Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Author’s Note
About the Author
Wanting to make her family proud takes a turn when she has to break-in for work, including snagging an elf who roars.
Karo wants to be in the shifter’s guild, and she wants to be a hunter. With her animal form lacking certain ferocity, she chooses to focus on stealth. Her aunt sets her on a training circuit, and when the time comes, she gets the position of hunter with no hesitation.
Spending her life finding things lost or stolen is her niche, and when she is offered a job while on holiday, she couldn’t imagine what sequence of events are kicked off.
Looking for a lost fey-lion becomes a rescue mission for a flock of shifters and makes her exit a tangle of exposure, desperation, and exhaustion. Karo never thought she would see him again, but the fey are tricky creatures, and she was no longer the predator but the prey.
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Heart’s Bandit
Copyright © 2018 Zenina Masters
ISBN: 978-1-4874-2183-0
Cover art by Angela Waters
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Heart’s Bandit
Shifting Crossroads Book 48
By
Zenina Masters
Chapter One
Karo grabbed the picks she had carefully crafted, and she balanced while she slid the steel into the keyhole. Her hands shook, she inhaled and exhaled slowly and carefully while she felt for the tumblers.
Being two hours out past her curfew had been essential to this part of the process. One couldn’t break-in if one wasn’t locked out.
The first two tumblers clicked easily, and she worked at the third carefully, finally feeling it move into position. Her giggle came out as a hiss, and she continued on to the fourth protrusion inside the lock. It was open. She just needed to turn the knob to open it.
Her small hands gripped the knob, and she twisted. It rattled in her grasp, but she couldn’t turn it. She tried for two minutes, but the slick metal slid against her skin.
She wanted to curse, but she didn’t have any good words. She crossed her arms and tried to think of another option.
The door opened and light spilled over the dark porch. Her cousin smiled and spoke softly. “Come inside, I will put the chair away.”
Karo knew when it was time to give up. She watched her cousin remove the picks from the lock, and then, Karo ran past her and up to her room. Pushing the door shut took a lot of effort, but when she was done, she ran to her bed and burrowed into the sleep shirt that she had left out on the bed.
The shift from raccoon to human was still new enough to hurt, but once she got her arms into the sleeves, she was ready to face her punishment for the nocturnal excursion.
When Delia pushed her door open and flicked the light on, Karo flinched. “Ow.”
“You are lucky that Mom is at the Field’s farm delivering a calf. She wouldn’t have found it as funny as I do.”
Delia handed over the lock picks. “These are cute. Did you make them yourself?”
“Yes. It took a while to get them strong enough but small enough to work in my smaller hands.” Karo flexed her fingers.
“Why did you disobey curfew?”
Karo’s Aunt Laura was standing behind her daughter, her disapproving voice stern and darkly irritated.
Karo looked up at her aunty, and she lifted her chin. “I needed the door locked so that no one would open and lock it again while I was working.”
Her aunt looked her over and held out her hand. “Come with me.”
Karo straightened to the height her fourteen-year-old body could manage, and she took her aunt’s hand, walking past Delia with a guilty shrug.
When they were past the rooms where the other foster kids slept, Karo murmured. “You are home early, Aunt Laura.”
“The calf was cooperative.”
Her aunt didn’t say anything else until they got into her study with the door closed.
“Sit down, Karo.”
Karo had a seat across from her aunt’s position behind her desk.
Her aunt looked at her with dark versions of her own pale green eyes. “Karo, what do you want to do with your life?”
Karo tilted her head. “You have never asked me before.”
“You were late to your first transformation, so I wasn’t sure what world you would end up in. As you are heading to use your fur form more frequently, I think that life in the shifter world will be for you.”
Karo nodded. “I want to be a hunter, like my dad.”
Laura let out a sigh that was part groan. “I thought you would say that. You know, my brother Terrence wasn’t a good hunter.”
Karo stiffened, but she nodded. “I know. My father meant well, but he was still one of the only raccoons in guild service. That is what I want for me. I want to take up a position there, and I want to make it my own. I have been teaching myself skills since I was first able to transform, and now, I want to learn how to use them properly.”
Her aunt leaned back in her chair and tented her fingers. “Were you able to open the door?”
“I was able to unlock it. I couldn’t turn the knob.”
Laura nodded. “When you can open the door on your own, we will talk.”
“Wait. What? You are going to let me do this?”
