Escape (34 page)

“I don't understand it either. I killed those beasts with my bare hands. One of them I just had to think about killing
—
and he dropped dead.”

Dimmi's eyes were wide and frightened. “That's not possible, and you know it.”

“Neither is us hearing each other's thoughts, but we can.”
Something very strange is happening to us.

Stay out of my head!

Technically, you were in mine.

Kieran held her gaze for long moment, then let out a shuddering sigh and climbed to his feet. “We need to get out of here.”

“And go where?” Dimmi said, sounding on the verge of panic.

“Crater City.”

“That old defalita could have been lying! There might not even be a Crater City!”

Kieran wasn't in the mood for an argument. “Well, we can't stay here!”

A groan drew their attention to the ground. Kieran stared dumbly down at Jilly,  not believing what he was seeing.

Her eyelids were fluttering.

“Jilly?” In an instant, Kieran was sitting in the grass with her head cradled in his lap. He hadn't imagined it! Her eyelids were still fluttering, and now she was moving her good arm. The wound in her side was suddenly bleeding, but the flow of blood was strangely subdued. “Jilly?” Kieran was blinking tears onto her blood-stained face.

“Don't just sit there you cretitch!” Dimmi squatted beside them, setting her daggers in the grass beside her.

A sudden howl cut through the mist, and Kieran's head came up sharply. “They're coming back!”

“So help me bind her wound before she bleeds to death!” Dimmi was looking around wildly for something they could use and coming up short. All of their clothing was too strong to tear. Then Dimmi remembered her knives.

Kieran beat her to it. He began tearing long strips off his flight suit with his bare hands. He tore both sleeves off in two quick jerks, tied them together, and began wrapping them around her rib cage. Jilly groaned again when he pulled the strips tight against her injured side, but she wasn't fully conscious yet.
Lucky for her.

Dimmi gaped at Kieran as he tore off one of his suit legs, wondering how he was able to do that. Then she remembered the three big wolvins that he'd killed with his bare hands. If he could do that, he could certainly tear up a flight suit. Kieran ripped the suit leg open and fashioned a sling out of it for Jilly's arm.

Another howl tore through the still, misty air. Kieran ignored it and straightened Jilly's arm. It was dislocated at the shoulder and broken in at least two places along the forearm where a ragged bite wound had soaked her flight suit with blood. That was when Dimmi noticed that Kieran had a similar wound on his arm. It was crusted with a lot of blood and torn flesh, but the bleeding appeared to have stopped.

Wincing in anticipation, Kieran took hold of Jilly's arm in both of his, bent her elbow to 90° and rotated her arm until her forearm lay across her stomach. Holding her upper arm against her torso with one hand, he took hold of her wrist and began to rotate her forearm out until her arm made an L against the grass.

Nothing.

He pushed a little further, and there was a sudden wet
pop
as her shoulder snapped back into place. Jilly's eyes stopped fluttering and snapped wide open.

“Ouch,” she said.

“Shhh. Don't try to move,” Kieran said.

More howling. It was getting closer.

Working quickly, Kieran slipped his makeshift sling over Jilly's arm and tied the ends behind her neck. Before he even finished, Dimmi was on her feet, knives in hand, looking like a caged animal, her head panning left to right, right to left, and back again.

“We need to get out of here,” she said. “Now.”

Kieran began helping Jilly to her feet. She winced as the movement upset her injured side. A trickle of blood escaped her makeshift bandage, adding another bloodstain to her tattered flight suit.

“Do you think you can walk?” he asked.

Grimacing against the pain, she nodded.

“No, I don't think I can.”

Their heads turned in unison.

Ferrel was limping toward them, all but hopping on one foot.

“Ferrel?” Kieran was blinking stupidly at the boy. “I thought you were dead!”

He gave a wry, pain-twisted smile. “Apparently not.”

Chapter 16

B
lood was seeping out of Ferrel's injured leg, but as it had been with Jilly, the blood flow was remarkably subdued. They worked quickly to bind the wound, tearing off pieces of Ferrel's flight suit for crude bandages.

Just as they were helping him to his feet again, the air erupted with howling, seemingly coming from every direction at once.

“Please tell me that's not what I think is,” Ferrel said.

Kieran caught a whiff of something like rotting meat on the cold, misty air. “I think we waited too long to get out of here.”

“Let's not stand around discussing it,” Jilly said.

”Right.” Kieran turned to Ferrel. “Swing your arm over my shoulder. You can use me as your crutch.”

Dimmi sighed, and watched them begin hobbling together. “Just carry him, you cretitch.”

Kieran stared dumbly at her, then realized that if he could beat wolvins to death with his bare hands, he could carry Ferrel without even breaking a sweat. He nodded and picked the boy up in one quick sweep. He was as light as air.

“Hey, man, I can
—
”

“No you can't, and we'll move faster like this.”

Kieran began taking long, purposeful strides, heading uphill, back the way they'd come. Jilly and Dimmi caught up and walked on either side of him.

“Do you know where you're going?” Dimmi asked.

“Out of the mist.”

“And after that?”

“We pick a direction at random and hope we stumble into some civilization.”

“Sounds like a brain-swirler to me,” Ferrel said.

Kieran regarded him patiently. “You have a better idea?”

Whatever reply Ferrel might have given was swallowed in a sharp intake of air. His eyes went wide and he pointed dead ahead. Kieran looked up and came to a sudden stop. Directly ahead of them, lighting up the murky gray mist like a wall of candles, were dozens of eyes, glowing gold, and narrowed to deadly slits.

