Remedy Maker (15 page)

Daisy scrambled up the slope, pulling at the dirt with her hands. The leafy-green pattern of her full skirt would help to camouflage her lower body. Until she was hidden, Rhy made certain to keep himself between her and their unknown stalker.

An endangered northern goshawk floated in the updrafts and keened a sharp cry. Its speckled black and white underbelly dangled stark against an azure sky, wings spread wide. Rhycious took heed of the bird’s counsel and hurried to take cover behind a giant hemlock tree. Directly across from where he hunkered down, Daisy crouched behind a sun-dappled rock.

He pressed a finger to his lips, signaling to stay quiet. Her blue eyes were huge in her ashen face, and her fingers gripped the rock so tight her knuckles showed white.

Without a sound, he slipped the pack off his shoulders and lowered it to the ground. Steady cadence of footsteps drew closer. A strike against hard packed dirt thumped an accompaniment to the double-time beat of his heart. Sweat popped out along his neckline and attracted insects that buzzed around his ears. The familiar feel of an advancing enemy drew unwanted memories.

Closer. Deliberate. Tentative.

Rhy worked to regulate his breathing and glanced at Daisy. He’d have chosen a better location to conceal her if he had the time. When their pursuers rounded the boulder, she’d be a textbook illustration of how
not
to take cover. Gods! Why hadn’t he taken a more thorough precaution for them?

He glanced at her again and she cocked her head, brows drawn together. “Don’t move,” he mouthed, and slid the Bowie knife free from its sheath. He rolled his shoulders, loosening up for the coming confrontation.

Tension thrummed, his unblinking eyes dried out. The lives of he and Daisy demanded he be at the top of his game. Should anything happen to them, who would know to go after Patience?

Before his mind could drift down another dark path, fern leaves scraped as a body passed a few yards from their hiding places. The feathery stalks returned to their resting place with a swish. Rhycious fell further back into the shadow of the tree. He maneuvered around the massive trunk to surprise their pursuer from behind.

He didn’t have any plans to become someone’s knife or bullet sponge today. He wouldn’t take any chances. No, today he would deliver his message with lethal aim.

Blood rushed in his head louder than the continuous crash of the Boronda Falls, drowning out calls of jays and pine warblers. Violence from two hundred years ago mixed with his memory of the past twenty-four hours. The edges of reality blurred, no matter how hard he fought the coagulation.

Which is reality? Could he keep the past separated from the present?

Please . . . gods! Not now.

Daisy sucked in a gasp and her squeal of surprise launched Rhycious into action. Time to sort his confused thoughts had just run out. Adrenaline flushed into his system as if a faucet blasted on, pumping his heart into a maddening beat.

With a wild paladin roar, he leaped out, his blade glinting and egging him on. Rhycious longed to sink his knifepoint deep into the neck of the enemy who appeared before him. He jumped the tango from behind, surprise in his favor, and wrapped his left arm around the man’s neck. Pulling hard, he cranked the Nymph’s head to the side and thrust his knife downward.

At the last second, the lithe body beneath him twisted and seized Rhy’s wrist in a steely grip, holding the knife at bay.

“Rhycious!”

Surprised the enemy knew his name, Rhy fought the hands holding his wrist. Held securely, he twisted his arm, trying to break free, slicing the air with his shiv. His other hand punched, catching the warrior under the chin.

Through his berserk mind, Rhy recognized the writhing body shape was irregular for a Wood Nymph.

Too elongated. A tan and black hide.

Ghostly cries of the fallen assailed his ears. Everywhere around him, the height of the battle raged. Transparent outlines of Centaur warriors surged past, swords drawn, shields up.

“Advance, Centaur clans.” Rhy shouted encouragement. “Long live Queen Savella!”

Fallen comrades writhed in agony. Illusory arrows flew, striking the cranium of the apparitional man ahead of him, protruding completely through. The warrior’s translucent body floated to the ground in death, dispersing as if it were nothing more than mist.

Beneath Rhycious’s clenched arms, the Nymph’s body bucked and struggled.

He shook his head. His mind scrambled to make sense of the grotesque carnage of the past . . . or was it the present?

“Look at me, Rhy.” The profound voice drifted from a distance and urged him to obey.

