“I have excellent night vision.” Though he could just barely make out shapes in this peculiar inky blackness. “The intel on the flash drive may be invaluable. Guard it well.”
From somewhere in the dark depths of the twisting passage ahead, a low, menacing growl rumbled.
Delaney lurched to a dead halt. “Rowan?” she whispered. “Please tell me that was your stomach.”
He sniffed the air. Reached out with his Power. If there were any living creature in this tunnel, he should be able to smell it. Sense it. “Eh, another aversion spell.”
A second growl echoed closer to them, raising the hair on the back of his neck. One heavy footstep vibrated the rocks beneath their feet, then another.
Delaney’s gulp was audible. “That’s no illusion!”
“Shite!”
He yanked her around in front of him and shoved her back toward the cellar.
“Run!”
Chapter 13
Rowan pushed Delaney ahead of him as the thundering footsteps sped up and dirt rained from the cave’s roof. “Faster!”
He flung open the massive steel panel with his Power, raced through behind her, then slammed it, metaphysically jamming it. He towed Delaney up the stairs into the kitchen, also barring that door behind them.
They’d reached the rear kitchen exit when the steel panel in the basement below exploded off its hinges and crashed inward, shaking the entire house.
“What’s after us?” she panted.
Something far too big. Too powerful. “Not bloody well sticking around to find out.” Grabbing her hand again, he pulled her outside and sprinted through the rift in the wards.
He javelined paralyzing spells and Power bolts behind them while zigzagging through the woods. Their pursuer didn’t even slow. Rowan’s expectation the thick forest would provide cover died as the earth trembled, and centuries-old evergreens cracked like matchsticks in their pursuer’s wake. He could only hope his and Archer’s wards would block it.
If they could reach the perimeter.
They were both using every molecule of combined Power to flee at top speed. Yet whatever was chasing them kept gaining.
Delaney’s breath wheezed. “Can’t. Outrun it. Go. Without me.”
“Know the saying, you don’t have to outrun
it
…you just have to outrun
me?”
She gasped. “Don’t
even—”
“You think I would sacrifice
you,
then?” He yanked her along. “Shut it. And
move.”
Finally, the cabin’s boundary wards glowed through the trees, Archer’s white-hot spikes crisscrossed by Rowan’s silver and green razors.
They stumbled across, with him nearly dragging Delaney.
Holding her sides, she dropped to her knees. “Are. We. Safe?”
He whipped out his sword. Spun to face whatever was about to erupt through the underbrush. “If an Enforcer’s wards interlaced with a Guardian’s can’t stop it…nothing will.”
“You. Never…” She staggered to her feet and drew her sword, took a defensive stance at his side. “Answer. A damned question. Straight.”
Admiration edged the adrenaline zinging through him. He prayed he’d taught the lass to fight with as much skill as she had courage.
The trees ripped apart…and a snarling monster charged out.
Muddy yellow-brown with a sinewy, hairless body thrice the size of a lion, a wolf-like head, and leathery wings. Hooked talons chewed up the dirt as the creature rushed the wards, long, lethal fangs bared.
It hit the barrier hard. The wards vibrated and lightning sizzled through the huge body, knocking it back. It slithered to its feet and paced, staring at them from furious orange eyes.
“Wh-what is that?” Delaney quavered. But she stood stalwart and ready beside him.
Rowan raised his blade again as the monster gathered for another charge. The jolt should’ve
killed
it. And why couldn’t he sense anything? “I haven’t a sodding clue. It looks like some sort of mutated gryphon.”
“Marvelous.” She winced when the wards trembled beneath the beast’s second assault. “It’s normal for the wards to rattle like that, right?”
“Nay.”
“Way to be reassuring, Enforcer. What now?”
He watched the thing outside scratch and bite at the barricade, undeterred by the lethal supernatural electricity. “I warned there’d come a time when you must obey me without question.”
She flashed him a wary look. “I’m going to hate this, aren’t I?”
Rowan lowered his voice, on the off chance the creature was sentient. “Your car is parked within the warded perimeter. Get in and floor it. Head for the city. Supernatural creatures usually won’t attack around mortals—even they fear Discord. Don’t look back, and no matter what happens,
don’t stop.”
“I’m supposed to run away? While you’ll be…doing what?”
“Buying you a head start. Then I’ll materialize inside the car.”
Her blue eyes flared.
“Hell
to the no. I’m
not
abandoning you to face Godzilla alone. Both of us together are—”
“The longer we stand here nattering, the less
both
our chances of survival.”
