6

The Caves

LORELAI

I spent the next few hours hauling stone, rock, and debris from the piles caging in the beast. I didn’t mention the witch who he was spelled to hunt; I didn’t even mention Zale. Instead, I just focused on what I was doing.

My body was warm now, damp with sweat, as the exercise ached in my muscles.

My arms hurt, my stomach, my legs. My throat was bone dry and burning; my head was pounding from lack of food, and I had no idea how much actual time had passed, but we were getting closer.

The beast only got angry every few minutes and didn’t constantly growl at us, so that was our upside.

The shadows helped by flicking rocks out of the way, but we had to be careful which ones we moved, or the whole cave was going to collapse on us.

“When we get you out of here, follow the cave out toward the water; there’s a portal on the bank there. It will take you to her,” I whispered to the beast as I finally got the boulder from his back that was pressing down on his neck, making it bleed.

Brax helped me move it to the side, and the beast shook out his head, his bones crackling as he stretched. He turned to me and nodded once, his lip curling.

Brax moved down by his feet, clearing each paw, as I tried to find safe ones to move on him.

I found one and went to pull, but my shadows hissed. I frowned and looked to Brax, who wore the same expression. The beast gnashed his teeth, snarling with a feral look as he tried to move more.

It made the rubble move with him, the same rubble I was standing on to balance.

A pang hit my stomach, almost like an electric shock.

“I think there is something trying to use the portal,” I said, frowning and hardening my hold on my shadows as they swirled and moved back inside, confirming my suspicions. My hold on my magic was distant, but my shadows could feel it too.

“We need to get to that portal,” I said, and Brax nodded just as the beast roared.

“Stop!” I screamed as his movements shifted everything beneath me. I toppled down. Brax went for me, but his human pace wasn’t fast enough. My head bounced off the edge of a concrete slab with a sickening thud before I rolled down.

I grimaced as the ache grew increasingly painful, blood trickling down my forehead.

“Fuck, your head,” Brax breathed, looking at the top of it. “It needs stitches,” he said.

I shook my head. “It needs healing, which we can do once we’re back. C’mon,” I said and ran to where the restless beast thundered and roared. The caves groaned too, threatening us again, and my shadows were on high alert, urging me to leave, but I wasn’t finished. I had to get the beast free.

It wanted out too, and apparently, we had cleared enough because it let out another deafening sound before it bashed the rest of the debris away.

It had the caves shaking again.

“Shit, it’s going to come down on us!” Brax growled through the crumbling walls and roof.

The beast shook out his body, bones crunching, teeth frothing before raking his claws through the rubble.

If I understood beast, I would say he grinned, and then he was gone, running, taking off through the tunnels, leaving us behind in the collapsing caves to be crushed to death after we had just saved it. Great.

I turned to Brax.

“We’ve got to run!” I screamed, and he nodded, grabbing my hand and taking off, almost dragging me through the caves. They were definitely trying to kill us. I couldn’t make a step without faltering on more debris, more skin scratched up, and my head was pounding.

It had stopped bleeding, I think, but it was hard to tell when there was new blood breaking free of the cuts on my arms and face. Brax was getting cut up too, and I pushed my protesting legs faster.

The shadows were helping, catching whatever they could, but mine were also keeping my will strong over the portal. Whatever was trying to test it, to see if it could get through, was still trying, and I had no idea if it could or if I could stop it without having a tether to my magic.

“Run, Little Luna. Your beast is almost here; he is just killing his way through the shadows that are inspecting the portal,”  Kai urged. I tried to listen, but my breath was harsh as it passed through my chest, and the caves were filling in quickly.  

“The beast can kill shadows?”  Brax asked.  

“Looks like,”  Derik said, his voice low, and I raised a brow at that. We hadn’t come across something like that before. But the witches said he would only go after Adrenna.  

“It’ll only come for you if you stand in the way of what it wants,”  Derik explained, and I knew that, so I focused on where my feet were going and not dying.  

By the time we got to the bank, the water was thrashing as it filled with rocks too.

“Fuck,” Brax cursed. I looked at the dark water, swallowing hard as panic settled in.

“What are the chances the cave out of here is still open?” I grimaced. Brax shrugged.

“Probably about the same as getting into the shadow realm and out again with all our body parts.” He tried some dry humor, but I was not amused. I sucked in a breath.

“We have no choice.”

“It’s not far. Now that I know where we’re going, we should get straight through.”

“And hopefully get some help from the shadows.”

Brax nodded. We looked behind us as there was a huge crash. The cave collapsed behind us, debris and dust rushing toward us. We had run out of time. I took a deep breath and jumped with Brax, sinking into the water as he dragged me along through the cave opening.

It was just as hard as last time to get my limbs to work in the water as well as his did. But it was the pain in my head that had me fighting my consciousness.

Blood trickled into the water, leaving a trail behind us as Brax hauled me up toward the surface, dodging the black spikes in the lake bed once again.

He almost got us there too. The lake surface was close enough to touch when something wrapped around my ankle again. I didn’t struggle; I didn’t even try to fight it because I thought we had an accord with the friendly shadows. But that was my mistake.

Whatever had me was not the same shadows, and its touch burned, searing my flesh.

“Brax!” I screamed through the water as another black shadow grabbed him before he reached the surface. He fought them off, but a heaviness filled me, a lead feeling.

My shadows were quiet as I was pulled back down to the spikes, my skin brushing against them.

The second it did, my body erupted. Fire filled everything inside me, and not in the same way it did when I was with my alphas. This was pure heat, like lava in a volcano erupting inside me.

My organs, my veins, and my flesh were on fire beneath my skin, and I screamed.

The air rushed out of my lungs as my shadows screamed in my head, no longer quiet.

The dark shadows pressed me against the spikes, and the longer it held me there, the more my own shadows burned. I blinked hard as Brax fought above me, but these things were stronger.

I could hear my alphas’ screams in my head, but they were distorted. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, and my heart stuttered. My entire body shook. I knew that I was dying, and Brax too. I could feel his body giving up the air in its lungs.

My heart screamed, trying to start through the fire that melted it, but it couldn’t.

Not when the roar of the fire was so loud.

I was ready to go; the beast was free, Enzi was safe, and I trusted Kai and Derik to get Zale back now. I just had to fall asleep.

But when I thought I was going to, the pain endured, and so did my consciousness. I frowned and looked up at Brax. He had gone limp in the water, his body slowly sinking to where I was being held.

The fire still burned inside me, but something in my chest kept me hanging on to the black edges of my mind. I had to survive; I had to see this through. I promised Enzi, and I couldn’t let her down too.