Darkness Wanes (14 page)

“If you say so.”

The nephilim hesitated for a moment before following me.

Chapter Eleven

Melena

We walked through a small clearing and up to the front door where I banged on the heavy wood. My senses told me both vampires were inside, but neither of them answered. It occurred to me it was still daylight outside, if a little smoky. I tried the doorknob and turned it easily.

“Wait, should we…?” Bartol began.

“He’s a vampire,” I reminded him. “He can’t answer right now.”

We stepped into the dim interior of the cabin. It was one long room with couches and a fireplace to the left, a kitchen/dining area in the middle and a sleeping area to the right. A door leading to the bathroom was a few feet away from the bed. It smelled like freshly cut wood inside with only a hint of the smoke spreading through the forest.

Nik and Josslyn were nowhere to be seen, but my senses told me we’d find them somewhere underneath us. I’d only been here once and hadn’t realized there was a basement. I searched for an entrance to it, homing in on a rug covering up the middle section of the cabin. A table sat on top of most of it, but the carpet extended from the legs another four feet. I peeked underneath and found a handle on the floor. The rug wouldn’t budge any farther than that without possibly damaging it.

“Nik?” I called.

The door lifted a moment later, pushing the carpet up as well. He must have glued it on there. Nik popped his head out and squinted at me. “Melena?”

The twelve-hundred-year-old vampire didn’t look much better than Bartol and me. Where was the sexy and suave man I once knew? His black hair was mussed and falling over his dark eyes. There wasn’t a hint of color in his skin—a sure sign he hadn’t fed for days. Had things gotten worse since I last visited?

“Hey.” I gave him a weak smile.

Josslyn popped up behind him, peering up at us. “Melena, how good to see…what on Earth happened to you?”

“It’s a long story.” My buckskin pants and top had definitely taken a beating in the woods with all the tripping and falling I’d done. The fabric was barely recognizable, though it didn’t help that I had cuts and scrapes all over me as well. God only knew what I looked like.

“I imagine so,” she replied, forehead creasing in concern.

Her chestnut hair was pulled back in a bun. Normally, she wore it down to show off her thick and luscious mane. Without it, her cheekbones stood out, pushing against her waxen skin. Her dark eyes were still pretty, but there was evidence of a lot of pain in their depths.

“What are you doing here?” Nik asked.

“The portal from Purgatory dumped us near here,” I said.

“Purgatory?” He took a step up the ladder and gave me a reproachful look. “You went back there again?”

I made room for him to come out. “Not by choice.”

“I warned you they wouldn’t keep tolerating your behavior,” he said, tone censorious. Then he turned his attention to the nephilim next to me. “Who is this?”

“Oh, that’s Bartol.” I gestured toward him. “He’s a friend of Lucas’ who got released the same time I did.”

“Ah, I think I’ve heard of you,” Nik said to the nephilim. He was doing a good job of not staring at the scarred side of Bartol’s face. “Weren’t you the one who seduced…”

“I don’t suppose you have a phone?” I interrupted. “No one knows we’re back yet.”

Nik helped Josslyn through the trap door. “I’m afraid not. We have no need for one.”

More like he didn’t want a phone. He’d cut himself off from the world after Felisha sacrificed her life to save his. If Nik had chosen her over Josslyn, or at least listened to Felisha when she warned him of impending danger, she might still be alive. He’d suffered from guilt ever since. She had been a fairy and one of the kindest women I’d ever met. For a while, a part of me blamed him for her death, but after seeing how torn apart he was by it, I couldn’t stay angry. He was punishing himself enough without my help.

“The forest is burning nearby,” I said, going over to a window and peeking around the curtains. The smoke in the yard appeared thicker than before. “The fire will probably come this way soon.”

“I would estimate that it will reach this place in an hour or so,” Bartol said. “You can’t stay here. You’ll be trapped and likely burned alive even if you hide in the basement.”

It was almost like fate brought us here at the time we were most needed. I didn’t want to think about what might have happened if we’d stayed in Purgatory a few days longer—or a few days less.

Nik frowned. “I hadn’t realized the fire was that close.”

Josslyn rushed over to a chest at the foot of the bed and began pulling out clothes.

“Then why were you down there?” I asked.

“We sleep in the basement now,” Josslyn said over her shoulder.

“I just finished digging it out a few weeks ago,” Nik explained. “We feel safer underground during the day, especially with summer approaching.”

I supposed that made sense. A lot of vampires preferred to sleep below ground. “Well, we have to figure out a way to get you two out of here. It’s too dangerous to stay.”

“The sun won’t set for a few more hours.” Nik took a seat at the dining room table. “We can’t leave before then.”

Josslyn made a soft noise. I didn’t need my senses to tell me she was growing more panicked by the second. The last time I’d been here, we’d discovered she was considering ending her life. I had no idea what had happened since—though I doubted anything good by the looks of it. Still, death by fire wasn’t the way anyone would want to go. Maybe this was my chance to finally get them back to civilization and around other people. The couple were never going to find their will to live again if they continued staying in the middle of nowhere.

“Is there any way you could flash them to safety?” I asked Bartol.

He shook his head. “I’d be lucky if I could relocate them a hundred feet.”

Josslyn finished packing the clothes into a duffel bag and headed toward Nik, desperation written all over her face. “We can’t stay here. I don’t want to burn alive!”

He pulled her onto his lap and wrapped his arms around her. “If I know Melena, she’ll figure out something.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I replied, glad I was already forming a plan in my head. I turned toward Bartol. “Could you watch over them and try keeping the fire at bay if it gets close? There’s a highway near here where I might be able to get help.”

