truth, his first reaction was simply to grab her and force her to go with him, but the bond between the three siblings was incredibly strong. Joie wouldn’t leave them unless forced and she wouldn’t forgive him if he took her. She wasn’t looking toward him to protect her, she would only enter the chute if her family agreed with the decision. He had a long way to go to earn her trust. The three of them trusted one another implicitly, knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses. He was the outsider.
Jubal closed his eyes briefly, glanced back in the direction they’d come and shook his head. “We have to trust you, but if anything happens to my sisters . . .” He nodded at his sisters.
“I plan to keep you all alive,” Traian said.
“Get your crampons off,” Joie advised Gabrielle. “You don’t want a broken leg. If we’re going to do this, we have to take every precaution.”
The three hurriedly removed the crampons from their boots.
“I’ll go first,” Gabrielle announced, her chin up. “If I get stuck, you’ll know you won’t fit,” she added over her shoulder to her brother. Her voice trembled but she was obviously determined.
Jubal caught her arm. “Not a chance, Gabby. I’ll be in front. We don’t know what’s down there.”
“The chute may be blocked,” Traian explained. “The cave is fighting back and we seem to be tripping mage traps as we go. I will lead the way down the chute and clear it. Once we are clear, I will seal it up behind us so the vampires cannot use that shortcut to follow us. It will not stop them, but it will slow them down. As you go down, shine your light ahead. I’ll let you know if the ceiling is low and you have to lie all the way down, but once you do that, you will not be able to see anything ahead of you so once past the obstacle get back into a sitting position as fast as possible.”
“Gabby, when you sit down, keep your axe to your side, hold with both hands and dig the point in to act like the brake,” Jubal instructed.
Gabrielle swallowed hard. “This sounds more dangerous than I thought.”
“We’ve practiced using the axe as a break,” Jubal reminded. “You’ll glissade down on your butt. You can do it.”
Gabrielle shook her head. “I’ve done it on skis and we’ve practiced in soft snow, but not on ice, Jubal. Not like this in a tube. We don’t even know where it leads.” Even as she protested she leashed her ice axe to her wrist.
“We have no choice, honey,” Jubal said. “We’ll be fine. Joie will be right in front of you and I’ll be close behind.”
Gabrielle looked for a moment as if she might cry, but then she squared her shoulders and nodded. “I can do it.”
“You may need your axe to self arrest. If I call back, use them fast. I will be clearing the way ahead of us. Hold until I give you the okay to continue.” Traian spoke tersely, confidently, needing the three humans to follow him without question.
“You know that doesn’t always work, depending on how fast we get going,” Joie said. “It’s a hit or miss proposition and that chute might be too narrow to flip over.”
“It is the best shot we have at living,” Traian reiterated, “and if we’re going to do it, we need to get moving.”
The descent into the ice tube was perilous to say the least. A mage cave was extremely dangerous, filled with all sorts of valuable items and as many or more traps to protect them, each more lethal than the one before. They had stumbled upon a great underground labyrinth, a mage haven beneath the mountain. Few could get past the mage spells pushing dread and fear into the hearts and minds of any trying to make the descent into the deep abyss, making certain to keep everyone away. Traian didn’t think the caverns were abandoned. The fact that vampires had entered didn’t mean a powerful mage was not at work here. He wanted to get his lifemate and her family out as soon as possible. He didn’t understand how they had made it into the caves in the first place, how they had managed to get past mage barriers.
They readied their equipment quickly, and very efficiently, hugging each other briefly before nodding to him that they were ready.
Traian pulled Joie tight against him, ignoring the harness