Growling, the beast leapt again, violently shaking the wards. Rowan speared a hard thrust of Power into his command.
“Go.”
The force sent Delaney reeling backward before she regained her balance. She skewered him with fury. “I owe you one for that.”
“Put it on my tab. Now book your sweet arse outta here!”
She reluctantly sprinted into the cabin. While he waited for her to grab her keys and hit the road, he assessed his foe. Observing how it moved, he watched for weaknesses. Saw none.
The GTO rumbled to life in the driveway behind the cabin. The beast’s head swung to follow the sound. It took a step in that direction. Another.
Rowan burst through the wards, shouting his war cry. He slashed the thing’s foreleg with his sword, drew a gush of orange blood. The snarling monster rounded on him…the wound instantly starting to heal.
No way in Hades.
An Enforcer’s weapon was designed to damage
all
evil.
Rowan deflected a talon inches from his face and pivoted, flanking his opponent. He severed the Achilles tendon on the back right leg, drawing more blood, and a shriek. That wound healed, too.
Feck,
wasn’t
this
gonna be fun?
He might have to settle for distracting his foe until Delaney escaped, then follow. He didn’t retreat easily or often, but he had bigger enemies to vanquish.
Rowan dematerialized into mist. Re-forming on the opposite side, he rammed his blade between the creature’s ribs, aiming for a heart-blow. It howled and knocked him flat with a wing-sweep. Talons speared his sword arm, scalding his flesh with acidic venom. His bicep convulsed and his weapon dropped to the ground.
Fangs snapped so close to his jugular he smelled fetid breath as he rolled, snatching up his sword with his left hand. Iced blade swinging, he clambered to his feet, cutting off a pointed ear along with a chunk of wolfish snout. “Heal
that,
wanker.”
The thing threw its head back in an outraged roar. Rowan dodged between the massive front feet, swung at its exposed neck. Orange blood sprayed. It leapt back, burning claws raking his thigh.
A blitz of pain dropped him to his knees. The thing charged, and he dematerialized just in time. But the poison weakened his Powers, and Rowan couldn’t hold his cloaked form. He couldn’t stop himself from solidifying…directly in front of the creature.
His sword arced in a strike, a millisecond too slow. Razored talons ripped open his entire left side from shoulder to hip.
Agony exploded through him as he crumpled. Black spots floated in his vision. He bore down. A dirt nap now would be permanent. He managed to roll away from the gnashing teeth. Barely.
Strength leached out of him along with his blood soaking the ground. The metallic tang of it filled his mouth, choking him. He couldn’t dematerialize.
A gigantic paw batted, toyed with him. He rolled a second time. A third. Hoisted himself to his hands and knees. Struggled to his feet.
He’d be bloody well damned if he’d die on his back in the mud.
Panting, lurching with pain, Rowan faced the monster. It snorted, triumph gleaming in its orange orbs. “Aye,” Rowan said. “Come on then, you sodding bastard. We’ll go together.”
He lifted his sword, held the blade steady in spite of the torment whipping his body.
Never forsake.
The creature charged.
Roaring filled his ears. Hot wind slapped his face. Then Delaney’s GTO zoomed inches in front of him and smashed into the beast, sent it flying. The car accelerated and bulldozed the mammoth body, the bumper repeatedly punching it toward the cliff’s edge. Then over.
Rowan lost a few moments of time. When he opened his eyes, he was prone on the grass, Delaney’s face hovering above him.
“Oh, my God! Rowan!”
She swallowed hard. “Okay. You’re gonna be okay—”
That thing’s. Not. Dead.
His essence was nearly spent, his message faint.
I am. Get. Away—”
“Shut it.” She wrangled him to a standing position. He staggered, and she propped him against her slight body. “And hustle your
sweet arse
into the car!”
Shoving, boosting him with her Power, she wrestled him into the front seat. She yanked off her sweatshirt jacket and packed the wadded cloth against his torn abdomen. “Hold this tight.” She buckled his seatbelt, then ran around and jumped into the driver’s seat. “The nearest hospital is—”
Take me. Sea. Only. Chance.
“You got it.” Tires churning sod, she sped past the cabin. “There’s direct beach access for vehicles near the lighthouse. Don’t you give up on me, Braveheart. I’d hate to have to tell Archer you wimped out, and have a Guardian finish my training.”
He smiled through the pain.
Saints forbid.
The car raced along the winding back roads. “Stay awake, MacLachlan. Talk to me.”
Not. Terribly. Conversational.
