Bite: A Shifters of Theria Novel (36 page)

CHAPTER SIX

THE VALLEY OF THE DYING

They say you see a light when you’re dying. And all of your dead relatives are there waiting to give you warm hugs, and your childhood dog runs up and licks your face and everything is happy and perfect and there’s ice cream.

There’s no light, no dead grandparents, no Mr. Muffins—just cold, black silence—total silence, save for a voice, reminding you of all the things you didn’t accomplish, the experiences you never had, the opportunities you passed for short-term comforts. The voice of regret.

Regret had a face—a familiar face, a nameless face. The man from upstairs’ face. Why didn’t you just talk to him?

His warm hand slipped under my neck and he smiled. He gently kissed my lips, tickling my face with his stubbly chin. He came to save me—but how did he find me? How did he know where I was? He pulled a warm blanket over my body. “You’re okay,” he said.

“I’m alive?” I asked.

“Yes.” He nodded and smiled.

“Kiss me again,” I said.

“What?” he said.

“Kiss me. Please.”

He was silent. I didn’t understand—why wasn’t he responding? What did I say? I reached up and placed my hand on the side of his face and let it sink down, running my fingertips along his abs.

“Open your eyes,” he said.

A girl with long blonde hair stared down at me. I couldn’t tell if she was a child or an adult. Her green cargo jacket was far too big for her little body. Who was she?

“Can you see me?” she asked.

“Huh? Yeah,” I said. “Where am I?”

“You’re in the woods—about twenty miles from Ilium.”

Something squeezed my hand. It was her hand. Why was she squeezing my hand? I didn’t have to ask. “You were bitten by a wolf spider. A baby wolf spider, by the looks of it,” she said. “They’re everywhere out here. Pretty dumb place to go for a hike, if you ask me,” the girl said. She pulled away her hand to check my wound. Between our hands was a small bundle of thin, scraggly roots. The swelling of the spider bite had gone down. “It’s meadow lily root. It can neutralize venom—temporarily, anyway,” she said. Her long hair rested on my chest as she reapplied the plant to my wound. “Long enough to get you out of here.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I make sure I know what can kill me before going out into the wilderness.” She didn’t look at me.

“Is that how you found me?” I asked.

She ignored the question. “Can you sit up?” she said.

I sat up and a bout of nausea fluttered through my body.

“Don’t throw up on me, please,” she said.

I looked towards the girl—towards my saviour. I didn’t know how she found me, but damn was I lucky she did.

“Thank you,” I said. “How can I repay you?”

“The kiss was plenty, thanks.”

My face quickly changed from green to red like a cheap Christmas ornament. “D—Did I—”

“You kissed me, yes. You told me that you wanted me so badly, and then you started to rub my belly. It was weird. Don’t do that again.”

“I—I’m sorry. I thought you—” I tried to say.

“I don’t care. It’s fine. You’re alive. You’re fine. Let’s get you back up to the surface. Think you can stand up?”

She helped me to my feet.

“C’mon,” she said, releasing my hand and turning away. She walked into a patch of fog. “If the sun goes down, we’ll be stuck down here.”

I struggled to keep up. The only source of light in the valley was the fog’s ethereal glow.

“How did you find me down here?” I asked.

“I could hear you screaming. You were having a fever dream. Fevers are common with spider bites. Watch your step.” As she said it, I tripped over a root and fell on my face. She pulled me up with impressive strength, considering she was so young and small. “I’m starting to think you just want to hold my hand.”

I couldn’t see past my knees through the low-lying fog. I didn’t know how the hell she could.

We came upon a tall, steep ledge. She stopped and helped me up.

As we emerged from the forest valley, the sun was creeping below the mountain horizon, one hundred different shades of pink and orange. The mountain range was a black silhouette. We stopped in a clearing.

“Jesus. What are you carrying around in that thing?” she asked, dropping my bag down.

“Um—a tent, a sleeping bag, water bottles, a bag of rice—”

“A bag of rice? Why the hell are you carrying around a bag of rice? Who carries around a bag of rice?”

“You can get a lot of meals out of a bag of rice. I saw it in a movie.”

The girl zipped open my bag and began to throw aside my things.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“You said you had a tent. I’m setting up the tent.” She tossed my bag of rice aside.

“Hey—I need that.”

“There’s no way I’m lugging a bag of rice for twelve hours, tomorrow.”

“What?” I asked.

“It’s a twelve hour hike back to town, and believe me when I say that you’re going to feel like you’ve got the worst hangover of your life in the morning—once that venom runs its course.” She pulled out the tent and started setting it up. “Gather up some wood for a fire—nothing damp. The dryer, the better.”

A sharp pain stung the back of my head as I stood up. I tried to muffle the throbbing pain with my hand.

“The headache might take a day or two to pass,” the girl said casually.

“How do you know so much about this stuff?” I asked again, hoping for a less sarcastic response.

She continued to set up the tent. “I was the leader of my girl scouts’ group,” she said.

“Are you from Ilium?”

“Yeah.”

“Aren’t your parents going to worry if you don’t come home tonight?” I asked.

She stopped and narrowed her eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know whether your parents were expecting you home or—”

“—I’m twenty-nine, for your information,” she snapped, still scolding me.

Twenty-nine? She looked fifteen. I didn’t know why she was so angry. If I had genes like that, I wouldn’t be upset. “What’s your name?”

“Maddy,” she said.

“When did you graduate?”

“Why?” Why? Why dodge that question?

“We were probably in some of the same classes in high school.” Ilium only had a single high school.

“The twelfth year,” she said sarcastically.

“Yeah, but what—”

“—I don’t remember.”

Another shooting pain surged through the back of my skull.

“What were you doing out here, anyway?” she asked.

“I was hiking,” I said.

“Hiking twelve hours from town?”

“Yeah, I guess I got carried away.”

“You weren’t hiking. Only an idiot would go hiking out here, twelve hours from town.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re carrying a bag of rice—everything in your bag screams ‘runaway.’”

My face became rosy again.

“So where were you running?” she asked me.

“I—I don’t know.”

“Just running away?”

“I guess so,” I said quietly, embarrassed. I didn’t want to tell her about my mid-life crisis, because I knew she would just roll her eyes. “What were you doing out here?” I asked again.

“I already told you.”

“You told me you were hiking—but you just said that only an idiot would go for a hike out here. So what were you actually doing?”

She was quiet. “I was just getting away. Sometimes I need to be alone. It’s complicated.” She stood up and went over to my bag. “What kind of food do you have in here? Or did you just bring rice?”

Before I could say, she was already peeling back the wrapper of an energy bar.

She threw me a water bottle. “Sit down and drink that.” I followed her command.

“I’ll be right back,” she said.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

She held up an empty bottle. “To fill this up. You need to drink at least three of these before you go to sleep so you don’t die.” Her tone was far too casual for my liking. “You’re in for a rough night.”

As if on cue, another sharp pain ached the back of my skull and reverberated down my spine. The nausea returned along with the light-headedness.