by Amy Miles
“No.” I shake my head, trying desperately to keep the waver of fear from my voice. I can’t be separated from Bastien. In my gut I know that if I am going to survive this planet I will need him by my side. “I would only be in the way. Surely your wife will not approve?”
I’m clutching at anything to place doubt in his mind but even as I suggest it I start to wonder if they even take wives here. Their ways seem barbaric and so far I haven’t seen a single female...that I know of. What if they are just as ugly as the men?
Drach’s scales seem to shimmer as he begins to pace. I can tell that I have at least given him a reason to think it over. “Bastien loves me; you already know that, and in knowing that you realize that he would lay down his life to protect me. Are you willing to do the same for me?”
His pauses in mid step and turns. His wide shoulders rise and fall with what I assume to be a deep sigh but I can’t hear him breathing. “Fine. You will remain with the man for now.”
“Thank you. We will need provisions though.”
The black slits in his eyes narrow. “Provisions?”
“A blanket to keep warm at night. More food. I can’t birth healthy babies on what you are feeding me.” I decide to push one step further. “And I will need a bed.”
A bark erupts from his lips. “We do not sleep on beds here. The floor is our domain.”
“Maybe it is suitable for you, but the floor is not a place for a pregnant woman.” A thought strikes me and I feel fear trickle down my spine. How are these monsters supposed to help me deliver the babies? Their hands are enormous and their claws...I shudder at the thought. Maybe they will bring in one of the girls from the slave ship to help me.
I swallow hard as I think of the alternative and vow that no matter what happens I will not allow Bastien to aid in bringing Eamon’s children into this world.
He nods in agreement, though I get the feeling he doesn’t enjoy doing so. “Of course. I will see to it myse--” his head whips around as a cry rises from somewhere down the hall. He twists his head this way and that, weaving back and forth. I watch him, realizing that he does not have ears like I do. Only small holes on either side of his head, nearly covered by the hood that rises from shoulders and connects at the crown of his head.
“What is it?” I ask, rising to my feet.
The thin layer of skin closes over Drach’s eyes, sealing out everything. I wait impatiently for him to open his eyes but he does not. His head continues to weave from side to side. A low rumble grows in his chest.
I hear more shouting from the opposite side of the room, spilling from behind the closed door. I sense Drach’s attention has shifted to it. His claws clench at his sides, burrowing deep into the flesh of his hands. Brown blood drips onto the floor. His stance widens, his legs slightly bent.
Every instinct in me tells me that something is very wrong. Drach is too silent. “Are we under attack?”
Drach’s eyes slowly open. The black slits in his eyes are wide, dilated. He lifts his nose to the air and sniffs, breathing in deep. “The Duturi have found you.”
“The who?” I glance back over my shoulder as I hear a guttural hiss. Four Roamers surge through the curtain behind me, each sporting deep gashes. One clutches its arm, the hand severed completely. It wavers on its feet, threatening to fall like a mighty oak of the forest, but somehow manages to remain upright.
“Protect the girl. No one touches her.” Drach’s shouted command echoes in my ears, driving me to the ground. The communicator screams shrilly in my ear. Loud explosions from behind the closed door sound dull against the ringing in my ears. The sound of some sort of weapon discharge echoes from behind me.
Something wet and warm splatters against my back and neck, coating my arms but I double over, clawing at my ear to be free of the translator. I feel the cartilage tear as I rip it free, chucking it away from me. Warm blood seeps from the wound, trailing into the hollow of my ear.
The ground rumbles beneath me. I can feel the vibrations arising from all around. On Earth I would have feared the presence of the spider drones but here...I do not know what is coming for me.
A face swims before my blurry eyes. It hisses at me with such insistence that I shrink back. Drach grabs my arms and thrusts me toward a wall, hissing at me again. With a mighty shove, he reveals a hidden passage. It is dark and long. I know once the door closes behind me I will be thrust into complete darkness.
Another hiss turns my attention back onto Drach. I do not need the translator to know what he is saying. Run!
