feel it spreading through me, killing the rot.” She pressed her fist to her lips as tears sprang to her eyes.
Rune squeezed her hand. “We have to find the witch. Then there will be time for catching up.” She looked at Strad. “You never rotted?”
He shook his head. “Rune, I—”
“Time for that later. It doesn’t matter right now.”
Standing before her were two more reasons for her to never leave. To begin all over in a new world. A world meant for her.
Strad.
Lex.
And…
“Z is here,” she said. “Z is in Skyll.”
“Rune,” Strad said. There was nothing in his eyes but a quiet gladness.
She smiled, then lost her smile just as quickly. “I can’t find him. The witch had him in a cage before she captured me. I don’t know where he is or if he’s…”
“First we’ll deal with that ugly bitch Damascus,” Lex said, “then we’ll find Z.”
“Lex.” Rune frowned. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Lex nodded, but looked away.
Strad squeezed her shoulder, gently. “Are you? What the fuck did they do to you?” But he kept his voice calm. The rage was in his eyes. “Who hurt you?”
“She spent some time with the crawlers,” Cree murmured. “The witch’s crawlers.”
Rune shuddered at the sudden, vivid image, then leaned forward and put her hands on her knees.
Strad blew out a deep breath and walked to Cree, who stood apart from them, her head down. She couldn’t hide what had been done to her, and she couldn’t hide what was in her eyes.
No matter what she’d gone through, she hadn’t lost her love for the berserker.
And Rune couldn’t blame her for that.
Strad waited until Cree looked up at him. His expression didn’t change, but Rune knew what that calmness cost him. “Cree,” he said. The pity was there, in his voice. The horror.
She ducked her head again, quickly, and said nothing.
“Fin?” he asked.
“I saw him,” Rune said. “He gave me a ride to the Flesh Shimmer.”
Neither Lex nor Strad looked confused. Obviously they’d been there long enough to learn about shimmers.
“Rune,” a familiar voice called, and Rune saw Olson running up the hill toward her.
The berserker stepped in front of her.
“He’s a friend, Strad.”
Olson tripped and nearly fell in his hurry to get to her. “Here, Princess.” He thrust a shotgun at her. “I retrieved Ian’s gun. It’s…you should have it.”
She grabbed it. “I never thought I’d see you again. How did it survive the blast?” Ian had been decimated, after all.
“Our guns don’t die,” Olson said.
She gave him a nod. “Thank you. Jim?”
He shrugged. “We were separated in the fight. He’s down there…somewhere.”
Then he turned around and ran, but not back to the battle below. Olson was done fighting.
She slipped the shotgun strap over her head so the weapon lay across her back, a warm weight of added protection. “These are the best fucking guns.”
Then without guile or hesitation or any worry of how it made her look—weak, clingy, or whatever else she’d promised herself she’d never be—she threw herself into the berserker’s arms.
“I missed you,” she said. “I missed you all so fucking much.”
“Rune,” Lex said, quietly. “The battle is climbing the hill. We’re going to have to go or fight.”
Rune pulled away from the berserker, but her stare clung to his for a long, long moment. “Let’s go. We have a bigger battle to fight.”
“What about Cree?” Strad asked.
“She can’t walk far,” Rune said. “We’ll grab a horse for her as soon as we can find one.”
“Let’s stash her somewhere away from the fight,” Lex said, glancing at Cree. “There are houses. Huts, more like. We passed them on our way here.”
“Fuck me,” Rune said. “I just realized…you can see. Lex, you can see?”
Lex’s smile lit up her face. Her eyes still looked the same, still danced like black lights in her face, but she could see. “I can,” she whispered. “Oh Rune, it’s like…” But she shook her head, unable to find the words. “You look exactly like I knew you would.”
But even in the joy, there was something else. Something terrible was wrong. Rune would have rather have yanked out her own eyes than ask.
Right then was not the time to find out something had happened to Jack, or Raze, or the twins.
Or, God forbid, her Ellie.
She couldn’t even ask after them for fear of what she’d learn.
“The witch,” she said. “Let’s get the witch, and we’ll deal with everything else later.” But still, before she went, she jogged to the edge of the hill and screamed Z’s name.