I could see Callon swallow before he spoke. “We know there’s one fairly close that’s been moving this way. That’s enough to be a problem, and we can’t simply hope it stops after what we saw.”
Boom. The room grew quiet again.
I waited.
I looked around.
I waited some more.
No one was picking up the reins.
As much as I’d wanted to fall into the cracks and pretend I wasn’t here, the thing was coming for me. I couldn’t afford even the tiniest crack if this was the way it was going. I needed to get this situation moving in the right direction, away from me, or it would be my ass swallowed by the mud next time.
We didn’t have time to sit around and ponder for another couple of days, which might turn to weeks, which might turn to a Teddy-shaped pile of mud. Callon had never struck me as a man of no action, but he didn’t seem to be stepping up to the plate. I’d have to save my own ass, and everyone else’s in the process.
I pushed off the wall. “We need to build a barrier around the one closest to us. It might not stop it, but maybe we can slow it down.”
I looked around the room, trying to ignore Callon. No one seemed overly enthused.
“That thing turned into a monster,” Hess said. “Should we really be getting close to it again?”
He had a good point, but maybe not a valid one. “It’s never acted like that before. Even as it approached the Magician, it was slow. I think that was an isolated event, as if it drew out some of the Magician’s magic. And we wouldn’t go to that one. We go to the one closer.”
“What’ll contain it?” Tuesday asked, trying to make sure her voice was heard in this meeting.
“We use me to lure it and we find out what it can’t breach. There’s going to be something, whether it be fire or acid or stone. Nothing is invincible. There’s always a weakness.” I looked about the room, and there was less resistance this time, only nods. Yeah, I’d thought that was a good point too.
When no one else picked up the baton by chiming in, I realized I was going to have to continue leading this meeting, this thing, this possibly doomed mission. When had I become a leader? I’d not signed up for this, and the whole thing grated, but I continued past the chafe.
“We don’t have a lot of time to figure it out, not after what we saw,” I said. “These Hell Pits, whatever they are, they’re much worse than we feared. I say we head out to the closest one tomorrow, armed with supplies. Anything you can think of that might work. And I mean anything—bring an old, stinky sock if you think it’ll repel it. We go, and then we go again, and keep going until we find something that stops it.” I’d paced up and down the room twice when I realized I’d pretty much given them a war cry. I was getting fairly decent facial responses, but they kept looking.
It needed a solid ending. I didn’t want to be a leader, but they were waiting for a closer. “We’re going to kick this fucker’s ass.” Boom. There was my ending and as good as I had. Which wasn’t that great, but seemed to do the trick for some.
Tuesday was smiling, as if she were about to raise her fist in the air and cheer me on. Koz was patting Tuesday’s leg again as he smiled at me. Hess was nodding. That wasn’t too bad. Zink shrugged. It was something, especially from him.
I wasn’t going to look at Callon because I didn’t need his approval or encouragement. If I looked, it meant I wanted it, which I did not. The guys might need his approval, but I was not part of his pack. I didn’t even want to be in the same fruit bowl anymore. I shouldn’t even be leading this debacle. I had no leadership skills.
Then my eyes flicked to him for a fraction of a second. He gave me a shrug. What the hell was a shrug? I’d done a lot better than a shrug. He should keep his stupid shrug to himself.
“We’ll start out at first light tomorrow,” Callon said, standing. “Zink, organize and send people out to any of the other Hell Pits within fifty miles of here. I want to know what other ones are shifting, and I want as accurate a location as they can get.”
“On it,” Zink said, getting up and leaving the office.
Hess moved toward the door. “I’m going to start gathering supplies.”
“We’ll help.” Tuesday stood, grabbing Koz’s hand and tugging him along with her.
Tuesday paused by the door with a look, telling me to find her later.
I was the last one to leave. I moved toward the door, not sure why I’d dallied at all.
“You did well,” Callon said as I walked past him.
I stopped, looked his way, and shrugged.