EIGHTEEN
Darkness closes in around me the instant the door seals shut. I can hear wild hissing followed by grunts. The door shudders behind me and the sound of claws digging into the flesh of the wall sends a shudder down my spine. I know that I should run, flee as far from this battle as I can, but I can’t. Bastien is out there. I can’t just leave him behind.
I turn slowly, my hands walking along the wall to feel my way. Only a thin line of light can be seen from the bottom of the door. I place a hand upon it and listen, holding my breath for fear of being heard.
Something slams into the door and I cup my mouth to keep from crying out. I back away slowly, realizing as I do that the bottoms of my toes are moist. I press one hand against the wall and wipe my foot, bringing my hand to my nose. I grimace at the metallic scent that accompanies the thick blood between my fingers.
Is Drach dead? If so, what sort of creature could take down a man of his size with so little fight?
The light at the bottom of the door is blotted out as more blood slips beneath. I back away, the scent of it turning my stomach. I move swiftly in the opposite direction, disoriented by the lack of sight. I keep my fingers trailing along either wall, praying that I don’t ram nose first into a dead end.
The air is thick. My hair feels like a matted rat’s nest against my neck, heavy and drenched with sweat. I push it back from my face, feeling the effort it takes for me to gasp each breath.
I’m running out of oxygen, I panic. I have yet to feel an exit or see any more light. This narrow tunnel has begun to descend and the ceiling has dropped dramatically, forcing me into a stooped position. From time to time I think I hear voices through the walls, muffled and far off.
I slow my pace, sure that soon I must find an exit. What if I missed one already?
This thought wiggles around in my mind, making my stomach begin to churn with fear at the thought that I could be trapped in this small space. I can’t go back. Even if Drach managed to survive, there is no way I could push him aside along with the weight of that door. No. There’s only one direction I can go.
I proceed at a slower pace, careful to keep my breathing under control. Even though logically I know there is still enough air to breathe, I don’t want to take any chances. Panicking isn’t about to help me.
The hall makes an abrupt left and I pause, flitting my hands along the wall to my right only to discover that another passageway has opened, giving me an opportunity to make the wrong choice. Perfect. Why can’t this stuff ever be simple?
I know nothing about the compound that Drach has been holding me in. After we moved through the horde of men bound for the mines on the day I arrived, I was blindfolded. It was not removed until the exterior doors of this building had slammed behind me. Even the small window in my room with Bastien was too high to ever truly see out.
I have no idea how far this compound spans. As best I can tell I haven’t been going in circles, so this place must be enormous. Odd that I never really saw many Roamers though, I muse.
Something doesn’t feel right. Not about Drach or this place.
I close my eyes and listen. The weight around my neck makes my need stoop, wearing m down. For a moment I hear nothing and my hopes begin to dwindle, but there, far off in the distance, I hear a cry. I take the right tunnel and rush forward at a gait somewhere between a jog and a speed walk. My fingers grow warm from running along the walls long before I glimpse light up
ahead. Not a thin line of light to hint at a door but a wide grate in the floor.
The floor?
I approach with caution, allowing my eyes time to adjust to the light. When I draw close I prop myself against either wall and lean over, staring down through the grate and into air. My stomach rises into my throat when I realize why the canopy overhead looked so much closer out of the window in my room with Bastien. The entire place is perched up in the trees.
It is eerie to not feel any gust of wind through the metal grate, crisscrossed with inch thick bars over the opening. The air is still.
A shout from up ahead captures my attention and I race forward, struggling to readjust to the darkness. Around a corner up ahead I spot three more grates, each tunnel fanning out into different tunnels. How am I supposed to know which one to choose?
I drop to my knees before the first one, peering down at the ground below. I can see figures pacing back and forth beside great vehicles with tires that I imagine to be taller than me. They look similar to the military trucks back on Earth mixed with a hybrid of the glass domes of the spider drones. Great cannons swivel from the top, searching the trees.
