Shifter Planet: The Return Page 17

  “You want to hold up here long enough to grab some—”

  “No.” Uncoiling the vine from his wrist, he turned and urged her ahead of him. “Let’s move.”

  Rachel took one look at his face and didn’t hesitate. She started climbing the upslope with grim determination. “I’m sure you’ll tell me why we’re in such a hurry. Being as I’m your partner and all.”

  Aidan felt the slight shift in warmth that told him the sun was rising as much as it ever did this deep in the rift. Catching up to Rachel, he looped an arm around her waist and powered them both another five yards up the slope until they reached a tree thick enough to provide some concealment. Shoving her behind the tree, he wrapped his arms around her and bent his head to whisper in her ear. “Watch.”

  As if waiting for his command, the sun beamed down through the tangled trees to touch directly on the water, which lost its neon green slick and became a dull, muddy brown. Steam soon became visible—a few wisps dancing over the surface to begin with, quickly becoming graceful ghosts. A single plopping sound, as if something had dropped into the water—though the truth was quite different—was the first sign.

  Rachel’s head tilted. “What was—? Oh shit. What the fuck…?”

  Aiden grinned at her reaction, only able to do so because they were well out of the danger zone. “We don’t even have a name for it. It’s just the swamp monster.” He watched the huge creature dash with surprising speed out of the water, its six legs churning up the opposite slope, where it gobbled up a trio of rodents as they raced away. The monster chewed with great deliberation, its mouth so big that it was as if its head simply cracked open to reveal a set of deadly teeth and a gaping throat.

  “The sun triggers it?” Rachel whispered, as if afraid to draw the creature’s attention.

  “The sun’s warmth,” he clarified. “We think it goes into a kind of cold stasis the rest of the time, although ‘cold’ is a relative term down here.”

  “Is it like this all year round?”

  He nodded. “With some time variation, yes. It always emerges with the sunlight, but we’ve never been able to match a schedule to its retreat. That’s why I didn’t want to cross in the afternoon.”

  “What’s it doing now?” she asked, leaning forward to catch every detail.

  Aidan almost groaned at the press of her ass against his groin. “The rodents were a snack. Watch this,” he murmured. The monster flexed its legs slowly, as if stretching, and then rolled its head back until it was studying the tops of the trees. With no warning, it suddenly shot forward and slammed itself against the base of a slender tree. There was a crashing noise overhead, and then one of the green-furred cebas fell almost right into the creature’s waiting maw. Its jaws snapped shut with a crunch of bone and a thin cry which was the only sound he’d ever heard a ceba make. Still chewing, its belly already growing fat, the swamp monster slowly turned and lumbered back to the waterline to digest its food. Its clawed feet dug in, anchoring itself in the mud, its solid black eyes going cloudy beneath a pale, nictitating eyelid as it soaked up the fragile sunlight.

  “Wow,” Rachel breathed, her body still. “I mean, disgusting, but…wow.”

  Aidan trusted she meant the swamp monster and not his body, which was not immune to the firm swell of her ass. He inched back. This was not the time or place, and he had no interest in tormenting himself.

  “Yeah. If you could stand the conditions down here, you could spend a lifetime studying the swamp.”

  “If you could stand it,” she repeated. “Not for me, thanks.”

  He chuckled. “I thought you were all about research.”

  She shook her head. “I’m also all about breathing. The air down here is so thick with foreign particles… I don’t want to think about what’s already taking up residence in my lungs. Speaking of which, can we start climbing out now?”

  “Sure. I thought you’d want to see our monster first.”

  “You were right.” She turned to look up at him, still standing far too close. “Thanks.”

  Aidan met the sincere look in her eyes and felt an awkwardness that he hadn’t experienced in years. He didn’t get flustered around women. Quite the opposite. He was more accustomed to causing the fluster.

  “You’re welcome,” he muttered, then turned and backed away. “We should move. There’s still a way to go before we’re in the clear.”

  …

  Rachel followed Aidan as they climbed the upslope of the swamp. They spent most of their time bent over, using their hands as much as their feet, but she didn’t mind, eager to leave the swamp and its monster behind.

