An Apocalyptic Need (12 page)

Cari thought she’d be a good ally to have.

Yeira glanced at Kord. “She can accompany us to the portal in the woods.”

He nodded, hanging back as the two women started out. It was clear to Cari that the big hunter intended to talk to his friend.

Though it was equally clear that Grimm had burned a bridge he was going to have trouble rebuilding.

It was just as well, Cari told herself. She no longer had to worry about Grimm’s safety on the
Stellam
. That was good.

Very good.

Somehow the knowledge didn’t dull the awareness crawling down her spine as she walked away from him, his dark scrutiny burning like flame against her skin.

~AN~

“What’s wrong with you, Grimm?”

Grimm watched the two women walk away, his temper raging. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m just trying to keep that stubborn woman alive.”

“Ah.”

He snapped his head around to find Kord with a smug grin on his face. “Ah what?”

Kord wrapped an arm around Grimm’s shoulders. “Ah, I know when a man wants a woman, Forbes. And it’s clear you want that woman bad.”

“That’s ridiculous. I barely know her.”

“Mm hm.”

“I’m trying to find out what she’s up to, that’s all. I have a feeling she’s working against the accord somehow.”

Kord frowned. “And speaking of that… Why won’t you tell Yeira what you were doing on the
Angel
?”

Grimm shook off Audie’s arm. “I can’t.” He gave his friend a searching glance. “You don’t trust me?”

“It’s not a matter of trust, Forbes. We’re dealing with trouble on multiple fronts right now. We need to know who’s with us and who isn’t.”

“I’m with you. I always have been and I always will be.”

“Then why did you disobey Yeira’s orders?”

When Grimm looked away, unwilling to respond, Audie expelled a frustrated breath. “Dammit, man! You were the one who recruited Yeira to lead the reborn. Yet you ignore her orders and go gallivanting off.”

“I wasn’t gallivanting. Everything I do, I do for her…”

Audie’s gaze widened. “You’re saying you were on an errand for Yeira?”

“I can’t tell you…”

Gunfire crackled in the distance and both men’s heads snapped up.

“Yeira!” Audie took off running and Grimm wasn’t far behind.

By the time they reached the mouth of the cave the firefight was intense. Yeira and Cari were crouched behind a large rock in the flatland below, and they were pinned. Both women were returning fire.

“Remind me to thank Yeira for loaning Cari a gun.” Grimm pulled the weapon he’d brought from the Stellam and fired toward the distant spot where O
²
blasts sparked in the growing dusk. Audie did the same and it wasn’t long before the firefight split between their two positions.

Ribbons of fire sizzled through the air and sheared chunks out of the hillside behind them, spraying dirt and chips of rock into the air. Pinned behind the rock, Yeira and Cari could do little more than shoot blindly in the direction of the attackers as fire spat all around them.

Finally, as their combined efforts took a toll on the attacking force, the blasts of O
²
fire lessened and the attackers appeared to retreat, their shouted instructions fading into the distance.

Minutes later, Yeira and Cari stood, their gazes on the distant forest where the firefight had originated.

“How did they find us?” Audie murmured, turning to Grimm. “Could the crew of the
Stellam
have followed you here?”

Down below, Yeira lifted her hand to indicate she was returning. She spoke to Cari before heading back toward the cave. Cari didn’t immediately follow. She stood with her back to them, staring toward the forest.

Grimm shook his head. “Unlikely. We took a couple of deviations before coming to the dead lands.”

Kord started down the hill. “The Healer’s lair and where else?”

“The portal on the
Stellam
took us to the eighteenth world, Earth’s wild west.”

Audie’s gaze snapped around. “Really? That’s odd.”

Cari finally started walking toward them.

“Yeah, I thought so too at the time…”

A wave of blue suddenly filled the air, rolling across the scorched land at an impossible speed. It illuminated the area from the forest to the spot where Cari had been standing and kept spreading.

Guide magics!
Grimm screamed Cari’s name and took off running.

She lifted her gaze to look at him and was hit in the back by the wide, blue wave before she could take another step.

She stilled in mid-step, her body going rigid.

Even from a distance, Grimm could see the look of surprise in her pretty features.

“No!” He dug in and ran full out as Cari was dragged backward, the guide magics sparking around her as they drew her away. Once the magics managed to coalesce around her with sufficient power, they would yank her back and away from him.

Grimm growled in frustration as he realized he wouldn’t make it in time. His gaze focused on the terror in her pretty eyes. “I’m coming, Cari. You have to fight it. Fight the magic’s pull.”

Dust flew around her, turning the blue sparks to fire that snapped on the air. Grimm knew the fire would burn her. And under the restraining magics she’d be unable to flinch away or cry out from the pain.

The light haloed Cari, glowing softly at first and then flaring brightly as it gained power.

He had seconds. No more. With a howl of desperation, Grimm leapt into the air, a wash of energy slamming into him from behind, and was propelled into Cari just as the magic yanked her backward.

He gritted his teeth against the repelling energy and wrapped his arms around her. They were flung toward the distant forest on a slingshot made of power, the world snapping past under a dizzying blue haze.

Grimm stared into her terrified gaze and clung harder, until he could feel the rapid beat of her heart pulsing against his chest. He didn’t know who was on the other end of the magic slingshot, or where they were going to end up, but he knew one thing for sure.

Whoever it was, their enemy was Sorceri.

Which meant he had to be one of the rogues. And for some reason he really wanted Cari.

“Help them, Kord!”

Audie had already flung a burst of power into Grimm to help him reach Cari in time. But the sparking blue energy snapping on the air before them was too powerful for Audie to hold. “I’m trying.” He gritted his teeth and turned the wattage up on his power, hoping to at least slow their progress toward whoever waited for them in the forest.

