The leather cloak is blocking my view. I have no fucking idea how deep the arrow’s stuck in him. When I pull, there’s so much resistance I begin to think it’s never coming out. I twist the shaft, probably shredding his muscle tissue as I do. He jerks, and screams again. The arrow lists to the side.
Ah, hell. It’s taking a different path out than in. I knew I’d do this wrong. But there’s no going back now. Mumbling an apology, I grab the shaft with both hands and pull. The arrowhead tears through his flesh—he doesn’t scream this time, and the silence is so much harder to hear—and then snags on his clothes.
God damn it!
Blood is everywhere. Just everywhere. While I fight with the arrow, it starts to gush. It stains his shirt, covering his leather cloak and my hands, drenching my skin until my fingers are slick with the stuff. It colors everything red and stinks like copper.
The arrowhead is tangled in Hunter’s cloak. With another yank, I make the hole as big as possible and twist the shaft again.
This time, it works. The arrow’s out. Finally. And I am so fucking proud of myself.
After snapping it in half, I throw the bloody arrow as far away from us as possible. Then, leaning back on my hands, I watch as Hunter pulls himself to his knees. He’s cradling his right arm, a terrible grimace twisting his face. It takes me a second to realize it’s a glare. He’s aiming it right at me.
I’m immediately defensive. “What?”
“Whatever happened to three?” he demands. He’s careful not to move his bad side. It doesn’t matter that the arrow’s out. I think of the huge hole and the way his blood is gushing. He’s still in a lot of pain.
And I feel guilty as hell.
Trying to push that aside, I shoot back, “I did it for you!”
He snorts. With his left hand, he starts digging in his trouser pocket.
“Think about it. The anticipation would’ve made it worse,” I insist. “I already didn’t know what I was doing. I wanted to get it over with quick, like ripping off a band-aid. Does it matter now? It’s out. Now we have to… I don’t know, clean that or something. It’s nasty back there. I don’t want it to get infected.”
As I say that, Hunter pulls out a square of white cloth. He tucks his bad arm close to his side, then shakes the cloth with the other one. It doubles in size. Another shake and the cloth triples.
He holds it out to me. I take it.
“Slip this under my cloak and apply as much pressure as you can. I need to stop the blood flowin’. If I bleed out first, it won’t matter much about infection.”
He’s got a point. Wadding the cloth up, I get to my feet since I’m way too short to reach his neck comfortably while we’re both kneeling on the ground. I stay hunched over, just in case, as I peel his leather cloak and linen shirt away from his sweat and blood-soaked skin.
Everywhere I look, I see red. I swallow roughly and shove the cloth against his bloody shoulder, applying pressure.
His sharp intake of air tells me that I’m hurting him. Again. My stomach twists.
I try to keep my tone even. “Okay. Now what?”
“Now you run.”
I’m so shocked, I let go. “I… wait—what?”
Glancing over his shoulder, Hunter reaches behind him to readjust the cloth and apply pressure himself.
“Go,” he tells me, gritting his teeth. “Find a portal. Leave me here. Get out of the Other. It ain’t safe for you no more, Noelle.” His eyes darken as he frowns. “I don’t know if it ever was.”
I don’t like that frown. Or what he’s saying to me.
“I won’t leave you,” I promise. I can’t. I owe him too much.
“You have to. I can’t protect you like this.” He nods at the way his right arm hangs awkwardly at his side. “You’ll be better off on your own.”
I remember the sword he had on underneath his cloak last night—on his left side. With his right arm injured, the sword is worthless to him. So the big idiot thinks he’s worthless to me.
I shake my head. “Forget it. Now let me have that rag thing. You’ll only end up hurting yourself more like this.”
The pain must be getting to him because not only is he being stupid, he’s being stubborn. He refuses to let me help. When I huff and move to grab at his cloak again, he swivels on his knees so that his back is out of my reach.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
“Hunter—”
“I mean it,” he insists. “Someone shootin’ arrows at the camp ain’t the only danger in these woods. And now… listen to me. Blood—human blood—is gonna attract monsters. You gotta get out of here.”
