New Beginnings

20. Carmilla

Well then, back to finding another set of stairs.

The sound of gunfire and shouting had become more sporadic. Either the goons were winning and there were fewer gargoyles to shoot at or the gargoyles were winning and there were fewer goons still alive to do the shooting. She knew which way she'd be betting.

Beyond the hall she left Gustav with the gargoyles in were more art rooms. The first floor had sustained much less damage than the second. In a lot of rooms the only indications of damage were the holes in the ceiling, most of which Carmilla suspected to have been made when the helicopter had shot at her with its giant gun.

As she searched for a way down to the ground floor, she heard a voice through those holes.

"Come on, you can do it Hollis. Just get one foot... in front of the other. If you could do the Mantario Trail in the rain with Dad, right after eating two whole tubs of ice cream and getting the stomach ache from hell, you can do this. One foot... in front of the other."

Her heart skipped a beat.

"Laura!" She shouted upwards.

"Carm!" Laura's voice floated back down to her. It was weak and unsteady, but Carmilla could hear the relief in it when Laura called back to her.

"Stay there. Don't move, I'm coming to you. Stay there."

"Oh god can I do that, I can absolutely do that. Sitting down and not doing anything sounds great right about now."

To hell with finding stairs, there were a few holes in the ceiling big enough to get through if she could reach them. She looked around the art room she stood in.

Near the middle of the room was another statue on a pedestal, much like the man on a horse one from before. This one was of a robed woman holding a baby. She moved to it and started climbing, first stepping onto the pedestal and then, with a grunt of effort, clambering onto the statue's shoulders. To keep herself balanced she crouched slightly and kept a hand on the woman's head. The nearest large enough hole was still a small leap away. She could see the fresco covered ceiling of the second floor through it.

When she looked down to see how far she'd fall if she messed up her jump, it struck her that after everything else they'd gone through, it would be quite the irony to break her neck now attempting this. She took a deep breath and leaped.

Her leap got her about halfway through the hole and she scrambled for purchase on the ruined floor, legs dangling in the air. Unable to find something to pull herself up and out, her arms started sliding inexorably backwards. She felt a rising panic as the next few seconds went by in a flash, another moment and she'd be hurtling back down to the hard floor below.

Hands grabbed her own, giving her something to hold onto. She did so gratefully and with their help she hoisted herself out of the hole and onto the second floor.

"What were you thinking?" Laura asked as they lay tangled together on the floor near the hole, she sounded like she was suffering from a bad case of the flu. "You could have been hurt!"

Carmilla kissed her.

She hugged Laura tightly as she did so, running hands over every square inch of her as if she needed to physically make sure Laura was all still there, that she wasn't missing any of her. When everything was accounted for, Carmilla broke the kiss and laid her head against Laura's chest, feeling the vibrations of her heartbeat and the rise and fall of her chest.

Of her five senses sight and sound were the least useful to her now. She needed to feel Laura with her hands and taste Laura on her lips. Her eyes had closed during the kiss and she hadn't bothered to open them again. Her fingers started gently massaging Laura's back. A pressure in her mind she hadn't fully realized had been there until now eased away. It may have been ludicrous, considering they were still stuck in a burning building full of enemies, but she found herself feeling safe and that everything was going to be fine.