Page 51 of Ensnared by the Pack: The Complete Series (Destined Realms #3)
AUDREY
We hiked until I was sure I couldn’t hike anymore and then hiked even farther. The sun sat low on the horizon when Cyrus finally stopped us for the night. My feet, legs, and back— hell, my whole body ached. The bruise on my thigh throbbed with every step, and the bite on my back stung, my backpack rubbing against it with each uneven step.
We’d stopped in an alcove, partially covered with a rocky overhang and sheltered from the wind on three sides. Our campsite sat at the edge of the woods that I’d seen far off in the distance and about sixty feet — and down a rocky incline — to the river.
Cyrus dropped his pack and tossed his and Knox’s canteens to Bishop. “Fill those and set up camp. I’ll get firewood.”
“What can I do?” I asked, letting my pack fall to the ground. I was exhausted, just like I’d asked for, but if I didn’t sit, I could probably help with something before I collapsed.
“Stay awake until dinner is done,” Cyrus commanded and he marched toward the forest.
“It’ll be easier with a job,” I sighed, and Bishop offered me a sympathetic smile.
“Come on.” He jerked his chin and I followed him down to the river. “Now take your boots off and soak your feet. According to the map, we’ve still got seven days until we reach the death god’s territory and if we keep up this pace you’re only going to feel worse.”
“I’ll feel worse if the bond forces me and Knox to seal it,” I replied, sitting downstream from Bishop and pulling off my boots. “I think I can last seven days. Surely my heat will end soon. But I’m not sure if I can last longer.”
“I’ve already promised that I won’t let you do something you don’t want to,” Bishop reassured me.
I sank my feet into the cool water as he submerged the first canteen. “It’s not just me fighting it. Wolves in my realm can be aggressive when it comes to their mate and the magic of this bond is…”
I shuddered, fighting my arousal, determined to stay in control. Except it was so much harder now that I knew what Bishop’s lips felt like against mine, his hands caressing?—
I clamped down on those thoughts and cleared my throat.
“The bond’s magic is powerful. If it overwhelms Knox, he could hurt anyone who gets in his way,” I finished.
Bishop closed the cap on the first canteen and started filling the second one. “Both of you are stubborn enough to resist it.”
“I’d rather not press our luck any longer than we have to.” My gaze flickered to Bishop’s, but I managed to pull it away before I could fall into his warm, brown eyes.
“I understand,” he replied, his voice husky. “You won’t have to.”
He filled the last canteen and then returned to camp, letting me soak my feet while he started to set things up. It probably wasn’t entirely safe to leave me alone given that I didn’t know how to defend myself and I was exhausted, but the water felt so good that I didn’t want to say anything.
A little while later, Cyrus returned and I pulled my feet out of the water, letting them dry a bit, then shoved them back into my boots. I staggered up to camp to find Cyrus turning meat on the spit over a fire and Bishop sitting under the overhang, leaning against the rock wall. Knox was nowhere to be seen, but given how fast Cyrus had returned, Knox had to have hunted our dinner while Cyrus gathered the wood.
“Come here, beautiful,” Bishop said, opening up his arms in invitation.
I huffed at the compliment. Even if I might be beautiful normally — which I wasn’t — I certainly wasn’t beautiful right now, not bruised and scratched up and exhausted. Still, I sank into his embrace, letting the warmth of being physically connected with him wash through me. The achy need from my heat and the mating bond swelled, but, as I’d hoped, my exhaustion was stronger than my desire, and all I really wanted was to lie against Bishop’s chest, wrapped in his arms.
This was perfect. This was the way it was supposed to be. Well, not the complete and utter exhaustion or the constant ache from my body, but the sense of peace and belonging and home that seeped through my cells and into my soul.
The guys talked about how much longer it was going to take to get to the death god’s altar and what they might expect, but I didn’t join in. There wasn’t much I could say because I didn’t know anything about this world, and while I probably should have listened and learned everything I could about what I might encounter, I was just too tired and comfortable with Bishop holding me.
Their voices lulled me into a sleepy state where I hung, suspended between being awake and asleep until Bishop set a bowl of food in my hand and told me to eat.
I roused myself enough to eat without Cyrus forcing me with his power then lost the fight and let sleep take me while still in Bishop’s arms.
The next morning, Bishop woke me at dawn after dream-Knox had brought me to climax with his lips but before my second orgasm with him inside me. I woke achy and needy and thankfully sore. Every muscle in my body hurt and it was easy to focus on my pain and not the thrumming need for a release or the icy hollowness of my rejected mate bond.
