“One more shot, daughter—I will guide your hand,” the voice told Danni.
She raised the blaster once more and squeezed the trigger—and the Leader’s head vaporized as his big body went limp in Bravik’s hands.
Then the warm presence was gone and Danni was alone again. But not alone—Bravik was there and the two of them had to get out of this cave before more Riivers came.
“Are you all right? We have to go—c ome on!” she gasped, running to him.
He shoved the dead body off him and rose to catch Danni in his arms.
“Little girl,” he rumbled, hugging her tight. “So glad you’re all right!”
“I knew you’d come for me!” Danni pressed her face into his chest and breathed him in—his scent of leather and campfire smoke and masculine spice filling her senses. “I knew you’d come, Bravik.”
“Of course, I’ll always come for you. You know that.” He stroked her hair and looked around at the many dead bodies on the floor. “That was some fucking fancy shooting,” he added, in admiration. “Didn’t know you were a crack shot, little girl.”
“I’m not,” Danni said. “Please, can’t we get out of here? What if there are more of them out there and they come back? And this cave smells horrible!”
“Yeah, it’s not exactly a rose garden is it?” Bravik rumbled, his nose wrinkling. “Come on, let’s get back to the village.”
And taking her by the hand, he pulled her out of the stinking Riiver cave and the two of them headed home.
Forty
They were almost to the village gates and the sun was setting when Bravik stumbled and nearly fell.
“Oh, are you all right?” Danni looked at him anxiously. “Did you trip on a rock or—”
“Don’t know…what happened…” His deep voice sounded sluggish to Danni.
“What’s wrong? Bravik, what’s wrong?” she asked anxiously.
“Don’t…know…” he repeated, his words getting slower and slower.
“Oh, my dear friends! I cannot believe you have returned!”
It was Navii and with her came Kozen, the two H’rakens came rushing through the gates of the village just as the sun was making its final decent.
“Are you well?” Kozen asked anxiously. “Were either of you bitten?”
“I wasn’t,” Danni said quickly. “And Bravik seemed fine all the way home but now I’m worried about him!”
“Friend Bravik, were you bitten?” Kozen looked at him sharply.
“Don’t…know. Don’t…think…so.” Bravik shook his head woozily.
“It’s too hard to tell in this light,” Navii said. “But both have been scratched. Let us take them in the village and bathe their wounds, dear husband.”
“But if one of them has been bitten…” Kozen began.
“We cannot know if we leave them here outside the gates,” Navii argued. “We will have time to do what must be done if one of them has a Riiver bite. Come, my dear friends,” she added, putting an arm around Danni’s shoulders and beckoning to Bravik. “Come and be cleansed.”
They were taken to a bathing house just outside the great pyramid which housed the Mother Stone. Danni had never noticed it before but according to Navii, it had been built exclusively for the purpose of cleansing Riiver wounds for those who had been attacked and had been lucky enough to get away.
Danni and Bravik were both stripped—the big Kindred was swaying on his feet at this point—and sprayed down with jets of water that had been warmed and purified by the Mother Stone herself.
Danni was pretty much all right. She had a few scratches from the Riiver’s long claws and the spot on her forearm where the Leader’s acid-like venom had dripped on her was raw and red, but other than that her skin was whole with no bleeding.
Bravik, on the other hand, was a mass of gashes and slashes—the Riivers’ long claws had dug deep into his muscular sides, back and chest. But it wasn’t until he removed his trousers that Navii and Kozen both gasped in dismay.
There, at the top of his hip bone, was an unmistakable bite mark—a set of long, curving fangs had dug deep to take a bloody chunk out of the big Kindred’s flesh and he was bleeding freely from the wound.
But that wasn’t the worst part, Danni thought—there were also lines radiating out from the center of the bite mark—black lines that looked like some kind of blood poisoning.
“He has been bitten!” Navii whispered, her purple eyes filling with tears. “Oh, Mother Stone—he has been bitten!”
“But…but the Riivers said that if they bit you it turned you into one of them!” Danni gasped. “He’s not, is he? Turning into a Riiver?”
“No.” Kozen shook his head firmly. “When one is becoming a Foul One, the lines are white, not black.”
“But what do the black lines mean, then?” Danni demanded. “If he’s not becoming a Riiver, surely he’ll be all right—won’t he? Won’t he?” she exclaimed, turning to Navii.
Her friend only shook her head and put her arms around Danni.