Eternal Refuge

by Annabelle McInnes

  A woman screamed.

  Kira.

  Fear, terror, dread congealed inside his belly. A horror so acute he almost threw up. The fright was in her voice. Her shriek laced with distress. She was scared, she was hurt. She was unprotected and he didn’t know where she was.

  Fuck!

  He ran. If he fell, he got back up. He ignored the pain, he ignored everything other than the effort needed to move in the direction the sound came from. He crashed through oak trees, leapt over boulders. The branches scratched his face, his gun in his hands useless unless he found her. His breath was ragged, both from exertion and from panic.

  ‘Euan!’

  Nick. A body dressed in black fatigues barrelled towards him. His scarf was lost, his face was white, his eyes wide with fear. ‘I can’t find her!’

  ‘That way!’

  They ran together. Side by side. Hearts hammered and breath sawed. They were as one on this, as they would be on everything.

  Until Euan tripped. He hit the ground hard, his gun skittered out in front of him. His wrists took the impact and he swore as his big body hit the dirt.

  Nick was at his shoulder, his features twisted as he fought with the need to assist and the requirement to save Kira.

  Another scream. Vivid, angry. Close.

  ‘Go!’ Euan bellowed as he reached out and pushed Nick in the direction of their heart and soul with all his might.

  Nick stumbled backwards, wavered.

  Against his instinct, Euan softened his voice. ‘Go, find her. I’ll be right behind. Get her safe.’

  ‘Euan.’ Nick’s voice broke, the anguish on his face tortuous to behold. He knew the loss they would share if anything happened, or if they couldn’t find her again.

  ‘Go,’ Euan ordered, even as his heart broke. ‘She needs you.’

  ‘I’ll find her,’ Nick choked as he rushed to Euan in the dirt. He bent, kissed Euan fiercely. He tasted like fear. ‘Then I’ll find you.’

  Euan suffered through the sting of Nick’s blistering kiss, and his heart exploded inside his chest. When Nick pulled back, Euan said, ‘Run.’

  Jade green eyes were angry, afraid. Nick nodded, turned, and disappeared out of sight.

  Chapter 13

  Kira

  The hand that covered her mouth smelt of dirt and rotten things, as if he’d been digging into the earth to bury bodies long decayed. She’d been focused, she’d been diligent, she hadn’t wavered, but her stalker had been better. She thought it had been Nick playing tricks until the body that pulled her close was too skinny, too hard and then she knew.

  She knew.

  Her first shriek of alarm had been muffled by the scarf that covered the bottom half of her face and the hand that held it there. Her elbow moved backwards into her attacker’s ribs. But his grunt of pain and jerk of surprise wasn’t enough to dislodge him.

  His other hand was quick to snare her waist, draw her against him, worm fingers into skin that was not his to touch. Despite the layers of clothing, the precautions they’d used in an attempt to impede the discovery of her gender were inadequate when hands could fondle her body. He jerked the moment he realised she was a woman. The hiss of elation in her ear turned her stomach, her throat burned with bile.

  The nightmare was real. The terrors that she’d been warned of were corporal, living beings that could snatch and prod and poke. Snared, captured, the feverish tirade her brother had garbled with his dying breath about degenerates and rapists was now the song that played in her ears on repeat. She knew it happened, she did. Nick had borne the scars, Lily’s silence screamed a voiceless warning. But she’d been exempt from it all, immune. Safe.

  Kira had been safe. And now, she was not.

  Her rifle was too big to shoot him. Even with her arms free, his height eclipsed her to the point that any attempt to swing the weapon around and use it as a club was rendered useless. So, she did the only thing she could.

  She aimed the butt of the stock downwards and used all her might to ram the thing into his foot.

  Unlike hers, his shoes were nothing more than sneakers held together with wire and twine. He grunted, and his grip over her mouth slipped.

  She didn’t hesitate.

  She screamed.

  They both flinched from the wild, female screech that reverberated through the trees. Stealth forgotten, the owners of the smoke were here, if her cry of alarm brought more, she’d risk it. It would also alert Euan and Nick.

