Page 168 of Darling Wildfire
I made the treeline and quickly slit his throat, disappearing into the trees before he’d even hit the ground.
A few minutes later, I emerged from a particularly dense part of the forest to see the lake sitting dark and ominous ahead of me. I didn’t have time to admire the view before a weight slammed into me and I pitched forward, tangling with my attacker as we slid down a small slope.
I lost my pack and my rifle in the fall but came up with my knife and immediately got the upper hand. But he was better than the others had beenand quickly dislodged me. We broke apart and circled each other, looking for a weakness.
We clashed again and rolled through the mud, ending on the edge of a large drop. Pain blossomed at my side and then the man was on top, his knife pressing down towards my neck. The pain just served to piss me off and I let the rage take over—I wasn’t going to die here. I lunged up and let the fire fuel me through the next few moves. I gained the upper hand only to feel the ground give way at my feet.
We fell together down a steep drop.
I hit trees and rocks on the way down, each one feeling like a punch to my body. When I finally came to a stop, I lay on my back gasping for air before pushing myself to my side. Looking for my enemy, I dipped my head in relief when I saw him impaled by a broken tree, still twitching in death but no longer a threat.
I stood up and stumbled as my body acclimated, and my breath returned. I looked up. My pack and my rifle were somewhere up there but there was no way I could climb back up. I muttered a curse and wiped the mud off of my face as best I could. At least I still had my knife and a handgun with one extra clip. It would have to be enough.
The rain was still coming down, but it wasn’t as intense as before and the clouds didn’t seem as heavy. I hoped that meant rescue was only a few hours away although I had a trek still to reach the clearing where the helo would pick me up. I debated just swimming across the lake but quickly decided against that as I would be exposed and the weather was not exactly prime for a dip in the cold alpine water. I raided the body of the man but didn’t come up with anything besides a few clips of ammo that were the wrong caliber. I cleaned my knife, made sure my gun was in easy reach and headed off into the trees keeping the water on my right.
For the rest of the day I put every bit of my skills into play. I created false trails, set up traps and basically wreaked havoc on my pursuers. By the end of the day though, I was hungry, exhausted and still hadn’t heard from North. The rain had stayed steady all day and to make things worse, the temperature had dropped. As the forest darkened, I knew I would be spending another night under the trees.
I was about to find a place to hole up for the night when pain slammed into me. I went down on one knee as a knife was pulled out of my side.
“All this commotion over one fucker.”
The man kicked me all the way down to kneel in front of him. He wiped his knife with my blood on my shirtand pressed it to my neck. He ripped my comms unit out and disarmed me, tossing the gun to his partner who emerged from the trees. Ten more men quickly surrounded us.
“One guy taking out almost half of our team,” his partner said with a shake of his head. “I’d recruit you if I didn’t have to kill you.”
“Not interested anyway,” I panted.
“Yeah, you’ll be wishing you had that choice soon,” he sneered.
Zip ties were pulled tightly around my wrists, restraining them behind me. They yanked me to my feet and dragged me away.
80
THERON
I stood just inside the hanger doors, watching the rain and hail pound down on the tarmac.
Nyx was next to me. He’d been standing here for the better part of the day, glowering at the rain. I didn’t like the delay either. Another day of this storm meant another day we couldn’t get to Atlas. The wind made flying anything impossible—even a drone.
Nyx had his arms crossed over his chest, his body tight with nervous, restless energy.
“He’s fine,” I muttered.
“I need you to stop saying that,” Nyx snapped.
Knight came up to stand with us. “The weather looks like it will let up a little tomorrow morning.”
“Hey!” West called. “Food’s ready!”
I turned with Knight and headed over to where we’d set up a table and some camping chairs around a fire barrel. Mads appeared from where she’d been tinkering around with the helo.
“Did a few fun things to her for tomorrow,” she grinned. Strands of hair were coming out of her ponytail and she had grease all over her face.
We sat down and ate. All of us except for Nyx who refused to leave his weather watch.
“Do we have a count?” I asked once we were all done eating.
“We have about five billion,” West said.
