“Yea, and now you have some explaining to do.”
Skye got to her feet and jumped over Aiden, looking for Shiv on the other side of the car. She was gone.
“She took off running up that hill.” Aiden pointed. “Grab a walkie from the jeep. Do you need a flashlight or is the moon enough?”
“Moon is fine.” Skye shouted over her shoulder. She was already half-way to the woods.
~~~
Damn, she was fast, Skye muttered to herself as she plucked her way through the pines and leafless twigs of underbrush. She could still hear Shiv up ahead, but hadn’t caught up enough to see her. There was no trail, not that the fact slowed Shiv in the slightest.
It wasn’t until they hit a sheer, rocky outcropping that blocked pathway straight up the mountain, that Skye finally caught sight of Shiv. She moved in and out of moon shadows along the base of the rock face, eyes looking upward, searching for a viable ascent.
It was worth yelling now.
“Shiv, just stop. It’s just me. No one else but me. Stop.”
Shiv looked over her shoulder at Skye, but kept moving.
“Shiv. I will follow until you pass out, so you may as well stop. I swear it’s just me here.”
Shiv slowed her steps, allowing Skye to quickly catch up with her.
“You can come with me, Skye, but I am not stopping. I’m getting as far away as possible from that monster back there.”
Skye reached out and grabbed Shiv’s arm, spinning her around, face-to-face. “That ‘monster’ just saved your life.”
Shiv jerked her arm away. “Great. Give him my thanks. That doesn’t mean he’s not a monster, and I am getting the hell off this mountain. I knew something was really wrong with this place. I never should have –”
The fireball that flew through the air and exploded in a tree directly above them, cut Shiv off. Both sisters froze, mouths agape as shreds of sparks shot from the point of impact and floated down toward them.
Flames instantly blasted alive, jumping from one tree to the next, fanning themselves up and down the trunks.
“Holy hell. We have to get out of here.” Skye whispered. Without looking, she reached down and grabbed Shiv’s hand, pulling her back in the direction they had just come up from. Her eyes were trained on the trees, watching them spark and alight one after another.
They were in a full-speed run along the base of the rocky outcropping, when the wind picked up behind them, sending the flames into a parallel race which threatened to cut off their path back down the mountain side.
Skye saw the flames advancing, and jerked Shiv into the woods, cutting right in front of the advancing fire. They flew through the forest, feet wrestling with the underbrush, but still stayed ahead of the flames that tailed them, no matter what direction they headed.
Through the blood pounding in her ears, Skye heard the barking first, then Aiden bellowing her name. They were a distance away, but she could hear them, and she headed for the sound, dragging Shiv behind.
At the crest of a slope they pulled up. Aiden and Rafe were far, but she could see their movement in the trees under the moonlight. They were barreling up through the forest toward Skye and Shiv.
“Aiden!” Skye yelled down the mountain side.
“What? No. Not him!” Shiv ripped her hand from Skye’s grip. She took off along the top line of the crest.
“Shiv!” Skye’s eyes went desperate as she screamed. She looked down the hill at Aiden, then at Shiv’s retreating back. Shiv was headed in a straight line that would intersect the fire.
At that instant, another fireball appeared in the night sky, trailing for a glorious moment like a comet caught too close to earth. It shattered into the ground below Skye. Right between her and Aiden.
Skye covered her eyes at the explosion, sparks and flames reaching up at her, the force sending her backward. She didn’t know what to think of the first fireball, but now that there were two — this was some sort of attack, she was sure of it. Real panic tightened her chest, but she took a swallow of the smoke-thick air and tried to ignore the pressure in her chest.
The initial explosion calmed, and Skye searched the slope, looking for a way down to Aiden. She would get Shiv and drag her down there by her hair. But the hill was already a wall of flame. Skye looked over her shoulder. She was now sandwiched between the flames — both fires creeping closer and closer to her. And she had lost sight of Shiv.
Just as she took her first step to run after Shiv, the walkie she had strapped to the back of her jeans beeped.
She turned it on. “Aiden?”