My heart starts to beat triple-time. I hear my pulse pounding in my ears. He’s right, but—
“No,” I snarl. “Not without you. Stop arguing with me,” I snap when he opens his mouth again. “Let me… just give me a second to think.”
My head feels like it’s spinning. I know he’s right. Hunter is from this crazy place. This—what did he call it? Other. He obviously knows the rules. And if he’s worried about what his bleeding will attract, I’m absolutely terrified.
Holy shit. Okay. Okay. One problem at a time.
“Okay. How’s this? We get rid of the blood, there’s less chance something follows the stink of it here. Do you have, I don’t know, some kind of bandage I can staunch this with? Your hankie is probably soaked through by now.”
“In my tent,” Hunter pants. It’s a miracle he’s stopped fighting me. “There’s a… unh… a small metal box I keep in the corner. Supplies should be in there.” He starts to rise. “I’ll go get ‘em.”
Uh-uh. No way. Gesturing for him to stay put, I dash inside his tent. I see a pile of neatly folded clothes and hides in one corner. There’s my pillow and the nest I made for myself last night. An empty lantern lays propped on its side along the back end. I zero in on the clothes. It’s my only shot.
I shove my hands underneath the pile of laundry, digging around until I find a metal tin. I pop it open.
Yes! Paydirt. He’s got a first aid kit. Gauze, medical tape, alcohol pads. Even those plastic tweezers that never work. I don’t know where he got this box from. Doesn’t matter. I’m grateful for it. The supplies look like they came straight out of a CVS. It’s exactly what I need.
After snapping the lid shut, I duck past the tent’s flap again and head over to Hunter.
He’s not looking too hot. Sweat damps the hair along his forehead, turning the sandy strands dark. Pain has leeched all of the color from his face; instead of his usual deep tan, he’s more of a pale café au lait. He’s slumped forward, his head hanging as he continues to hold his rag in place.
Panic makes me rougher than I should be. I start to tug on his cloak, pushing it off of his shoulder. After another gasp—and a mumbled apology from me—Hunter gives up on holding the rag in order to help me remove his cloak.
One glance and I know that his linen shirt has got to go, too. A stark crimson stain has blossomed on his right shoulder, as big as a tennis ball. And the blood is still trickling out.
“Take it off,” I tell him.
“Noelle—”
“Later, Hunter. Argue with me later. I’ve got to get you cleaned up and bandaged.” My jaw clenches. I can’t tell if it’s because I’m frantic, I’m aggravated, or because I still feel like I’m gonna hurl. “So take your shirt off now. Please.”
He hesitates for a second, then nods.
I take a moment to brace myself for what I’m about to see after Hunter lifts his shirt over his head. It’s not as bad as I thought. There’s a dime-sized dark hole about two inches from the point where his arm meets his shoulder. The arrow went in and came back out as cleanly as it possibly could. Even after I jerked on the shaft, the wound is contained.
The first aid kit sits at my feet. Flipping open the lid, I grab a trial size bottle of rubbing alcohol. I bite down on my bottom lip. I know I have to if I want to keep Hunter’s wound from getting infected. This is still goi
ng to hurt.
My voice is light and cheery as I warn him, “Hold tight. This might sting a bit.” Then, before he can move away from me, I twist off the cap and dump half of the bottle right into the hole left in his shoulder.
The sound Hunter makes is somewhere between a snarl and a moan. After muttering a few creative curses under his breath, I hear strained panting. But he doesn’t move, and when I tell him I have to wipe away all of the blood before I can start bandaging him up, he only says, “Do it.”
So I do.
I try to be as gentle as possible. Focusing on what I’m doing, I smear the antibiotic ointment over the gash and then place a thick swath of gauze on top of it. I use the roll of tan bandages to wrap his upper torso, securing his shoulder and keeping the gauze in place.
“All done.” I wipe my filthy hands on my poor, poor nightgown. “You doing okay, big guy?”
“I’m fine.”
Fine? Ha!
Liar.
Then, as if he heard my thought, he adds, “I mean, I’ll be fine. Don’t worry ‘bout me, darlin’. It wasn’t my head he was aimin’ at.”
