by Lexy Timms
Guilty as charged. Angelica swallowed hard, swiping at tears with the back of her hand. “I’m sor—” She laughed a little, a touch ruefully. No apologies. Right. She could do this. She lifted her chin, feeling the strength coming back into limbs a moment ago she doubted could support her. “Yes, I understand, and you’re right—I shouldn’t. Tell me where to set up. I’ll start preparing for the injured.”
Helga nodded, her eyes alight with approval. “Excellent.” She took Angelica’s shoulder and turned her so that she was facing away from the direction she’d been going. The older woman pointed to a dim opening through the trees. “Follow the path there, down the hill. There is large building there with many lights. The staff do not speak English, but all know you are a doctor.”
It wasn’t the first time she would work with a staff with a shaky command of the language, but it was daunting all the same. “Olaf said something about someone learning English who could translate for me?”
“She went with the rest.” Helga stood and thought for a moment. “I’ll come and translate.” She smiled at Angelica’s reaction. “I might be an elder, but I can look inscrutable and aloof later.” She laughed a little. “Besides, advanced age lends a certain gravitas to one’s words. I should think I would be obeyed quickly, save some time.”
Angelica nodded and placed her hand on the elder’s arm and took another breath. She said a quick prayer for Taylor and turned to head down the beaten path to the building that served as a clinic. She moved at a slow jog, wishing that she could go faster, that she had the eyes of the cat to see unseen obstacles in the dark. Helga fell into step behind her. Angelica didn’t miss the significance of that. Instead of the acolyte following the elder, the elder followed the doctor. For this part of the journey, Angelica would be the one in charge.
It was a strange and heady feeling. Fear receded. Something else replaced it. A certain calm, the assurance that this at least she knew how to do. Here she could be of service. She could matter.
“I understand you shifted earlier to run from that man,” Helga said from behind her. Surprisingly, the older woman kept pace with her easily and didn’t even sound winded.
“I did.”
“I should warn you to not shift again. Until we discover the location of your inner beast, it becomes progressively dangerous and likely that you might not be able to change back.”
“You mean, spend the rest of my life as a lioness?” Angelica called over her shoulder.
“Precisely.”
Angelica raised an eyebrow and pictured it. A lioness in a jungle... would that really be all that bad?
The lights from the clinic showed in front of her. It was a large building, the largest she’d seen on the compound, and was at the base of the hills. That made sense: if someone was injured it would be easier to get them downhill rather than up. There were other lights off to the left. The compound proper, she guessed. Somehow she’d come full circle.
She heard a wet thud behind her and turned as another explosion lit the sky. She covered herself, cringing away from the blast, even though it was still too far away for there to be any fallout. When she looked up, she was alone.
“Helga?” she called, but Helga was gone.
Surely she’s behind me somewhere...
“HELGA?” Angelica screamed, turning, preparing to go back. In a single bright white flash, the world came to a stunning conclusion and Angelica was no longer in it.
It was followed by the feeling of falling.
She caught a glimpse of worn leather boots before the world went black.
Chapter 20
Gunfights were all the same when you got down to it.
Men rushing at other men, weapons belching death, howls of rage, screams of hate, shoots of pain, and cries of loss. Taylor worked in a vacuum of that sound. Bullets tore through the trees beside him, shining in the reflected light of the burning car.
He grabbed a rifle someone flung to him, his ears bright—tiger ears hearing the clack of the bullet loading in the chamber. He pointed at a group and gestured with his hand in the direction he needed them to go. They moved under his command as smoothly as if they’d been doing it for years, and dropped down the edge of the ravine to circle around and come at the enemy’s flank. He lay still, waiting, then heard the resounding echoes of his erstwhile squad pelting the enemy from the side. Then he rose, half crouched, fired, and made way for one of their own coming back to him.
A woman raced back, limping heavily, rifle in hand, and lay the weapon at his feet. Blood had soaked the cloth at her shoulder, but she smiled at him from a dirt-smeared face, and headed back to the compound as fast as she was able. Another arrived to take up her gun and rejoin the battle.
Around him the battled raged savagely. He aimed, shot, reloaded. Repeat.
Then suddenly it was over.
In a single heart-stopping moment, the noise ceased. No rifles fired, no fresh screams echoed in the greenery. For just a moment, the world held its breath and waited. Taylor rose from the crouch, rifle trained ahead of him. He heard the sounds of engines in the distance, vehicles driving away, kicking up gravel and dirt as they tore through the backroads.
There was a shout. Taylor didn’t understand the words. Another. Olaf appeared in the night, his smile as bright at the full moon. “They are gone!” he cried. “We scared them off—we beat them!”
It didn’t make sense. None of it did.
“Why would we scare them off?” Taylor asked the night.
“Because we outnumbered them and we are without fear,” Olaf shouted, the pride in his voice raising a cheer from those around him who likely had no idea what he’d just said. Taylor recognized the bravado that came from adrenaline and smiled. Let the man enjoy this day. Others would come. He lowered the rifle and flexed his back.
