Ice Baron (Ice Chronicles, Book One (science fiction romance)) (33 page)

Anya shot Elise’s guard through
the grating. He roared in pain. A black, smoking line charred his shirt.

The guard at the door whipped out
his laser and Anya squeezed off another round at him. Out of the corner of her
eye, Joshua launched himself onto Marli’s captor’s back.

The guard at the door thunked to
the ground, taking the camera with him. Elise fought her guard. When her captor’s
back turned briefly to Anya, she shot him again. Fire hit his neck. He
collapsed on top of Elise.

Marli was now free, and the knife
swirled halfway across the floor. The big, bald man shook Joshua, who was on
his back, like an angry bear. Joshua hung on, his elbow tight around the man’s
neck.  The bruiser backed up and slammed Joshua against the wall, again and
again. Joshua’s head hit hard the sixth time. He released the guard, but landed
on his feet. The guard spun and his meaty fist connected with Joshua’s jaw. It
made a horrible, sickening sound. Joshua slid to his knees, but evaded the next
punch.

Marli darted into Anya’s line of
sight. Now Anya couldn’t get a good line on the bruiser, who was sure to kill
Joshua. She had to get into the room.

Fury mottled the guard’s jowled
face, and he lunged for Joshua. Joshua rolled sideways, then lunged up and staggered
forward, ramming his shoulder into the man’s stomach.

Anya scuttled forward, searching
for the entry panel into the room. Here. She shoved it aside and dropped almost
three meters down, straight into the fray.

Roaring obscenities, the bruiser
beat Joshua, who had collapsed to his knees again. Marli had the knife. With
wide eyes and shaking hands, she advanced toward the Altai man.

“No, Marli!” Anya shoved her
aside. She shot the man point blank in the base of his skull.

“Watch out!” Elise screamed.

Anya spun. A fourth guard, whom
she hadn’t spotted, smashed a fist into her face, and pain exploded, so hot and
black and fierce she couldn’t think.

She fell. Then the guard’s face
twisted like an overwrought cartoon character, and he crumpled to the ground,
too. Elise gripped a laser. She must have retrieved it from the dead door
guard.

Groggily, Anya sat up. Marli
sobbed wildly, struggling to pull the massive man off of Joshua. Elise ran to
help, and Anya crawled to do the same.

They rolled the heavy man
backward. He was dead. And Joshua…blood covered his face, and he lay
unnaturally still.

“Is he dead?” Marli cried out.

Anya pressed shaking fingers into
Joshua’s warm neck. A faint pulse twitched beneath her fingertips. “He’s alive.”

“We’ve got to get out of here,”
Elise said, her voice high with fright. “More guards will come.”

Anya pressed a hand to her
throbbing temple and looked up at the opening through which she had dropped.
Then she glanced about the empty room. “Stack the guards. We’ll climb on them,
and then crawl out.”

“What about David. And Joshua?”
Marli whispered. “They’re unconscious.”

Anya crawled to her brother.
Although his face was terribly bruised, his pulse felt stronger than Joshua’s. “David.”
Urgently, she shook his shoulder. “David! We need you.”

After an excruciatingly long
moment, her brother’s eyes opened. They were black, bleary, and unfocused.

“Can you sit up?” Anya said urgently.
Under normal circumstances, she would urge him to lie still until a doctor
could determine the extent of his injuries. But if he remained here, Onred
would kill him. “Come on,” she said, pulling his arm. “We’re going to escape.
We need your help.”

David partially sat up, propped up
on one arm. His eyes closed, as if dizzy.  “How? I…don’t think I can walk.”

“Can you crawl?”

“Yes. I think…maybe.”

“Elise, you go up first,” Anya
directed. “Then Marli and I will push David up to you. You’ll pull him through.”

Elise was a stronger girl than she
looked, for all of her slight figure.

Anya boosted Elise up through the
opening, and then she and Marli struggled to get their brother up onto the
guards’ backs.