“Oh, come on. I’m sure as a big, bad Enforcer, you’ve had worse, yeah?”
Sure,
he lied.
“There, see? Aren’t you supposed to be all, ‘buck up, chap, it’s just a flesh wound…keep a stiff upper lip and all that rot?’”
You’ve mistaken. Me for. James Bond.
“So, you’re admitting an English dude is tougher? I think William Wallace just rolled over in his grave.”
Shite,
it hurt to laugh, but damned if he didn’t.
You took. Big chance. Back there.
“I threw Power around the car. No damage to my baby, lots to Godzilla.” Anxiety tightened her lovely features. “I flipped a U-turn the second I sensed you got hurt. I should never have left.”
Should’ve kept. Away.
He battled to stay conscious as the automobile bumped and jarred every painful kilometer down a gravel path. It veered through a narrow opening in the cliffs surrounding the lighthouse. Oblivion beckoned.
“Open your eyes,” Delaney demanded. “Stay alert.”
He didn’t know if she realized she was doing it, but her Power blanketed him, lent him energy. Rowan forced his heavy eyelids up.
The GTO stopped on the beach in a secluded cove surrounded on three sides by towering rocks. Delaney whipped his door open. Her arms wrapped around him. “Don’t you dare die on me.” Her whisper warmed his ear. “I need you, Rowan MacLachlan.”
Her confession gave him more strength than her Power.
He tried to make his legs work, but she pretty much had to drag him to the surf. The instant his body dropped into the waves, the ocean knew what he needed. Seawater boiled furiously around them in a heated frenzy.
Rowan clenched his jaw against a scream as hot salt water surged into his torn flesh.
Delaney scooted beneath him, cradling his head in her lap. “It’s all right if you need to yell. Or cry. There’s nobody around.”
Chieftains. Don’t cry. Haven’t cried. Since I was. Six.
Her worried, compassionate face was the last thing he saw before darkness claimed him.
* * *
Rowan drifted in and out of awareness. The only constant was wrenching agony…and Delaney.
Each time he surfaced still bathed in warm seawater, she was there. Holding him. Forcing him to drink from a bottle of fresh water. To chew bites of a protein bar. She encouraged and bullied him.
She refused to let him go.
He fought the poison and the pain, for her as well as himself. She’d come after him and faced down a monster.
If he lost this battle, she’d be vulnerable to much worse.
Finally, Delaney’s stifled sobs shocked him fully conscious. He lay in warm, eddying waves, smooth sand hollowed beneath him. His head rested in her lap, her body supporting him from behind, her face buried in the curve of his shoulder. She was rocking him.
Her hot tears trickled down his neck to mingle with the sea.
Listen to me, Rowan. Fight! Beat this! I can’t lose you, too.
He shakily reached up. Touched soft copper tendrils that curtained his face.
She jumped. “You’re awake!”
“Aye,” he croaked. He blinked at the gray-clad sky. “How long…?”
Delaney dashed her hand across tear-stained cheeks while he pretended not to notice. “Over thirty-seven hours.”
Beast? Did it revive—
“And attack again? Yeah. But you’d warded this area in with the cabin’s perimeter, and the protection seems stronger here. Native American legend says this is sacred ground, maybe that makes a difference. After Godzilla fried his fugly face about two hundred times, he finally limped off.” She cupped his jaw. “How do you feel?”
He should be a hundred percent after so many hours in the ocean. Especially on sacred ground. But his wounds still throbbed viciously…and he couldn’t raise enough Power to heal.
Bollocks,
he couldn’t even sit up. Lifting his chin to assess his wounds sapped every scrap of energy. Delaney had removed his boots, socks, and shredded sweater and left him in just jeans. Raw, angry scars branded his bare torso and streaked across his left thigh through the torn denim.
Delaney carefully extricated herself, tucking her folded sweatshirt jacket beneath his head for a pillow. Grabbing a water bottle, she knelt and supported his head while he gulped the cool liquid.
“Where’d you get drinking water?”
“I regularly travel the mountain passes between Portland and the cabin. Since cell service is so spotty, I stow emergency supplies and spare clothes in my trunk.” She laid him down, then tossed the empty bottle beside a crackling driftwood fire above the waterline. “I’ve kept the fire going for light, although I didn’t need the warmth. The ocean has stayed warm, and there’s an ethereal shield all around us. I’ve been sitting in the ocean with you, but it hasn’t waterlogged me.
“Water is my element. It maintains a symbiotic relationship with my living essence. ‘Tis the sea taking care of its own.”