Chapter 11 #2
“Blade!” She screamed his name between gulps of breath. “Blade!” In the darkness, there was nothing but terror and pain as Scotty crashed into floating logs and slammed into boulders.
Then, in a rush of swirling water, she felt herself being sucked violently downward.
Then, she felt nothing.
Blade’s head was pounding.
The sensation of dampness and grit on his skin and clothing grew more uncomfortable as consciousness pushed back the fog of confusion in his brain.
What happened? He blinked, but all he could make out in the darkness were blurry shadows. Where was he?
He sat up, groaning at the aches and sharp, stabbing pains that seemed to emanate from every muscle, every bone, and every freaking cell in his body. He shoved his wet hair away from his eyes. He was soaked and sitting in a puddle of mud.
The flash flood.
Scotty!
He lumbered to his feet, staggering a few steps before a hand snagged his arm and held him upright.
“It’s about time you woke up.”
“Scotty,” he breathed, tugging her against him. “Thank the gods you’re okay.”
“I’m fine.” Her words, muffled by his chest, comforted the hell out of him. “But I was worried about you.” She pulled away and guided him over to a relatively flat-topped boulder, where he could sit. “You’ve been out of it for hours.”
Hours? He sank down onto the rock and tried to get the lay of the land. Well, the under land. It appeared they were inside a subterranean tunnel system. It looked like two, maybe three passages extended from the small cave.
“I think the flood washed us down here.” She gestured to a puddle a few feet away. “I woke up in that.” She held up her left arm. “With a broken wrist and some busted ribs.”
Instantly, he gripped her shoulder and fired up his healing gift. In his hands, her bones felt small and delicate. Birdlike. But this female was a powerful warrior, and the most delicate thing about her was absolutely nothing.
“It’s fine,” she said. “Everything was healed half an hour ago.”
She was right. He didn’t detect any residual damage.
“You look better too.” She scanned him with a critical eye from head to toe. “You were pretty beat up at first.”
He was still pretty beat up. Everything hurt, and his neck protested as he tilted his head up to take in the fissure in the cave ceiling. The gap was just wide enough to reveal a sliver of the moon and a handful of stars. “We must have dropped through that crack. That’s a hell of a fall.”
Scotty nodded grimly. “We got lucky. Sort of. Do you want the good news or the bad?”
He usually went for the bad news first, while Mace went for the good. Scotty chose depending on her mood.
“Good news,” he said. “In honor of Mace.”
“Aw, that’s sweet. Okay, so I looked around while you were recovering. I’m pretty sure we stumbled upon a wendigo nest.”
He blinked in surprise. “Awesome. That’s some Wraith-level luck.
” Wraith was famous for his luck at finding shit.
“You can gate us out of here, and once we find Jon and Skoll, we can ambush the bastards. It’ll take a while to get back here, since there’s no Harrowgate close, but—” He paused. “Wait. What’s the bad news?”
She blew out a frustrated breath. “I can’t summon a gate.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“I tried.” She gestured to a small pool of blood, evidence of her attempt. “Since we’re not surrounded by water, and there’s not a hellmouth nearby to block my ability, my best guess as to why I can’t summon a gate is that there’s a Morabuble somewhere in these tunnels. We might even be inside it.”
Definitely bad news. Morabubles were incursions of the hell realm into the human one.
Places where the veil between the realms was thin or unstable, allowing demons and humans to pass through—intentionally or accidentally.
Worse, the twisted, untamable energy that seeped through the veil warped magic spells and innate abilities.
Even if Scotty could open a gate, it wouldn’t be safe to use it.
They could end up in a troll’s cookpot, on another planet, or shredded into confetti.
“That explains the demons,” he said. “If wendigos draw demons, it would be easy for them to come through the incursion.”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“Okay, so we need to find a way out.” He looked around for their packs. “We can call Jon and Skoll—”
“No, we can’t. I think our packs got swept away. And I don’t know about your comms, but all mine can do is keep time. Everything else is toast.”
He glanced down at his wrist, taking in the shattered face of the unit staring back at him. Muddy water had gotten inside the device. So much toast.
At least his weapons had survived intact, if a little waterlogged. The harness itself was shredded in places, and he’d lost a couple of loops, but not a single knife or throwing star.
Oh, no. Frantically, he patted himself down. Shit, shit, shit!
“Blade? What is it?”
“The Reaper. It’s not in its holster. I think I left it in the pack.”
“Dude.” A look of horror crossed Scotty’s face. “Kynan is going to kill us.”
“Nah.” Blade swallowed dryly. “He’s just going to be happy we’re alive.”
“He can be happy we’re alive and still want to kill us, you know.”
He laughed. It made his ribs hurt a little. “Come on, let’s find a way out of here.” He accepted her hand and allowed her to help him to his feet.
But the feel of her palm in his brought a new, horrible awareness. When she started to withdraw, he tightened his grip, keeping her there.
“We should hurry,” he said gruffly.
“Agreed. I don’t want to face more than one wendigo without backup.” She frowned down at their hands. He knew he should let her go, but the feel of her skin against his felt too good, spreading through his arms, his chest, torso…groin. “Blade?”
“Sorry.” Reluctantly, he released her, but the arousal remained. “How long did you say I was unconscious?”
“At least a couple of hours.”
Oh, fuck.
“Blade? What is it?”
He unleashed a barrage of curse words. “My injections were in my pack.”
Scotty’s eyes shot wide. “How long?”
“Soon. If we don’t get out of here soon…” He swallowed. He couldn’t even say it. Not to her. Not to the one person he wanted more than anything. Not to the one person he could never have.
“You’re going to need sex,” she finished. “And you’ll need it from me.”