Licked by the Flame (15 page)

H
oly hell.
She was alone in the dark…again. She wasn’t in their vehicle, though. This time she was sitting on a hard, glassy floor. It was slightly warm, and not quite flat. The floor actually curved upward behind her. Was she in a room? No, it seemed more like a tunnel.

She felt along the walls, getting her feet under her and standing. Yes, this was a tunnel, and some sort of breeze tossed her hair and brushed over her face. Hmm…that felt familiar.

Oh, that’s right. A breeze had come up, and it turned into a storm…a storm with horrible wind and lightning. She remembered now…she’d been on that damn mountain! So how did she get here? Unless maybe this was still the mountain.

She must have made it into that void, that dark cleft she had seen. Ah, that would make sense. She’d been trying to get to the opening in the rock face, to get out of the storm, when…

And now she was laughing at herself. A dragon. Yeah, dragons and UFOs. What kind of crazy hallucinations was she having? Man, but she must be so much worse off than she knew. Thankfully she’d somehow gotten herself into here and she must have passed out. How long had it been?

Her head still ached a little, but not like before. She could tell from the direction of the breeze where the opening of this cave was, so she felt her way toward it. The cave was incredibly smooth and level inside, but she figured that was probably because at one time it had been a lava tube. She’d never seen one like this, but she wasn’t really much of a geologist.

How had she gotten herself inside? That storm was so fierce…and those damned hallucinations. Well, at least her imaginary dragon was gone now and she could think straight again. She’d find her way out of this cave and back down from the mountain. Maybe Nic was out there somewhere, hunting for her. Or maybe not.

Either way, the guys back at the jobsite would realize something was wrong and come looking for them. She needed to get herself out into the open so that at first light, she could be found. Then they’d discover Nic’s fate. God, but she hoped he was okay.

The first glow of early morning moonlight crept into the cave. She could see the opening ahead, the sky still a spread of roiling clouds. The storm was not nearly as violent as it had been, though. Thank heavens things were calmer, and it was still before dawn. She’d not been unconscious too long. Perhaps Nic had simply found someplace on the mountain to wait out the storm. There was still hope for him.

She scooted to the edge of the opening and peered out.
Steep!
How had she managed to drag herself in here, half-insensible and fighting against that horrible storm? Good thing that she had, though. Already she could feel a huge difference in air temperature, just from the spot where she’d been inside the cave and here, at the opening. She pulled her coat tighter and shuddered. Her toes tingled from numbness. She’d be useless if she tried to go after Nic now.

Maybe she’d wait until daylight to venture back out there. Surely no one was looking for them yet, and she’d stand a much better chance of getting herself down from this mountain safely and locating him if she had a little more light and whatever heat the Icelandic sunrise could bring. For now, she really ought to just wait here and clear the fog from her brain.

She moved back toward the interior, out of the cold air blowing in, but not quite all the way back into the darkness. The smooth walls made it easy to navigate, and she found a comfortable spot to sit down. Her feet ached in these damn new boots, so she slipped them off. It would be good to get some blood flowing into her toes again, so she sat cross-legged on the cave floor and rubbed them. Ah, that felt better already.

Her brain was running over all the possible scenarios for what might have happened to Nic last night, and none of them were good. Unfortunately, some of them included such ridiculousness as dragons and space aliens. Damn, but those hallucinations had been so real! If she hadn’t sworn off her doomsaying doctor, she might be tempted to call him and see what he said about them.

She leaned back against the cave wall, wriggling her toes. Was it wise to abandon medical science and ignore what was happening to her body? No, probably not. But she knew as well as the doctors did that nothing would change the inevitable outcome of this tumor. It was her choice to make and she’d made it. She would live out her life on her terms, even if it meant there’d be slightly less of it to live.

It was funny, actually, and she had to laugh at herself. If she’d stayed home for another round of useless treatments, she’d have totally missed out on this. All in all, she guessed she’d much rather be taken out by a freak storm on a mountain in Iceland than to die hairless and suffering in some hospital bed with her friends and family feeling sorry for her. It was kind of invigorating, actually, to realize she’d cheated that storm, despite all its best efforts.

