Demon Trackers: The Anointed

part twenty-one

“It’s all right.” Henry forced his voice to be steady. Seeing his usually unruffled son breaking scared him. “He couldn’t have been thrown far.” But he was thrown. They all were. “We’ll find him.” Henry pulled the headlamp off his own head and handed it to Jake. He wanted to keep him within his sight as well as give Jake the added benefit of seeing where he placed his injured foot. “I’m going to look right. You search a small grid around here.” He patted Jake’s shoulder. “We’ll find him.”

Jake nodded rapidly and angled the small square lamp in his hand to illuminate the ground. Henry turned to go in the opposite direction. He could barely see a thing and all the torn leaves and soot that had settled from the thick air, that were still settling, left a lumpy carpet of bits and fragments that all looked the same.

He walked slowly, feeling carefully for twigs and rocks beneath his foot before shifting his weight on each step. He couldn’t afford to twist his ankle, not when both his sons were counting on him. His thigh was killing him. He was twenty steps out. In combat he’d seen men ride a blast-wave pretty far, but no farther than twenty steps, unless they rolled when they hit. Which in this situation meant downhill. Henry sidestepped to move down the slope a little and the side of his boot slid in the dirt, coming to rest against something soft, pliable.

He froze. His pulse banged in his ears as loudly as the ringing had earlier.

He crouched down, afraid to hope that they’d get this lucky. He couldn’t see a damn thing. He felt around with his hands, meeting fabric, grainy with dirt. Bunching it between his fingers, he found goose-pebbled skin beneath, the dip between hips and back, the knobby bones of Cal’s spine. And small movements with each inhalation on the boy's side. Henry squeezed his eyes closed, letting the shakiness of the sudden relief work through him. He needed that light.

“Jake! Over here!”

He watched as the receding light suddenly changed direction, coming right at him. As Jake picked his way over, Henry checked for a pulse—slow, but there. He ran his hands over Cal’s back, over his legs, finding nothing of immediate concern. One of the kid’s arms was bent awkwardly beneath him. Henry didn’t dare move it—or him—until he could see what he was doing. The back of Cal’s head had a nasty gash that was wet and filthy, but not bleeding profusely, probably more to the dirt packed in it than anything else.

When the light played over them, Henry realized exactly how lucky they’d been. Cal was covered in the same debris that blanketed the ground, hair, clothes, skin, even his boots, blending in completely. Had it been daylight, they still wouldn’t have been able to see him. Although he and Jake were likewise covered, it hadn’t occurred to Henry what they could have been up against.

“Dad?” Jake was staring, his voice child-like. “Is he…?”

“He’s alive, Jake. He’s going to be fine.”

Jake’s legs seemed to go out from under him and he sank wobbly to his knees. Henry glanced at him briefly, noting the glassiness to his gaze. “Hold the light. I need to turn him.”

Jake nodded, steadied the headlamp in his grip.

Reaching over Cal and under to hold his arm steady, Henry lifted Cal by the chest, rolling him by the shoulder back toward him while gently guiding his arm. He got him on his back, checking his arm first. “Wrist’s broken.” He pressed Cal’s stomach. “Soft.” Felt each rib. Cal’s face was streaked with dirt, long eyelashes coated and making them look even thicker. Henry slid his fingers gently around each contour, noting the scrapes on his cheek and a goose-egg beneath the hairline above his temple. Two head injuries within minutes of each other. He’d been unconscious for a long time. Not good.

Jake watched silently. And earlier Henry had thought the kid could never be still. Worry streamed between them, a heavy twisting thing. “He’s in good shape, Jake. His wrist is the only thing broken.”

“And his head,” Jake whispered.

And his head. Henry swallowed.

Jake lowered his palm slowly to rest on Cal’s forehead as though he’d been afraid to touch him until now. “Dad, Cal didn’t flinch when that gremlin bit into his arm. How far out of it do you have to be to not feel a gremlin biting you?”