My heart ached for simpler days. For a pillow and hot chocolate and a good crap TV show to lose myself in. “You have to know I deserve better than that.”
“I know,” Jens whispered. “It’s just… you’re married to Foss and laplanded to my best friend. Your brother’s in love with you. I felt like you were slipping through my fingers when I was with you, and I’m still terrified of that.”
I kissed him again, sighing with utter contentment that anything felt familiar in this strange place – and that it was him. “I don’t want to fight. If we’re supposed to be together, we’ll figure it out eventually. Everyone’s waiting for Superman to fly us off this rock, so take off your glasses, Clark.”
I’m not sure what I expected him to do or say, but I for sure was not anticipating the make-out session that came. Jens pressed me against the cave’s wall in our private little nook with his hard body, one hand tangling in my hair, and the other sweeping down the slope of my side. I gasped against his mouth when his hand roamed under my shirt and traced my lowest rib. He’d never gone there before. There were a thousand conflicting feelings racing through me, trilling up and down my spine like a miniature drag-racer in my nervous system. His kiss was earnest, pleading with me to forget what he’d done, to start over as if this were our first kiss.
I wanted to. Oh, how I wanted to go back to the only simple thing in this world of oddities and complexities. How I wished it could be mine, that he could be mine.
That I could be mine.
“Wait!” I begged. “Wait, stop.” We pulled away in the cramped space, catching our breath with our foreheads mashed together. “Don’t do that.”
“I’m sorry. I got carried away.” He shoved his hands in his pockets to keep them honest and mustered an apologetic smile. “I get it. You, upper hand. Me, doghouse. I’m sorry.”
“No. We’re equals, Jens. The kiss. Don’t kiss me to change my mind, to change me. Kiss me because you love me. That’s the only reason I ever want a kiss from you.”
Jens evaluated my response and nodded slowly. “You’re right. That was low. You can feel however you want about us.” Then with purposeful hands, he lightly touched my jaw, tipping my face up to his. “I love you, Lucy Kincaid. Only you. It’s only ever been you.”
Then he kissed me the right way. Slow, meaningful and full of all the things I loved best about him. I could feel his adoration in each movement, his devotion in every hitched breath.
The kiss remained unhurried, but with each measured movement, the emotion ran deeper, like roots wrapping around my heart and tugging me closer to him. I could feel his love for my family, the lengths he had gone to in order to keep us safe. I could taste the heartbreak he suffered when Linus died, and the shock and devastation when my parents followed soon after. When his fingertips traced my face as if it was made of glass, I began to understand the lengths he was willing to go to for us to stay together. His self-loathing over his addiction to the powder was evident, but his determination to put that chapter of his life behind him also rang out as his lips dragged to my cheek and placed a single, lingering kiss there that communicated his permanent place in my life. I was his golden choice, and not his duty that was etched into his golden face tattoo.
Suffice to say, I’d never been kissed like that. The crushing and elating sensations coursed through me, making my scalp tingle and my toes curl. I wanted to say something sophisticated or sexy, but all that came out was a gust of, “What the crap was that?”
Jens smiled through the composure that was escaping him as he breathed against my cheek. “That’s our new first kiss.” He pressed his stubble to my face and gently nuzzled me. “Every time you start to forget us, let me kiss you like that. I’m here. Beneath the scar, right over your heart.” He tapped my heart, and my knees fought for control over the gravity that pulled at me. “I’m always here.”
Fourteen.
Sleipnir
Jens and I were attached at a physical and emotional level until the need for physical separation could not be put off any longer. He went down into the boat first and guided the bodies Foss lowered over the edge down into the quaint vessel, ignoring the smattering of rain. It barely held the four, but somehow it worked. The stricken puppy expression tugged at my heart when he begged me with his eyes to be safe until he came back for me. I watched Jens paddle Britta, Alrik and Charles away with slashes of raw emotion on my face.
He came back. No bloodshot eyes, no stink of The Den. Jens rescued me. There were still parts of him worth trusting, so I decided to cling to those for the moment.