My stomach drops. Wow. I wince and recoil from him. My gaze on the grass, I mumble, “Thanks for the reminder. Because having to pull that arrow out of you wasn’t traumatic enough, right?”
“I didn’t mean it like that. I just…” Hunter huffs. He’s still on his knees, his back to me. “You shoulda run when I told you to.”
My head shoots up as I glare at his muscular back. Part of me wants to reach out and knock him over. Considering all the work I did to patch him up, I would only be spiting myself, but the urge is there. I barely manage to tamp it down.
In case it flares up again, I pointedly walk away. And not only because he managed to seriously piss me off.
Hunter glances over his shoulder. His color is slowly returning, though his frown makes me feel even guiltier. “Where you goin’?” he asks.
I ignore him. Despite my flare of annoyance, I realize that I have to get him dressed again. It’s one thing to run my hands over his toned body in order to bandage him up. It’s another entirely to ogle his biceps and pecs now that the threat has passed for the moment. His shirt is ruined so that won’t do. Remembering the piles of folded clothes in his tent, I go and grab him one.
Hunter is standing again, fiddling with his bandage as I exit the tent. He’s not paying attention to what his hands are doing. Instead, he’s watching me walk toward him, his eyes narrowed. The frown is back. I don’t like it.
Wordlessly, I hold the shirt out for him. When he snatches it, I try not to take it too personally. Then he turns his back on me and I bite my tongue. He took an arrow for me, I remind myself. If he wants to be rude, that’s fine. I owe him a whole lot more than that.
After taking a few steps away from me, Hunter starts to pull the shirt on over his head. I see him stiffen when he raises his right arm. His whole body tightens, fighting through the pain as he tries to get his bad arm through the sleeve.
What is wrong with me? The guy’s got a giant hole in his shoulder. How can I expect him to get that shirt on by himself?
I slip up behind him. Standing on the tips of my toes, I place the flat of my hand against his good arm. “Here. Let me.”
Hunter jerks his body out of my reach. “I can do it on my own.”
I owe him, yes. That still stings. “You wanted my help before.”
“I did, and you did your piece. Thanks. I got it now.”
Flinching at his suddenly gruff tone, I hold my hands up and back away. Great. My one hope of surviving this place until I find a portal and I piss him off by getting him shot. Just my luck.
I shake my head. There’s only one thing I can say.
“I’m sorry, Hunter.”
His head jerks around. That damn frown deepens. “You say somethin’?”
My hands are trembling. “I’m so sorry. You getting shot, it’s all my fault. It shouldn’t have happened. And I’m so, so sorry.”
Hunter finishes pulling his injured arm through the sleeve before shoving his left arm through the other. His expression darkens, a sudden rage flashing in his eyes. I step away from him and he growls.
Growls.
“I don’t want to hear you say anything like that again, Noelle.”
“But, I—”
“No. Listen to me. That’s foolish talk. You ain’t the one who loosed that arrow on us. You didn’t try to hurt me. So there’s no reason you should be apologizin’ to me. If anything, I should be apologizin’ to you.”
That stuns me. “What? Why?”
He shakes his head roughly. “Because.” As if that’s any kind of answer. “So trust me when I say that I don’t want to hear you try to say you’re sorry to me again. Understand me?”
Understand?
Okay. There’s a couple of things I understand. One, I know I’m not the one who fired the arrow. Two, I’m well aware that that arrow was heading straight at me—and Hunter stepped in front of it when I was too stupid to get out of the way. So, yeah, I did understand—understand that what happened was all my fault.
But if he doesn’t want to hear me take the blame, fine. I can keep it to myself.
“Yeah.” I nod and look away from his piercing stare. “I understand.”
12
Have you ever seen a one-armed man pack up a campsite by himself?
It sounds like the set-up to a bad joke but, as I perch on my stump again, that’s exactly what I’m doing. Within minutes of wiping down and wrapping himself up in his torn cloak—and pulling on his stupid hood—Hunter is gathering supplies while I sit, my chin in my hand, feeling like I’ve been put in time-out.
The sighing doesn’t help. Or the pout.
