Next, Elijah threw out several balls of fire, lighting up trees.
“Burn the vines grabbing people,” Vincent yelled out.
Zander watched soldiers struggle, then watched the fire cut through the thick vines that were dragging them away. He could also see them bleeding out.
“I’m going to help,” Zander yelled, and jumped through the fire Elijah had around them. He shielded himself, skin-tight, and ran for a fallen soldier.
Dead.
He moved to the next one.
Dead.
A snake tried to bite through his shield and he slammed a boot on its head. He didn’t have time for them to try and kill him. He had people to help.
He found another body, hoping the young man even had a faint pulse.
Dead.
“I have wounded here! Leave the bodies, I already checked!”
Zander’s head snapped up and he saw one of the soldiers’ healers in a shield as well, tending to some he could drag in.
He ran for them, watching fire burn a circle out from them. It rose into the trees above them. Branches in flames began to fall. Zander threw a shield over him to stop one from knocking him unconscious but its impact to his shield still was too much. It shattered the shield and Zander jumped out of the way, barely given enough time to move.
He was let into the other shielded area and ran to the first wounded soldier.
“Where?” he demanded.
“I got bit three times on my legs,” the female soldier cried. “Oh god.”
Zander grabbed her, his hands on her skin, and focused. The venom was quickly necrotizing the tissue around it. Muscles were dying. He concentrated hard on the area and poured magic in and used his control over water to push venom out. It wouldn’t be perfect. They were too far away for more help and he couldn’t get everything. Her right calf, with two bites, would be permanently damaged.
“Tourniquet both,” he ordered. It would slow the spread of venom to other parts of the body. She nodded, tears still on her cheeks. He didn’t blame her. Even a lot of the guys, injured, were crying out in pain.
He looked around and did a count. There were fifteen soldiers in the shield. He added his own on the outside of theirs, creating another layer of protection.
“Oh my God,” one whispered, pointing out.
Zander followed the gesture.
He wished he hadn’t.
A soldier, very dead, was still being constricted by the massive anaconda that had him. Bodies were hanging from the trees.
“Ignore the dead,” he choked out. “We can’t save them now.”
“We need to get the fuck out of this place,” one screamed out. “We need to fucking go.”
“I know,” Zander agreed. He tried not to sound worried or angry. He needed to be a healer. He had to save these soldiers around him.
He went to the next and nearly broke. His back was broken. Zander didn’t know how he was even still alive. He couldn’t fix the damage to the man’s back.
He grabbed the guy’s face and began to heal what he could. The cuts and bruises. He wouldn’t bleed out at least. He would never walk again, but he wasn’t dead yet.
“Where is everyone else?” Zander asked as he moved to another soldier. More snake bites, five on the legs. At least they were all far from the heart.
“I think your guys and us are all that’s left,” the other healer answered. “Call me Doc, or Rodriguez-”
“I’ve heard about you,” Zander cut him off. Jasper had told him about the cool healer who had tried to do something nice for Sawyer, but he didn’t have time to make introductions. “How many more injured?”
“We all are,” Doc answered. “I got a bite while trying to grab someone to get them to safety.”
“Fuck,” Zander snapped.
He looked back to his team and reached out to talk to Vincent.
“Everyone here is injured, most with snakebites, others with broken bones, scrapes and bruises. We can’t stay. We need to get them out of this fucking jungle.”
“Elijah just got bit,” Vincent replied. “One was in the ring of flame - dropped from the trees, and we missed it.”
Zander filled with more dread, his hope at saving the few of them left fading into obscurity.
Not Elijah. Not one of the team. Not one of his brothers.
“We can’t wait on Sawyer and Quinn,” Vincent whispered into his mind. “We need to get this moving. Maybe with distance, they will lay off, especially with the fire.”
Zander’s heart broke. He knew Vincent’s was too, could hear it in his mental voice.
Save many and leave the love of his life, or doom everyone to die.
She would kill him if he saved her, kill him if all of these people died so he could stay for her. She would never forgive him for it.
“Get here and we’ll all move under the same shields. I can’t move the wounded to you and I’ll need hands to help carry some.”
24
Sawyer
Sawyer ran into the darkness, following the irresistible pull. She could hear snarling and fighting in the bushes close by.
She broke into a clearing and saw Shade and Scout fending off jaguars. They were outnumbered.
Before she could move, one of the cats jumped for the wolves, who couldn’t keep an eye on all of them.
A black blur slammed into the jaguar. Sawyer blinked forward to Scout, injured and whimpering. As she checked him, hoping he wasn’t bleeding out, another cat jumped for them and she threw her body over the wolf, holding him as Shade went for the jaguar.
“Lay down, boy. I’ve got you now,” she whispered to the small wolf. “I’ve got you. Where’s Quinn?”
A whimper. Shade limped to her and she looked around. The cats were gone.
“Where’s Quinn?” she asked him. The dark shadow of a wolf turned, his head pointing to a mass of vines. Sawyer swallowed. Quinn was in them.
She scrambled for the mass and began to cut it away. Dread filled her. What would she find?
