It was hard to climb when everyone and everything was so wet. Our clothes were heavy as bricks, but Britta and Mace managed to make it up the slope without falling. Jens pushed Alrik up and held out his hands underneath him until the older man was out of the water and safely on his way to his surrogate son.
Foss tugged on my leg, the water now only to his knees as he stood atop a rock at the base of the mountain. “Can you climb?”
I nodded, knowing it was a lie. “Yeah. Put me down and go on ahead.”
Jamie shook his head. “Our ankle’s busted. No way are we scaling a mountain on it. I’ve been hopping or swimming the whole way.”
“The rope from your pack,” I suggested. We were so beaten down by the rain, but so close to our goal. I wasn’t giving up now just because I couldn’t scale a mountain. Details, details.
Jens fished around and yanked out a rope from the ship he’d packed just in case. We shouted the plan up to Alrik, who caught the end on the third try. Jamie wrapped his end around his forearm and climbed as best he could on one foot, using mostly upper body strength to move toward safety. We both cried out when he slipped on the rock, our bad ankle banging pain up our leg. “We’re okay, Jamie!” I called to him. “You can do it!” Foss rubbed my calf and kissed the inner part of my kneecap.
Mace, Britta and Alrik tugged Jamie up the last few steps, and I heaved a gust of relief for him.
“I can take her,” Jens said, turning to Foss. “No way is she making that climb. Jamie barely survived it.”
Foss waved off Jens’s offer, taking the handicap as a challenge. “Wait behind us in case she slips off.” He lowered me from his shoulders to his back and gripped the rock, testing his balance with me pulling him backward. “Hang on tight,” he warned me.
Jens and Foss were natural climbers. They were natural everything, really. But as Foss hoisted us out of the water, every step upward was met with either a grunt or a noise of frustration. I could not imagine how strenuous it must have been for him to climb with all the obstacles, plus me on his back.
When he finally gripped the plateau, Mace and Alrik tugged me upward off of Foss so he could hoist himself over the edge. Jens followed soon after, and when we were all safe, they all made their way into the shallow cavern that provided much-needed shelter from the storm. Everyone panted and collapsed on the floor, adrenaline surging as I tried to join them. Jamie had been dragged to the back of the cave, and I tried to crawl, but my body rebelled, my arms buckling.
Foss pushed himself off the plateau and picked me up like the useless rag doll I was. He carried me into the shelter and away from the rain that pelted us in painful places. “Here. Take this,” he murmured to Jens as he handed me down to sit in Jens’s lap.
I cried on Jens’s bare shoulder. The rain, the Nøkkendalig and my many injuries all stacked atop each other, crushing me where I sat. Jens was breathing heavy, but despite his fatigue, he held me tight, kissing my face every few seconds to make the most of my presence in his embrace.
The relief of having made it through the storm mingled with the rush of being back in Jens’s arms. Before I knew it, I was kissing him. He tasted like rain and the most delicious man I’d ever been near. I devoured him, his relief and testosterone swelling at my break on our stalemate. I tugged on his hair and kissed him hard, our lips sucking and teeth nipping as we clung to each other’s wet bodies. He ran his hand under the bottom of my tank top and clutched my back. My body was both freezing and on fire, and the only thing I needed was more of whatever addicted me to him so. I ran my hands over his bare chest and clawed at his shoulders, wishing there was a way to be physically closer than skin-to-skin. I could not get close enough, nor could I satiate the desire that burned inside me.
Each kiss only added more accelerant to my furnace, until somehow we were writhing against each other on the floor at the back of the cave. He pinned my arms above my head and kissed a line down my neck, sucking on the skin and biting like an animal as he climbed his way back up to my mouth. We kissed like maniac cannibals trying to tear at each other just to make certain it was real. That we were real. That we would not be swept away by anything other than each other ever again.
The others were too exhausted to pay us much mind as we temporarily made up without the use of words.
Eleven.
Jens Running Away
The next three days were spent in the cave as it continued to rain. It was close quarters, so we all tried to be extra polite. Foss’s version of that was going completely silent, which was a vast improvement on his usual personality.