“No! It’s a trick.” Rhy squeezed his arm tighter around the man’s throat. If he couldn’t carve the words out of the warrior’s throat, then he’d cut off his air supply.

Hooves shuffled and kicked, muffled crashes against rock, jolting Rhy’s head with the repercussions. He welcomed the fight and hung on. When the grip on his wrist slackened, he pressed the blade’s deadly edge ever closer.

Vehemence of a mosquito pushed like an impatient child against his left shoulder. “What’s wrong with him?” Shrill with fright, the feminine words shook, breaking through Rhycious’s mental barrier.

Female. Fear.

“Patience?” Rhy glanced around him. What the hell was she doing here, in the midst of combat? She’d be killed if he couldn’t protect her.

The horrific thought of her innocent blood spilling, jackknifed the adrenaline coursing through his veins. In his head, the buzzing increased to an eardrum ripping decibel level.

“Rhycious. It’s me, Daisy.”

He strained to focus his eyes on the source of terrified speech. Chilled hands tugged at his arm that wrapped the enemy’s neck.

Where was he?

“Daisy?” He loosened his strangling hold by a notch, but kept his knife at the ready
.

Phantom warriors rose from both sides of enemy lines, summoned from the souls of the deceased. They wavered before him in bloodied combat armor.

“Yes. It’s me.” She yanked on his arm. “Let go before you kill him.”

“Rhycious—put the knife down, buddy.”

“Alek?”

“Put the fucking knife down before you scrape me with it, asshole.”

Wails of ghostly agony subsided to real-time truth. The quiet of the Boronda Forest deafened with a crescendo resembling the bang of thunder.

Slick with sweat, Rhy dropped his arm from Alek’s neck, leaving it to drape over his friend’s withers. Sick and disgusted with himself, he bent over at the waist. His cramping hold on the Bowie’s leather handle slid out of his bloodless fingers to fall amongst the composting leaves.

Humiliation cracked a brittle wall inside him, leaking out shame, cruel and black. “Oh gods, Alek. I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened.”

Perspiration dripped into Rhy’s eyes and he wiped it away with an unsteady hand. Soon the shakes would set in when the adrenaline rushing through his veins wore off.

Not to mention the internal anguish.

He’d held a razor-sharp dagger to Alek’s jugular during another moment of flashback torment. Nausea burned up the back of Rhy’s throat, threatening to spill his stomach’s contents and further disgrace him.

“Well, if it makes you feel better, you haven’t lost your touch with a knife.” Alek reached up and wiped a single crimson drop off his neck. His crooked half-smile housed an attitude of self-command and studied relaxation. Base knowledge of their shared history made for a good friend, and Alek understood without saying a word. “Reminds me of the time we tried to shave when we were drunk.”

Rhy snorted, because he was too shaken to laugh. “Except I wasn’t trying to give you a Minotaur neck-tie in the process.”

How his friend could forgive so easily was beyond him. If their roles were reversed, Rhy wasn’t sure he could be as absolving.

Daisy stepped forward, a pensive shimmer in the shadow of her eyes. Lines of concern wrinkled her brow. “How ya doin’, big guy?” She appeared uneasy, and deservingly so.

Rhycious hunched and focused his stare at the ground. He fought to lower his heart’s frantic beat, concentrating on each pump until it regulated itself once again. What was there to say? He’d been in a physical war for 200 years—and a mental battle ever since. 

Diagnosis: permanently fucked in the head.

Damn, he wished they’d go away so he could be miserable by himself.

Alek pointed to a spot on the ground near the tree. “Why don’t you park it a minute and catch your breath.” He dug into his travel bag, brought out a canteen, and tossed it to him.

Rhy caught the container, but shook his head at the offer to sit. How could he rest when Patience was out there somewhere?

 “Just for a moment,” Alek said. “Sip some water. Your damn legs are shaking.”

After taking a long swallow, Rhy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “By the way, Daisy, this is Kempor Aleksander. Head palace guard and,” he heaved a sigh, “thankfully, still a friend of mine.” He handed the canteen back. “Alek, meet Daisy. She’s a friend of Patience’s and shimmered me out of the tree.”

Alek deftly lifted Daisy’s fingers and touched his lips to the back of them. “Hello, sweet-thing. What a pleasure to make your acquaintance.” He brushed his goatee over her skin, his eyes glinting in flirtatious mischief. “Where is Patience, by the way?”

