Darklight 2: Darkthirst

by Forrest, Bella

  Dorian gritted his teeth in frustration. “It’s too powerful to stop from the ground.”

  “If we can take out its wings, it will stop,” I shouted. “The wings were chained before.”

  We needed to stop it, fast. I leaned up over the top of the saddle, staring at the place where my knife had previously pierced its skin. Inky blood slowly bubbled out of the wound but not enough to suggest I’d caused any real damage.

  “I’m going to try to injure the spinal cord,” I yelled to Dorian.

  “Leave the wings to me,” he shouted back and leapt effortlessly to the first pair. He dodged a powerful flap and tore through them with two small, hooked blades he took from the other side of his belt. The monster screamed in pain as Dorian jumped back and forth between the wings, slashing at any flesh he could reach.

  The monster bucked, and I held the blade in my hand, poised above its neck. Using the last of the furious strength in my body, I forced the blade through its sickly, scaly skin. It immediately screeched in pain. My pulse stuttered with hope. Had it worked?

  The intense wind from the monster’s frantically beating wings began to slow, the left side going completely limp. Dorian rolled out of the way with inky blood on his hands. The monster made no sound as we plummeted.

  Oh, no.

  “I don’t know what I hit, but it did something,” I told Dorian as gravity took over. I clung to the saddle with shaking hands.

  Dorian did the same with a grim expression. “Get ready to follow me,” he said.

  For several awful seconds, we were freefalling toward the rocky forested mountaintop. I screeched with terror, my stomach flipping wildly. The monster seized beneath me and released a tired death rattle from its scratchy throat. Beside us, Dorian’s redbill dove, keeping pace despite the blood dripping from various places on its body.

  “Jump!” Dorian yelled.

  I leapt for the redbill’s back just as the monster spasmed, completely losing control of its body, and I lost my balance. For a terrifying moment, I swore my heart stopped, as there was nothing but air between me and the jagged ground below.

  Then Dorian’s arm wrapped around me, and he hurtled us over to the redbill. The bird gave a startled cry, crumpling beneath our combined weight. It tumbled to the earth, barely in control. I grunted in pain as my arm caught on a nearby branch, pressing my head against the bill’s feathers. If we were going to die, I didn’t want to know. The redbill couldn’t rise above the trees, and they were packed tightly together. The bird spiraled down, following the creature.

  The redbill cried out as its body struck the first branch. I felt several more intense impacts before we crashed to the ground, skidding to a stop in dirt and leaves and blood and feathers. The landing threw Dorian and me to the ground. We rolled across the forest floor, dead leaves and rocks kicking up painfully beneath my body.

  We finally stopped. I took in a shuddering breath, feeling like I had just been run over by a tank. Dorian’s arm was wrapped protectively around my bruised ribs—he hadn’t let go throughout the entire chaotic tumble. I sat up alongside Dorian, his hand still holding my side. Something crunched in the forest. We froze. Was the creature still alive? My knees quivered from exhaustion.

  Please be dead. It has to be dead.

  My body contained zero fight. The adrenaline had burned my nerves to a crisp. We waited in tense silence, but there was nothing. Only the occasional crash of falling limbs from the wreckage of the treetops, torn down by the monster’s immense body.

  “It’s dead,” Dorian finally announced. “I can feel it.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. He stared at me, his handsome face marred with shock. I opened my mouth to say something, but no words came out. We looked at one another, reeling from the last few minutes. Looking at our impossible situation, I couldn’t help but start laughing, giddy to just be alive and knowing that if I didn’t do something, I would probably start screaming.

  Dorian stared at me for a few seconds, jaw slack with disbelief, before his face contorted with fury. He grabbed my shoulders with a fierce movement. “You could’ve gotten yourself killed,” he snarled. “You were absolutely reckless!”

  Wrath filled me instantly, my laughter evaporating. “Like you’re any better,” I yelled back, tears pricking my eyes with the intensity of my anger. “You take reckless risks all the time, Dorian!”

