Smack! Smack! Clang!
The two of them clashed together. Logan landed two solid punches to Preston's face, but the Reaper lashed out with his sword, making Logan jump back. And on it went.
The more I watched, the more worried I got. Preston had his Viking strength to rely on, and he was a good fighter, almost as good as Logan. I hadn't been at Mythos Academy long, but even I could tel that.
Plus, Preston had a sword and Logan didn't. That was what was tipping the scales in the Reaper's favor. Logan just couldn't get in close enough to do much damage to Preston, not without getting cut up in the process. I stood there and bit my lip, swAll owing my screams, not daring to do or say anything that would distract Logan.
Smack! Smack! Clang!
The two of them came together again, and Preston sliced his sword through the air. This time, Logan wasn't quite quick enough, and the blade cut across his left leg, opening up a deep, deep wound. He stumbled back, and Preston raised his sword for the kil ing strike.
"Logan!" I screamed.
Adrenaline, concern, and fear for Logan surged through my veins, blocking out everything else. I didn't think-I just acted. I charged in between them, raised my sword, and swung it at Preston. Of course, he blocked my clumsy blow.
Preston laughed at me. "Sorry, Gypsy. I'm going to kil your boyfriend, and then I'm going to kil you-and there's nothing you can do to stop me."
"Shut up, Reaper," I snarled.
And that's when I snapped up my left hand and smashed him in the face with the hammer I'd grabbed. Preston screamed and stumbled back. I fol owed him and hit him again, cracking the hammer across his skul as hard as I could. He tripped over a couple of two-by-fours and fel face-first onto a pile of cement bags.
I didn't look to see how badly I'd hurt him before I dropped the hammer and raced back to Logan's side. He had dropped to a knee on the floor beside Oliver. Logan put his hand under Oliver's shoulder, trying to help his friend get to his feet, but Logan was just too weak to do it with the deep cut in his leg.
"Leave me," Oliver whispered, his face white, the tendons in his neck tight with pain. "Go. Save yourselves."
"Spartans never leave each other behind," Logan rasped, and tried to lift his friend again. "Never, remember?"
Once more, he failed. In the middle of the pile of cement bags, Preston let out a low groan. The Fenrir wolf stayed where it was in front of the door, blocking our escape and watching All of us with its glowing red eyes.
"Make him go, Gwen," Oliver said, pleading with me. "Or the Reaper wil kil us All ."
Logan grabbed for his friend again, but Oliver slapped his hands away and flopped back down onto the floor. He shut his eyes and let his head lol to one side. Playing dead, which was the only thing he could do right now, the only way he could protect himself.
Preston groaned again. The Reaper got up onto his hands and knees.
"Come on! Come on! Come on!" I shouted at Logan.
I put my arm under Logan's shoulder and got him on his feet.
Then I dragged the Spartan away from Oliver, Preston, and the wolf, heading back into the gloom of the construction site.
I didn't know how long we hurried through the site, navigating around All the piles of tools and lumber and moving from one half-finished hAll way to the next. All I could think about was getting Logan away from Preston before the Reaper kil ed him or sicced the Fenrir wolf on both of us. The Spartan limped along beside me, and I took as much of his weight as I could on my left shoulder. I carried Vic in my other hand.
"Stop, Gwen, stop!" Logan finAll y said. "I have to stop and tie off the wound. I'm losing too much blood." I didn't want to stop for anything, but I knew that he was right. So I helped him sit down on a couple of bags of cement that had been stacked up on top of each other. I unzipped my hoodie and took it off, passing it over to him.
Logan grabbed the jacket and used Vic to tear the fabric into a couple of long strips. He quickly wrapped them around his leg, tying them off with a series of tight knots.
Blood from the gash had already soaked his jeans, turning them more black than blue. My stomach twisted. So much blood.
"Can you go on?" I whispered. "We have to get out of here."
"I think so."
Logan tried to stand and immediately sat down again, biting back a scream of pain. Sweat rol ed down his forehead, and his lips were a thin white stain in his face.
