Bearing the Black Ice (Ice Bear Shifters Book 4) (5 page)

Alan and Hannah spent the next several days exploring the nearby tunnels, only to be faced with dead end after dead end. Hannah had started to despair again, but Alan remained confident that they would find a way. They snuck into the greenhouse every evening, grabbing fresh vegetables and berries, and replenishing their water supplies from the stream that ran through the area. They chose a different room to sleep in every night, and did their best to minimize their scent and any evidence of their presence. If it hadn’t been for the constant threat of a Blizzard attack, exploring the cave like this might have been fun and almost romantic. Although an escape route eluded them, they made a new, interesting discovery nearly every day.

One day, the tunnel they were exploring dead ended into a room of sparkling purple and green stones. As Alan shone his flashlight around the room, the beam reflected back at them with colorful, tinted hues. Another day, the tunnel they explored ended in an underground waterfall. Hannah couldn’t believe that the water hadn’t frozen, since the room felt to her like it was about a million degrees below zero. But Alan explained that it wasn’t actually
that
cold in the room, and that the force of the running water was enough to keep it from turning into ice.

The most interesting discovery, however, was the room they dubbed “the meat locker.” One day while they were in a particularly cold branch of a tunnel, they came across a large room where numerous blocks of ice had been stacked into makeshift shelves. On the shelves were piles and piles of frozen meat. Hannah sniffed at it.

“Seal,” she said. “With a little bit of whale here and there.”

Suddenly, everything seemed to click for Alan.

“This all makes sense now,” Alan said.

“What does?” Hannah asked, as she ran her fingers across one of the piles of seal meat and tried to think of a way they could build a fire down here in the cave and roast some meet. Her mouth watered at the thought. But she forced herself to dismiss the idea. Even if they could figure out a way to make fire, the smell of smoke and roasting meat would quickly alert any passing Blizzards to their presence. As appealing as a meat dinner sounded, it was far too risky.

“The Blizzards have been here all summer, but no one knew how they were surviving the heat. But it’s been easy for them—they just hide out down here in the areas of the cave that are cold. They have plenty of water and vegetables, and they stocked up on frozen meat. What more could they ask for? There’s no need to go up to the surface, except to attack or torture bears from another clan. This place is like a fortress.”

“It’s definitely a fortress,” Hannah agreed. “I can’t believe we’ve been down so many tunnels and haven’t found a single exit.”

“I think they’ve blocked all the entrances and exits on this side of the greenhouse room. If there’s only one, it’s easily guarded.”

Hannah’s face fell as she considered this possibility. “Well, that would put a damper on our escape plan. For our own sakes, I hope you’re wrong about there only being one entrance.”

But Alan wasn’t wrong. The next day, they explored the next to last tunnel, and the further down the tunnel they went, the stronger the smell of Blizzard became.

“Alan,” Hannah whispered. “Do you think it’s a smart idea to get so close to them?”

Alan just shrugged. “I have to find out if there’s an entrance here, and, if so, whether there’s any feasible way of us sneaking past them to get out. Why don’t you go back where it’s safer and let me finish up the exploration of this tunnel by myself?”

Hannah shook her head, horrified. “No way am I leaving you alone here near their main hive. If you insist on exploring here, I insist on coming with you.”

Alan looked back at her and smiled. “You really are an obstinate one, aren’t you? I tell you what. Let’s go back and set up camp for the night. We’ll have dinner and rest up a bit. When it gets really late we’ll sneak back here for a night mission. We’re less likely to be discovered if it’s late and most of the Blizzards are sleeping. We’ll just have to be wary of using the flashlight.”

Hannah agreed. The idea of walking into the Blizzards’ lair still terrified her, but she didn’t have much choice other than to trust Alan. Letting him go by himself wasn’t an option for her. She would never forgive herself if he ran into trouble and had to face the Blizzards alone.

