“Hold on tight,” I growled, holding Rose closer against my chest as I leapt into the starry abyss.
Chapter 35: Rose
After Rhys had put me to sleep on the boat, I’d come to again once Rhys had already jumped through the crater. The free fall had forced me to consciousness and the next thing I knew, we’d landed on a black pebble beach beneath a tall grey statue. The warlock had refused to answer any questions as he carried me toward the cave, but, despite the agony my leg was causing me, my addled brain managed to come up with some theories.
I thought back to the first time I’d met “Micah”. He’d been floating in the ocean calling for help, claiming he’d strayed outside the boundary and needed our assistance in coming back in. That was how the warlock had first entered The Shade. The real Micah must have strayed past the boundary in search of fish, and that was when the warlock had caught him.
I’d seen with my own eyes how Corrine had managed to turn my mother into my father. I doubted it would have been much of an effort for Rhys to turn into a werewolf. I shuddered to think where Micah might be now, if he was still alive.
I remembered how keen he’d been to stray from the boundary that day on Sun Beach. If Saira hadn’t swum up to stop him, he would have made off with me then.
And to think I’d been beginning to fall for his act… I thought back to our conversation in the boathouse. Rhys had likely made up everything he’d told me about Micah’s tragic past. It had all been designed to evoke sympathy from me and draw me closer. The real Micah likely had a completely different story.
Although I’d managed to piece together some parts of the puzzle, there were still so many questions clouding my mind.
Once Rhys had gained entrance onto the island, why hadn’t he taken the opportunity to sneak more witches in and overpower Mona? If he’d done this, it wouldn’t have been difficult to take over The Shade and our supply of humans.
And why take me of all people? Why would the witches throw away the chance to take over our island just to have me, a weak human girl, kidnapped again?
Nothing made any sense.
My blood was still boiling at the warlock’s deception. I felt almost as angry as I had when I’d believed Caleb too had been a lie. Only in his case, I’d been mistaken.
Now that Caleb had jumped back through the gate with me, I had no idea what was on the other side. I thought we might arrive in Stellan’s or perhaps even Caleb’s island. But when we reached the end of the tunnel, I landed on a bed of wet soil. I gasped for breath. The air was heavy and humid. A symphony of chirping, hissing and buzzing pierced my eardrums. In the distance was the sound of thundering water.
I opened my eyes, trying to adjust to the darkness. We had landed in the undergrowth of some kind of jungle. Sharp-leaved bushes surrounded us. I stared up at the canopy of trees—so thick it shut out the moonlight but for a few shafts.
Caleb stood a few feet away, casting his eyes around the area. He walked over to me and gripped my arms, helping me up. My leg still useless, I had to lean against him for support.
“Where are we?” I whispered.
Before he had a chance to answer, the bushes rustled to our left. I let out a scream as I came face to face with a wild boar. Caleb grabbed me by the waist and helped me onto his back. Holding my weak legs around him, he began to run.
“We need to get far away from the gate,” he said, his chest heaving as we lurched forward with furious speed. I tightened my grip around his shoulders. He was travelling so fast, the jungle was a blur to me and it was a struggle to breathe.
My leg was already causing me agony, but now that it kept bumping against Caleb’s hip as he ran, the pain intensified. After what felt like fifteen minutes, I could no longer hold in my groans of pain. He stopped and laid me down on the ground. He crouched down next to me and rolled up the right leg of my jeans. But these jeans were tight and wouldn’t roll up high enough for him to reach my injury. To my surprise, he lowered his head to my thigh.
“What are you—?”
The tips of his fangs pierced through the fabric and grazed my skin as he ripped a gash in my jeans. He used his claws to tear the rest of the way around my leg and pulled the fabric away, leaving my skin bare, my injury in full view.
His breath hitched. I dared not look down. The pain was overwhelming enough as it was, I was afraid I might lose consciousness again if I saw how mushy a wound the warlock’s sharp boot had caused. I kept my eyes on Caleb’s face.
Extending a claw, he slit the center of his palm. Holding the back of my head with one hand, he held his bloody hand to my lips.
“Drink.”
I refused to drink my own parents’ blood, let alone Caleb’s. But my suffering was now so overwhelming, even I wasn’t stubborn enough to refuse. I held his forearm and sensed his muscles tense as soon as my mouth touched his skin. I ran my tongue gingerly along his palm, lapping up his blood like a cat would do milk.
I held my nose, trying to avoid experiencing the taste. But it had such a strong flavor, I tasted it all the same.
Caleb made me keep drinking for several minutes. Finally he let go of my head and allowed me to sit back. But as soon as I did, my stomach began to churn and I felt a burning in my throat. Crouching on all floors, I retched, remnants of the last meal I’d eaten spilling all over the soil. Spinach lasagna laced with vampire blood. Yum.
Caleb reached an arm around my waist and forced me to stand. I groaned, pre-empting the pain I’d become accustomed to in my leg, but found I was able to stand straight without even needing to lean on him. I stared down at my knee. It looked quite normal. My skin was grubby and covered in dried blood, but it seemed intact. I ran my hands over my skin over my face and my arms, my lower lip—the cuts seemed to have healed.
