a low warning only they would hear. Then she glanced through the trees and into the open space behind her before she twisted back and allowed another soft rumble to escape her again.

Drosni stepped forwards and raised one paw, growling softly as he peered past her.

Good—he understood. Or at least realised that she was trying to warn him.

Siraay backed away, growling again, then turned and leapt up into the tree she had been hiding in a moment before and began moving again. She had to act fast, as uncertainty over her actions would inevitably cause Drosni and Lifron to follow soon.

So she ran along the thick branches of the trees, leaping from one to another and sometimes moving farther in when she thought a tree would not offer sufficient coverage. In this manner, she prowled quickly through the tops of the trees that arced around the left of the open space, hoping that if a sentry heard anything, they might attribute it to the wind.

As she got closer to where her target was squatting on a low branch, Siraay identified the shine that had drawn her attention.

The female sentry was wearing a pack, and one of the clippings was metal. Obviously, the hard material had been used as a quick fix, maybe where something had broken. Regardless, it was a mistake, one that only novices made.

Realising the inexperience of the opponent she was dealing with allowed Siraay to move faster. The young female wasn’t even scanning the area properly but was only looking down and out. So it was a simple matter for Siraay to circle around behind her on the branch and, using one large paw, aim a blow at the female’s head.

Out cold instantly, the female fell limply from the branch, landing with a muted thump on the ground.

A breath later, a cripwof and blirrus sprinted from the other side of the clearing.

A quick flash of teeth, a muted gurgling, and the female lay twitching on the ground, that one spot on her pack still shining in the final rays of light that filtered through the trees.

The pair left their kill and paused below Siraay’s tree, waiting for her next move.

She took out two more sentries this way, and then a fifth simply by dropping directly out of a tree onto the figure’s shoulders and biting through the back of their neck.

There was no question of leaving any of them alive. They were the enemy, and further, they were weak. Siraay didn’t bother to move or hide the bodies after each kill—what mattered now was speed and surprise. Besides, another unit would gather up the bodies later to learn what they could from them.

So Siraay, Drosni, and Lifron had taken out five of the enemy by the time they came upon the main group of Resistance soldiers.

But it