He scanned the valley, near wild with a need to find her, thoughts of her in danger crowding his mind to make it hard for him to focus. Where was she? He flew in another direction, desperate to spot the valley, heart clenching as he feared he wouldn’t find her. He needed to find her. He needed to see her again and know she was safe. He needed to wrap her in his arms and never let her go, to make her see that he needed her.
That he felt something for her.
A feeling that was deep and powerful, and scared him.
Something roared.
Thanatos’s head whipped in that direction, a frown knitting his eyebrows as he listened hard and waited to see if it would call out again so he could pinpoint its location. Whatever had made that noise, it was big. An alpha predator. Nothing he had come across in his travels in this realm.
It roared again, the sound carrying for miles across the valleys. His gaze darted to the right a few degrees, adrenaline surging through him as he recognised the mountain range there.
And the feminine scream that froze his heart and his blood.
Calindria.
Thanatos flew harder than he had ever flown, his wings aching with each great beat of them, fear sinking icy talons into his heart as he rapidly closed the distance between him and the valley. The canyons came into focus and he pushed himself harder, every muscle burning with the strain as he swooped lower. He scanned the crevasses that riddled the ground, desperately seeking Calindria.
Another shriek had his head jerking left and he growled as he spotted what looked like part of a huge dark leathery wing slicing through the air just above the plateau and disappearing from view again.
Thanatos drew his sword and pinned his wings back, his focus locked onto his target. The beast’s head came into view, its huge yellow eye swivelling towards him as it angled its head to one side, causing the six horns that protruded from a circular bony plate to almost brush the muscles of its wings.
A wyvern.
It turned its head away from him and snapped its beaked mouth at something. Thanatos looked there and his lungs seized.
Calindria.
She desperately brandished the dagger he had left in the cavern, her blue eyes wild as she switched back and forth between threatening the wyvern he could see and looking at a cave that came into view. Thanatos cursed as he spotted a second wyvern in the shadows there.
On a loud roar, Thanatos tucked his wings back and dropped from the air. He gripped his sword in both hands, holding it point downwards, and glared at the first wyvern, his gaze fixed on a single point between its wings. The dark grey beast lunged forwards just before Thanatos’s booted feet hit its scaly back, almost throwing him off-balance. He plunged his sword into the beast’s back, slicing clean through its scales.
The wyvern reared back on a vicious roar, throwing its head high into the air, and Calindria gasped. Thanatos ducked, hurling himself prone on the creature’s back to avoid being speared by its horns as it thrashed its head side to side, attempting to catch him. When it flapped its enormous wings instead, lifting off the ground with him, he pushed to his knees and grabbed his sword, yanked it free of the creature’s back and brought it down again. He pierced the scales again, just as the beast began to ascend, taking him higher into the air.
The dark grey beast swung its head towards him and snapped at him, hissed and flashed long fangs as its yellow eyes narrowed on him.
Thanatos could almost read its thoughts. Knew exactly what it intended to do once it had reached a satisfactory height.
It was the reason he had stabbed it in two places.
He dropped again, dug the fingers of his left hand into one of the wounds and held on tight. The wyvern roared again and flapped its broad wings harder. Thanatos growled, hefted his sword in his right hand and started hacking at the beast’s right wing where it joined to its body.
As predicted, the wyvern rolled in the air, attempting to throw him. Thanatos clung to the creature, dangling below it one moment and slamming against its back the next. He kept hacking at the wing, cutting through the thick scales to the muscle beneath.
Forcing the beast to land.
It hit the ground hard and reared onto its legs, shook and snarled as it tried to dislodge him. When that didn’t work, it snapped at him and he was forced to move further down its back to avoid the wyvern’s sharp beak.
His sword hit bone.
On a mighty bellow, Thanatos swung with all his strength.
Shattered the bone with his sword.
Vibrations rang up the length of his silver blade, numbing his hand for a moment, but he didn’t pause for even a second. He pushed up and stood on the beast’s back as it howled and screeched, and desperately tried to reach him. He drew down a deep breath and swung his sword again, grimaced as it struck the wyvern’s meaty neck and blood spurted across the black ground. He swung again and again, hacking deeper as the beast struggled, not stopping until he hit the creature’s spine.
The wyvern’s head lolled and it collapsed to the ground.
Thanatos breathed hard, stabbed his sword into the dead beast’s back and rested on it.
Calindria shrieked again.
Strength surged through him, pushing fatigue to the back of his mind, and he beat his wings, the urge to reach her strong, propelling him forwards. His eyes widened as he reached the place where he had left her, as he spotted her clutching her left side.
Crimson stained her hand, spilled down her leg from beneath the tunic she wore.
Rage veiled the world in that colour and Thanatos shot towards the wyvern stalking towards her as she edged backwards, as she bumped into the wall of the canyon and threw a panicked look at it.
Darkness was swift to overcome him, obliterating all rational thought as the need to protect her clashed with the fact he had already failed in that task and she was injured. He slammed into the remaining wyvern, was only dimly aware of what he was doing as he hacked and slashed at it, as the black hunger to kill it consumed him.
“Thanatos.” Calindria’s soft voice curled around him, coaxing him back from the darkness.
Into the light.
The battle-haze lifted and he stared at the carnage spread before him. The wyvern’s head was just to his right, one of its wings removed and discarded against the opening of the cave, and it was missing one of its legs. There was a huge opening in the creature’s grey chest too, a gaping hole where its heart had once been.
“Thanatos?” Calindria’s voice swept around him again.
He blinked and looked at her, frowned as he saw all the blood on her. He rushed to her and gripped her shoulders, looking her over as fear pounded inside him. She still clutched her side, but he couldn’t spot any other wounds on her. Where had all the blood come from?
He stilled as it hit him.
Looked down at his own bloodstained body.
The wyvern.
He had sprayed her with blood when he had been killing it.
He looked back at her, into her eyes this time, needing to see that what he had done hadn’t repulsed her. Stilled again, his lungs tightening as he saw the tears that lined her lashes.
Tears he was sure were his fault.
He just couldn’t stop doing everything wrong with this female, even when he desperately wanted to do everything right.
“I saw the demigoddess again… I thought perhaps she might try to hurt you. I only wanted to protect you, Calindria.” And himself too. And whatever fragile thing this was they had going on. He didn’t want to destroy it, but he feared that he had.