Vengeance (The Captive #6)(39)
She glanced back at the horse munching on the small handful of grain William had given to him. A lot of her blood supply had come from animals, but she didn’t like the idea of feeding from the pretty, bay horse either. The blood they’d had from the foxes would get them through a couple more days; they’d be hungry, but she preferred hunger to feeding from the horse.
“What about oxygen for him?”
“The fire will start to die down and alert us if the oxygen starts to get low. We’ll have to make a hole in this wall for him. This cave goes far back too, so there should be enough oxygen for him for at least a day or two.”
“I hope so.” She glanced back at the animal within the shadows. She’d never spent much time around horses, but she enjoyed the velvety feel of his muzzle against her palm when she handed him the feed William had stored in the main room of the cave. “Does he have enough water?”
“He should,” William replied as he filled the last hole in their makeshift doorway. At his feet, he’d mounded a couple piles of snow against their wall. “And if not, we’ll melt these piles down for him and to clean ourselves. The piles will stay intact this close to the door.”
“They will.” Tempest stared at the wall of snow blocking the cave before them. The lonely call of the wind howled outside, but the wall had dulled the noise. Her numbed hands rested against the wall as she strained to hear anything beyond the wind. “How many more of them do you think are out there?”
“I don’t know. There were a couple dozen in the basement of that prison. I don’t know anything about the towns in this area. I have no idea how many vampires were in them, or how many towns the troops that entered Badwin have been through. It’s been over five months since I last saw Kane; that’s plenty of time for him to do a lot of awful things, in a lot more places.” Her eyes turned back to the wall before them. “They locked those vampires up in the prison because they didn’t want them to send back a warning.”
“Why wouldn’t they just kill them?”
She hated the haunted look in his eyes when they met hers. “The ones beneath the prison were already too far gone when I found them, but they were also working on tearing their way out of there. It was only a matter of time before they managed to free themselves. By then, the idea of telling someone would have been gone from their memory. They would seek out nothing but blood and no one would see them coming, or expect them, until it was too late.”
Tempest’s hand flew to her mouth as realization dawned. “They’re the perfect weapon.”
“Nothing but a killing machine,” he agreed. “They will attack anyone traveling through here and keep them from revealing what they may have discovered. I don’t know what is going on with those vampires in your town, or who that woman is claiming to be the queen, but they are relentless about achieving their goal.”
Tempest rested her forehead against the snow; her fingers dug into it as her mind turned to Pallas and the children. “We have to help them,” she whispered.
He rested his hand on her shoulder. “I promise, we will. Come.” He tried to turn her away from the wall but she remained where she was, staring at the white formation before her. “Tempest.”
Reluctantly, she allowed him to pull her away from the wall. “What if those things are already out there, waiting for us?” she whispered.
“It’s a possibility, but if they come in here, they’re going to have one hell of a fight on their hands.”
“Do you have a weapon I can use?”
“I have stakes, have you ever handled one?”
“No and I never wanted to.”
He grinned at her. His arm slid around her shoulders as he pulled her closer. The gesture threw her at first; it was so comforting and familiar she didn’t know what to make of it. They barely knew each other, but he was wrapping his arm around her shoulders as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Oddly enough, it felt like the most natural thing in the world.
Nestling closer against his warm body, her eyes closed as she inhaled his scent. He smelled of fresh snow and the warm fire he’d stood close to earlier. His tantalizing aroma reminded her of summer and warmth. Maybe it was because of his fiery hair color, or maybe it was because he reminded her so much of the wilderness and something uncontrollable, like fire.
He released her when they returned to the main part of the cave. He went to one of his bags sitting against the wall. From within he pulled out half a dozen stakes and laid them on the ground. “Were you expecting a war?” she inquired.
“Always be prepared,” he replied before scooping them up and walking over to her. “Do you mind?” he asked and waved at the cloak she wore.
She glanced down the front of her. “Ah no,” she replied uncertainly.
“Don’t worry, I don’t bite.”
Her head flew up, her eyebrows furrowed over the bridge of her nose when he winked at her. She’d seen glimpses of the playful man beneath the steely exterior he’d been exhibiting over the past couple of days, but he’d always quickly slammed his walls back into place. Now, he remained smiling at her and more open than she’d ever seen him.
“I’m going to hold you to that,” she teased back.
The smile he flashed her lit his eyes and revealed all of his teeth. Grabbing hold of one side of the cloak he’d given her to wear, he pulled it open. He took one of the stakes and slid it into a pocket she never would have known was there, before sliding two more into loops sewn into the material. Letting go of that side, he grabbed hold of the other side and slid two more stakes into two pockets.