Surviving in the Shadows (Thornhollow Academy - Third Year)

Surviving in the Shadows Shadowmen Chronicles: Book Three Published by Bob Dattolo Copyright 2023 by Bob Dattolo All rights Reserved. This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return this copy and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Contents Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Chapter 40 Chapter 41 Chapter 42 Chapter 43 Chapter 44 Chapter 45 Chapter 46 Chapter 47 Chapter 48 Chapter 49 Chapter 50 Chapter 51 Chapter 52 Chapter 53 Chapter 54 Chapter 55 Chapter 56 Chapter 57 Chapter 58 Chapter 59 Chapter 60 Chapter 61 Chapter 62 Chapter 63 Chapter 64 Chapter 65 Chapter 66 Chapter 67 Chapter 68 Chapter 69 Chapter 70 Chapter 71 Chapter 72 Chapter 73 OTHER WORKS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ABOUT THE AUTHOR BACK PAGE SUMMARY Chapter 1 Blackest rage filled me as I lashed out, causing the tree in front of me to practically explode where I hit it. I purposefully went for a thicker one this time, so it took three hits for it to give way and fall, joining its brothers and sisters around me in death. And I still can’t control the rage tearing its way through me. Another tree goes down the same way. Then blades come out, one in each hand, and I lean into a far larger tree and begin carving it with hellish abandon, all the while trying desperately to calm down. I know the area around me is clear. I’m not that far gone. Yet I can’t do this. I can’t let someone see me attacking a random forest like this. At least not with the kind of damage I’m doing. As off the edge as I am, I did make sure nothing was apparent in the area from the satellite pictures. I scanned everything and ran some additional applications before giving up the fight. And here I am. My breathing is calm, almost serene. In direct contrast to everything going through my head as I silently work on eradicating the trees in this area of the forest. Please, please, please step back, Ty. Calm down. Calm down. What I read is bad, but…I can’t let this kind of thing out. People can see me. I can get caught somehow. Heck, I can possibly get injured enough that my elven and shifter healing won’t let me recover before someone finds me. Yet that doesn’t stop the bladework before the massive tree loses enough mass that it starts to fall. That has the blades going away as I focus more and bring on my partial shift, letting my claws slide from the end of my fingers. Something very, very few shifters can do. Too bad I can’t shift, otherwise I’d know what’s going on with me and why my claws don’t look like wolf claws. Which they should, since I was bitten at ten by wolves and joined my pack with my new father. They’re just so not wolf claws. Like at all. Not bear. Not any kind of cat that I’ve been able to find. Not any other carnivore shifters. They almost look like eagle claws, yet there aren’t any bird shifters like that, so…sure, maybe I’m different because I’m an insanely rare hybrid shifter and elf, but you’d think there’d be something in the books about that at some point. Nothing. More frustration fills me as I let it flow out through my hands as the next tree gets shredded by my razor-sharp claws even faster than they did with the knives. As that one falls, I let the desperation take over and drop me to my knees as I huddle over my arms, willing the claws away as I try to focus. Calm. Deep breaths. I meditate every day; I can do it now. I can. I have to. Deep breathing. Calming thoughts. Think about…think about Gwen. Best friends since I was ten. Let’s think about her. I love her to death and she’s my absolutely best friend in the world. I’d give her anything that I have just for the asking. I’d do anything for her. She’s the same back. We’re closer than close, and she has a knack for helping me calm down at times. Let’s use that connection. Let the upset flow out. I have a solid quarter acre of treeless forest around me, and I need to pull it back. Get myself collected. Centered enough to get out of here before anyone lucks into finding me somehow. Or flies over and somehow sees me. Not that most would care or be able to identify me, but stranger things have happened. Besides, when you’re in hiding from a worldwide organization of killers for hire, you really, really don’t want to be identified if you can help it. Unless you want to die. And have everyone you’ve ever loved die as well. Calm. Calm. Placid water. Falling snow. Soft waves. Light breezes through fields of wheat. Think good thoughts. Puppies playing. Kitties with string and floppy ears and questionable balance. Penguins