  She should never have let them leave her sight.

  Never would she again.

  His grip around her waist was strong, and all attempts to wriggle and squirm to escape were ineffective. But she still tried. She used her short nails to tear at the face and pull at the matted hair that hovered over her shoulder. She kicked with her boots into shins that were covered by clothing that tore with her efforts.

  He cursed but did not let go.

  His stink was in her nose. Unwashed, dirty, foul. He moved them backwards through the trees. His boots left a trail of displaced leaves. This man had nowhere left to go, there was no force on this earth that would keep her men from her. They were close, she could feel them. She kicked, she clawed. She was small, but she was fed, strong.

  Then the cool kiss of a blade was at her throat.

  Kira had the urge to laugh.

  ‘You make another move and I’ll cut you.’

  His voice was eager, excited. As she squirmed, her greatest fear prodded her through the layers of clothing between them. She squashed that feeling, rode the adrenaline. When she did laugh, it came out as a hysterical giggle, too loud, too sharp. ‘You’re not going to do anything to one of the only women left on this earth.’

  At the undeniable feminine lilt to her voice, and the statement of the obvious, his grip faltered.

  She was ready. She tore her body from his arms and bolted, another scream erupted from her throat with an abundance of force.

  They would find her.

  She didn’t look back. It would only waste the precious moments in victory. Nick would locate her. Euan would never stop looking. She just had to get away. She just had to find somewhere to hide. They weren’t far. They were never far from her.

  A small voice whispered in her ear. Maybe all their protective requirements weren’t so unnecessary after all.

  A body ploughed against her and she tumbled to the ground. She ate dirt. Her breath was knocked out of her. Stunned, listless, it was easy for him to pick her up and throw her over his shoulder.

  The sharp angles of the bones that made up his shoulder were painful as they stabbed into her belly, and the lack of air in her lungs was the cause of her gasps. They ran through the trees. Branches whipped at her exposed face, caught in her hair.

  Where was Nick, Euan?

  It was a sudden realisation. The thought as she hung listlessly over a skinny man’s shoulders, that she was waiting to be rescued.

  She could damn well rescue herself.

  The man that held her was tall but malnourished. She was small, and he held her tight. But she was also agile.

  She twisted. Her breath now in her lungs, she screamed. It wheezed out of her. But it was still a shrill wail. It still could be heard.

  But it didn’t matter.

  Up ahead was the one thing that could ruin Euan and Nick’s attempt at rescue.

  The truck rumbled, loud and ominous. Over his shoulder she couldn’t see it, but the vibrations of its engine reverberated with the call of the damned. If she was ensnared in that vehicle, she would have only a slim hope of escape. She struggled with all her meagre might. She kicked, scratched, fought, railed.

  Behind her, the screech of a door swung open to accommodate the oncoming man and his prize.

  ‘They said not to take prisoners.’

  A voice from inside the cab startled her only long enough for her captor to say, ‘He’ll want this one. It’s a woman.’

  Four hands were on her. Four hands that gripped, pinched, pu
lled. Her clothes tore and her hair came loose. Her scarf was gone and her feminine features were visible to the sky.

  And to two men whose intentions turned lecherous.

  They spoke of foul things even as she struggled. They spoke of their intentions, of their destination and all that she would suffer when she got there.

  The back seat of the cab was at her back, her escape almost out of reach. She had a brief moment of reprieve, and she heard him come, she sat up just as Nick crashed through the trees.

  Blond hair wild, face of stony determination, eyes no longer green, lost to gold resentment and fury. He raised his rifle but couldn’t fire. She was entangled in them too tightly.

  The man in the cab didn’t hesitate. He didn’t have the risk of hitting the woman he loved. The click of a primer was the only warning they had.

  The gun fired.

  The spatter of Nick’s blood was all she saw. Crimson so bright, it looked unreal. The body of the man she loved, the man she adored, the man she worshipped and revered shuddered, jerked and fell backwards. A face contorted in shock and pain was her last consideration before, in Kira’s surprise, she was manhandled into the cab.