She stared out the opening of the cave, at the swirls of galaxies and stars glowing in the midnight of the sky. Yeah, she’d beat that damn storm and sent it back wherever it came from. She decided to take credit for that, and she smiled.

Her smile faded when she realized that a tiny dot she had noticed in the sky through the cave opening was not one lone star peeking through the clouds, but something heading directly toward her. Whatever the odd little light was, it was clearly getting brighter and brighter. An airplane? Helicopter? No, given the way her night was going, it was probably nothing that innocuous. With her luck, this was a meteor with her name carved right on it. Hell, it would just about figure, wouldn’t it?

She grabbed up her boots and scrambled to her feet. Her eyes never lost sight of the glowing dot. Thankfully it seemed too small and too close to actually be a meteor. But it was definitely not an airplane, or even a helicopter that might be searching for them, either. It was very much like…those orbs she had hallucinated last night on the mountainside.

Crap! She was doing it again. Unless…maybe she wasn’t. Maybe this was something real. But how could it be? She couldn’t even tell fact from fiction anymore. She felt panic rising inside and she instinctively pressed up against the side of the cave wall. She found a slight ridge to tuck herself behind, where she could peer out and watch the oncoming glow-ball, but not let it see her.

If glow-balls had eyes. What the hell was happening to her? She had to struggle not to hyperventilate.

Just as she had almost convinced herself with repeated internal chanting that this was not real, this was not real, the object began to take form. It was in the opening of the cave now, about half a foot in diameter, hovering there until it slowly descended to the cave floor. Silver and blue glitter seemed to emanate from it, sparkling against the smooth cave walls, and she could make out a tiny form there inside of the glow.

A fairy. She held her breath and stared. She was looking at a fairy, a tiny blue-glowing fairy. And not some pretty little princess thing, either. No, this was a guy fairy and he did not look very friendly. Even from where she hid in the darkness, she could see a sneer on his face.

But then he held up some kind of device. Was that a tiny cell phone? No, it couldn’t be. What would a fairy need with a cell phone? But then he spoke into it and she had to admit that maybe her first guess was accurate.

“I’m in,” the tiny creature said. “The safeguards are off. No sign of Vladik or any of the others. We can go ahead and send the next shipment down.”

A voice crackled back on the tiny device, but it was too small and too far away for Lianne to make any sense of it. Not to mention that she couldn’t make sense out of anything right now.

“All right,” the fairy continued. “Contact me when they’re close by. I’ll wait here for the signal.”

He must have finished his conversation, because he tucked the device into a little bag that he carried at his side. Lianne stared, but then he took a few steps into the cave and his gaze shifted her way. She sucked in a breath when he spotted her and they made eye contact.

“Who are you?” he demanded. “Explain yourself, human!”

She was suddenly struck by the absurdity of it all. A six-inch fairy fluttered up to her and was demanding she explain herself? She didn’t have time for this. She needed to get out of here, find Nic—or whatever was left of him—and get back to the jobsite. These hallucinations were starting to suck.

Without thinking, she swung her boot around and nailed the snippy little fairy right on the side of his tiny, glittering head.

“I’ve got fucking cancer,” she told him as he went sailing senseless into the wall. “I don’t need to explain
anything
.”

He had no explanation.
Something was wrong.
Nic could feel it, but he could not determine what it was. His mind was tiring, growing weak. His body, too. The closer he came to the clutch hidden deep inside the mountain, the more his power drained.

He pressed on, concentrating on keeping his movements silent, stealthy. The labyrinth of passageways was intentionally complex and he purposely did not take the most direct route. His dragon senses—dulled, though they were—told him caution should be his first priority. There was a reason his safeguards were gone from the entrance, and he did not like to think of what it could be.

