The Adventures of Thalia and Reyna: A Hunters of Artemis Tale

Chapter 7

Reyna's P.O.V

Following a trail of sparkly magical paw prints was not the strangest thing that Reyna had done since joining the Hunters of Artemis.

Aurum and Argentum swatted their metallic paws at the sparkles, and the wolves tried to catch them in their jaws. Daria skipped along holding Reyna's hand. It felt good to have more family. She would have to write to Hylla about Daria. Maybe they would run into the Amazon queen while on their hunt.

Thalia led the way. As happy as Reyna was about her newfound sister, she was concerned for her honorary one. Thalia had a look of pure worry on her face ever since they left the wrecked camp. The lieutenant sometimes looked as though she was on the verge of tears, to looking like she wanted to punch the trees until her fist was broken.

Reyna knew what was wrong. When she led The 12th Legion, she would always blame herself when any of the romans were hurt or passed away. It can be hard to be a leader sometimes, as honorable a job as it is. Now, the girls Thalia was tasked to lead and protect were being held captive by werewolves. That must be unsettling.

Mia stayed close to Thalia. She often put her arm around her shoulders protectively. Reyna figured they were very close, though she still couldn't figure out why Mia was so overly protective of Thalia at times.

Sky flew above them looking for any sign of the trails ending. Nalani helped Helena along. Her wound was better, but it was still a wound. She struggled to walk without a shoulder to lean on and Lani, sweet as ever, was happy to offer hers.

The trail of prints started to lead into the more dense part of the forest. It was dark here, the tall trees blocking the sunlight. It looked as though the trees arched inward at them. This was definitely a place werewolves would hang out. Their wolves started to look more wary, and Sky flew down from her search.

"I can't see the trail anymore with all these trees," Sky reported.

"That's okay Sky," Thalia reassured her. "Thanks for trying. Girls, be on the lookout. We are most likely in their territory now. It is clear that since they took the others alive, that this is probably a trap."

Daria shuddered and seemed to hold Reyna's hand tighter now. If this was a trap, who was it for? Thalia? Most likely it was for Artemis, since they took all the hunters, except for them. The werewolves probably hadn't anticipated on Thalia and the girls to be getting Reyna from New Rome when they attacked the hunters main camp.

"Thalia?" Reyna whispered, as they crept through the shadowy forest. "Why would Lycaon set a trap? For revenge?"

Thalia looked thoughtful for a moment. "I guess so. We were able to defeat Lycaon back in the war with Gaea, but no monster is ever gone forever. Besides, we never actually killed Lycaon, we just won a battle with him, lost a lot of girls." She looked sad again, and cast her eyes to the ground.

Reyna put a hand to Thalia's shoulder. "We will get them back, we will do it together." Thalia smiled at her.

"Anyways," she continued. "Lycaon had a nymph daughter named Callisto before he was turned into a werewolf, who joined the hunters back in ancient Greece. You know the story of Ursa major and minor?"

Reyna nodded. "Zeus loved Callisto and she bore his son. Artemis cast her out of the hunters when she found out. I don't really remember a lot, but I think Zeus put them in the sky as constellations before they were about to be shot with an arrow?"

"Yes," Thalia said. "There are a lot of different versions of who actually turned Callisto into a bear. Some say Hera, some say Artemis, and some even say Zeus did it. But Lycaon blames Artemis for Callisto's fate and has been out for revenge ever since then."

The girls started to walk closer together. Reyna felt like a little kid telling ghost stories around a campfire.

The forest was starting to feel like it was closing in on them. Every leaf crunched underfoot made them jump. Reyna's greyhounds left the wolves and glued themselves to her and Daria's side. The sparkly paw prints had started to fade, the spell was wearing off.

Reyna's foot dropped down suddenly as she was walking. She tripped and fell into some kind of dip in the path.

"Great Pluto," she said. "Where did this ditch come from?"

Daria stopped before she could fall in with her. Reyna got up and dusted off her knees.

"Ummm, Reyna?" Lani pointed where Reyna was standing. "That's not a ditch."

Reyna climbed clumsily out of the dip in the earth. She stood back a bit, and gasped. It was a giant paw print. The werewolves would be tiny insects to whatever creature had made this print.

"It is the fox," Mia knelt down and felt the earth in her hands. "The track is fresh. We must be cautious."

Reyna knew the fox was a monster, but she didn't realize the full scale of its destructive power. A thing this size could body slam a three story building and not think anything of it.

"The spell wore off of the werewolf pawprints, but they were heading in this direction." Mia said. "We can follow the fox prints, and maybe it is looking to have a werewolf snack."

Sky giggled and bounced in place. Lani's eyes sparkled. Thalia drew her bow, and they started to follow the massive prints. Reyna had a bad feeling about this.
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It took them most of the day to follow the prints. By the time they got any leads, it was almost dusk.

The trail led them to a more rocky area of the forest. The trees started to open up more, but it was starting to get dark out. Thalia had told them she did not want them camping here. So they drank some moonwater for energy.

Though the darkness, the prints led them to the huge mouth of a cave. Thalia gestured for them to stay away from the cave opening and stay behind some trees.

Reyna copied the others and tried to stay as still as she could behind the rotting bark. She kept her eyes on Thalia, awaiting her order. Thalia made a motion with her hands like drawing a bowstring. The other girls drew their bows and arrows.

Reyna felt a little left out. She had still not received her bow. But she unsheathed her daggers quietly, she would get her bow in time.

Thalia made a stay here gesture with her hand and started to creep forward by herself. Mia grabbed Thalia's wrist defiantly. Her eyes were saying one thing, let me go first.

Thalia shook her head no and gently pushed Mia back behind the tree. Mia looked like she was about to argue, but Thalia gave her that child of Zeus glare that can just scare the living soul out of you.

The girls stood behind the tree, arrows aimed just above Thalia in case anything came out of the cave. She peeked inside with just her head, her bow ready to fire.

Voices started to cry out in protest from the cave. Their shouts echoed off the rocky walls.

"Those are our sisters," Helena whispered.

Thalia still had her head poked into the mouth of the cave. She seemed to be speaking to the trapped huntresses, too cautious to enter.

Reyna felt something slimy land on her shoulder.

"Gross," Reyna wrinkled her nose in disgust. Some sort of sap must have landed on her from the tree. She tried to get it off with her hand. If you can laugh silently, that's what the others were doing. Daria handed Reyna a rag with a smile. She took it gratefully.

A strange smell had filled the air. The girls resisted letting their hands off their bows to plug their noses. A loud, deep growl sound followed the terrible smell. Reyna lifted her head to see that it was not sap that landed on her shoulder, but drool.

The Teumessian fox stared at them from above with cold, dark eyes.

Note:

Hey readers! I just wanted to take a moment to say Happy Holidays to you all. As promised, this chapter was longer. I hope to be able to write more chapters during my holiday break soon. Hope you are all well. And as always, keep writing.

-Karazorel257