  And the truck drove off in a cloud of dust and stones.

  Chapter 14

  Nick

  Nick had one chance, one priority. He’d given an oath. He would not let Euan or Kira down.

  Wild, angry, afraid, Nick hurtled through the trees. His heart shuddered inside his chest, his hands slipped against the grip of his rifle, and his breath was ragged in his lungs. His throat ached from the chill. The terrible fear propelled him forward.

  The trees thinned, and the increase in the light forced him to squint. Instinct drove him faster. It took an extra moment to realise why.

  The rumbling sound of an engine was unforgettable, and its proximity heralded horror.

  He could see the dark outline of the truck through the spindly branches. An ominous shadow against a brilliant white background. His eyes stung. Only a few more steps and he would be there. He could save her. Just a little closer.

  He broke through the tree line.

  In that flashing instant, his vision consumed the picture before him, and he saw everything. The decayed tarmac that stretched out before them. The brown oak, the blue mountains. Kira battling with a man in grey-green rags. A reconditioned jeep, its rusted exterior modified and wrangled for the new world. A second man, his body tight with fortitude and his eyes bright with hate, moving from Kira to the wheel of the vehicle.

  The barrel of a gun pointed his way, the dark hole of the muzzle a pinpoint of blackness.

  He raised his weapon. But she was too close. He couldn’t risk it.

  He faulted.

  And slipped.

  The thundering crack of the gunshot reverberated through the forest and he fell. In an instant, his view went from his worst nightmare to the grey sky, bilious with swollen clouds.

  There was the tear of the fabric at his arm, the shred of his skin underneath, the zing of his nerves as they registered the destruction, the attempt of his brain to compute the information through the chaos.

  His back hit the earth. His breath shot out of his chest. He grunted through the agony, the shock, the confusion.

  Kira was screaming. It pulled him from his second of reprieve. He rolled, desperate. He gagged, he wheezed, he coughed.

  The truck’s engine revved. Nick pulled himself up to his knees. His hand, free of weapon and hope reached out to the vehicle, to Kira, as the back door slammed closed and the truck lurched forward.

  Nick screamed her name, his voice was not his own. Hoarse, horrified, despairing. Christ, she was being taken from them. Their beautiful little living fairy, the embodiment of bravery and perfection, of courage and love. One of the last women on this earth, maybe the last woman untainted by the horrors of the new world, was about to vanish before his eyes. If they lost her, the odds of holding her again were minuscule. But the probability of her hurt beyond repair was undefinable in its significance. Nick struggled to his feet and screamed for her again.

  His gun lost, his body trembled, Nick staggered forward on unresponsive feet …

  Just as Euan dashed past him.

  He was a blur of black fatigues and muddy boots, a man possessed who sprinted with power unknown towards the retreating vehicle.

  The big man was still not fully recovered from surgery. His feet not yet healed from the burns and lacerations made from fire and miles travelled through rugged terrain without shoes. He had one eye missing, often tripped.

  Yet, his speed was inhuman.

  At the sight of Euan, Nick’s faculties kicked in. He was no longer a man who gasped on the ground, he became a predator, his mate stolen from him. He found inner strength he never knew he possessed and ran with the power of determination in his veins.

  He caught up to Euan before he had even fully comprehended that he had begun to run.

  They were within reach of the vehicle. The engine whined and clunked. Whatever biofuel the occupants had used as power for the truck was a poor substitute for the fossil fuel that had once been in abundance.

  The shadow of Kira’s face could be seen through the back window. Details of her features were almost indistinguishable through the grime, but her white-blonde hair was undeniable. Her pink lips were open in a silent wail of despair, a purple smudge and significant swelling under one of her eyes. Her ghostly fingers gripping the edge of the back seat as they held each other’s gazes for a heartbeat.

  Beside him, Euan reached out. His long fingers were impossibly close to the rusted bumper. A few more sure steps and he would grip it, pull his body close, climb the vehicle and take control.