It was a good thing we had no avenue of escape. Jamie and I needed time to heal. Alrik needed time to work out the bugs in his suicidal plan for the Elvage portal. And Jens and I just needed time.
The cavern was small. Only four meters by four for six large people and one me. Still, there was a small nook in the back corner that curved off in the dark. It was just enough room for Jens to sit down and pull me onto his lap. We whispered in our tapered off area and made out like teenagers for hours. We slept curled around each other, stuffed in the back, away from view of the others. Though I could tell Mace was annoyed that I’d apparently forgiven Jens so soon, everyone else enjoyed the extra space we left them by being on top of each other all the time out of sight. I threw up a solid wall in my mind to keep Jamie out, but every now and then when I was swept up in Jens, Jamie politely reminded me to put it back up so he didn’t have to see our reunion.
We did not talk about The Den. Jens tried to bring it up a few more times, but I shushed him. “I’m not ready to deal with that right now. Let’s just get through this. End the portals and go home. We can set up a normal life and go to couple’s counseling after that. I’ll be really mad then. Promise.”
“You can really do that?”
“Compartmentalization is my super power. You’ve got invisibility, and I can deal with intense emotional trauma. No trading.”
“Loos, I’m so sorry. I’ll never touch the stuff again. I haven’t used since you and Jamie brought me back. Longest I’ve been clean in a long time.”
“Good for you.” I wanted to feel super proud of him, and part of me probably was, but I kept picturing the naked women sucking the fight out of him. “I still don’t trust you.”
He nodded solemnly, donning his gulping-a-spoonful-of-medicine face. “That’s fair. Anything I can do?”
I traced a line down his bare chest. “Keep your shirt off to distract me from plotting your inevitable demise.”
He chuckled, flexing his bicep for my benefit. “Done. Though the other guys gave up on shirts a while ago, too. Not sure that gives me the edge I need.” He kissed me, not able to make it more than a few sentences before he needed a reminder that we were somewhat together. “I hated seeing you sleep with Foss.”
I tried to tame the beast within me that was harder to stuff into a box and put away to be dealt with later. I’d been spending far too much time with Foss, because my first instinct was to punch Jens in the throat so he could never say anything so stupid to me again. I waited a few beats before my inner ferocious beast quieted. Then I spoke in our usual whisper. “I hated seeing you getting ridden by two naked women while strung out on Undra heroine, but whatcha gonna do about it? I think I’ll make my peace with it.”
That shut him up about Foss. “I think your cape is slipping, Supergirl,” he chided, moving his face back from mine to better carry his shame.
“Sorry. That wasn’t fair.”
“No. That’s exactly what it was. You just don’t usually throw as low as I do.”
I turned his chin to angle toward me again. “I can’t believe how crazy you must be if you think Foss and I could ever be… I can’t even say it. It’s gross.”
“Never thought I’d see you all cozied up to a half-naked Foss. That was some swift medicine.”
“Shut up and kiss me. Logic’s starting to take over again.”
Jens jumped on his opportunity and
pressed his lips to mine, sedating me before I rethought the nature of our fragile relationship.
When he pulled away, a glimmer of clarity flickered in the back of my brain. “We should see other people.”
Jens jerked as if I’d slapped him. “What? Are you joking? Was it that bad a kiss?”
“Of course not.” I pressed my lips to his once more. “I just don’t think I can handle the crushing blow if you cheat on me again. Seeing other people would lower my expectations. Plus, less stress for you while you get over the powder hump. You can be with other girls who can give you what I’m not ready to.”
His hands retracted from their home around me as if I was covered in something sticky. “What? Where do you get off making the rules in this?”
I shrugged, unperturbed. “Easy. You’re the risk, so I have to calculate the cost. This takes the pressure off.”
“Off who? I don’t feel any pressure being with you. Are you saying you’re feeling pressure from me?” He placed his hands atop his head to keep them honest. “I’m sorry, Loos. I thought you were into every kiss. I’ve been reading it all wrong. I’m so, so sorry.”
