Chapter Two
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PLUNGING DEEPLY INTO salt water, Urzra woke from the Void at the moment of impact. He tucked his arms against his body and held his breath. Kicking his legs, he rose to the surface and gasped for air. “This definitely isn’t Egypt,” the warrior said, peering around as he treaded water.
He could see a small island to his left and began swimming towards it.
Information began to filter through to him and he knew the island was too dark.
There should have been at least a few lights shining.
The sense that something wasn’t right began to rise inside him.
Urzra could detect someone who wasn’t human and they were dead ahead.
“I don’t think that’s one of my brothers,” he murmured, then felt something brush against him.
The creature turned and struck before he could call on his sword.
Sharp teeth bit into his right thigh and he roared in agony.
The shark dragged him down as he conjured his weapon.
He shoved the blade into the shark’s eye and it let him go.
Blood poured from the deep wounds and he knew it would draw other predators straight to him.
Urzra surfaced, sword vanishing again and began swimming as fast as he could towards land.
It wasn’t easy swimming with only one leg while the other one trailed behind him uselessly.
He was already beginning to feel dizzy from blood loss.
The shark must have bitten through an artery.
If he didn’t stop the bleeding soon, he would end up straight back in the Void before he’d even encountered a Soldier of Chaos.
Something nipped at his injured leg and he swam faster. He could sense the being moving closer, but he was too close to panic to focus on whether they were a friend or a foe.
He was too far from land and Urzra knew he wasn’t going to make it.
The sharks were getting closer, vying to be the first to take a chunk out of him.
He glanced up to judge how much further he had to go and saw a small boat heading for him.
The motor chugged loudly as the vessel zoomed in his direction.
Urzra raised his hand and waved, then teeth clamped around his foot and tugged him downward.
The knight conjured up his sword again and sliced at the sharks.
He was surrounded by them and couldn’t see clearly, thanks to his own blood muddying the water.
More blood was added to the mix as he desperately fought off the frenzied sharks.
Strength waning, he surfaced long enough to take another breath. The boat was only yards away now. Exhausted from the fall, blood loss and his battle, Urzra’s hope of rescue wilted when he sensed what sort of creature was captaining the boat.
“It’s a cambion,” he croaked, wondering why Fate had chosen to forsake him. Teeth closed around his wounded leg again and he braced himself for death. Then a sense of calm flowed over him like a heavy blanket. The sharks stilled and the one that had been about to bite his leg off let go of him.
Urzra didn’t have the strength to keep treading water. His sword slipped from his grasp and disappeared. He stared defiantly at the cambion as she reached him. Instead of grinning in malicious triumph, she leaned over and held out her hand. “Grab my hand!” she urged him in a frantic tone.
This had to be a trick, but he was so entranced with her beauty that he reached upwards. Her tiny fingers grasped hold of him and dragged him up. He grabbed hold of the edge of the boat with his other hand.
“Are you naked?” she asked incredulously as she tried to haul him into the vessel.
“Yes,” he said, voice raspy from swallowing seawater.
“Can you get your leg over the side?” she asked. “I don’t have anything to hold onto to lift you up with.”
“Do you have any rope?” he asked, shivering in shock from the vicious attack.
She left him clinging to the side and returned a moment later. “Here,” she said and held out an ancient, smelly length of rope.
Urzra tied the rope around his waist with one hand, forming a clumsy knot he hoped would hold. “Pull me up, female,” he requested. “I’m about to pass out,” he said, voice slurring.
His vision darkened and he was only vaguely aware of the cambion heaving him into the boat.
“Oh, my God! Your leg!” she said in horror. She untied the rope from his waist, then tied it around his thigh tightly enough to cut off the flow of blood. “How the hell can you possibly be hard right now?” she muttered.
Urzra roused long enough to look down at his shaft. Sure enough, it was standing at attention. “Beautiful,” he said, shaking even harder.
“What’s beautiful?” she asked, getting the motor started again.
“You are,” he said. She gave him a startled look, then he passed out.
Urzra wasn’t sure how long he was out for, but his hair was still damp when he woke up.
He was lying on a couch in a house. His leg had been bandaged, but it had almost healed by now.
A light blanket covered his nakedness. Deep relief that he was still alive was mixed with utter confusion.
“Did I lose my mind, or did a cambion just save my life?” he murmured.
He could sense the female somewhere nearby and examined the room.
He was in a living room with scant furniture.
A combined dining room and kitchen were to the right.
A hallway was to the left. He assumed the bedrooms and bathroom were in that direction.
The female was at the far end of the hallway.
He couldn’t hear any noise and figured she was asleep.
“Her soul is gray,” the warrior realized in shock.
“How is that possible?” It seemed Fate hadn’t abandoned him after all.
Instead, she’d sent him to this unknown location where he would sense and investigate a lone cambion.
Still too exhausted to work this puzzle out, Urzra hoped he would be able to figure it out in the morning.
He closed his eyes and fell asleep again.
Birds woke him at dawn. He got up and checked his leg.
His wounds had healed without a trace. The knight wrapped the blanket around his waist, glad he had something to cover himself with.
Unlike most of his brothers, he quite enjoyed humans and found them to be interesting.
This cambion wasn’t like the others of her kind.
She was an anomaly and seemed to have passed for a normal person so far.
If humans knew what she was, she would have been killed or imprisoned by now.
Moving as silently as he could on the creaky floorboards, he inspected the house.
It was obvious she lived here alone. There were no signs that a male shared her home.
There were only feminine products in the small bathroom.
Her pantry was loaded with preserved vegetables.
They seemed to be homemade, since the jars didn’t have any labels on them.
A quick search of the area near the house showed him where the vegetables had come from.
“She’s self-sufficient,” Urzra said thoughtfully as he stared at the garden.
He scanned the area and saw a few houses scattered in the distance.
The only sounds were birds, insects and the distant waves from the ocean.
“Where is everyone?” he asked with a frown.
His mind told him vehicles should have been moving on the roads.
People made noise and he couldn’t detect anything other than nature at play.
Heading back inside, he sat down on the couch to wait for the female to join him.