“Set guards here for tonight,” he said, reaching out to touch Olaf’s shoulder, drawing him back from his visions of glory to the here and now. “Someone to watch the gate until daylight, when it can be repaired.”
Olaf smiled and actually saluted him before giving orders to the group. Two men and a woman offered to stay behind.
The battle, though short, hadn’t been without loss. There were several casualties. The heart and blood of ancient Vikings were no substitute for experience and training. Two of the defenders lay dead, six more were being tended for bullet wounds. Once the bullets were removed shifting would close any open holes instantly, but infections were universal in man and beast, so ideally they needed to be cleaned first. Taylor had transformed too many times while injured in the last months and had fought the effects of it after South America. If he could spare the same here, then so much the better.
He gave orders to that effect. There was some protest, but this was a people unused to these kinds of injuries. In the end they nodded, urging their comrades to wait on shifting until they could return to the clinic, warning against foreign objects under the skin while shifting and the potential damage it could do.
This would be done under general anesthetic, meaning that the wounds had to be packed until the patient could shift. Battlefield first aid administered, the injured were distributed among the well to carry them back to where they might receive medical treatment. Taylor carried an injured man in his arms to the makeshift clinic and set him down on one of the cots set in the triage area.
“Where’s Angelica?” He’d expected to see her there, but when he looked around at the busy staff her bright eyes and dark hair were nowhere to be found. Olaf translated. Answers were sparse. There were more pressing needs than his missing fiancée. His questions were generally ignored, the staff buried in blood, intent on doling out enough painkillers to keep everyone calm. One young attendant simply shrugged and continued on her way.
Olaf looked at Taylor and shook his head.
“Well, she is a doctor; did no one think to ask her to help out?” If they were so pissed about the invasion and holding her and, by extension, him to blame f
or it, there was going to be no end of trouble. Taylor’s body was rigid in anger by the time he tracked down the man acting as a doctor, the one tasked with pulling out the bullets. He caught him between patients, holding a long instrument freshly sterilized in one hand, about to administer what passed for surgery on the patient lying unconscious before him. He spat out a long string of words without looking up. Taylor didn’t speak the language, but it was easy to tell that most of that dialog wasn’t exactly acceptable in most workplaces.
Olaf blanched a little at the tirade and turned to translate, his shoulders slumping with weariness now that the adrenaline had burned out of his system. “He said Elder Helga went to ask her to help, but that she’d refused to come.”
“Refused?” Taylor stepped back without realizing it. “She would never refuse.”
Olaf shrugged. “They said she never came, and they really could use her right now.” It was obvious that by now Olaf was tired of playing translator, and his opinion of Angelica had shifted somewhat after this last bit of information. He seemed irritated and turned away, making it clear that he was done.
Taylor stared at him a moment and then took off out the door. Anyone who knew Angelica knew she’d be the first one here. Someone was lying. She’d been here and turned away. Or something else. Fear suddenly gripped his stomach.
She was missing.
He raced down the road, then turned and headed back up the hill, but stopped and thought a moment. In the light of the medical building there seemed to be a clearing on the other side. From here it looked like there might be a path. A shorter way to get to the room he’d shared with Angelica. He chose this route, jogging easily up the trail, cat eyes giving him the ability to see what he might have missed otherwise—a branching of the path, a lesser used footpath that led back toward where he thought the computer shed might be if he had his directions correct.
Which was, of course, where he’d left her.
He ran along its length, praying that by some miracle she would still be there.
In his haste he stumbled over what he should have seen. A body half-concealed in the foliage, long ferns covering her face, the sickly smell of blood clinging to her clothes. He fell heavily next to her, stunned for a moment. Then realizing that it was a body, still warm, that he was touching, he shouted though he knew no one would hear. Not from here.
“OLAF!” His fingers tore at the leaves, brushing them away from her face.
There was so much blood.
He needed help. Someone. Anyone. His own throat closed, fear and anxiety making it impossible to get the sound out. In desperation he asked the cat.
Do you think you can do it?
I will try.
The tiger’s roar torn from his hybrid throat ripped through the jungle and filled the valley. Faces appeared in doorways and up and down the path. People came running, Olaf with them.
Taylor was on one knee, cradling the fallen woman in his arms when they reached him. It wasn’t Angelica. He handed her to them, careful to brace Helga’s head, to keep her from further injury. She was still bleeding from her skull, her matted hair tumbling around her face. Her breathing was shallow and erratic. It sounded wet and somehow wrong. She smelled... like she was bleeding inside her body, too.
“Get her to the clinic!” Taylor yelled. Many hands turned to carry the old woman to help, but the eyes that belonged to those hands turned balefully to Taylor. He felt their suspicion. The growing anger.
“Do they think I did that?” Taylor asked Olaf.
“No,” he said curtly as they took the woman away. “They think you’re responsible.”