He ground his jaw. I knew I was asking a lot from a deeply traumatized man who’d had no time to adjust to being back on Earth. Neither of us expected to jump from the frying pan into the fire when we left Purgatory. It was just more of our bad luck. For months, I’d dreamed of seeing Lucas and Emily as soon as I came through the portal. That didn’t happen, and now we had to focus on getting everyone to safety. We could deal with our personal traumas later.

“Please, Bartol. I need your help to do this,” I implored.

He released a slow breath. In his eyes, I could see a thousand horrors reflected there from the difficult things he must have faced long before I met him. He was nearly at his wits’ end at this point with the barest hint of willpower left to keep him going. I was surprised when he straightened his back and cleared the painful expression from his face.

“Go. I will watch over them,” he said, voice firmer than expected.

The tension in the room dropped considerably. I wasn’t the only one worried he wouldn’t go along with the plan. Josslyn had tears of relief rolling down her cheeks.

“Thank you. I’ll be back as soon as I can,” I said, hurrying to the door.

As soon as I stepped outside, I decided Bartol’s estimates were probably right. The smoke was thicker than when we’d first arrived and despite the cabin being in a clearing, I couldn’t see the sky at all anymore. Everything was dark, gray and ominous.

I took off in the direction I knew led to the highway, entering the forest once again. Fresh spring undergrowth hid potential obstacles for my abused bare feet. I should have asked Josslyn to lend me a pair of shoes, but in my haste to leave I’d forgotten about it. All I could do was suck up the pain and move as fast as possible. The highway was over a mile away, maybe farther since the path twisted along the way.

It was dark under the thick canopy. The farther north I went, the more the smoke thinned, but I still found it difficult to breathe. My nose and throat burned from the acrid scent, sending me into a coughing fit every time I dared to take a deep breath. There were no signs of life. All the forest animals must have fled when the fire moved into the area.

I’d never felt more frustrated than in that moment. The soles of my feet were cut and bleeding, my aching muscles protested every step I took, and dehydration was making me lightheaded. I’d become physically exhausted to the point my body threatened to collapse. The only thing that kept me going was the desperate need to find help before it was too late. How could getting home be this difficult? I couldn’t remember the last time anything in my life had been easy. It only got more complicated.

The highway appeared up ahead. When I reached it, I fell to my knees gasping for breath. No cars were in sight yet. I allowed myself a moment to rest and think about what I’d tell the random motorist I planned to stop. I didn’t have the ability to compel them, but it probably wouldn’t be necessary. People in Alaska understood forest fires. They’d take pity on me if they thought I’d barely escaped the flames and needed help rescuing my friends. It wouldn’t be too far off from the truth. Plus, all I needed was a phone to call Lucas, and he could take care of the rest. For once, I’d gladly hand all my problems over to him.

I stood and waved when a man driving a semi truck came barreling down the road, but he passed by without stopping. I ground my teeth in frustration and waited for another motorist to come along.
Please, God, don’t make me stand on this road forever.
All I wanted was to rescue Nik and the others and then go home. Was that really so much to ask?

Another few minutes passed before my senses picked up someone heading toward me. I recognized their supernatural signature as the local shaman, Ajax. It was all I could do to hold back tears of relief. There weren’t many reasons for him to take this highway unless it was to see Nik. Had Remiel warned him about the fire? No, that couldn’t have been it or Ajax would have called Lucas—who would have flashed over right away and found me.

Watching the curve in the highway, I eventually saw a white van come around it. I waved my arm. We were more like acquaintances than friends, but I’d never been happier to see him. The shaman stopped in front of me and hopped out.

“I thought you weren’t getting released until tomorrow,” he said, frowning as he took in my appearance.

It had been a few months since I last saw the native Alaskan, but he looked like he’d aged a decade in that time. He no longer had the fresh face of a normal twenty-five-year-old recently out of college. His black hair was getting to that unruly stage where nothing could be done with it, and he’d begun letting a beard grow. The weight of his responsibilities must have been getting to him.

“They let us out a day early because of the fires in the area.” I hobbled toward him. “What are you doing here?”

He pulled the side door of his van open. “I saw the news reports and thought I’d check on Nik and Josslyn. It appears like the fire is getting close.”

It was the local shaman’s duty to stay apprised of everything happening on his land. A forest fire would be something he needed to know about and monitor closely in case it got near people. And he had a special interest in keeping Nik safe. The master vampire was his main source of information on Charlie—the last shaman. Nik had gotten to know Charlie well over the decades they shared territorial responsibilities, and knew a lot about how he’d handled things. Considering Ajax didn’t get his powers until after the last shaman passed away, he had a lot of catching up to do.

“Yeah, it’s getting really close. We need to hurry, or they’re not going to make it out.”

“Here.” He tossed me a pair of rubber boots. “They’ll probably be a little big, but at least they’ll help protect your feet.”

“Thanks.” I slid them on. They were a little roomy, but that turned out to be a good thing since my feet were swollen badly. If I could have rested for a few hours they might have healed, but that wasn’t happening just yet.

Ajax pulled two black body bags out next. “We’re going to have to carry them out of here.”

“Can’t you call down some rain or something?” I asked. His grandfather had been able to do it during fire seasons before.

His shoulders slumped a little. “I’m afraid I drained myself the other day doing that for the last outbreak. It takes a lot of power for me to alter the weather and the fires seem to keep cropping up as fast as I can drench them down.”

Once again, I realized how dulled my senses had become in my current condition. I’d completely missed how weak the shaman felt. Then again, he hadn’t reached the strength of his grandfather yet, so I was still getting used to his natural power levels.