Darkness Possessed (Order of the Blade) (28 page)

Zach looked up. "Can they fly?"

"No," she whispered, "but they can climb."

She raced over to the wall, and pressed her hand to the plants. The moment she touched it, she felt heavy vibrations as the wall took impact. Fear clenched in her belly, and she looked at Zach, who was watching her. "They're already climbing it. They'll be over the top within seconds."

"They'll be over in seconds?" Zach swore as he looked up. His skin still hurt from the fire that had burned him before. He wasn't going to stick around and let José finish the job, not when he didn't have a damn thing to use against him. "If they're going up, we're going low. Open us a doorway, Rhiannon!" His sai felt heavy and awkward in his hand as he continued to look upward. A warrior needed his weapons to be an extension of himself, so intertwined with his soul that he could will them to act simply with his mind. As a Calydon, that was supposed to be his relationship with his sai, but they had never felt as comfortable as fire.

Right now, facing an enemy more powerful than he was, with the lives of Thano and Rhiannon at stake, the lack of his weapon of choice was a glaring, grim, vulnerability for him. He wanted fire. Jesus, he wanted fire. One well-placed fireball would incinerate them before they could even get over the top.

"A doorway? What are you talking about?" She spun around, searching the wall that was keeping them alive. "They're on all sides—"

"In the ground! Go through the ground!" He grabbed one of the torches she'd lit and shoved his hand directly into the flame. The pain burned through him, but he didn't pull it out. He just focused on the heat of the fire and tried to draw it into his body like he used to do. He steeled his jaw as he kept his gaze on the top edge, waiting for the enemy to crest it. He felt a flash of heat in his palm, and elation ripped through him. Was it working? Was he absorbing the fire? "Now, Rhiannon. Now! "

She dropped to her knees and shoved her hands into the dirt. He heard her whispering frantic chants as she asked the plants to clear a path for them.

His hand was on fucking fire, and he finally tore it out of the flame just as the first warrior crested the top. With a roar, he balled his hand, but no fireball appeared on his palm.

"Shit!" He hurled his sai straight up. It slammed into the warrior and knocked him back over the edge. He called his weapon back, and it was streaking though the air toward him as another warrior topped the wall. Zach threw his second weapon, and it smashed into the warrior, but another Calydon was already climbing the south ridge before Zach had even gotten his first sai back. "Now!" he shouted to Rhiannon. "We need to get out of here!"

"I can't!" she screamed. "I can't concentrate!"

"Come on!" Zach sprinted across the campsite to where Rhiannon was on her hands and knees, her fingers digging into the dirt. He hurled his sai again, and took out two more warriors cresting the top, but there were already three others coming over the edge. He stood right next to her, pressing his calf against her hip, trying to connect them the way they'd done before. "Come on, babe, you can do this!" Electricity burned through him at the contact, and he pressed more tightly against her, hurling his sai and calling them back in rapid succession.

The night was alive with metal blades streaking through the darkness as he fought, but he couldn't keep up the pace. There were simply too many of them. They were going to defeat them with sheer force of numbers, he realized. Not a single one of them had thrown a weapon at him, and he realized it was because he was so close to Rhiannon. Clearly, they had orders not to kill her. That gave them time, an extra three or four seconds at least. "Rhee?"

There was a sudden burst of wind, and he looked down. The earth was splitting beneath their feet, and green vines were streaking through the opening. It was working, but not fast enough. Swearing, he grabbed another torch and hurled it upward. It crashed into one of the Calydons, and Zach felt a rush as the flames erupted, as if he'd done it himself. Instinctively, he palmed his hand to call another fireball...and nothing happened.

They were halfway down the sides now, at least twenty of them. Jesus. How many had José sent for her? "Rhee?"

"Come on!" She grabbed his arm, and he looked down. A dark tunnel lined with vines had opened up beneath them.

Without hesitation, they leapt into it. They dropped about ten feet, and landed hard on the dirt. As they landed, the earth closed over their heads, plunging them into pitch darkness. It took a moment for Zach's eyes to adjust, and then his preternatural vision took over just enough for him to see that the tunnel opened up to the west. Rhiannon grabbed his hand, and they ran down the tunnel...about twenty feet, and then they hit the wall. The vines were still sweeping around them, and dirt was churning, but that was as far as they'd gotten.

