Chapter
CLARA
Escape
Clara wiped the sweat from her face with Kaeso's now soaked coat sleeve. Although she matched Kaeso's quick pace beside him, tailing the group, time crawled before the literal and figurative light at the end of the tunnel came into view. As Sam reached the threshold, thunderous barks of vicious hunt and attack dogs blasted through the tunnel behind them.
Sam groaned. "Goddamn it. Come on ya'll! Move it!"
Kaeso muttered as he turned around to look into the opaque space behind them. "I used to have dogs." As he jogged backwards, he glanced at her and unsheathed two daggers from his belt before turning to face the exit again. "They truly are man's best friend." With a slight whistle, he got the attention of Wyatt and Cruzer, the two males they just freed, and tossed them each a blade. Wyatt, caught his midair, and Cruzer did the same, expertly manipulating it between his fingers. "Right now," Kaeso continued, "I hate dogs." He twisted his neck to peek behind them again. "Every. Fucking. One of them."
They clamored forward, and Clara forced her legs to move faster despite the pain shooting through her limbs. She ignored her still-tender stomach and burst out into the open, cringing at the blinding, sweltering atmosphere. The cave heat was more tolerable than this frying pan. She felt a hard hand on her upper arm and squinted through the bright daylight to adjust her eyes on Kaeso. How handsome he was in the suns' light, and how wrong a moment it was to focus on that.
"Go with the others into the bushes, behind those rocks," he pointed to the left where large boulders blocked the expansive horizon of the flattest land she remembered ever seeing. "This should not take long." He released her arm and uncovered what had to be the widest, sharpest sword in existence.
Clara gripped the hand of her friend and cell mate, Jessica, and pulled her along as she addressed the group of women. "Behind that boulder. Come on." They scrambled to the hiding spot as the growing fear in Clara's gut created a wave of nausea she swallowed back.
The women squatted and listened to the four men coordinate. The hounds growled as they emerged from the tunnel, and Clara shuddered at each ferocious snarl and bloodcurdling scream. Several men entered the fray, and it was difficult to differentiate between voices. She counted the dog screeches, each yelp reducing their numbers by one. But when the battle sounds stopped, she had only tallied six, and she was well aware from having the task to feed them that there were seven hounds total. What happened to the last? And who won the slay fest?
Through the shrubs, the sound of rustling branches grew nearer and boot steps approached. The women huddled together, trembling in their collective terror.
The two male slaves appeared, uninjured and covered in blood that was not their own. Kaeso and Sam followed with a new, loyal companion.
Clara let out the breath she forgot she held and shook her head. Kaeso befriended one of those large dogs, and it beamed, wagging his tail and licking the fighter's hands. He laughed when it stood on its hind legs to slobber on him. "What should we call you, boy?"
"Call him BadAss. Cuz that's what he is, man," said the freed male with chocolate brown skin while wiping his face with a small cloth given to him by Adelais, Clara's closest friend. "I ain't never seen a dog that big before."
"BadAss?" the warrior repeated and did so a few more times, listening to the words roll from his tongue. When he flashed a satisfied smile, Clara realized she was staring at his lips. A flush hit her cheeks and she peeped around, relieved that no one noticed. Perhaps they, too, found him intriguing.
"Yes, I like how that sounds," Kaeso grinned. "BadAss. Do you like your new name, BadAss?"
Clara jumped when the animal barked to show approval of his given moniker. Funny how a large, intimidating killer could be so playful and lovable, as though he could run through a field of green grass on a sun-kissed day with a rainbow adorning the sky and plop down, content, without a care in the world. While she shared a recent emancipation from a life of bondage, murder and gore with the fluffy, four-footed protector, as Kaeso's new pal, that dog still had it better than her.
Sam chuckled, cleaning his blade. "BadAss. That goes well with Pain-in-the-Ass. Ya'll will make a great pair." As he turned and scanned the landscape, his expression turned somber. "You need to go through Mysteria now. You can bet the other way is bein' watched after this shit carnival."
"Yes, you are right," Kaeso bit his bottom lip. Clara surmised that the way through the Lizen Desert was their best option at first. But instead, their intended covert mission became a massive coming out party and there was no way they would all get through unnoticed. "Go to the outpost. Bring troops to meet us at the gates of Mysteria before second sunrise," he said.
Sam's version of agreement was apparently to wheel around with a clenched fist and land a solid blow to Kaeso's temple. He staggered to his knees and scowled. "Fucking hell, Sam! That could not wait?"
"Nope," Sam said as he disappeared into the trees, whistling an upbeat tune.
Kaeso recovered and walked off a punch that would have laid anyone else out flat. Once again, she gawked at this seemingly impenetrable man. He was remarkable, and the fact that he seemed so unaware of how much people revered him amused her.
An older man named Joshua greeted them the moment they set foot on his property, and he corralled them into a network of caves behind his home. That allowed everyone time to recover for the trip ahead. The destination: Fort Lyon, and the city of Creyos in the Immortal land of Fresia.