Wild Cat

Dokk alfar.

Cassidy got Diego to his feet. He stumbled, but she was strong, and they ran, step by excruciating step, as the dokk alfar swarmed the Fae and started to fight.

“The gateway should be over there,” Diego yelled to Cassidy, pointing. “But I don’t know if it will open again, and it’s about four hundred feet in the air and six feet away from the cliffs on the other side.”

“I could jump it. You can hang on to me.”

“I don’t think I can hang on to anything. I’d pull you down. Too much weight. Jump it yourself, bring help.”

“Like hell I’m leaving you here.”

“Cass, remember when they asked if I’d die for you? Well, I would. If that’s what the mate bond means-that my world would be all wrong if anything happened to you-then I have the effing mate bond.”

“Diego…”

“You said you wanted to rescue me. Well, this is you doing it.”

They reached the spot. Diego looked for mist, tried to feel a tingle. Collapsed instead.

“Damn it,” Cassidy said.

“Come on, Cass. Just go. I would die for you, but I’d rather live.” He gave a breathless laugh. “Sex with you is fantastic. I want a chance at more of that.”

Cassidy had tears in her eyes as she looked at him. “I love you, Diego.”

“I love you too, mi ja.”

She leaned down and kissed him. Diego’s pain receded the slightest bit, enough for him to savor the pressure of her lips.

Then she stuck her hand through the mist forming on the other side of the boulder. And shouted in surprise.

Diego tried to haul himself to his feet, but whatever had grabbed Cassidy on the other side of the mist now shoved her back into Diego. A form came through the gate, tall and lean and pissed off.

Reid, carrying an iron crowbar, sprinted toward the fight.

Shane charged in after him, in full bear mode, roaring as he ran past. Then a leopard with a Collar, a smaller bear without one, and finally, Xavier.

“Hey, Diego,” Xavier said, grinning, arm in its sling, as he stopped in the middle of the mist. Behind him, morning light shone on dry cliff walls, the Nevada sunshine hard and clear. “This time I’m saving your ass.”

Reid and Xavier had crossed the gorge on a bridge-a narrow platform seven feet long, drilled and anchored into the cliff walls. Diego learned later that Xavier had made the rescue team build it, using engineers recruited from the fire department plus the best construction workers from the dam.

Xavier held out his good hand. “Come on, hermano. Time to get you down off this place.”

“Wait.”

Reid had joined the fray behind them, incongruous in jeans and T-shirt while the others of his kind wore skins.

More hoch alfar were riding in over the open field, on white horses that glowed a little-the cavalry, Diego supposed, coming to rescue their comrades.

“We need to help Reid,” Diego said.

“Doesn’t look like it’s our fight,” Xavier said.

“They just saved our butts. I need to do something for them.”

Diego held out his left hand for his Sig, and Cassidy reluctantly relinquished it. His right hand, the one the knife had gone through, was pretty much useless, but Diego’s left hand was strong, and he was a good marksman with either hand.

“Got a spare clip?” Diego asked his brother.

Xavier wordlessly handed it over. Diego ejected his empty and reloaded. He looked at Cassidy.

He knew he’d waste his breath begging her to run across the bridge to safety. Cassidy was staying, would fight by his side, would haul him off to save him if he fell. As he would for her.

“Nice day for it,” Diego said to her.

Cassidy smiled back, her beautiful, loving smile that made his heart beat faster. “I say we go for it.”

Diego leaned down and kissed her warm lips. “Love you, Cass.”

“Love you back.”

Xavier put his arm around Diego’s shoulders, his shining chrome Sig dangling from his good hand. “When’s the wedding?”

Diego gave him a look and released Cassidy. “Let’s go help Reid.”

Reid didn’t look like he needed a lot of help. During the little time Diego had known him, the man had always been morose and unhappy, lashing out in anger or folding up in misery.

Now Diego saw what Reid must have been before his exile-a fighter. A good and bloodthirsty fighter.

Reid laid into the hoch alfar with his crowbar, going up against those with bows, swords, chain mail-he didn’t much care. He swung and brought down a Fae from a horse, smashing the iron bar into the Fae’s face. The Fae screamed and then went horribly quiet.

The dokk alfar were fighting hard, and the hoch alfar were fighting just as hard back. Peigi jumped in, her bear attacking without restraint.

Peigi showed Diego how Shifters were bred to fight-no Collar holding her back. She attacked with the strength and speed of a bear coupled with the cunning of a human. Animals with human intelligence. As dangerous as Reid had once told him.

Peigi fought at Reid’s side, keeping the hoch alfar from reaching him.

Diego and Cassidy waded in. Xavier stayed at the bridge, guarding the retreat.

Diego knew he wasn’t going to be much good for fighting, but he could at least still shoot. Cassidy ran to help Shane, she beating off a hoch alfar who had been about to skewer the bear. Diego took aim, ready to shoot if he needed to.

The general broke out of the group and headed for Reid, the target for this whole fight. Pretty elaborate and long-lived trap for one man, Diego thought. Did they consider Reid that dangerous?

A long sword glittered in the general’s hand. Reid was unprotected, no vest, no weapon but a crowbar.

Peigi and Reid were fighting, not seeing the danger. Diego held his hurt hands steady, took aim, and shot the sword out of the general’s hand.

The general whirled around, and Diego grinned at him. “Hey, remember me?”

The general grabbed a bow out of a passing Fae’s hands, his own hands flashing as he drew it. The next moment, the general went down with a wildcat on his back.

Cassidy’s Collar went off, but she held the man pinned in place. Diego limped toward them, ignored by most of the fighters. More hoch alfar had ridden up, and the tide was going to turn against the dokk alfar soon. They were fighting hard, but they’d be crushed by numbers alone.

As Diego reached Cassidy and the general, a weird, piercing war cry came out of the couple hundred dokk alfar throats. It rang into the mists, scary as hell.

A lone cry answered it. Reid. He held up his iron bar and shouted one word.

The hoch alfar started scrambling away, running in pure terror. Diego watched over his aimed pistol, not sure what was going on.

The Fae jumped onto horses, galloping back across the field for the hills beyond. Those on foot ran like hell. The general, with a surge of strength, got out from under Cassidy, but instead of turning to fight, he sprinted away like a man trying to outrun floodwaters.

Reid’s iron bar exploded. It morphed from an ordinary crowbar into a rain of iron shards that flew with the speed of bullets after the fleeing hoch alfar.

Those it struck screamed and fell. A few got up again and kept running, but now the dokk alfar were after them.