  My adrenaline had returned, pumping through my veins, filling every limb with a furious urge to do something. “You think I’m just so fragile,” I snapped. “Did you not watch me sink a tiny blade into the back of an Immortal Plane beast? You seem to be able to do nothing but underestimate me, even when I am acting as any good soldier would. I took that risk to protect the lives of the people that thing would have melted.”

  “And when will you understand that in comparison to things from my world, you are fragile?” he growled. “It is not always your job to remedy the damaging decisions of the Bureau.”

  Our mutual anger crackled in the air in a furious dance between us.

  I grabbed him by the cloak and pressed my lips to his without another word.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  We kissed. There wasn’t an ounce of sweetness in it. It was passion and frustration and weeks of impossible situations.

  He pulled me against his body, his grip almost frantic. My lips seared against his. Glorious agony rocketed through my veins as I pushed myself into his warm embrace. His usual faint scent of cedar was now overwhelming, sending a wave of eager longing through me. I wanted more. How many times had we danced around this? I couldn’t handle fighting against my feelings anymore. I just wanted to have this moment without worrying about our survival. I wanted to be selfish.

  Warm pain lit in my chest, but a deep pleasure was wrapped around it. My mind burst with delight, the chaos of the scene all-encompassing.

  Rising to my knees, I wrapped my arms around him, slipping under his cloak, and dragged my hand up his back, letting my nails dig in through the thin material of his shirt. He grunted, pleased, returning the kiss. Desperately, he pressed himself against me, hand tugging insistently at my hair, needing more. I responded in kind. I wanted him. His everything. Even with the pain in my chest, it felt too good to stop.

  The pain was nowhere near as bad as our last kiss, yet the burn creeping into the edges of my vision began to rival the desire clawing deep in my belly. Pull away, you fool.

  With a strength I didn’t know I had, I reluctantly broke away, sitting back and tilting my face upward to the cool night air. My chest rose and fell as I panted for breath, my face flushed warm. Dorian got to his feet with a look of tight restraint, running his hands through his hair as he paced for a moment to regain his composure. We both knew the pain was dangerous, yet we both deeply wanted to continue. To be more. To be closer. But nothing had changed for the better since our last discussion about this… us. We’d agreed it wasn’t a good idea right now. In fact, many external factors had become much worse.

  I swallowed the grief in my throat as the realization crashed over me.

  “It wasn’t as bad as last time,” I said hoarsely, trying to find a positive way to break the silence before I had to go back to talking about death and betrayal and exhausting conflict. My throat was tired from shouting.

  He lifted his hands and flexed them as if trying to contain his need to reach out for me. Finally, he closed his eyes with an expression torn between primal longing and the logical worry I loved.

  I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to replace the glorious feeling of his comfort. The space between us seemed small. It would be easy to cross again, but I stopped myself. He needed to know what had happened.

  I told him about the CIA meeting and what had occurred afterward. “Finley shot Grayson,” I finished bitterly, shuddering at the recollection. “There’s no way he survived, Dorian. We couldn’t stop to help him with the Bureau soldiers and the monster.” I shook my head, feeling a rising sadness. I could still he
ar that first vicious gunshot, swept away in the wind along with Grayson’s startled cry as the bullet pierced his chest. “He died alone and betrayed.”

  I’ll never let the Bureau live this down, Grayson. I would get justice for him somehow.

  I swiped at the tears forming. “And Zach… Gina… I have no idea where they are or if they even survived the crash.” My fist crashed down into the dirt. “How many more lives is this mess going to cost?”

  Dorian’s expression turned solemn. Shadows gathered on his face as he leveled a tormented gaze at me. My stomach dropped. He still hadn’t told me about the mission in the Immortal Plane.

  “What happened?” I asked, wishing I could touch him again to comfort him.

  “It was bad,” he admitted unsteadily. “We lost Jeth and Myndra in the Immortal Plane. Rhome went off after his family. Now they’re all missing.” His face looked worn, lined with grief. He dragged a hand through his hair and sucked in a measured breath.