Grimm and Cari were caught in a glittering web of blue magics that no doubt tore at their flesh with opposite purposes, threatening to rip them apart. Audie had only wanted to ensure they stayed together. If he couldn’t wrest them free from the other hunter’s magics, he would have to do something else. He glanced at Yeira. “Take cover.”

She shook her head, clasping his arm. “I’m not leaving you…”

Spitting and biting under his skin, the energy was almost too much for him to stand. “Please! Just do as I ask.” Audie forced himself to calm…to let the energy suffuse his cells until his skin felt too tight. “I’ll be fine. I’m going to use a power word and I don’t want you getting caught in the back draft.”

Yeira hesitated a second more.

It was all Audie could do not to scream at her. The power throbbing through his body was like a powder keg waiting for a spark. It threatened to burst free with the slightest moment of inattention. If that happened, unguided by him, it would explode Yeira and Audie and everything in the immediate area. “Yeira!”

She reluctantly let go of him and ran toward the hill, where a jutting plank of rock provided enough cover to protect her. As soon as Audie saw she was safe he closed his eyes, let the energy coalesce, spitting and impatient at his fingertips, and allowed the power word to roll off his tongue. “Invigorate!”

Energy blasted away from him with a thunderous roar, rolling along the sparkling blue wave until it landed on Grimm and then burst into blue fire. Grimm seemed to swell, his body expanding as the magic incantation pulled the dormant power from his cells and set it to life again.

Throwing back his dark head with an agony-filled roar, Grimm wrapped one arm around Cari and flung the other toward the woods, blasting the invading magics with a silvery blue trail of his own unfettered power.

A scream sounded in the distance as Grimm’s energy reached the end of the restraining wave and smacked into Cari’s would-be captor.

The guide magics that had been dragging Cari away disappeared in a whoosh and Grimm and Cari dropped into a limp pile on the dusty ground.

Audi took off running after them, Yeira sprinting at his heels.

They never made it to their friends.

Grimm helped Cari to her feet and turned, lifting a hand in thanks to Audie. He wrapped his arms around Cari, their forms quickly thinning on the dusty air, and disappeared with the sound of air sucking into a vacuum.

~AN~

Cari gasped as their feet hit the ground and yanked her arm from Grimm’s. “What the hell just happened?” She looked around, seeing a strange town with dirt streets and rough wooden buildings that squatted in a bumpy line for a couple of blocks before petering away into scrub and rock nothingness. “Where in the world are we?” Even as she asked the question her gaze fell on a crooked wooden sign hanging from a post on the edge of town. Ragged letters which looked to have been carved in the wood by an unsteady hand, proclaimed the area as Dodge Town.

Grimm stood a few feet away from her, his hands lifted and a strange look on his face. He didn’t seem to have heard her. Rather than respond, he lifted one of his hands, palm up. Sparking blue stars appeared in the air around him and drifted toward his hand, swirling into a sizzling column of energy.

Cari stepped farther away. “What are you doing, hunter?”

Grimm laughed and she took another step back.

Her movement finally seemed to pull him from his thoughts. He glanced up. “I’ve got my guide magics back.”

She frowned, unsure if that was good news for her or not. “How did that happen? You never told me how you lost them in the first place.”

Grimm curled his fingers into a fist and dropped his hand to his side. “It’s a long story. One I’ll be happy to tell you sometime, but right now I need to see a saloon girl.”

Cari glared at him. “Do you really think this is the right time for that, Grimm?”

He looked perplexed for a moment and then grinned. “I only want to talk to her. She was the last person I spoke to before going to the dead lands. I need to find out why she sent that hunter after us and what he wanted.”

Realization sparked. “The blue energy that grabbed hold of me back there.”

Grimm nodded. “Yes. That was guide magics. Which means it was Sorceri energy. I’m guessing one of the rogues.” He cocked his head. “Unless you’ve done something to warrant capture by the Authority?”

Despite her awareness that he watched her closely, Cari couldn’t help sliding her gaze from his. “Don’t be ridiculous. Until you dragged me away I was performing my mission in epoch 2180.”

She felt him staring but refused to meet his gaze. Finally, desperate to get out from under his scrutiny, she glanced around, seeing several men standing under a low overhang across the narrow, pitted street. The men watched them with suspicious glares. Smoke curled from one rangy looking man’s wide lips and when she caught his eye he pushed the wide-brimmed hat back to expose his bright gaze.

The man inclined his head, pushing away from the post he’d been leaning on to step into the street and stride toward them.

“We have company,” Cari murmured to Grimm.

Grimm turned to the man who ambled toward them, the stub of a yellowed cigarette clamped between wide, well-sculpted lips.

Ignoring Grimm, the local stopped before Cari and took off his hat, ducking his dark head in greeting. Bright blue eyes sparkled beneath dark eyebrows that lay like slashes across a wide, unlined brow. “ ’lo ma’am. You’re new in town, ain’t ya? You lookin’ for a place to stay the night?”

Grimm frowned. “The lady’s with me.”

The man turned his head, dropping the dusty hat back over long, wavy hair. He fixed Grimm with that bright blue gaze for a beat and then turned back to her, smiling. “Happens I know the lady who runs the boarding house up the street. I reckon she has a room you can stay in while you’re in town.”

Grimm wrapped a big hand around her arm, gentle but firm. “That’s very kind of you, sir. If you’ll point us in that direction my wife and I will ask her about accommodations for the night.”

Cari’s mouth fell open in shock but Grimm tucked an arm around her waist and pulled her close. His expression was unreadable, except for the hostile glint in his gaze.