Rhycious appreciated the hell out of Alek’s antics, and the reason behind why he did it. But brushing the PTSD incident off like crumbs on a table wouldn’t work anymore. Rhy’s episodes had become more gripping in their intensity, threatening the lives of others.

He’d rather take his own life than kill an innocent while he vacated reality.

What would happen if he slept with Patience and woke up disoriented? Would he mistake her for an enemy and try to choke the life out her, as he had once done to Hippy? Hippolyte was a trained soldier; she survived based on wits and skill.

He stored the thought away in the back of his brain, to unravel at a more opportune time.

Closing his eyes, he concentrated on breathing, centering himself while sitting on the ground cross-legged. His leg muscles twitched spasmodically while his body’s energy wound down.

A short distance away, Alek and Daisy spoke in hushed tones. Their voices merged with a lone jet droning high overhead, then the excited chatter of squirrels drowned them out entirely.

Rhy used his positive affirmations:
I breathe deeply. I open every cell in my body to the good vibrations of nature. I am full of life, and the power of the gods.

Inhaling a deep, cleansing breath, he opened his eyes and searched the surrounding area. Aleksander and Daisy stood a few Centaurs’ lengths away, and he smirked at Alek’s old pick-up lines in progress. Daisy’s hand lay open, the fully armed Centaur hovered over it, tracing creases in her palm.

Gods, the old palm reader crap. Women still fell for it.

Pushing off the ground, Rhycious rose to his feet, anxious to keep on the move. He bent to retrieve his Bowie and slid the knife back into its leather case. Collecting his scattered wits, he slogged up the faint trail again, concentrating on the hunters’ tracks. To distract Alek’s attention off Daisy, he asked, “How’d you find us so quick?”

“You leave a trail like a herd of bull elk.” Alek stroked Daisy’s wrist while they followed alongside, not in the least sidetracked. She snatched her hand away.

Rhy’s heart rate slowed and beat closer to a normal rhythm. He gathered his hair and tied it back with a thin strip of leather while he marched along. “Where were you last night?” He heard the critical tone to his voice.

Alek’s gaze snapped to him. “I had unfinished business to attend. Where were you?”

Rhy stopped, and held his raw emotion in check. “Stuck inside a fucking tree while Patience delivered your dinner.” He paused to take a breath. “Apparently, you were gone within thirty minutes, or else she’d be here. Must have been real important.”

“Yeah, it was.” Alek brought his front hooves closer. “Personal, too, so back the hell off.”

Alek’s arms were crossed, his square chin thrust upward to look down an aquiline nose.

What’s he all pissed-off about?

Rhycious returned his friend’s icy glare straight on, wondering about Alek’s motives for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. Their friendship spanned more than two hundred years, but what did he really know about the Centaur soldier?

 Perhaps it was his own uneasiness at the edge of his mind. He became more uncomfortable by the minute, wondering if his reactions were PTSD induced paranoia, or an actual gut feeling. He didn’t trust his own judgment anymore.

He prayed to Bacchus, Pan, and whatever god he’d left out that Alek had nothing to do with Patience’s disappearance. Did Alek do zilch to help while she was nabbed?

Crazy
. His thoughts were driving him right over the brink.

At one time, the chasm between reality and imagination stretched wide and deep. Lately, crossing the gap was as easy as stepping over a twig in the dirt.

There was no mistaking Alek’s accusing eyes, and it ate at Rhy’s better judgment.

“What’s wrong, Alek? Is there something going—”

A shriek with the combined fear of a four lifetimes behind it split the morning air. High-pitched reverberations slung like moss webbing through the trees. The encompassing woods absorbed the sound in the vein of a tuning fork, passing the scream through branches and vast underground root systems.

Rhycious’s gaze flew to the top of the trailhead, and then back to Aleksander, whose irritated expression had changed and become serious.

The female’s voice, Rhy’s de-stressing
happy
place,
wobbled faint across the distance. “You goddamn, drugged-out,
mutherfucker
. I’m so . . . .” another long, drawn out scream. “. . . gunna shoot your worthless ass!”

With his heart lodged in his throat, Rhycious shot like a jackrabbit and sprinted for the rise of the knoll. He pulled his sheathed blade on the run.