Branches of Life

Over the next couple of hours, I drifted in and out of a restless sleep. The first time I woke up, was when Ander and Wyatt switched off on watch. Ander laid down using his bag as a pillow and was almost immediately out cold. The second time was when Harmony threw her cards at Starling. Apparently, someone brought cards, which was a weird thing to bring on a mission. Harmony woke me later when she checked on my healing progress. Hers and Ari's argument over who deserved the iron throne was a particularly memorable moment, even in my half-asleep state.

The final time, I awoke to silence, with Rowan draped over my feet. Koa's hand traced light circles on my stomach where my shirt had ridden up. It still amazed me how such a causal touch had my stomach clenching and my skin heating. Which seemed like it would be miserable in this sweltering place, but wasn't. I didn't move, instead, I remained leaning back against Koa, relishing in this small intimacy.

"How are your ribs and shoulder?" Koa asked, keeping his voice low. His hand still moving in slow circles, distracting me for a few moments. I sat up and his hands slid off my stomach. Testing my shoulder, I found it was stiff, but no longer aching. After taking several deep breaths, I was relieved when I didn't feel any pain. I didn't attempt moving my hip, but I figured it too was healed.

"I'm good," I murmured, pushing myself to my feet with the help of Koa. His hands lingered on my waist and all I wanted to do was lean back into his warmth. Damn pheromones.

"Lead the way through hell." Ari waved her arm towards the entrance of the tunnel.

Harmony grumbled under her breath as she shoved on her pair of sneakers. Bare feet and lava weren't a good combination. At some point while I napped, she had changed out of her muddy clothes and cleaned her feet.

"Wait, have you been barefoot this whole time?" Starling asked incredulously, holding up her hand. She also changed her clothes and pulled her hair up into a top knot.

"No." Harmony scoffed like that was the dumbest question she'd ever heard. "I wore these foot cages in Antarctica."

Starling blinked, opening and closing her mouth. "Foot cages," she muttered under her breath.

"We can talk about how unobservant you are later. Right now we need to find the next portal," Ander practically growled, storming down the tunnel without waiting for a response. Starling minutely flinched, before shaking her head and shutting down her expression.

"You should hear Harm's rants about heels," I joked, trying to lighten the mood.

"Oh don't even get me started on those spiky assholes," Harmony said struggling to keep her voice low. Up ahead of us, Ander sighed, having already heard her in-depth rants about shoes many times before. A small smile lifted Starling's lips.

We filed out of the cave with Wyatt leading and Koa bringing up the rear. My hand was practically glued to the wall, my eyes firmly planted on the ground in front of me as we continued up the path. While I was glad we weren't crossing behind the lava, I didn't love the growing distance between us and the ground. Especially on this narrow path. Would it be wrong to fake an injury to get Koa to carry me again?

The pull of the mate bond was way stronger than I thought it would be. The more time I spent around Koa, the more I craved him. Wanted to be near him. His touch soothed something inside of me that I hadn't known needed soothing. Shaking my head at the random thought, I shoved it aside and all other unwelcome thoughts on this mate bond.

A winding river of bubbling lava sat in front of us at the top of the cliff. More volcanos dotted the horizon, one of them coughing up heavy clouds of smoke and spewing out chunks of lava as it erupted. How nice. We followed the river, making sure to stay at least a couple dozen feet away. Even with the distance, it was still hot as fuck. My shirt was drenched and clung to my body. Loose strands of hair were plastered to my face and neck. I was seriously considering ripping off my jeans and walking around in my underwear. If this portal didn't take us to the demon's region, I hoped we ended up in the snowy region.

An earthshaking roar sounded in the distance, making us freeze. Even though it was far away, anywhere where we could hear this mystery creature was too damn close. After standing in place for several tense moments without hearing another sound from the creature, we resumed walking. Picking up our pace as we didn't want to find what creature that sound belonged to.

No way that came from a small creature.

The ground faintly rumbled and shook from another volcano erupting, this one only a few miles to our right. "We should be fine as long as we keep moving," Koa said as he continued watching the volcano.

"It would be nice if we had some cover." Ander tilted his head back, scanning the open skies. "I have a feeling a lot of the creatures living in this region can fly."

Our pace picked up to a brisk jog. My hip and shoulder were still a little stiff and took a little while to loosen up. While I wasn't keen on dealing with oversized creatures, and I didn't love this heat or the smells coating the air, I preferred it to the forest. A true sign of how much I hated the dark forest since spending time in a forest was usually relaxing for me. The asshole trees were a big reason for my hatred of the last region. But it was also due to the sinister energy and unseen eyes watching our every movement.

Over the next few hours, we maintained our brisk jog, only slowing down for water and surveillance of our surroundings, making sure there weren't any creatures sneaking up on us. Ander's biggest worry was coming across a firebird. I hadn't even considered that they might live in this region, and now I couldn't stop thinking about them, thanks a lot Ander.

At one point Ari tried starting a game of I-spy. Considering the landscape of this region, it went about as well as it had for the moose brothers in Brother Bear. Other than a few jokes and some light ribbing, we didn't really talk much.

