Up in the thick branches of the canopy, Finn and Murphy hacked frantically at the thick, fibrous vines binding Jasper to the tree.
"Hurry!" Clarke hissed from the ground, her eyes constantly sweeping the tree line. "We don't know how long they're just going to watch!"
But the Grounders weren't the immediate threat.
A low, vibrating growl suddenly rumbled through the clearing. It was a sound so deep it rattled the dirt beneath their boots.
Clarke froze. She slowly turned toward the dense brush on the opposite side of the clearing. Stalking out of the shadows was a massive, mutated jaguar. Its sleek black fur was marred by strange, hairless patches of hardened, scaly skin, and its jaw was unhinged, revealing double rows of razor-sharp, jagged teeth. Its pale, glowing yellow eyes locked instantly onto the group.
"Bellamy," Clarke yelled, her voice bordering on absolute panic. "The gun!"
Bellamy didn't hesitate. He dropped his hand to his hip, his fingers closing around empty air. He looked down, his eyes widening in pure shock. The heavy leather holster was empty.
"Where the hell—?" Bellamy gasped, spinning around.
Ten feet away, Wells Jaha was standing with his feet planted, the stolen guard's pistol gripped tightly in both hands.
"Wells, what are you doing?!" Bellamy shouted.
The jaguar roared, its muscles bunching as it charged forward.
Wells pulled the trigger. The deafening CRACK of the gunshot echoed violently through the trees. The first bullet grazed the beast's shoulder, tearing a chunk of black fur and flesh away. The jaguar shrieked, instantly abandoning a straight charge and darting aggressively to the side.
Wells fired again, and again, but his hands were shaking. BANG. BANG. He hit it once in the flank, but the jaguar was too fast. It bolted into the thick, heavy ferns, using the dense brush as cover.
"Where is it?!" Finn yelled from the tree, clinging to the trunk.
"Watch the brush!" Clarke screamed, backing away.
Bellamy spun in a slow circle, his heart hammering in his throat. He was completely unarmed, his leadership and bravado entirely useless against an apex predator. A rustling sound came from his right. Bellamy turned just as the massive black jaguar exploded from the bushes, launching itself through the air directly at his chest.
For the first time since they landed, Bellamy Blake completely froze. The sheer, overwhelming size of the beast paralyzed him.
He didn't even have time to brace for the impact.
A blur of dark motion intercepted the beast in mid-air. Aleksander hit the jaguar with the force of a freight train. His Fey speed and unnatural strength made it look effortless as he tackled a four-hundred-pound predator right out of the sky.
They crashed violently into the dirt, rolling in a tangle of claws and limbs.
"Alex!" Clarke screamed.
The jaguar roared, twisting to sink its double-rowed teeth into Aleksander's throat, but the Alpha Station boy was already moving. He didn't flinch. He didn't panic. He moved with cold, terrifying precision.
With his left hand, Aleksander grabbed the beast by the throat, his Phoenix strength locking its snapping jaws inches from his face. With his right hand, he drew the karambit from his coat in a single, fluid motion. The curved steel caught the sunlight for a fraction of a second before Aleksander drove it upward.
He stabbed the jaguar perfectly beneath the jaw, severing the brain stem. Not satisfied, he ripped the blade out and drove it into the beast's chest, right between the ribs, piercing the heart.
The jaguar went completely limp, dropping dead onto the forest floor.
Silence slammed back into the clearing, broken only by the ragged breathing of the search party.
Aleksander slowly pushed the massive, bleeding carcass off of himself and stood up. His heavy jacket was torn, and his hands were coated in dark blood, but his expression was entirely unchanged. He was breathing normally. He calmly wiped the blade of the karambit on the jaguar's fur, the curved steel gleaming cleanly once again, and slipped it back into his pocket.
Bellamy was staring at him from the dirt, his face completely pale, his chest heaving with adrenaline and shock. He had just stared death in the face, and Aleksander had swatted it out of the air like a nuisance.
Aleksander looked down at Bellamy, his dark, calculating eyes completely devoid of the panic that was consuming the older boy.
"You let someone pick your pocket in the middle of hostile territory, Bellamy,"
Aleksander stated quietly, his voice cool and analytical. He held out a blood-stained hand to help Bellamy up. "Rule number one of our new system: Keep your weapon secured."
Bellamy grabbed Aleksander's blood-stained hand and let the Alpha Station boy haul him to his feet. Still shaken, his heart hammering against his ribs, Bellamy looked at the dead, four-hundred-pound apex predator, and then back at the calm, completely unfazed teenager who had just saved his life.
Bellamy gave a stiff, genuine nod. "Thanks."
"Don't thank me. Just grab his legs,"
Aleksander ordered smoothly, already turning back toward the massive tree where Finn and Murphy were lowering Jasper.
The forest blurred into a frantic, chaotic sprint as the group tore through the brush, rushing back toward the dropship. Finn and Bellamy took the brunt of the weight, carrying Jasper between them with his arms slung over their shoulders. The jarring motion of the run woke the wounded boy, and Jasper's agonizing, breathless screams echoed terribly through the trees.
"Keep pressure on it!" Finn yelled, stumbling over a root.
"I'm trying!" Clarke shouted back, running alongside them in a sheer panic, her blood-slicked hands pressing down hard on the crude bandage over Jasper's chest. "Don't stop! Keep moving!"
Aleksander took up the rear guard, staying a dozen paces behind the frantic group. His dark eyes darted through the canopy, and his Dark Fey senses were hyper-tuned to the surrounding forest, sweeping the brush for the Grounders who had set the trap. He moved with silent, predatory grace, his boots barely making a sound on the forest floor.
As they tore through a dense, overgrown ravine, Aleksander's foot landed on a thick patch of green moss.
To a human, the footfall would have sounded like normal dirt. But to Aleksander's heightened senses, the subtle reverberation was completely wrong. It sounded hollow.
He paused, letting the group run ahead, and dropped into a low crouch. He brushed his bare hand over the damp moss. Instantly, his Fey connection to nature fed him the truth of the soil—the root systems of the ferns here were shallow. They weren't growing deep into the earth; they were spreading laterally, struggling to find a hold over a massive, flat surface.
Aleksander inhaled deeply, his senses cutting through the heavy smell of pine and damp earth to catch the faint, unmistakable, metallic scent of oxidized iron.
It was a slab of rusted, reinforced steel, buried just beneath the dirt. A bunker door, or a ventilation hatch.
He looked up the ravine. He couldn't stop the group or investigate now—Jasper was bleeding out, and they needed to get behind the camp walls immediately. Instead, Aleksander raised his hand, snapped his fingers with a sharp click, and dropped a localized, invisible magical mark on the moss. The exact geographical coordinates locked permanently into his mind.
Satisfied, Aleksander pushed off the ground and sprinted, his unnatural speed allowing him to effortlessly catch up with the rear of the group just as they broke through the tree line and saw the dropship.