The nymphs went out of their way to avoid contact with Jesse and Roark, like they knew if they bit a man, they would die.
Five of the ten nymphs lay comatose at my feet. The rest bumped into one another and stepped on the fallen to get to me. I shifted my huddle with Jesse and Roark backward, leaving a trail of bodies as the remaining nymphs followed.
The fighting had moved closer, the men now distracted as their eyes followed the nymphs, widening as each one fell to the ground. Some of the men stumbled. Others completely stopped fighting to watch us in horror. The distraction was going to get them killed.
I might’ve sucked at strategic planning, but I could multi-task. “Roark, rip my shirt.”
Pressed against my back with the quivers of arrows pushed to the side, he angled the sword between us and sliced. The cool breeze lasted a second before the hot skin of his chest slid against my spine. “Talk to me, love.”
He wasn’t asking why I wanted the shirt ripped. That, he could figure out. He wanted to know how I was doing.
“The bites are painless, and each one is making it a whole lot easier to breathe again.”
Jesse hadn’t moved his chest from my side, hadn’t unlocked his rigid arm from around my waist, his posture on high-alert as he vigilantly watched the encroaching battle. “Make them lie down.”
I glanced at the sharp lines etching his profile. “The aphids?”
“Yeah.”
I didn’t question him. It was brilliant, really. As the last five nymphs fell around my feet, I exhaled a command that forced thirty-three aphids to lay like cockroaches, on their backs, with double-jointed legs pointing to the heavens.
The men on the field faltered and tripped at the bizarre sight, shouting at one another in confusion. But it didn’t take long before the arrows and blades flew.
The final aphid vibration snapped from my insides within thirty-seconds of me giving the order. And I hadn’t fired a single arrow.
Scattered around my feet lay ten sleeping nymphs. Ten cured women. My stomach relaxed, my lungs expanded, and my heart soared, every inch of me free of pain. And happy. So damned happy I couldn’t keep the smile off my face.
Until I met the angry black eyes of the bald man racing across the field. He sprinted toward us, crossbow aimed, those deep dark eyes pinned on me.
Jesse jumped in front of me, arrow anchored. “Stay back.”
I dropped my head against his shoulder blade as footsteps circled around us. The man was still approaching, and so were his friends.
“I said stay back!” Jesse tensed, his breathing picking up.
I peered around his torso and locked eyes with the bald man. In that shared look, the pull of his eyebrows asked, What are you?
He looked down, scanning the nymphs as anguish creased his rugged features. “What have you done?”
Jesse and Roark crowded in front of me, always blocking my damned view.
I spoke at their backs. “I cured them.”
“Cured?” The man’s gravelly voice boomed.
I poked my head around Roark’s arm. The crowd of men circled behind the bald man with arrows and knives raised, all eyes on their leader, as if waiting for his command. Were some of these men related to the nymphs? Such as husbands, brothers, fathers? Probably not fathers. There wasn’t a gray hair or wrinkled face in the group.
The bald man held a nymph to his chest. “Liliana?” He patted her cheek. “Wake up.”
I was experiencing a nasty case of déjà vu, only this time it was with an army of men instead of Amos and his concealed gun.
He glanced up and found my eyes. “She’s breathing. Why isn’t she waking up?”
I pushed on Roark’s back until he shifted an inch to the side. I spoke carefully and clearly. “She’ll sleep through the transformation. They all will.”
“Call off your men.” Jesse aimed his bow at the armed gathering of blood-drenched faces. “Do it now!”
The bald man glanced over his shoulder and returned to the nymph. “Stand down.”
It was a trivial request with twenty-some-odd soldiers against the three of us. We didn’t stand a chance if it came down to a fight.
I wedged my body between Jesse and Roark. “What’s your name?”
“Lincoln. They call me Link.” His black eyes took me in from head to toe. Not in a pervy way. It was more of a Yep, she looks like a woman. “You’re cured.”
It wasn’t a question, and I didn’t bother correcting him. This wasn’t the time to give lessons on new-world genetics. First, I needed to convince him not to kill us.
“Link, my name is Evie. This is Jesse and Roark. And in a few hours, your nymphs will begin the physical transformation back to human. My blood is working in their bodies right now, erasing the nymph genome from their DNA.”