“It’ll be nightfall before long. Unless you want to get caught out here in the dark, Princess, I suggest you get your ass up and try putting some weight on that leg.”
He began pulling seven- and eight-foot sections of wood from the rope he’d looped around the bundle. Tree trunks, she realized, none more than five inches wide, stripped of their limbs so they formed long poles. Her mind tumbled again. What on earth were the trees for? And who the hell was he?
The setting sun flashed over muscles in his arms and back that flexed and rippled beneath his skin as he worked. Three long red gashes, equally spaced, cut across the middle of his back. Another ran down the outside of his left bicep, this one redder and deeper, the puckered ridge indicating the injury had happened more recently than the others.
She tried to make sense of what was happening and who he was. As if he felt her eyes on him, he turned and glared at her.
And in the split second his face shifted from shadow to sunlight, Isadora gasped.
The voice finally registered. She scrambled back on her hands and feet, stopping only when her back hit something solid.
Demetrius’s glower darkened but he didn’t say anything, just clenched his jaw and went back to loosening the rope around the bundle of logs. But Isadora’s heart rate shot into the triple digits. The last thing she remembered was sitting in her suite at the castle, staring into her mirror as she prepared herself for the binding ceremony with Zander, and seeing a vision of her and Demetrius locked in an erotic scene.
Her hand shot to her mouth and her eyes clamped shut. She couldn’t even think the words, let alone remember the image—the first glimpse of the future she’d had in over a month. She forced her eyes open and looked across the sand to where Demetrius was now laying out the logs two feet apart.
Holy Hera, what was going on?
He turned before she could collect herself and marched in her direction. She tensed as he drew close and tried to scoot back more, but the wall—no, it wasn’t a wall, it was some kind of lean-to shelter built out of more logs and twigs and foliage—stopped her.
His mouth was set in a hard line, his jaw covered in a thin layer of stubble, his dark eyes flat and resigned as he leaned close. For a second she thought he was going to touch her and her body stiffened, the heady scent of sweet male sweat and something else she couldn’t quite place drifting in the air to make her light-headed. But instead of grabbing her, he reached past and picked up something at her back, then turned and walked away without a word.
Curious, she shifted forward and that’s when she realized he’d grabbed a rope from the mini-shelter at her back. Only it wasn’t like any other rope she’d seen before. This one was green and consisted of a number of differing vines woven together like a braid.
She watched as he strapped boards together. He worked in silence, his muscles flexing and relaxing as he moved, his skin shining with a thin layer of sweat. Head still spinning, Isadora sat silent, unsure what to say or do. Glancing around, she took a wider look at where they were.
Behind her, green mountains rose. To the right and left the white sand beach stretched into infinity, bordered with forest and dense brush and the occasional palm tree here and there. The air was temperate, the push and pull of the water familiar. In front of her lay a pile of black ashen logs, as if from a recent fire, and off to her right, just out of her reach, a collection of spears of differing lengths, all made of wood, the tips chiseled to dangerous points.
Trepidation washed over her. There was no other sound besides the gentle lap of water and ropes thwacking wood where Demetrius worked. There were no other people anywhere close, no signs of life either. She knew they weren’t in Argolea—at least nowhere she’d ever been—but nothing else made sense. And though she didn’t mean to, her eyes kept straying back to Demetrius as he worked. At the play of muscle and bone beneath his tanned skin. At what he was doing with his big, powerful hands.
Warmth gathered low in her belly. A warmth she didn’t want and didn’t understand. What was going on? Why was he here? And where the heck was here, anyway?
As the sun dropped toward the water, she finally realized he was building a ladder.
A loud shriek sounded in the trees at Isadora’s back, followed by a howl that seemed to shake the ground. She jerked, every hair on her body standing on end. Instinct had her scrambling out of the lean-to on her hands and knees and looking back into the trees. “Wh-what was that?”
“Skata,” Demetrius muttered. Rope thwacked board faster. “That, Your Pampered Highness, was either a Calydonian boar or a harpy. Take your fucking pick.”
Wide-eyed, she turned to look at Demetrius. His jaw was locked tight and his hands now moved with lightning speed over the boards. “A what or a what?”
“Not a what, Princess. A when.” He dropped the end of the ladder in the sand and stepped close to pick up a handful of spears. “And if you don’t get your ass moving, you’re gonna meet one or both up close and personal.”
The trees rattled and swayed as the shrieks and roars grew louder. Fear had Isadora struggling to her feet. She took a step back just as her left leg went out from under her.
Pain shot up from her shin and she cried out. Before she hit the sand, Demetrius’s arm wrapped around her waist and tugged her tight to his side.
“Fucking lovely,” he muttered. He shoved a spear into her hand. “Take this.”
She had little time to do anything else. He hooked the other weapons under his free arm, picked up the end of the ladder, and then he ran. Clamped tight to his side, Isadora could do nothing but put her good foot down in time with his to keep her balance and hold on tight to his shoulder with her free arm.
Her leg throbbed and every step sent pain ricocheting throughout her body. She had no idea where they were going, but the roars and screams behind ratcheted up her adrenaline. A loud crashing sound echoed and Demetrius slowed, whipped them both around. A gigantic boar sailed through the air as if launched from the trees and landed hard against the lean-to Isadora had just been sitting in.
The lean-to split apart into dozens of pieces. The boar grunted, squealed, rolled to its side, and righted itself. It whipped around and looked back into the trees. Then it opened its mouth and bared enormous fangs and razor-sharp teeth.
No way. It couldn’t be real. Before her brain could click into gear, a flutter of tree limbs drew her attention. She glanced back to the forest only to see a winged monster that looked like something straight out of a nightmare emerge and hover above the boar.
“Fuck,” Demetrius muttered.
“Wh-what is that?”
The sickeningly gray-colored thing that looked like a twisted cross between a woman and a bird shrieked, the sound so loud Isadora felt the sharp stab of pain in her eardrum. She slammed her free hand over her ear and cried out. The creature swung its gaze their way and narrowed bloodred eyes.
“Skata.” Demetrius let go of Isadora and shoved the end of the ladder into her free hand. “Run. Run hard.” Then he dropped the bundle of spears from under his arm and picked up one in each hand.
Terror leaped in Isadora’s throat. She had no idea how any of this could be real, but she wasn’t about to stand here and get into a debate with Demetrius. Balanced on her good leg, she turned to look behind her. Then had a moment of Oh, shit.
They’d run far enough down the beach that she could see around the next set of rocks. Fifty yards away the beach came to a dramatic end, a sheer cliff rising straight up at least four stories.