Jax and I looked at one another. We knew what to do when we heard the evacuation order come through. Our camp would scatter, disappear in the night like we were never here. Abandon everything. It was a loss, but it would save our lives.

The logistics of abandoning a camp during an attack were not exactly simple. The aerial team would need to keep their defenses up while we escaped, but then they would be isolated and trapped. So we had to leave in waves and remain hidden in order to help them.

It was dangerous and we would lose some warriors while we did it. If they thought we needed to abandon, though, then that meant the alternative was for everyone to die or be captured.

Jax's eyes fell down to my stomach. I didn't wait for him to ask. I didn't want to be coddled.

"I can move still."

"You're sure? We need to strategize if not."

"I'm telling you I can. We're in the first wave to leave, anyway. Let's go. I want to find a place where we can offer support when the second wave flees."

He nodded.

I caught Ralph's hand, wincing. "Be careful."

He clasped my cheek, worry bright in his eyes. "You too. You won't have a healer."

"I'll be okay."

We couldn't wait any longer. I remembered the powerful hit that Jax had taken to his stomach and wondered how much of a fight he had left in him as well. I could tell that his movements were not as clean and precise as usual. He covered it well, but he was hurting. I would go down faster, though.

I stopped by the warrior I'd hit with my power before we left. "How bad is it?"

She shook her head. "I'm okay. I put up a shield. You saved me life."

I smiled, not sure that I'd directly saved the life of a Silver Moon guild member before. Of course, in battle we had supported each other and undoubtedly all saved each other with our efforts. This was new ground. So was fleeing with an enemy guild member turned partner.

I swallowed hard as I grabbed my side and tried my best to run through the camp. Jax followed me on the ground when flying would be faster. He may not have had the energy, though.

Abandoning camp felt terrible. It was worse than defeat because we weren't even finishing the battle. When Lote had created our plans for abandoning camp, I'd told him that no warrior would be okay with it. He'd insisted that our lives were our greatest resource and the most important thing to the guild leadership. I understood the necessity of retreat and abandoning camp.

I just resented not being strong enough to take down these enemies.

As Jax and I escaped through the fog and ran into the smoke, I realized just how outnumbered we were. The warriors we had fought were only the first wave. I now sensed more surrounding the perimeter, waiting to join the reinforcements.

I would make these people pay in battle for attacking us in the night when we were isolated from the rest of the army. What cowards. How had they been allowed to get this close? This would be investigated.

I faltered as we stole into the woods, catching myself on a tree. Jax grabbed my hand and pulled me to him so fast that my feet lifted off the ground. He didn't slow down, but held me with his arm around me as he ran. I managed to get my feet underneath me and to run with him, but I didn't want him having to drag me around like I was a child.

"I'll be fine."

"We can't slow down."

He was breathing harder than he normally would. Begrudgingly, I allowed him to keep hold of me and to help me run along. My ankles started to itch from the smoke. It was starting to attack us as well, which would force us to use a shield and give away our positions very clearly to the enemy.

Then, I sensed the energy ahead.

"Wait!" My body bowed as I pulled away from him and gathered my power into a sword. Three warriors moved through the woods for us. We'd been spotted or sensed. I'd been trying to conceal my energy, but it was hard when I was so weak.

I noticed that this far out, the smoke wasn't strong enough to break through their defenses. They ran toward us with a shield surrounding them.

Jax and I let them come to us this time. We didn't need to tell the other. For the first time, I realized that we had fought together so much that we'd gotten an instinct for each other.

The fight immediately felt overwhelming. I parried a hit and tried to kick, except my foot completely missed when the enemy dodged. My wound felt like a weight trying to drag me to the ground. The adrenaline helped to energize me and mask my pain, but my body felt clumsy.

I was bleeding again, likely having broken open my wound that Ralph had barely managed to close enough for me to not bleed out. Jax charged two warriors, forcing them to focus on him, and I knew he did this because I was hurt.

Panic scratched at me. It wasn't just this immediate danger right here. It was that all of our people in the camp were facing the same attacks.

We needed to escape. We didn't have the strength to fight these people off. I'd have to swallow my pride and let Jax help me. The only way to get away from these three would be for him to carry me while he flew away. Did he have the strength to do it?

I couldn't even communicate the plan with him, though, because I was breathless from the fight and the blood loss. I swung with all my might only for my attack to be easily knocked away.

Forget honor. I gathered energy in one hand and thrust the blade with the other. When the warrior went to defend herself, I dropped the attacks, and ran to Jax.