  She blushed, remembering other things about their morning monster viewing. Like the raw strength of Aidan’s arms when he’d dragged her behind that tree, and the press of his body as they’d stood there watching. All of his body. She hadn’t missed the hard length of his erection against her butt. How could she? He was barely dressed in that thin tunic and pants he wore all the time.

  Unfortunately, the swamp picked that moment to show its teeth one last time. She was digging her fingers into the slope as she’d done a hundred times already, gripping the slick undergrowth and looking for a handhold. But this time, the undergrowth fought back.

  “Fuck!”

  …

  Aidan heard Rachel curse. She’d been swearing under her breath for most of the morning, but this one was different. There was pain and—panic. He spun. If he’d learned one thing about Rachel, it was that she didn’t panic. Sliding down on his heels, he uttered his own curse. She was on her knees, one hand still gripping a sturdy, green tree trunk. But her other hand was in the air, half swallowed by what looked like a snake, but was actually an insect. Its many legs were waving wildly in the air, its teeth sunk into the flesh of her hand. Rachel reached for its mouth, fingers poised to grip the jaw and force it open.

  “Don’t!” he shouted, when she went to pull the partially opened jaw off her arm. He skidded next to her and grabbed the writhing insect with one hand and her wrist with the other. “This is a rizer,” he said, trying to distract her with facts. “Its bite is rear-facing, three rows of teeth. If you try to pull it off like that, you’ll only dig the teeth in deeper.”

  She stopped in mid-motion, but now he could see a faint tremble in her arm. “I think… There’s…” She swallowed slowly, as if it hurt. “Heat,” she said finally. “I think it’s—”

  “Poisonous,” he finished for her. If she was sensing heat, the paralyzing agent in the rizer’s bite was already pumping into her muscles. “It’s a paralytic,” he explained, replacing her hand with his much larger one on the creature’s jaw. “Let go, sweetheart. Let me do it.”

  Her hand fell away. “How serious?” she asked, meeting his gaze evenly, despite what had to be significant pain. He’d been bitten by a rizer. He knew exactly how bad the pain was.

  He gripped the insect’s jaw and squeezed with shifter strength, breaking the joint and backing its teeth out of her flesh. He tossed the thrashing bug down the hill. With its jaw broken, the rizer’s life expectancy was no more than a few minutes, but Aidan didn’t care. That was life on Harp. He was far more concerned about Rachel, who was staring at him as if he held the answers.

  He pulled her into his arms. “It’s okay, Rachel. I know it hurts like hell, but slender as you are, you’re still much bigger than its usual prey.”

  She laughed weakly.

  “You’ll lose the arm—”

  “What?” she rasped, pulling back to stare at him.

  “Use of the arm,” he amended quickly. At her disbelieving look, he amended that even further, saying very clearly, “Temporary use of the arm. Very temporary.”

  She blew out a relieved breath and rested her forehead on his shoulder. “How long?” Her voice was stronger, but still not fully restored.

  “Let me see.” He held the wounded arm in both hands, gently squeezing muscles, trying to determine how deeply the rizer’s poison had penetrate
d. She never uttered a sound, other than giving a startled hiss when he felt along her forearm, closest to the bite.

  “Should you cut it open? Try to drain it?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “The poison is too thin, disperses too quickly. We’d only open you up to infection. Speaking of which, do you have antibiotics in that giant bag of yours?”

  She nodded. “Ointment and capsules. In a zipper compartment just inside the main pack.”

  He dragged the pack closer and found a small plastic bag that held the antibiotics. Popping two of the capsules from their blister pack, he handed them to her along with the canteen. She downed them obediently then watched as he cleaned the bite with some antiseptic wipes from the same compartment of her pack. He smeared ointment on the rows of tiny puncture wounds and then pressed a stick-on bandage to it, reinforcing it with a pressurized wrap. It was a little bit of overkill, but they still had a long way to climb out of this fucking swamp, and Rachel was going to need the use of both hands.

