Page 26 of Stealing Mercury (Arena Dogs #1)

The cavern ceiling formed a dome directly overhead, but the moment she started exploring, it crowded down to only a few centimeters between her and what looked more like rotting debris than rock.

She didn’t immediately see Carn, but there was a bend in the cavern, which was looking more and more like a crevice or ravine that had been covered over in a land slide.

She headed for the bend, picking her way around the bony remains.

As she cleared the corner, the space between floor and earthy ceiling closed down to about two meters.

A freshly fallen layer of mulch-like material covered the bones and the debris overhead bulged downward like a tarp straining under too great a weight.

Directly under the lowest point, a pile of debris and dirt created a mound. A mound with twisted legs.

Carn.

Samantha dropped to her knees and scrambled around the mound. She found his arms shielding his face. Luckily, he’d landed on, or gotten to, his side. His arms not only shielded his face but kept a path clear for air to reach him. He was breathing, but unconscious.

“Found him,” she said aloud.

The bulging ceiling above shook loose another layer of debris. Samantha coughed and covered her face in her shirt again. When things settled overhead, she dusted herself off and started scooping debris away from Carn’s arms and shoulders. “This ceiling is shaky.”

She couldn’t hear a response, but there was no more movement above. She had him mostly uncovered when a voice drifted around the bend in the crevice. Reluctantly, she left him to get back to the tunnel she’d come down.

“I’m here.” She shouted up. “Carn lost consciousness.”

“Can you move him?” Mercury’s voice settled the sense of doom that had been growing inside her.

She looked over her shoulder, despite not being able to see him around the corner.

She didn’t need to see him to know he was big.

And heavy. Still, if she needed to move him, she would.

And she hadn’t tried the med kit. A stimulant might bring him around.

“Yes, but there’s no way he’ll fit through the gap up there. ”

“Agreed,” he shouted. “But the roof here must be more solid. Safer.” A gust of wind chased his voice through the opening. The heart of the storm had to be over them now.

She nodded to herself. “You’re going to try to dig through.”

“It’s the only way.”

It was also incredibly dangerous. One of the slopes above could slide down on top of them. Especially with the rain. But he was right. What choice did they have? “Has it started raining yet?”

“Yes.” She was sure there was a lot that one word left out. What would rain be like for them if they’d never experienced it?

“I’m going to try a stimulant. Are there any medications that he’ll react badly to?”

The answer was slow in coming. “No, but be careful. He might be confused if he wakes.”

Samantha went back to Carn and dug through her pack for the med-kit.

She found a mild stimulant and applied it to the vein in his neck to try to get the fastest reaction. While she waited, she pulled out her water and set it in reaching distance, then backed up.

“Come on, Carn. Open those eyes for me.” She could try to drag him, but—

He came around, sputtering and coughing. She wanted to reach out and help him sit-up, but she didn’t dare. Not after the way he’d reacted to her touch in the past, and not after Mercury’s warning.

“Carn.” She hoped she sounded calm. “It’s Samantha. You fell, but you’re going to be okay. There’s water to your left.”

He was already trying to push up. He leaned toward her, seeming to respond to her voice. When he lifted his head, he studied her face then grabbed for the water. After a big swig, he cleared his throat. “Mercury? Lo?”

“They’re fine. They couldn’t get down here without bringing it down on top of you. Right now we need to get you around that corner.” She pointed. “The roof is more stable there and the sooner we move, the sooner they can finish digging through here. Okay?”

He nodded and untwisted his body. Small nicks and scrapes peppered his skin with bloody dots of color. Brushing dirt from his face and shoulders, he moved slowly but with purpose.

Samantha crawled toward the corner, leading the way with a glance over her shoulder.

Carn panted with effort. Pain tightened his face into a ferocious mask.

Crawling through the debris, filthy, and looking capable of chewing engine parts, he looked more animal than she’d ever seen any of the Arena Dogs, but beneath it all he was still Carn. A man plagued by worry and pain.

When the space over their heads opened up, he tried to stand, but failed.

Samantha edged closer. “Not much farther now. Will you let me help you?”

