Daysider

She nodded without comment as he removed his jacket, rummaged in his pack for a fresh shirt, and put on the new one. She quickly turned away from the sight of his bare, muscular chest and started up the hill to the south. There were no more bullets, nor did Alexia sense anyone else, vampire or otherwise, in the vicinity. It seemed the shooters had, indeed, accomplished their mission. With or without Damon’s help.

She was panting by the time they reached the third hilltop. Damon took her arm and herded her into the shade of a large, stately oak.

His touch seared her skin, but all at once the crawling sensation was gone. She worked her arm loose from his grip and sank onto the patchy grass among the oak’s thick roots.

“Rest now,” Damon said, helping her remove her pack. “We’re at a good vantage point, and I’ll know if anyone approaches.”

Alexia didn’t want to sleep with Damon standing over her, but she wouldn’t last even twelve more hours without it. By the time she woke up the shakes could be worse, and it would take concentration to keep Damon from seeing them.

Maybe, when she was well rested, she might even figure out why he thought he could keep her alive if he had any idea just how desperately she needed the patch.

Maybe he doesn’t know, she thought. Maybe Erebus is still in the dark…for now.

“Sleep,” Damon said, his voice soft with what almost sounded like concern. “I’ll wake you when it’s time to go.”

She was trying to figure out what he meant when her bone-deep exhaustion carried her away.

There was something wrong with her.

Damon crouched over Alexia as he had when she’d lain injured in the hollow, the same unbidden emotions crowding his chest and filling his throat.

It wasn’t just her injury. Soon after she’d fallen asleep, he had carefully checked her wound and found it nearly healed under the bandages, enough so that he was able to remove most of them to let her skin breathe.

Yet in spite of the healing, he had seen her get subtly but steadily worse since they’d begun hiking again, though she did her best to hide it. The smell of dried blood was still strong on her clothing, but there was another scent now, a mingling of chemical odor and the scent of illness that any Opir—or Darketan—could detect from a kilometer away.

Damon had no idea what it was. He had never come closer to a dhampir than shooting distance; though he wouldn’t have disobeyed an order to kill any Enclave agent who stood in the way of an assignment, he had been forbidden those missions that might involve such acts.

Now that he wanted to keep a dhampir alive, his ignorance about Alexia’s kind was no longer a minor inconvenience. The Council had provided no information about dhampir illnesses; that was no surprise, since the breed was believed to be as hardy as Darketans. Perhaps this was something that also afflicted humans, but his instincts told him otherwise. Even a mild sickness might become deadly to one as weakened as Alexia was.

And though he’d told her that he didn’t think the shooters would attempt another assault, he knew nothing of the kind. Either the original plans had drastically changed, or some other party had been involved.

After the first sniper’s attack, Damon had been quick to deny any possibility that the opposing faction might send operatives to stop him and the Enclave agents. The gunman had been a good shot, too good to miss unless it was deliberate. Damon could well believe he had been carrying out his or her part of the mission as planned.

But these last shooters had been out to kill or incapacitate Damon and Alexia—or send a powerful warning. They could have been colonists. That still seemed by far the most likely possibility.

If the attack had been meant as a warning, it might explain why the shooters hadn’t killed him and Alexia. Murdering sanctioned operatives would be making a move too provocative to be ignored by the Council or Aegis. Surely the shooters would realize that.

Just the attack alone was provocation enough.

Damon rose and paced back and forth under the gnarled branches of the grandfather oak. Once again he was faced with a crucial decision: leave Alexia under cover while he tried to find the shooters, or stay with her and wait until she was recovered enough to continue. He couldn’t imagine her agreeing to stay behind; she’d drive herself into her grave first.

He stopped to gaze down at her, wondering if it was his imagination that her breathing was much more labored than it had been even an hour ago. She had become steadily weaker since the attack, and he could easily overpower her if he had to.

But then he would have to tie her down, and she’d be helpless. With a curse Damon began to circle around the oak, noting every detail of their location: the number of nearby trees and shrubs, the various angles of potential attack, the approaches and avenues of escape.