I looked up at Caleb, who was looking at me impatiently. I wiped my mouth quickly with the back of my sleeve, realizing I probably still had a bit of puke somewhere there. Not exactly the look I’d imagined sporting when reuniting with Caleb in my fantasies.
“I’m so thirsty,” I croaked, realizing how dehydrated I felt for the first time, now that I’d just coughed up the remaining fluids I had.
Wordlessly he bent down and pulled me onto his back again. He began to run again.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Who is that warlock? Why did you take me? What was that island? And what were you doing there?” Some of the questions that had been crowding my mind blurted from my parched mouth at once. And Caleb answered exactly none of them. He remained silent as we lurched through the jungle.
When I pressed for answers, he said, “Not now.”
My throat was too sore to argue. I had to save my speech for when I really needed it.
It was probably a good thing that it was dark and I had trouble seeing. The disconcerting noises surrounding us—those of predatory animals and tropical insects alike—made me realize that this was a jungle so wild, if I was able to actually see the creatures around me, I’d be screaming. Sometimes ignorance really is the best course.
As Caleb ran, the thundering of water got louder and louder, echoing around us. Finally, he stopped again. He set me down on my feet and held my hand, leading me down a slope toward a roaring river. I let go of him and crept toward the edge of the water.
“Careful,” he said. “It’s slippery.”
I tried to heed his advice and go slow, but I was so anxious for water. The sight of it made me even more keenly aware of how much my throat hurt. I lost my footing on a muddy stone. The next thing I knew, I’d slipped into the river. The water submerged me and before I could fight my way back to the bank, a ferocious current sucked me under. By the time I surfaced again, gasping for breath, I was already a good ten feet away from the bank and moving fast. It had all happened so quickly, my body was still in shock.
Caleb had already dived in. His powerful arms sliced through the current as he waded toward me. But this river was
so monstrous, it slowed even Caleb down.
He swore.
“Don’t look behind you, Rose,” he shouted. “Keep your eyes on me. I’m coming for you.”
“Wha’d you—” I choked, swallowing a mouthful of water.
How can he say something like that at a time like this and expect me to actually obey him?
I cast my eyes back over my shoulder. And I immediately wished I’d obeyed him. The moonlight reflected a set of slimy scales, gliding streamlined toward me.
I shrieked. An alligator.
“Look at me,” Caleb bellowed. “Look at me, Rose.”
I fought to turn myself around and face him again. I forced myself to stare into his intense brown eyes. Eyes that had haunted me for weeks. Eyes that I now believed might be my last vision. I realized I couldn’t think of much else that I would rather be looking at. I could look at them all day. I just wished that a giant reptile wasn’t creeping up on me from behind, about to swallow me alive. That would have made it much easier to follow his instruction.
“Caleb,” I screamed. “Help!”
“I’m coming for you. Just keep your eyes on me. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
Another current pulled me under water. I was afraid I might resurface right next to the beast, perhaps even underneath it. But I reappeared ten feet away. I fought to turn myself around in the water to look at Caleb again, and breathed out as I saw he too had been swept under by a current and was now only few feet away from me. He closed the distance between us quickly with his broad muscular strokes. And then his strong arm snaked around my waist, guiding me to climb onto his back. I was expecting him to immediately turn round and swim in the other direction. But to my horror, he headed straight for the monster.
“Caleb! What are you—” But it was too late.
The creature quickened its strokes until it arrived within two feet from us. I shut my eyes, burying my face against Caleb’s neck.
The alligator bellowed and when I dared open my eyes again a few seconds later, the reptile was bleeding from its eye sockets. Caleb had ripped out its eyeballs, leaving it thrashing in agony. Caleb turned away and began swimming against the current. I felt his whole body tense—pure muscle challenging the might of this terrifying river that was so bent on swallowing us up. Caleb won. It was a slow and steady process, but a few minutes later he was climbing back onto the bank. I rolled off him and lay on the ground, panting.
I stared up at him, then let out a scream. I pointed to his shoulder.
“What’s that black thing?”
He glanced down. “A leech,” he said. I expected him to immediately pull it off. Instead he crawled over to me and began running his hands over my own arms. I shivered as his hands brushed down my legs, reached up beneath the hem of my ripped jeans and touched my thigh. Then he lifted up my wet shirt to reveal my stomach. I screamed again on seeing a black leech writhing and sucking on my own skin, just above my panty line.
“Lie back,” he ordered.
I leaned back, but only enough that I could still keep an eye on what he was doing with the leech. I gasped as he lowered his mouth to my stomach, his mouth enclosing the leech. I shivered as his lips brushed against my abdomen. Then I felt a sharp pain. He sucked the leech from my skin and threw it over his shoulder. He jumped up several feet away from me, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and spitting on the ground, I assumed to rid himself of any trace of my blood that might have entered his mouth. I couldn’t imagine the amount of self control it must have taken him to do that. I knew he craved my blood as it was. If he allowed himself to taste even a drop of my blood, he might not be able to stop himself from sucking me dry.
“You may want to check beneath your clothes,” he said, casting me a sideways glance.
