Baring the Thorn (The Mountain Tribe #3)

Chapter 16

Thorn

T he mountains echo with my voice, yet Samara does not move.

I feel her still, clinging to me, her distant voice, as though she is miles away from me instead of before me. Yet all of my senses, all of the blood that rushes to my limbs, is trained on the bear.

Huge, hulking, snuffing at its kill.

Its full black eyes watch us, catching any small movement.

It is territorial because of the fresh deer meat in its enormous paws, and we have stumbled upon it at the cusp of spring, when it is starved from a long winter of hibernation and ready to fight for any scrap of food.

I have never fought one before, only run, but I know the signs of aggression.

The beast roars, revealing a mouth twice the size of my head and enormous teeth, and Samara gives a terrified shriek against me.

The bear drops back down, pawing and huff at the ground, scraping knife-sharp claws over the rocky terrain of the mountains.

The need to protect Samara is like a roaring in my own skull, like every cell in my body is preparing itself to defend her.

I am furious that she does not run, that she does not listen, that cruel fate has placed us in this situation where now she may be hurt, that we followed the medicine and the man and that I could not convince her to stay back.

I do not have time to tell her again.

It dawns on me, with creeping dread, that it will be between the two of us now, that it will be my life or hers.

Without thought, I make the decision.

There is no alternative.

There is no regret.

There is acceptance only, the very purpose of my task strengthening my arms and legs to fight the enormous creature.

If Samara will not run, I will have to engage the bear.

I shove her out of the way and advance, knives in hand, shouting and making myself appear big in contrast to the female.

If it works, then the bear will kill me, and Samara will have time to escape. If this does not work, the bear will lunge for her instead, and I do not know how quickly it would hurt her at its size, how quickly it could deliver a killing blow to the fragile female.

I cannot think of that now.

Adrenaline courses through my veins, my heartbeat pounding in my ears, and as I run up the bear, I think only of maiming, of killing, of wounding it enough that it will not go after her.

It cannot go after her.

The bear is faster than me.

It slams it’s paws on the ground before charging at me, mouth opened, it’s front teeth nearly the length of my forearm and it’s tongue red with the blood of the deer.

When we finally clash, the world is a blur of reeking brown fur, of heavy weight slamming against me, and of shouting, mine or Samara’s or the beasts - I cannot be sure.

It is like a hundred rocks piling on top of me from a rockslide, like falling into river rapids and being flung against the hard bottom.

I lose sight of which way is up and down, of where the grey sky is.

We tumble and roll, and a claw slashes against my back and shoulder, gouging into my bicep.

At the heady release of pain in my bloodstream, my efforts redouble, and I stab wildly at the mass of fur above me, grunting with the effort of keeping myself from being crushed.

Ground. Earth.

More screaming.

I’m slammed down on my back over some rocks.

I hear my spine snap in protest, and perhaps the only thing that protects me from death is the heavy pack that is still secured to my back.

The bear rears up on its hind legs, growling and roaring into the air, and it’s teeth drip with deer flesh. It slams it’s claws down on me, raking through my chest, and I release a cry of agony.

My mind drags through swirling blackness to stay conscious, to keep fighting.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Samara racing towards us, her expression stricken and blurry from the blood in my vision, and my stomach drops.

“No!” I roar, loud enough to be heard over the beast. Why is she not running? Why is she drawing nearer? “Run, Samara! Now!”

Yet she does not, she advances and begins to hurl rocks at the creature, tossing the largest she can manage in an attempt to help me.

Panic has me panting hard as I turn my attention back to the bear, terrified that it will leave me and hunt her down.

Desperate to distract it, I fight back harder, and stab one of my bone knives into its thick chest. I am not even sure if I reach meat through the layers of fur, but the bear snarls and claws over one of my arms.

The animal and I shout together, dizzying pain and fury and bloodlust.

Samara is forgotten, but the claws have sunk in deep.

Blood sprays.

It is in my mouth, my eyes, my nose. My chest is warm with it, from either this attack or earlier, the deep slices carved into my chest.

My body pumps blood out like it wants to flood the forest, and I feel parts of myself going numb, fingertips and toes.

The bear rears back for another attack, and I throw a protective arm over my head. It latches it’s jaw on, and I feel it’s enormous incisors clash into the bones of my arm.

I am screaming, from the fire of pain that explodes from the bite, and the pressure only increases as the creature turns me over onto my stomach.

It lashes the same attacks onto my pack, but these are not deep enough to go through, and I have a moment of dizzy wakefulness where I blink at the ground before me.

I catch a second of Samara’s feet nearby, and then hear her cry as she launches herself at the bear. Something must connect, because the weight is lifted off my back and the creature begins to roar in pain and fury.

Turning myself back over feels nearby impossible, my body screaming out in agony from various wounds, the blood like a pool beneath me, the world spinning and hazy, but I know that I must.

I will fight to the dying breath to protect Samara, and if I can still move, I can still fight.

It is with her in mind that I grunt as I turn back around and look up, finding that she buried her knife into the creature’s eye.

Blood pours down it’s vicious face, and the bone knife sticks out at an angle, all the way to the bone. Beneath the panic and the pain that are a torrent in me, I feel a rush of pride for my strong female.

The bear now stumbles, rearing back, clawing at its face in an attempt to release the knife, and while it is busy, Samara kneels behind me, looping her arms under my own and dragging me back.

She is trying to pull me away, hoping that the bear is too distracted to chase, but I know that this must end with a death. It will hunt us until it cannot move.

“Listen to me, Samara, you must-” I do not even have time to finish my hurried instructions. The knife is forgotten and the bear charges once more.

I use my good arm to knock down Samara, aiming her to stumble and roll down a particularly steep patch of the hill, and then ready my second knife when the beast drops over me once more.

It’s teeth connect with my shirt, tearing and rending my leathers or my flesh, the adrenaline and exhaustion in my body cannot let me know. But the sound is sickening, a bloody ripping that I feel down in my bones.

With my last strength, I bury my knife into the bears head, again and again.

I crack through the skull. I sink into fleshy brain matter. I splatter both of us with blood and sinew and bone. I gouge out an eye in the process. I cannot stop.

I pour the rest of my waking moments into rage, shouting as I drive the knife over and over until the creature is still and the weight of it drops down onto me.

The world is dark, the sky blocked out. I cannot see if I still have an arm or not.

I give into that swirling blackness and think of Samara.

My Samara.

I picture her face, round and delicate, her dark features and her brown eyes as fierce and enduring as the earth, giving and taking, in the unending cycle of life within the forest. Then I am swallowed up by fathomless night.