The Van Helsing Conjecture – Excerpt No. 270

Their discipline was unreal, with barely any variance in their heart rate and breathing. What differed were their strides, varying based on height and size.

The bigger and presumably stronger men were leading, whereas the smaller and younger ones hung back. If this were to devolve to hand-to-hand combat, those in the back would maintain their distance and engage with their crossbows… even I’d have problems engaging multiple threats at two ranges…

They collectively stopped, once the lead group was within fifteen paces. The man who lined up with the direction of bolts in her back made a sign with his arm to order them to halt.

“What are you doing here?” Asked a man who stood to the left of the one she guessed was the leader.

A moody, high-contrast, cinematic photograph of a dozen menacing men, clad in dark, tattered clothing, emerging from the blackness of a misty, moonless night in a foreboding forest, their faces obscured by the shadows, their crowbows drawn and at the ready, the only sound being the soft crunch of leaves and twigs beneath their slow, deliberate steps, the camera positioned at a low angle, looking up at the ominous figures, capturing the eerie, unsettling atmosphere, with the dark, gnarled tree trunks and twisted branches looming in the background, illuminated only by flashes of faint, eerie blue moonlight filtering through the canopy above, the overall mood dark, ominous, and foreboding, with an air of impending doom.

Disclaimer: This novel is an work in progress and readers may encounter grammatical errors and inconsistencies. Please view this a draft and not a published work.