Foss whistled. “So, you forgave him?”
Being brought back to the present was like being yanked down from the clouds down to, well, a cave in the middle of the rain. I shrugged. “Jury’s still out. Not ready to throw in the towel just yet.”
“Throw in the towel?”
I was grateful Charles kept up Foss’s dose of whistled Prozac before he left. Foss was much less likely to get thrown off the mountain by me, or me by him, come to think of it. I waved off the question. “It’s a sports term. I’m not ready to give up yet, is what it means.”
We watched them row away to a point that could barely be seen through the rain, which was coming down in a heavy drool now. I checked in with Jamie through our bond, since he was unusually quiet. He alternated between worrying for Britta’s safety and observing the peppery bunch of tiny gray clouds not too far off.
Jamie scratched his head. “I can feel you doing that, you know.”
“What?” I looked around and realized he was talking about me. “How?”
“It starts to feel crowded in my head. Not like you’re banging on the door, but like you’re right outside it listening for me or something.”
“Yikes. Sorry. I was just making sure you were okay.”
The cold rain fell just a foot in front of us, providing a semi-transparent curtain that separated us from the whole of Undra. Jamie reached out for my hand in a move uncharacteristic of the proper man. I migrated to his side, feeling the little sister to the giant, hulking big brother. “If I told you to hide in that little nook you love to share with Jens, would you listen to me?”
My alerts went up, and I squeezed his hand. “Of course. What’s going on?”
He squinted into the sky at the gray blobs that were moving quicker than the clouds around them. “Do you have Sleipnir on the Other Side?”
“Huh? The eight-legged horse things? No.”
Foss stiffened and pulled his sword out of his bag. “Sleipnir can’t fly this great a distance. The flood’s too vast. It’s not possible, Jamie.”
Jamie followed me into my little hiding spot on the right side of the cave toward the back, and then kissed the top of my head. “Stay put, liten syster.” He pulled out a short dagger from his pack and closed my fingers around it, his serious expression trying to force out calm for me. “In case we fall.” His hand gripped over mine and gave a few practice jabs to an imaginary foe. “Aim to kill. In and up before you retract.” He jerked my hand forward and dragged it up, gutting the imaginary beast. “In and up.”
My eyes were wide, and I suddenly forgot how to breathe. Yet Jamie was composed as he spoke of whatever doom was bearing down on us. “What, Jamie? What’s going on?”
He pressed the fist holding the dagger to my chest. “Keep yourself hidden, now. Don’t come out until I tell you it’s safe.” Then he turned invisible.
My skin was instantly cold and wet with sweat. Anxiety flooded my veins as if coming into me from an amphetamine IV drip I was tethered to. I obeyed with clumsy feet, casting a look of concern at Foss. He gave me a solitary nod as a means of conveying some unspeakable connection he would never admit he felt toward me.
I plastered my body tight to the furthest corner of my little make-out space, wishing we had all found a way to escape aboard the dinghy together.
Foss backed himself into me, the muscles in his shoulders tight with a soldier’s intuition. He t
ied a rope around one of the boulders and tossed the end to Jamie, who took up his post on the other side of the cave. He tied it around a similar rock and tossed it back to Foss. They repeated the motion until they had made a web of sorts, closing us on the side separate from the rain that was starting to pick up.
Foss turned to face me, pressing his overlarge body as far into the narrow alcove as possible. There was scarcely room for my lungs to expand as he smeared me to the wall with his naked chest. The overpowering thrum of claustrophobia banged around in my body, but I fought to control myself. “Foss, what…”
His hand covered my mouth, and he shook his head. “How do the Weres always find you?” It wasn’t exactly an accusation, but it wasn’t a straight question, either. “It’s you. No matter where we go, Pesta’s tracking you. Why? How?” If he expected an answer, he did not wait for it. He pushed the dagger flat against my chest. “Stay hidden. If it’s you she wants, we won’t give you to her.” He paused his thought to press a closed-mouth kiss to my lips. My stomach was already in knots, but it managed to do a backflip in its befuddled state. “If it comes to you to fight, show no mercy.”
