“Lizzie?” came Aiden’s shout from somewhere above us.
“Here!” I replied.
“And Monty?”
“Also here.”
“Stay where you are. The hill remains unstable, so I’ll be down as soon as I can.” He paused. “Are either of you hurt?”
“Nothing’s broken, as far as I’m aware.” I glanced down as Monty stirred. His face was bloody thanks to a large cut above his left eye, and his right cheek was scraped and bruised. “You?”
“Same.” He coughed and then winced. “The bruises are going to be horrendous, however.”
“If bruises and a few cuts are all we come out with, then I’m not about to complain. We should be dead.”
“That was certainly the bitch’s intention. Thank God you called the wild magic into action.”
I didn’t disabuse him of the notion. Right now, it wasn’t important. “Can you sit up?”
“Yeah, I think so.” He carefully pushed away from me and then levered himself upright, his expression a mix of determination and pain.
I carefully followed suit, but a dozen different hurts flared the length of my body, and the world briefly spun. I sucked in a breath and then raised a hand to the tender spot on the top of my head; my fingers came away smeared with blood. At least it wasn’t profusely bleeding—unlike the cut above Monty’s eye. I swung my battered backpack around and pulled out some tissues. “Shove these on the cut.”
He did so. “Well, one good thing did come out of all this—we now know our Manananggal is magic capable.”
“Which is no doubt how she sensed us—she must have felt me spelling her blood.”
“And that is going to cause problems, because if we can’t use magic to track her, finding the bitch is going to be a whole lot harder.”
“Maybe.” I shifted position, trying to ease the ache in my back. “And maybe not.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Meaning what?”
“Meaning, how is she finding her victims? Either she’s hanging around wedding venues or she’s casting a spell of some kind to find newly married couples.”
“I guess a love spell could be perverted in such a manner.” He swiped at his cheek, smearing blood across the few bits of skin that weren’t either bloody or dirt caked. “But the reservation is a big place, and we’d have to be close enough to detect the spell’s formation.”
“What if we stake out local weddings? There can’t be that many booked—not when it’s almost winter.”
“Not everyone dreams of a summer wedding.”
“Of course not, but numbers have to be down—why else would most of them offer deep discounts during the winter months?”
“I guess.” His expression remained doubtful. “The other problem is the fact that the rangers haven’t the manpower to watch all possible venues. We certainly haven’t the witch power.”
I glanced past him and saw Aiden sliding toward us. Relief stirred, along with an odd feeling of security. Of being completely safe, even though that was as far from true as it could get given both Clayton and the Manananggal were still casting long shadows over us.
“Then how are we going to find this thing?”
“I don’t know yet.” He glanced around. “Nice of you to join the party, Ranger.”
“Nice to see you’re obviously well enough to joke about the situation.” He squatted between us, his gaze briefly sweeping me and coming up relieved. “How the hell did you survive the collapse?”
“Luck and magic.” I touched his arm lightly. “Help me up.”
“It might be better to wait for the medics—”
“How long will they be? And what about Belle?”
“Aside from a sprained ankle, she’s fine.”
“I know that much—I meant, are the medics going to her?”
“No, because Mac and Jaz are currently carrying her out to them.”
“If this ravine is anything like the other,” Monty commented, “the medics aren’t going to reach us very easily, especially when they’re carrying all their equipment. It’ll be better all round, Ranger, if we just walk out.”
He hesitated, studying Monty and no doubt seeing the determination there. “I think it’s foolish, but I can’t actually stop either of you. But please, can you both agree to being fully checked out at the hospital?”
“Agreed.” Aside from the fact I wasn’t stupid, the doctors could provide the industrial-strength painkillers I was no doubt going to need once all the aches and bruising fully developed.
He hesitated and then helped me upright, his grip moving from my hand to my elbow as my legs wobbled alarmingly. Once I was steady, he released me, then helped Monty to his feet.
He studied the two of us for a second, and then shook his head. “This way.”
Our pace was slow, and it seemed to take hours to get out of the damn ravine. I was sweating and aching by the time we reached the road and the waiting ambulance officers. Belle had already been taken to the hospital, but the medics assured me it was nothing more than a precautionary measure and that her sprain wasn’t that bad.
Monty and I were bundled into the waiting ambulances and taken to the hospital. It was a good five hours before they’d run all their tests and confirmed what I already knew—aside from cuts and bruising, I was perfectly fine. They loaded me up with painkillers, told me to rest up over the next couple of days, and then shuffled me out the door—where I discovered Aiden waiting for me.
“Hey,” I said, rising up on tiptoe to kiss him. “I thought you were working?”
“I am, but I’m also the boss.” He opened the truck door and ushered me in. “And we need to talk.”
I waited until he’d jumped into the driver side. “If this is about Katie—”
“It’s not so much about Katie, but rather your continuing refusal to fully trust me.”
I frowned. “That’s not true—”
“Isn’t it?” He pulled out of the parking area and then glanced at me. “Then why not simply tell me you were going to see Katie and that you didn’t want me along?”
I wrinkled my nose. “Because I thought you’d insist.”
“I would certainly have asked