I went to leave the room and then slowed my steps. Had he just forced me into taking the lead? Nah. Why would he do that? This was Callon I was thinking about. He didn’t hand over the reins for anything, not even cooking his sausage.
But he had. I turned back to him. “Why did you want me to lead this meeting? What was the point of that?”
He leaned back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Well, that was a bald-faced lie if I’d ever heard.
“Are you mad because of last night? Is that what this is about? Slow torture?” I kept a close eye on his eyes, watching for a flash of red. There was nothing, not even a glimmer.
“Not at all.”
I walked out. He could keep his secrets.
Twelve
I stared at the shelves in the cellar: dried meat, potatoes, different-colored stuff in jars, some other root-looking things I couldn’t name. Nothing struck me with inspiration for the Hell Pit, but I didn’t want anything left behind.
The clatter of someone making a mad rush down the stairs had me turning in that direction.
“I’ve been looking all over for you,” Tuesday said.
She locked her hand down on my wrist and began tugging me out of the cellar.
“Is it important? I’m still looking for stuff to bring.”
“We can’t carry all the stuff we already have ready.” She continued to drag me along after her.
I let her because it was Tuesday. Anyone else and I’d have told them to get the hell off me.
“Where are we going?”
“I don’t want to tell you. I want you to see it.” Tuesday pulled my arm forward until it was locked under hers so tight that there was no chance of escape.
We pushed through the door into the kitchen where Issy was having her late tea. She had tea three times a day, like clockwork. Breakfast, afternoon, and right before dusk.
“Teddy, do you want to have a snack? I’ve got one last jar of strawberry preserves,” Issy said as Tuesday dragged me through the kitchen.
“I’m good. Thanks anyway,” I said.
Tuesday paused by the back door, thrusting my coat at me. I barely had time to put it on before she was pushing me outside.
“How come she’s so much nicer to you than me? Do you think I did something to piss her off?” Tuesday asked as she took the lead, since I had no idea where we were going.
“You didn’t do anything to piss her off. I did something to make her like me with the whole lifesaving thing. I’m new to this, but it does come with some benefits.”
“Yeah, I’d give you the last preserves too. Has she asked you about it?” She was huffing a little as we began hiking uphill.
“Luckily, no, because I definitely don’t want to talk about it. It’s creepy. I’m creepy.” I looked about the trees as we kept climbing. There was nothing up here. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere spectacular that isn’t so far that we’ll have an issue with your Callon problem.” She was pushing through trees and barely squeezing through.
Were those wind chimes? “Where’s that tinkling noise coming from?”
“You mean the water?”
“No. That chiming sound. Don’t you hear it?”
“No. Come on, hurry up.”
I didn’t move right away, trying to hear it again, but it faded into the sound of water. “We have a stream closer to the lodge. Wh
y are we climbing all the way up here to get water?”
“Just come on,” she said, walking until we hit a clearing with a lot of rocks and a small pond.
She stripped off her jacket and dropped it to the ground. Her boots were kicked off next, then her pants dropped.
“Are you nuts? It’s going to be freezing.”
She pulled her shirt off. “It’s a hot spring. It’s fantastic,” Tuesday said as she jumped in. “Come on. This’ll help you sleep tonight.”
She was right. Steam rose from the surface of the water in lazy spirals. I stripped out of my clothes and jumped in with her, my entire body unwinding as the warm water surrounded it.
“This is amazing.” I leaned my head back on a rock as I let the water suck all the tension from my limbs.
Tuesday stretched out her legs. “I know. Koz brought me here last night after he told me about the Hell Pits.” She leaned her head back and then smiled. “It really limbered us up,” she said, and then giggled.
An image of Callon climbing in here with me popped into my mind. Only Callon would try to hijack my daydreams too. Maybe I needed to get it out of my system. If being around him helped me sleep, maybe sex with him would cure me for a week?
