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Genna opened her eyes to darkness. Surely she hadn’t slept that long. As she slowly became aware she realized that a cloth covered her eyes. The steady jostling under her was the movement of a steed. Then she remembered—the black unicorn, his rider. The Dark Warrior held her in his arms.
She slid the hood of her cloak from her head and squinted at the brightness. So it was yet daylight, she thought with relief. Genna twisted in his grasp to sit up, careful not to dislodge herself from the unicorn’s back. At this pace her landing would be unpleasant, to say the least.
“How long?” she asked. Her throat felt scratchy and she fervently hoped she hadn’t been snoring.
He did not look at her. “Several hours. It is nearly sundown.”
Genna felt her bandaged arm, which was sore but not painful. She offered a quick prayer of thanks. A branch from a passing tree grazed her ankle as she fought the desire to leap from the unicorn’s back. Its unnaturalness disturbed her.
Drago leaned toward her ear. “Do you need to stop for a few moments?”
She shivered at his tone, too warm—too masculine. “Yes, please.”
He reined in the unicorn and it slowed to a walk. Genna slid from his grasp once the animal stopped and looked for an obliging copse that would provide privacy. Drago dismounted behind her, close enough that she could still smell him. Genna hurried to put distance between them.
Drago caught her wrist. “Not that way.” He motioned ahead of them, where a group of tall bushes blocked their view.
Genna nodded her thanks—she had only taken two steps before the magic of the Demon’s bracelet started to hum. She could not backtrack, so she turned and headed in the direction he’d indicated.
Knowing he was still near enough to hear everything made Genna blush furiously as she relieved herself. She took extra care to ensure her clothing was properly placed before rejoining him—it gave her cheeks time to cool. He did not smirk as he looked at her, as she’d half expected. Instead he offered her a water skin, which she took gratefully.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
She nodded. It had been over a day since she’d eaten anything. Drago reached into his pack and withdrew some dried meat and fruits, which he passed into her hands.
Genna stepped away from him and took a bite. Even if the food had been sitting in his pack for weeks it tasted wonderful. She devoured the offering and wiped her hands on her gown.
Her gown—she grimaced over its sad state. She would never be able to restore it. Not that it mattered. Still she wished she would have been able to change, or even wash some of the travel grime from her face and hands. She didn’t even want to think about the state of her hair.
She looked up to find Drago watching her. “Shall we go?” he asked, as though they had plenty of time.
Genna nodded and moved forward. Her foot accidentally brushed a rock, leaving a smear on her boot. “Ugh.” She bent to get a better look. The rock she’d touched had split open and a foul stench assaulted her nose.
Drago was by her side in seconds. “Don’t touch it.”
She didn’t need to be told. “What is it?”
“Batik dung.”
“No.” Genna fought panic—batik were ruthless killers. “Are they close?”
Drago put up a hand to silence her as he looked around. She examined their surroundings more closely now with a sinking dread. There were tamped down piles of leaves and foliage that could be beds of sorts. Her heart lodged in her throat as she realized they had stopped in a nesting place—and she had just marked their territory with her scent.
“We have to leave now.” Drago moved toward Lagos without waiting for her to follow.
Genna chased after him, every horror story she’d ever heard of the batik swirling through her mind. “Will they chase us?”
He mounted the unicorn and pulled her up behind him. “Batik are territorial. They will hunt us down and do all in their power to kill us.”
That thought did nothing to calm her. “What do we do?”
Drago looked grimly back at her. “We do whatever we can to stay ahead of them, starting now.”
Genna grasped him tightly as he urged the unicorn forward. “Can’t your beast outrun them?”
His words cut across the air. “No black unicorn is fast enough to outrun a batik, but if we can establish a lead perhaps, they won’t catch up to us.”
She didn’t feel he offered much hope and buried her face in his cloak to stop the cascade of tears. She felt certain that, should the batik catch up to them, she and her captor would die.
***
Drago cursed to himself as he urged Lagos faster. How had he missed the fact that he’d led her straight into a batik nesting ground? Her questions replayed in his mind. She couldn’t be expected to know what signs to look for, but he certainly did. How had he missed them? It was worse than stupid—it was a deadly mistake.
He could hear nothing but Lagos’s hooves thundering across the ground, but still he strained to hear anything that might indicate the batik closing in on them. Experience taught him they would first surround them, often silently and without warning, before they attacked. How would he protect the maiden from a threat he could neither see nor hear? At least, if the batik killed them both, they would be free from the Demon’s grasp.
Oddly, that thought didn’t comfort him at all.
Drago pushed Lagos onward until the unicorn practically flew over the earth. He hadn’t exaggerated to the maiden—their only hope of survival now lay in staying ahead of the creatures who would hunt them. His mind strayed to her, clinging to his back. He could feel fear radiating from her as they rode. At least, this time, she hadn’t given him an argument about riding Lagos—though he knew that was probably because she was too afraid of the batik to think of it.
A thought occurred to him—one so absurd he brushed it aside. Though he could likely not prevent her from praying for her safety, he certainly wouldn’t ask her to do it.
He began a mental calculation of how far they would have to ride before they were out of the forest. Batik hated leaving the forest, for it left them vulnerable and exposed to attack. It was likely the batik—if they did not find them sooner—wouldn’t pursue them once he and the maiden left the forest. Could Lagos get them out in four days? Likely not, given that he carried two instead of one. Five days then. They had to stay ahead of the batik for five days.
Drago’s mind drifted back to the nesting ground and he wondered if the batik had returned from their day’s hunt and found it disturbed? How long a lead would he have? He considered the alternative—that had they been delayed just an hour or two, they would’ve ridden right into the nests full of waiting batik. In a way, having to escape the pixies that morning had given them an advantage. At least if one considered the alternative.