Chapter
Fourteen
D ay after day they walked as they left the Shoowilp territory and crossed into the Fwen and the Gillup territories until eventually they left the swamp and began their ascent. In all of Gwum’s exploration and numerous trips to acquire supplies, he had never before been outside of the swamplands. Gwyr were notorious for violently defending their territory, so he never felt any reason to be good enough. Only his saroongna was worth the danger. He wasn’t prepared, however, for how it would affect him.
Despite the fog, the air felt dryer, making his skin burn and ache as thirst constantly ravaged him, and his eyes burned so that he was forced to continuously blink them. Even the mountains themselves were miserable as the hard stone cut into his feet with only large patches of moss offering relief. The trees seemed to share his misery as they refused to grow to an appropriate size. Instead, they remained small and thin compared to those that grew within the swamp and far less plentiful, providing for less comfort for their rest. It also made him feel more exposed than ever before, which was bad enough but made worse by the fact that something was hunting them.
“It shouldn’t be much farther now,” Noelle wheezed breathlessly as she stumbled to his side. “It’s just over that rise according to my comm’s tracker,” she said as she nodded toward a cliff rising in the near distance.
His hearts hurt for her. She was noticeably exhausted, and he wanted nothing more than to snatch her up and haul her back to the safety of the Shoowilp territory whether she wanted it or not. He could make her happy. He loved her with all of his hearts. He would gladly devote his existence to her, and his family adored her. They would give her all the family she wanted. And he would breed her eagerly every night, preferably multiple times a day, and if they were lucky, they might have offspring of their own. He could give her everything… except the humans she was searching for.
To take her would be selfish and he hated that he loved her too much to hurt her that way. For once he wanted to be selfish and take something for himself, but he could not do it to the detriment of his mate. And she was his mate—there was no denying it or trying to ignore it. He recognized it within his hearts and bred her all throughout the night, mingling their pheromones together inescapably even if she was incapable of scenting it. He was proud to wear her scent but hated that even if it did not disappear that it would eventually fade with the passage of time without her there to renew it.
He squinted at the rocky rise and frowned. There were no trees at all up there. Noelle would have no shelter or defenses, and he was expected to leave her up there?
“There? Are you certain?” he murmured.
She nodded wearily. “Yeah. Not very homey looking, is it? That’s just the drop site. It was a bit off course but at least the plateau isn’t too far away. Hopefully it won’t look so… so…”
“Dead,” he supplied. Sighing, he turned toward her reluctantly, not wishing to hear her refuse him again but unable to go further in good conscience. “Noelle, I do not like this. I…” He froze, his senses sharpening as a crackling thrum rose.
Cazka? What was a cazka doing out of the swamp? Unless it had followed them from the human camp. It was not unprecedented for cazka to follow the scent of prey once they have locked onto it for long distances. He had assumed that the predator had been not able to locate her due to the change in her scent making it nose blind, but they were highly intelligent creatures… If he was right, then it would seem that his initial assumption was incorrect.
It did not matter. The important question was how were they going to escape it without suitable trees to flee into? The cazka was not incapable of scaling trees but did not climb fast and gave up quickly. That was not going to pose the same sort of obstacle with the trees that grew along the mountainside. It was trying to locate them now, the snuffling sound growing louder, all it would take was one loud noise to give away their position and?—
“Gwum, what?—”
“Shh,” he hissed and grimaced apologetically at the look of surprise she gave him. “Cazka,” he whispered as he opened his arms for her and bade her to step into them.
Her eyes swept the forest nervously, but she nodded and closed the small distance separating them, practically climbing up his body the moment she stepped into his embrace. He hugged her to him and swept her up into her arms. They would travel faster this way. They had only one chance and he would need to move fast in order to get them up the cliff to the sole source of potential safety. He just hoped that a human structure designed to be intentionally dropped from the heavens would be enough to keep out a cazka.
He glanced toward her comm and oriented himself, his hearts pounding in his chest as he clutched Noelle tightly to him and leaped forward into a sprint. Sacrificing silence for speed, he raced from the woods and bounded up the cliffside. Tiny pebbles rolled down the cliff at the cazka’s roar and the sound of trees cracking and young saplings crashing to the ground rose abruptly from behind them, and Gwum glanced back frantically to judge the distance separating them as the predator broke from the tree line with a ferocious whip of its head. It barreled toward them, its leathery skin and the armored scutes that covered its back between vicious spines catching the sunlight in an oily gleam. Its mouth snapped the air, its sharp teeth in a continuously exposed grin as its maw opened with a rattling howl, ropes of salvia falling from its jowls.
“Holy fucking shit, it’s the gator from hell!” Noelle shouted, and she clung tighter to him. “Move it, Gwum! We’re almost there!”
He did not need any further encouragement; sadly he was also going as fast as he could go and already his body was laboring to maintain the speed. The Bia, while capable of moving quickly, were not designed to do so continuously over long distances. He could feel fatigue catching up to him but he stubbornly pushed himself beyond his limits. Just a little farther. He had to get Noelle to safety. He had no chance alone against the cazka, but as long as he got Noelle safely tucked inside with her supplies, he would face what was to come.