I laughed quietly. “No, no.” I pecked his lips. “Nothing like that. Every kiss has been exactly what I wanted and needed. I’m talking about pressure for you to stay monogamous. I don’t want to put that on you and make you relapse, so if there’s no expectation that you’re with just me, maybe you’ll stay sober longer.”
Jens blinked at me, and then moved me off his lap. “I need some air.” He went out where the others were, their feet dangling off the ledge as they searched in the sky for oddly-shaped storm clouds, trying not to let the boredom get to them. He looked out onto the water that was still at least two meters deep a mile out. “I curse this stupid place!” he shouted with his fist in the air, making Britta jump. “Curse Bedra and everything in it!” He tugged at his collarbone and ran his hand around his neck, searching for the powder pouch that was not there. “Screw it. I’m going for help.”
“Jens, no!” Britta exclaimed, jumping to her feet to stop her brother from climbing over the ledge. She pointed to the sky. “It’s not even done raining for good yet. You can’t swim that far.”
“I probably can.” He stretched his back and rubbed a sore spot on his arm to ready it for the task.
“Probably? You’re still learning to cope with the pain of your job without the powder! You can’t do this!” Then I saw Britta do something she rarely did. Girlfriend stood in front of her brother and yelled. “For once in your life, stop running from your problems! Whatever you’re afraid of, go back to your cave and talk it out with Lucy before you throw away the best thing that’s ever happened to you!”
Jens was as shocked as I was. He stared at his sister as if she’d grown a second head. “I’m not running from Lucy. I’m running toward a solution. Anyone else tired of sitting on this mountain?” He raised his hand and started the trend of a couple other hands lifting uncertainly. “That’s what I thought.”
Britta looked to the back of the cave at my dumbstruck face I tried quickly to compose as I stood. “Lucy, is he running away? Are you two fighting?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But Jens can go wherever he wants. He doesn’t have to stay with me.”
Jens turned to me and mimed stabbing himself in the heart with a knife. The hurt on his face was awful to see; he was usually so cool about things. He cleared the distance between us and kissed me just once. “I would have stayed with you till the very end. You only had to ask me.”
“I did,” I breathed, “and you didn’t stay. I know I can’t make you be with me.”
Jens kissed the scabbed-over cut on my cheek and wound his fingers around my hair, gripping tight to pull me closer. He whispered with pained desperation in my ear, “Damn this caring that we do. It was so much easier before I loved you! Be with whoever you want, but I’m done looking. I’ll wait until you know that I’m the only guy for you. You can go through every guy in the phone book. I’ll wait till you’re sure I won’t slip again.”
My heart pounded in my chest. I wasn’t sure if we were breaking up, or if we were even together enough to warrant a re-breaking up. Or maybe we were floating in that relationship limbo I suggested. Whatever it was, the surface was too far above my head to do or say the right things that would, of course, occur to me moments after. As it was, all I could mutter was a simple, “Okay” before I was left breathless by the unwavering look in his eye. “Don’t run from this,” I whispered.
“I’m not running.” Then he released me, pressed his spine to the back of the cave, took a deep breath and shot himself forward. Jens ran past everyone and leapt off the edge of the cavern, catapulting himself out and freefalling to the waterlogged land below.
I shrieked. I know it was something incoherent, but it was meant to be a “what-are-you-doing-you-idiot” kind of sentiment.
Britta called after him, fearful she would never see her brother again. “Jens! Come back here!”
It was no use. Jens swam away in his perfect breaststroke toward the buildings in the distance so far away, they could scarcely be seen.
Twelve.
Doesn’t Save the Day
Jens did not come back that night, or the night after that. Britta was certain he had run off to The Den with no intention of coming back. We followed his form until we could not make him out anymore in the darkness. The others turned in that first night, but Britta, Jamie and I stayed awake, searching the black for the most stubborn mule in Bedra.
On the second night when I finally decided to sleep with everyone, I laid down between Foss and Britta, attempting comfort on the rigid rock.