Just as I was about to reach him. A blade broke his energy sword in half and caught the edge of his chest. He managed to follow-throw by creating and throwing a dagger energy at the opponent, but the warrior knocked it away.

The second warrior wasn't slowing down.

"Jaxon!" I dove forward, wrenched my shield up, and just barely caught a powerful blow from an ax that carried with it an enormous amount of energy. If I had not managed to steel myself with my own power and focus upon reinforcing my defenses, it would have snapped my shield in half and carved through my body.

The fear that had flooded me when I saw Jaxon go down exploded out from me in a blast of energy that smacked against the attacker. He slid back from the invisible force pressuring his body, but I planted my feet and pushed more of my strength into the attack, until it broke through his defenses and sent him flying back onto his ass.

I lifted my shield once more and prepared my blade. "Can you stand?" I couldn't afford to look at him when I had to keep my attention on our enemies.

His voice came out strained, but I could hear him rising behind me. "Yes. Thank you."

"I couldn't let someone else kill you, could I?"

I heard his sly grin in the tone of his voice, despite the pain I heard as well. "That honor is saved for you alone."

This damn man must have started to rub off onto me. What was I doing teasing when we were both bleeding and running for our lives?

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"Can you fly?" I asked.

He caught my eyes, seeming to understand.

The three warriors attacked at once.

Jaxon caught me around my waist and darted up into the air, breaking through limbs, the branches snapping against us. It hurt like hell but within seconds we were flying above the tree line.

I couldn't draw in breath. Agony screamed from my wounds and gripped my lungs.

Jax fell lower in the air suddenly and then caught him. His blood soaked my back.

"Hang on," he said.

He tried to reposition his arms but no matter how he held me, it hurt horribly. Finally, he twisted backwards so I was lying on top of him as he continued to fly with his back to the ground.

I gasped in a breath, digging my nails into my skin to keep quiet. The world spun, not just because of his flying, but because of the blood and pain and the dizziness.

"Can you… make it…?" I asked.

"Yeah." His voice sounded as strained as mine and he said nothing else. We flew slower every passing minute, but we were still flying.

How could we provide cover if we flew away like this? Protocol was that if you were severely wounded, then you fled. What about the others though? We couldn't leave them to die.

Tears burned my eyes. "Jax," I said. "The next wave."

"We can't."

That was it. He said nothing else. I wasn't sure that I even had a say in it because I could hardly talk and I couldn't exactly climb off of him to plummet to my death.

I tried to speak again but my voice came out only as a groan.

My heavy eyes slid closed.

"Hang on, Ash." He'd already said it and it wouldn't help me any, but still hearing him say my name soothed me.

The trees blurred beneath us as we disappeared into the dark of the night sky. I missed the summer when the midnight sun never left us. These days, the nights had grown longer and longer. Soon it would be horribly cold. Deadly cold. Too cold to war. That wouldn't stop any of us, but it would likely slow down the fight for territory until spring.

I wanted to tell Jax I was sorry that I couldn't help and I was literally weighing him down. His breathing was ragged against my head now, his flight incredibly slow. His hard chest pressed against my back, straining from the effort of carrying us both away. I figured that he probably never carried someone around while flying, especially not while wounded and exhausted from a late night ambush.

We cleared the woods and flew over a narrow stretch of field between the trees. Jax slowly lowered toward the ground until finally we landed. It wasn't entirely graceful but it wasn't a crash landing. Still, it was enough to jostle us both. We both groaned as we rolled onto our sides, his arm still around me.

I couldn't move. It seemed he couldn't either. His heavy arm was limp and one of his legs lying over mine.

If we could rest for only a few moments…

No. Jax was bleeding and hadn't been bandaged yet. I had soaked my own bandage. We needed to find shelter.

I started to crawl out from under his arm but ended up collapsing on my back. I looked over to see his body covered in sweat. Dark blood stained his chest and his left arm. His eyes just barely opened.

"We can't stop," I said.

Together, we managed to rise to our feet and clung to one another as we stumbled toward the next line of trees. We were far enough away that I could no longer feel anyone's energy. So if we could find a good place to hide, we could stop.

We needed water and bandages. Medicine. Neither of us had the strength for it.

Jax and I stumbled along together, holding trees for support, until he spotted a little creek.

I could have cried.

We chose a spot where a tree had grown into the stream and a few smaller ones had formed a little alcove.

Jax and I both collapsed and drank desperately.

I felt myself on the verge of passing out. I couldn't until we had ourselves bandaged.

"Okay," Jax said. "Okay. Let me see your side." He tugged on me, rolling me toward him.