  “How’s the pain?” he asked, watching her eyes for the truth.

  “Much better,” she lied.

  “Uh-huh. Can you flex your fingers?”

  She tried and failed. “Fuck,” she muttered.

  “Totally expected,” he assured her. “It’s too soon. How about the arm? Can you bend your elbow?”

  It took her a few seconds, as if the nerves weren’t getting the message, but then her arm bent, and she shot him a triumphant grin. Little victories, he thought, and smiled back at her. “That’s actually better than I expected. Why don’t we break early, have some lunch? By the time we’re ready to head out, you should have most of your hand back.”

  “I wish you’d stop saying it like that,” she grumbled. “I keep waiting for my fucking arm to fall off.”

  He laughed. “Sorry. I forget you’re not from around here.”

  Her smile was pleased, and he realized he’d paid her a compliment—an Earther woman who fit right into the Green. What he didn’t tell her was that they wouldn’t be heading out until morning, because the rizer’s poison wasn’t quite finished with her yet. She was still in for a miserable night.

  Chapter Ten

  Aidan cursed as he held Rachel’s shivering body, sweat soaking her face and into her hair, her shirt already drenched. He wished for a cool cloth to wipe her forehead, like his mother had done for him when he’d been small. But their supply of drinking water was already low, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to use swamp water on her. Besides, while it might have soothed for a minute or two, it wouldn’t have done much good. She didn’t have a fever or an infection. He’d given her another dose of antibiotics to make sure of that, just because the rizer’s mouth was filthy. But what was making her sick was a reaction to the poison itself, her body rejecting the alien venom. And it was alien. Rizer was the one venom that no one and nothing on Harp had managed to develop a resistance to, not even shifters.

  Rachel’s eyes opened as another wave of tremors shook her hard enough that he had to tighten his hold to keep her securely against his chest.

  “You lied,” she rasped. “You said I’d be better after lunch.” She licked dry lips, and he offered her the bottle of water for a tiny sip, then smeared her lips with a moisturizing salve he’d found in her pack.

  “I said you’d be better by the time we headed out. I didn’t say when.”

  Her eyes closed as she drifted back to sleep, but there was the slightest smile curving her lips.

  …

  Rachel stifled a groan when she woke the next morning. Everything ached. Everything. She hadn’t felt this bad in… Fuck that. She’d never felt this bad. It was as if a herd of something with big feet had stomped over her body and left her in a bog. Because it wasn’t enough that she felt like shit, she also stank. It had to be pretty bad when she could smell herself, given her present surroundings. She refused to open her eyes, hoping she was still dreaming, that they were actually out of the swamp and back in the leafy sunshine of the Green itself.

  “Nope, it’s not a dream. You really are waking up to the most charming man on Harp, who’s already hunted and cooked breakfast.”

  She gave in and started to sit up, fighting the urge to bat away his hands when Aidan reached out to help her. She had to admit she wasn’t at her best, and his arm did feel good around her, comforting in its solid strength. She had a vague memory of him holding her through the worst of the night, too.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “You should taste the breakfast first.”

  She smiled. “That’s not what I’m thanking you for.”

  He hugged her gently. “I know. Here.” He handed her more of the antibiotics and water.

  Rachel was thirsty, but she drank only the minimum necessary, knowing their water supply was still short. Taking back the canteen, he then offered her a piece of what she recognized as ceba meat. She wrinkled her nose. “I should probably stick with one of my energy bars.”

  He grunted. “Nice try. You need protein first—real energy, not sugar. You can have one of your dry-as-dust bars for dessert.”

  “Who put you in charge?” she grumbled, but took the small piece of meat, knowing he was right. She ate doggedly, ignoring the unfamiliar taste. It was energy, nothing more. But she still declined a second slice. “I’m full. Honest.”

  Aidan laughed. “You want dessert?” He held out the energy bar.

  She shook her head. “I’ll save that for later. I need to—” She rolled to her knees, hoping she wouldn’t embarrass herself if she tried to stand, pretending not to see his outstretched hand, ready to catch her if she fell. Not likely. She’d survived worse than a giant bug bite in the past, and she was sure Harp had even worse to offer in the future.

