by Andrews, Jo
“We’ll come, but in our own time.”
“I can take you to her, right through the outliers. They will not see us.”
“They’ll have a watch on her. One shout and we’re all dead. Then what will they do to her in retaliation? No, we play this my way.”
“I will do whatever you say.”
“You’ll go back tonight. You’ll keep an eye on her until we come. You said they wouldn’t harm her for two days, but there are all sorts of ways to harm without reducing her usefulness to Arrhan. Isn’t that so?”
“Yes,” whispered Kihain miserably.
“So if they try to hurt her in any way, you will stop it. Or die trying.”
“I swear it,” said Kihain intensely. “On my honor and my life. Which is forfeit to you for what I have done.”
“It is,” said Ian in a flat, hard voice. “Remember that, because I will claim it if I survive when all this is over.”
“If I too survive, I will turn myself over to your justice. My oath upon that, pride-lord.”
“Go.”
Kihain went.
“Will he keep his word?” Nick asked wryly. “Or will he turn his coat one more time? All this spinning around like a top is making me dizzy.”
“Guess we’ll find out,” said Ian tonelessly and reached for the phone.
* * * * *
Sierra hoped the night would be uneventful. Retreating to the edge of the clearing, she wedged herself between two huge roots of a massive oak. With its wide trunk at her back and the roots protecting her flanks, the only avenue of attack left open was directly in front of her. Of course, that wouldn’t be any protection at all if a Shifter really wanted to attack her, but at least it gave her some illusion of safety.
She didn’t sleep well. There was constant movement in the clearing as Shifters came and went, and she kept having the uneasy sense of being watched, which she probably was since they wouldn’t have left her unguarded. But no one approached her, for which she was profoundly thankful since gang rape would not have been considered damage by Arrhan, only an amusing diversion for his followers. Iseya must have given orders that she was to be left alone. Only a word from Arrhan would have countermanded that, but he seemed to have forgotten she existed, the way one would forget a gnat once it stopped buzzing in one’s ear.
She woke with the dawn and eased herself out from under the fur that had kept her warm during the night. There were still plenty of Shifters in the clearing and she stayed in the shadow of the trees as she headed toward the stream. A Shifter suddenly blocked her way.
“I just want to wash,” she said. He nodded brusquely and stepped back to let her pass.
She brushed her teeth, washed her face, then took a long drink before heading back to the clearing, combing her disheveled hair as she walked. It was no good trying to go anywhere else. Shapes moved throughout the woods on every side.
She was too nervous to be really hungry, but she ate some of the food anyway, knowing she had to keep up her strength. Then she huddled back against the oak, the fur pulled over her. She wanted to remain unnoticed for as long as she could and the brown of the unknown animal whose skin had provided that fur blended into the brown of the oak reasonably well.
It was a beautiful day, sunny and cloudless. Birds fluttered and sang in the trees, but otherwise nothing much happened. Time dragged. Sierra found herself falling asleep, still exhausted after her restless night.
A little flurry of excitement brought her awake again. Glancing up at the sky, she saw that it was nearly noon. The Shifters in the clearing were all stirred up with smug, satisfied grins on their faces. Sierra didn’t like the look of that.
She saw Arrhan giving orders to his men on the other side of the clearing, Iseya beside him. Then the two of them came strolling her way. Sierra withdrew even farther under the fur.
“We have him now,” Arrhan was saying. “I knew the human female was the right bait for the Lowe.”
“He is too honorable to allow her to suffer in his place,” agreed Iseya tonelessly.
“He is a fool. But that is to our advantage. He says he will be at the meeting point by mid-afternoon.” He smiled grimly. “He vows to come alone with only two of his henchmen to act as marshals for the combat. Which means he will come instead with all of his pride and many of these other felines who have chosen to support him.”
“Perhaps,” said Iseya. “Or he may come as he says.”
