Page 52 of Stealing Mercury
She started to laugh and then she was bending forward again with her belly heaving uncontrollably. He’d been teasing her about the green, but he would welcome the sight of her colorful nature, even green. Her complexion had grown dull and colorless.
She’d been small and slight from the beginning, and he knew human bones were less dense than those of the Arena Dogs, but her personality had a way of convincing everyone around her that she was tougher than those facts allowed. She’d charged Resler, fought with Drake. Now that he held her, the slender ridge of her ribs beneath his fingers, it seemed impossible she could have done those things. He cringed at the memory of how he’d fucked her like an animal. He’d tried to be gentle, but he never should have touched her. He shouldn’t have, but he had, and he wanted to do it again. First, he needed to stop this damn signal that was making her and Carn sick.
He helped her sit up again and wiped the perspiration from her brow. “We need to keep traveling,Courra.”
She nodded. “I know.” Her gaze drifted to where Carn lay unconscious. “The last time he came around, he seemed delirious. That’s seriously not good.”
“No,” Mercury agreed, aware that her condition was deteriorating faster than Carn’s had. Another day and she’d be as bad or worse.
She reached out and rested her delicate hand on his arms. It was the first time she’d reached out to touch him since that awful moment in the cavern when he’d confessed his desire to kill Rachel. They’d both pretended like it hadn’t happened, but he’d been waiting for her to push him away ever since. She’d let him carry her, but there had been nothing offered—until this.
“Lucky for us that you and Lo are okay,” she said. “We’d be in real trouble if we were all feeling like Carn.”
“True.” He turned to let her wrap herself around his back. By the time he got to his feet she’d already leaned forward to lay her cheek against his shoulder.
He gave Lo the signal to move and watched as he lifted the handles of Carn’s litter, then fell in behind them. As they slogged forward, the next rocky rise loomed larger and larger. When they reached the end of the plateau, dread became a stone in his belly. He’d have to leave Carn and Lo behind. Trying to get the litter up the rocky slope didn’t make sense.
Lo must have come to the same conclusion. He dragged Carn over to a small cluster of rocks jutting up. “This is a good defensible spot.”
“We don’t know if there’s water nearby.”
Lo’s ears twitched. “I’m hoping you won’t be gone so long we’ll need to find it, but I think there’s water nearby. I hear a noise like the creek we followed some days back, only bigger.”
Mercury knew if Lo heard it, then it was there. “I hope you’re right on both counts. We’ll return here as soon as we can. And I know Samantha will want a bath.” Thoughts of their last bath together heated his blood.
Lo slapped a claw-tipped hand over Mercury’s heart. “Return soon, my brother.”
Mercury mirrored the movement. “Be safe and well.”
***
Mercury picked up his pace when he started up the rise. He wouldn’t be able to maintain it long, but instinct told him they weren’t far from the source of the pulse. The increase in pace made for a rougher gait. Samantha woke, tightening her clasp around his shoulders.
A sudden jerk rippled through her body at his back. “Where are Lo and Carn.”
“Not far. At the base of this slope.”
She turned as if to look behind them and he had to adjust for the shift of her weight. He bent his knees and pushed to leap up the next outcropping. This time when she clung tighter she pressed her body tightly against his. The pleasure in that served as a welcome distraction from the ache in his muscles and the growing pain in his head.
He leaped again, reaching for what appeared to be a ledge. He gripped the rock edge tightly and strained to use nothing more than upper body strength to pull them up. At his back, Samantha didn’t so much as breathe until he swung his legs onto the ledge.
“Show off,” she teased with a playful squeeze of his biceps.
Despite his pain, joy soared within him at the reminder of her unflagging spirit. He started to tease her back, but the words froze in his throat at the sight in front of him.
The ledge cut further into the slope than he’d anticipated. It looked almost as if something had sliced away a section of the incline. The ledge reached about ten meters into the slope, ending in an unnaturally smooth cliff. Someone had carved hand and footholds in the rock, making a ladder at one side. They had painted symbols in a deep blue color all along the cliff. At the center of the ledge, a two-meter-tall spike had been driven into the rock. Atop it sat a multi-sided object with more symbols etched into its surface.
“Samantha?”
“I see it. Help me.”
She pulled free of him as he set her on her feet. On shaky legs, she stumbled over to the strange object.
“What is it?” He caught himself whispering as if the owners of the object would appear out of the rock face.
“A pentagonal cupola.”
“That sounds as if you’re speaking another language.”
