Page 84 of Run Like the Devil

If I wasn’t getting dragged through the Path by Guardian, I might have reconsidered the choices I’d made that had led me here of all places. Now wasn’t the time for major life reflections.

I tried to focus, to look ahead despite the fog and the way the world bounced around me. I aimed carefully, and when we neared another tree, I shifted my weight and planted my free foot against the trunk.

Pain blossomed in my hip, a sure sign the joint did not love the abrupt stop. Guardian lost its grip on my leg, and I took that chance for what it was. I reached blindly around me until my fingers wrapped around a branch on the ground.

Better than nothing.

I snapped it in half as I sat up, and when Guardian came back for another swing, I brought the stick down over that tentacle and buried the sharp edge into it.

Guardian released a frantic noise of pain before retreating into the fog.

I laid back for a moment, breathing hard, my back scratched raw and the leg Guardian had yanked on useless.I couldn’t even move it.

After a moment, a rustling in the fog reminded me I couldn’t stay here forever. I doubted Guardian was going to take this as an L for long. If I didn’t get myself moving, I’d end up in the same position as before, and I doubted Guardian would fall for the same trick twice.

I grasped the tree that had saved me—I should name the thing in thanks—and used it to pull myself to my feet.

When I tried to put my foot down, it refused to hold weight. Had Guardian managed to dislocate it? If I caught that bastard, I was going to chop off one of its limbs as payback.

I wasn’t in a position to follow through that as I was, so instead, I grabbed a thick, relatively straight branch from the ground and used it as a cane, limping in the opposite direction to where Guardian had gone.

We’d taken so many turns that I had no hope of making my way back to the men. I had no clue where they were.

Then again, they’d managed to locate me each time I’d ended up separated, so I had to just trust that they’d find me yet again. Fuck knew they were moving better than I was.

Which meant I just needed them to find me before Guardian decided to take another swipe.

I moved slowly—far too slowly for my liking—but what did the speed matter? Since I didn’t know where I was going, it wasn’t like I needed to get there faster.

Sweat ran down my back, despite the chill in the air, and I gritted my teeth against the pain. I forced myself to keep going, resting more and more weight on the stick.

Fuck, I missed that bath and that house and all of it. It was a far cry better than this. I wished I could go back to before this, to that moment of happiness and ease I’d found.

Instead, my vision wavered in and out, telling me that I was really fucking close to passing out.That’s not a good sign.

I collapsed forward, unable to hold myself up anymore, the world spinning around me.

Something moved in the fog, twigs snapping beneath it.

“Well, at least if you do anything weird, I’ll be unconscious,” I muttered. “But just so you know, Guardian, I have a weird STI that only infects tentacles. If you touch me, I hope you’re ready to have your bits get sores and fall off!”

The world grew even hazier around me, so much that I wasn’t sure I even got all those words out. A shadow fell over me, and I glanced up, ready to see the Lords.

They always managed to find me right when I needed them, to swoop in at the perfect time, to do the impossible.

Except, when I looked up, as the world darkened around me, I realized those were not my men. Instead, strangers, people I didn’t recognize, surrounded me.

Well fuck, I suddenly miss Guardian…

Yazmor

I moved through the trees so fast it felt like a blur. Avoiding them was easy, since I gave myself over to the instincts inside me, to the thing I had once been so long ago.

My body had taken my true form when I could no longer hold the human shape. In some strange way, it felt better than it had in so long, like one of those dogs who lives its life in a tiny crate, unable to stretch out. Now, it seemed as if someone had opened that door and I embraced what I really was.

I lacked the time to think about that much. Nothing but Loch’s scream mattered, but the way she’d disappeared when Guardian had grabbed her.

That creature moved impossibly fast. It made me appear slow, and I was far from that.

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