He hugged her to him as he ran, his already broken hearts shattering. “Noelle, you will live, I promise. Do not forget that you are my saroongna, this means you are not only life, but you are specifically my life,” he rasped in a labored breath. It hurt to breathe, much less speak, but he had to tell her while he had the chance. He saw the metal structure rising above the rocks just ahead of them, they were almost there. “You are everything that I love and treasure and I would have?—”
He cried out as he stumbled and fell to his knees as he crested the cliff. His body curled around hers as they rolled down the opposite side together until they stopped just shy of the massive metal box. He stared in a daze at it. They were there. He tried to rise but his limbs shook uselessly, his body spent. He wept as he released her, a ragged sob tearing from his chest.
“Go. Run!”
Her feet scrambled for purchase on the rocks but she did not leave him. Instead, she bent down and looped his arm around her neck, shouldering the bulk of his weight as she relentlessly tugged him to his feet. His eyes lifted to the top of the cliff at the sound of small rocks breaking loose and rolling down toward him. The cazka rose over the edge, its rattling hiss turning into a hunting hum as it focused on them. Its jaws opened wide, its spiked spine rising in preparation for the attack.
“Go!” he hissed vehemently, and he tried to push her away so that she was forced to drop him, but she shook her head stubbornly and clung to him.
“No! I’m not leaving you!” she shouted.
The cazka’s muscles bunched and it raced from the cliff, its claws scouring deep grooves as it ran. The air shrieked suddenly in a way that sent a cold trail down Gwum’s spine and he braced himself, curling his body around his mate as much as possible to protect her with his dying breath as it sprung, its claws stretching like the hand of death for him.
The air shrieked suddenly, and an unholy scream filled the air with a sharp thunk . It was followed by a loud crash that could only be made by the impact of something heavy falling as a cloud of dust rose, mingling with the fog. Gwum blinked in surprise, the tension slowly draining from him when he didn’t feel the touch of the cazka’s deadly claws. Coughing a little, he looked over his shoulder toward the beast and his eyes widened. Its body was stretched across the ground, blood pouring from a wound made by a large Gwyr-made metal bolt lodged deeply into its neck.
His eyes snapped up to the surrounding slopes nervously, waiting for the Gwyr to show themselves.
“It’s dead,” Noelle whispered in a voice dull and distant with shock. “How?—”
“A Gwyr bolt,” he hissed. “They are somewhere.”
“Then let’s get to the cargo container and hide before they see us,” she quietly replied.
He nodded. It would not matter. The Gwyr possessed sharp eyesight, and if they had seen the Cazka well enough to fire from such a distance, there was no doubt at all that they had seen them as well. Still, he allowed his mate to haul him to the container where she released him only to inspect it.
“The opening mechanism should be around here somewhere and I—” A startled gasp left her. “Kastle was here!” she exclaimed, and she laughed in disbelief as she swiped a hand over her face. Her fingers trailed over what appeared to be crude shapes carved into the metal. “She left us all a note.” Her brow furrowed quizzically. “She left supplies for me and said to use the transporter inside to bring them up to base camp, but she was going up the mountain. Something about catching a lift with a friend on a rescue mission. What in the world?”
“That would be me,” a deep voice interrupted, and Gwum whirled around with a vicious hiss. The Gwyr male lifted an eyebrow at him but made no move to attack. “Fine reception considering that I saved your worthless hide. But what can one expect from a Bia? You are just fortunate that I happened to be passing by. Regardless, it was not you I am interested in.” His gaze shifted to Noelle and he smiled, revealing his sharp fangs. “You, on the other hand, I am delighted to see. Amanda will be relieved.”
“You know where Kastle is?” Noelle asked doubtfully.
He inclined his head. “This cliffside is on the edge of my property and I happened upon her while hunting much in the same way I came across you—minus the cazka, though that makes a fortunate feast,” he added, licking his lips. He sighed and shook his head before gazing upon Noelle with a look of admiration. “It seems that she was right about you after all. She said if anyone could come out of the swamps alive, it would be Noelle Xander. I can take you to her, or you can carry on with her instructions if you like. No one will bother you here as it is within the bounds of my territory. So long as I keep up appearances, no other Gwyr will venture to cross into it.”
Gwum frowned. Although the offer of protection would give Noelle the safety that she needed against the Gwyr, he distinctly dislike giving her over to the smug male. He glanced over at her curiously. Would she go with him to be reunited with her companion? He disliked that option even more, but he also knew that he had no power over her decision. That was, after all, her stated purpose.
Her expression shifted to one of uncertainty as she glanced over at him. “What if…” She faltered but drew in a sharp breath, then made a valiant attempt to smile. “What if I didn’t go to the plateau?”
He froze, uncertain whether or not he misheard. “Not go?” he echoed, refusing to allow a false hope to take root.
Noelle’s smile disappeared and she ducked her head, her gaze fixing on the metal shell in front of her. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s probably a stupid idea. I’m basically a dead woman walking in the swamp and?—”
“And I will love every minute of having you under my protection. For the rest of our lives,” he added in a rush as he gently cupped her face and tipped it so that her eyes met his. “I never wish to let you go. You dwell within my hearts, Noelle. You are my mate—the only mate I have ever wanted and will ever want. Please stay with me.”
“Forever?”
“Forever,” he confirmed as he drew her into his arms, hugging her tightly against his heart. He had never wanted a mate. But he did not just have a mate. He had everything.
The Gwyr chuckled with delight. “What a perfect ending… or rather, a new beginning. I cannot wait to tell Amanda.”
The male’s wings flapped as he took to the sky, but Gwum ignored him. Brushing his knuckle beneath her chin, he tipped her head back and claimed her lips with the first of many kisses that they would have for the rest of their lives.