In all the chaos, I'd managed to forget who we were, what he stood for and who he served. The temporary loss of my grip on reality now faded. We were once again Ashton and Jaxon, enemies from the two most powerful guilds in the Valley.

I shoved him back, panicked I'd let him close, refusing to allow myself to be so weak that I accepted his help. "Take care of yourself. You're hurt."

"Stop it." He grunted as he pressed his hand to his chest and pulled at my bloodied bandage again. "Why are you being annoying again?"

"I told you–"

"You know what, we are going to fight. Right now." He pushed to his knees despite the pain tightening his expression. "Get your sword ready."

I would have laughed if I had enough breath. "Look at yourself. You'll pass out."

"Look at you. I've put up with you long enough. If you can't even let me help you–" He lowered his head, breath catching. "Shit. If you… can't let me bandage your wounds, then we just need to fight it out."

I swallowed hard, realizing I'd gone too far this time. It was just that I could feel his body against mine still and he was so close that his heat warmed me. I needed to push him away. "You really want to fight me?"

"You clearly want to fight, so yeah, let's fight."

Sweat peppered his temples. I felt my own wetting the small of my back. A laugh bubbled up and I was entirely too exhausted to hold it in. The sound came out winded and strained and more than a little pathetic. Practically a whimper. But I couldn't hold it in.

Jax watched me for several seconds before a tired grin crawled on his face and he laughed quietly as well.

"Fine. I concede. I do." Gasping at the pain from moving, I moved my hands away from my wound so he could help me. "We have to take care of you soon, though."

He peeled my bandage back. "It's not good, Ash."

"Yeah." I rolled my head to the side and glanced down him to search out any injuries I'd missed. "Do you think that punch damaged any organs?"

"I think I'm just bruised from it."

Jax tore away more of his tunic, leaving a swath of his stomach bare. We were all used to the cold here, but we didn't have blankets. He was going to be freezing. I noticed gooseflesh prickling his skin already. The contours of his hips and abdomen caught my gaze for longer than it should have.

I closed my eyes while he rebandaged my wound, not needing to distract myself for long because it hurt horribly.

"If you help, we can close my wounds without bandages," Jax said. "I already closed the one on my arm. I may need just a little more energy."

"Sorry. I'm not good at this."

"You can't be good at everything. It's fine. Just focus on strengthening what I'm doing. I can get us both to stop bleeding at least."

I could feel his eyes on me. Glancing over, I met his look, holding my breath. It scared me how he didn't seem so bad. I so easily fell into loyalty for my friends. If I let him into my heart at all, then I'd struggle to keep him as my enemy. He might not have the same qualms about me. His easy attitude made me suspicious.

Jax held pressure on my wound while I did so to his chest.

"You lost a lot," he said.

I nodded, trying to hide how shaky I felt. "What about you?"

"I didn't lose as much. It just looks nasty."

"Probably feels nasty too."

He managed a weary smile and I was too exhausted, too hurt, to draw my defenses up against him. It was hard to keep him and the others in his guild from encroaching upon my heart when we fought and bled together on the battlefield. It was especially hard to keep him out. He made it seem so harmless to pretend we were anything more than enemies. I reminded myself I couldn't be his friend, that I should remain cold to him, only the worry in his eyes as he looked at me seemed so genuine, it disoriented me.

I closed my eyes, wanting to drift to sleep and escape from him.

"Hey…" His voice roused me from the verge of sleep minutes later.

I murmured and forced my eyes open.

His voice was soft and the smile absent from his face. The seriousness of his eyes took me by surprise the way it had in battle. "You sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine. Really."

"You didn't look okay. You were groaning."

I glanced down to my hand that pressed against my wound. "We should sleep."

After staring for a few more seconds, he finally nodded. "Just wake me up if you start to feel bad. I can try more healing."

Jax had reached the limit of his abilities. The energy he would expend would not be worth the slight improvement to my injury. "Thanks."

He hesitated, seeming surprised. "You too."

For the span of only a heartbeat, I met his eyes, unable to keep myself from briefly seeing how beautiful they looked with his dark whiskers making the gold in them pop. My heart pinched and I turned my head away.

Helping each other with our wounds was as close as we could get.

I absolutely under no circumstance could allow myself to feel anything, no matter how infectious his smile, or how convincingly deep his gaze. This man had devoted his life to a guild that threatened the existence of my own. It was not that he simply belonged to them. His conviction and loyalty matched my own. We were enemies. The truest form of enemies.

So why did I always have to remind myself of this simple fact?

"You fight better…" My voice started to fade. "Than anyone I know…"

His fingers were still touching my hand and I felt them move every so slightly, brushing my skin, as sleep took me under.