“You may want to check beneath your clothes,” he said, casting me a sideways glance.
This was no time to be worrying about preserving my modesty or being a shy wallflower around him. He turned around while I stripped to my bikini. Thankfully, after a thorough inspection I was able to conclude that there were no bloodsuckers anywhere down there. I slipped my torn jeans back on.
“Okay, there was nothing,” I said. “You can turn around.”
But he didn’t turn around. I walked up to him to see him concentrating on removing a particularly monstrous leech that had attached itself to him just above his navel. He gripped its head and yanked it out, squeezing out the blood from it before tossing it into the bushes.
“How many did you have on you?”
“Just two.” He looked down at my stomach, frowning. “Lift your shirt again.”
I lifted it to reveal the wound the black leech had caused, blood flowing freely from it, showing no signs of clotting. His wound flowed similarly. I thought he might bend down to look at it more closely but his jaw tensed and he jolted back several feet away from me again.
This was so difficult for him. I was a walking meal. He turned his back on me, his shoulders heaving, struggling to regain control. Finally he turned around again, his eyes focused on my face, avoiding looking at the blood leaking through my shirt.
“You’re going to need to drink my blood again,” he said, his breathing still uneven. He extended a claw and poised to slit his right palm again.
“No,” I said quickly, not willing to risk vomiting up my guts again. “Don’t cut yourself again. My wound will heal.”
“Not fast enough. Leeches inject an anticoagulant to stop your blood clotting.”
When I still hesitated, he breathed out sharply in irritation. He stood up and began walking away.
“Wait,” I said, “Don’t leave me!”
“I’m not leaving you,” he hissed. “Just stay there. If you won’t drink my blood, I need to find something else to help clot the blood, or I’ll drink from you myself and there will be no blood left in you to coagulate. Trust me, unlike the leech, there will be no detaching myself from you if I do lose control.”
I watched as he disappeared behind a tree, now regretting that I hadn’t just forced myself to drink his blood again. I breathed out in relief as he returned a few moments later carrying a handful of long thin leaves. Still keeping his distance from me, he put three of them in his mouth and began chewing.
“What are you—?”
He removed the leaves from his mouth—now crushed to a mushy pulp—and approached me slowly. He swallowed hard as he stood next to me. He lifted my shirt and placed the pulp against my wound.
“Hold it there,” he said.
As soon as I held it in place he stepped away, turning his back on me once again.
“It will speed up the clotting,” he said.
“Oh, thanks,” I said, staring down at the gooey pulp. “And what about you?” I looked back at him, noticing that he was making no attempt to stem his own bleeding shoulder.
“It doesn’t matter if I bleed.”
“It matters to me,” I muttered.
He ignored me. Silence fell between us. He paced up and down in front of me, like a panther protecting its territory. I assumed he was waiting for my blood to stop flowing.
My assumption was correct. A few minutes later, he looked at me again.
“Check the wound.”
I peeled back the pulp. The blood had clotted, just as Caleb had predicted.
“It’s okay now.”
“Then we need to keep moving.” He closed the distance between us and bent down in front of me. “Climb back on.”
I wrapped my legs around his waist. He stood up and began rushing through the trees again. Still holding the mushy pulp, I reached for his shoulder and placed the plant against it. I looked at his face for a reaction. His jaw twitched, but otherwise he didn’t acknowledge my gesture.
I held the pulp there as he raced forward until the blood had stopped flowing freely and began to thicken. Then I threw the pulp away.
I replaced my arm around his shoulder.
“So you still have no idea where we are? Are we even on Earth?”
“Yes, we’re in the human realm.”
“Where are we going?”
“I don’t know,” he breathed.
I decided to ask no more questions of him. At least for now. He seemed to be as clueless as me as to our whereabouts, and he needed to concentrate on getting us out of this jungle before day broke. And the sun drained him of all energy.
We passed the next few hours in silence. We didn’t stop again. I supposed that was a good thing. The speed at which Caleb was running prevented mosquitoes and other nasty-looking insects from landing on me. I felt their high-pitched buzzing in my ears several times as we ran through particularly thick clouds of them, but thanks to Caleb’s swiftness, none were able to land on me.
I didn’t know how I did it, but as I rested my head against Caleb’s back, listening to his heavy breathing, feeling the strength of his body so close against mine, exhaustion took over me and I drifted off.
* * *
Strong hands shaking my shoulders brought me awake with a start. I sat bolt upright, bewildered as to where I was or how I was looking up into Caleb’s face. It took a few seconds for the memories to return.
I was lying on the ground, Caleb leaning over me, artificial light casting shadows over his sweaty face. Sounds of civilization surrounded me, just a few meters away. We were in a cluster of bushes, and just a few meters away street lamps lined a concrete road. A little further than that was a market.