Marking Territory (Freelance Familiars Book 2)

by Daniel Potter

  I took a step forward, smiling to myself.

  "You're insufferable," She told me even as she reached out and curled her hand around my neck, pulling me into her newly smothering chest. I leaned into her. This close, I could smell fear and nerviness soaking through her shirt.

  "For your Christmas present I'm going to sew a cellphone into your hide. Tallow had no idea where you'd gone. Said you broke your bond and abandoned O'Meara."

  "I did not! Well, abandon her I mean," I protested.

  "I figured. That witch has you wrapped around her broomstick." She slid her hand down the length of my spine and banished the last of my adrenal vigor, the only thing holding back the tide of exhaustion. It hit me with like locomotive constructed of couch cushions, and the tension left my body.

  Even altered, her scent spoke of safety, and I let my head fall into her lap. "You should have mentioned the..." My words swam away from me. "Bigness."

  "I don't need help from O'Mooora." She clapped her hand over her mouth and swore. I finally got a good look at her hand. The tips of her fingers had knitted together. She looked down at me. "You said this would fade," she said, her tone slightly accusatory.

  I tried to respond, to snap something back, but I couldn't find the words. They were there somewhere in the haze of my mind. If I could just sleep for a bit. I closed my eyes.

  "-omas! Thomas!" An earthquake shook my world. I peered up at Noise through the hazy film of my third eyelids. "What's wrong with you?"

  "Tired," I managed before slipping back into the black.

  ***

  I woke to the sound of running water and the wet scent of body wash. I started awake with far less grace than is usual for a cat, rolling off the couch and getting tangled in the blanket that'd been placed over me. I looked around, a bit dazed. Bright, natural light crept around the corner of the kitchen. Dogs on pogo sticks, how long have I been sleeping? I wondered. I usually woke up an hour before the crack of dawn. I nosed Noise's cellphone and the display, along with the chibi Tracer from Overwatch, read 9 a.m..

  The door to the bathroom opened to reveal Noise toweling herself off in a blast of steam. I whirled, and my eyes nearly popped out of my head. Every part of her had enlarged and rounded, from her hips to her arms, and nearly double for her chest. It was only a little outsized for her nearly six-and-a-half-foot frame but edging into cantaloupe range. She caught the angle of my eyes and raised a thick finger in warning. "You make one dairy joke and I'm going to lock you in the closet with an open bag of catnip for a day."

  I wrenched my eyes away, wincing at the thought of the time I'd "tried" catnip. Noise only broke out that threat when she was being serious. "Sorry."

  "Well, at least we know you're still a little human beneath that fur, despite the feline sense of humor. You going to tell me what happened to you?"

  "What are you talking about?"

  "You passed out so thoroughly that I painted your claws."

  "What!" I looked down and flexed out my claws. Sure enough, the claws of my right paw had been painted hot pink and the left sported fluorescent green. "NOISE!" I pulled them into my paws so hard my muscle ached. I looked up into her huge impish grin, her ears flicked with amusement.

  "Do you want me to get the remover?" she offered, innocently.

  My jaw fell open. "No!" If there was a scent worse than nail polish remover in the universe, I had yet to experience it. The barest whiff and I'd have an awful sneezing fit. "You are a cruel and sadistic person, Noise."

  She cupped her breasts with two-fingered hands. "These are your fault. If I don't get this fixed, I'm going to be on my father's menu. I thought you might need a reminder of me when you’re out gallivanting with your magi friends."

  That struck me as unfair. "Noise, I don't cause the random overlaps of realities. That sort of thing requires a magus that doesn't faint every time she channels."

  "I don't care, Thomas! I want you to fix it." She pulled her hair back so I could see the nub of a horn that had begun to poke out of the crown of her skull. "At this rate I'm going to be a slab of beef before the half moooooo—" Noise slammed her fist into the doorframe, cutting off the prey animal sound with a saw-toothed growl. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before continuing. "If we don't fix it by the half moon," she said, clearly annunciated the word, like a hiker skirting the edge of a sinkhole, "then my family might decide to have me for dinner. Then you won't have me to crawl to after O'Meara does whatever the hell she did to you last night."

