17 RISE AND SHINE
RISE AND SHINE
A SHARP PAIN IN HIS SHOULDER HAD R AUM DRAGGING his mind out of the soup of oblivion he’d been swimming in. He felt the weight of his arm at his side, and the blood rushing into his hand felt like a hundred needles, which helped wake him up a little.
“Raum?”
There was light pressure against his face, like someone was touching his cheek. It was nice, and he relaxed into it with a sigh. He hadn’t allowed himself to feel anything good in a long time.
He needed to chill out more. He was always stressed out and in a bad mood. When was the last time he’d just enjoyed the moment?
“Raum, wake up—”
The sound of that voice … It was like music. He would commit gratuitous acts of violence just to hear more of it.
He tried to respond, but all that came out was an unintelligible mumble. Even he was aware enough to know it made no sense. Not that he cared. As long as that hand kept touching him, he was good.
“Raum, you need to wake up. We can’t take a hellgate out of here until you’re conscious.”
He tried to blink. He wanted to please the voice.
“Yes! Try again. Let me see your eyes.”
He leaned into the hand on his cheek. He felt like Faust when he wanted head scratches. If that hand pulled away, he’d shuffle closer to get more.
“I’m going to unlock your other arm, okay? Try not to fall on me.”
He felt something tug on his other hand, but he kept focusing on trying to blink. The voice wanted to see his eyes, and apparently, he’d do anything for her.
A moment later, his hand dropped. The blood rushed into the limb, and immediately the pins-and-needles sensation started along with the burning in his muscles.
“Fuuuck,” was the first proper word he managed.
With his arm freed, his balance shifted, and he didn’t have the presence of mind to stabilize himself. He tipped forward and collided with a warm, soft body. He felt arms wrap around him and heard a grunt of exertion as he slumped into them.
“By the Spheres, why are you so heavy?”
He felt the warm, soft body angle against his weight, and he complied, levering back until his spine hit the wall. The body pressed against him, keeping him from falling forward again.
“Sunshine …”
“Yes, it’s me. I came to get you. Can you open your eyes?”
He tried as hard as he could, blinking through the haze until he saw a darkish outline and vague impression of a familiar face. “You’re here.”
“You’re awake.” Cool palms framed his face. “Your head is covered in blood. What happened?”
“M’fine.”
“I can’t heal you until we get back to Earth, so we’d better get going.”
His eyes slid closed again, but not because he was passing out. No, it was because it was the best feeling in existence to have her touching him like that.
“Feels nice,” he mumbled.
“What?”
“When you touch me.”
He opened his eyes again to find her frowning. Or at least that’s what the blurry features of her face looked like. Perfect. Blurry or not, she was so damn perfect.
“You’re perfect,” he told her, because it seemed important that he tell her. “Perfect ’n beautiful.” He squinted, trying to get her face in focus. “Skin’s so soft.”
“Are you drunk?” she asked, and he snorted.
“Drugged.”
“With what?”
“Necromancer … has a scorpion tail.”
Her eyes widened. “He’s venomous?”
Raum made a grunt of affirmation. Fuck, he was tired. How had Sunshine gotten here anyway? It was hard to think.
“Even more reason to get out of here. He was asleep, but he’s not now, and it’s only a matter of time before he figures out I’m here. It took me ages to find the key to your cell and those stupid manacles, and the guards kept waking up while I was searching, so I had to keep stabbing them.”
“Les’go then,” he slurred, leaning against her. Now that his eyes were focusing, the only thing he wanted to look at was her. Her body was mostly covered by a big ugly cloak, and that struck him as a shame. He wanted to see her naked. Hot damn, he really wanted to see her naked.
“Where’s your shirt?” she asked.
“Murmur took it.” It was a wild guess. He hadn’t even been aware he wasn’t wearing one until right then.
“I need something to draw a hellgate with.” She looked around. “I don’t suppose you still have a piece of chalk, do you?” She started patting around his pants pockets.
It took all of three seconds for him to get hard. “Little … over to the right.”
She followed his instructions until she palmed the bulge in his pants, and then she gasped and jerked back. “That is not chalk, Raum!”
“It isn’t? Better reach in and find out for sure.”
“Now is not the time for jokes,” she hissed, but she was definitely blushing. She stepped back, grabbed his arm, and slung it over her shoulder. “Just come with me, and don’t pass out again. We’ll have to use blood.”