Anya held him steady while David
slowly rose to his feet. “Hold your arms overhead,” she instructed. “Elise will
help you through. Come on, Marli. One, two, three…” Anya gripped David by the
waist and heaved him upward with all of her strength. Marli did the same. Her
little face looked grim, teeth gritted, with the strain of trying to lift her big
brother.

“I’ve got him,” Elise said.

“I can help,” David muttered. He
went up on his elbows at the air duct’s ledge, and with a combination of Elise
pulling under his armpits and Anya and Marli pushing him up by his knees, he
went through the opening.

“Now you, Marli.” Anya gripped her
sister about the thighs and lifted her. She wavered on the guards’ backs, trying
to keep her balance. Marli swayed.

“You can do it,” Elise encouraged,
face pinched. Anya teetered. “Got her.” Anya steadied when Elise pulled Marli upward.
The last she saw were her sister’s feet wriggling through the opening.

Now for Joshua. Anya stumbled off
of the dead guards and collapsed onto her knees beside him. Gently, fearfully,
she touched his battered face. Was he still alive?

His eyelids twitched before she
could take his pulse. Relief made her feel weak. “Come on. Time to escape.” She
tugged at his arm.

His bruised mouth moved. Blood
dripped from his split bottom lip. “No.”

“We’ve got to leave
now,
”
Anya whipped a glance at the door. “Before more guards come.”

“No.” His voice was weak, but his
swollen eyes slitted.

“Joshua
please,
” she
implored. “We’ve got to leave now. Can you stand? I’ll help you.”

“No.” His voice was stronger. “I’ll…slow
you down.”

“Don’t be a hero.” Tears filled
her eyes. “We need you, Joshua. Please.”

His hand lifted, and then settled
like a heavy weight around the back of her neck. A tiny flexion of strength
urged her down, closer to him. His breath touched hers. Behind the swollen,
bloodshot eyes, she glimpsed tawny fire. Joshua. Her Joshua was alive and well
inside of his mangled body.

“I love you, Anya.” Gently, he
kissed her. “Go. Now.”

Her fingers clutched into the
solid muscle of his body. She whispered, “I love you, too.” Tears welled. “I
won’t leave without you. Please. Try to come with me.”

“No. Go. While…still time.”

He clearly could not move, and she
didn’t have the strength to lift him. She wanted to rage at him to fight…to
try. Not to give up. “No. I won’t…”

“Go.” That low, forceful command
silenced her.

Lips quivering, she stared at him.

“Trust me. One…last time. Go.”

Biting her lip, she sat back on
her heels. He was a stubborn man. He had chosen his fate, and Anya reluctantly
understood that she would not be able to change his mind. The least she could
do was obey his last wishes.

“I’ll take them to safety,” she
told him. “And then I’ll come back for you.”

He closed his eyes, but did not
answer. Clearly, he believed he would die a battered, broken man in Onred’s
prison.

“Anya.” Marli’s small whimper drew
her attention. Her sister was afraid. As she should be. More guards would soon
discover their escape.

Anya kissed Joshua’s temple—the
only spot not battered by bruises or blood. “I love you,” she repeated. “And I’ll
be back. I won’t leave you here to die.”

Joshua did not respond. Was he now
unconscious? Anya wished that she and her sisters possessed the strength to
lift him into the air vent. But they had barely managed to boost David through
the opening. Joshua was much bigger and heavier. She needed help. She would get
it, and then she would come back.

Chewing on the inside of her lip
to keep back the tears, she grabbed two of the guards’ lasers and piled them
into Joshua’s lap. When Onred’s men came, at least he would be able to defend
himself. Then she hoisted herself into the air duct.

Before setting the diamonite
square back into place, she looked one last time at Joshua, sprawled awkwardly
against the wall. She loved him so much.
Oh God, please keep him safe.