“If so, it will then be easy. He is old and no match for me. His death in challenge means that I may lawfully take over his pride without further dispute. If on the other hand he comes in force, we will still have him. I want that area ringed and my men in position an hour before the agreed time. We will be there first and we will outnumber whatever coalition he has managed to cobble together. All the cats in this county total not a quarter of my troops.”
“True.”
“I want to overrun them. Capture, not death, is the goal. The other cat species are to be killed, but I want all the lions alive and bound to me. This means that each of my men must be vastly more powerful than the Lowe he faces. I believe there is a spell that will empower them.”
“There is, Lord.”
“Cast it when the time is right.”
“I will, Lord.”
He didn’t miss a trick, Sierra thought bitterly. It didn’t matter that the Wade County Shifters were hopelessly outnumbered. He still wanted more of an advantage. It wasn’t fair, but he wouldn’t care about that. He would think it the practical thing to do. His ambitions reached further than just the Lowe pride. Once he had taken the Lowes, his troops had to be ready and in good condition to move on and seize the next pride.
If only there was a way to stop Kurt from coming! He was meeting Arrhan’s challenge because of her and there was no way to prevent it. Even her death right now wouldn’t help since Kurt wouldn’t know of it and would still come to the rendezvous point.
If only there was some way to warn him!
Mid-afternoon could mean anything from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. She had only a couple of hours to find Kurt. If Arrhan’s Shifters didn’t see that she was gone. If they didn’t hunt her down. If she could even figure out where the hell she was and cross the intervening distance. Oh God, it was hopeless! But she couldn’t just sit here and do nothing. Even if it was futile, she had to try.
She slid out from under the fur and stood up, pressing back against the trunk of the oak. Arrhan and Iseya were at the center of the clearing, but neither of them was looking in her direction. Arrhan’s followers seemed to be busy as well. Very carefully, Sierra began to inch her way around the wide bole of the tree. If she could put that between her and the clearing, she might be able to slip away unseen.
She froze suddenly. A lion who had been crouched in the shadows was rising slowly to his feet, his yellow eyes fixed upon her. It was one of the lanky adolescents, lacking the weight and the full mane of the adults. He must have been assigned to watch her. She had been aware of him before, a bulky shape lying in the grass some distance from her. He had been there all night, so still and silent that she had forgotten his presence when the day came and the other Shifters had either returned from their nocturnal activities or begun to rouse from sleep and move around.
Well, that put paid to any hopes of escape, Sierra thought bitterly. Then the lion reared up and turned into Kihain.
Sierra gasped. Everything that had happened yesterday argued that Kihain was Arrhan’s man. But now something in his strained expression suggested otherwise. A little spark of hope lit inside her. Maybe he wouldn’t give her away.
He made a tiny, furtive gesture to stop her from speaking, then looked pointedly past her and upward. She turned to follow his gaze and found herself staring at a tree a third of the way down the side of the clearing. Amidst the thick branches and dense foliage, something moved and then was still again.
Sierra caught her breath as her heart lurched. Seen previously against the green of grass and
bushes or the white of bed sheets or the rosy tiles of the sunroom, the gold fur and black rosettes of a leopard’s coat had been a punch in the eye, glaringly obvious. But high up in the tree amidst the shifting sun-dapple of golden light and black shade, that same coat was virtually invisible, the perfect camouflage. If Ian hadn’t moved on purpose to show her where he was, she wouldn’t have seen him at all.
For a moment she thrilled with delight and relief. A second later, though, that relief turned to terror. He had come as she had known he would. Right into the most awful danger. What could he hope to do against over a hundred other Shifters, even if he did have Kihain apparently on his side? He had positioned himself so the wind was blowing in his direction and the other Shifters in the clearing would not scent him. But any Shifter downwind would. And so would the others when he and she finally made a break for it.
Kihain was making a little hissing sound between his teeth to draw her attention. She saw the urgent look in his eyes and the tiny jerk of his head toward Ian. “Go to him,” he was saying silently. She had to trust whatever he and Ian had come up with between them.