Whose blood? His head throbbed from the aftereffects of Murmur’s venom, and his arms still ached from being chained, making it hard to focus. He let her lead him out of the cell, into a long tunnel, but his brain still wasn’t entirely with the program.
Neither was his body, apparently. A wave of lightheadedness suddenly crashed over him, and his vision tunneled. He stumbled into Sunshine, who tripped, and they both hit the ground.
They ended up slumped against the wall in a tangle of limbs, which seemed hilarious, so he laughed.
Sunshine stared at him like he’d grown a second head. “I’ve never seen you—You are not okay!”
“I’m fine. It’s just funny.” He stopped laughing anyway and marveled again at how captivating her eyes were. No wonder he’d been obsessed with her from the moment he saw her. He hadn’t stood a chance when she’d come after him in the club.
“Nothing about this is funny!” Those eyes weren’t full of seduction now, sadly. “We have to hurry.” Scrambling to her feet, she tried to haul him up by the arm. “ Why are you so heavy?!”
He sagged in her grip. “Use your angelic strength, baby.”
“Raum, you have to focus.”
“I am focused … on how incredibly fine you are.” He reached over to feel her up, but she swatted his hand away. He let her pull him to his feet and then steadied himself with a hand on the wall when the world started spinning again.
He felt like he needed to sleep for a week, and his eyes kept trying to close of their own accord. He still wasn’t even sure why Sunshine was here, how she’d found him, or where they were supposed to be going.
“Wait. Shit.” He forced his brain to work. “Did you get the book?” He assumed she wouldn’t have come down here to get him if she hadn’t.
“I found it, yes.”
“So that’s it? You’re done?” Why did he feel such a crushing sense of disappointment?
“Not until we get out of here.”
“Where is the book? Is it here?” He looked around. As if he’d even be able to see a book right now with his vision so blurry.
“I’ll explain everything once we get back to Earth. There isn’t time now.”
He shrugged mentally. She wouldn’t be willing to walk out of Murmur’s lair if she hadn’t found what she needed. Still, something about this whole thing struck him as too easy.
All he’d had to do was get his ass captured and drugged for Sunshine to get her book? He supposed the amulets would’ve done most of the work getting her past the wards, but still. Where was the book anyway, if she had it?
He tried to think, but it just made his head pound, and in the end, he trusted Sunshine to take care of herself. She said she found the book, so he believed her.
He let her lead him down the tunnel until they came upon a pile of bodies. He blinked at the sight. Two demons had their throats slit and knife wounds in their eyeballs, and the other two’s heads were facing the wrong way. All four had been stabbed in the chest repeatedly.
“Did you do this?”
“Yes, and now I need to use their blood to draw the hell-gate. Just stay there, and don’t pass out again.” She pushed him against the wall to prop him up like he couldn’t stand on his own—a fair assumption—and then went over to the mangled demons.
“There aren’t exactly any paintbrushes around here,” she mumbled. “I’ll just have to use my hand, I suppose. How revolting.”
He watched in disbelief as she bent over one and then dipped her fingers into the blood seeping out of his grisly neck wound. Hand dripping, she quickly moved over to a clear spot on the floor and began finger painting the hellgate sigil.
Where was the Sunshine that had balked at killing the cannibal demon? And why was it so hot seeing her covered in blood, knowing she’d gone on a killing spree to get to him?
“We might need to stab them again,” she said after the third or fourth dip in the paint. “Their wounds are closing, and it won’t be long before they wake up.”
He stared at her.
She glanced up from the half-finished gate. “Would you mind?”
Would he mind stabbing a demon so she could have more blood for finger painting? Why, no, he wouldn’t.
Shifting his hands into half-demon form, he trudged over to the fallen foes and slowly crouched, careful to keep from passing out again. His awareness was sharpening the longer he stayed awake.
Just to gauge her reaction, he stabbed all five claws into a demon’s stomach and stirred them around a little. The creature twitched a bit but remained otherwise unaware.
Raum watched Sunshine, waiting for her to react to the gore.
Instead, she leaned over, dipped her fingers straight into the blood-and-guts soup, and then flashed a sweet smile at him. “Thank you.” And she went right back to drawing the hellgate.
Maybe he was hallucinating as a side effect from the venom. Maybe this was all a fucked-up dream.
“How do you even know how to draw a hellgate?” She was an angel. She could teleport and had no need for them. That lent credibility to his hallucination theory.
When she glanced at him again, her eyes were somber. “I was once trapped and couldn’t flash to save myself. Afterward, I studied and practiced so I would never end up in that situation again.”