Chapter 7 Does Not Belong #2
“Great. So, we’re stuck together.” I pluck the sickle from the dead man’s hand. I’m not going to let Niklaus inflate his own ego by saving me again. Besides, sickles hold a weird importance to my family. It’s feels right to take it for myself now.
“Not for long. You still might freeze to death.”
I look down at my exposed legs. “There’s a cave that way.”
He helps me gather the wood, following my lead to the gaping mouth of hollow murkiness. It’s musty, covered in icicles, and pitch black the further in we go.
“At leastthis gets us awayfrom the wind chill,” I say with chattering teeth.
Shit, I really might die. Dropping to the ground, I start rocking back and forth to keep warm. Niklaus attempts to light the fire. He curses several times.
“The wood is wet. It’s not going to work.”
I’m going to die.
My entire body vibrates like a storm is shaking my skeletal system. I can’t get warm. Rocking faster, I clutch my own core, breathing shallowly.
“Spitfire,” Niklaus says with caution.
I can’t answer. Keep rocking.
“Hey.”
I roll onto my side, bringing my bare legs to my chest in the fetal position. My teeth clack together like high heels against a marble floor. Everything aches. Everything is numb.
Where’s DaiSzek when you need him? With his bum leg, he’s not good for much, but at least he’s warm.
“I can’t start the fire,” Niklaus says at a loss for words, standing over me, staring like a fucking idiot.
I clutch my cloak tighter around my body. I used to think this thing was so warm. So thick and good at trapping heat. But right now, it feels like ice is coating my skin, layering over the chills and goose bumps.
Niklaus starts pacing, running his hand through his hair. He’s wearing more clothes than me. It’s not fair. Why did I have to go to that tavern wanting to look hot in a short dress?
Frozen tears leak from the corners of my eyes, dripping onto the cave floor.
His footsteps pause, and I can feel those radiant eyes boring into the side of my head, my quivering, curled up body.
“I’m not doing this because I want to,” he clarifies, then begins taking off his clothes.
What is he doing exactly?
“But you’re my only way home.”
His pants drop next to my head.
Oh god!
I flinch as the metal from his belt buckle clanks against the stone floor. His shirt. His boots. And suddenly, Niklaus is kneeling at my side, undoing my cloak, pulling it away from my body.
“Yout-tryingtok-k-illmef-f-faster?”
“I know your mother taught you about wilderness survival too. You’re just too fucking stubborn to offer the idea first.” He reaches under my thighs, pulling my dress up.
“H-hey!”
“Would you rather me rip it right down the middle? Because I will.”
Damn. I know what he’s doing. Body heat. And right now, I’m not in a good position to argue. To come up with a plan that doesn’t involve our naked bodies touching.
I stop struggling as he pulls my dress over my ass, tugging my arms to loosen as he unveils the rest of my body. I’m wearing red lace panties and a brassiere. Please. Please don’t remove them too.
Niklaus positions himself behind me, tucking his legs behind my own, circling his body around mine like a quotation mark. There’s a quick gust of air as he drapes our cloaks over top of us.
And for a quiet, awkward moment, he doesn’t know what to do with his arms. With his hands. They remain close to his sides, as if I’m made of poison oak, as if touching me will burn him.
The heat from his chest pulses into my back, cutting through the vicious shivers in my bones. I melt a little against him, going to mush as some of the discomfort passes.
“J-just put them around m-me,” I stammer. Coward.
Niklaus doesn’t move, though his breathing finds a faster rhythm. After a few seconds, he sighs, and his breath tickles my ear. Those lean, muscular arms slide around my waist, circling over my chest. He pulls me closer, hugging me against the flexed, shivering planes of his frame.
Krimson, you wouldn’t believe what I’m having to do to survive out here.
“We’re not going to last like this,” Niklaus breathes. “We need fire. Warm clothes.”
I nod, shifting under the cloak.
Body heat can only get us so far.
“Do you think you can control it?” he asks.
“Control what?”
“Whatever you did to get us here.”
I breathe hot air against my fingertips, remembering that strange onyx animal that helped us get away. Maybe I did do this to us.
I shake my head slowly.
Niklaus grunts, squeezing me tighter in frustration.
“Did you see that—thing that came out of the darkness?” I sound nuts.
He’s quiet for three seconds. “Yes.”
“It helped us.”
He doesn’t respond.
“Maybe it will again,” I add.
Again, his silence leaves room for me to practically hear the subtle cues for what he wants to say about this topic. The rolling of his eyes. He thinks the idea is absurd and not worth wasting his breath on.
“Don’t get yourself turned on right now.” I feel something against my butt, and I’m not sure if it’s just his pelvic bone or something else. “I’m only doing this, so I won’t drop dead.”
He chuckles unkindly, rumbling my back. “Not even lying with your naked body could get me off. Your best friend is what a man wants. Not. You.”
Blood rushes back to my numb limbs. Just when I started to think we could set aside our differences for this…
The stupid motherfucker proves me wrong.