Someone
had
come through. It was not anyone of his kind, either. He would have felt them, known they were here. Whoever it was that had penetrated his defenses, they were not here on friendly business, and they must have gone to great lengths to keep themselves hidden from him. His instinct pounded with worry for the young, curled inside their iridescent eggs below, growing and incubating in the clutch. It was an effort to keep himself calm as he moved steadily through the passages, reaching with his senses for anyone who might be waiting to surprise him.

He’d been forced to release his mental hold on Lianne. As he’d grown weaker, it was impossible to keep his connection to her and search through the myriad of hiding places down here. He hoped to the Depths that she was still sleeping above, oblivious to anything going on around her. It grated at him to have to leave her alone, but his first duty was to the clutch. He had to get there, to see that it was safe.

The clutch was his future, the hope of his kind. Nothing could be allowed to endanger that. When he did find whoever—or whatever—was down here draining his power, it would be his life or theirs.

And he had no intention of dying today.

Something caught his attention. He froze, his huge body tensing as he put all of his effort into his thoughts. Yes, he could feel someone nearby…several someones, actually. Human. By the Fires, there were humans in the clutch!

He made himself drain all his fury. He must stay cool, keep his temper low and his fire doused; it was the only way to keep hidden. He breathed slowly, methodically, reaching ever so carefully with his mind. No one must feel him. No one must know he was here.

He found the first mind easy to penetrate. This was a human, someone simply doing a job without much passion or drive. He searched carefully but could learn very little. This human was a mere technician, someone simply hired to install machinery, but that was all that he knew about it. He’d likely been kept ignorant for this very purpose, so that no one could learn valuable details from him.

This meant Nic was expected. Whoever was in charge of this operation knew telepathic searches could be a possibility. They’d likely taken precautions. It might not be so very easy to get information out of the others whom Nic could feel moving around just one passage over, working at the very mouth to the cavern his kind had crafted especially to harbor the clutch.

He had to try, though. Gingerly, slowly, his mind touched the next human he found, and then the next. So very empty—how could their minds be so blank? He reached into a fourth—the final human in this group. Ah, here was the leader. Nic could feel that immediately.

But there was something more. He felt something inside the man, something that shouldn’t be there. He sensed magic! This human possessed magic within his mind? How could that be?

He probed deeper to understand what he’d found, but suddenly an alarm began blaring loudly, echoing through the passages and alerting anyone within earshot. Damn it all, but the magic inside the human had reacted to Nic’s presence. Now all four of the humans knew he was here, and Nic could feel their desperate thoughts loud and clear. They were prepared for him.

The leader ordered his men to attack the clutch—to destroy it! They possessed weapons to do so and Nic could feel their vicious intent as they began their onslaught. He gave up stealth and caution, charging ahead, letting the full fury inside him boil over. His weariness threatened to slow him, but sheer force of will allowed him to ignore that. The walls of the passageway glowed with his flame, although he had to notice the intensity was not nearly what it should have been. Still, he pushed himself forward. Sparks shot from his claws as he tore at the rock with all four legs, covering distance in labored strides.

He rounded the final turn in his route toward the clutch and burst into the nursery cavern only to come to a screeching halt. All four humans stood there, some sort of weapons in their fleshy hands. The weapons weren’t aimed at the helpless young in the clutch, though. No, each human stood at the ready, his weapon trained on Nic as if he had been fully expected.

Obviously he had been, at least by the leader of their group. That man Nic recognized immediately by the smug sneer on his face. The other three men seemed somewhat less prepared to find a huge, fiery red dragon raging over them. They each took a step back and held their weapons just a bit higher. They did not fire, Nic noted.

“Nicolai Vladik, I presume?” the group leader said confidently.

“You should not be here,” Nic roared, not bothering to acknowledge the man’s question. “This is not your place. You will die for being here.”

“I think not,” the man continued. “As you no doubt have already noticed, you’re lacking a little steam right now, aren’t you? Yes, I can see it in your eyes. You know something’s wrong, don’t you, Nic?”