  That got my hackles up. "She didn't do anything to me!"

  "Her scent was all over your fur! And I've never seen you so out of it! And you had supposedly left her!" she growled. "Where the hell have you been?" Her voice cracked and a soft sound escaped her, neither cow or wolf nor human, but the hurt in it was crystal clear. She turned away and took a drawn out sniff that might have been the start of a sniffle.

  My ears wilted as my mind broke out the clear-in-hindsight-hammers. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I'd hurt her, again. I should have gone to her the night I'd walked away from O'Meara. I trotted over and encircled her legs. "Sorry. Just a lot of magus stuff is going down. There was a duel and O'Meara nearly killed herself. I had to re-bond her to stop that, and I wore myself out. That’s all." Noise's gaze remained skeptical, so I continued to babble. "I broke it again once I was done."

  That piqued her interest. She knelt, took my head in her massive hands and stared into my eyes. "Are you telling me you're not bonded to anyone right now? There's nobody's in there with you?"

  Well, there was Mr. Bitey, but he didn't kiss and tell. "Uh, no. I'm unbound." It finally dawned on me what she was saying.

  A slow smile spread across her slight muzzle. "So we're really alone. After six months?” She slid her hands down my neck and sides in a decidedly non-platonic way. Heat rose into my ears, and into other places as our lips met, finally unhindered by the thoughts of another.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  We rolled into the parking lot outside Jules' workshop around noon. Noise had developed a nervous grunting sound in her breath as we opened the door.

  I'd expected stares and inquiries as we walked in. Instead, Jules and Jowls were huddled over one the work tables, Jules frantically sketching on the paper before them. The rest of the crew snoozed on cots spaced out between the other tables. Tom, Dick and Harry slept on a large yoga mat piled on top of each other, a mass of wrinkled suits.

  "You sure this is the spot, Thomas? Kinda looks more like a tech start up that's running out of funds," Noise commented after she walked through the door. Nobody even glanced up at the nearly seven-foot-tall werecow-wolfwoman.

  I couldn't really disagree. "Jowls? Jules?"

  Jules’ gaze never wavered from the paper in front of him as he held up a hand. "Busy. Need a few more moments."

  I padded close to the huddled men and poked at Richard's leg. The three snorted as one and each of their eyelids fluttered. Harry finally opened one eye. It lazily slid over to me, to Noise as she loomed over the Magi, and then it slowly traveled up her body. The other eye joined the party as they paused on her chest. Noise had broken out her largest clothing yet still appeared poured into them.

  Harry muttered something that I didn't catch, peeling himself from the pile, which groaned. "Hello there." He rapidly wiped the sleep from his eyes and ran his fingers through his short, fizzled hair. He stood up and extended his hand. His head was precisely level with Noise's chest. He blinked.

  "My name is Noise. I'm hoping you can help me." Noise took his hand with her massive two-fingered one. Harry jolted with shock as it engulfed his.

  "Well that’s awkward," Tom and Dick said, smiling from back on the mat as Harry tilted his head back to look at her face.

  "I'm, uh… I'm Harry." He rubbed both eyes with his fingers to clear them of the remaining crusty sleep, then gestured back at the yoga mat. "The layabouts down there are Tom and Dick."

  "Richard," Muttered Richard.

 
Harry's eyes flicked down and back up to her face. "You're not a werewolf. What are you?" Fear flashed over his face as the other two men's eyes burst open.

  I quickly interposed myself between Harry and Noise. The motion wasn't as successful as I'd hoped since my head only reached her waist. Harry stumbled back as he noticed me. "She is a werewolf," I said.

  "I got stuck in a transition," Noise added.

  Immediately, the other two of the trio were hauling themselves up, peering at Noise with curiosity. "I'm hoping you all will be willing to take a look at her and try to help us figure out what went wrong," I said.

  "After you cut us off at the duel?" Tom said. "Why did you abandon us like that? Are you still bound to O'Meara? Did you tell her everything we are working on?"

  A slight whine slipped out of my throat, but I centered myself and tried to look unfazed. "I thought it would be better for all parties if O'Meara hadn't lost consciousness at that moment. And to do that I needed to take her fatigue."

