“Dorie!” comes a mighty yell behind me. There’s the splashing of someone running through the surf. Gasping and coughing, I don’t dare to move. But the dactyl is the size of an airplane, and even Kenz’ox can’t have any hope of defeating it.
Then he’s there, grabbing me and pushing me behind him while he lifts his huge sword just in time to meet the dactyl’s butcher-knife talons.
The monster screeches again, this time in fury and frustration. The wind from its huge wings nearly blows me off my feet as it passes right overhead.
Kenz’ox thrusts something hard into my hand. “Your weapon!”
I clench the spear, but I have no idea what to do with it. The dactyl circles higher, looking like it’s given up.
Just as I’m about to breathe again, it suddenly dives straight for us, blocking out the sun again and making an uglywhoosh. It’s diving, razor-sharp beak first, and I find myself idly wondering,are beaks supposed to have that many teeth?
Kenz’ox pulls his sword back. “Strike its underside as it passes!”
He swings at the monster and hits the immense beak. I don’t know what to do except jab the spear into the air, hoping it hits something that’s not Kenz’ox.
A terrible judder goes through me, and the spear is knocked out of my hands. The blunt end hits the sand, and the dactyl is all over us in a chaos of talons, wings, thick skin, and a furious crash of water.
Kenz’ox throws himself at me and pushes me under, then, to my horror, stays on top of me.
I panic again, kicking and punching to get up—I have to breathe!
The caveman’s weight comes off me, and he drags me fast towards the shore while the dactyl screeches and kicks andbeats its wings furiously, sending immense amounts of seawater cascading all over us, edged with pink foam.
On the sand, we stop and turn. The dactyl is definitely in serious trouble. It can’t get airborne, and the water has taken on a reddish tinge.
I gasp and grab Kenz’ox’s forearm. A dark blob is making its way in from the ocean, half of it above the water. It’s a splotchy brown and gray, and I’m sure I can see big eyes on stalks.
The dactyl screeches again, and this time I definitely detect fear in it.
The tip of a tentacle snakes out of the water next to the dactyl, then another. They seem to attach themselves to the dactyl, and the blob starts moving back to the ocean again, dragging the dactyl along behind it.
The dactyl goes wild, screeching wildly and churning the sea up, so we lose sight of it behind the masses of water and foam.
The blob dives beneath the surface, pulling the dactyl under. There’s a final furious screech before the long, terrible beak is gone, and the beach is all peaceful again.
I’m still breathing hard. “I lost my spear,” is all I can manage.
“We must get you another one,” Kenz’ox rumbles. “You are a master of that weapon.”
“No, I just…” I don’t know what to say.
“I missed,” the caveman says calmly. “I only hit the hard beak, making no impression on the irox. But you struck your spear right at the root of its wing. It went deep, nearly killing it right there. I’ve never seen such perfect use of a spear! And using theirox’s own weight to push the spear deeper. Truly, alien women are fearsome in combat.”
I glance up at him to see if he’s being sarcastic. “What happen was—oh! You’re injured!”
He looks down on his chest, where there are three long cuts from one shoulder and almost all the way across to the other side. Dark red blood is dripping down to his sensational abs. “I thought something stung. It got me with one full talon. Three claws.” He looks down on me. “And you? Ah, no wounds. It would be impossible to hide.”
Only then do I remember that I’m naked. “Oh. Wait.”
I locate my jumpsuit on the sand and walk over to get it, some primal instinct forcing me to swing my hips more than I normally would. But it’s fine—if he likes what he sees, then he absolutely deserves that as a reward for risking his life to save me from a dino that absolutely was trying to kill us both.
The adrenaline is still coursing through my veins, but the elation of having survived is making me susceptible for some serious heat down below.
I put my jumpsuit back on, noting that the front of Kenz’ox’s leather loincloth has developed a bulge that’s casting a long shadow in the setting sun.
“We go home,” I tell him. “Need to look at your wound.”
He replaces his sword in his belt. “It’s not deep. But all the blood is annoying.”
