Only enough she felt no fear at the realization, only cold resignation and detachment. Her last moments were amusement of all things as Artemis suddenly turned to her, horror flashing in her eyes, before the goddess pulled her into a tight embrace.
Kelly smiled at that, almost remembering the days when Artemis was so much kinder before the second Giant War's conclusion.
"It was an honor my lady …"
Crash!
...
"…p"
"…"
"K… ne … ease!"
"…mm …"
"Ke … up!"
"… w-wha—?"
Kelly's eyes blurred open as something roughly shook her shoulder. It took all of three seconds before the pain of having her form shaken registered as she gasped, only for more pain to flare. Whoever was shaking her luckily stopped as Kelly blinked back the tears and tried to get ahold of her surroundings.
She noticed that while being shaken she had been moved into a sitting up position and reclining against a tree, the beat up face of Sahara, another hunter, looked at her in worry.
"Kelly?" Sahara asked hesitantly as she wriggled her hands nervously, her own forehead bleeding over the left side.
"Yes?" she replied, wincing as she adjusted slightly before tenderly placing her hand just below her left breast and gasped slightly again. At least one broken rib and another fractured.
"Do you think you can stand?" Sahara asked before the brunette glanced over her shoulder. "I think we're trying to group together before moving out and hopefully finding some cover."
Kelly followed her line and sight to see a long trench with broken trees some meters away with hunters and campers alike moving towards Artemis as the goddess splinted the leg for one of the joining campers.
It seemed her own injury had healed enough to use both arms but just barely since Kelly could see Artemis grimace with every move of her right side. Kelly then did a quick scan of all the hunters and campers present, marveling at the fact that none seemed to have died.
"Any losses?" she asked as she bit her lip and forced herself to her feet before stumbling until Sahara got underneath her right arm to support her.
"Oddly enough no," Sahara replied with a slight shake of the head before frowning as she looked to the totaled sleigh. "It's weird though. The ground around that trench the sleigh made was soft … unusually so."
"Not enough to avoid the broken bones though," Kelly muttered as they limped together towards the group.
They reached them in a minute or so, Kelly cursing her injuries all the while though thankful that her apparent end had not come just yet. Maybe she could get another hug after this was all over? That sounded nice.
Still, the hunters stood silently as Artemis finished with the camper who was then supported by another older looking camper.
Thank goodness none that came were younger than 13—hunters withstanding considering all current members were at least a decade old or more since joining the Hunt—but now they needed to get a move on. One bolt came down and there was nothing saying another couldn't follow soon.
"Everyone gathered?" Artemis called as she looked them over, her parka matted with ichor and a new cut running the length of her left thigh.
She got murmurs of agreement from all. Plenty of bruises and some broken bones but all travel worthy as far as demigods went. Artemis nodded on approval before she tilted her head up and narrowed her eyes at the sky in the mountain's direction. She kept staring for a minute as the girls got restless before she muttered, "Something isn't right."
Before Kelly could even ask there was another bolt of lightning struck making plenty of the girls shriek before rain started pouring on them. Kelly stared up at the newly formed rain clouds in shock, knowing that it had been clear not even a minute ago. There was no way this downpour wasn't divine in nature but who the Hades!?
"Did something make Lord Zeus angry?" Sahara asked beside her as she furiously blinked away the rain batting at their eyes.
"This wasn't father," Artemis answered for her as she looked around, her bow already in hand.
At once all the hunters, even Kelly though the pain was practically killing her, drew their bows with arrows at the ready. The campers present also pulled out their weapons, mainly swords and some bows, as they circled up but the rain was being a bitch to see through.
Nothing could be heard aside from the rain as well and with every second passing the temperature kept dropping. 'Wait, colder?' she wondered as she breathed out and saw her breath misting over.
Before she could question it there was a loud thud making her jump as she looked at Artemis' feet to see a pitch black arrow missing her foot by inches.
Artemis aimed her bow in the direction the arrow came from and let loose a silvery arrow. The other hunters aimed in that direction but they couldn't see more than a dozen or so feet in any direction with the rain and dark clouds eating up all the light.
"D-did you get it?" one of the campers asked nervously while holding a bronze sword in trembling hands.
Another arrow passing close enough to cut the cheek of the girl who'd spoken was the answer to that. More arrows soon followed as the girls ducked and covered but they couldn't pinpoint where the arrows were coming from.
"Run! We're too open!" Artemis ordered as she fired a salvo into the direction of the black arrows.
The hunters hesitated but Artemis sent them a writhing glare that got them moving along with the campers in the middle of them. As them moved Kelly glanced back to her mistress along with Sahara only for their eyes to widen as they saw a black blur come out from the trees on her blindside.
"Lady Artemis!" they screamed as a horse sized black wolf bodily tackled the goddess into another patch of tightly packed trees, their forms being hidden in the rain and darkness.
Sahara pulled to a stop and was about to turn but Kelly grabbed her shoulder and jerked her forward.
"We have to help her!" Sahara shouted but Kelly was having none of it.
"Our lady can handle one oversize mutt! We need to move like she said and she'll catch up," Kelly returned as she started to move again, fighting through the pain as they caught up to the larger group of girls keeping pace for the campers, Sahara following close behind.
"Stick together!" she shouted over the downpour as the girls burst through thick foliage and ducked around trees.
They moved in near silence for over ten minutes as Kelly kept glancing around to see if Artemis had caught up but there was no sign of the goddess.
Boom!
Kelly stumbled slightly as the earth and forest shook around them, her eyes darting back to the direction of Artemis but before she could voice any concerns her blood ran cold as she noticed several large black blurs moving just within the fields of her vision. 'A pack,' she thought in horror as she turned to the group of girls that had paused with the sudden miniature earthquake.