I huff. Hunter pretends not to hear.
After a while, I start to wonder if I should get up and go off on my own. His mood dark, that dumb hood hiding the scowl I know is there, Hunter insists that we move out. I try to help and he won’t let me do anything around the camp. Then I start to ask him why we have to hurry. After he bites out one word—“Archer”—he ignores the rest of my questions. Guilt still has a stranglehold on me and I let it go.
Archer, he says. I bet he knows exactly who shot that arrow. Hunter won’t tell me, though. My guilt gets a couple of buddies. Now I’m feeling frustrated and a little angry, too.
He moves awkwardly, obviously favoring his right side. Even though he’s wrapped in gauze and wearing a fresh shirt, I can’t stop seeing the big hole in his arm. I breathe and the stink of his blood is still in my nose. And the blood… I shiver, pulling my cloak closer. There was so much blood.
My head is heavy. I brace it with my other hand, pressing my palm against my cheek. I’m a little feverish and the cool touch is nice. I need it. My stomach is still queasy, my head spinning as my thoughts race.
The shock from the surprise attack is gone, and so is the adrenaline that followed as I tended to Hunter. All that’s left are two certainties that I really don’t want to believe. It’s impossible to deny them—because someone had shot an arrow at me. And, even more incredibly, Hunter took the arrow in his back so that I didn’t take it in my head.
In my head.
As Hunter disappears into this tent to pack up something else, I drop my hands, lean over, and vomit into the grass. I could’ve been killed. Killed. If it wasn’t for Hunter, I’d be dead and no one would ever know what happened to me. That thought staggers me. And I throw up again.
Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I realize that Hunter’s right. This place is way too dangerous. I have to go home.
Now.
After ducking under the flap again, I watch him pause. His nostrils flare. The acrid stench of puke surrounds me. I refuse to ask forgiveness for that, either.
He doesn’t say anything. He simply reaches under his cloak and offers me his canteen.
I hesitate. That nectar did something funny to me before.
“Just water, Noelle,” he
murmurs.
I have to believe him. I nod my thanks as I take the canteen. Hunter hovers next to me, waiting for me to rinse my mouth out. When I get rid of the foul taste, he loops his canteen on his knife belt while I pull myself up off of the stump. My legs are shaky as I stand. At least my stomach has finally settled a bit.
We walk in silence. This trip through the trees is much easier than last night, thanks to my new sandals, but I purposely hang back so that Hunter can take it easy, too. He refuses to let me carry anything except my cloak and my knife. I watched him leave a lot of his supplies back at the campsite—after assuring me that it was only one of many of his hunting camps and he can always find more—and I bet the bundle he carries over his good shoulder has to weigh a ton.
He started off at a brisk pace, though I quickly realize that he’ll always slow down if he thinks I’m struggling. It’s clear that Hunter doesn’t want to leave me behind anymore. So what if I can't get a read on his motives? It doesn't matter. Feeling protective of him, I go as slow as possible so that he can take his time.
I definitely want out of this forest. As much as this snail’s pace is totally my fault, I’m beginning to really get that I’m stuck here with who knows how many different threats. Scorpions. Archers. I keep my ears cocked for the warning twang of another shot.
One good thing is that the further we go, the denser the trees are. Even if that bastard tries to shoot again, I doubt he has an arrow that can find us through all the vegetation.
It’s dark, the closely grown trees blocking out the sun. The storm Hunter promised arrives shortly after we start off. We’re shielded from the worst of it, and I’ve got to admit that the wrap he gave me is a godsend. Wind screams over our heads, raining down leaves and thick drops of water that roll right down the back of my leather cloak. My feet squelch in my sandals as some of the moisture seeps in.
When I go even slower, I’m no longer thinking about Hunter and the hole in his arm. Even after the storm passes, I entertain myself with plotting how to steal the boots off his feet.
I don’t know where I’m going. Hunter’s giant boots leave humongous imprints in the mud. After the rain hits, we stick to walking single file. It takes me two small steps for every one of his big ones so I basically spend most of the journey hopping from impression to impression. On the plus side, it keeps most of the mud off of my sandals.
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