“Skye — thank god.”
“Aiden, what the hell is happening? Where are these coming from?”
“It’s an attack, and Skye you need to get out of there. You need to run to your right as fast as you can. It’ll take you to the river before the fire cuts you off.”
“I can’t — Shiv’s the other direction.” Skye was already on the move, following Shiv into the thickening cloud of smoke.
“The fire is already closing in that direction — you need to go right now, Skye.”
“I can still get to her. Is smoke going to kill me, Aiden?”
“No — but you can’t stay in there Skye — you know about the fire, about becoming a Malefic.”
Skye stumbled, then caught herself on a tree. “We don’t know that it didn’t happen when Evan had me.”
“Skye, you can’t take the chance — you have to get out of there.”
“You know I can’t leave her, Aiden.” The smoke was getting thicker and thicker in front of Skye. She yelled for Shiv.
“Shit — it’s closing in on you.” Aiden was yelling now. “You burnt to a crisp is not okay, Skye — there’s only so much Charlotte can heal. You have to go now. I’m trying rain, but it’s not working — the winds are taking it.” There was a long pause. “I can’t get to you, Skye. I can’t get to you through the fire, but I can at the river. You need to get to the water. Please don’t choose this. You need to save yourself.”
Skye tripped and almost fell, but kept moving. She didn’t answer him.
“Skye?”
Skye stopped and closed her eyes against the soot flying in the air. She pushed the button on the radio. “Aiden, I know I told you I would always choose you, but if I don’t go after Shiv...if I abandon her again.” Her voice caught and she shook her head to herself. “I can’t do it. I love you more than life, but I won’t be able to live with myself if I abandon her again. I promise you I will try to get us both there.”
“Skye –” Aiden’s yell was heart-crushing.
Lump in throat, Skye bore down, ignoring his voice as she turned off the volume and attached the radio to the back of her jeans.
Without hesitation, Skye flew, searching, and within moments, tripped over Shiv before she saw her. Shiv was on the ground, weak coughs shaking her body. Skye knelt by her head. Shiv’s eyes were closed.
“Shiv — wake up.” Skye slapped her face. “Shiv!”
Shiv’s eyes numbly opened with a racking cough. “Skye –” she sputtered as her fingers reached up to Skye’s arm, “you didn’t leave.” Her voice was barely audible over the cracking of burning wood around them. “You...you need to go.”
“No. Not leaving you Shiv.” Her hands were still on Shiv’s face. “I’m getting you to your feet, and we’re getting out of here.”
“No, Skye — I can’t. I can’t walk anymore...I can’t run. You need to get out.”
“No. We are both getting out of here.” She grabbed the walkie from her back and clicked on the talk button. “Aiden, I don’t know if I’m in range — if you hear this, we’re headed back to the river along the ridge.”
A weak crackle over the speaker was the only response.
Shiv managed the weakest squeeze on Skye’s arm. “Go. You can make it out.”
Skye grabbed Shiv’s shoulders. “No more. We are getting out of here. You remember when we were little and I got you out of the
car in the river? Same thing. I’m not leaving you. So just shut up and save your strength.”
The heat closed in, more intense than ever. As quickly as she could, Skye slid her arms under Shiv’s shoulders and hoisted her half to her feet. The smoke was already so thick, Skye spun in a circle, momentarily disorientated. She turned, hoping she was heading back in the direction she came.
The thick wall of smoke lessened, so she assumed she was tracking in the right direction, mostly dragging Shiv. Shiv’s movements and body were getting limper and limper. The coughing had ceased.
Skye could feel the thickness in her own lungs. So much ash and smoke had been sucked into her body, it weighed her down like lead. But she kept moving, hoping. She knew she was traveling along the top of the ridge again, when her foot repeatedly slipped down the hillside, missing solid ground. She could see nothing around her, except for the orange glow of the fire, which lit the suffocating smoke blanketing her.
Skye didn’t even realize when she hit the ground, and it surprised her when she tasted the dirt in her mouth. Her feet were still moving, arm still wrapped around Shiv. But she was flat on her stomach. Every pore was suffocated with the weight of the smoke.
