Even knowing this, a clammy sweat broke out on her body. She tried not to let her rising panic show, but she suddenly felt like the word guilty was stamped across her forehead in vivid red letters.
“Is this going to create an issue?” the lycan asked.
“Of course not,” Lexi said and hoped her voice didn’t sound as strained as it felt. “We have nothing to hide here.”
They had everything to hide here, but she couldn’t stop them from doing this. If she tried, then she really would have guilty stamped all over her.
They won’t find the tunnels.
Her father carefully crafted each entrance, so it was impossible to detect even if you knew it was there. However, she couldn’t stop her rising terror over the possibility they would somehow uncover them.
And if they discovered them, then everyone inside was as good as dead. She compelled herself not to look at Brokk again. Would the Lord kill him too if they discovered Orin here?
No, she wouldn’t let that happen. She would gladly throw herself on that sword before she let Brokk and Sahira pay the price for her choices.
“Right this way,” she said to the lead lycan.
The others dismounted before following her inside.
Chapter Thirty-One
Only five feet of rocky land separated the lake from the fire beyond it. Cole almost reeled backward when the fire hit him. For a second, the idea of the acid water was far more pleasing than the flames jumping and snapping all around him.
Then he realized that if he kept running, the fire burned but didn’t devour him. He sprinted forward as the flames rolled over the top of him, beat against his sides, and roared so loud he couldn’t hear his rapid breathing.
And then, just when he believed the fire was going to devour him, it eased up. Smoke and heat didn’t blast his lungs as he inhaled crisp, fresher air into their brutalized depths.
The blisters covering his freshly grown skin from head to toe popped. Their ooze sizzled against his red flesh. The bottoms of his feet, already burned from the wet rocks, were nothing more than tendons and bone again.
Exhaustion and hunger had become heavy, draining weights, but he pushed onward. He’d made it this far; he would not stop now.
Flames crackled around him as the towering volcanoes spewed black smoke into the air. The red lava sliding toward him bubbled and popped as it consumed everything in its path.
Was he supposed to climb up through those volcanoes? He studied the rocky terrain and oozing lava as he tried to figure out where to go from here.
From the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of movement a second before a creature rushed out of the flames. Cole danced back from the lumbering monster and ducked the massive, rocky arm it swung at him.
It’s a cherufe!
He’d never thought to see one of the hideous, man-eating creatures in his lifetime. He’d believed they were all extinct, but the eight-foot-tall monster was very real and made up entirely of rocks and magma. Flames encompassed its colossal frame and rolled from its eye sockets.
When it opened its gnarled mouth, it bellowed smoke and ran toward him with the wide step of a charging gorilla. It would have been comical if it wasn’t for the monster’s determination to bash him to pieces.
Cole ducked when it swung a fist the size of a wheelbarrow at his head. If one of this thing’s punches connected with him, it would flatten his skull.
Despite its size, the cherufe was fast as it spun toward him. Cole darted to the side as its rocky fingers gouged his back.
He ducked as its arms came down like it was trying to embrace him in a giant bear hug. Except this bear hug would crack his spine and tear him in two.
He danced back from the creature as he tried to figure out how to defeat it. He was no match for its strength, and with the flames enveloping its body, it would engulf him in fire if he launched himself at it. He also couldn’t use those flames against the monster as it was part of the fire surrounding them.
The best he could do was stay free of its grasp, but he couldn’t do that forever. This thing consisted of rocks and was in its element. If it tired, it wouldn’t be for a while, and he was already exhausted and battered.
The ground shook as the thing ran at him with more speed than something that easily weighed a ton should exhibit. The impact of its steps caused rocks to break away from the side of a volcano. They clattered down the side and bounced across the ground.
Fresh smoke belched into the air from one of the volcanoes. A whistling sound followed a couple of seconds later. Cole chanced a glance at the sky as a black, flaming pile of debris soared toward him.
He threw himself to the ground and rolled away as it hit the place where he’d stood only seconds before. Smoke coiled from the three-foot dent it left in the earth.
As if shit wasn’t bad enough, now the volcanoes were spewing lava bombs at him. Rocks clattered down the side of the nearest volcano, and fresh smoke billowed into the air when more bombs launched at him.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Lexi stood by the open doorway of the library as the lycans filed into her home. The large men took up far too much space and heated her manor more than the midafternoon sun. She had to resist pulling at the collar of her shirt as it became increasingly difficult to breathe.
“Can I get you something to eat or drink?” Sahira asked the men.
“No, thank you,” the head lycan said. “We won’t be long.”
Brokk leaned casually in the manor's open doorway, but the tension emanating from him was anything but casual. He crossed his legs and folded his arms over his chest as the lycans made their way upstairs.
Sahira stood in the doorway across from Lexi. She kept her eyes on the stairs as doors opened and closed above. The bang of drawers shutting, closets opening, and the squeak of beds moving drifted down.
Lexi didn’t know if they really thought a rebel might fit inside their dresser drawers or if they were going through everything to make it clear they had the right to do so, but resentment was starting to replace her dread.
They had no right to come into her home like this and go through her things. The Lord had no right to invade her privacy, but there was nothing they could do about it, and that monster and these men knew it.
The Lord had taken control and now wielded his power over all of them. And like a guillotine about to fall, Lexi felt the deadly blade of that control poised over her neck.
The lycans spent ten minutes upstairs before appearing at the top of the stairs again. Lexi hid her apprehension as they descended the stairs. She almost smiled to show she had no cares in the world but stopped herself.
Did she want to smile at the men who just pawed through her underwear? Was that the normal reaction to have?
No, it was not.
Besides, there wasn’t anything to smile about. While she hated the idea of them upstairs going through her things, there was nothing to find up there. The entrance to one of the tunnels was behind her, and though it wasn’t true, she suddenly felt its cool air brushing against her neck.
The lycans didn’t acknowledge them as they split up to search the rest of the house. When one of them swept by her to enter the library, she waited a couple of seconds before turning to watch as he examined the shelves.
He pulled books free before sliding them back into place with too much force. She winced when a book tumbled from his fingers to hit the ground with a loud bang. He muttered a curse before bending to pick it up. At least he returned it to the right spot.