“I think we took a wrong turn,” Kieran said.

One of the wolvins stepped forward, materializing out of the mist. It was a massive, gray-furred beast, larger than any of the others he'd seen so far. The wolvin stopped a few micró-astroms from Kieran, and opened its mouth in a vicious snarl. Its teeth glinted like daggers, and the smell of rotting meat returned, stronger than before.The hair on the beast's back stood straight up, and it pawed the long grass at its feet, sending clumps of it flying.

“Get behind me!” Kieran said. He set Ferrel down, and Jilly stepped forward to support him.

“What are you going to do?” she whispered.

The wolvin was baring its teeth and snarling again, but it hadn't moved any closer.

“Hopefully nothing,” Kieran said.

Another three wolvins materialized from the mist, these ones with oily black fur like the ones he'd killed. They also broke into snarls as they padded slowly forward. Kieran stood his ground with Dimmi beside him, while Jilly and Ferrel kept to the rear. One of the three wolvins snapped its teeth uncomfortably close to Kieran, but it seemed more a warning than an attack. The other two wolvins followed its lead, snarling and snapping their teeth as they approached Dimmi. She raised her daggers and set her feet.

Come on! Just a little closer you ugly defalitas!

Kieran sent her a quick look.
Wait.

Dimmi scowled.
What for?

I don't think they're planning to attack.

You don't
think
? You'll have to do better than that!

Ah
 
.
 
.
 
.
am I going crazy, or can I actually hear you two
thinking
?
Even though the words weren't spoken aloud, the tone was distinctly Ferrel's.

Deus
.
 
.
 
.
 
.
I thought it was just me!
That was Jilly.

I'll explain later,
Kieran thought back at them.

“If there is a later,” Dimmi said, keeping a careful eye on the two wolvins that were still snarling and snapping at her, just out of reach.

Kieran nodded quietly. “Watch this.” He took a quick step forward, moving so fast that he seemed to blur. Dimmi watched, somehow still able to track his movements, as if they were far slower. The wolvin that had approached him barely had time to react. Kieran reached an arm under its chest and flipped it onto its back. There came a heavy
thud
which Dimmi could actually feel reverberating through the ground. The wolvin howled in terror, but Kieran let it scramble away.

The other two wolvins that had been challenging Dimmi saw this and began slowly backing away. The gray wolvin didn't budge, even when the others had disappeared once more into the swirling mist. Kieran met its unfathomable golden eyes, and a long, silent moment passed with man and beast staring at one another.

“How did you do that?” Jilly asked.

Kieran didn't answer. He was too focused on the images swirling through his mind's eye: A dark cave, the entrance surrounded and obscured by mist. Inside the cave
 
.
 
.
 
.
a door, old, and rusty, blocking the way. Then, he saw the door opening. From within came wan, flickering orange light. A man emerged. He was dressed simply in coarsely-woven brown cloth, and tough water-stained animal hides. He had long black hair, and a matching scraggly beard. Kieran saw the wolvins approaching the door, walking slowly up to it. In their midsts walked for humans, vaguely familiar. Two male, two female. Kieran's green eyes widened in sudden recognition.

When the wolvins delivered them to the rusty door, the man standing there tossed bloody chunk after bloody chunk of meat at the wolvins. They pounced on the meat in a feeding frenzy.

“Are you seeing what I'm seeing?” Kieran asked, sending Dimmi a sideways glance.

She nodded. “I think he wants us to follow him.”

“Are you two on
glit?
” Ferrel asked. “Why in the infernal would we follow them?”

Kieran shrugged. “I saw in his mind where he wants to take us. These animals are trained. They want to take us to their masters.”

“What
—
like that shriveled nutbag who led us here? No way, man.”

Kieran frowned and looked to Dimmi. “I didn't recognize the man behind the door. Did you?”

Dimmi shook her head. “Anyway, it doesn't matter. We need to find our way to civilization. This looks like our best bet. Even if the people are hostile, at least we'll be able to reason with them, and I don't trust these beasts to let us go our own way without a fight.”

“Okay.” Kieran met the gray wolvin's gaze once more. He sent his own mental image back to the wolvin
—
the gray wolvin turning to walk away, them following, walking through the mist, reaching the cave, reaching the door, the wolvins getting their reward from the man behind the door.

The wolvin cocked his might head to one side.

Kieran repeated the imagery. He hoped that the lack of coercion in those images would inspire the beast to believe they wanted to cooperate.

Suddenly the gray wolvin let out a short howl. He turned and dissappeared into the mist.

Kieran smiled. “Come on!” He and Dimmi began to follow.

“Wait up!” Jilly called.

Kieran stopped and turned. She and Ferrel were hobbling awkwardly together, Jilly favoring her injured side, Ferrel favoring his injured leg.

Dimmi noticed the gray wolvin return, and she tapped Kieran on the shoulder. “I think he's wondering why we stopped.”

“Tell him to wait.”

“How do I do that?”

“Use your imagination
.
 
.
 
.
 
.
literally.”

Dimmi frowned and began a staring match with the beast.

When they reached him, Kieran picked Ferrel up again, with seemingly no effort at all. Jilly looked on wonderingly.

“Do you need any help?” he asked Jilly.

She shook her head. “I think I can manage.”

“Because Dimmi could carry you.”

Jilly sent the smaller woman a dubious look. “I doubt that.”