Which is why, late that evening, Hannah found herself tip-toeing along behind Alan as they headed back to the spot where they had left off earlier. As they continued past that spot, the scent of Blizzard only got stronger. When faint light started appearing in the long tunnel, Hannah almost turned around and ran back. But Alan never wavered or slowed his pace. He just kept steadily moving forward. At one point, he pulled her quickly down a side tunnel and held her pinned against the wall. Breathing heavily, Hannah heard the voices of the two Blizzards Alan had been trying to avoid. She thought the Blizzards would smell them and attack for sure, but they kept walking by. From their loud, obnoxious laughter and slurred words, Hannah recognized that they were drunk. She breathed a sigh of relief at the near miss.

As they continued on, they reached a point where they could catch a glimpse of a large, arched entrance to what looked like another oversized cavern. Soft torchlight lit up the room and spilled into the hallway, silhouetting a large man pacing slowly back and forth under the arched entrance. He was the only guard at the entrance, as far as Hannah could see, although she had no doubt that others were stationed in the cavern and roaming the tunnel where she and Alan were exploring. Straight across the large room was another arch, this one with a proper door affixed to it. Another large guard leaned lazily against that door. Inside the cavern, dozens of Blizzards were lying around the room on cots, snoozing soundly. Alan had been right. This was their main hideout, and that door on the other side probably led out of the cave.

Alan poked Hannah’s arm gently, and made a motion that he wanted to head back in the direction they had come from. Hannah had never felt so relieved. Her heart had been pounding nonstop during this whole expedition, and she couldn’t wait to be back in the relative safety of their evening hideout spot.

When they got back to their base camp, Alan sighed loudly. “Well, it looks like we’re screwed,” he said.

Hannah made no comment for a moment. She wasn’t willing to come this far and then admit defeat. She had gone from being certain that she was going to die to hoping that her escape was imminent. She couldn’t let go of that hope yet.

“You don’t know anything for sure, yet,” she finally said. “We still have one tunnel we haven’t explored. There could still be another exit. And we could always go back to the other side of the cave where we came from. There are a lot of exists over there. They’re just really hard to find.”

“Hannah, the other side of the cave is a mess. It’s a freezing wasteland. Honestly, it’s a miracle we made it through a few days over there. If we go back, we’ll lose our easy source of food and warmth. We could wander in circles for weeks with no sign of an exit. And you know as well as I do that the last tunnel over here is only going to lead us to a dead end. Whatever extra exits might have been on this side of the caverns originally, the Blizzards have closed. They aren’t stupid. They want to keep things as secure as they can without having to station guards all over every tunnel.”

“Well, we have to at least look. We don’t know for sure until we try.”

Alan rolled his eyes. “Hannah, come on. You know it’s a waste of time as well as I do.”

“Do you have a better idea?” Hannah asked. She crossed her arms and stared Alan straight in the eyes. She wasn’t going to back down on this one. They had to be sure they weren’t leaving any options undiscovered.

Alan sighed. “Fine. We’ll look tomorrow, if it will make you happy. But don’t think I’m not going to say I told you so when we confirm that I’m right.”

Hannah grinned. Victory! She knew it was a long shot, but she just had a good feeling about the other tunnels.

Alan’s face broke into a smile. “You’re so cute when you’re feeling all self-righteous,” he said. “Come here, you.”

Hannah went over to him and let him pull her down onto their rocky bed. He leaned in to kiss her, and she let him as she relished the feeling of his erection stiffening and pressing against her. They had spent almost every night making love. Hannah had thought the feelings of chemistry and passion would eventually start to fade, but so far they were still going strong. Being trapped in a cave was a pretty depressing situation, and Hannah could not have been more thankful for the nightly distraction. And tonight, especially, she needed the distraction. She closed her eyes and melted into Alan’s kiss, letting everything fade away except the delicious feeling of his body against hers.

* * *

“I told you so,” Alan said, crossing his arms and giving Hannah a defiant look.