  “Don’t go too far,” Aidan cautioned. “I’ve seen women pee before, you know.”

  Rachel nodded. She was sure he had. In fact, she was sure there was very little about a woman that Aidan hadn’t seen. Once the necessities were taken care of and her clothes restored to their proper order, Rachel returned to what passed for a campsite in the swamp.

  He looked up, his gold-flecked eyes searching her face. “Are you good to head out?”

  “I’m ready. It was a bad night,” she acknowledged, “but the clock is ticking, and I don’t give up that easily. Let’s go.”

  He studied her for a moment, then said, “You set the pace.”

  Rachel agreed. She’d have done the same thing—hell, she had done the same thing when a member of her party had been injured. You either traveled as a team, or you didn’t travel. She reached for her pack, looked up when Aidan would have taken it from her.

  “That thing weighs a ton,” he said dryly. “I’ll carry it today.”

  She shook her head. “And if we were on a stroll in paradise, I might let you. But you’re the one who insisted there’s always some new threat lurking on Harp. I’ll carry the pack. You can be the muscle.”

  He muttered something about a “stubborn woman” but handed over the pack and didn’t even try to help her put it on, which she perversely appreciated.

  “The air will get fresher the higher we go today,” he said from behind her as she started climbing.

  She dug her toe in and pushed herself high enough to scramble for the next handhold. “It sure as hell can’t get worse.”

  Almost before the words were out of her mouth, she wanted to take them back. The universe was a trickster with an infinite playbook. It was never a good idea to tempt its imagination.

  …

  Aidan reached overhead and gripped a low-hanging branch, pulling himself up the damn slope with pure muscle power. Rachel was ahead of him, setting the pace. They had to keep going at least until they left the swamp behind. After that. Well, he knew she wanted to reach the city and whoever it was that had hired her. He was anxious to find the asshole, too. But as remarkable as she was, and as determined, she risked more by pushing too hard. In fact, he intended for them to head f
or Clanhome. She could rest there while Aidan and the others tracked down the traitor. Assuming she’d tell him the traitor’s name. She hadn’t yet because she was convinced he’d go after asshole without her. Which he would. He and his cousins could shift and get there in half the time it would take her.

  He growled low in his throat, loud enough that ahead of him, Rachel froze, moving only to give him a questioning look over her shoulder. He shook his head. “Just me,” he said, smiling. “I missed a branch and nearly fell.”

  She studied him with hazel eyes that saw too much, before giving him a silent nod and continuing her climb. He had no doubt that she understood there was more to Harp than he was telling her, but she hadn’t worked out what yet. She never would. There might be several forms of genetically modified humans out there—mostly created to deal with the unfriendly conditions in space—but he could guarantee she’d never seen a shifter among them. He and his shifter brethren were one of a kind. The scientific records of their genetic mods and births had been destroyed, lest anyone, like Earth fleet, think to breed up a shifter crop of their own. Harp’s shifters remembered their own history. They knew how easily norms dismissed anything other than perfectly human as less than. Less than human, less than worthy of life and freedom. And shifters were not about to become the fleet’s newest super-soldier slaves.

  His thoughts slammed to a halt as he caught a wisp of unease among the trees. The closer they drew to the upper edge of the rift, the stronger the link between the local trees and the Green beyond, and what they were whispering wasn’t good. It was the same as he’d sensed earlier, before they’d hit the swamp bottom, that feeling of something wrong, something big, that even the trees couldn’t explain.

  He threw his head back and scented the air, wishing he could shift. Every one of his senses was sharper in his animal form, not to mention he could have climbed into the treetops to search out whoever was on their trail. Because he had no doubt that the invader the trees were sensing was after him and Rachel.

  Shaking his head in disgust, he looked up and realized she had gotten at least twenty yards ahead of him, which was too far. He’d taken his first, hurried step to catch up with her when the swamp went dead silent. Animals large and small had gone quiet, hiding in their nests and burrows, while the trees’ confusing song had become a litany of warning.