Orc’s Forbidden Claim (Red Planet Dragons of Tajss #33)

17. Khiara

17

KHIARA

M y head throbs painfully. I can’t form a coherent thought. Something is on me. The weight makes it hard to breathe.

Saylor. Where is she?

“Dragoste!” I yell or try to but instead of sound coming out, my mouth fills with dust and gravel.

My heart beats faster. I wiggle and shift until my hands are beneath my chest. I can’t feel my legs, but I will them to shift and hear the sounds of movement. I push against the ground, trying to rise. Nothing happens. The weight is too much.

No. No. My dragoste. Nothing will stop me.

I try again. Pushing. Muscles straining to the point of failure. I growl, pushing past the failure by force of will alone. My heart beats so hard it feels as if it too will explode but I do not care. I must get free. Must save Saylor. Nothing else matters.

I reach the limit of what I can do. My body collapses to the ground against my will. In my head I scream but no sounds emerge. I take a moment, as brief as possible, waiting until the muscles stop quivering then I try again.

I hear gravel and dirt sliding. Shifting. The weight eases, lighter… lighter… I break free.

“Saylor!” I roar as I burst from beneath the piles of dirt, gravel, and small boulders.

I take in the situation with one fast look. The Urr’ki detonated a bomb of some kind, and it collapsed the tunnel. Mounds of rock and dirt surround me. To my left one of them shifts. Saylor was on my right. Indecision freezes me in place. The shifting mound is probably Sek’su, but he is secondary to her.

He can help find her.

That clears my decision, and I climb over the rocks and work to unbury him. It takes a few minutes. Precious minutes that I should be spending saving her. Doubts and regrets assault my head, but instead of listening to them, I work faster.

I find his tail first. It twitches letting me know he’s alive. A moment later he bursts up from the rubble, hunched over, growling as he does. Jealousy stabs through my heart as he turns towards me, and I see that he has his female protected in his arms. My hands ball into fists and I have to stop myself from punching him in his stupid lizard face.

He protected her. I didn’t, but he did.,

Recognizing the source of my jealousy doesn’t ease it, it replaces it with regret and self-abnegation. But there is no time for that either. I scramble up and over the mounds of fallen rocks back to where I broke free. She was at my side, close. I tried to push her behind me to protect her. She has to be in this area.

She has to be okay. She is alive. I’d feel it if she wasn’t. I didn’t lose her. Not like this.

Pressure builds behind my eyes and my sinuses burn. It must be the dust filling my nose and mouth. I scan the piles and mounds, scrambling up and over trying to find a clue as to where she is.

“Saylor!” I call. “Say! Dragoste!”

I circle where I broke free. The collapse is uneven. Large chunks of the stone create structures almost like pillars around which the loose dirt and gravel have piled. If she is under one of those pillars… no. No. No. No.

I continue the search, and it feels like time is racing. Minutes pass as if they are only seconds. Every instant is one closer to her not being able to survive. Her dying alone. Without me. And it is all my fault. I should have known. Why didn’t I check that the downed Urr’ki was dead? Lust and desire. I saw her and all I could think of was touching her. Feeling her. Stupid. That bad decision could cost me everything.

There is no light source, which isn’t helping either. I, like all Urr’ki, have excellent dark vision, but that doesn’t mean it is not hard to make out details. Important details that might tell me where she is.

“Khiara?” Sek’su calls.

“Here,” I growl.

Then I see it. Boots, sticking out from under a large pile of gravel. They are not her boots, but an Urr’ki’s. I scramble over, slipping and sliding on the loose debris. Kharta had run forward. Towards us.

Towards her?

A tiny sliver of hope, but it is all I have, and I will latch onto anything. Anything that represents a chance.

Sharp rocks and debris tear at my pants and knees but the pain and discomfort doesn’t matter. It might as well be happening to someone else. I dig through the rubble, throwing aside rocks as I fight to unbury the body.

I’m only dimly aware of footsteps approaching, but when I do hear them, I don’t look. I assume it’s Sek’su, if not then whoever it is can wait.

“Help me!” I yell.

Sek’su is at my side and helps. It moves faster with the two of us, but more debris flows in almost as fast as we dig. It’s taking too long. Each moment is an eternity, one in which I can do nothing but fear I am too late. Too slow. Too… something.

The legs lead to a back. It is Kharta. He isn’t moving but his form is hunched over, protective. Protruding from beneath him I see a hand. Her hand.

“Saylor!” I shout. The fingers of her filthy hand twitch. There is a dark streak across the upturned palm. “Is there any light?”

I growl and Sek’su disappears while I continue to unbury Kharta. When I remove enough that his head comes into view, my stomach tightens. There is no way he survived the explosion. It gives me pause, but only for a moment before I resume.

He gave his life to save her. I am grateful and will give him proper honors when I can, but first I have to see if he sacrificed his life in vain. Grabbing his shoulders I pull back, rising to my feet as I strain to move not only his body weight but the remaining rocks.

Muscles tear, I growl, but he moves. Debris is sliding and shifting. I can’t see exactly what’s happening, but a light comes, throwing back the darkness which tries to cling, sticky shadows laying across the body I’m moving and worse, hiding her.

Sek’su sets the lantern down and then moves to my aid. Together we lift Kharta. Sek’su takes him in his arms with a surprising degree of reverence while I drop beside Saylor. My hand shakes as I place two fingers on her neck.

She is okay. She has to be. Must.

Her pulse is weak, thready, but it is there. I scoop her into my arms, cradling her to my chest, and pull her out of the rubble. My throat is dry as I turn with her. Sek’su has his back to me, but I watch him lie Kharta gently down.

Wrenlee is close by his side. She’s covered in dirt. Her eyes are wide and don’t seem to be seeing what’s in front of her. She mumbles something, then touches one hand to her ear, shaking her head. Blood trickles down her forehead and into her eyes but she doesn’t seem to notice.

“Is she?” Sek’su asks, not finishing the question, looking every bit as grim as I feel.

I look at Saylor, lying curled in my arms. So small, tiny, so perfect, my everything. My heart given shape outside my body. The pain is choking, clenching both my throat and stomach. I don’t see any visible wounds, but I’ve been in enough battles to know that the worst ones often aren’t the ones you see.

“She is fine,” I snap.

I don’t know that. How can I know it? But it has to be. I will not allow it to be any other way. If that bastard hurt her… if he… I will destroy the Shaman with my bare hands. I’ll put him on his infernal machine and listen to him scream for as long as I can possibly make it happen.

As my thoughts grow darker, she twitches, as if pulling me back from them. She is, as she always has been, my savior.

“Saylor?” I ask, hating the desperation in my voice. Her eyelids flutter and a sigh slips from her lips.