Still no sign of the shooters. But that didn’t mean they weren’t there, just beyond Damon’s senses.

Making his decision, he knelt beside Alexia and carefully gathered her up in his arms. She moaned as he carried her to a thicket of low shrubs just outside the circle of shade and laid her down again under the entangled branches. He searched her pack and found the small, thin blanket she had covered him with before, laid it over her, and then began to gather twigs, fallen branches, rotting leaves—anything he might use to camouflage her while he was gone. When he was finished, he knelt beside her and touched her shoulder. Her skin had become so feverish that he could feel the heat through her shirt and jacket.

“Alexia,” he said.

Her lips parted, soft lips that seemed to beckon him now that they were no longer stiff with suspicion. Her eyelashes fluttered.

“Damon?” she murmured, lifting one hand toward him. “What is it? Is it time to go?”

She sounded like a child, innocent and trusting, certain that the one who loved her would make sure everything was all right. It must be the fever talking, he thought. A delirious, fever dream.

“Not yet,” he said gently, taking her hand in his. “I have to leave for a short time, to make sure we’re safe here. I need you to stay under cover while I’m gone.”

Her eyes opened, searching for his as if she couldn’t quite make out his face. “I’m going with you,” she said.

He stroked her fingers, aware of a painful and inexplicable wave of tenderness that threatened to dissolve the foundation of everything he had worked so hard to build since Eirene’s death. “You aren’t in any shape to help now,” he said. “The best thing you can do is rest until I return.” He laid her hand on her chest, picked up his canteen and held it to her lips. “Drink.”

Alexia did as he asked without protest, though she wouldn’t take more than a few drops. Her eyelids grew heavy again.

“Don’t leave me,” she pleaded. A small vertical line had formed between her arched brows, suggesting an inner struggle of which she was hardly aware. Damon smoothed it out with his thumb.

“I’ll be back soon,” he said. “Promise you’ll stay here.”

“I…” She shivered and subsided, the muscles of her neck and shoulders relaxing. “I promise.”

Then she was asleep again, and Damon covered her with the assembled leaves and twigs until she resembled no more than a pile of forest debris blown against the bushes by a gust of wind. He hesitated long after he was finished.

He didn’t want to leave her. Not even for a minute. And that was all the more reason he had to.

Moving almost soundlessly, Damon began to work his way down the other side of the hill, weaving back and forth to and from any small cover he could find. Once he’d reached the bottom of the hill, he walked around it, pausing to listen every few steps. Then he climbed very slowly, circling as he went.

Still nothing. It seemed their attackers really had left them—completed their task, whatever it was, and gone on their way.

Or they were lying in wait somewhere between here and the colony.

Damon reached the top of the hill, assured himself that Alexia was still safely hidden, and then continued to canvass the area, placing each step with infinite care as he turned northeast toward the colony.

He’d gone about four hundred meters and was descending the last of the hills overlooking the valley when the shots came, pelting the underbrush around his feet and shredding leaves overhead. He ducked and fell to his stomach, rolling sideways until he was behind an outcrop of rock thrusting out of the slope.

A heartbeat, two, three, ten. No further attack. Damon rose to his knees, waited, and then got to his feet. Silence. He took a step back, in full view of whoever was doing the shooting. Still no shots. But when he took a step forward…

The bullets tore a very clear line in the ground three centimeters from the toes of his boots.

He backed away, staying well back from the invisible line, and made his way a little farther to the north. When he moved east again, the bullets erupted again, tracing out that very distinct line between him and the valley.

It was a clear and unmistakable boundary. This was as close as he and Alexia would be allowed to approach the colony. But that still didn’t tell him who was doing the shooting, or even if these gunmen were the same as in the last two attacks.

None of this made any sense to him yet. But as long as the snipers didn’t go any further than trying to keep him and Alexia away from the colony, he could still carry out his mission. In fact, considering that the two of them had been left alive, the current circumstances would make his task even easier.

Provided there really wasn’t anyone out to kill them.

Damon retraced his steps toward the temporary camp. No bullets assailed him. He was back at Alexia’s hiding place in less than an hour. She was still there, still safe.