  His cousin’s family. I sank my fingers into the soft mulch of the forest floor, needing to ground myself, unable to process this news. How could this be happening? The only slight silver lining was Rhome being able to go after his family. Had he found Kreya and been reunited with his children, even amid the chaos of the Immortal Plane? Carwin and Detra would be overjoyed to see Rhome if he could manage to find them.

  “I’m sorry, Dorian. Do you have an official count among your group?” I asked, swallowing the hard lump in my throat. I had no idea whether he’d been able to fully take stock of his group. Were they forced to flee? He’s already lost so much of his family.

  His glacial eyes flickered with pain. “Laini, Bravi, Sike, and most of the newer recruits made it back.”

  Laini, his fallen brother’s partner, was the only member of his family left on this plane. Laini, who was kind and sweet even when things got tough between the vampires and humans. Dorian had fought hard to keep the last scraps of his family together. I shut my eyes for a moment, blinking away my furious tears. This wasn’t fair. None of this chaos was justified, yet we had to live with it.

  “What happened to the others?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice from shaking. I was hopeful for more information about Rhome’s pursuit of his family.

  “We got to the Immortal Plane to find Detra had been captured by one of our immortal enemies,” Dorian relayed. “Kreya had been coming back through our ruined city toward the tear, running from a hunting party, but they caught up to her and took Detra. We followed the signs of the struggle and found Kreya in pursuit. She was… devastated but determined.”

  I nodded with understanding. In my mind’s eye, I could see Kreya, understandably stubborn and unwilling to back down at the loss of her little daughter. Kreya would do anything to get Detra back. She loved her children fiercely. I hoped desperately that Detra was okay. She was an innocent child. Tears stung my eyes again, less angry this time. Grief choked my throat. I dropped my gaze, hiding my face. Dorian had been through enough in the last few days. I didn’t want to add to his emotional burden.

  But what did Dorian mean by an immortal enemy? Something like the acid monster we had just faced? Something about it sounded more sinister than that brutish mass.

  “We couldn’t find the Immortal in question, and we ran into some trouble as we tried to track the enemy down,” he muttered bitterly. “It was too much to do all at once.” His eyes focused on the wreckage in the distance where the monster’s body had scraped the forest clean.

  I shivered unconsciously, picturing the beasts they had met along the way.

  “By the time we fought it off, my family was gone,” Dorian said with a grim shake of his head. “It was chaos. All I know is Rhome went with Kreya in search of Detra, and they took Carwin with them. Everything else happened so fast. Rhome and Kreya were desperate to find Detra and bring her back. I didn’t want to split the group, but there was no time to communicate. Before I could do or say anything, Rhome and Kreya were gone.”

  There were no right decisions in situations like these. Rhome had reunited with Kreya, at least, but Kreya did something awful to him and his family by leaving in the first place. Would they be able to sort things out while looking for their daughter? I hoped they could find Detra together. What kind of enemy took Detra and to what end? From Dorian’s description, the capture sounded purposeful. The acid monster didn’t have that sort of strategic thinking, from what I could tell.

  A pang of fear struck my body. Dorian’s family was on their own in the Immortal Plane trying to get Detra back. Detra, full of life and mischief, could be anywhere. I doubted they’d found her yet. The Immortal Plane seemed like a lawless place full of twists and turns for an enemy to hide in. I prayed Dorian was right about small groups finding it easier to travel through the plane.

  “We spent too much time looking for them,” Dorian added. “Our large group kept attracting predators, and we were losing people. We had to return.”

  I nodded, wiping away lingering tears. The aftermath of the battle was fully catching up with my body now. I hadn’t realized how much adrenaline and grief were still coursing through me.

  Dorian caught my torn expression. “Lyra,” he said. “I was worried about you.”

  The ground blurred, and I sensed more than saw Dorian move to kneel in front of me. Our anger before… it was out of deep affection. The thought scared and soothed me.

  “I couldn’t watch you get hurt again,” Dorian said. His hand found my shoulder, then slipped up to trace the curve of my neck and jaw.

