Enthralled by Tiffany Roberts

Chapter 19

Even the deafeningnoise of the rampaging yatins could not stop Ketahn from hearing Ivy’s scream. It sliced through all the other sound and pierced to his core, wrapping around his heartsthread and sparking terrible fire within him.

He felt the fear in her cry. He felt the defiance, the anger, the passion, the selflessness. And he felt his failure.

My mate.

He’d sent her ahead with Urkot and the others to keep her safe. But now he could not get to her. Now he could not be at her side to protect her.

No.

The word rumbled from the depths of his spirit, thrumming with power.

His mate needed him. Whether it was an enraged yatin, a hungry mire, or Zurvashi herself with every warrior in Takarahl at her command, no obstacle would keep Ketahn from Ivy.

The ground shook beneath him as the yatin he and Telok were battling charged. Ketahn embraced the flames in his chest, willing them hotter still and welcoming their heat into his limbs. His muscles swelled with desperate, bristling energy. This beast was not just an obstacle keeping him from Ivy—it was a direct threat to her.

Ketahn ran toward the beast, his hearts beating faster than the frantic pounding of legs over the battered ground. The yatin snorted and dipped its head, angling its huge, stained tusks toward him.

He would be with Ivy soon.

Ketahn dove forward, stretching his body to pass through the space between the yatin’s curved tusk and its broad horn. The beast snapped its head aside as though to catch him. The hard bone of a tusk struck Ketahn’s legs with enough force to disrupt his arc, but there was no pain—not until he landed.

His left upper shoulder took the brunt of the impact as he came down. Agony burst through it, echoes of the damage Zurvashi had inflicted recently. But he twisted as he fell and threw out a right hand, slapping it down on the shaft of his fallen spear. His fingers closed around the weapon and, using the momentum of his fall, he rolled until his legs were again beneath him.

Xiskals shrieked in the thorn snarl, and humans shouted in panicked voices. Something powerful clutched Ketahn’s heartsthread and pulled it hard toward the sounds. But his vision focused on the yatin.

The beast skidded to a stumbling halt that whipped its hindquarters around into a nearby tree trunk. Bark splintered, cracked, and showered the ground. A spear shaft—Telok’s spear—bounced and shook on the yatin’s flank, the head buried too deep for it to be shaken free. A dozen other wounds made the creature’s hide glisten with dark blood, but Ketahn knew none of those wounds were deadly. The hunters’ efforts had yet to so much as slow the beast down.

Now, Ketahn charged at the momentarily disadvantaged creature. His limbs burned with the fires of his fury and desperation. The yatin threw its weight aside, turning its bulky body to settle its small, dark eyes upon Ketahn. It roared.

Ketahn roared back, the harsh sound tearing out of his throat. His lower hands worked furiously to coil the long silk rope trailing from his spear, but their work was not yet done by the time he jumped.

The yatin swung its head upward, anticipating Ketahn’s path through the air. He threw out his arms and legs and latched onto the beast’s head as he came down, grasping horns, tusks, and hide. The air fled his lungs at the impact, and his stomach lurched; for an instant, it seemed as though the beast would fling him off, but he held fast.

The yatin snorted and shook its head furiously. Its hooves tore up clumps of damp dirt and moss and crushed undergrowth, enhancing the jolts assaulting Ketahn’s body. His lower hands worked deftly, lashing the silk rope around the yatin’s horns.

The jungle whirled around Ketahn as the yatin spun. Though he did not see it, he felt a solid, towering object looming behind him, and heat crackled along his back. The yatin lunged forward. Ketahn tightened his hold on the rope’s slack and threw himself up and over the beast’s horns.

The yatin’s downturned head crashed into the tree with immense force that resonated through every thread of Ketahn’s being, but he was clear of the blow. The rope went taut and cinched around Ketahn’s hand. His body jerked, falling to the side of the yatin’s thick neck; his weight tugged on the horns around which the rope was tangled, twisting the beast’s great head aside.

With a stunned groan, the yatin staggered back from the tree. That groan became a pained sound when Telok dropped onto the creature’s backside and grasped the spear jutting from its flank.

“Soon, Ivy,” Ketahn rasped.

Hooking his claws into the yatin’s side, Telok reached out a hand to Ketahn. Ketahn took hold of it and swung himself up onto the beast’s back.

