22 #2
But Koda is sick, wracked with shivers from the cool air, leaning on the shaft as a crutch. It’s the only thing keeping him upright. When he tries to stand on his own and raise the weapon toward the boar, he almost topples.
Hazi and Elias reach Koda just before the boar does, jabbing their spears at its dripping snout. Its hackles raise as it squeals, lunging at them and retreating only to circle back.
I creep up behind the beast and stab at it, but this time I miss. By a lot. The hog runs away, but the bastard will be back.
“Veronia, we have a weapon you can use.” Hazi waves for her to jump down, but she shakes her head, deciding to stay on the branch where she’s safe.
“Your champion is goddess of the hunt. Not the goddess of hiding in trees!” I shout. “Pathetic wretch.”
Let the mortals watching her paint that on her flags.
Breathy snorts come from the mist. First to my left. Then to my right. Then they seem to come from behind.
“I don’t like this,” Elias grits, turning in a circle, chasing the threat we hear but can’t see.
“Help,” Koda weakly cries, trying to walk on the thick moss.
August drops his makeshift spear and scoops Koda into his arms, carrying our friend to Veronia’s tree. “Hold onto him. Keep him safe.”
She scoots back so August can lift Koda up to the branch, but she doesn’t try to help pull him up. The branch is broad enough that if Koda keeps his balance and his back to the trunk, he won’t fall off.
“If you abandon or harm him, I swear to the gods, Veronia…” Hazi threatens the girl I thought was his ally, feigning a cut to the throat.
She seems as shocked as I am, blinking at his warning. Her gaze flicks to me like I’m somehow to blame for his harshness.
I take the golden spear when Hazi extends it and pass it to August.
“No, you should keep it,” Aymes insists.
I shake my head and show him my obsidian spear. “I’m good. I’ve already stabbed it with this.”
We circle up the way we did when we ran out to face Daedalus, this time with Hazi next to me. I glance over at him. I don’t understand why he’s suddenly helping us or why he threatened his ally for mine.
“Who is that?” Elias squints, looking ahead and raising his sharpened branch.
An unchampioned woman with shoulder-length, midnight hair limps toward us from out of the mist.
“Look at her mouth,” Hazi warns.
Blood-tinged froth thickens in the corners.
“You have to help me,” she weakly begs. Foam spittle flies with every word. “Don’t leave me here.”
“Will the gods heal her?” Elias asks.
“Even Susanoo wouldn’t save Akira yesterday, and this woman isn’t championed,” Hazi bites. “What god would bother?”
She hobbles closer. The fog swirls, revealing more of her form. The hem of her rolled pant leg sags heavily with blood that pours from a deep puncture wound on the outside of her calf. The woman trips, falling in a tangle of root and moss. She tries to stand back up and can’t.
Hazi’s words about boars and teeth keep repeating in my mind.
I start toward her.
Hazi holds his spear out to block my path. “No. You can’t risk it.”
A frantic male yell comes from deeper within the forest, followed by feral squeals. Then anguished screams.
Elias curses. “It got someone else.”
Helpless, we listen to the man’s repeated cries for help.
“Is anyone here?” Niall.
I can’t see him through the fog.
“Get to a tree!” Hazi shouts.
“What?” Niall asks. “Why?”
“Run toward my voice!” I yell.
If he’s running, I can’t tell.
“Run to me, Niall!” I scream.
“I am!” he grumps, but now I hear his steps in the cadence of his voice.
Snorting. A tight squeal.
“What is that?” he shrills. Closer. “Where are you?”
A guttural shriek, closer to him.
“Here! I’m right here! Here, Niall!” I keep yelling so he’ll find us.
Separating from our cluster, August, Elias, Hazi, and I move in place to strike the wild beast from both sides.
When Niall bursts through the trees with the boar on his heels, the four of us lunge. August drives the broad spearhead through its side and into the ground with a gritty roar.
The creature tries to free itself. Squealing and grunting. Twisting and thrashing. Its hooves peel the moss from the forest floor, flinging it all around. The earth under it scorches and chars.
Seconds stretch, and finally, the boar’s strength leaches away until it can only twitch. Its wild eyes fix in one spot.
Everyone watches, panting, as August jerks the spear out of its body. His relieved eyes meet mine.
My shoulders relax. I take a deep breath, thinking it’s over and that we just need to find the portal now.
But then we hear Veronia scream. “Help! Help us! Hazi! Help us, please!”
We run. An unchampioned man who’s tasted age but hasn’t shed all the strength of his youth staggers toward their tree. He’s infected, his inner thigh badly mangled. Blood stripes his calf and streaks his shirt where he dragged his hands over the white. He reaches out for Koda.
Veronia shrieks and tries to kick his hand away, but she can’t fight him off and hold Koda in the tree.
Hazi takes off in a sprint, and when he’s close, he uses his spear like a bat, cracking the man in the temple. The infected man collapses with a groan.
Veronia squeezes Koda a little tighter as Hazi pushes the man’s shoulder back with the blunt end of his spear. “This is the first man I told you about,” he tells me. Foam spills from the man’s purplish lips. “Whatever’s happening to them is getting worse. Look at his eyes.”
The veins beneath them are dark and webbed.
Koda lets out a groan, his head lolling forward. The tiny tin of tea sits heavy on my thigh. “We have to get him out of here.”
“We don’t know who or what else is in this mist. We don’t even know where the portal is!” Veronia panics.
“Well it’s certainly not here!” Hazi snaps. “We have to move before the gods insist upon it.”
Aymes hands the golden spear to me and takes Koda into his arms just as we hear a loud, breathy snuffle behind us. We all turn as the boar August killed begins to wriggle.
“There’s no way,” Niall breathes. “It was dead.”
I place the golden spear in Niall’s hand. “Go with August and Koda. Guard them.”
Elias narrows his eyes at Veronia. “You want to reach the portal? Then help.” He tosses the woman a sharpened branch before hurrying after Niall and August.