“Don’t be a jerk,” Hannah replied, her voice taking on a hollow note. “You can’t tell me that you’re happy about being right in this instance.”

Alan didn’t reply, just watched as Hannah traced her hand along the perimeter of the solid rock wall where the last tunnel turned into a dead end. Of course, he wasn’t happy about being right. But he wasn’t surprised. And, as far as he could tell, they only had one option left. An option he knew Hannah would protest against vehemently.

“We have to storm the Blizzards’ cavern,” he said.

Hannah froze in her tracks, with her hand pressed against the rocky wall. Her back faced him, so he couldn’t see the expression on her face. But he knew whatever it was it wouldn’t be happy. After a few long moments, she turned to look at him, her eyes incredulous.

“Are you out of your mind?” she asked.

“I’m assuming that’s a rhetorical question,” Alan said.

Hannah kept talking without even acknowledging his snarky comment.

“There are only two of us, and a bazillion of them.”

“Bazillion’s not a real number,” Alan said. Hannah shot him a look of death, and he decided to keep quiet and let her talk for a few minutes.

“We’re way outnumbered. And, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not the strongest of fighters like you are. If we try to go into that room we’re dead meat for sure.”

“Listen, Hannah, just hear me out. We’re not going to fight them. At least, hopefully not. All we need is a decent head start. If we can get out of that door before most of them have time to realize what’s happening, we can get away. The guards are lazy and not very alert. They’re not expecting anything exciting to happen. We’ll just go late at night, when everyone else is sleeping. We’ll count to three, shift, and run like hell. By the time they see that there are two non-Blizzard bears running across the cavern, we’ll be almost to the door. I’m a fast runner. I’m assuming from your small bear size and large calf muscles that you are, too.”

Alan glanced appreciatively down at Hannah’s calves and she blushed.

“Look,” Alan continued. “Staying in here forever isn’t an option. Going back to the other side of the cave isn’t a viable option. If we want to live, our only hope is to take them by surprise and get out of here before they have time to react. The longer we sit around here contemplating what to do, the greater chance we have of being discovered. I don’t think they know we’re over on this side of the cave yet. Obviously, they must know we’re in here. They might have looked in the old cavern where they threw you and saw that you were gone. And I’m sure they’ve discovered the dead Blizzard patrolman who attacked you by now. But, odds are, they think we’re lost or starved over on the other side. We still have the element of surprise. Let’s use it while we still can.”

Hannah looked long and hard at Alan after he finished his attempt at a persuasive tirade. For a moment, he thought she might agree with him. But then she broke the silence by shaking her head at him and snorting in disgust. She took off back down the tunnel in the direction from which they had come.

“You’re crazy,” she called out over her shoulder.

Alan sighed, and started following her. He had to think of a way to convince her to try his plan. Of course it was risky. But there wasn’t exactly a safe option available here. He followed her in silence, trying to come up with different ways to word his pleas that might appeal to her more. But no matter how he planned to phrase it, the end result was always obvious. They were going to run through a den of Blizzards. Either they would escape or be torn to pieces. There wasn’t much of a middle ground here.

As it turned out, however, Alan didn’t have to convince Hannah of anything. She could demonstrate her stubbornness quite forcefully sometimes, but she wasn’t stupid. She must have mulled over Alan’s suggested plan and the other available options during their trek back, and come to the conclusion that Alan’s plan was their only real choice. As they settled back at their base camp to eat their raw vegetables, Hannah spoke softly.

“Okay,” she said.

“Okay?”

“Okay, let’s try your plan. Tomorrow night.”

He looked up at her and nodded, then went back to chewing on his bell pepper. No further explanation was necessary. They were throwing all their chips on the table tomorrow, and hoping to win big.

Later that night, as they snuggled down into their rock bed for the last time, Hannah sighed deeply and squeezed her arms around Alan so tightly that she nearly cut off his circulation. He would have liked to make love to her here one last time, but she was nervous and clearly not in the mood.