Snarling and grunting, the yatin bucked and thrashed in an attempt to dislodge its unwelcome riders. Ketahn latched on with his leg claws and a grabbed a fistful of the thick fur on the yatin’s back. Pulling on the rope, he raised his spear high and plunged it between the yatin’s shoulders. The spearhead glanced off the hard bone of the beast’s spine and sank deep into the muscle of its neck.

The yatin’s movements became more frenzied, its sounds more intense. It slammed into the tree repeatedly, shattering bark and making twigs and leaves rain from overhead.

Telok clawed his way into place directly behind Ketahn and took hold of the rope. Together, they drew back on it hard.

Heaving its bulk up, the yatin stood on its hind legs; it was easily three times as tall as a male vrix in that stance.

Ketahn relinquished the rope to Telok and swung himself down, grabbing onto the side of the beast’s neck. He moved his face close and snapped his mandibles together on the relatively soft hide of the beast’s throat. His fangs tore through flesh.

He twisted as he pulled his face away, tearing out a chunk of the yatin’s throat. Hot blood sprayed his face and chest. An agonized sound rumbled from deep in the beast’s chest, emerging broken and strained.

Thrusting himself off the yatin, Ketahn landed heavily on the ground, but he managed to remain upright. Telok leapt down a moment later. The yatin’s breaths were ragged and sputtering, each weaker than the last as the beast stumbled and spurted blood from its ruined throat. It finally sagged against the tree, unable to support its own weight any longer.

Ketahn did not wait to watch the creature die, and he did not allow himself to acknowledge the sorrow that had replaced the fury in the yatin’s eyes. He was already moving toward the next obstacle between himself and Ivy—the yatin that Rekosh and Ahnset were facing.

Ivy’s scream echoed in Ketahn’s mind, each repetition pulling his heartsthread impossibly tighter.

His eyes swept over the scene, and his instincts offered immediate understanding. The yatin’s hide was shredded and bleeding with dozens of cuts both from vrix weapons and the nearby thorns, blood flowing from the wounds in rivulets, but it was Ahnset’s first blow that had inflicted the real damage. Only half her war spear’s shaft jutted from the yatin’s side. At least one of its lungs had been pierced.

Though the yatin had backed away from the thorn snarl, it was still far too close—far too close to Ivy.

Ahnset had the creature’s attention. Her claws and fanged club were dripping with blood, but some of the crimson spattered on her hide looked to be her own. Rekosh still held his spear. It was also bloodied, and half the shaft was missing. With his free hands, he was spooling a thick silk strand drawn from his spinnerets.

The strand would do little on its own, but…

“Telok, with me,” Ketahn called.

Telok fell into place beside Ketahn, and they sprinted to the yatin, which had its side turned toward them. Just as it lunged at Ahnset, Ketahn and Telok threw their bodies against the beast. It felt like slamming into a solid stone cliff face, but it did not hold against the might and weight of two vrix. The yatin snarled and tumbled over, landing heavily on its side.

Ketahn and Telok sank their claws into the beast, using their momentum to roll the creature onto its back.

Rekosh was atop the beast immediately. His spindly limbs moved in a blur as he wound the silk strand around the yatin’s thrashing legs; Ketahn was reminded of the patterns Rekosh sometimes made by stretching a loop of thread between his hands and hooking it repeatedly with his fingers.

Ketahn and Telok dove clear of the beast. Rekosh continued his work until the beast’s struggles heaved it back onto its side, narrowly avoiding a swinging tusk as he tumbled away.

The beast finally righted itself, bracing its hooves on the ground. Dirt and plant debris clung to its blood-slicked hide. Its small, dark eyes fixated upon the vrix in front of it—Ahnset—and it tried to charge. Rekosh’s strand pulled taut the instant the beast’s front legs moved forward. The yatin’s hind legs buckled, and its rear crashed down again.

Ahnset released an undulating battle cry and lunged at the yatin. She slammed her club down on its head, burying the blackrock shards in its flesh with a sickening crack, before grasping its horns and tusks with all four hands. She braced her legs wide and heaved the beast aside, twisting its head. The snarling yatin fell again, this time into the edge of the snarl, crushing vines and thorns beneath it.

