“That didn’t sound ominous at all,” Mat said, crossing his arms and glaring back through the darkness toward the tent’s flap, toward the ravine where the others were. “Are you going to tell us more, Neve, or should I not bother asking?”
Neve sighed and shook her head. “It’s complicated and I’ll tell you later, but what I want to know is why the hell she’d be looking for you.”
“Something tells me that the only one who even might know the answer to that question just walked away,” Cameron muttered.
Tala tugged on Matt’s sleeve. “C’mon. Let’s get those blankets before Jac goes sideways.”
“Please do,” Jacqueline said, her voice just barely on the gentler side of a snarl. The wounds looked bad, worse in the light than they had in the dim, oozing dark blood sluggishly to track in purple-red rivulets down Phelan’s shoulders and back.
“Claws,” Neve said. “It must have been. If I know them both, Phelan tried to do something idiotic and heroic and Seamus had to rescue him. It’s par for the course when it comes to the men in my bloody family.” She eased a dribble of water from the kettle into the mortar and kept working. “I’m sorry, Jac, I really am.”
“It’s not like it’s your fault,” Jacqueline muttered, quickly cleaning the wounds and trying not to bite through her lower lip while she did it.
He hasn’t moved. He hasn’t even made a sound. That never happens. What’s going on? She sucked in a rasping breath and struggled to master herself again. God, Phelan, don’t do this to me. You promised.
Damn you, you promised.
Thordin’s sudden roar shook all of them. Cameron nearly dropped the lamp, his head jerking up.
“That didn’t sound good,” he said.
“Not at all,” Jacqueline whispered. “Go. Find out, come back—or stay if they need you. But hurry.”
She didn’t need to tell him twice. He was gone a heartbeat later, leaving the lamp flickering silently by her knee.
Neve met her gaze with a worried one of her own.
“This is worse than I’ve imagined, isn’t it?” Jacqueline asked with a terrible, sick feeling growing in her stomach.
Neve swallowed hard and looked down into the mortar. “Déithe agus arrachtaigh, I hope not, Jac. I sure as hell hope not.”
whew…. this is getting tense. This story keeps my mind racing. I go over odd scenarios to try to determine the latest attacks.
Thanks for the new post. I appreciate it a lot.