Page 23 (1/2)

"Yes, but that kind of fury, and what it demands of you, kills the soul"

"It didn’t kill yours"

Inside, she trembled "I’m not sure about that"

He released her hand and pulled her close, his ar her arainst his shoulder All she’d wanted since Fox first ca was to reclaio back to the way she’d been And sheCastin

But for the first ti up asthis connection she’d begun to form with Fox cut like a well-honed blade

A short while later, as they continued down the beach, Fox felt another low vibration He and Melisande tensed as one, spinning to findtoward them

"There have to be asped

"That’s our cue to get the hell out of here" A shiver tore through hi up an escape route He hoped Into the trees Now

He grabbed Melisande’s hand "Coether, they ran for the tree line Exactly how this would help theh the forest and out the other side, what then?

A glance over his shoulder told hi across the sand quickly and fanning out He and Melisande would have no choice but to go through the tropical forest unless they wanted to fight And considering the savages’ prioal appeared to be to strike down Melisande, there was no way in hell they were taking on two dozen of them at once No way in bloody hell

As he and Melisande leaped into the trees, they separated, dodging underbrush and fallen limbs and trunks

"Stop!" Melisande yelled a short distance in front of hied to stop a rabbed her hand, pulling her back against hih, pal all but one corner of what indeed appeared to be another pit But as he looked around, he found pal as carefully laid as the one in front of hiut had led hiht to it He couldn’t even think what that ut that had led hiht into the path of the vines?

Melisande started forward, and he grabbed her arht"

"Okay You’re right We go forward"

This was the reason they were here--to fall into one of these traps just as Castin likely had To be captured by the Mage, Melisande al to let it happen

Chapter Thirteen

Melisande’s heart pounded as she stared at the pits hidden beneath the palm fronds all around the all of the holes But the inal place, if it had ever ently "They’re here Run"

Stars in heaven There had to be paths, but the way the palan to lift the huge leaves, tossing the the holes, one by one The trouble was, bending, lifting, shoving the fronds down took ti to cut out their hearts, there was no tirabbing one of the long fronds and sla as fast as she could Where she hit solid ground, she followed Where the frond pushed through, she exposed another hole

At the clash of ed in battle The only good neas that the savages would be as hindered by the pits as they were And maybe the pits were the key, the way to even the nuht back, she er running interference, the painted ones began racing straight for her Two hit the first pit and fell in with twin cries of fury

Melisande grinned and kept going Another three leaped for her and landed in the next pit Death cries echoed through the tropical woods as Fox es leaped to fall in They certainly weren’t the sain, they weren’t real

She’d sent seven of them into the holes so far A quick look over her shoulder told her that Fox had killed close to thatten Still far too ht Fox was hacking through the them out from behind Seven, six, five

Suddenly, three of the and leaped at Fox all at once In a coordinated, horrifyinghi hi forward, but one of the two re warriors stepped into her path and the other came at her from the other side until she was trapped between theround no more than two feet wide If she fell in either direction, she, too, would be trapped in one of those pits And she had little doubt that she’d never leave it alive

Her only choice was to fight

Melisande hesitated for only aher actions, she fought for her life and for the life of theto care about far too much She ducked, stabbed, whirled, until sweat ran into her eyes, and her tunic was torn and bloody But, finally, shehim into one of the pits Then she whirled and slashed the other’s throat

With a shuddering breath, she wiped her bloody blades on her ruined tunic and slaed for the pit where Fox had disappeared But between her first step and her second, the tropical forest disappeared

And suddenly she stood in the middle of an empty, snowy plain, at the base of a rocky, frozen hillside No She turned, trying to return to the island, and failed There was no going back And Fox was trapped

The labyrinth had separated them at last

It was late afternoon when Grizz and Lepard knocked on the front door of the tan-and-broo-story frahborhood street, its front porch overfloith plants and flowers, in thetabby

In the distance rose the mountains, the Rockies, their snow-covered crowns at odds with the warht brown hair falling straight and shaggy to his shoulders, his beard full and thick Paint splattered his white T-shirt and jeans and a glass of what appeared to be whiskey sat comfortably in his free hand

"Yarren Brinlin?" Grizz asked

Small eyes narrowed "Who wants to know?"

Grizz pushed his way into the house, startling a squeak of objection fro?"

Grizz stopped in the middle of the front room and looked around at as essentially an art studio--two easels with half-painted canvases, a stack of blank canvases propped against one wall Paints of every conceivable type and color littered every surface The house s layer of cigarette smoke and microwaved pizza

"Get the hell out of s and claws erupting in a hard growl

Brinlin gaped, his eyes going wide as dinner plates, his whiskey glass slipping through his fingers to shatter on the paint-splattered hardwood floor "You’re a Feral Warrior"

Grizz felt Lepard’s hand on his shoulder "Dial it back, Grizz"