  The driver found third gear.

  The truck pulled away with a lurch, a roar and a cloud of black smoke.

  Kira’s muffled howl from within the cabin eclipsed even the deafening thunder of the engine. Nick’s own shout of anguish reverberated through the trees. Euan’s was quick to follow.

  Birds took flight. The yellow and green clouds swelled and rumbled. The oxygen-rich air was thick as Nick pulled it into his lungs. His pants were laced with sobs.

  They both ran until the truck, and its plume of exhaust, disappeared into oblivion.

  Nick’s hands shook. His mouth was filled with the taste of ash and misery. He fell to his knees on the tar, fisted his hair at his temples and screamed profanities towards the heavens.

  He was destroyed. He knew. He knew firsthand what was going to happen to that beauty. The tarnish that would colour the preciousness. The vile filth that would destroy the perfection.

  The perfection that was Kira.

  His body shuddered from the dreadful knowledge.

  Then Euan’s hands were in his hair. Warm, strong fingers pulled at his fists. Nick shook his head, attempted to dislodge the tender probing. He didn’t deserve the cosseting. Euan had trusted him to find her, save her, get her safe.

  And he’d failed.

  A single brown eye consumed his vision. Gone was the warm molasses. In its place was the dark, cracked surface of charred timber. The fire that had blemished the wood still burned behind the iris. The fierce determination was etched into the coloured muscle. A jaw, covered in a thick dark beard, was clenched tight, as hard as stone, as strong as fortified steel. The crooked nose, the cauliflower ears, the eyepatch and naked scalp was familiar, and yet, almost everything about it had altered.

  Instinctively, Nick understood. Euan’s mask was gone, and in its place was the warrior that had pulled him from the brink of destruction. The fighter that had run for sixteen hours straight after he cut the throat of a man who had sold his life to meet the devil. He had run on decaying boots with nothing in his belly and no hope that what he searched for would be there at the end of his terrible journey.

  Before him now was the boxer that had fought for their lives in a dirt pit built for death, that had sent two souls to the wind with nothing more than a miniature axe
and his wits.

  The soldier that endured horrifying torture, so that he would never utter the whereabouts of those he loved, those he called family.

  The man that now held his cheeks in his hands, who waited for Nick to calm. A man who brushed his thumbs under Nick’s eyes to dispel the wetness. A man whose knees knocked his own, both oblivious to the bite of the rough surface into their tight skin underneath. A man who made soothing noises through scarred lips, to quieten the tremor in Nick’s body.

  Everything Euan did now would be for one single purpose. To save Kira. To communicate his plan to rescue the most precious thing left on this earth.

  ‘How bad are you hurt?’

  The words seemed garbled at first. As if Euan spoke another language. When they registered, so did the pain.

  Burning fire. Agony. Wetness. Nick attempted to move his arm to understand the damage, only to draw in a sharp breath as the spike of hurt speared through his nerves.

  It was Euan who let go of Nick’s face to look. He clucked as he drew back the torn fabric and opened the wound on his forearm to the air. ‘Bleeding like a river,’ he muttered, his gaze narrowed. ‘It will need stitches before we go.’

  Nick blinked. ‘Go?’

  Euan raised that single eye to meet his. The scar that ran down from the bottom of his black eyepatch to bisect his cheek was still pink, purple, and dotted with white reminders of the stitches that had held his flesh together. An angry token to the horrors that Kira would now face. ‘We’ve got three choices, kid.’

  The breath caught in Nick’s lungs. He swallowed.

  Euan’s hands were back at his cheeks, and this time, Nick was not so consumed by the horrors of what had happened to be ignorant of the tremor in the muscles that held his face. He looked closer to discover Euan’s fear was just as prominent as his. The big man was just a master at concealing it.

  After a swallow and a slow blink, Euan continued. ‘First, we can both go after her. Second, we can both find what’s left of Mickey-O’s men in an attempt to use them to save her.’ He paused, breathed. ‘Third, we can split up. Each take one path, in the hope that we increase the odds of success.’