Laura chuckled. “I am your aunt and your guardian. I am giving you full rein to do what you want as long as your grades don’t suffer and you keep up with your chores. By the way, you are now going to get more chores, as you are training to become something more. The guild demands a lot of you, and you need to be ready to multitask at a moment’s notice. If you are sure that this is what you want, I will start training you.”
“You will train me?”
Laura smiled. “Before I had Delia, I was also involved in the guild. I can get you into shape to pass the exams and tests they will put in your path. You will earn your place to represent our family in the guild, and if you can manage to finish your training to my satisfaction, I will send you on with a clan recommendation.”
Wow. That was huge. A clan recommendation would get her application in front of the hunter council, and she would have a leg up on getting into action.
“When do I start?”
“I will prepare a listing of what you need t
o do and what form you need to do it in. When you finish the chores in the shapes that I order, you will be ready for the recommendation.”
Karo waited for the answer.
“You start at dawn, and you can’t be late for school. Get some rest.”
Karo jumped up and sprinted to the door. “Thank you, Aunt Laura. You won’t regret this.”
“I am sure at times, you will. Goodnight, Karolyn. Get what rest you can. Your chores will be listed and slid under your door as well as emailed to you.”
“Yes, Ma’am. I had better get to bed. Thank you again.” She waved and then bolted out of the study and up the stairs as quietly as she could.
Delia was waiting, and she whispered, “Well?”
“I get to start working myself into a stupor in order to earn my recommendation to the guild.”
Delia blinked. “You are going to do it?”
“Of course. Your mom has been great, taking me in, but I need to start training for what happens when I am an adult, and this is the right time for it.” Karo folded her blanket back and set her alarm for five hours later. “I can screw up now all I need to so that I don’t do it later.”
“Right. Well, goodnight.” Her cousin waved goodnight and left, closing the door behind her.
Karo got up when the alarm sounded, and she rushed to her door, the promised paper lying there with the order, Collect the eggs, feed the goats, and clear out the stalls in raccoon form.
She pulled on a sweat suit, slipped her lock picks in her pocket and headed for the barn.
The pre-dawn light was brightening the yard, and the chickens were sound asleep when she arrived at the barn. The chickens were not particularly fond of their raccoon forms.
Karo thought through the logistics and smiled. If she got the chickens’ food ready and delivered it in the front of the yard, she should be able to open the rear hatch and get into the coop from there. Dragging the collection basket would be messy, so she was going to have to take the eggs out one at a time.
She put the lock picks in her mouth and shifted, crawling free of her suit. It was time for phase one of her assignment.
Karo carried the last of the eggs into the barn with her stubby legs moving as fast as she could. Once inside, she clutched the eggs and pushed back on the door until it closed tight enough to keep the cascade of attacking chickens.
She huffed and waddled back to the collection of eggs, setting her last three onto the pile in the collection basket, high up on a stack of boxes.
The goats were stirring, and feeding them was going to be difficult at ground level, so she climbed up to the hayloft and chewed the straps holding the bale together. The hay puffed outward and knocked her back. She squeaked as her little fingers gripped the edge of the loft as she dangled. The goats below were interested in her fur, and a few went up on their hind legs to try and nibble at her tail.
Karo swung her body and gripped the nearby ladder, returning to the hay and pushing it, chunk by chunk, into the feeder below.
The goats would get their particular mix when they were milked, but it was too early for that right now. It took dozens of trips before the hay was in the feeder, and it was time to move the goats.
Karo’s raccoon arms were tired as she crossed the barn and opened the holding stall across the hall. This was the moment. If she opened it and the goats made a run for the feeding stall, she would be trampled.
Her limbs started to shake, and she fought the change back to human. It was no use, Karo was naked and shivering in the middle of the barn a second later.
“Congratulations, Karo. You did far better than I imagined. Get dressed and get some breakfast. I will finish the goats and get them ready for your next assignment.”
Karo was dazed. “Next assignment?”
“You have to milk six of them then make it to school on time. If I were you, I would hurry to breakfast.” Aunt Laura shooed her away.
Karo struggled into her sweats and saw that her picks were still clutched in her hand. Her hand was cramped around them. Her shoes fought her feet, so she clomped back to the house.
The smell of breakfast was intriguing, and Delia smiled at her, sliding a full plate onto the table for her. “Wash up and eat. Mom has given me a breakdown of what she wants you to do, and it will take you a while to master it.”
Karo didn’t comment, she scrubbed her hands in the sink and sat, eating as quickly as she could manage. Her homework was done, and she was ready for the next phase.
“Did you hold your shifted form this whole time?”
