Page 46 of Monster Married
We shifted through the veils. The water went away and the smell of the place changed. The sound of fighting broke out, punctuated by a single gunshot. And then, a mighty roar.
“Move.” Vergis dragged me along before I even had my eyes open.
I stumbled after him while keeping a death grip on the bag. The bear roared. This really was turning into a Shakespeare play.
The outer wall was to our right, the lower, inner wall to our left, and white-clad combatants had their backs to us. They hadn’t realized there was a bear yet. The beast roared a third time.
Which was when it hit me that the bear was not supposed to be here.
“Brace!” Vergis spun, grabbed me, and tossed me over the lower inner wall to our left into a prickly bush, not that I had any time at all to brace or complain. “Stay down,” he said after vaulting over the wall in the kind of gravity-defying move that left me envious.
He crouched next to where I was trying to disentangle myself from the bush and pulled one of his bags open. The bear kept on roaring, and someone screamed as if they’d been pursued by it and forcibly exited, permanently. It was not the kind of sound I ever wanted to hear again.
I saw Vergis’s sharp grin. “Sounds like a Koa Esher making new friends.” He did something clicky with a rifle or shotgun thingy. “Princess, you’re not throwing any loaded guns ever, got it? It would probably be the only time you ended up killing anyone, and with my luck, it might be me. Fellisse!”
Vergis dashed forward. I didn’t see him toss the rifle or whatever it was. I was distracted by more roaring in response to screaming, which then led to more roaring and…sort of wet tearing noises. I was not going to get up from behind this bush and look at what was happening. Not ever. I was embracing the most prominent role of my career to date: significant shrubbery.
The staccato of more gunfire cut through all the screaming. It was loud even with the earplugs. Vergis fired some rounds from his own gun, gestured, then prepped another long gun from the bag, and tossed that as well.
All of this happened in a few seconds and with fluid movements, and Vergis just being relaxed while he did all of this was so at odds with the situation as a whole.
There was more roaring, from farther away, and more guns being fired. I cowered behind the bush and covered my ears.
The gunshots grew fewer, and then they stopped. Vergis shook me by the shoulder, and pulled me up, and?—
“Inkiri!”
He was right there, a rifle in his hand but not aimed at anything. He turned when I shouted his name, and his tight expression relaxed into a smile, which was not a huge relief since he had a long gash on his cheek. It was oozing red.
I slid the duffel off my shoulder and ran toward him. It was probably another romance movie moment, one lover loping to the other, except here, Inkiri was bleeding and holding a gun, so it wasn’t all that romantic. That dampened the moment, but I didn’t care. I just wanted to hold him.
I hugged Inkiri, and he closed one arm around me.
I touched his unharmed cheek. “You’re hurt! You’re bleeding.”
He huffed. “One of the fighters got lucky.” He bent his head to smile at me. “You are a light in the darkness, sweet thing.”
Vergis ran past us and loped up to the wall. “Don’t mind me. Need to sacrifice that bear.”
“What did you do with that effing bear?” I asked. I also took a closer look around, but not too close. I’d seen the aftermath of monster attacks back on Earth one too many times. There was blood, torn limbs, torn-open bodies. I didn’t need to see any more than that.
Inkiri let go of me and went to pick up a sword—his sword—which he then proceeded to do the flashy flourish thing with before sheathing it one-handed. He was still holding the gun in the other.
“Why did you bring a bear, Vergis?” Inkiri reached for my wrist, and when he was holding me, I never wanted him to let go again.
“That bear did not like the Koa Esher,” Fellisse said. He was coming up from behind us, his rifle slung over his shoulder. He headed for our hiding spot behind the bushes, pulled out the bags we’d dropped there, and picked them up as if they were filled with feathers. Behind him, black-clad Raikengana followed, their weapons out.
I saw the bright glimmer of magic, and when Inkiri led me up the stairs of the inner wall, Vergis was kneeling in the circle we’d arrived in, his hand on the center stone. The vines that grew here and had been almost invisible against the gray of the outer wall were dappled with red now. I looked away.
The magic dimmed, and he stood. “Your mate is a trouble magnet. I never ran into a bear at the cache before, but as soon as I bring him along, boom, bear. I decided to make trouble useful, so I brought the bear. I was hoping the Koa Esher had never seen one and would pee their pants.”
“You and the peeing,” I mumbled.
Fellisse came up the stairs behind us and grumbled, “What if we’d been at the circle like we agreed? The beast would’ve torn into us.”
Vergis shrugged. “I had a feeling you might be late. Plus, I used magic to brand a carbon copy of the ko circle on its back so I could straight up sacrifice it. I’ve never done that before, but it seems to have worked just fine.” He tapped the circle with his foot. “I’m just that good.”
“You had a feeling?” Fellisse crossed his arms, the bags easily dangling. “I’m not sure even a nice café au lait would help me with your…feelings.”