“How did you end up getting together with Koz? Like, how exactly did it happen? What did you do or what did he do?” I dipped a little deeper into the spring, letting the water take the blame for my flushed skin.
“You mean the nitty-gritty play-by-play?” Her look started with a squinty eye that corrupted the rest of her face until she was beaming at me with a toothy grin.
“Yeah.” I ducked my head under the water for a couple of seconds. Her face hadn’t changed when I came back up for air.
“Why? What are you thinking about? I know it’s not Koz and me.”
I leaned my head back, taking in the place one more time. “We’re pretty far away from the lodge, right?” Even beast ears wouldn’t be able to hear up here.
“It’s safe. Spill.” Tuesday stared at me like I was about to tell her all the secrets of the universe. The pressure was almost too much, considering there was nothing to spill.
“There’s nothing to tell.” I was wishing like hell I hadn’t started this.
Tuesday rolled her hand and her eyes at the same time. “I know there’s something. Spill already.”
The crease between her brows said she wasn’t going to drop this.
“When we went out to meet the Magician, we stayed in tents the first night. I thought Callon was going to sleep outside. When he came in the tent and started to take off his jacket, there was a moment that I thought he was going to try to fuck me. Or at least kiss me.” The memory of him kneeling over me as he undressed, and then doing nothing else, made me bitter even now.
She leaned closer. “Did you freak out?”
I shook my head quickly. “No. That’s the thing. If you had asked me before it happened, I would’ve told you I had no interest.” I wouldn’t have been lying. Baryn had ruined that for me, or so I’d thought. Years of Baryn being his twisted self had created scars you couldn’t see. The idea of a man touching me had revolted me before now.
I wasn’t sure what had happened or why I’d switched on with Callon. I barely tolerated him most days. And yet I wanted him.
I ducked my head under the water again before I broke the surface and said, “I might’ve been a little disappointed.”
“So you’re admitting you like him?”
I pushed off the rock, wading around the hot spring. “No, I’m doing nothing of the sort. I don’t like him. I’d even go as far as saying I hate him most of the time. He’s controlling and pushy and just…” I raised one hand and made a growling sound, because the words to describe how much I wanted to rip Callon apart had not yet been invented.
Tuesday leaned back, watching me as she shook her head. “Most people don’t want to sleep with a person they hate. That’s an awful lot of emotion in one direction. You know, feelings can overlap. Hate can layer over love and make a person all sorts of confused.”
“I may not be in touch with my feelings all the time, but I’m not in love.” Burying emotions had been one of the ways I’d survived. But to suggest love? She was crazy. Disdain? Dislike? There were plenty of fitting words for the kinds of feelings I had.
Suddenly, it hit me. It made sense why I wanted him.
“You know why it had to be him? He’s too cold to care if I use him and I don’t want entanglements. I don’t want love. I want to test the waters, you know? Have some kind of normal experience with a man I don’t have to worry about being with. Like, maybe sex with Callon can be a reset? He’ll wash away the other memories like spring rain over dirty skin, and then I can move on.”
The gleam in Tuesday’s eyes died with my words, and the corners of her mouth finally found anchors strong enough to weigh them down.
Just when you thought you knew someone, they threw you for a loop. Sometimes Tuesday could confuse the hell out of me.
“What now? I thought you wanted me to get together with him?” I asked.
She gripped one of the stones that formed the pool and tilted her head slightly to the side. She said in the quietest voice, “Teddy, you’re not dirty.”
I laughed. “Of course I’m not. I’m in water.”
She didn’t laugh with me. “I’m serious, Teddy.”
“I know. I know,” I said, trying to move the subject along.
She was shaking her head slightly. “I’m not sure you do.”
“I do know. Can we move past this? I don’t want to think on the village anymore, or Baryn. I want to move on, and Callon might be helpful in that area. So, are you going to help me?” I asked, knowing her answer would be yes. It was always yes. She’d help me, whether I liked how or not, sometimes whether I wanted her to or not. She was Tuesday.
