Jude’s jaw tics, as Gage grunts and curses. I grin.
“Don’t worry, he just used his fingers. He didn’t give it up to the nefarious vagina. My point is, it seems I’m going to be running low on firsts pretty soon, at the rate I’m going. You boys better not come crying to me when you missed all the firsts for being completely unreasonable pricks.”
Gage does the same petty thing, refusing good sleep offered by the evil vagina holder for no cost of admission.
They both ignore me, because they don’t really like arguing as much as I do. I could quite literally point logic out to them all day.
Surrounded by the four guys who easily close their eyes in my presence, willing to put their life in my hands, yet completely unwilling to stubbornly admit they trust me, I stare out over the fiery lake.
It’s actually sort of pretty once you get over the dangerous part of it. Also, as long as you don’t mind the occasional bird-snake carcass floating by you, or the living ones casting their ominous shadow over you from the red sky.
I take it back. It’s not pretty. I’m really just trying too hard to make this not as doom-and-gloom as we know it is.
With all of them quiet, not bickering or bantering with me as a distraction, the reality of our situation sinks in, and it grows heavy pretty quickly.
I can’t see land on any side now. The crackle of the lake and spitting fire that hisses when it shoots too high don’t exactly give off a comforting melody.
I’m so alert that it’s a good thing they can’t feel me jostling around to inspect each sound or smell.
Gage suddenly moves into my knee with just the very tips of his fingers, not making a sound or looking at me.
Jude’s eyes are open, staring at me before dropping his gaze to the fingers Gage leaves there, his body relaxing as the tingles soothe him. At least I assume it’s the tingles.
Jude’s eyes narrow in challenge, as though we’re in a war and this is a pivotal battle.
Obviously, I mouth the word, “Three,” before holding up just as many fingers and waggling my eyebrows at him.
It’s clearly the most mature course of action.
He doesn’t find it quite as amusing as I do.
“That’s twice you’ve called me comoara tr?d?toare. What does it mean?” I ask him.
He holds my gaze for so long that I think he’s not going to answer.
Just as he closes his eyes, I hear the words that are almost whispered.
“Treacherous treasure.”
Chapter 4
“I swear, I never want to see another fucking beetle for as long as I live,” I mutter under my breath.
Which might be as long as an hour from now for all I know.
We’ve been stuck on top of this foul-smelling thing for over ten hours now. At least. Possibly even longer. Just floating on the fire. If my ass was capable of feeling anything in this form, it’d still be numb.
Bright side, three out of four guys just got a lot of proactive rest before day two starts out the same way day one ended.
Jude is the only one awake. He never really slept as deeply as the other three, and I’m fairly sure he resents the hell out of all of them for sleeping as well as they have. And he resents me for my wicked vagina voodoo.
My milkshake brings all the boys to naptime…Yeah, that’s not how that song goes. The song is a lot sexier, but beggars can’t be choosers.
They’re a tough crowd, so I take the small wins that come along.
“Fucking finally,” Jude says, causing my attention to lift.
I spot gray land with nothing but a shadow behind it, almost as though there’s a second picture out of frame, and for a second I’m relieved, until I see a girl and guy lifting bows and launching arrows.
“Get the hell up!” Jude shouts as I leap to my feet.
Before I can even react, he flips into the air, snatching both speeding arrows, and lands in a crouch back on the beetle.
He casually tosses an arrow to Ezekiel as he lands at his side, and the two of them throw the arrows so hard they zip through the air in a blur of speed.
Both archers drop to the ground, the arrows sticking out of their throats as their bodies convulse.
“They could have just went on instead of mistaking you to be vulnerable on the back of a beetle, and they’d have survived,” I state, as though they need a reminder of the obvious.
“Depending on their ability to heal, they may still survive if we leave them,” Jude tells me.
They’d better stay dead.
“Does that mean you’re going to do your five-finger-death-punch to ensure they don’t chase us down and try to kill you again?” I muse.
He gives me an annoyed look.
“Did you really just do that?” he asks incredulously.
“What? Use your favorite band to name your Hulk Smash and Decay power? Yes, yes I did,” I say very seriously, holding his gaze like there’s a challenge to see who holds it the longest.
He breaks our stare-down first, and Kai smirks, even though he seems distracted.
“Well. That’s certainly problematic,” I announce in a huff when I see what has their attention.
The closer we get, the louder the telltale sign is, making us view the optical illusion differently. It’s not one stretch of lake we’re seeing anymore. There’s a massive drop below before it levels out, and we’re actually seeing two levels of fire now.
The newest issue is a massive, fiery waterfall that we’re fast approaching, and there’s roughly a hundred foot gap from the start of the firefall to the land across from us.
Hell really sucks.
“How far can you guys jump? Because that’s a little difficult for me even in this form,” I say warily, my heart starting to hammer now.
Gage looks around like he’s searching for something, as Ezekiel answers me.
“We can’t make that jump.”
No land is on either side of us, not giving us any other option, since we’re surrounded by hellfire lava. And this firefall? It’s five times the size of Niagara Falls in width.
The fall isn’t that steep—maybe fifty feet—but there’s no way the beetle won’t submerge with all that weight, even if they manage to all stay on it during the fall. They’ll never survive the hellfire burns.
And the Devil wins.
“Now would be a good time to figure out the riddle early,” I tell them, frantically waving my arms as though that will spur them into brilliance.
“How do you cross an uncrossable passage layered with flames of fucking death without falling or jumping into the fire, when there’s no obvious escape around you?” Jude asks on an annoyed breath.
“I hate that riddle,” I point out, not coming up with my own genius idea this time.
“Jude and I can throw the farthest,” Gage says, cracking his neck to the side. “And we can jump farther as well.”
“Obviously that’s Plan Z. What’s Plan A through Y?” I reasonably ask, knowing he can’t possibly be suggesting that as anything other than a last resort.