  The three heads reeled a bit. "You can do that? You can sleep for her?"

  "Is that why you fell asleep mid-sentence last night?" Noise stared down at me.

  "It’s something familiars can do sometimes, but it requires a very open bond," I said with as much authority as I could muster. Truthfully I had no idea. I'd done it without much thought months ago to enable O'Meara to spend a few hours awake at a time when she'd first come out of her coma. "But yes, if you wanted, I could sleep for the three of you." I unspooled Mr. Bitey. "Same deal as before."

  "We require a bit more warning if you plan to break the bond," they said.

  "A whole minute would be nice," Richard added.

  "Deal." And we re-bonded without a fuss. Although the link seemed even smaller than before. A note of wariness flowed from the three magi.

  "Miss, if you would stand on this table here." The three gestured at the workbench with the inscribed casting circle.

  Richard then glanced up at the ceiling, which was about six inches above Noise's head. "Well, sitting down in it might work better," he amended.

  Noise nodded and levered herself onto the table. The wood creaked dangerously under her weight.

  You realize we've never actually looked at a thread itself before, Thomas? the trio thought. That’s not something we can do easily without the sight.

  Harry's voice drifted over the other two's. Not to mention it's the opposite of what we're trying to do with our current research with the LAPIS.

  I mentally kicked myself. Raking through my memories, I hoped I hadn't actually told Noise that these three could fix this.

  How hard could it be? Let’s take a looksee, Tom countered. Go ahead, Thomas.

  Okay. Would this be a scrying spell then? I closed my eyes to Noise's knitted eyebrows and stared into the dark of my eyelids. I could make her out, a pale figure in the dark slowly focusing as if I were watching a Polaroid develop. Her hand blurred up to her nose. “Stop moving!” I snapped and continued to stare into her. Interconnected lines of faint energy flowed through her like a web of rivers, a hidden circulatory system. Yet the energy appeared to have no source or outlet.

  I felt Richard's eyes flutter open, broadcasting another image of Noise, fuzzier, shifted, less crisp but Noise all the same. Yet the lines of energy didn't line up, didn't connect. The viewing angle had changed the very location. More images flowed from Tom and Harry.

  Wow, the trio breathed.

  What? What are you all seeing, I asked.

  Hold all four viewpoint in your head at once, they instructed. It’s much easier that way.

  I did as instructed, trying to hold what I saw as well as what they saw in my mind’s eye. It hurt, stretching parts of my brain that had not been used before.

  Bob you head side to side a bit.

  I did so, and the lines flowing within shifted as my viewpoint changed.

  Suddenly I saw it, like something in my brain slipped out of alignment, and for an instant the lines knitted together.

  There! You had it! Do that again!

  Like probing your teeth to discover which one has the toothache, I concentrated on the feeling. I'll never forget that sensation. After several attempts, I found that white hot spot in my brain and pressed. Noise snapped into clarity in front of all of us, the thread of her soul a river looping through her body and out into the unknown. All the smaller rivulets broke apart and resealed again. Yet some of the flows appeared disturbed. A stream of something else ran through, tangled in the capillaries of her very being.

  Following all the flows to their source took some doing. Threads braided together as they exited her body, peering inside these threads the vision of the full moon flashed through my mind, carrying with it a name, Luna. I pulled back with the speed of a reflex, but not before I felt a searing weight of perception slam down on me. Pale light began to fill the darkness between the realities.

  Yet in that light, my eyes caught the glint of something else in the braid of Noise’s soul. A thread clear as glass had invaded the braid. I peered closer and saw green fields within. It had actually pierced Noise's original thread and, as the pale energy flowed down the thread from the moon, bits of this invading thread came with it.

  Merciful tides of Mercury! the trio exclaimed. She's like a tiny shallowing! As the moon grows stronger it will push more and more of this plane, this reality down into her.

  With all that friction between planes, it’s got to generate some tass! Harry thought, peering deeper at the connection. Within it, a distorted image of a cow lay at the intersection point.

  You could milk her for tass! Tom laughed.