He didn’t have time for this. While strangers condemned, the love of his life was gone. Missing. If one woman had been hurt and left to die, so too could another. But the path was empty, and he had no sense of her being near. The tiger couldn’t scent her.
She was gone.
Taylor spun and ran. Behind him were shouts. Questions. They wanted to know what had happened, how he had found Helga. He could talk to them later. Right now he needed to find Angelica. He ran the rest of the way to his room. Angelica wasn’t there.
Somehow he’d known she wouldn’t be.
She would have come at my call.
Taylor stood a moment, chest heaving, heart racing. Everything inside of him lost.
What if she’s dead?
The tiger didn’t answer. He needed to look for her. Maybe she was simply lying unconscious somewhere. The jungle around the camp was thick. She could have been just off the path and no one would have ever known. He returned to the trail. Eyes spotted him and were averted. Tongues whispered words he couldn’t understand. Two men were dead. An Elder fought for her life. None of this violence had been part of their lives before he and his mate had come.
Taylor roared again. It was a plea, a searching call, a man—no, beast—seeking his mate. Seeking his other when surrounded by enemies. It was call of wild desperation for the one he loved.
It was answered by silence.
Echoing silence.
The silence of the dead.
Chapter 21
Taylor knew there was a limited number of vehicles in the compound. So far, the only things around with a combustion engine included the car Olaf had used to get them and an old pickup. He expected there to be more somewhere, but from what he’d seen there really hadn’t been a need for too many vehicles. He’d thought he’d seen another, a flatbed with some rust issues, but it was long gone. Taylor and Olaf crammed into the car along with three others. There was some confusion for a moment about whose clothing was flung where, but it was sorted out by the time dawn broke. Six more jumped into the back of the pickup and a half-dozen shifted back again when they heard about Angelica being taken.
The entire group was on the road as the first streams of light broke over the trees. They drove behind a pair of tigers. Olaf said they were husband and wife, that they had led the hunters as trackers for decades. They streaked down the road now as fast as tigers could go, an impressive sight in the early morning dawn, two magnificent beasts, low to the ground, moving with a grace equal to nothing else alive. For a moment Taylor envied them their freedom and wished he were out there, doing something more active to bring back the love of his life rather than just sitting and jolting over the dirt track that led out of the compound into the world. To call it a road at all just proved how little Taylor had been in jungles. It was a rutted, worn path of packed dirt that sprouted small green patches of sprouts when the traffic let up.
There was, believe it or not, a T-juncture ahead, which surprised him. It indicated there was actually somewhere else to go in this bloody, forsaken jungle. Their trackers took the fork to the right without hesitation.
Trust them.
I’m trying.
The enemy had who knew how long of a head start on them, but the road was too treacherous for them to gain time. This at least would work in their favor. With any luck the group they were chasing would take the road too quickly for the conditions, impatient and unsure on ground they’d only traversed once before. If they rushed their vehicles would be trashed, and then the pursuit would come to a crashing halt.
It was a positive thought. Olaf pointed out that there were no gas stations out here for repairs and the nearest refueling was 20 miles away, adding his own optimism to the discussion. Even that particular service station was a remote outpost for the occasional hunter or hikers. Most of the time, it wasn’t even open.
In the distance, a form appeared on the horizon. The blur shifted and refocused as the inner cat enhanced his vision. It wasn’t unlike adjusting binoculars, only without having to hold anything to your face or fiddle with the dials.
Thank you.
Find her.
Taylor was surprised at the cat’s mournful plea. He sounded scared.
But at least he could see what he’d been staring at now.
“What is that?” Olaf asked, squinting through the dusty windshield an
d pointing at the form ahead.
“Tiger,” Taylor said softly. “One of yours, female, right ear is down, white muzzle, one white foot on the left front.”
“Sounds like Ingrid,” Olaf said, gritting his teeth and hitting the accelerator a little as the tigers streaking ahead picked up the pace upon sighting their comrade. The vehicle responded with a jolt that rattled everyone’s teeth. No one so much as complained.
The lone tiger ran toward them. As she drew near it was obvious that she was exhausted and in pain. She ran past the two in front without hesitation. Olaf frowned and hit the brakes hard enough that Taylor had to throw his hand against the dash to steady himself. The tiger paused at the door of the car. She began to shift, the painful, bone-breaking shift Taylor knew too well and only now realized that he hadn’t experienced in days. When did that start to not hurt?
When you stopped fighting me.
She appeared then to them, a woman in her early thirties, brilliant blond hair, her body lean to the point of being very thin. A woman from the truck ran up to them with a robe to drape over the woman’s back. Although Taylor didn’t know the words, he guessed from the nod and weary smile that she was thanking their benefactor. She turned back to Olaf, addressing her comments to the occupants within. Her words were few, but from the way Olaf’s face paled what had been said was more than sufficient to add a slump to his shoulders. He glanced at Taylor with pained eyes.
“She said a car is up ahead, much blood.”
“Blood? What kind of blood? Whose blood? What did you see?”