“What are you doing?” a sneering, angry feminine voice asked from the dark. “He’s mine until I say he isn’t. He’s to stay alive until all of his precious humans are dead. I’m almost done.”
“Sorry, you can’t take something that belongs to someone else. It’s stealing,” Sawyer retorted. She pushed the kukri deep into the vines and tore them open, finding Quinn’s face. His eyes were open, and she wanted to weep.
“You do know I’m going to kill you and every other dirty human in my rainforest, but fine, look at your mate’s face one more time,” the Druid taunted.
Sawyer felt vines take her ankles. They didn’t concern her. She only touched Quinn’s cheek gently and felt blood. His eyes closed.
Dread had been replaced by relief that Quinn was alive. Her relief was being replaced with fury. Cold, dark fury.
“Time to die, little human,” the Druid hissed in the dark. Sawyer sublimated out of the vines and went back towards the clearing.
“Sure.” Sawyer spun the hilt of her kukri in her hand.
She needed to find the woman, the mad Magi Druid, before she decided to just kill Quinn instead. Sawyer wasn’t losing him. He was the reason she was there, so that he wouldn’t come down here and die without those who cared for him. She wouldn’t leave him to this.
Something connected in her mind, a click, an anchor, a hook. Sawyer knew the sensation and couldn’t question it. Not yet. She would worry about it when they all survived the night. They just had to survive.
An image floated into Sawyer’s mind, and she didn’t question its origin. Now wasn’t the time to wonder.
The woman was behind her.
She wasted no time. With the image in her mind, she didn’t need to turn to look to the spot. She blinked to it and the Druid screamed as Sawyer struck.
A force slammed into her back and she went to the earth, not prepared to get hit. Claws tore into her back then were wrenched away, making her scream in pain.
Sawyer sublimated out of the hold and went after the Druid, who was pulling vines around herself. She hacked at them, hoping to break through and kill the bitch who had slaughtered everyone.
A sharp pain on her leg stopped her, and she looked down to see a viper pumping venom into her calf. She swung her kukri down and cut its head off. Vines grabbed her legs and she sublimated again, flowing through the vines, but she found no space around the Druid to reform and attack.
When she reformed, ignoring the snarls and fights breaking out around her again, she tried to just stab into the mass and heard the scream from the Druid.
Something hit her again and she fell hard, her kukri falling from her grasp. She screamed as teeth sank into her left shoulder. The pain took over her mind, and she couldn’t concentrate on using her magic. She would need to get out the hard way.
She punched the cat’s head as it shook her shoulder, tearing open the wounds wider. She reached down with her other hand and found another of her blades, one of her throwing knives.
She brought it up and buried it into the soft tissue of the cat’s head, killing it instantly. Pushing the body off her, Sawyer stood up, grabbing her kukri. She looked around quickly.
The Druid was gone. The fighting was continuing, but a snarl and a feline screech ended it. She swayed, hoping it was over. She hoped that bitch was bleeding to death somewhere, but Sawyer had no idea if she’d succeeded. She could only hope.
A whimper had her limping back to Quinn. The vines were reaching over him again. Sawyer saw Shade trying to pull them open. She cut the vines open again, hoping to find those blue eyes watching her. When she revealed his face again, she just kept pulling it open. She couldn’t stop, or she would lose progress.
Scout laid by her side while the black blur, the black jaguar that had joined them, helped rip back the bonds holding him. Sawyer didn’t spare the cat a glance and ignored the onslaught of emotions rushing through her, unsure who they belonged to.
She wasn’t ready for what it meant. None of it.
“Quinn,” Sawyer gasped, finally able to pull him out. “Oh, baby.” She dragged him away from the mass that had held him and looked over the damage.
Large gashes covered his chest and gut. He was bleeding heavily, or had been. He’d passed out from the blood loss.
“We’ll get help,” she told him, knowing he probably couldn’t hear her. She tried to lift him and grunted from the exertion of it. Quinn didn’t look heavy, but she’d never thought she’d be pulling him around the jungle unconscious. “I have to get you to the team, Quinn. We’re not going to die out here.”
She had to do it fast. She had no idea if the Druid was going to come back and finish them off. Sawyer didn’t know when the jungle would start coming after their lives again.
“One of you show me to the team,” Sawyer ordered. She had no idea where she was in the jungle, no idea how to get back to the guys. It was too dark, and the magic around them was too much for her to just feel anyone else.
The jaguar began to tug on the bond, pulling her. Sawyer resisted growling at the feeling. She should have been happy, but something about having a new animal bond pissed her off. It felt like an invasion. Sawyer had had her own mind for years, and now she was sharing again with an animal that wasn’t the one she’d lost.
This cat wasn’t her Midnight.
Having a new animal bond meant Midnight was really gone.
Shade and Scout limped after the jaguar, though, and Sawyer pulled Quinn, hoping she wasn’t causing his injuries to get worse. Her own left shoulder was revolting against any sort of movement she asked it for. Her left arm wasn’t completely useless, but it wasn’t much of a help either.
“I need to make a litter,” she decided after twenty feet. “I can’t carry him.”
She knew the lesson he’d taught her: large leaves, a couple of sturdy branches and some rope or vines to tie it all together. It was surprisingly fast and easy, but she was slowed down by her own injuries. Shade and Scout brought her things to use when they realized what she was doing.