  I broadcast what she would likely do to someone who attempted that along with a growl of my own. I'd like your help fixing this, not harvesting my girlfriend.

  A ripple of embarrassment went through the three men, along with a note of disappointment from Harry. As they thought on the problem, the three turned in on themselves, their thoughts becoming distant murmurs for a few moments.

  We're no experts on werewolves Thomas. It’s an interesting problem, and we have several ideas. She's got a corner of a universe lodged in her soul. It's wonderful as long as she survives it. Events like these are what create creatures of myth. Fixing this sort of thing usually isn't done.

  She's a werewolf, not a science experiment. Give me options.

  They grumbled about the waste. With a lot of tass, you make a soul spider spell. It crawls up the thread and carefully pulls the thread apart, separates the strands and then weaves them back together. You'd need somebody good with souls, like Lady Cavell of House Morganna or Exploding Fox of House Hermes. What we could do with a bit of tass, a groat maybe, you trim off one corner of that plane with a blade of tass and give the soul a good shake. Should get it disentangled. Might snap though.

  Snap her soul? That didn't sound good.

  Souls are neither immortal nor indestructible, Thomas, but they're tough and repair themselves. We'd probably need to wait and—

  "Eureka!" A distant shout echoed through the shared mindspace as heard by four sets of ears.

  "They did it?" the trio burbled excitingly and started pulling their attention out of the shared perceptions. While Noise's condition was interesting, whatever Jules shouted about was capital-I important. I looked back at the tangle of Noise's soul, the loss off each of the magi's perceptive made it look flat. I traced the invading strand back into the void. The thread attached to a tangle of colors that twisted upon itself and bent around everywhere. It hurt to look at.

  My vision flared to white, sending searing pain into my mind. I tore myself away and blinked. My mind felt sunburned as my vision started to clear.

  "We did it!" Jowls said. "Oh, it’s going to be fabulous! But we have to move quickly before the calculations decay!" I could hear the sound of the workbench creaking under Jowl's bouncing weight without seeing him.

  "Thomas, why is she here?" Jules asked.

  "Oh never mind her! She's clearly a friend!
Aren't you, hun?" Jowls countered.

  I smacked the side of my head with my paw, as if that would help get my eyes back online. The white had faded into blotches of runny colors and dim shapes that might be the table, but everything continued to be fuzzy.

  "Yes, I'm Thomas' friend," Noise answered. I felt her eyes on me. "Thomas, are you okay?"

  The fuzzy bits in my vision resolved into absurd shapes that could be reality. "Maybe?"

  "I believed you broke the circle while he was still in deep scry mode. He'll be okay," Tom said.

  "Oh my poor handsome Thomas!" Jowls cooed. A warm body pushed against my flank. "Do not worry. If you're blind, then I can guide you!"

  Okay, that object in front of me was definitely a table. The thud of a pair of booted feet hit the ground next to me.

  "Just what are you doing to my boyfriend, cat?" Noise growled at Jowls.

  Oooooh. That's why you didn't rebind us! Richard thought. A night with your lady.

  Jowls weight promptly disappeared. "Oh ho ho! That sort of friend! Thomas, I'm so hurt!"

  I looked toward him, an orangey blob. I'd never seen the purple bits of him before, however. At least twelve different foci ringed Jowls' collar, a multitude of colored nexi and more than half of them golden, wards of some type. I'd never noticed them before. I wondered if they were concealed.

  The weight of Noise's hand on my head reminded me of the conversation. "Jowls, you're male."

  "Of course! You're open to dating way outside your genus, but you're troubled by a little thing such as gender?" He sighed dramatically, pressing the back of his paw to his forehead. "It's alright. I'll gather up the pieces of my shattered heart and carry on. Somehow! Someway! I'll find a way to distract myself. Maybe a ton of tass will have to do for now."

  A cheer went up from the trio. "Where is it?"

  My vision had recovered enough that I could see the cat’s sharp-toothed grin. "Barely two miles away. But we have to hurry! We have less than an hour to get there and setup."

  "You're not leaving without us." Sandra had appeared in the corner of the room, her face flush with excitement. "It's finally ready."