All three male vrix pounced upon the creature at once. Ketahn and Telok attacked with a torrent of claws and fangs; Rekosh thrust his spear into the underside of the yatin’s jaw. More bone cracked. The yatin jerked, creating a tremor that must have shaken the entire Tangle. A rattling breath escaped it, and its chest sagged.

The beast stilled.

The tang of blood dominated Ketahn’s senses of taste and smell, leaving room for nothing else, and his hearing rang in the absence of the yatins’ thunderous noise. But the silence didn’t last for more than a few heartbeats. The shrieks and hisses of xiskals mixed with frantic human voices reached Ketahn with new clarity.

Ketahn’s hearts stuttered. He leapt off the yatin before even freeing his claws, tearing up chunks of flesh that he cast to the jungle floor with flicks of his wrists. Without hesitation, he darted into the now mangled opening in the thorn snarl through which Urkot and the others had gone. Vines caught on his limbs, and thorns scraped and snagged his hide, but he barely felt any of it as he clawed across the ground to get to those sounds. His hearts beat faster with each passing moment, and his breaths were ragged and strained.

The same thoughts repeated in his head over and over, like the simple blessings and prayers sometimes chanted by spiritspeakers.

Be all right, Ivy.

Almost there.

Be all right.

The low passage opened on a place not unlike one of Takarahl’s understone chambers; a den the xiskals must have cleared amidst the thorny, tangled vines. The humans were clustered at the center, several holding their metal knives—bloody metal knives. The carcasses of many xiskals were scattered around them.

A few of the beasts were still alive, growling and gnashing their fangs at the humans.

Urkot’s hulking form was visible on the far side of the group, but Ketahn didn’t see Ivy. Where was she? Where was her scent? All he could smell was blood, human sweat, and the musty stench of nesting xiskals. Any traces of Ivy were buried.

Ketahn lunged at the closest beast. His lower hands struck the xiskal on its underside, claws punching through flesh before the strength of the blow lifted the creature into the air and flipped it over. It yelped in pain and came down hard.

A human leaned out of the group, driving a spear into the fallen xiskal. The beast writhed, but its struggles rapidly weakened; it was motionless within the space of a few heartbeats. The human turned her head toward Ketahn, her sweat-dampened golden hair brushing her shoulders. Despite the gloom, despite the dirt and blood smeared on her cheek, Ivy’s blue eyes were bright—with fear, yes, but also with relief and something far deeper.

With a growl, Urkot threw himself to the side, driving three of his legs down on the only surviving xiskal. The creature’s agonized cry blended with the sharp sound of crunching bone.

Ketahn had already closed the distance between himself and Ivy. She released her spear, leaving it stuck in the dead beast, and turned to face him fully just before he caught her in his arms and lifted her against his chest. She wrapped her arms tight around his neck as his claspers hooked around her backside. She immediately lifted her legs to either side of him.

“My heartsthread,” he rasped. His inner heat intensified, but now it drained the strength from his limbs rather than bolstering it. He smoothed a hand over her tousled hair again and again. Ketahn might have been content to sink to the ground right there, curl up around his mate, and hold her until the Tangle swallowed them up.

“I’m okay,” Ivy panted, her breath hot on his neck. “I’m okay. We’re all okay.”

He breathed her in, willing her sweet scent to battle away the stench of blood, to overcome the xiskals’ musk, to soothe the fear that had lodged in his core. He’d lost friends and family aplenty during his lifetime. He’d seen them wrapped and buried in the wet jungle dirt, had seen them left to rot in the mires, had seen them laid in holes deep beneath Takarahl, but his sorrow for those loses hadn’t been anything like his fury and panic at the thought of losing Ivy.

She was okay. She was here in his arms, and she was okay. He hadn’t been too late. He hadn’t failed.

Ketahn was unaware of how much time passed—he knew only that his breathing eventually eased, his hearts slowed, and his instinctual need to destroy everything to protect Ivy retreated to the recesses of his mind.

Reluctantly, he pulled his head back to look down at her. Her pale skin was smeared with blood and dirt. His mandibles fell, and the ashes of those inner fires stirred, threatening to rekindle. “I am sorry, my nyleea. I have covered you in blood again.”

She smiled and ran her fingertips down the side of his face. “It will wash away.”

Ketahn’s fingers flexed, and he clutched her tighter as he tipped his cheek into her touch. The gentleness of her hand was at odds with the ferocity and brutality of moments before.