She rolled him on the litter gently, all the animals watching her. She looked up at the black jaguar and glared at the gold eyes.
She hurt too much to deal with those gold eyes.
“One of you want to pull?” She showed them the vine ropes she’d made to yank the litter along.
The jaguar just headbutted her leg and she cursed, pain racing through her like a lightning strike. She looked down to see the snakebite and cursed.
She reached for more of the ropey vines and fashioned herself a tourniquet. Sitting down, she considered what else she could do. She had nothing else to stop the bleeding on Quinn, nothing to stop the bleeding on her back and shoulder.
They were probably going to die, but Sawyer was going to try to her damnedest to make sure they went down fighting. She pulled off her shirt, biting back a whimper at the pain and used it cover the rips over Quinn’s torso.
It was all she could do.
Shade grabbed the ropes she’d shown them and began to pull. Scout nudged Quinn’s face, but her feral friend didn’t respond.
Tears were in her eyes as the jaguar nudged her. She looked at it, big, muscular, and nearly perfectly black. She could still see the faint pattern of spots. She wanted to hate how beautiful the animal was.
Another nudge and Sawyer realized the jaguar wanted her to get moving. Help. They needed to get to help.
“I’m going,” Sawyer muttered, standing up. She limped after the wolves with Quinn, and the jaguar trotted past her to lead the group. “I shouldn’t be surprised you aren’t injured,” she mumbled, feeling petulant. Of course the jaguar wasn’t hurt. It was from the area. It knew how to fight the things here. “You have a name? Do I need to name you? You’ll need to give me a few days, or I’ll give you a shit name like Shithead. You don’t want that.”
Humor, a sad humor radiated back to her. She snorted. Midnight had given her the same feeling when Sawyer tried to make jokes when she was in pain.
That pissed her off, but she locked it down. The jaguar didn’t know that she was hurting Sawyer by existing, and she hurt too much physically to handle the emotional load that was waiting to crash into her.
Dawn was beginning to come, a faint light breaking through the trees.
Over the course of what felt like hours, Sawyer realized they weren’t headed back to the team or the campsite. “Where are we going?” she demanded.
The jaguar sent her annoyance and impatience. Follow her. Trust her.
Sawyer growled at the cat and the cat snarled back.
Trust her.
Sawyer swallowed her anger. They had nothing else they could do. She checked Quinn’s pulse. Weak, but steady and there. The bleeding had stopped thanks to her shirt and time. She needed to make sure nothing got infected, but she had nothing to help in that cause.
Follow her.
The cat’s pull on their bond was irresistible and stubborn.
Sawyer continued to walk after the cat deeper into the jungle, further away from the team.
Trust her.
25
Jasper
They never stopped moving.
Once they were together, the few of them alive didn’t stop moving. Those who were relatively uninjured helped pull along those who needed help.
By midday after the night of hell, the world quieted again. Rain put the fires out and the animals stopped bothering them.
During the hike, four died. They took the dog tags and left the bodies. They couldn’t keep the dead weight.
They never stopped moving. Jasper’s heart broke every step.
Further away from their missing teammates, their missing family. Sawyer and Quinn were still out there, alive or dead. He felt like he’d failed them. He felt like the team had failed.
“Fuck,” Eli
jah stumbled, looking down. Jasper grabbed him and didn’t let him fall.
“We can make it,” Jasper whispered to him. “We have to make it, my man. Don’t stop.”
“Why not?” he asked. “Why not just leave me?”
“Why the fuck would we do that?” Zander demanded, snarling as he stormed to Jasper and Elijah. Vincent looked over to them and the soldiers kept quiet. Jasper knew they were all dealing with the same issues.
“You can move faster without me,” Elijah answered.
“Stop,” he snapped. “If I can get out of here on one fucking leg, you can too.”
“I can’t leave them,” Elijah’s voice broke. His country accent grew thick with despair.
“If anyone can survive out there without help, it’s them. It’s Quinn and we have to hope Sawyer is with him,” Vincent reminded him.
This wasn’t the first time they had the conversation. Elijah was the most vocal about going back out and finding them. But Jasper saw Vincent’s and Zander’s points as well. Sawyer and Quinn would never forgive them for leaving the soldiers to die or getting themselves killed to find their two most capable teammates. It would be a waste of life for two people who were strong enough to figure themselves out. Sawyer would just hate them for it.
“I can’t…”
Jasper hated the tears in Elijah’s eyes. They brought his own. He pulled Elijah to keep walking, and the cowboy moved without a fight.
On day three, only an hour after Elijah’s outburst, they made it back to the village where their vehicles waited, safe.
“Oh thank god,” Vincent whispered reverently.
Jasper saw the extra vehicles. So did some of the soldiers, all confused.
“Halt!” someone yelled.
Jasper frowned at the soldiers that came out from cover and walked over to them, their weapons raised.
“Wait, we’re Cavalry Unit 08,” Varya yelled out. She’d told the team her name during their long walk back. “We’re survivors. We have several severely injured.”
The Redemption Saga Box Set Page 91