Foss scooted over to make room and murmured, “So you’re now driving men to jump off cliffs just to get away from you. Can’t say I’m surprised.”
“How long you been sitting on that? There’re at least four better jabs than what you dug up. I’m insulted your insults are so lame. You’re losing your edge,” I snapped back. “Shut up and leave me alone. I can’t believe I still have to say that to you. You’d think you would have learned by now.”
“Learned what? That you cost us the second most valuable member of our team?”
“He’s coming back,” I argued, biting my lip and shutting my eyes as I willed my words to be true.
“If he doesn’t, it’s on you,” Foss snarled.
“You’re the one who made him think we were hooking up!” I whispered.
“You could do worse.”
I sat up and pretended to barf in slow motion all over his face and chest as he grinned. “When this is over, I’ll be so glad to be rid of you. A world of space between us will be a breath of fresh air.”
“When this is over, you’ll miss me every day because you’ll have no one to fight with.” Foss patted the ground next to him. “Lay down, little rat.”
“I hate you so much.” I stood up and hobbled over near the edge of the alcove, deciding again that I would not sleep with them, but risk falling off a cliff to get a little space.
Waking from slumber brought stiffness I’d only heard old people complain about. Foss was a jerk, but boy, was he a great pillow. I’d never had a proper massage before, but I made a mental note to schedule the longest one ever when this was all over. It was the wind that woke me before the others. I looked up and groaned at the onset of yet more rainclouds. The plains weren’t even halfway drained yet, and there was more darkness looming. The weather made my insides feel gloomy, and I began to wonder how long the others would wait for Jens once the water level sank to an acceptable level.
Uncle Rick woke up, but he was the only other one besides me who couldn’t sleep. He moved away from the others and sat beside me on the ledge, our feet dangling over just to test our daring.
“Why aren’t you sleeping, Goose?” he whispered with his small grandfatherly smile.
“Thanks for asking that like you don’t already know. I’m a pathetic mess who waits up for h
er non-boyfriend to come home. When they asked in kindergarten, I think that was exactly what I said I wanted to be when I grew up.”
Alrik chuckled softly. “It’s perfectly acceptable to wait up for a member of the team. However, I daresay Jens is a stubborn one. He’ll come back when he’s ready.” When I did not respond, he continued, and I could tell he was choosing his words carefully. “It’s no surprise that you ended up with someone who has a stubborn streak to match yours. I wonder which of you will be the first mule to blink.”
I wanted to argue on principal, but Uncle Rick had a way of making me see things in the proper light, blinding though the brightness was. “Do you think he’s coming back? Or is he knee-deep in The Den, and you’re all treating me like a child again by not telling me?”
Uncle Rick took the underhanded correction with grace. “I should have told you. I’m sorry.” He straightened next to me and looked out on the water. “But no. I don’t think he’s slipped back into his habits. Oh, lavender powder is a powerful thing, but so are you. I have faith in our friend.” He looked down his hook nose at me. “So should you.”
There was something about the wind and the elevation that made it feel like we were the only two people in the world. There was a privacy to it I had not felt in a long time. “Uncle Rick, do you regret bringing me over to your side and signing me up for this mission?”
Alrik’s shoulders lowered, and there was a hard look in his gray eyes as he watched the wind tease the water and make small waves. “Every day, though not for the reason you’re thinking. I was right in my assumption that you would prove yourself a valuable asset. You destroyed a sea creature that’s been besting seasoned sailors for years. You killed a Were and have managed to transition into laplanding with grace. Jamie’s curse is almost non-existent now. And of course, you’ll be strong and brave enough to tear down the portal when it comes time for that.” He pursed his lips before continuing. “But I would take it all back if anyone else could prove to be an asset even half as useful as you. You’re older now,” he observed, folding his hands in his lap. “I did that to you. It’s a crime I hope to pay heavily for once this is all over. You used to sing for no reason. I took that from you. Every scar and bump you endure is my fault, so I regret the decision to put you through this very much. I know you don’t understand everything I do, but I do love you, dear. If you understand that, I can die a contented man.”
Elvage Page 6
