We halted. Even our labored panting quieted.
Remo pressed the spear back into my still shaking hand. “Can you make another net?”
Nodding erratically, I waited for the predator to show itself, not wanting to flay my palm and fingers on the prickly metal mesh. When two hulking beasts materialized in our line of sight at the very same time, my heart damn near exploded.
“Shit,” Remo hissed.
“I don’t think . . . I don’t think my net can snag both.”
“Just focus on the one coming up on your right side; I’ll get the other.” He widened his stance and raised his elbow, viscous crimson droplets of blood dribbling from the machete’s blade.
As though a cannon had detonated, both mammoth cats sprang at us, their golden stripes glittering over their bloated muscles and their tails flogging the air.
“NOW!” Remo yelled.
I squeezed the spear, fashioning my barbed wire net, and hurled it over the cat. The animal howled as its front paws got tangled, which brought its huge body down right at Giya’s feet. Squeaking, she hopped back. Unlike yesterdays’tigri, this one chewed through the wire, ripping it with its fangs. Muzzle and front legs wet with blood, it squirmed backward, managing to disentangle itself, licked its muzzle, then narrowed its gleaming eyes on us.
Crap. Crap. Crap. I needed to recall my dust and transform it into a weapon before it could chomp on one of us. “Giya, get behind me.”
“Why? What are you thinking?”
“Just get back, please,” I begged her.
She took a measly step back. I touched the part of the barbed wire net farthest from the tiger and liquefied it, molding it into a new weapon—a five-headed spear. Five, because accuracy wasn’t my forte.
The second the net vanished, thetigri’s tail flicked up, its spine arched, and its haunches lowered. I lunged before it could become airborne, shoving my spear between its peaked ears. All five of my blades went in, and blood sloshed out in wet streams that spiraled over the handle of my spear, streaming down over my hand and wrist. When the hot, tinny scent hit my nose, I gagged.
“Amara!” Giya yelled, gesturing to Remo.
I gasped. The back of his T-shirt was shredded and red—four parallel grooves flapped while the rest of the fabric was glued to his skin.
Thetigrilimped back before growling and rearing onto its hind paws. I scaled the beast I’d killed and flung myself, spear first, at Remo’s foe. I shut my eyes right before impact, but felt the blades sink into hide, heard the squelch of taut flesh, tasted the spray of hot blood on my face. Hands clamped around my ankles and dragged me back so fast the grains of sand rug-burned my chin. Since I was still gripping my weapon, the spear slipped wetly out of the beast’s belly right before disintegrating and ribboning back into my palm. I tucked my arms in just as the ginormous feline collapsed, a hairsbreadth away from my head.
Heart rattling, I thought:Three down, three down, three down.
When I rolled onto my back, Remo crawled up my body, his palms cupping my cheeks. “Trifecta, are you okay?” His voice was as shrill with nerves as his gaze, which whipped over me, seeking wounds.
I inhaled deeply and nodded. Remo gently grabbed my hands and tugged me into a sitting position. A streak of blood on his temple reminded me of his lacerated back. “Turn. Let me see your back.”
“My back’s fine.”
“It didn’t look fine.”
Inhuman yelps followed by human shouts had both our attention snapping to a spot beyond Remo’s shoulder. When the ground shook, I inferred that another beast had fallen.
Remo stood, heaving me up. And then he hugged me to him, and for a brief moment, the gore and jungle faded away. “Fuck, you saved my life.”
Not really. I’d saved him from another mud-bath.
I nestled my face against his collarbone, feeling his heart kick against my cheek. It matched the tempo of the one presently lodged inside my throat.
Suddenly, I pressed away and my neck gyrated every which way. “Giya? Where did she go?”
He looked around, too. “I-I don’t know. I was watching you.” He rammed his hand through his wild red locks. “I’m sorry; I should’ve kept an eye on her.”
“We have to find her. I have to find her.”
He nodded just as an aloe thicket shivered.