I hadn’t expected my plan of being too tired for sex to affect my mornings as well, but a quick release in the bushes before I emptied my bladder took away enough of the pressure for the other sensations battling inside me to overwhelm my desire. And while it was the only practical way to deal with the situation, I couldn’t stop my face from burning once I washed my hands and returned to camp.
Without comment, Bishop handed me a small bowl of oatmeal with last night’s leftover meat while Cyrus dumped his canteen on our dying fire and packed up.
We walked all day and the next, and long before we reached the evening of the third day of my terrible plan, I was seriously regretting telling Cyrus to push our pace. I’d hoped I’d get used to all the walking, but it’d been a fantasy to hope I could get past the exhaustion and aches without resting for a day or ten. And while Bishop had gotten me good quality hiking boots, my feet just weren’t used to it and I now had blisters.
But the pressure from the bond and my heat and the achy icy hollowness kept getting stronger, and I was certain the only reason I hadn’t jumped Bishop again was because I was so tired.
I’d promised Cyrus I could push through and I would. The sooner we got to the death god’s altar the better and not just because I was on the verge of snapping. Cyrus had said leaving town was dangerous, and while I hadn’t seen any grimalkins or more flying snakes, I knew they were out there. I could feel them watching us, waiting to pounce, and like a lion hunting gazelle, I was fully aware that I was the weakest member of the group and the easiest target.
Now the sun sat on the western horizon just starting to turn the sky pink with the beginning of the sunset. If today was like the last couple of days, I still had at least an hour before we stopped, and I wasn’t sure if my feet would make it.
Ahead of me, Cyrus crested a rise and paused, staring at the sunset. His eyes narrowed and he unclipped his canteen from his pack.
“Bishop, fill up our canteens,” he ordered. “Knox says there’s a cave up ahead so we’re stopping for the night.”
“But we have another hour,” I said, despite my complaining feet. An hour more of walking meant I was an hour closer to where I needed to be.
“And this is shelter,” Cyrus replied, his attention flickering back to the sunset before shooting Bishop a stern look.
“Give me your canteen.” Bishop held out his hand, and I unhooked it and handed it over.
He headed toward the river, while Cyrus led me around a jagged outcropping of rock and down a long, uneven slope with enough levelish rocky protrusions for footholds, so I didn’t have to slide all the way down.
Another jagged pillar of rock and a scraggly pine tree that looked half alive partially hid the cave entrance and shaded it from the late-afternoon sun, illuminating only a few feet beyond the cave’s wide mouth. Without my wolf form, I didn’t have the night vision ability other shifters had, but from the sound of Cyrus’s footsteps as he march into the gloom a few feet ahead of me, I could guess the cave was big.
“Sit over there and stay out of the way,” Cyrus said, pointing into the darkness where there could be anything I could trip over or bang my head against.
“How about I wait here until there’s a fire,” I offered instead, making him frown. Then realization flashed across his face and his expression grew even darker.
Yeah, yet another reminder of how weak I really was.
I bit back a sigh and leaned against the mouth of the cave, too tired to be upset about it anymore. Right now, just like everything else, it was what it was and there wasn’t anything I could do about it.
Bishop returned with our canteens and a handful of branches to start a fire but not enough to keep it going, and Cyrus left while Knox remained out of sight. I’d caught glimpses of Knox during the last couple of days, and last night I’d partially woken when Bishop moved me out of his arms onto my blanket and saw Knox sitting beside Cyrus near the fire.
I’d known Knox was avoiding me, knew it was for the best, but seeing him there, clearly having joined our camp after he knew I was asleep, had made the icy hollowness of his rejection surge inside me and even my sexy dream of him didn’t push the sensation back to what it had been before.
Bishop got a small fire going, which didn’t illuminate much more of the cave, and, like the previous nights, opened his arms to me. I sagged into his embrace, but while I was exhausted, I couldn’t let myself relax enough to fall asleep.
The sense of something out there, something watching us, had grown stronger the longer I’d stood in the cave’s entrance waiting for Bishop to set up the fire, and it hadn’t gone away even with the warmth of his arms around me relaxing my body and soul.
Dinner was dried rations from our packs, adding to the feeling that I wasn’t the only one on edge. If Knox wasn’t able to hunt down anything for us to eat, it either meant there were other things in the area scaring off the smaller game or he didn’t want to be distracted from protecting us.
But Cyrus and Bishop didn’t say anything about it, and by the time I’d finished eating, I could barely keep my eyes open and didn’t have the energy to ask. And really, would they even tell me? There wasn’t anything I could do to help. Hell, given the condition of my feet, I wouldn’t even be able to run very fast for very long.