Due to erupting volcanoes, we altered our path a few times, slowly drifting away from the lava river as we did so, to the point it was no longer in sight. One thing we hadn't expected was the geysers that randomly popped up. We had to change our route several more times to avoid those fuckers.

"We're close," Ari panted, chugging her water. I'd have to take her word for it since I couldn't feel a damn thing yet.

"I'd say we have about a mile left," Wyatt confirmed, wiping the sweat from his face using the bottom of his shirt and exposing his toned and glistening stomach. Somehow we had found ourselves near another lava river, one that seemed even hotter than the last.

Our relatively uneventful trip came to an abrupt end when we heard a roar, that was way too fucking close. Hearing heavy steps behind me, I dove to the side and tucked into a roll, narrowly avoiding getting mauled by a chimera. The fucking thing was more horrifying than I pictured growing up. With its three heads including, a lion at the front, a goat in the middle, and a serpent as its tail. Surprisingly the goat was the scariest part, especially when it breathed fire, making me have to dive to the side again. This time I hadn't fared as well as before, my left arm stinging from the jagged lava rocks. Rowan plowed into the creature, biting at the goat's neck. Releasing one of the blades from my sword, I quickly dispatched the lion head of the creature while Rowan took care of the goat and the snake.

Once the creature was dead, we took off toward the portal, several yards behind the others. Blood was dripping down my arm, but I barely even felt the scrapes. Charging at us from the side was another chimera. Ari fired several arrows at it, but only one struck it in the shoulder. Even if her aim had been good—which it usually was—it wouldn't have been enough to kill it. All it would've accomplished was pissing it off, even more than it was now. A vicious snarl ripped from the lion's mouth as it neared us.

"I got this," Ander announced, unsheathing his sword in time to sidestep the attack and slice out with his sword. He rolled out of the way of its next attack and blocked the serpent's strike with the side of his blade.

Ahead of me, Ari was no longer firing off arrows, probably for the best with how off her aim was. She was sprinting like no tomorrow—I was pretty sure she was even tapping into her wolf's speed—and it had nothing to do with how close we were getting to the portal. From the way she was single-mindedly focused on running, I knew she didn't see or hear the chimera charging her way from the other side of the lava river.

"Watch out!" Picking up my pace, I tackled her to the ground as the chimera leaped over the twenty-foot-wide river. Coarse lava rocks cut into my other arm and shoulder as I slammed into the ground. Ari remained on the floor as I popped to my feet, ignoring the stinging in both of my arms and the dripping blood. After dodging several attempted strikes from the creature, I had to yet again, roll out of the way of the damn goat's fire.

Of course, the region with the jagged ground was the one I was rolling around on. At least I had my bag to protect my back from the sharp rocks, even if it did slow down my roll.

After narrowly avoiding being bitten by the serpent, I sliced off the damn thing at the base. Going as far as kicking its body in the lava. One down, two to go.

Having finally climbed to her feet, Ari drew the attention of the goat head, while I dealt with the lion. With both of us together, we had this fucker dead within minutes.

A moment too late, I saw another chimera jumping at us and watched in horror as it plowed into Ari, knocking her to the ground. Without thought, I lunged at the creature, not even caring that I was using my wolf's speed. In one clean move, I sliced the goat's head off as I leaped onto its back. With my other hand, I pulled a dagger free and jammed it into the lion's neck. Ari's hand snapped forward and pierced the creature's heart with her blade. For good measure, I chopped off the serpent and tossed it into the lava, before shoving the dead body off of Ari. Claw marks ran down her arms, but weren't deep enough to worry about right now.

A dull thud sounded behind us, and we whirled around to find Ander standing behind us, having just killed another chimera. "Are you alright?" His eyes quickly took in the blood running down our arms.

"We're still alive and breathing," I answered, checking to make sure no more creatures were sneaking up on us. We didn't have more time to make sure all of us were okay. Not with the growls and sounds of fighting up ahead of us.

We had fallen pretty far behind everyone else—something that seemed to be becoming a trend for me, one I didn't like—and it took us several minutes and two more downed chimeras, until we came across Starling and Harmony, working together to dispatch their chimera. Both Koa and Wyatt were busy taking care of their own creatures. Before now, I hadn't gotten a chance to watch Wyatt fight, and I almost found myself mesmerized by his smooth and graceful movements.

As if fighting off a pack of chimeras wasn't bad enough, Rowan chimed in with a warning. 'I can sense the wyverns waking. We need to be gone before they arrive.'

Fucking great, just what we needed.

A chorus of swears followed when I relayed Rowan's warning before we flat-out sprinted toward the portal.

Not even a minute later, I finally felt the energy from the portal, a relieved sigh whooshing from my lungs. Well, until I heard the ear-bursting screech of a wyvern, sounding way too fucking close.

One at a time we ran through the portal, the sounds of a wyvern closing in on us, giving me the motivation I needed to run faster than I ever had before. Apparently, I wasn't running fast enough, because Koa tossed me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing, and sprinted the last few yards to the portal. I glanced over Koa's shoulder and saw the black-scaled wyvern only twenty feet away before we were pulled into the portal and away from this monstrosity.

That was way too fucking close.