The fabric strips he'd just tied around his leg were already turning an ugly brown as the blood seeped into them.
"I'm sorry," he rasped. "I don't think I can walk any farther.
Go on, Gwen. Get out of here. Run. Before he finds us both."
I shook my head. "We already left Oliver behind. I'm not leaving you, too."
Logan grabbed my shoulders and shook me. "Listen to me!
This isn't like that night in the Library of Antiquities. I had weapons then. All we have now is your sword, and I'm stuck with a bum leg. There's no way I can beat Preston like this. He's almost as good as I am, and we All know it."
"Listen to the Spartan, Gwen," Vic chimed in. "Go and get help. I'l stay here with him. We'l give you time to get away."
"Shut up, Vic," I snapped. "I'm not going anywhere. Be quiet and let me think a second."
Logan frowned and looked around, probably wondering who I was talking to since he didn't know about Vic. I ignored the Spartan and his confusion. Instead, I paced back and forth, my sneakers sending up puffs of sawdust into the shadows. Thinking.
Logan couldn't beat Preston, not now, not with his leg cut up, and I simply didn't have the skil s to go toe-to-toe with the Reaper and win. Preston had said that I was like a five-year-old with a toy sword, and he was right.
So what were we going to do? If only I'd been the one that Preston had injured instead of Logan. I could have just given Vic to Logan and let the Spartan use All of his years of training, knowledge, and fighting skil s to beat the Reaper. If I'd had more training, if I knew how to actuAll y use a sword myself, then I would have taken on Preston in a heartbeat. But I didn't, and there was just no getting around that.
If you can use my memories to help you with archery, why can't you use them to help with something else? I know I'm right about this. I'm always right.
Daphne's words whispered in my mind, and I flashed back to that first day in the gym when I'd thought about the Valkyrie, when I'd cAll ed up her memories and used them to put my arrows into the center of the target. I'd done the same thing again on Friday, when I'd flashed on Daphne skiing and used those images to help myself get down first the bunny slope and then the higher ones. A crazy, crazy idea came to me then, a way that I could keep Logan and me from getting kil ed, maybe the only way that I could keep that from happening.
I crouched down in front of Logan . "Listen, we both know that you can't fight Preston with your wounded leg, and I can't beat him by myself. But maybe we can stop him-
together."
"What do you mean?"
I quickly told Logan about this new thing I'd learned how to do with my psychometry.
"So you want to touch me and take my memories of All the battles I've been in and All the weapons training I've had. Then you want to use them to fight Preston yourself?" Logan asked after I explained everything.
I winced. It sounded completely nutso when he said it out loud like that. "More or less."
Logan thought about it a second. "I think that's one of the craziest things I've ever heard-and one of the most bril iant.
Let's do it."
I blinked. "You ... believe me? You reAll y think it wil work?"
"I think you're one of the smartest, bravest people I know,"
Logan said. "I trust you, Gypsy girl. If you think it wil work, then I know it wil ."
Certainty blazed in his ice blue gaze, and his voice rang with an absolute, unwavering trust. The Spartan's rock-steady belief in me, that I could actuAll y use my magic to get us out of this mess, made hot tears sting my eyes.
Emotion clogged my throat, making it hard to breathe. I nodded and stretched out my hand toward his.
Logan held up his own hand, signaling me to stop. He looked at me a second, then gave me a crooked grin.
"Come on, Gypsy girl. I'm bleeding to death here, in case you haven't noticed. At least make it worth my while and kiss me before I die."
Despite the situation, my heart lifted at his words, and I found myself grinning back at him. I wanted to kiss him. I wanted that more than anything, especiAll y since this might be the last chance I ever got to do it. But I wanted to make sure Logan knew what he was doing-and what might happen when I touched him.
"Are you sure?" I whispered. "I don't-I don't know what I might see, and I know there are some parts of yourself that you want to stay ... hidden. That you have ... secrets you want to keep to yourself."
Logan nodded. "I'm sure."
I stared at him. "It'l be okay, I promise. No matter what I see or feel. You'l stil be Logan, and I'l stil be your Gypsy girl."