He nodded, and she helped him loop his arm over her shoulder. He couldn’t seem to put weight on one foot. Together they hobbled clear of the danger zone and beneath the domed stone ceiling where Samantha had come down.

“What is this place?” He stared at the bone littering the cavern floor.

“I’m not sure.” She urged him on. “Let’s get as far away as we can.”

They stopped where the stone floor began to slope up and she helped him prop against the cavern wall, then shouted up to Lo and Mercury.

She knew the moment they started to dig. The scrape and groan of shifting debris echoed off the stone walls. The noise of the storm outside kicked up. The muffled roar of the rain grew louder, punctuated by the whistle of the wind.

The temperature dropped.

She shivered.

“They’ll be all right.” Carn’s certainty sounded as solid as a sand-break in a sandstorm, and she wanted to shelter under its strength.

She met his gaze. “I know. I’m just cold.” But it wasn’t the cold making her pulse pound loud in her ears or drying her mouth beyond swallowing.

When they broke through, chances were high that the area would collapse further, bringing more sodden earth down on top of them. Mercury and Lo could be buried under more debris than she could shift.

“Thank you.” Carn put a hand on her shoulder.

Confused, she waited for his explanation.

He smiled, a small smile, but a smile none the less.

He shook his head and the explanation never came.

The rustling crash of dirt and debris collapsing drew their attention back to staring down the cavern to the bend where instead of seeing the two faces they hoped for, they watched as dirt and dust swirled in the air and a stream of water trickled around the rock.

It widened into a small rivulet that hinted of the danger but disappeared into a crevice in the rock floor.

As the dust settled, Samantha’s chest grew tight. Something at the back of her throat made her gasp for air. Her eyes stung. Too long. They had to have come down with the collapse. They should have been up and moving.

Before she made the decision to move she was running back. “Mercury! Lo!”

She dropped to her knees at the edge of a pile of mud and roots that nearly filled the space where Carn had been laying.

She dug, dragging big handfuls of the stuff down and pushing it to the side.

A yawning gap loomed overhead. She could hear the storm above clearly now.

The wind in the trees. The rain pounding the ground.

She was vaguely aware of the trickles of water plopping down on her from above and the moisture on her cheeks. Carn was there beside her. She didn’t know how he’d made it back across the floor of the fissure when he could barely stand, but he was digging with purpose.

Something shifted in the now sodden muck where she’d just shoved her hands. She pushed in further until her arms were buried above the elbows. She felt firm flesh beneath her hand.

“Carn.” A whisper, both hopeful and panicked.

His hand shoved in beside hers and he pulled back hard, knocking her to her ass.

It didn’t matter. Not one bit. All that mattered was that Mercury came up, clutching Carn’s arm, gasping and shaking muck from his face.

As his shoulders and chest emerged, he scrambled forward, pulling Lo free behind him.

All four of them ended up in a heap, like the tangle of silk thread she’d always ended up with when she’d tried to learn to weave.

Mercury was in her arms and Lo and Carn were there, too.

For a moment, she felt the sort of connection she’d always imagined she’d one day have with her father and his crew.

She’d only known these men a few weeks, but she already felt a part of them.

It had to be an illusion, a mix of adrenalin and euphoria.

Like that heap of thread, one good shake and it would fall apart.

***

Alone, Mercury crouched in the wider part of the cavern while the others slept around the bend.

He looked up to the gouge in the dark roof and the steady streams of muddy water trickling down.

At least the chunks of muck and mud had stopped sliding down on top of the mound below.

When he’d been lying beneath that pile of muck he’d had no fear of dying.

He’d known they’d dig free, but Samantha hadn’t known that.

She’d thrown herself into action to save them.

He hadn’t been surprised when her hand brushed against his.

Some part of him had known. Known she would offer aid.

Known he could rely on her. She’d proven it time and time again.

And that was something he’d never had from anyone except his brothers. The feeling left him uneasy.

“Can’t sleep, brother?” Lo hunched nearby. That Mercury hadn’t heard him approach said a lot about how unsettled he was.

Mercury shifted his gaze to the sky beyond the gap overhead. “I want to get moving as soon as the rain stops.”

“It’ll be slow-going with Carn’s injured knee.”