Karo nodded and kept eating. When she paused to have some juice, she said, “Until I was stopped and thinking about how to open the gate without getting trampled.”
Delia laughed. “A good thing to think over. Tiyan and Liba are still in bed.”
Before she finished the eggs and sausages, she asked, “What time is it?”
“Five forty-five.”
Karo sighed. “Right. Okay. I can do this.”
Delia grinned. “Go get those goats! Wait, put your shoes on first.”
“I am just hoping that she doesn’t want me to milk them in shifted form. That would take some time.”
Karo finished her food, got up, and put the dishes in the dishwasher and set up a bucket of warm, soapy water with some disinfectant in it, got the empty bucket, and the cup for teat dip ready. When she was set up, she headed out to the barn and the dozen goats who needed milking for Aunt Laura’s farm. Millican Acres was one of the only sources of goat milk in the area. It was a nice income for Aunt Laura, combined with the eggs and other produce from the small farm. Fostering three children added to her income and let them all live in a working environment where they could shift at home and be their beasts when they needed to be.
Karo was happy that she had ended up with her aunt after her father was killed on duty. Her father’s sister had known her brother’s faults and had stepped up to help Karo get through the grief and back into living as normal a life as she could.
Karo entered the milking area, set up her station, and went to the connecting room to the barn. The first goat streaked past her and situated herself on the milking stand.
“Hello, Empress. Good morning to you.” The latch held Empress’s head in position near her food.
Her first client was busy nibbling and snuffling at her compressed alfalfa, minerals, and molasses oats. Karo cleaned her udder, cleared the teats, and set the bucket in place. Milking only took a few minutes, it was the setup that took the time.
After Empress came Leotard then Panther, Mitsy, Caber, and Twist. Twist was named for her squirming on the stand, and Karo was very glad that she had put the other milk in the carrier when Twist took the stand and her feet got restless.
“I know, I know.”
Karo moved the seat she was using and reached in, under the tail. Twist widened her stance, and Karo was able to milk her calmly. She just didn’t like to be milked from the side.
Karo smiled as she finished the milking, brought the dip cup up to cleanse the teats to fend off mastitis, and poured the last of the milk into the strainer over the canister.
Once you learned the necessary procedure, even the most annoying task was easy. That was a motto that she was going to engrave on her eyelids, but first, school.
Chapter Two
Karo crept through the dark corridor, her body pressed against the baseboard. Every day that she used her raccoon to find what was missing, she thought back to that first day of her Aunt Laura’s weird training regimen.
The work that she and her aunt had put in to getting her to this point was astronomical. More than one round of goats had trampled her beneath their dainty hooves, but she learned to channel her human strength through her raccoon form, and the force and dexterity that came along with it were key to her success. That was the key, as was her refusal to come back without her mission focus.
Today, she was in search of a clipping of seal fur. The loss of the fur had occurred whe
n the seal wasn’t looking and the possession of the missing patch was causing the living owner of it issues. Sometimes, the little bits that the collectors and mages used were deadly or crippling for the shifters. Sometimes, the damage was done with malice.
She hunkered down and crept up on the door to the study. Her nose told her that the magician had just left it and farted as he locked the door. She wrinkled her nose, gathered her strength, and jumped.
She gripped the doorknob with her feet and used her hands and the matte black picks she carried in her mouth to pick open the six-tumbler lock. When the lock released, she twisted the knob with her feet, and then, she dropped lightly to the floor, tucking the picks back in her mouth.
The scent of the seal was in a case on the far side of the room. Karo went the long way, hugging the baseboard again and watching out for traps. She circumvented two nasty rodent traps, and then, she used her human strength to climb the podium, using her picks again on the lock of the case.
There were layers of magic to get through on the lock, but her picks carried similar enchantments to her fur. The mage wasn’t the only one who could use human magic. There were a few mages who worked with the shifter guild. This man just wasn’t one of them.
Karo got the fur patch and tucked it into the elastic pouch that she wore as a choker when she was human, and it held her catches when she was a raccoon.
She closed the case and latched it again before climbing down the post and heading back with the same care that she had taken for her first incursion. Getting out was harder than getting in. Now, she had the potential to be chased.
Karo followed the same route and used her own footprints as much as she could. The path through the guest room was the one she had chosen, it just happened to be on the upper floor, which meant a lot of stairs.
She scampered up the stairs until she was at the attic level, and then, she crept through the door and exited via the window.
Heart's Bandit (Shifting Crossroads Book 48) Page 1