  I leaned into his touch, ignoring the slight burn in my chest. The pleasure of contact outweighed the painful sensation. “I don’t want to watch you get hurt either,” I agreed. A sob escaped my mouth.

  I forced my chin up to meet his gaze. To my surprise, tears brimmed in his eyes too. Tears of grief, concern, love, anger. We were in a mess, but we were together. I leaned my forehead against his chest. Trying to steal a second of peace in the chaos made me want to curse life for being cruel and unfair.

  “We’ll figure out our next steps, and we’ll figure out our situation,” Dorian promised. I nodded against his chest and breathed his scent, feeling some relief from it.

  It’s time for strategy. One day, this will be over… one way or another.

  I pulled myself away, sniffling but feeling fractionally better. “Thanks.”

  “I’m here for you,” he said in a low voice. “Never forget that.”

  The quiet forest around us seemed to buzz with peace. No monsters right now. It was time to pull ourselves together. I could feel bruises blooming to life all over my body. My ribs felt especially sore after being thrown around the monster’s back like a sentient sack of potatoes. I wasn’t bleeding badly from any of my cuts and scrapes, though, and I was grateful for that. The worst soreness would come tomorrow, my muscles promised.

  Now that I’d taken stock of my own injuries, I turned my concern to Dorian. He had been working hard and pushing himself for weeks now. Although his vampire physiology protected him from some damage, he wasn’t anywhere close to full strength, especially if he hadn’t managed to feed while he was in the Immortal Plane.

  I frowned as I surveyed him. He didn’t flinch from my studying look. He had looked the same way back when he was starving during the trial experiment after he’d nearly attacked that man in Las Vegas. I bit my lip, using the slight pain to distract me and keep the memories of his wild hunger at bay.

  Of course, we all looked rough. Dorian’s redbill was alive but looked quite badly wounded. It stood a few yards away from us in a darker patch of trees and winced as it shivered its wings slightly. A puddle of blood stained the ground beneath its wing, but most of the bleeding from the actual wound appeared to have stopped.

  Dorian followed my stare. “He’ll be able to fly on his own, but there’s no way we can ride him,” he noted.

  “Do you have anything we can use to patch up your redbill?” I asked. “I’ve got nothing.” I ge
stured down at my outfit. Boot daggers, an electric baton, sore muscles, torn clothes, and that was it. Even the dagger from Dorian was now somewhere in the mountains, still buried in the monster’s neck.

  “I’ve got a small medical kit,” he said and pulled a bundle from under his cloak. He unrolled it to reveal a few metal instruments, a pile of gauze bandages, thread, and several small leather pouches that gave off a pungent smell. “He may not need it. He’s tougher than he looks.”

  We approached carefully, and I helped hold the bill’s wing steady while Dorian smeared a thick blue paste from one of the small bags across the worst wound just under the joint. Most of the bleeding had stopped, but hopefully, whatever salve he applied would help to clot and protect against infection. The redbill gave a chirp that sounded tired and grateful.

  “You’ve had worse, Drigar,” Dorian said, smoothing the bird’s feathers as he worked. “I nearly landed you in a nest of immortal beasts the other day. You were able to get us out of that, too.”

  I raised a curious eyebrow as I listened to him ramble, not entirely sure he remembered I was there. “Drigar?” I echoed.

  Dorian smiled softly. “It’s a word from the Immortal Plane, though there’s no direct translation,” he admitted. “I don’t often use his name. My touch and unconscious connection with him is usually enough, but he needs extra comfort now.”

  I felt bad for Drigar. He had stayed loyal to Dorian even when the other redbills fled to safety.

  “We can let him feed in the forest as we go along,” Dorian announced, wiping the last traces of salve and blood onto the hem of his cloak. “Fortunately, he can survive on blood from animals as well as humans. In fact, I think Drigar prefers it.”

  “They can?” I asked. “It seemed like humans were their favorite treats.”

  “I get the impression from the redbills that they just find humans to be easy prey.” Dorian’s face was serious, but his eyes gave him away. They glimmered with amusement.