The earth above their heads trembled as the warriors landed on the ground, and he felt the vibrations as they began hammering at the earth, tearing up the dirt as they fought to open the tunnel.

Zach lunged forward and swung his sai through the dirt, moving at top speed as he helped the vines dig through it. Rhiannon stood right behind him, her hands pressed against his back as she commanded the vines. Electricity seemed to hum through him from her touch, galvanizing him. His sai whipped through the earth, ruthlessly clawing a tunnel, working side by side with the massive tropical vines. The dirt sprayed through the air past them, and he had to close his eyes against it. He felt Rhiannon bury her face against his back, and she coughed, no doubt sucking in the dirt contaminating their air.

He kept his mouth shut and fought not to breathe as he cleared the earth. Faster, and faster, desperation rising as the noise behind them grew louder. Each chunk of dirt they cleared went behind them, refilling the tunnel as fast as they dug it, leaving the two of them in a very small, mobile crater beneath the earth. They'd made it twenty yards now. Thirty. Forty.

"I think we're past the river," Rhiannon said, then gagged from the dirt.

"We have to go up," he told her, tucking his head to try to get enough clear air to talk. The air was so thick with damp soil that it was almost impossible to breathe, or even talk. "Tell your vines to go up. José's warriors are almost breaking through in back. We need to be able to run."

Energy hummed through him, and the vines changed trajectories instantly, tearing ruthlessly through the earth as they headed up. Zach fought beside them, his head turned as the dirt poured down upon their heads. The dirt was in his mouth, caking his eyes, filling his nose, lining his throat. Rhiannon was tucked up behind him, pulling at his shirt, and he hoped she was using the cotton as a filter to enable her to breathe.

The air was so thick now, thick with wet, damp dirt, almost up to their hips. Despite his efforts not to breathe, it felt like the dirt was filling his lungs, suffocating him. The vines were spewing it behind them, filling the tunnel they had just been through, but it wasn't fast enough to combat the tons of dirt falling down upon them.

Rhiannon suddenly let go of his shirt and collapsed.

He spun around. She was on the ground, not moving. Not breathing. Fear tore through him as he scooped her up, digging her out of the earth. Jesus. She was suffocating! He used his shoulders to try to block the falling dirt, frantically trying to clear the dirt from her mouth and nose, but it was falling faster than he could clear it—

And then he realized that the vines had gone still. They were laying in quiet lines around them, no longer commanded by her. Without Rhiannon to direct them, they had simply become plants again. The dirt was cascading down around them, their tunnel collapsing.

Jesus. She was going to die. Right then. Right there. In his arms. "No!" The anguish ripped through him, a grief more virulent than anything he'd felt since the day he'd held his dead wife in his arms. Something seemed to break inside him, a dam that had held him in check for so long. Heat exploded through him, a violent, wild fire beyond his control, just like the one that had killed his daughter.

He couldn't hold it back. He had a split second of horrified realization that he was going to turn into a ball of fire and incinerate Rhiannon just like he'd killed his child, and then he dropped her between his feet, and thrust his palms upward toward the sky. His skin ignited, and he thrust all the fire upward, slamming it into the dirt coffin above their heads. With a furious boom, the earth exploded upward, showering thousands of tons of dirt into the night. The fireball tore up into the night, an inferno of flame a hundred meters wide streaking though the sky, ripping every last bit of flame from Zach's body.

Flaming dirt showered down upon them, pouring from the sky.

He fell to his knees, his body shaking violently as sweat poured off him and nausea churned in his belly. Beneath him, Rhiannon lay still, her face streaked with dirt, her eyes closed. "Rhiannon," he rasped, scooping her up in his arms. He had to get her out of there. He had to get her to clean air. He had to get her away from the others.

