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His anger surprised me. I didn’t know he had a beef with lions. “Stop worrying. This will be fine.” Then why was I trembling?
The deadly animals were within striking range now, surrounding us. Two had short manes—juvenile males. One roared, his head lifted into the air, making short grunts. Hot air wafted on the wind from his mouth.
I flinched against Gage, who pulled me close and wrapped an arm around me. But this wasn’t about being scared. If I intended to find a dragon-tooth dagger, well, I had to get over my fright.
“We’re here to speak to your leader,” Gage said in a deep voice.
Hadn’t he just said that no one gets to see their leader? Or was he trying his luck?
One lioness swiped her clawed paw at the air, snarling in a way that sounded nothing like,sure, right this way. The others froze on the spot, hunched low as if waiting for the command to tear us to shreds.
My breaths raced, but I reluctantly stepped forward. “I met with Reed, and he told me about his kidnapped sister and how your pride is being hunted down.”
I prayed my honesty and insight would change their mind. But if Reed hadn’t returned to his pride after the encounter with the gargoyle, I might have opened us up to an attack.
Nobody moved and even the lioness taking charge tilted her head sideways, staring at me as if trying to make sense of my words.
“We don’t mean Reed or anyone harm,” I added.
The lead female roared and approached Gage, sniffing him. She headbutted him in the leg, sending Gage into a stumble.
The other lions closed in.
My pulsed spiked, and I stiffened. Was this a warning, demanding we leave?
Two of the animals turned and wandered across the field, glancing back at us. One yawned, as if she had hunted for dinner all day. The female nudged Gage’s leg again, pushing him in the same direction.
“Think they want us to follow them,” I said. Together, we marched across the field to the woods on our left. Lions flanked either side of us and a few fell behind, grumbling. I fought the urge to scream and run, telling myself once I found Reed, we’d be fine.
You keep telling yourself that, but wishes don’t make truth.
We entered the woods, trampling foliage and stepping over shrubs. The animals stayed close on our heels.
“Where do you think they’re taking us?” Gage asked.
“Their home?”
Before long, we emerged from the woods into an area with scattered foliage, an open meadow, a gurgling river cutting the land in half, and gigantic trees with figures underneath them. More lions. Glowing eyes stared our way. Any chance of escape was now gone. They’d tear us apart before we ran fifty feet.
I swallowed the lump in my throat, counting at least thirty coming our way. Goddess, how big was this pride? Two beasts with shaggy, brown manes approached and their noses creased as they strutted closer. Nope, they weren’t happy.
“Okay, which one is your friend?” Gage asked. “Can you call out to him before they make a meal of us?”
“Reed?” I called out. My voice shook, and I loathed sounding weak, but it wasn’t every day I stood amid a pride of animals capable of scratching my heart out of my chest without warning. There was a reason people stayed away from this land— most lions attacked first.
“Why aren’t they responding?” I brushed against Gage’s arm as we followed the lioness to a seven-foot wooden pole sticking out of the ground. My thoughts swung to being tied up while they took turns taking bites out of us. My muscles froze in place but flooded with the tingling pressure of needing to run. Fleeing was the dumbest course of action, but my brain turned to mush trying to make sense of how to escape with my head intact.
“Fuck,” Gage whispered, and I trembled, my gaze swinging left and right.
I shook my head and refocused on the shithole we’d walked into. Now I regretted my decision. We should have planned it better.
“What about them?” Gage lifted his chin to more males coming our way. “Any of them the leader?”
“Hell knows. They all look the same.”
One animal licked his paw, the razor-sharp claws extended. Probably cleaning them for dinner. Dread dug deep into my chest. We were trapped and no screaming in the world would save us.
My breaths raced.