She waded in the water, nodding. “Okay, so let’s make a game plan. I’m sure we can get him in bed with you. Sex? Easy-peasy. Getting an ‘I love you’ is the hard part.” She stared off for a second. “I should know. Koz has said everything else, how I’m beautiful and smart and funny and oh so wonderful. Just not that.” She raised her hands as if she were choking an invisible man.
He’d say it to her eventually because he did. I saw it in the way he looked at her. I was also positive because if he didn’t, I was going to beat him to a pulp and threaten to suck the life from him.
“You two haven’t been together that long, but it’ll happen,” I assured her. I was the last person in the world who should be giving advice in these matters. I knew little of love in general and nothing of the romantic kind. But this conversation had little to do with knowledge and everything to do with gut and knowing I’d be around to make sure she heard the words she needed to be happy.
Tuesday turned her eyes back to me. “You really think so?”
“Yes, I do.” Clearly my lack of experience didn’t seem to devalue my opinion in Tuesday’s mind. Although if a toad could talk and tell her the same, she’d probably listen. As long as the message was right, she didn’t care who delivered it.
“Well, luckily we don’t have to cross that hurdle with you. All you want is easy stuff,” she said.
“Are you sure?” Nothing about Callon had been easy yet.
“Oh my wilds, yes. If he were with someone else it might be different, but the single ones always seem to be looking for a place to stick it in.”
My face scrunched. “That sounds horrible.”
“Don’t worry. This is a good thing.” She shrugged and smiled.
Thirteen
It had taken us two hours to get here, and now all I was supposed to do was stand in one spot. That was it. I’d gone from leader of this expedition to a big, fat boulder with a moldy northern side.
“I can do more than this.”
“Yes, you can. You can move farther back if needed. You don’t get any closer to it. You don’t cross this point.” Callon pointed to the ground while he watch
ed my face to make sure I was paying adequate attention. Not only was I paying attention, everyone here was too. Zink, Hess, and Koz were standing closer to the Hell Pit but kept glancing over.
Tuesday was only a few feet away and didn’t bother with the pretense of having an interest in anything else. She stared at us like she was examining a piece of evidence.
Of course I was paying attention. How could I not when he was mentally bludgeoning me with his bossiness, and right in my face? Sometimes I wondered if I were actually free, or had I merely upgraded to a more attractive jailer? He was definitely better looking than my last captor. There was even something intriguing with the way his brow quirked up sometimes.
His eyes narrowed a hair, as if he could sense my interest. Shit. Could he? Dammit.
I needed to put out “pissed off.” Go back to pure anger. I couldn’t show my hand here in the middle of the field next to the smelly Hell Pit. This was not the right moment.
“Can I ask a question?” I crossed my arms and gave him a glare that should’ve warned him what was coming.
“Yes,” he said, sounding less stubborn and more curious.
“Do you imagine I’ll run over there and dive into it? I’m not sure what would happen without your wise directions. I must say, I do have the urge.”
His eyes narrowed. “Unfortunately, left to your own devices, I’m not sure you wouldn’t go leap in.”
Why did I want to sleep with him?
That was right. To wipe my history clean. I needed someone exactly like him, an arrogant ass that wouldn’t care if I used him as long as he got something out of it too. He was perfect for the task.
“You know, I wonder if diving into that smelly sludge might be a blessing in disguise? It might be less painful than this.” I kept my tone logical and calm, as if I were seriously debating it.
“I didn’t chain us together. You did. You chose to be here.” He smiled, as if he’d trumped my high card.
“Really? You want to go there again? Because the only reason I could chain you is you dumped the chain right in my lap while you were hunting for opportunities.” I was insane. I could never sleep with this man, ever. Fuck cleansing. I’d die filthy and be fine with it. He was lucky I didn’t drag him over to that Hell Pit and kick him in.
Savage One: Born Wild Book Two Page 8