36. The Fifth Game #2
I turn away from the treasure, and jump out of the cage toward the rock wall again. My boots slide as I desperately try to keep hold of the medical kit while grabbing for some kind of purchase with my free hand.
The moment my foot catches on a spike, everything and everyone falls away and all I focus on is making it down to Az.
As I near them, he doesn’t look good. Not good at all.
“Hey,” I shout. “Catch.”
Reiva doesn’t hesitate and I drop the medical kit into his hands.
“You’re not dying in a ravine, mate,” he tells him, opening the kit and pulling out item after item, some of which he discards and others he keeps close.
Az’s lips twitch weakly. “It would… be less epic… than I’d… like.”
Khali lets out a shaky laugh through her tears and Reiva gets to work.
I glance at his leg again. The bone is definitely broken. Badly.
Even if we stabilize him, he won’t be walking out of here. Which means…
My gaze lifts. The ravine walls stretch impossibly high above us, and the exit is beyond them, way out of reach.
We need to carry him. But he’s so big, not even Reiva, who isn’t a small man himself, would be able to climb while carrying Az. Not alone.
My gaze shifts to the pieces of shattered cage lying around Az from the one that fell and took him with it when he grabbed Khali’s stars.
The wood that’s been woven together is thick and looks strong.
“We need to make something to carry him out of here,” I say. “I think we could use the broken cage for it. Make some kind of bed or basket to roll him onto.”
“Then that’s my item,” Reiva says simply. “I’m allowed one item that I need, and I need the wood from that cage.”
“I saw rope,” Khali says. “Before he fell, I saw a cage with rope. We could use it to bind the wood together like a stretcher."
“Hell, if there’s enough of it, we could make a pulley and not have to carry him at all, just lift him out from the top,” Reiva suggests.
I nod. “He’s too big to carry. It’s the only way we’re getting him out.”
Az wheezes a laugh. “Epic,” he murmurs. “My grand exit… carried out… in a fucking… fruit basket.”
“Shut up,” Khali mutters, though the relief in her voice to have a use is obvious.
Az’s breaths are coming all wrong, shallow and uneven, and his face is even paler now beneath the cuts and blood and grime.
“The rope can be my item.” Khali presses a shaking hand to his shoulder, her black eyes glassy with unshed tears. “Don’t die,” she orders.
Az huffs weakly. “You’re… very bossy… when I’m… dying.”
“You’re not dying,” she snaps. “If you so much as think about dying before I get back, Azazel Thorne, I swear to every Sister I will drag you back from Hell just so I can kill you myself.”
Az lets out a weak chuckle that dissolves into a cough.
“So…” he rasps, “romantic.”
Khali’s fingers close briefly around one of the throwing stars lying beside him. The ones he almost died retrieving. “You’re not allowed to die for something stupid like this.”
Az’s eyes open and he tries to lift his head to look at her despite the obvious pain. “Didn’t feel… stupid… felt… heroic.”
Khali looks like she might say something else. Instead she stands abruptly and turns to the ravine wall, then starts climbing.
Fast.
Within seconds she’s halfway up the rock face, her small horns nearly scraping the stone as she moves with the smooth confidence of someone who’s spent her life scaling impossible places.
I glance back down at Az.
His eyes are half-lidded now.
“Stay with us,” I say quietly, dropping down into the spot Khali had knelt in.
Then, without any warning, Reiva pulls out the throwing star that’s lodged deep in Az’s side.
Az screams.
Khali yells down. “What happened?”
“He’s just being dramatic,” Reiva calls.
“It’s fine,” I shout. “Keep going!”
I reach for a bottle and shove a potion with the label Solamen Doloris, Comfort for Pain, between his teeth.
Az stops thrashing and Reiva starts packing the wound with bandages.
“Stay with us,” I repeat.
Above us the chains continue to creak and cadets shout. Treasure and cages and more bodies clatter.
Down here on the ravine floor, fighting to keep our ally and friend alive, greed loses its grip completely.
Mine and Reiva’s hands are slick with his blood and Az’s scream still echoes in the ravine when Reiva eventually gets a bandage tight enough to slow the bleeding.
Not stop it completely, but slow it.
Khali returns with the rope and we leave Reiva to continue working on Az while we work on making some sort of bed for him to lie on.
“Ungrateful bastard,” Khali mutters to herself as her fingers loop, thread and tie wooden lengths with the rope. “Part of me wishes we had fruit to dot around him. He wants a damn fruit basket, he can get a damn fruit basket.”
She’s angry at herself more than him, and being Satan’s daughter, her rage is likely even more difficult to quash than most others who descend from the wrath demons of Ira.
She knew he was going after the throwing star and didn’t stop him.
Knowing Khali, she is feeling guilt and it’s coming out as anger.
“It wasn’t your fault,” I say. “You know that right?”
She sighs. “I know.”
We work in silence until the bed is long enough to fit most of him. “His knees can just dangle,” I say. “He’s had enough pain relief in that potion, he shouldn’t even notice the break as we hoist him.”
Once Reiva is happy he’s stable, he calls out. “On three, we lift the princess into his carriage.”
Despite the narrow space, we manage to lift him on and Reiva and I begin to climb, leaving Khali to secure him with makeshift ties.
Whether it’s because he’s top of the triad, or because people simply fear, respect or like him, when we reach the top of the ravine walls, I’m shocked that a few of the other cadets join the two of us to help.
Together we hoist Az up higher and higher, and Khali stays right alongside him, making sure she navigates the tighter spots around the cages and the sharp shards of rock sticking out from the walls.
When I glance over to Silver, no longer standing atop the cage but holding open a hellgate over to my left, I’m surprised to see such a morbid expression on his face.
Shouldn’t he be proud of us?
Relieved that we all made it when all bar one of Yuvi’s cadets fell to their deaths with no one willing or able to help them like we have for Az.
Khali climbs over the ridge of the ravine just in time to help as we pull Az over it too.
“What now?” she asks.
“The hellgate is over there,” I nod toward Silver and where the cadets who helped are now racing toward the magical portal.
With Khali and I holding a corner each at his head, and Reiva supporting the part where Az’s legs hang over the end, we carry him toward the hellgate.
“Wait.” I hesitate as we go to step in. “Are you conscious Az?” I ask, remembering Yuvi mentioning about going through hellgate’s unconscious. “We don’t want your insides on your outsides.” Or whatever it is that’s meant to happen. We haven’t done all of this only to accidentally kill him now.
“Unfortunately,” Az grumbles.
And after a quick shared look with Khali and Reiva, we step into the gate.