Gently, she replaced the square.
Unchecked tears streamed down her cheeks as she led her siblings away from the
man she loved. Using her phone as a flashlight, she headed toward the
conference room…and ultimately, for access to Gorno’s roof.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Travel in the
air duct
was slow. Elise whispered that they hadn’t eaten
in days. David’s slow crawl appeared to be fueled by determination alone.
Shivers intermittently racked Marli’s small body, for her clothes were still
damp from Onred’s first torture session.

“Just a little further,” Anya
encouraged, checking her GPS. Soon, they’d need to drop into a room, find an
elevator—if they were still working—and take it to the top floor of Gorno. No
easy task. She might need to leave her family in the air duct until she could
find help. Had the extraction team landed yet? And what about Michael? If she
made it to the roof, he had said she could activate her transponder and he’d
arrive within minutes. Of course, an air battle waged outside right now. But
Michael possessed his remarkable shield. He’d make it through. Maybe he could
help rescue Joshua, too.

A shudder rippled beneath their
knees as they crawled.

“What was that?” Marli whispered.

“Our forces and Richert’s are
attacking Gorno.”

“Richert is
helping
us?”
David’s voice cracked.

“He’s on our side. For now.” Anya
checked her GPS and slowed down. Here was the conference room where she had
first accessed the air ducts. Dared she check inside?

Might as well. She lifted a finger
to her lips. “Shh. I’m going down. You three stay here. I’m going for help.”

Marli clutched her arm. “Don’t
leave us!” Her whisper verged on hysteria. “Don’t, Anya, please!”

Elise’s wide eyes looked
frightened, too. She clutched Anya’s hand. “If something happens to you, we won’t
know where to go. Don’t leave us. I’d rather die with you than stay here.”

David asserted, “I can walk.”

“And I’ve still got the guard’s
laser,” Elise said. “Thanks to our father, I’m a good shot.”

The idea of taking her frail
family through Gorno’s dangerous hallways did not seem like a good idea at all.
However, with their frightened, pleading eyes staring at her, how could she say
‘no’?

“First, I’ll make sure the
conference room is safe,” she compromised. “If it is, we’ll all jump inside.
From there, we’ll take it one step at a time.”

Elise nodded, and the others
looked relieved.

Anya pried up the diamonite slab
and peered into the conference room. All three men lay where she had shot them.
Were they dead, or unconscious? Sickness stabbed at her. How many people had
she killed today? She swallowed back bile. No time to think about that now. She
had to get her family to safety.

Silently, she swung down into the
room. “Come on,” she whispered, and helped the others down.

Next, she slipped to the door and
peered out. Hordes of people swarmed down the hallways. While the uniform shirt
Anya wore would help her blend in, she feared her brother and sisters would stand
out like sore thumbs. In addition, every Altai citizen must have seen their
faces broadcasted on Alpha.

“They’ll recognize you,” she
whispered. “This isn’t a good idea.”

Three pale, frightened faces
looked back at her.

David slowly staggered to the far
end of the room, where the men lay. When Anya realized his intent, she ran to
help him. The jackets they pulled off the bulky men were too large, but their
black color would help her siblings blend in with the Altai people better than
the pale clothes they wore now. Marli drowned in her jacket, but Anya directed
her to walk tight in between Elise and herself so others wouldn’t notice her.

“When we leave, walk straight, and
with purpose, like you know where we’re going,” Anya instructed.

“Where
are
we going?” Marli
asked, hugging the jacket tighter around her for warmth.

“The elevator. I’m hoping
generators are still powering them. If not, then the stairs.” Although she didn’t
say it, Anya didn’t know how her weak family could possibly climb three flights
of stairs. She sent up a silent prayer for help. “We need to get to the roof.”

David offered a feeble grin. “Think
our guys have landed yet?”

“Maybe.” Unexpected goose bumps
rippled across Anya’s skin. The temperature was dropping. It remained to be
seen how much destruction Emelie’s virus had already wrought in Gorno. “Let’s
go.” Another blast shook the floor beneath their feet.