Sasha laughed.
A nightmare, dreaming. Not real. Engulfed in pain, swimming in shock, Riley struggled to unsheathe her knife with her left hand.
The sound she made when Sasha’s boot stomped on her hand was a high-pitched shriek. Her vision wavered; her stomach pitched.
Then her friend’s artist’s hands closed around her throat.
• • •
Doyle strode into the kitchen where Annika happily put groceries away, and Sawyer sniffed a fat tomato.
“Still more, right?” Sawyer set the tomato aside. “I’ll bring it in.”
“You going to make that salsa?”
“As advertised.”
“Do that.” Doyle grabbed a cold beer from the fridge, took a long pull. “I’ll get the rest.”
“There’s a deal.”
After one more swig of beer, Doyle set the bottle down, started back through the house. A beer, he thought, some chips with Sawyer’s salsa would be a solid way to offset Annika’s shopping enthusiasm.
In any case, they’d gotten everything they should need for a good week. And next time, somebody else would deal with the mermaid.
He glanced up, momentarily baffled when Sasha jogged down the steps.
“I didn’t hear you get back. I was painting on the other side of the house. How—”
“You’ve been upstairs?”
“Yes, I went by the tower library just now to see if I could help Riley, but—”
“Jesus Christ. Get Bran, get the others. Riley’s in trouble.”
“What? How?”
“Get them.” He drew his sword from the sheath on his back, was already running. “She’s in the woods.”
He’d barely reached the verge when he heard her scream.
He didn’t think, just moved. The sound had been agonized, and he already might be too late.
He caught the sound of laughter—horrible, gleeful—and sprinted toward it off the track. No time for stealth, and his instincts demanded he make more noise. The sound of someone coming, and fast, might stop whatever was being done to Riley.
He didn’t pause when he saw Riley crumpled on the ground, bleeding, unmoving, and Sasha—or what had taken Sasha’s form—standing over her with a wide, wide grin.
“She’s dying,” the thing said with Sasha’s voice, then long teeth shimmered between Sasha’s lips, claws sprang from her hands. “You’ll all be dying soon.”
Even as Doyle charged, it delivered a vicious kick to Riley’s head. When Doyle’s sword cleaved down, it struck empty air as the thing coiled down into itself and ran through the trees with preternatural speed.
Doyle dropped to the ground, pressed his fingers to the pulse on Riley’s raw throat. Found a pulse, thready, but beating.
Bearing down on fear, on rage, on a kind of grief he’d sworn never to feel again, he ran his hands over her, checking her injuries. Her face, sickly gray under the bruising, bleeding, abrasions, was the least of it.
He heard running, shouting, tightened his grip on his sword, prepared to defend Riley should foe join his friends.
They burst through the trees, armed for battle. But Doyle knew the battle was done for the moment.
“She’s breathing, but she’s been choked, and her hand’s broken, ribs, too. I think her right elbow’s shattered. And—”
On a keening sound of distress, Sasha all but fell on the ground beside Riley. “No, no, no, no.”
“Let me see.” Bran dropped down beside her.
“We need to get her inside, heal her.” Tears shimmering, Annika knelt by Riley’s other side, stroked her bloodied hair.
“I don’t think we move her until we know . . .” Sawyer’s knuckles showed white on the grip of his gun. “You’re not supposed to move her, right, because it can make it worse?”
“Sawyer’s right. That’s sensible.” Calm as a lake, Bran cupped his hands on Riley’s head. “Neck and spine. We should see if they’re injured.”
“I can do it.”
Bran looked into Sasha’s eyes, eyes glazed with shock. “Calmly, fáidh. Slowly. Just the surface now.”
“All right.” Closing her eyes, Sasha took in air, let it out until her breath was nearly steady. She used her hands, her heart, and with Bran’s hands on her shoulders to aid her, she let herself feel.
“Oh, God, oh, God, so much broken, so much damaged.”
“Neck and spine, Sasha,” Bran said quietly. “Start there.”
“Bruised, jolted. Not broken.”
“Then we can take her inside.” Those tears streamed down Annika’s cheeks. “She shouldn’t lie on the ground. It’s cold. She’s cold.”
“Yes, we can move her.” When Bran started to lift her, Doyle nudged him aside.
“I’ve got her.” She moaned when he gathered her up, and her eyelids fluttered—both of which he took as good signs. For an instant, her eyes opened—blind with pain, with shock, met his. “I’ve got you, ma faol.”
Her eyes rolled up white, closed again as he carried her out of the forest.
“Straight to her room,” Bran ordered. “I’ll get my medical kit. Anni, towels and hot water. Sawyer, a pitcher of cool water. Not cold, cool, and a clear glass. Sasha, strip her bed down to the sheets for now.”
They scattered as Sasha ran up the stairs behind Bran. Though he wanted to run himself—and could have, as she weighed nothing much to his mind—Doyle moved carefully, doing what he could not to jar her.