Will hissed. “Fucker got me.”

But it seemed those bloody matters were not yet done.

Ketahn lifted his eyes to look over the humans. They’d already been sweaty and dirty from their long trek through the jungle, and now they were bloody too, all bearing glimmers of fear in their eyes though the immediate threats were now gone. That fear could consume them if left untended—but it could also be shaped into a tool as readily as a piece of blackrock or a block of wood.

Will had a hand clamped on his left arm over a long, deep gash. Blood seeped from the wound and dripped onto the ground.

“Let me take a look,” Diego said, carefully taking Will’s arm and examining it. His brows were pinched as he gently prodded the cut. “Spread your fingers for me and then squeeze them in a fist.”

Will did as instructed, baring his teeth in pain. His fingers moved stiffly but seemed not to have lost any flexibility.

“Good,” Diego said, using one hand to grasp the strap of his bag as he shrugged it off his shoulder. “It’s a nasty cut, but it looks worse than it really is. I’m going to get you patched up, all right?”

Will nodded.

Diego looked over the others. “Anyone else hurt?”

Lacey dropped to her knees, breath heavy, and swept her hair out of her face. “Just a few scratches.”

The other humans replied similarly; minor cuts, scrapes, and bruises, but nothing else as severe as Will’s wound—and nothing worse.

Cole chuckled; the sound was laced with a hint of bitterness. “Guess we got lucky.”

Will snorted, cocking a brow. His expression was somewhere between pained and amused. “If this was good luck, I don’t want to see what bad luck looks like.”

“Now you know,” Ketahn said in measured English, gently lowering Ivy to her feet. “There is danger, always. Death, always. But we are most strong together.”

“I can’t help but feel like we skipped a couple steps between being ama-chur survivalistsand fighting wild animals to the death,” Callie said. She was bent forward, hands braced on her thighs, as she caught her breath.

“Sometimes the best way to learn is to do,” said Ahmya, her voice small and soft but somehow not weak. “You know…kind of like sink or swim? At least that’s how my dad taught us.” She raised a hand and tucked her hair behind her ear. “Anyway, are you okay, Ella?”

Ella nodded; beads of sweat dripped down her face. “Yeah, thanks.”

“Is there still some light out there, Ketahn?” Diego asked.

Ketahn nodded. “For a little longer.”

“Will, clamp a hand on that cut. Let’s get you out of here.”

“Let us all go,” Ketahn said, waving them onward.

The humans left the way they’d come in, a couple of them glancing back before doing so. Ketahn could not help but wonder if this was the first time some of them had ever fought for survival. He could not imagine the sort of lives humans led on their world, even after all Ivy had told him, but he would not have complained about a lack of excitement if it meant his mate never had to look her potential death in the face again.

His hold on Ivy lingered until the last of the humans, Cole, had entered the low, thorny tunnel. Ketahn bent down, tipping his headcrest against her forehead. She briefly reached up and twined her fingers in his hair, standing on her toes to peck a kiss on his mouth. Then she pulled away. He let her go and watched as she crouched and entered the passage.

“I should have known,” Urkot rumbled behind him.

Ketahn turned to look at his friend, mandibles sagging.

“Should have seen the signs, should have smelled them,” Urkot continued, thumping a leg on the ground. “But I did not. I…I was too focused on…”

“Enough, Urkot,” Ketahn said softly. He extended a foreleg, brushing it against Urkot’s. “You did what was necessary to protect them. Any closer to the edge of the snarl, and the yatins might have reached them.”

Grunting, Urkot brought his upper forearms together and sank into a low bow. “You entrusted me with your mate, Ketahn, and I—”

Ketahn turned to face his friend fully and thrust his upper arms out, catching Urkot by his broad shoulders and forcing him to straighten. “You kept her alive. You fought for her, bled for her, and for that you forever have my thanks. As though you had not already earned my thanks a thousand times over before this day.”

The vrix held one another’s gazes for several heartbeats before Urkot finally looked away. His voice was low and gravely when he spoke. “They attacked because we were in their nest, but…I think they smelled sickness on that female. Ella.”

The dread in Ketahn’s gut—which should have vanished when he was reunited with Ivy—coiled tighter through his insides. “They sought to separate her from the others.”