Skye closed her eyes, concentrating on the moment Shiv’s car hit the rock wall, which had sent it flying over the precipice. Time had to move back.
Skye opened her eyes. She was still on the forest floor.
She closed her eyes, trying again.
No time shift.
And Shiv was not moving. Skye pushed up on her arm, but the extreme effort only rolled her over onto her back.
The orange smoke spread in a thick blanket above her. The scalding heat, now, not even noticeable to her numb skin.
She stared up at the orange-grey haze, eyes burning from the smoke, as bright embers went flitting and flying, then flaming out above her. Little fireflies in a haze of hell.
~~~
Charlotte looked at the tracker. “This has got to be it. The beacon stopped moving here. It’s right below us.”
“If she still has it on her.”
“Aiden said there were faint words after he lost contact. And it was moving until a few minutes ago. She wouldn’t have left it behind, she knows that.”
“Shit, we can’t see anything down there.” Triaten pulled his head back into the helicopter; the flames reflected enough light upward, that they didn’t need flashlights.
Triaten and Charlotte had started down the mountain the instant the time shift happened, knowing something was wrong. Rafe had jumped into the back of the truck. When they got to the spot where Shiv’s car had almost gone over, they figured out pretty quickly what had happened.
Rafe was already tracking a path from the scene, when the first fireball screamed across the sky. Rafe was way ahead of them, but they could follow the barking. By the time they caught up to Aiden, the fire had engulfed the mountainside. And then they found out Skye and Shiv were in the middle of the flames. So Aiden took off toward the river, and Triaten and Charlotte scrambled a helicopter from the airfield, praying they could get to them in time.
“We’ve got to get down there — there’s still this sliver in the middle that isn’t engulfed.” Charlotte was already attaching to the drop cord at the edge of the helicopter opening. She pulled her black gloves on tight.
The pilot’s voice came over their earpieces, interrupting the noise of the helicopter blades. “You need to either drop or not — we have to get out of here — the copter downdraft is spreading the flames out of control.”
Both Triaten and Charlotte ducked their heads out of the copter again, searching the mess of flames licking upward at them.
“I’ve got to pull up now — there’s only time for one of you to drop.”
“I’m going. Hold it steady.” Charlotte answered the pilot and moved to the edge of the helicopter, leaning back as she prepared to rappel down.
Triaten grabbed her wrist. “You’re not going down, Char — look at the fire — it’s closing in.”
“We have to go now. I need status,” the pilot demanded.
“I’m off.” Charlotte tried to wedge her wrist from Triaten.
He gripped her tighter. “I’m not letting you go down.”
“Tri, Shiv is down there, and I’m the only one that can keep her alive.”
“No. You can’t go down.”
“If I don’t, and she dies, Tri –”
Triaten grabbed her behind her neck with his other hand and pulled her into him, his face inches from hers. His voice was just below a yell. “And if you do go down? If you do, you could be dead, Char, and I’m not going to lose you. Not again. We’ll figure out another way.”
“She’ll be dead by then. You know that.” Charlotte leaned back away from him, but he still had her left wrist in a death grip. With her right hand, she reached up and locked onto the drop cord.
With one swift move, she lifted her body up and wedged both feet onto Triaten’s stomach, and kicked hard. He flew back into the helicopter, slamming against the opposite wall.
Feet on the edge of the helicopter’s opening, Charlotte leaned way out, almost horizontal. She paused for a second, wrenching apology on her face as she saw the fear in Triaten’s eyes.
“Char, no. I can’t lose you.”
“Well then, you better save me. I know you can do this, Tri. I save her. And you figure out how to save both of us.”
Charlotte dropped out of sight, disappearing into the flames and smoke before Triaten could even get to the side of the helicopter and look down.
Within moments the line went slack.
Charlotte hit the ground hard, not being able to see through the smoke enough to slow down. She felt her left leg shatter up to her knee, taking the brunt of the landing, while her right foot snapped in half.
