The Cold Eye (The Devil's West #2)(41)

The presence off to her side flickered once, limned in darkness. For a heartbeat, it was massive, flaring over her, blocking the sky, and then moved so swiftly she could barely follow it, plowing into her with the force of a rockslide. She felt the blow this time, felt her knees buckle and her ribs crack, and she froze, so cold, unable to breathe.

Old. So old, so very old and so powerful and so angry and so hungry, and it writhed and seethed, the whirling center of a storm, grit and stone and bitter heat.

Then there were hands on her, hard and rough, and she was being dragged away, thrown away, and the sound of another voice in words she couldn’t identify, a rising chant that sank down into her skin, into her bones, warming them until she could feel herself again, feel the air moving in and out of her chest.

She opened her eyes, then closed them again. There was a snort of warm, fetid air on her face, and she opened her eyes to confirm that yes, there was a thick, pale brown muzzle a handspan from her nose, too narrow to belong to horse or mule, even without the multiple points of bone equally close and three times as terrifying. But between nose and prongs, wide-set brown eyes studied her, then closed once in what she suspected was meant to be a wink.

“Isobel.” Gabriel’s voice, farther away than the elk’s head but still close by. The glow around them had to be coming from the coalstone, because past that pale light, night surrounded them. How long had she been insensible?

“Yes.” Her voice was raw, as though she’d been screaming.

Gabriel’s wasn’t much better. “What happened?”

She managed to shake her head, as the elk shifted slightly, until it towered dizzyingly over her. “It didn’t want my help?”

It took a little while before the elk backed off enough to allow Isobel to sit up, and even then, Gabriel was hesitant to approach her, as each time he moved in her direction, the prongs would lower again and a deep, wet snort would be issued, warning him off. It wasn’t until the moon had risen overhead, its waxing white light making the spray of stars seem somehow dimmer, that the beast faded out of the firelight.

It did not go away; she could hear and smell it, just out of sight, but it was allowing them room to tend to her now.

She couldn’t sense the haint at all; it was gone, but she didn’t think it had gone far. She suspected that it couldn’t go far. It might not be bound within the circle, but something here held it fast, against its will.

Broken Tongue touched her forehead, his fingers dry as twigs. “Vous êtes—” and he used words that Isobel didn’t recognize, followed by a hand sign that she thought meant strangers, and then . . .

“Euh . . . des étrangers avec les mains ouvertes?” Gabriel hazarded, frowning. He clearly didn’t know the hand signs either. The old man considered, then gave a shrug.

“Ils peuvent être des amis, peut-être.”

“What?” Isobel asked, trying not to move her head, for fear of more dizziness.

“I think we have moved from useless to possibly not entirely useless,” Gabriel told her. “He’s, I think, calling us ‘friends-not-yet-made.’?”

“Pas pire,” he told the old man, nodding. “Good enough.”

The old man scowled, his lips thinning. “Mais elle est pas assez forte.”

“What did he say now?”

“He’s worried about you.” But the look that Gabriel gave the old man told another story. Did her mentor still somehow think that she couldn’t read him? She knew that his ribs still ached, that he was concerned about something he wasn’t telling her, and that he was lying to her now.

“Do you remember what happened?” he asked again, even as his hands were moving gently against her skull, her braid undone so he could check for injuries to her head. She knew she wasn’t hurt, but she also knew that telling him that wouldn’t stop him from making certain.

“What did you see?” she asked in return.

“Nothing. You stood up and looked around like you’d heard something, then you reached out your hand”—and he tapped her left hand with a forefinger—and told whatever you were looking at that you wanted to help. And then a breeze came up.”

“Warm or cold?”

His hands paused a moment. “Cold.” He pulled back and poked one finger at her jacket, helping her ease it off her shoulders. The skin under her blouse prickled without its warmth, even as his hands braced against her ribs, and he had her inhale and exhale. “And then you . . . I’m not sure, but you seemed to be arguing with something. And then your hoofed friend over there showed up and knocked you flat on your back.”

Isobel turned her head, wincing as her muscles protested, to where she was reasonably sure the elk waited, draped in the shadows.

“Thank you,” she said.

“It was our quiet friend who dragged you out of the way,” Gabriel said, misunderstanding her words. “I think whatever you were doing is what changed his opinion of us.”

She risked turning her head again to look at Broken Tongue. He was sitting by the fire again, legs crossed in front of him, the firelight casting him half in and half out of shadows. “Merci,” she called, not expecting him to acknowledge her.

He didn’t.

“Do you feel up to eating something?” Gabriel asked, moving away slightly. “We saved you some of the fish.” He grimaced. “What didn’t burn, anyway. But there’s some left, and bread, if you can stomach it. Then I want you to move around a little before you sleep.”