“Yes. Had the hyu-nins not grouped around her…”

There was no need to complete the thought; they knew what would’ve happened. The silence spoke loudly enough for the direness of what might have been.

A tired trill sounded in Urkot’s chest. “Come. This place stinks. I am ready for the fresh jungle air once again.”

Standing aside, Ketahn waved Urkot on. As the other male crawled into the passage, Ketahn turned to survey the nest. Normally, he would have dragged the carcasses out, skinned them, and carved what meat he could, but the group would be busy enough with the other harvests—and the meat and hides of yatins were far preferable to that of xiskals.

Releasing a slow, unsteady breath, Ketahn exited the snarl to rejoin his mate.

The humans were gathered several segments from the yatin that had died at the edge of the thorn snarl. Diego was tending Will’s wound with his strange human tools, using one hand to work while holding Will’s hand with the other, and the two males looked up at each other every few moments.

A curious smile formed on Will’s lips. If he was still in pain, it no longer showed.

Ella was on the ground, lying on her side with her upper body and head leaning on one of the bags they’d brought on the journey. Though she seemed to be sleeping, her eyes sometimes fluttered open to glance at the others; even such a tiny movement seemed to tire her.

Ahnset, Telok, and Rekosh joined Ketahn and Urkot.

“Are you hurt?” Ketahn asked, studying his friends and broodsister.

“No wounds that could not be bound by some silk,” Telok replied.

“We will all have aches in the morning,” Ahnset said.

Ketahn chittered. “New and old.”

His body was already pulsing with some of those aches, which would grow stronger as he put distance between himself and the battle that had taken place here.

“That tool he is using,” Rekosh said, gesturing toward Diego, “it seals the wounds like webbing, only faster and cleaner.”

“Human technology,” Ketahn replied in English. His eyes had settled upon Ivy, who was helping the others wash their wounds in preparation for Diego’s attentions. There was a slight tremor in her hands, but she held her composure well.

He could not wait to have her alone so he could rain upon her all the tenderness and affection she deserved—and more.

“Are we meant to understand that word?” Telok asked.

Ketahn turned his palms skyward. “No. But it is the word, all the same. I have told you, many of their tools are beyond our imagining.”

After the humans had tended their wounds, Diego, Lacey, Ahmya, and Ivy walked over to the vrix. With Ivy translating, the four offered to help the vrix tend their injuries.

Ketahn’s friends seemed caught off guard by the offer, but they accepted gratefully. Ketahn and Ivy both had to hold in their laughter at the way his friends fidgeted as the humans touched them and cleaned and sealed their cuts and scrapes.

Soon, only Ahnset’s wounds remained untreated. She looked at Ketahn questioningly every time Diego spoke to her or was about to apply one of his strange tools.

When all was done, everyone looked tired—both human and vrix.

“That was fucking crazy,” Cole muttered, surveying the dead yatins.

“These things make elephants look small,” said Will.

“Fuck them.” Cole waved his hands dismissively. “I’m ready to collapse in my pod and sleep for two damn days.”

Diego knelt over his bag to put away his tools. “I finally agree with you on something, man.”

Ketahn trilled. “We cannot leave.”

“What?” Callie asked as all the humans looked at Ketahn.

“Don’t tell me there are more of those things,” said Will, wide-eyed.

Raising his mandibles in a smile, Ketahn dipped his head toward the fallen yatins. “Their meat and hide is very good. We cannot leave it.”

“Are you serious?” asked Lacey. She looked at Ivy, then Ketahn, then back again. “He’s serious, isn’t he?”

Ivy laughed. “He’s serious.”

“Fuuuuuck,” Cole groaned, shoulders sagging.

“Be fast, humans,” Ketahn said with a chitter. “The jungle is dangerous at night.”

“Was that sarcasm? Is he being sarcastic?” Callie put her hands on her hips and cocked her head, regarding Ketahn closely.

“Maybe it’s better when he’s serious,” said Lacey with a shrug. She drew her knife from its little holder on the leg of her jumpsuit. “From beekeeper to butcher. Not the career change I’d planned on.”

As the group converged on the nearest yatin, Ketahn’s dread eased. For all that had gone wrong, this had been an encouraging day. There was promise here. There was potential for a future of cooperation and prosperity. There was potential for he and Ivy to live a long, happy life together in peace.

They just had to, as a human might have said, get the fuck away from Takarahl first.