Flat on her back, she disengaged from the cord, and choked back a frustrated screech as she bit her lip.
“Bloody, fucking, dammit-all-to-hell!” she screamed, unable to keep the words in her mind and not in her mouth, pissed, even though she was half-grateful a tree didn’t take her out on the way down.
Her head tilted back into the ground as she closed her eyes, letting the pain wash over. When it peaked, she shut off any attention to it. She lifted her arm and looked at the tracker on her wrist. The blinking red light was almost right on top of her green light. Just to her left.
Charlotte sat up and looked around her. Nothing but thick smoke in every direction. And the incessant cracking of the fire wasn’t allowing a thought to form in her mind.
“Skye,” she yelled.
No answer.
She got to her one good knee and began crawling to her left. She went a few yards, seeing nothing. A few yards more, and something suddenly squished under her hand.
A body, she knew, even though she couldn’t see down to her own hand. Her fingers quickly followed up over the legs and torso, to the face. Charlotte put her head down, nose-to-nose, and then she could finally verify that it was Skye. She was alive, no bubbling burns that Charlotte could identify, just immobilized. Smoke wasn’t going to kill her, just stop her.
Charlotte slapped her face, trying to get her to open her eyes. Skye refused to cooperate, but she did open her mouth.
“Shiv. Help her. Shiv. Shiv. Help her.” It sounded pitiful. And she kept repeating it.
Charlotte followed Skye’s outstretched arm, pulling herself over Skye’s prone body. She ran into Shiv almost immediately. She could feel Shiv was on her stomach, so Charlotte flipped her over.
Dead weight.
Charlotte ran her hands over Shiv’s body, hoping for some sign of life. She didn’t feel any, but she wasn’t giving up. Ripping off her gloves, she rubbed her hands together, and then set them on Shiv’s chest, one over her heart, the other splaying her lungs.
Charlotte’s hands glowed red — the only thing she could see through the smoke. She’d seen her hands glow tens of thousands of times, but this time they had an ee
rie glow, almost like a flame, through the smoke.
Time slowed as Charlotte tried to heal Shiv. Tried to get her heart beating, her breath started. Time slowed and the smoke became impossibly thicker, closing in on Charlotte, suffocating her limbs. The heat was intense, and breaking through the smoke, the flames were shooting closer and closer. There was no route out, now. They were completely enclosed by the flames.
Charlotte couldn’t judge time, didn’t know how long it took before her body gave up, and she collapsed, head hitting the ground, arms and hands still on top of Shiv. Her hands were still aglow, still valiant in their effort to spark Shiv back to life, even if she could no longer hold her own arms up.
Embers were falling rapidly now. Landing on Charlotte’s cheeks, burning through her skin, only to be extinguished when they reached blood, and were sizzled quiet.
Charlotte fought to keep her eyes open. Fought because she wasn’t going to give up on Shiv. She wasn’t going to give up until her hands were burnt off of Shiv’s body. Until then, there was still hope.
Charlotte focused her eyes on her hands. She had lost all feeling in her limbs, and didn’t trust her own touch — whether it was imaginary or real. Didn’t trust in anything other than the glow of her hands.
So when the drops of rain hit her cheek, she couldn’t feel them. Even though she saw them hitting and bouncing off her hands, she didn’t believe them.
And then she saw Triaten.
Past her glowing-red hands on Shiv, Triaten burst through the flames, a tornado of wind and rain clearing the smoke and blazes surrounding them. A hell-storm of water and fire engulfed Triaten, but he was solid. Aiden was right behind him. The rain clouded on her lashes, and she tried to blink the thick wet cloak away.
Triaten was soaked — his dark hair, t-shirt, jeans — and it just made more visible the relief that shook his body when he spotted Charlotte.
Time still crawled, and Triaten was in slow-motion, even though he was in full run. It was an eternity for him to cover the ground between them, but his eyes never left Charlotte’s, not until he skidded into the pile of them. He grabbed her, ripping her hands away from Shiv.
Triple Infinity Page 27