I could hear the rain and the blood rushing in my ears. Then I heard a whooshing outside the cave that matched my pounding heart. Foss was pushed up against me, holding his breath as something hard like hooves clomped on the floor of the cave. I counted three beasts by my hearing, though I could not see them to confirm what sort they were. I thought invisible thoughts, willing my body to melt into the rock. I’d read about monks who had mastered the whole mind-over-matter thing, but knew I was not on their level of awesomeness.
Snorting and a sort of breathy growling came from the creatures, adding to my already overactive imagination. They gnawed at the ropes and I heard hacking.
Then it started.
I heard Jamie lunge to the middle of the cave, slashing with his sword. High-pitched screeching that sounded like metal ripping rang in my ears. Foss tore himself from our hiding spot and came out with his blade swinging. His exclamations of surprise frightened me, and I heard a mix of metal and animal fighting for the limited ground.
“There’s too many!” Jamie shouted. “Don’t let them corner you!”
My hand shook as it gripped the dagger that felt simultaneously too heavy to lift and too small to be of use. I heard flesh tearing and more of the enemy’s screams. Then I felt a swift kick to my chest, and the air knocked out of me. I did not cry out, but my ribs burned as I fought for breath. I fished around in Jamie’s head to get a look at what bested him so easily.
My jaw dropped as the image of several enormous winged horses came into my consciousness. They were gray, larger than life, flying, and I counted eight spidery legs on each one. The horses were foaming at the mouth and had yellow eyes that made their matted gray coat that much more dead looking. On the hooves, I noticed not horseshoes, but claw-like talons, painted with fresh and dried blood.
Most shocking of all were the riders. Each of the five Sleipnir was ridden by a man just as rabid and deranged as its animal. Yellow eyes searched manically for something they could not see. Saliva and foam coated their chins, and their speech was distorted as they fought.
“Don’t kill the riders!” Jamie insisted. “They’re possessed!”
One of the mutant horses reared up and bucked at Foss, who shoved his body into our nook. His shoulder was bleeding, but he seemed more ticked off than injured. He growled as he lunged out again, gutting and tearing with both blade and bare hands. He fought off one that was coming for Jamie as the prince wrestled his own Sleipnir. They switched places, and Jamie was closer to me now, his horse and rider baring down on him as Foss found himself in another fight he could not barrel his way out of.
The horse stomped down, hoping to crush the invisible man, but Jamie was quick. He rolled yet closer to me, but the horse was no fool. The rider had Jamie cornered.
There was no time for a moral debate. There was no room for hesitation. I climbed up using the sides of the tight walls and angled my head around so I could see the snout of the horse. Without waiting for a better idea to pop into my head, my arm shot around the bend just as Jamie’s sword plunged upward. I screamed as my dagger sunk deep into the horse’s eye socket. I wrenched it out as it bucked backwards and fell off the side of the mountain.
Suddenly my world spun. I was no longer in the nook. I was on the floor of the cave, looking up at… me.
Fifteen.
Zombies on Meth
Another Sleipnir replaced the one Jamie and I had killed together, giving me no time to evaluate the situation. I scarcely had time to look down at my new invisible body before a rider dismounted and came at me like a zombie on meth. I took the sword that Jamie had been holding and rammed it into the chest of the man, sobbing an apology as I retracted the weapon and kicked him over the ledge with a boot that was not mine.
Then the strangest thing happened. My body flew out from the nook, and from the back of the cave, I saw myself fighting with a Sleipnir on the ledge.
I gripped Jamie’s sword as my brain caught up. Jamie and I laplanded again by killing that horse together. Instead of tying us together, it switched our bodies. My hands were strong and manly, and my body was tall and capable. Jamie had caught on, and was using my body to fight with trained vigor I had never before possessed.
“Lucy, get back!” Foss shouted as he threw a rider off his horse.