She started to work her way cautiously toward Ian, hugging the tree trunks and keeping in the shadows at the edge of the clearing. A few yards deeper in the meadow, Kihain kept pace with her, his body blocking the view of those in the clearing, hiding her unless someone came close. Sierra prayed that wouldn’t happen.
She saw Kihain cast a glance upward. Sierra looked up too, but there was nothing to see but the sun. It was high noon.
There was a wailing shriek in the woods, the sound of something in agony, dying. Then a clamor of shouts, yells and roars broke out. Bodies poured from the forest—big cats battling and squalling and tearing at each other. She heard the thunder of Arrhan’s voice bellowing orders, then he raced past her in lion form, his fangs bared in a vicious snarl and a horde of his troops following him. An opposing wave of lions met them head on. The fight spilled out across the clearing.
In the chaos, she saw Ian. He had leaped down from the tree and was flashing across the grass toward her.
“Go to him!” Kihain yelled at her. “Get out of here!”
She started to obey, then stopped suddenly. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of Iseya drawing a sign hurriedly on the grass with some sort of white powder. The spell! The empowering spell! The one that would make Arrhan’s troops vastly stronger than ordinary Shifters. That’s what Iseya would be casting.
She couldn’t be allowed to complete it. The Wade County Shifters were already so badly outnumbered that a further handicap would doom them. Sierra spun and ran toward Iseya.
“Sierra, no!” Kihain leaped in front of her.
“I’ve got to get to Iseya!” she screamed at him. “Help me!”
For a horrible second, he hesitated and she thought despairingly that he would stop her. Then he shifted and flung himself at a group of three lions in her path. They rolled across the grass, kicking and tearing.
Sierra jumped over the limp body of a dead lion sprawled on the grass, its throat torn out. The tiger that had killed it was now tackling another lion. His action, by fortuitous accident, cleared the way for Sierra to reach Iseya.
Iseya had completed the arcane sigil she had drawn on the grass and was standing with her arms flung up above her head and strange words pouring from her lips. She gave Sierra a dismissive glance and then ignored her. Even in human form, Iseya was far stronger than Sierra and had nothing to fear from her.
Sierra yanked out the paddle Doc had given her way back when Ian was fevered, tore off the rigid plastic cover that protected its head, and slammed the prongs into Iseya’s bare shoulder. As Doc had promised, the anesthetic took effect at once. Iseya dropped like a stone in mid-word.
“No cheating allowed!” snarled Sierra to her limp body. “I’ll bet even in your world mages wouldn’t be allowed to interfere with pride wars. Or if they did, our side would have its own mage who could stop you.”
Arms grabbed her.
“Run, you crazy little fool!” Ian snapped in her ear. “This is no place for you! Straight ahead. Don’t stop for anything. Go!”
He shoved her forward with one great push that lifted her feet right off the ground. She landed running, then saw him flash by her in leopard form, his claws ripping out in one slash the throat of a lion in her path.
She ran as fast as she could and he cleared a path for her, killing, killing, killing. He seemed to be everywhere at once, in front, beside, behind. It was superhuman, more than even a Shifter should have been capable of, because she saw other Shifters quailing before him. He had gone beyond himself, into a killing frenzy. He had told her of it once, the rage that was close to madness but still retaining intelligence and cunning.
They were out of the seething, heaving, caterwauling insanity that was the clearing and its close environs, were racing through the forest now. Here too cat shapes were locked in vicious combat, though the crush was far less. She found herself herded sideways by the pressure of Ian’s shoulder against her hip. He was angling for a specific point with a definite destination in mind.
The ground was rising, which made it even harder to run. Her calves ached, she had a painful stitch in her side and her chest hurt from the exertion. But he insisted on keeping up the pace, pushing at her with his shoulder every time she flagged.
Something loomed in front of her—a gigantic shape more than ten feet high as it reared up. It was brown and shaggy and looked as if it weighed over a thousand pounds. Not just any bear. A Kodiak.