Drach said they found me. Do they really think that I found a way to get down there?
“Get off me!” A grunt quickly follows the cry and I’m instantly on my feet and leaping over the grate. I turn right and run straight toward a dead end. I lean against the wall as the voice comes again. “I told you it was him, alright. Now let me go. We had a deal!”
Hyde! What is he doing here?
I turn my ear and press it against the wall, straining to hear. I wince at the burning in my ear and am swiftly reminded that I tore a chunk of it off when I threw my translator away. I hold my manacles away from the wall, fearful of making any sound that will betray my location.
“Hey! What are you doing?” Hyde’s voice rises in volume. I can hear his mounting panic but it is quickly drowned out by a thrumming of an engine. The floor below me begins to quake as a deep throaty rumble echoes through the tunnel.
I cover my ears, doubling over as a wave of heat blasts the door. I can hear Hyde’s shouts as if from a distance. He sounds terrified. The heat against the door diminishes and the sound of the engines change.
“Don’t leave me here!” Hyde screams. I can hear him thrashing and realize that he must be kicking against a door because of the resounding clang against metal. “No! You can’t do this to me!”
The first explosion rocks me off my feet. I stumble into the wall, slamming my head hard enough to see flashes of light before my eyes. The second sends me to my knees. I cry out as the wall on my left explodes. Wood, metal shards and fire spiral around me. I cover my head in my hands. The debris slices deep into my skin, some pieces burrowing deep, cauterizing the entry points.
From all around the compound I can hear the crackling of fire. I’m going to be burned alive. Get up! I scream at myself, thrusting up to my knees. The air is thick with debris and smoke. I crawl over the remnants of the wall, wincing at the heated wood that scalds my hands.
There is one final explosion near the far end of the building and then silence. I search the skies but can’t see any ships. The sound of an engine roars to life and then diminishes, apparently sinking back to the ground.
I kick at the wall before me repeatedly, grunting with effort. Sweat drips from my brow, stinging my eyes. Pain from burns and wounds along my body seems to alight at once, stealing my breath away.
“Hyde!” I scream, stumbling and falling as I crawl over the demolished wall. “Where the heck are you?”
“Queeny? Is that you?”
“Yeah.” I grimace as I clutch my bruised ribs. Nothing like aggravating an old wound. “It’s me.”
“Well I’ll be darned.” He calls. I peer through the smoke to find him strung up against what appears to be a small metal shed. The flesh of his wrists has been torn by his struggles against the chains. He looks thinner than when I last saw him. His beard far more pronounced. His eyes are sunken and his lips cracked and bleeding.
“You look like crap,” I grunt as I pull myself over the final section of the wall, beating at the small flames that linger. The crackling of fire surrounds us. I can feel the heat of the flames at my back but am too afraid to look.
“Missed you too, sweet cheeks.” Hyde’s head rolls to the side and he tosses me a pained yet lopsided grin. “You gonna get me out of these chains?”
I push up to my feet, wincing as I tread on a hot plank of wood. I hop to the side and pick my way carefully toward him. I appear to be on some sort of landing pad, large enough to house maybe three or four Caldonian fighter wings. Judging by the massive vehicle down below and the vast size of this compound, there is little on this planet that is small.
“That depends,” I say, searching the ground.
“On what?”
The fire begins to stretch out from behind me, eating away at the wooden structure to my right. Before long we will be trapped within a ring of fire. We don’t have much time. “On whether you sold us out to those monsters.”
“Monsters?” He shakes his head, chuckling to himself. “Those weren’t monsters, Queeny. They were men.”
“Men?” I turn back to look at him, my gaze narrowed as I try to decide if he is lying to me.
When he nods I notice how weary he looks. “Seems like there was more to that future battle on Earth than Aloysius let on.”
I turn and walk back toward him, sinking down into a crouch at his side. “What do you know?”