"Keep moving, there are wolves on our tail!" she shouted, getting several alarmed looks as the girls started to really haul ass.
Kelly fell into the back as she kept an arrow notched and watched their flanks but then a hunter screamed as she fell to the side, a black arrow buried in her side.
Before anyone could go to help her, the hunter was silenced as another arrow buried itself in her throat, the sound of the hunter—Natalie if Kelly could see right—gurgling and drowning in her own blood sounding oddly clear even through the rain and occasional thunder clap.
More arrows followed forcing the tightly knit group to disperse into clumps or alone, many shouting in freight and some firing random arrows back into the trees.
Kelly was back-to-back with Sahara, the younger hunter trembling as she looked around wildly. Kelly turned her attention to an enraged shout and saw another one of their hunters standing a few meters away while firing up into the tree tops.
"Dana, over here!" Kelly called to her, getting the blonde hunters attention.
The hunter nodded and ran at them, taking all of three steps before a black blur tackled her right into the bushes across from Kelly and Sahara.
"Dana!" they both screamed as they ran to the thrashing bushes and Dana's screaming.
Kelly tripped over some mud though and fell to her knees just a few feet away, looking at the bushes before water suddenly splashed in her face along with Dana's screams being cut off. She furiously wiped away at the liquid only to notice it was leaving her eyesight hazy.
She glanced at her hand wondering if there had been mud on it only to stop cold at the sight. That hadn't been water splashed into her face, but blood. She looked back to the now silent bush, one bloodied and dirty hand sticking out from under the leaves but nothing else.
Kelly swallowed thickly as she turned away from the bush and looked to the others girls, her own hands shaking on her bow. A quick count of the hunters she could see already told her at least three were missing and another was pinned by the forehead to the tree right behind her.
More arrows rained down as the girls started to well and truly panic, making them run again as another hunter was picked off with an arrow to the knee. Kelly glanced back only to see two wolves pounce on the girl and drag her into the shadows as she screamed and cried for help … but they couldn't do anything already.
Kelly's attention was brought forward again, seeing as their numbers started to dwindle before a searing pain in her right shoulder made her cry out and buckle to the left, knocking Sahara down with her. They both fell to a halt, getting separated from the routed group of hunters and demigods.
"Kelly!" Sahara shouted as she moved around to see the arrow buried right in her shoulder along the rotator cuff. "This looks back," she muttered while Kelly resisted screaming 'No shit!' She grit her teeth through it though, having suffered far worse pain in her two centuries of being a hunter.
Sahara didn't give her a warning though as she grabbed the shaft and pulled it with a meaty squelch as Kelly couldn't stop the scream this time around. Sahara cringed at it as she tossed the damn arrow away before holding Kelly while trying to check the opening.
"Oh no," Sahara gasped in horror making Kelly look at her in further alarm. Catching her eye, Sahara swallowed before murmuring, "You're … freezing."
Kelly could have sworn her heart paused for a good three seconds as she digested those words, the gravity of her situation setting in along with probable shock leaving her numb to the once blaring pain.
She couldn't even speak as she slowly looked at her shoulder while pulling back the torn sleeve of her parka, seeing the already blueish flesh of the hole left by the arrow and watched it slowly spread like a living virus eating at her skin.
She'd gotten the accounts from Athena just the other night when the goddess came to the camp to tell the campers the plan and answered questions about Deimos and Percy's sword. If this was the same curse…
Seemingly reading her thoughts Sahara brought out a knife, the silvery edge glinting with a sudden crack of lightning as her fellow hunter's eyes narrowed with determination.
"What are you…?"
"Cutting the cursed flesh out," Sahara replied as she aimed the knife point.
"Are you crazy!?" Kelly shouted as she backed away. "The arrow went to the deep muscle, there's no way we're getting that out!"
"I'm not losing you too!" Sahara returned with a desperate glint in her eyes.
"I'm already dead!" Kelly shouted back, tears streaming down her face. "Just go and catch up with the others before it's too late!"
Sahara shock her head as her lips started to quiver, the knife falling out of her grip.
"No," she whimpered as Kelly tried to shove her to move.
"Why!? You have a chance, just go!" Kelly shouted at her but Sahara shock her head again. "Why are you staying with me!?" She just couldn't get this girl. It was one thing if she was just hurt and needed help moving, it was another being afflicted with a freezing curse that even Apollo couldn't heal.
"I won't …" Sahara murmured as she griped Kelly's shoulders, making the lieutenant look into her light blue eyes. "I won't leave you because I lo—"
Squelch!
Kelly blinked. And then blinked again, the sight not properly registering in her mind as she looked at Sahara. Said hunter was looking wide eyed back at her, her face paling as blood started to pour through her parted lips. As if in sync both looked down to see a black-scaled tail of all things impaled just below her sternum, through her back and out her front.
Sahara coughed slightly as the tail end twitched before slowly rising, taking Sahara with it as Kelly watched in numbed shock, unable to even muster the strength to grab her down bow or even move more than looking at her fellow hunter.
The long black tail curled around as it held the hunter up to a tree just above them, the body of it going into the shadows of the leaves before a low, near seductive giggle rang through even the sound of the rain.
Kelly watched in horror as a woman's upper body connected to the snake body at the hips leaned out of the tree.
Black hair cascading down to her back, deep blue eyes with narrowed pupils, a small grin with glinting fangs, all decorating a flawlessly creamy skin. Topped with a black corset that teased bountiful cleavage and a large black bow in hand.
A beautiful death if ever there was one.
===================
Don't forget to throw some power Stones, to keep the story going.
...
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