Chapter 23 #3
“No. Listen.” He grips my shoulder with his left hand, and it isn’t steady. “That fight made noise. The blood, mine, theirs, it’s carrying on the air right now, and every male within miles is going to come looking. Do you understand? In this state, I can’t protect you. I can’t even protect myself.”
“Then we need to go right now. We—”
“Some of my ribs are broken. My right arm is useless. Something in the shoulder, it’s broken too; I felt it go,” he says, wincing. “I can’t run, and I can’t fight, and I can’t climb.”
“Okay.” I’m already working through it; triage, the way I’ve watched Robyn do it. Pressure first. I need to stop the bleeding. “Okay, so we—”
“You have to go back to the cave.” His hand tightens on my shoulder. “You know the way. Stay in the thick growth, move quietly, get inside and stay hidden. I’ll come for you when I’m healed enough to move.”
He will be killed long before then.
I can’t leave him.
I won’t!
“No, Magma.” I shake my head.
“Carla, listen to me.”
“No.” I reach for the knot at my hip and drag my skirt loose.
I fold it into a thick pad and press it against the worst of the slashes, and he hisses.
“You came to this island for me. You’ve been throwing yourself between me and everything on it since the day we arrived, again and again, and now it’s my turn to help you.
So you can save the speech. We are in this together… you and me…a team.” My voice hitches.
“There’s too much blood. It’s all over the ground. All over me.” His voice drops. He puts his hand over mine where I’m pressing the cloth to him, and I feel how much of it is soaking through already, warm against my palm. “They’ll come.”
“I don’t care.”
“You need to run and—”
“You told me never to run from you. I won’t do it.”
He rolls his eyes and groans. “You know that’s not what I meant.”
“Here’s my version.” I pull back just enough to look him in the eye.
“We’re going to the river. It’s not that far from here.
We get you there, we clean these wounds so you’re not bleeding a trail through the jungle, we bind you up properly, and then we find somewhere to hide until you can move.
We hole up together. I’m not leaving you here to die, so stop wasting your energy arguing with me, because you’re going to need all of it to walk out of here. ”
He stares at me.
His jaw tightens, and his eyes blaze. I know he doesn’t like it, but I don’t care.
“You’re the most stubborn female I have ever met,” he growls.
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
“Let’s sort out your arm and then we’re leaving, so best you be prepared to get your ass up and walk,” I tell him.
He gives me a pained smile, and something eases in me.
I use what’s left of my skirt to make a sling, which I tie behind his neck, holding it in place.
“That’s a little better,” he pushes out.
Then I help him up. It takes some effort and a few grunts before he’s on his feet. He sways, and I grab him by the arm to hold him in place.
“Which way to the river?” I ask.
He tips his chin at a gap in the green, and we start walking. It’s agonizingly slow, even though he’s leaning heavily on me.
I glance at him, and he’s ashen. Trickles of his blood run warm down my side where his ribs press against me. His breath drags in and out through his teeth. Every few steps, a sound gets away from him, but we’re moving.
As long as we keep moving, there is hope.
The jungle is too loud around us. Every snapped twig spins my head around.
Every birdcall cuts off mid-note and leaves me staring into the undergrowth, waiting for it to grow claws.
Twice I stop us dead because I’m sure I hear something keeping level with us in the green, and twice there’s nothing, and we stagger on.
“You’re doing well,” he murmurs at some point, which is ridiculous, because he’s the injured one.
“Quiet. Save your energy.”
The trees begin to thin. The undergrowth opens up, the canopy pulling back overhead, more sky showing through in ragged patches of white glare. Magma stops, sagging against me, and his chest works overtime.
“Just…a moment,” he grinds out. “Need to catch my breath.”
“Okay.” I scan the tree line, the sky, the tree line again. “But we can’t stay out here in the open; we’re—”
“I know. Let’s go.”
We keep going. The river can’t be far now. I really hope it isn’t because I don’t think he has much more in him.
Magma’s head comes up, and he sucks in a breath. His whole body goes rigid against mine, his eyes snap to the sky, and then I hear it too. Wings. Many, many wings.
They pour over the treetops.
Red Dragons. Not one, not three, but dozens of them.
They come in a boiling mass of wings and color, swirling around each other against the sky, so many of them I can’t hold the count in my head, and even as I watch, more rise from beyond the tree line to join the churn.
Screeches tear the air, a sound that scrapes the inside of my skull.
They’re flying toward us.
They’ve seen us.
“No,” I whisper.
Magma’s arm tightens across my shoulders. There is no cover. There is no way out of this.
My heart sinks.
It’s over. For both of us.