He stared back at me, his eyes as bright as blue stars in his rugged, pain-fil ed face. "I know it wil , Gwen. I know it wil .
Now shut up and kiss me before I pass out."
"Wel , when you put it like that, how can a girl possibly resist?" I quipped back.
Before I could think too much about what I was about to do, I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his.
Chapter 22
The feelings and images immediately overwhelmed me.
Touching Logan, feeling his skin against mine, flashing on him with my magic. It was All just-just- elec-tric. He was so strong, so ful of life, so fun and crazy and irrepressible. The Spartan's strength flooded my heart and mind, even as his arms crept around my waist and drew me closer. His spirit gave my own new power, energy, and hope.
Logan's lips were firm against my own, and the kiss was everything I'd ever dreamed it would be. Warm, caring, and sexy.
I opened my mouth, and our tongues touched, slowly stroking against each other. For a moment I just let myself enjoy the kiss, just let myself relish the feel of his hot mouth on mine, the feel of his hard, muscled body pressed against mine.
Being this close to Logan made me dizzy and breathless, but I forced myself to focus. I concentrated on the Spartan, going beyond that crazy jumble of desire and longing, and looking for the memories I needed to help us both survive. I could feel Logan concentrating too, trying to cAll up every bit of his fighting and weapons knowledge and bring it to the surface of his mind, so I'd be able to see it, remember it, use it.
My plan worked.
The memories poured into my mind, and hundreds of images flashed by, one after another. Logan using swords, staffs, spears, and weapons I didn't even know the names for. The Spartan sparring with other Mythos students in gym class and almost always winning. Him battling kids outside of the gym, for real, and winning All of those matches, too.
Even Logan fighting the Nemean prowler in the Library of Antiquities the night Jasmine had tried to kil me. Logan's strength roared to the surface then, along with his ferocity and pride at overcoming something as dangerous as the prowler.
It was like a light snapped on inside my head. Suddenly, I saw everything I'd been doing wrong during our mock fights in the gym. All the sloppy mistakes I'd made, All the obvious weaknesses I had, All the easy ways Logan had been able to "kil "
me time after time. And I realized what I had to do to beat Preston, what I had to do to save us both.
I was just about to pul away when the memories of Logan fighting faded away, and a different one popped into my head. I should have ended the kiss then, but I didn't.
Even though I knew it was wrong of me, I stil wanted to see the image. I wanted to know everything there was to know about Logan. I wanted to learn what deep, dark secret he'd been so desperate to hide from me.
In this memory, Logan was a little boy, only around five years old. Even back then, he was cute, with big blue eyes and a tousled mop of black hair. But the memory wasn't a happy one-
not at All . Logan huddled on the floor of a large closet, hidden in the very back, behind a rack of clothes.
Screams sounded just outside the closed door, and shadows twisted and writhed on the other side of the wide slats. Logan clutched a smAll metAll sword in his hands, but he wasn't using it.
He wanted to, though. The urge to run out of the closet made his heart pound, but he was so afraid of the screams, so scared of the shadows, that he felt frozen in place.
The image abruptly shifted and bled into another memory.
Logan stood over two bodies, a woman and a girl who was a few years older than he was. His mother and his sister, a voice whispered in my mind. They were dead, their throats cut, and blood covered the floor All around them, coating their faces. So much blood. Logan stil clutched his sword in his hand. Angry, he threw it away, then lay down in between his mother and sister, not caring that he was getting their blood All over him. Tears streaked over his smAll , pale face, and then, he started to scream.
Logan drew back, breaking the kiss, breaking our connection.
I would have fAll en over, if he hadn't caught me and cradled me in his arms.
"Gwen?" Logan whispered against my cheek. "Are you okay? What did you see?"
I saw why part of you is so sad, I thought. Why you won't let me get close to you, because you once lost the people you cared about the most. But I didn't say the words. I just
... couldn't. Not now. Later. We'd ... talk about it later. If we had a later.
I shook my head and drew back, looking into his rugged face.