This was no time to be worrying about preserving my modesty or being a shy wallflower around him. He turned around while I stripped to my bikini. Thankfully, after a thorough inspection I was able to conclude that there were no bloodsuckers anywhere down there. I slipped my torn jeans back on.
“Okay, there was nothing,” I said. “You can turn around.”
But he didn’t turn around. I walked up to him to see him concentrating on removing a particularly monstrous leech that had attached itself to him just above his navel. He gripped its head and yanked it out, squeezing out the blood from it before tossing it into the bushes.
“How many did you have on you?”
“Just two.” He looked down at my stomach, frowning. “Lift your shirt again.”
I lifted it to reveal the wound the black leech had caused, blood flowing freely from it, showing no signs of clotting. His wound flowed similarly. I thought he might bend down to look at it more closely but his jaw tensed and he jolted back several feet away from me again.
This was so difficult for him. I was a walking meal. He turned his back on me, his shoulders heaving, struggling to regain control. Finally he turned around again, his eyes focused on my face, avoiding looking at the blood leaking through my shirt.
“You’re going to need to drink my blood again,” he said, his breathing still uneven. He extended a claw and poised to slit his right palm again.
“No,” I said quickly, not willing to risk vomiting up my guts again. “Don’t cut yourself again. My wound will heal.”
“Not fast enough. Leeches inject an anticoagulant to stop your blood clotting.”
When I still hesitated, he breathed out sharply in irritation. He stood up and began walking away.
“Wait,” I said, “Don’t leave me!”
“I’m not leaving you,” he hissed. “Just stay there. If you won’t drink my blood, I need to find something else to help clot the blood, or I’ll drink from you myself and there will be no blood left in you to coagulate. Trust me, unlike the leech, there will be no detaching myself from you if I do lose control.”
I watched as he disappeared behind a tree, now regretting that I hadn’t just forced myself to drink his blood again. I breathed out in relief as he returned a few moments later carrying a handful of long thin leaves. Still keeping his distance from me, he put three of them in his mouth and began chewing.
“What are you—?”
He removed the leaves from his mouth—now crushed to a mushy pulp—and approached me slowly. He swallowed hard as he stood next to me. He lifted my shirt and placed the pulp against my wound.
“Hold it there,” he said.
As soon as I held it in place he stepped away, turning his back on me once again.
“It will speed up the clotting,” he said.
“Oh, thanks,” I said, staring down at the gooey pulp. “And what about you?” I looked back at him, noticing that he was making no attempt to stem his own bleeding shoulder.
“It doesn’t matter if I bleed.”
“It matters to me,” I muttered.
He ignored me. Silence fell between us. He paced up and down in front of me, like a panther protecting its territory. I assumed he was waiting for my blood to stop flowing.
My assumption was correct. A few minutes later, he looked at me again.
“Check the wound.”
I peeled back the pulp. The blood had clotted, just as Caleb had predicted.
“It’s okay now.”
“Then we need to keep moving.” He closed the distance between us and bent down in front of me. “Climb back on.”
I wrapped my legs around his waist. He stood up and began rushing through the trees again. Still holding the mushy pulp, I reached for his shoulder and placed the plant against it. I looked at his face for a reaction. His jaw twitched, but otherwise he didn’t acknowledge my gesture.
I held the pulp there as he raced forward until the blood had stopped flowing freely and began to thicken. Then I threw the pulp away.
I replaced my arm around his shoulder.
“So you still have no idea where we are? Are we even on Earth?”
“Yes, we’re in the human realm.”
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“Where are we going?”
“I don’t know,” he breathed.
I decided to ask no more questions of him. At least for now. He seemed to be as clueless as me as to our whereabouts, and he needed to concentrate on getting us out of this jungle before day broke. And the sun drained him of all energy.
We passed the next few hours in silence. We didn’t stop again. I supposed that was a good thing. The speed at which Caleb was running prevented mosquitoes and other nasty-looking insects from landing on me. I felt their high-pitched buzzing in my ears several times as we ran through particularly thick clouds of them, but thanks to Caleb’s swiftness, none were able to land on me.
I didn’t know how I did it, but as I rested my head against Caleb’s back, listening to his heavy breathing, feeling the strength of his body so close against mine, exhaustion took over me and I drifted off.
* * *
Strong hands shaking my shoulders brought me awake with a start. I sat bolt upright, bewildered as to where I was or how I was looking up into Caleb’s face. It took a few seconds for the memories to return.
I was lying on the ground, Caleb leaning over me, artificial light casting shadows over his sweaty face. Sounds of civilization surrounded me, just a few meters away. We were in a cluster of bushes, and just a few meters away street lamps lined a concrete road. A little further than that was a market.
I looked up at the sky. The sun was about to break above the horizon.
“Where—?”
“We’ve reached a town,” he whispered.
“Oh… Oh, thank God.” I attempted to stand. He pulled me back down.
“I need you to wait here,” he said. “Can you do that?”
“For how long?”
“Ten, fifteen minutes. Stay in the shadows of the trees. Make sure you’re not seen. All right?”
“O-okay.”
A Shade of Vampire 10 Page 14
