I kick Stiles and hear his sharp grunt. Direct hit, my foot arcs off of his rounded kneecap. I’m rewarded with another, more vicious twisting of my arms. If my arms were free I’d take my newest elixir and smear it into right Stile’s eyeballs until the cells melt into goo. All I can do is scream and pray someone hears me.
He drags me down the hall past the spare room that I slept in during my coma, and toward the back stairway. I wheel around to screech long and shrill right in his eardrum. I hope it damages his hearing. He veers away, and hauls me down one stair at a time. It hurts, badly. My ankles bump, bump, bump against the sharp corners of the stairs.
Thrashing around to stall his progress and create as much chaos as possible, I trip him. He stumbles but rights himself, then bites down on my hand. With a meaty crunch my flesh gives way. Bump, bump, bump, he bounces me down the last flight of stairs.
I can’t let him take me back to the compound; he’ll beat me, kill me even.
“Let go!” I thrash against him. We’re lost in a struggle of twisted limbs, close to the garden door. Fireseed, hear me! “If I have to go back to that hellhole, I’ll demolish everything!” The curtained gazebos where the men pair up with underage partners, the podium where they fill us with unholy lies and false proclamations. Where they singe the small children with brands.
“I’ll destroy you, Ruby,” Stiles hisses in my ear with his putrid turnip breath. “Your face is scarred now, you’re not even pretty anymore.”
The zing of an arrow misses its mark and thwacks into the sand. Armonk!
Stiles flings open the glider door. He throws me in and secures my arms with agar binding to the seat post. The zing of a second arrow hits Stiles’ left shoulder, and Stiles, with a shocked groan, jerks backwards. His hands move upward, fumble with the arrow, but by the look on his face, he can’t stand the pain of trying to pull it out. His cloak’s already red, but this new liquid, spreads darker red, in pulses. With the arrow still jutting out, he starts the glider.
“Let me go! You don’t want me, I don’t want you,” I shout. I unfasten the door with my foot. He leans over, grabs the handle and slams the door on my ankle. With all of the strength in my other leg, I swivel around and push it open again. Good Fire! Cursing at me, Stiles tries to grab the door handle again. I only have another second or two before I’m airborne.
Then, an enormous body hurls itself on Stiles, all mammoth curled back and rock-hard thighs like some leathery Skull’s Wrath monster. I swerve away to avoid being crushed. Looking up, I see Blane’s cropped brown hair and wild eyes, mad for the kill.
His potato-fists seize around Stile’s neck and squeeze. Stiles burbles and coughs like a clogged pipe.
Armonk sinks his third arrow in Stiles’ calf, where Stiles raised it to kick Blane off him. Red spurts onto me, onto Blane, onto the floor. Armonk must’ve hit an artery.
“Get off me,” pleads Stiles. “I’m leaving, get off!”
At this, Blane eases up on Stile’s neck. “Leave then!” Blane orders. Stiles struggles to his feet and over to the console while Blane unbinds my arms. “Ruby, go! Quick,” Blane exclaims.
I scramble out, taking care not to slide and fall into Stile’s bloody mess. Blane gives Stiles a parting punch and then leaps from the vehicle. “Don’t even think about coming back,” he warns.
From over my shoulder I see Stiles blinking to regain alertness. He fumbles at his wounds in another attempt to dislodge the arrow. Then, he ascends, swerving my way. “Sinful woman,” he hollers from the window, “next time, I’ll bring an army. And you …” He glares down at Blane. “You’ll be meat for the flies.”
“Coward! I should’ve shot you when I had the chance,” Blane shakes his fist at the departing specter of Stiles in the angry sky.
Already my ankle and wrists are on fire and swollen to ridiculous proportions. My hand smarts where Stiles bit it. Armonk hurries over to help steady me as I limp away.
“That was the man they had you partnered up with?” he asks me.
“Yes,” I gasp, and thank him.
“I see why you left. I heard yelling, and had a bad feeling about it,” he explains as we shuffle toward the back door. “ I told your brother to stay put in his room, and I came running.”
“You’re a good shot,” I say. “Did you see it sticking out from his shoulder?” We both exhale in shaky, relieved laughter.
By this time, Blane has caught up to us. We stop in awkward hesitation as we regard him. Am I the one who feels awkward, or is it Blane? His eye is blackening and the skin under it is torn from where Stiles got in one lousy punch. But it’s Blane’s expression that tears me up.
“Thanks,” I tell him. I loosen myself from Armonk’s firm arm and gingerly test my weight on my sore ankle. It feels wrong to lean on Armonk right now with Blane staring at me, a hungry, lonely look in his eye. It’s as if he’s never been hugged, never been fed, never been loved, as if the sight of Armonk touching me, even just to help me limp along injures him. “Thanks,” I tell Blane again. “I really mean that. That man would’ve killed me if I’d gone back.”