But my body didn’t listen. Jamie leaped off the edge of the cave and clawed his way onto the back of the Sleipnir whose rider had been upended, and was currently swimming below. I watched Jamie use my body to slice across the horse-spider’s throat with the dagger I’d been given in case of emergency.
I screamed a low-pitched but still girly utterance that made Foss turn his head in the heat of battle as a rider dismounted and charged at me with a chain and mace swinging.
In that moment, I found my footing. Shedding my invisibility like flipping a switch, I stood and brought my sword down hard at an angle on the meth zombie’s neck. It wasn’t the most expert of slices, but it delivered a decent cut that would give him a slow bleed out. “I’m sorry!” I yelled, stepping back as he took a determined, but drunken step toward me. “Don’t make me do this!”
He responded with a garbled version of “screw you” or something to that effect. Despite the handicap, he lifted the chain and flicked his wrist to fling the mace straight for my head. I ducked, but operating Jamie’s body felt a little like running a construction crane while wearing a mattress. Everything was too tall, too beefy. I felt the mace swipe across my now curly brown hair and let out a choked squeal as I hunched in a ball.
The mace was coming again, so I resorted to my limited knowledge of gymnastics and did a somersault, knocking into the meth zombie’s legs and bumping him from his already janky stance. In his stumble, I yanked the chain from him. My body was so big; it was easy to see Jamie doing the things I did. Jamie would have no problem wrapping the chain around the zombie’s neck. He would not hesitate to tighten the noose and choke out the once-human. I sobbed as I felt the life drain from the undead man. I trembled as I tightened the noose beyond what was necessary just to make sure the job was done.
As yet another spider horse landed on the precipice, something in me shifted. I was no longer Lucy the Pacifist. I became Jamie the Destroyer. I punched the horse in the throat, and watched as Foss ran it through with his sword. I jumped back as it reared on its hind four legs, bucking out at me beyond what I was able to dodge quick enough. One of its talon hooves scraped me down the outside of my arm, and I shrieked in pain. I glanced up at my body that was still choking out the Sleipnir midair. Jamie did not flinch at the pain or the blood that streaked down our arms. He remained focused on the task at hand. With teeth gritted and muscles shaking, Jamie stayed focused on his task of taking out the threat. I had never seen myself look so determined or more heroic.
Tears streaked my Jamie face, and I watched as my body stab
bed the flying spider horse, and then leaped from it just as it lost its flight and plummeted into the water below. I pulled my body up with far more ease than should be natural. I had no idea Jamie was so strong. I towered over me, and finally realized how fragile I looked to them.
Foss kicked the last Sleipnir over the side and knocked out the final bad guy with three swift blows to the temple. “What is this?” he demanded of me. “How is Pesta possessing people? They look like my kin!” He examined the unconscious man’s dark-skinned face as his chest heaved, coming down from the fight with every breath.
I looked out over the water and saw Jens rowing toward us with such tenacity, it looked as if he might leap from the canoe if it would get him to us sooner. “It’s Jens!” I said, standing on my toes and waving him down. I turned back to Foss and gasped at the gash across his chest and the deep cut at his shoulder. “Oh, Foss! Let me look at that. Don’t worry. I’m sure I can fix it.” I gently fluttered my fingers across a scrape on his forehead.
I must’ve looked like a giant girl, because despite the craze of battle, Foss looked at me like I was the most confusing bug he’d ever seen. He backed away, regarding me without his usual coat of hatred or irritation. “I’m fine, Jamie.”
Oh, right. I’m Freaky Friday’d with my laplanding buddy. “I’m not Jamie,” I clarified, pointing to my body. I glanced over and watched myself look down curiously and grab my breasts. “Hey!” I barked. “Hands off! Those are mine, Jamie. Be cool.”
Jamie unhanded my breasts in shock, as if only just realizing what he was doing. Both our faces turned red as he stammered an apology. “I wasn’t thinking. Forgive me, Lucy.” He set about examining his various cuts and gouges, unable to look me in the eye.
Foss’s head whipped from Jamie to me and back again until the shocking information sunk in. “You… how? Jamie, what?”
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