Chapter 8
At first, he only thought he imagined her calling his name. Thoughts of the heated look she had given him just before he had walked away haunted him. It was a hunger, and he could imagine the wild, reckless desire he saw there reflected that of his own.
He wanted her. And from what he saw, it might be mutual.
Yet down that path lay trouble.
As he ran back toward the lake, through the overgrowth of the small forest that touched the other side of the water, he accepted the fact that, even if he believed her for a minute that her childhood had been torture and hiding, much as his had been, she was still Grawl’s daughter.
Grawl! The sorcerer who had destroyed everything he’d had to live for, had ripped away his freedom, and had taken away his only means of escape. Revenge was all he had lived for ever since.
He couldn’t just let that go. Not for a lust that would no doubt pass.
Her argument had been convincing, though. What if the sorcerer couldn’t be killed? What if Rise finally got close enough to Grawl to strike a mortal blow, a sure suicide mission, and it was all for nothing?
Could he afford to take that risk? Could he afford not to? Did she really know how to kill her father? And did she really want Grawl dead as much as he did?
He heard Liv’s voice once more, a slight panicked edge to it. He needed to get to her, right the fuck now.
Not because he cared about her. Surely, that wasn’t it. He needed her alive because any decision about what to do would be taken from him if he lost her.
He rounded the ridge at the fastest pace he dared over the rocky terrain, his heart stopping at the scene below him.
She was caught in the tentacle of a chelator, a six-legged, winged creature that hid in lakes, waiting for prey to come close enough to grab and drown. From the looks of things, Liv had put up quite a fight, but she’d seen the bottom of the lake a few times.
It wasn’t supposed to be here. How had it gotten inside the dimension he’d created?
Without thought to the danger or pain, Rise turned around and slid backwards on his hands and feet, falling at a faster pace than he could run.
He dropped from handhold to handhold, somehow maintaining control until about half-way down the cliffside.
His hand slipped from the slightest lip of the vertical rock, and he felt his stomach drop as he fell freely downward, gravity taking over.
He hit hard, feeling every bone in his body rattle and knocking the breath out of his lungs.
The world spun for a moment, but the sound of Liv’s scream, a little weaker than before, cleared the fuzz from his mind.
Fortunately, he’d only fallen about thirty feet.
It was still galling that he’d fallen at all.
If he’d been whole, it wouldn’t have happened at all.
Assured that nothing was irreparably broken, he stood up slowly and finished his climb down, a little slower this time until he could leap from the cliffside and sprint toward the water.
He yanked his knives free the minute his feet touched the cool sand, and with three hops, he was in the air.
A feeling he’d forgotten took over as he shot through the air, knives raised, covering the distance like he was flying.
His weapons sunk into the soft flesh of the creature with a sickening sound of gelatinous muscle ripping. The predator let out a roar that echoed off the canyon walls, but it still gripped Liv in it’s long, spindly arm.
“Come on, beast! Release her!”
As he pulled a knife free and drove it in once more, the creature cried out and began swatting at him with its tentacles. One wrapped around his leg and pulled but slipped free as Rise held tightly to the knife hilts driven deep into the beast’s flesh.
“I need her more than you do!”
At once, the predator wrapped two tentacles around one of his lower legs and yanked his body backward.
He managed to hang on, but the force attempting to pull his lower body from his upper body made Rise feel as if, at any moment, he might rip in two like a piece of cooked meat.
He wouldn’t be able to hang on, but he didn’t want to lose his weapons.
He yanked both knives free and felt the tentacles tighten as he was pulled backward and hung upside down over the clear water below.
A quick view of Liv’s limp body as the creature swung him around worried him more than anything. He needed to end this fight, and he needed to end it quickly.
Just as he suspected, the creature moved him toward its mouth, no doubt trying to end him in one, huge gulp.
He worked his body, trying to wriggle free, but found the grip of the suckers were tightly adhered to his legs.
The more he struggled, the more he felt his clothing ripping away with the creature’s hold.
With a mind for driving his knives into the tentacle, maybe making a meaningful cut that would weaken its grasp, he contracted his midsection and worked to pull himself toward the area on his leg where the beast had a hold of him.
Yet, try as he might, he couldn’t seem to do anything more than nick the skin, annoying the creature more than causing any real damage.
He grew ever closer to its gnashing beak, realizing he needed to think of something quick that would work or he’d never get his chance to punish Grawl for all he had done.
He wasn’t going to let this beast rob him of his chance at victory when he was finally so close.
And he sure as hell wasn’t about to let Grawl live happily ever after without the death he so richly deserved.
