Chapter Two
"Run!"
Spike latched onto Tara's hand and pulled. She spun around and stumbled and her feet couldn't seem to find their place. One of her shoes slid off her foot but Spike didn't stop. He tightened his grip, and hauled her behind him and her feet began flailing through the air. She managed to touch them to the ground ... one step, two step ... and he gave a great yank and her feet went flying again. She felt like a bundle of tin cans tied to a string, buffeted by the wind and bouncing all around.
This is ridiculous. He can't do the running for both of us!
Legs. Legs were meant to be pointed down and upright when one was traveling, not flapping to one side one minute, and then flipping up two feet higher than her head the next. She twisted at the waist and forced her feet down. Touched the groundthere! She was running.
She was flat on the ground, chewing dirt.
Spike was getting up and coming back to her. Tara realized the force of their separation must have knocked him down as well. She felt the ground shaking beneath her. The Jabberwock! He was making the earth reverberate with the shock of each pounding step he took.
Fear electrified her limbs into spasmodic motion and she lurched to her feet.
Oh, there was her shoe.
Tara's stomach heaved. They hadn't moved. There was her shoe, right were she had lost it! They had run and run and they hadn't moved at all.
She turned and gawped at the Jabberwock. They hadn't moved but it had!
"Come on!" Spike grabbed her arm.
"We haven't gone anywhere!" Tara couldn't look away from the Jabberwock. His head ... weaving back and forth ...
"I know. We have to run faster ... Tara! Don't look at it. Run!"
Tara tried. She tried moving her feet as fast as she could. Pumping her legs and pounding the ground. Long strides, short strides. No matter how fast she ran she stayed where she was. Her shoe sat motionless and she was running but both stayed where they were.
Spike bounded ahead and Tara's heart seemed to stop beating. Oh go. Get away!
Instead he turned around. He was coming back for her! She would have laughed but her teeth were chattering so hard.
He threw his arm around her waist and swung her off her feet. "Don't try to run, Luv. Just hold onto me!"
She locked her arms around him, clasped her hands together, and held on as tightly as she could. He ran and she flapped behind him like a banner. He ran faster and she was buffeted by the wind. He ran faster still and the wind became a living thing. It jerked at her hair and puffed in her eyes and roared in her ears. It tore at her arms, pried at her fingers but she just held tighter and hoped Spike could breathe.
Her vision was blurred but she could see the scenery changing around her. A tall tree took the place of the stump and a bush replaced the tree. A rabbit darted away and she saw a stone and they were running up a hill. They were moving!
Were they moving fast enough? The whiffling sound grew louder or was that only the wind? The earth was shaking or was she only trembling? She felt hot breath on her back or was that only the sun?
Spike ran and Tara held on. They went over the hill and down the hill and started up another. They ran through streams and onto rocky ground and entered a forest. The sun fell from the sky and the moon bounced up and still she held on. She felt as though she had held on forever.
She bounced, her feet dragging on the ground and she yelped. That hurt!
Spike slowed and she wasn't flying through the air anymore. She scrambled to regain her footing, yelping again as her shoeless foot scraped across loose stone and brambles and rock.
He slowed, then staggered, and suddenly Tara was supporting him.
They stopped and she twisted her head in frantic jerks, scanning the countryside. Where was the Jabberwock? Had they outrun it? Was it close behind? She listened for the sound of whiffling or pounding feet but her heart seemed wedged between her ears. The thunder of its beat drowned out all sound. She feared her head was going to burst from the throbbing of the blood that pulsed through her veins.
Spike sank to his knees, breathing in gulps of air, and Tara turned her attention to him. He was wind-kissed. The wind had kissed his lips until they were ruby red and peppered his eyes until the soft skin around them was bruised with blue. It had kissed his curls into a dandelion crown that whispered around his head. The moon joined in the devotion and danced on his golden locks and turned his pale skin into silver.
The Jabberwock was forgotten as she gazed at him. She was convinced in that moment that he must be fey, a prince of the fair folk, a magical being. How else could he be so obviously a boy and yet so beautiful, look so delicate and be so strong. How could he have run so fast and so far and still have a hand that felt so cool in her own?
She was flushed and sweaty and her hair stuck to her skin or stuck out in disarray. She was certain she looked like a wild monkey.
Her shyness returned. She wanted to ask how he was but he'd saved her life and was magical and why would he want to listen to anything a plain, frumpy girl like herself had to say?
