I turn back to the dark tunnel.
The scent is still there. The “fresh lifeblood.”
But now I know what it is.
It is not blood.
It is a mimic. A lure.
Something is growing in the dark. Something that smells like life but tastes like death.
And it is feeding on the heat.
I look at the red smear on my claws. It tingles. Burns slightly.
“Poison,” I project. “Alive.”
My gaze shifts back to Mih-kay-lah.
“We go back,” I project again out of habit. I force my throat to move instead. “We tell…Kol. The water…not sick.”
Her throat moves, shoulders still heaving from my desperate run.
I check the basket still attached to my hip, then the gourd she clutches in her grip. She managed to snag a sample of the red ooze even while falling.
Stubborn female.
Brave female.
Myfemale.
“Come,” I say, offering my claw.
She takes it. Her fingers lace through mine.
Chapter 11
SPOON ME ONCE, SHAME ON YOU. SPOON ME TWICE...
MIKAELA
We run until the air stops tasting like copper and rot.
We run until the deep, bone-shaking rumble of the mountain fades into a distant, sullen vibration beneath our feet, and the only sound left is the harsh, tearing raggedness of my own breathing.
When Sarven finally slows, skidding to a halt in a wider section of the tunnel, I don’t just stop. I crumple.
I slide down the rough stone wall until I’m sitting on the floor, legs splayed, head tipped back against the rock, trying to remember how lungs work.
“Okay,” I wheeze, pressing a hand to the stitch in my side. “Okay. We’re alive. That’s… good.”
The adrenaline crash hits me hard. It sweeps through my system, taking all the energy with it and leaving behind acold, shaking void. My hands start to tremble with violent, uncontrollable tremors that rattle the bones in my wrists. The fever I’ve been ignoring thanks to the terror around us comes roaring back, making the sweat on my skin feel cold and clammy while my insides burn.
Sarven isn’t sitting.
He stalks the perimeter of our small safe-zone, glowing arm held high, red eyes scanning the darkness for cracks, for shifting rock, for the bleeding red slime. He looks like a golden tiger caged in the dark. Pacing. Agitated. And lethal.
“Safe,” he rumbles finally, though he doesn’t look relaxed. He looks ready.
