And as a hoard, they skittered towards the warm flesh of the prisoners, hungry for blood, some of them taking to the air in a whirl of wings.
"So," Titus said, keeping his voice amazingly calm, given the situation, "you know a bit about roaches, yes?"
"Yes," Kataryna agreed, stomping on some as they got too close to her. The problem with stomping blagh gru was that Furrae did not normally wear shoes, and the critters had exceptionally hard shell-cases and sharp jaws. She made an effort, but could feel them clawing their way up her legs.
"What's good against them?" He skewered one on his knife. Its legs twitched spasmodically.
"Fire," she replied, jerking her tail out of harm's way and swiping at one of the airborne critters with Titus's shirt, "but I didn't think to bring a firestarter. Did you?"
"Err, no. So anything else then?"
"Poison, Flyspray and well… we're kinda screwed, aren't we?"
Titus only nodded. The roaches were swarming up their legs now, and Kataryna swatted as many as she could aside, but she knew only too well how fast these little monsters worked. Even adult zebu fell beneath them.
Behind her the deer bucked and kicked and squealed. Having harder hooves then the two Furrae, it was making better progress, but blagh gru were alighting on it, and it did not have the advantage of protective clothing. They would have to think up something, and fast.
Titus exhaled sharply, a sigh of hope. "Kat," he shrieked, "the rope, I can see it - lift me on your shoulders I'm sure I can make it out."
"Maybe you can," she replied, batting off another blagh gru, "but what about the deer and I?" They were wasting too much time - she could feel the cockroaches climbing up her legs, their little claws imbedding themselves in her flesh and the cold numbness that spread from their bites as they injected the poison to make the blood flow smoother.
"I'm sure I can get you out," he replied, declining to mention the deer. Kataryna suspected he did not really care about it. It was a typical attitude. However, if she got out of here, the deer was coming too and that was the end of it. She crouched down and Titus scrambled onto her shoulders. He was surprisingly light - little more then skin and bones. She clenched her teeth against the claws of the blagh gru. Her head was already starting to get a little light. She wondered if there were enough here to drain her before she escaped and found the thought too much for her.
"Almost got it," Titus called, "can you just step to the left a little?"
Kataryna obliged, and felt relief as Titus's scrabbling fingers grasped the edge of the pit and he dragged himself out. A moment later the end of the rope came tumbling down.
"Climb up," he called, but Kataryna had other plans.
She still held Titus's shirt and now she grasped the deer by the scruff of its neck and pinned it between her knees. It squealed and bucked, made wild by the biting bugs, but she managed to slide the shirt beneath its belly and tie the sleeves at the top. It closed its mouth hard about her wrist and she could feel the long canines slashing deep, but she held fast. The rope was too short to tie to the deer's halter, indeed, it was barely long enough for her to reach, if she were to stand on tiptoe, so she hooked one hand beneath Titus's shirt, praying that it held, and grasped the rope with the other.
"You'll have to pull me up," she called, and realised that her words were slurring and that sweated beaded her brow. She must have already lost quite a bit of blood to the vampirical creatures. A familiar crimson haze danced behind her eyes.
Titus tugged on the rope. "Goddamn," he muttered, "you're heavy. Must be those wings." The rope jerked and danced and the deer writhed, struggled and pulled and Kataryna's fingers began to ache. The whole world seemed to be slightly out of focus and her thoughts tried to flit and dart away from her. After what seemed like an eternity but was in truth probably less then a minute, she felt Titus's hand close about hers and she and the deer were dragged to the ground. Titus slashed off the remaining cockroaches with his knife. The deer wriggled free of the shirt-halter and bolted into the woods.
"Brilliant," he muttered, crouching by her head, "not only did you risk your life for a blasted animal, but you've ruined my favourite shirt." He paused, shaking her, "Kat? Kat?"
But she could not reply, her mouth did not seem to want to work properly anymore.
More urgently, "Kat!"
She blinked, remembering the warm water as it slowly turning to crimson around her, the haze that settled upon her. No pain, no elation - nothing, nothing but this growing spreading numbness.
"Kat, we have to get you to a healer and now, you've lost a lot of blood," he glanced around fitfully as though searching for help that of course was not to be had, and then draped what remained of his shirt across her and hastened off into the woods.
And from the shadows the deer padded forward to stand beside the semi-conscious Furrae, gazing down at her with dark, solemn eyes, he slowly began to lick the bloody cuts that marred her arms, her face, her neck and feet.