As he dangled over the snapping beak, Rise lifted his knife and twisted his body. With an adrenaline-induced lunge toward the creature’s protruding eye, Rise felt the splash of gooey liquid as his blade struck true.
Gravity returned as he felt the beast’s grip loosen, and Rise plunged into the water below.
He touched the bottom and pushed off, shooting upward toward the surface with one knife still in his grip.
He spun around, searching for any sign of Liv, but she was nowhere in sight.
At least she was no longer hanging in one of the beast’s tentacles. But where was she?
The creature used one of its long arms to pull the knife from its eye. It dropped the weapon and dove back into the water, disappearing in an instant.
Rise waited, weapon ready, for it to reappear, but like the heliskrat, it seemed to have retreated as quickly as it had arrived. Once again, he had to wonder how it had even gotten here in the first place.
But, with Liv nowhere in sight, he couldn’t spend time worrying about that. Instead, he began diving down beneath the water, searching for any sign of her. After the third time, he spotted her unconscious body lying prone on the bottom, and his heart nearly stopped.
Without sparing a moment, he swam for her, wrapped her in his arms, and wasted no time getting her out of the water and onto the shore.
He laid her gently onto the sand and brushed her hair from her face as he knelt beside her.
“Liverity!” He shouted her name as if it would return the pink back to her cheeks and the life back to her body, but her chest remained still and her lips were a terrifying blue. “Dammit, Strongwill, live up to your name!”
A moment of panic took over. He couldn’t lose her. And if he was being honest, it wasn’t because of some damn plan. Somehow, he knew, deep inside, that she meant something to this world. She needed to live. She meant something…to him.
Most likely, it stemmed from their shared childhood. Though she didn’t remember it, he couldn’t forget it. It was the best and worst time of his life. It was a time when he had felt hope in a hopeless situation. He couldn’t let her slip away now.
He couldn’t waste any more time. He gently pinched her nose, took a breath, and lowered his lips to cover her entire mouth.
He blew two breaths into her mouth and pulled away.
He placed his hands together just under her breasts and began to pump his hands, arms straight, up and down to make sure the blood continued to pump throughout her body.
After about thirty, he pulled away, prepared to breath into her mouth again, but he didn’t have to.
A gurgling cough erupted from her lungs, and he helped her turn to the side slightly so she could expel the water from deep inside her chest.
She vomited water for a few moments before falling backward once more and lifting a hand to her forehead. Her gaze searched for his, and the minute they looked at each other, she reached for him.
He wrapped his arms around her and held her as she sobbed. He relaxed into the familiar embrace, but, more than anything, he was relieved she was alive.
She pulled back from him, muttering apologies, and he let her, knowing that she had just experienced something he understood all too well. Being that close to death changed a person in ways that were irreparable and permanent.
“You…you saved my life. Why?” As she spoke, he noticed the state of her clothing, or lack thereof.
She had been bathing. What had he expected?
At least she had kept on her underwear and bra, though they left nothing to the imagination.
He could see her hardened nipples, round and tempting through the scant cloth that passed as a bra, and a dark triangle of hair was a faint shadow beneath her soaked underwear.
Suddenly uncomfortable, Rise cleared his throat and lifted his gaze to the cliffside looming overhead as he slammed a foot onto the ground and stood up with stilted movements. He turned away from her as he tried to remember the question.
After a moment, he got himself under control enough to answer, “I couldn’t lose my leverage. You’re my means to an end.”
Yet, even as he said it, he knew it wasn’t true. He had saved her because the loss of her life would have mattered greatly.
He heard her get to her feet but only realized she’d closed the short distance between them when he felt her hands on his back.
“Wings. You had wings.”
He jerked free and turned to face her, grabbing her hands in his. His rage built to a wild blaze, but he took a deep breath and said, “Once upon a time, yes. No longer. Thanks to your father.”
He knew what she saw there now. Blackened, jagged remnants of his once beautiful, cream-colored, arching wings that spread wide and were weapons as much as they were tools to fly. The pain of their loss came rushing back, and a red-hot anger took over his body.
He could feel the pity that rounded her eyes. Full and suffocating, it was the last thing he wanted to see.
“Stop looking at me like that! The minute I see him, he’s dead. Do you understand? I will have no mercy. Not for him! And, you can bet, I will have zero mercy for his offspring.”
“My dream! You used to wrap me in your wings, and I would sleep. I used to call you My Dream.”
Now, finally, she remembered him. “Don’t say that. Maybe once a dream! Now, I’m your nightmare.”