Mabel Rose. Mabel Rose. Mabel Rose.
Hot, bitter acid splashes against my throat. A million malicious thoughts spring to life in my mind. Unforgivable phrases, below-the-belt comments. But instead of using my words, I arch my back against his groin, releasing a soft moan.
It can’t be healthy how quick his erection presses against my backside.
He seems just as surprised and frozen with shock as I do. And to further dig into the roots of his humiliation, I roll my hips back again, rubbing up his bare shaft. I briefly pause at the length as it keeps going for longer than I was expecting.
Niklaus coils his arms around me tighter, like a snake preparing to strangle its victim. His fingers dig into the side of my waist, the soft space on the underside of my breast. The growl that rumbles up his chest, into the back of my head is embedded with sexual frustration.
With one quick jolt, he pulses that long erection against my ass. Pleasure tingles along my inner walls, causing me to clench and lose my breath. My mind shifts from vindictive to desperately wanting to chase that crazed feeling again.
“Fuck,” he hisses against my neck.
What am I doing? Stop. You’re supposed to tease, then blue balls the shit out of him!
“Spitfire,” Niklaus grunts in my ear, rolling his hips into me again.
I moan despite him using the name I hate.
Causing me to choke on surprise, his cold hand latches onto my throat, tugging the side of my face in the direction of his mouth. “You think you’re special because I got hard? We’re in the middle of the frozen wilderness. Any hole would do.”
My elbow flies into his rib cage before I have a chance to let the flood of anger pass through my system. “Die then.”
I shimmy away from the warmth of his body, exposing my body to the deadly winter winds.
“What the hell are you doing?!”
“Isn’t it obvious? I’d rather freeze to death than cuddle up next to a fucking sociopath.”
We lie in shivering, haunting silence. And it dawns on me that I will in fact die of stubbornness. But Niklaus isn’t stopping me. He’s bearing the biting slice of the icy winds alone, without another terrible comment, without even attempting to pull me back in for the sake of heat.
He will also die of stubbornness.
I pull my cloak over my shoulders with stiff, aching fingers and pray for a quick death.
I can hear his shallow breaths behind me, in and out, quick, pained.
I should have an instinct to help him, to care for him.
We both should, considering we grew up together. Considering we are practically family.
But I’ve never hated anyone more in my life.
“I’m glad your father is nothing more than a piece of limp meat.”
“Patient Thirteen was incapable of real love. Especially not for you.”
I tighten my grip around my own quivering frame, as if I’m slowly frosting over. My fingers, too stiff to uncurl, dig into the backs of my arms. The wind hisses along the floor, stinging my exposed skin until I’m numb and made of painful marble.
I glance out at the white curtain of snow whirling in a constant churn at the entrance, punching hard gusts into the cavern.
I’m going to die here.
My body already feels like a corpse.
Forgotten.
Alone.
Empty.
Numb.
The cold from outside settles into my heart. And I tremble so forcefully, my joints mold into an unbreakable position. Elbows hardly able to bend. Knees like metal grinding against each other.
I always thought being hot was the worst feeling. Sweating. Standing under a scalding sun. But it’s not. Not even close. Lying under a cave ceiling, creaking under the weight of hardening ice is much worse.
My brain starts to shut down in choppy increments.
Stay awake.
My eyes flutter like a candle flittering against someone trying to blow it out.
I look at the skin on my arms, it’s pale-bluish color. The agonizing pulses of cold air rolling over them.
Please, come find me, Mom. I won’t make it much longer.
“Spitfire,” Niklaus utters, gripping my elbow.
I jerk away.
But there’s an urgency in his touch. A pause of the shrill, whistling winds that permeate the cave opening. And his spine goes taut behind me, sitting up as he tries to get me to follow his gaze.
Coming from the mouth of the cave, an animal snarls, ripping through the void of shrieking winds and falling snow.
I flinch as much as my numb neck and limbs will allow and peel open my watering eyes to get a better look.
White wolves. Seven of them. A full pack. And they aren’t small either. Not as big as DaiSzek, but still, quite large.
“Come—here,” he stammers once more.
I can’t find it in my frozen brain to argue.
Freezing to death is one thing. But being mauled by hungry wolves is another.
I shimmy back against his bare skin, now lacking any body heat he had before.
We’re cold flesh pressed against cold flesh, watching the pack with watering eyes as we wait for their next move.
Foggy air chuffs from their snouts.
They seem to linger in place, unfazed by the shooting squalls of flurries beating against their heavy coats of fur.
Another minute passes.
“Could—they be—”
“From—Stormsage?” Niklaus finishes.
As they approach, they don’t stalk forward with lowered necks and predatory eyes.
Their ears press back, and their tails starts to wag back and forth.
A whooshing breath of relief leaves my tightening lungs as they lie down around us, snuggling against our bodies to create a warm cocoon of white fur and warm bodies.
“W-what aretheyd-doing?” I ask.
“Saving us.”