He shrugs. “What’s it worth to you?” I grit my teeth and force myself not to knock his in. Instead I rise and start to walk away. “Wait! Come back. I’ll tell you what you want to know if you get me out of this place.”
I look back at him, trying to weigh my options. I could take my chances on my own and leave him behind to burn alive or do the right thing and free him. I sigh, knowing there is no way I could live with myself if I left him. I approach and kneel before him, jabbing a finger into his chest. “Any funny business and I will shove you off the edge and not feel an ounce of guilt for doing it. Are we clear?”
He nods slowly and with great effort. I can tell if his life were not hanging in the balance he would tell me which nearest cliff to take a running jump off. I nod and grab the door behind him and yank on it. It doesn’t budge. “Get out of the way,” I grunt, kicking at his side.
Hyde sneers at me but shifts, scooting on his backside to allow me room to slip inside. The heat within is suffocating. The floor has begun to heat to blistering temperatures. I hop from foot to foot in search of something that I can use to cut his chains.
“Any day now, Queeny. It’s getting a bit toasty out here,” Hyde calls. I can hear him rustling around outside and look to see him stamping on cinders floating in the air and landing nearby.
“It’s not like walking into a shop filled with bolt cutters, you know?” I yank open drawers and topple over racks. Many of the tools before me are foreign. Some are circular in design and remind me of something that would tighten gears. Another is bright yellow and looks like a floatation device you would find on a boat. Hardly helpful.
“Grab something long and pointy,” he shouts.
I grit my teeth as I topple a set of metal shelves onto the floor. Nothing? How can there literally be nothing that I can use?
Just as I’m about to face the reality that Hyde might not be able to make it out of this alive, I spy a long brace running along the bottom of the shelves. It is nearly twice the length of my arm and has snapped from the underside. I grasp it, biting my lip to still my cries at the residual heat from the metal.
I grunt, twisting and turning, leaning all of my weight onto it. “Queeny?”
I look up, concerned by the fear in his voice. Outside, the landing pad has finally ignited. Angry flames flicker all around. The heat is intense. I peer around the door to see Hyde pressed as close to the shed as possible. “Hang on. I think I’ve got something.”
“Well, be snappy about it. I don’t fancy ending up like a roasted pig!”
Leaning onto the bar, I scream, pushing with all my strength. The metal groans but doesn’t give. I push up off the bar and slam my foot down on it in anger. With a loud pop the bar shudders and slams to the ground.
“Queeny, get out here now!”
Dipping low I grasp the bar and rush outside, barreling into a wall of heat. I raise my hand to shield my eyes, turning my back on the flames. Hyde eyes my tool and nods, holding his chains out. “Don’t look,” I shout as I ram the bar into the handle.
“What are you doing?” He opens his eyes and stares wildly up at me.
“I’m saving your life.” I pump my arms, pressing and releasing on the bar. Metal groans and screeches as I work to free the handle. Pains ripple across my stomach but I fight to ignore it, knowing that we are out of time. Hyde cries out and pulls his feet back from the line of blue flames rapidly eating its way toward us.
Sweat douses my hands, making it nearly impossible to grip the bar. I release it and take a step back. Hoisting my leg I slam my foot into it. Pain ricochets up from my heel as my bar foot takes the impact. I slam my foot again and again, spurred on by his cries. The scent of burnt hair stings my nose and I can feel the flames licking at my back.
“We’re gonna die!”
“No,” I grunt, slamming my foot again. The handle gives an inch but it’s not enough to slide Hyde’s thick chain through. “I’m not going to let that happen.”
I look down into his face, blackened by soot. I can see his fear and his resignation. It is that second emotion that fuels my anger. I grab the bar, noticing that it has begun to bend and shove it between the door and the wall. I cry out as flames land upon my arms as I slam the door shut. Hyde cries out, dragged by the door. The metal creaks and snaps.
“I’m free!”
I turn to look at him and my eyes widen in horror. His pant leg is alight. Hyde begins screaming, beating at his pants and I look around us. All I can see is a wall of flame. We are trapped.