Sierra jerked back, appalled, tripped and fell flat on her rump. Ian skidded to a stop and stood over her in leopard form, snarling, while she stared at the bear in shock.
The Kodiak rippled and turned into the biggest man Sierra had ever seen, six foot eight with a chest as deep as a cavern, shoulders that splayed hugely wide and muscles that bulged like boulders. Even with most of his bear mass existing in limbo, as Ian had once told her, he was still ginormous. Sierra gaped.
Arms scooped her to her feet, held her tightly.
“You’ll take care of her?” Ian said to the Kodiak.
“Yes,” rumbled the bear.
Ian pushed her gently from him, his hands leaving bloody marks on the shoulders of her white tee. He was splattered with gore, none of which was his own, she saw with relief.
“Stay with Thorvald, Sierra. You’ll be safe with him.”
“Where are you going?” she exclaimed, grabbing at him as he turned away.
“To help Kurt.” He turned back abruptly, caught her to him and kissed her hard. “Gonna say it now whether you want me to or not, Sierra. I love you.”
“Oh God!” She clung to him. “Then stay here, Ian! Don’t go back!”
“I must,” he said, shifted into leopard and was gone before she could say another word.
“Ian!”
“Those are his friends down there,” said Thorvald, glancing down at his nakedness and moving discreetly behind a bush to spare her human sensibilities. “He can’t leave them to fight alone.”
“Then what are you doing here?” she flung at him angrily. “Why aren’t you down there, helping?”
“It’s not our business,” said a harsh new voice behind her.
She spun, startled and saw a lean, rangy figure lounging insolently against a nearby tree. Wolf bodies wove behind him. But he was in human form, a dark-haired, swaggering, arrogant man, brazenly naked and, unlike Thorvald, caring nothing for her sensibilities. She jerked her gaze upward and pinned it to his face. He grinned at her embarrassment.
“Challenges are considered internal conflicts. Other species don’t interfere. Ian and the other cats of this county are actually breaking the rules by involving themselves in a pride matter. But we will overlook that because of the discrepancy in numbers.”
“Big of you,” Sierra said bitterly. “They’re only outnumbered four to one.”
“Oh, it’s not that bad.” He shrugged. “Ku
rt called in a few favors and other prides have sent along their surplus progeny to help out. The odds are a little better now.”
Sierra closed her eyes in relief. Maybe they had a chance! Especially now that Iseya and her empowering spell had been taken out of the equation. Arrhan’s troops wouldn’t have the physical advantage Arrhan had wanted and would have to fight the Lowe pride and its allies on an equal basis.
She looked down at the clearing where the battle was raging. The clearing and the woods around it lay in a shallow bowl that seethed with embattled forms. All around the rim of that bowl, shapes moved. To her left, huge, shaggy, black and brown and white bears were rearing up on their hind legs to watch. To her right, wolves were lined up, their eyes like green flames, their jaws open and drooling, whining a little with excitement as they looked on. There was even the mad cackle of hyena laughter in the distance, coming from the other side of the valley.
“My God!” she breathed. “How many other species are here? Why have you all come?”
“For the show, what else?” mocked the wolf leader. “Really can’t pass up this kind of entertainment.”
“Shut up, Reece,” rumbled Thorvald, rolling his eyes in resigned exasperation. “Ian called us in, Miss Wallace. A valid challenge may not be our business. But we will not countenance invaders from the old country threatening the prides of our world. This Arrhan might succeed in taking the Lowe pride and its friends. He will not take more. He and his people will be bottled up in this valley. Any who attempt to cross our lines will be summarily killed.”
They were the cordon sanitaire and Arrhan a disease that would not be allowed to spread. The bowl had become a trap. The valley in which Arrhan had chosen to conceal his band was not a refuge, but a prison. Sierra caught her breath as she realized the further implications. If Iseya recovered enough to open a Gate to somewhere else in this world, that location too would be immediately surrounded by this world’s Shifters. Wherever he went, Arrhan would find himself contained and his threat negated.
“Ian arranged this?”