Page 27 of Stealing Embers
We haven’t run into any other people yet, but the echoed shouts and screams that lash at my ears are enough to make me jumpy.
With a shake of my head, I shatter my unease. I don’t have room for frivolous emotions right now.
Fear gets you dead.
My mind’s eye conjures an unwelcome vision of the color-blanched Forsaken. Pointed teeth bared in an inhuman hiss. Greasy hair hanging in limp clumps. Stick-like fingers bent and ready to claw its enemy.
It’s only a moment’s distraction, but long enough for me to miss that Steel’s stopped moving. I throw my hands up as I plow right into him and elbow myself in the gut. The air whooshes out of my lungs with a harshoof.
Steel’s body barely sways forward on contact.
To keep from tripping, my arms latch around his waist. My face is smooshed between his shoulder blades. Tipping up my gaze, I find Steel peering at me over his shoulder. One eyebrow is raised.
Snapping my arms wide, I scurry back several steps. My cheeks flood with heat as he turns.
“Sorry.” Unsure what to do with my hands, I busy them in my hair, rechecking that my hat is still in place. “I didn’t notice that you stopped.”
Obviously.
I should eye-roll myself. I won’t blame him if he does.
Instead, his cocked eyebrow ratchets up and the corner of his mouth tips ever so slightly. Several seconds pass—an awkward and long several seconds—and we just stare at each other. Then, as if remembering himself, his lips flatline and his face hardens to granite.
A chill zips down my spine when the change occurs.
“Wonderful. You’re clumsy, too.” Even his voice has morphed into a mocking lilt.
Not usually, I want to spit out, but bite my tongue to keep quiet. I haven’t survived all these years by not being able to swallow my words.
As if reading my thoughts and finding them amusing, his lips twist into a cruel smirk. My stomach knots with the unsatisfied craving to punch the look off his face. My fists clench and I force my eyes away from him in order to stop scanning his body for vulnerable places to land a blow.
“Why did we stop?” I push out through clenched teeth.
I never react this strongly to people I don’t know. I perfected the ability to let insults and slights roll off me years ago. It’s a necessity when you’re constantly the target of school bullies.
“I heard—” A scream tears through his words. As one, our heads snap in the direction of the cry. It came from down the intersecting hallway, and we give chase.
As we round the corner, a body punches through the wall in front of us, sending drywall flying. Dust, splintered wood, and chunks of concrete explode everywhere as the person slams into the opposite wall and crumples to the ground.
I’m frozen in place. Steel takes off to check on the hunched figure.
“Powers, on the left flank! Guardians, on the right! Dominions, to the front!”
A shouted command carried through the newly created hole cracks through my shock and frees my limbs. I rush to where Steel is bent over the figure.
Blood pours out of the man’s nose and trickles from his left ear as Steel holds two fingers to his neck. I think I see his chest moving, but my attention is stolen by a shriek loud enough to split the air. A fresh wave of fear-induced adrenaline is released into my body.
Steel rises and starts toward the danger. Spurred by panic, I catch his arm in a firm grip as he brushes past me.
His body vibrates with barely contained violence. I don’t trick myself into believing he was stayed by my strength alone. I get the impression that if Steel’s mind is set on a course, only an act of God can stop him.
“What?” he barks.
The fierceness of his gaze causes my insides to clench. Even in his human form, he’s a force when angered.
Glancing at the prone figure on the floor, I grasp for an excuse that doesn’t reveal my own cowardice.
“You’re just going to leave him like this?” My words are clipped with annoyance. Annoyance at myself for my spinelessness, rather than the cavalier way he dismissed the injured man—but that’s not something he needs to know.