"Are you all right, pet? You look a bit frazzled."
Tara bet she did. She burst into tears. She was lost and didn't know who she was and he was beautiful and she was so ugly!
"Here now!" Spike's voice had taken on an alarm that hadn't been apparent when he'd been faced with the Jabberwock. "Don't cry. I'll protect you if it shows up. Really, I will. I wasn't afraid. I wasn't. I-I just didn't have a weapon. And look ..." he jumped to his feet and ran a few feet away to pick something off the ground. "Here's a stick. It's stout. I could whack him with it or-or jab it in his mouth when he tries to bite."
Spike knelt beside her where she'd flopped down on the ground and he picked up her shoeless foot. "I'm sorry. Should have grabbed your shoe. Wasn't thinking."
"N-no. You were so brave!" Tara's shyness was forgotten and she wiped at her tears. He was worried about what she thought! "You came back for me. I've never seen anything so heroic in my life!"
"Really?" Spike's smile was shy but he straightened his shoulders and threw out his chest. He stood back up and hefted the stick, made a few practice jabs. "Well, I'll be ready for him next time. He won't get away without a bruise or two. If I had a sword, I'd gut him right quick."
"Oh, I think running is probably the best thing." Spike's face fell and Tara hastened to continue. "I mean, if you had a sword, sure, you could whack off its head." Tara demonstrated the proper procedure by clasping her hands together and swinging them in an arc. "It's just ... it was so big and, the wings would give it an awful advantage."
Spike appeared to consider this. "Maybe. I could duck under real fast-like and jab his belly a few good ones." He dropped to one knee and stabbed the stick into the air. "Make him fetch up his lunch, I would." He glanced at Tara from the corner of his eyes.
His dandelion coiffure looked a bit silly bobbing about as he mimed fighting the absent Jabberwock but she didn't care. Her own hair probably looked like a rat's nest. She wished she had a comb but she wasn't sure she could use it even if she had. Now that she was sitting still for a moment she was aware that she ached. Her arms felt like sausages and sharp pains radiated from her shoulders at the slightest move. Her foot throbbed and her scalp fit like a cap that was three sizes too small.
She was very, very tired.
A touch on her shoulder made her jump. She must have been half asleep and hadn't seen Spike approach. He looked at her, his expression grave.
"You look done up. We need to find a safer place. Somewhere I can build a fire. No telling what's in these woods. Can you walk?"
"Of course." But she couldn't really. Her legs were jelly.
"This won't do, lamb." Spike gave her a hug and swept her into her arms. Tara was too tired to protest. She should have been carrying him. He'd done all the work. She couldn't bring herself to care. She rested her head against his chest and thought how quiet and snug it was being cradled in his arms. He was so strong.
The merry snap of the fire woke her up or it might have been the scent of the roasting meat. Spike was poking a stick at something in the flames. He lifted it out and it fell and he caught in his hands, cursing as shifted it onto a flat rock. He sucked at his burnt fingers and muttered under his breath. He saw that Tara was awake.
"Sorry. Did I wake you, Luv?"
"Uh-uh. Something smells good."
"There's a rabbit hole nearby. Managed to catch one." Spike pushed his tongue against his teeth and tilted his head.
"You killed a rabbit?" Tara sat up, horrified.
Spike blinked. "Well ... yeah. Thought you'd want something to eat."
"You killed it and skinned it and ... poor rabbit."
"Yeah, I did and a lot of work it was, too! Fast little buggers." His lower lip protruded and Tara realized she had hurt his feelings.
Still, a rabbit!
Her stomach rumbled. The meat did smell good and she was hungry. Spike had done all the hard stuff too. A lot of boys might have caught the rabbit but she didn't think many would have cleaned it and cooked it. Not when there was a girl at hand.
"I'm sorry. I ..." He was so wonderful and she was just stupid. She didn't know why he didn't take off and leave her.
"S'all right."
His voice was curt and Tara thought it probably wasn't all right. "I was being silly. Of course we have to eat and we're lost in the woods and you can hardly go picking berries at night and I'm really very hungry and I'm sorry and ... and please don't be mad at me!"
"I'm not." He smiled and she sighed with relief.
He turned back to the rabbit. "You want a bite then? Leg, maybe?"
"I don't think so!" The sound of a strange voice made them jump and they turned to stare at the ring of soldiers that surrounded them. "Are you aware of the penalty for hunting the King's rabbit?"
TBC...