Page 23 of Sun Warrior

“Mari, get your butt up there! Grab his hand! Go! Go! Go!”

Nik’s words acted on Mari as if they had been hot coals. She scrambled up his back, clutching the tree and pulling herself up so she was standing on his shoulders.

“Hurry! Take my hand!” Antreas shouted.

Nik felt her hesitate. Antreas cursed softly under his breath and said, “Sorry, I’ll retract the claws on that hand. Now, hurry!”

Mari’s weight lifted from Nik’s shoulders and then he was there, by himself, standing on the forest floor as the ominous sound of the swarm drawing ever closer intensified.

“Come on! Your turn. Grab my hand, then climb over me like Mari just climbed over you,” Antreas said.

Blocking out the stabbing pain in his hands, Nik did exactly as Antreas said, thinking to himself he didn’t even give a damn if the Lynx man’s claws were out, in, or shredding his skin, as long as he was being lifted above the forest floor and the deadly swarm that converged upon them.

“Nik! Help!”

Sprinting for the tree was Davis, his little blond Terrier, Cameron,running beside him. Nik glanced at Antreas, and the Lynx man shrugged his shoulders. Nik nodded quickly and then cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted down to Davis.

“Cammy first, then I’ll get you!”

Davis let his actions be his response. He assumed a position much as Nik had taken moments before, leaning like a human ladder against the old pine. The well-trained Terrier didn’t hesitate. He sprinted a few yards away and then ran at Davis, leaping onto his back and scrambling up and up until Nik, who had wrapped his legs around a low branch and was hanging upside down, arms opened to accept the canine, caught him and passed the Terrier along to Antreas.

Then, with Antreas’s help, they pulled Davis up with them. Between Antreas, Davis, and Nik, they managed to pull and push Mari up to the platform to join the Shepherds, where they all collapsed together, breathing heavily.

Nik crawled to Mari. She had her arms around Rigel—her face pressed into his coat. “Hey, it’s normal to feel exhausted after calling down sunfire. You’ll be back to yourself again as soon as you can eat and rest.”

She looked up at him, her gray eyes dull and hopeless.

“You know we’re not going to be able to rest. The swarm is going to kill us.”

Nik shook his head. “No, we’re safe.” He pointed up. “From above, the Tribe will open vats and pour liquid on the roaches. It’s a concoction made of cypress oil, peppermint oil, lye soap, and salt water. It makes it almost impossible for them to breathe, and if they can’t breathe, they can’t climb up here. We’re safe,” he repeated, and then he put his arm around her. “Okay, watch. As soon as the roaches get close enough the Tribe is going to rain oil and salt water on them.”

Nik felt the tension in Mari’s body beginning to release when someone rappelled down to their platform, landing with athump!beside them. Unstrapping the Shepherd from across her back, she nodded a grim hello to Nik.

“Claudia, good to see you and Mariah are well.”

Claudia shoved a crossbow and a quiver of arrows at Nik, saying, “Sadly, tonight there’s not enough Tribe left to rain anything on anyone—or at least not in this pine there isn’t. Good to see you, too, though. If I’m going to be stuck on a platform in the middle of a swarm, it’s handy to be stuck with the best bowman in the Tribe.” She turned her attention quickly to Davis. He had his own bow strapped across his back. “Davis, you need more ammunition?”

“Whatever you can spare,” Davis said, taking a handful of sharp-tipped arrows from her.

Claudia squinted appraisingly at Antreas as her Shepherd ignored the Lynx crouched beside him. “Are you good with a crossbow?”

“If the alternative is to be consumed by the swarm then, yes, I am good with a crossbow.”

Claudia grunted and unslung another bow from around her shoulder, along with a handful of arrows. “Make each of them count.”

The Lynx’s head rotated around, reminding Nik suddenly of an owl. Then the big feline arched her back and hissed a warning.

“Swarm’s here,” Antreas said.

Mari began trembling against him. “I can try to call down more sunfire,” she said weakly.

Nik shook his head. “No, it can be fatal if you call sunfire without the energy to control it, but we’re going to get through this—I promise. Move to the center of the platform. Rigel! Stay with Mari. The rest of us will keep the swarm away.”

Mari leaned on Rigel as she crawled to the center of the little platform, and Claudia moved into the spot beside Nik. Laru pressed close to his other side, ears pricked and tail up, ready to clamp his mighty jaws around whatever roach dared get too close.

Nik glanced down the platform at Davis. “You might want to get Cammy back with Mari and Rigel. Those damn Death’s Heads are as big as him. They might carry him off.”

“Shit!” Davis swore softly. “You’re right.” He ruffled the curly blond hair on the top of the little Terrier’s head and kissed his noise quickly. “Stay by Mari,” he told his Companion. “Help Rigel keep her safe.”Cammy licked Davis’s face and then padded to Mari, taking a defensive position pressed to her other side.