He stumbled to his feet and looked around, trying to see through the flaming embers cascading around him. They were in the bottom of a massive crater at least a hundred yards wide. Swearing, he started to run, but the loose, scorched earth slid under his feet, robbing him of traction. He fell to his knees, and then lurched back to his feet.

He could hear shouts in the distance, and he knew they were coming. He had to get out. He had to go. He fought across the slippery dirt, going down on his knees repeatedly and struggling back up. The solid earth was fifty yards away now. Thirty. He was almost there.

The shouts were louder now.

Rhiannon still wasn't breathing. She was limp in his arms, flaming embers sizzling on her skin as they landed on her.

Swearing, he pulled her tighter against his chest, trying to shield her from the carnage as he fought toward the edge. His body was screaming with the agony of the fiery explosion, and his muscles were trembling. It hurt to breathe. His eyes felt like they'd been stabbed with a red-hot knife, and the pain of keeping them open was almost unbearable. His skin was charred and half-melted, severely damaged by his own fire. And still he fought, keeping his attention focused on the firm ground at the edge of the crater.

Once he got there, he could run. He could get away. He could stand without falling.

Ten yards away.

Then five.

Shadows loomed behind him, and he smelled the dark, rancid odor of sweat. The warriors were close.

With a last effort, he threw Rhiannon over the rim of the crater. She rolled out of sight, and then he clawed his way up the last of the loose, burning dirt, his hands sinking into the blackened earth as he fought for purchase.

His hands finally closed around the top edge, around solid ground, and he grabbed hold, hauling himself over the rim. He landed on his shoulder, and rolled away from the edge to drag his legs out of the pit.

Rhiannon lay on the ground before him, inert.

Zach lunged to his feet, risking a glance over his shoulder as he picked her up. Swarming around the rim of the crater were more than three dozen huge warriors, each moving with the grace and speed of predators in their prime.
Jesus.

A new burst of adrenaline galvanized him, and he spun toward them, holding out his palm to summon a fireball...but nothing came. Jesus. His body was completely drained internally. The fireball had taken it all. Shit!

He spun around and broke for freedom, forcing his beleaguered body to run, willing his muscles to work as they'd never worked before. Rhiannon bounced against his chest, but he held her tight, ducking his head against the branches lashing at him. He knew he couldn't keep it up, not for long, not with the state of his body. Desperately, he scanned their surroundings, searching for something, for
anything
, he could use to save them or escape.

But there was nothing but jungle. Plants that Rhiannon could use to destroy everything  sat useless while she lay unconscious in his arms. He tried again to summon a fireball, but there was nothing,
nothing,
inside him. Where the fuck had it gone? Why hadn't that explosion changed things?
Where the fuck was his fire?

Ahead of him, he heard the quiet lap of water. Another river. Water wasn't what he needed right now. He needed heat. He needed fire. He needed—

Something moved above his head, a black shape sweeping past him. Even as he ducked, he called out his sai with a crack and a flash of black light. The gleaming steel appeared in his hand as he shifted Rhiannon to free his right arm. He looked up as he ran. Something was circling above his head. Something large and black. What the hell was it?

Too late, his instincts screamed a warning. He jerked his gaze back to the ground just as a massive warrior stepped out of the jungle less than twenty feet in front of him...a warrior who appeared to be entirely made of flames.

Zach hurled his sai at the exact moment that the other male flung a fireball. His weapon hit the fire and melted instantly, and then a second fireball exploded at his feet.

The earth opened up beneath him. He tried to stop, but he was too close, and he fell, catapulting into the crater that had just been created. He cradled Rhiannon in his arms, using his body to protect her as he tried to right himself to get his feet beneath him. He almost managed it, landing on his hip and tumbling sideways as they hit the dirt.

With Rhiannon still anchored in his arms, he leapt to his feet as he called out his other sai with a crack and a flash of black light. He spun toward the direction where José had been, just as the flaming warrior walked to the edge of the pit. He was tall and broad-shouldered, wearing only black pants and boots. His bare chest was emblazoned with ancient symbols that Zach recognized as fire and fury. His dark hair was long and loose, whipping about his face in the wind. His eyes were black and his face triumphant as he gazed down at Zach and Rhiannon.