Heart of the Cat

by S. E. Smith

  Walkyr hesitated. He looked at the forest again before he nodded his head. The others at the camp would assume that they had been attacked and eaten or that they had deserted the group. At least they would if any of the others even noticed they were gone. They had drawn little attention from the disgruntled band so far. With a sharp nod of his head, Walkyr reluctantly agreed.

  “Notify Vox,” he quietly instructed.

  Walkyr waited as Pallu contacted their brother. He could hear Vox’s quiet inquiries as Pallu told him that Eldora, Vox’s former lover, had spoken the truth. Walkyr felt little sympathy for his brother’s former lover. She had betrayed her people. She’d said she had done it to protect her family. In the end, someone had poisoned Eldora to silence her, but before she died, she tried to repair a small part of the damage she had done by sharing her knowledge of this hidden camp, and warning them that the threat to their family and people was still very much alive.

  “Watch your backs. I’ve ordered the attack team to take the encampment,” Vox stated.

  “The men said they were waiting for the High Lord. I overheard several of the men talking. They said he should have been here days ago. They are concerned that he has not arrived,” Pallu replied.

  “Bragnar must have warned the High Lord that we were closing in on him before he attacked Viper. I want this finished, Pallu. The Heart of the Cat must be found and secured,” Vox ordered.

  Walkyr snorted and looked over at the screen. “Your wish is easier said than done, brother. Even with the Curizan’s technology, we can barely see more than a few feet in front of our faces,” he retorted.

  Pallu nodded in agreement. “IF we don’t get lost… or eaten… and those are two big IFs, we still have to find this forgotten palace and decipher the message that was left behind in the scroll,” he added in a dry tone.

  “Between the two of you, you’ll figure out where it is,” Vox responded with confidence. “We are departing now and will meet you at the encampment when you get back. Out.”

  Walkyr saw Pallu blink at the blank screen before he bared his teeth at it. Walkyr quietly chuckled and shook his head. Where Vox charged into things, Pallu planned everything out and used technology to resolve an issue as much as possible. Each had their special skills. However, those skills came with different attitudes. Vox was bossy and impatient. Viper tended to be short-tempered, but his actions were well thought out. Walkyr’s other two brothers, Gable and Qadir, liked to work as a team. Walkyr, on the other hand, preferred to work alone.

  “You should stay here,” Walkyr quietly said.

  Pallu frowned. “I thought we agreed that I should go with you? Don’t you think I can keep up?” he responded with a slight growl of frustration.

  Walkyr turned and looked at his younger brother. His gaze dropped to the screen in Pallu’s hand. Lifting an eyebrow, he grinned.

  “I changed my mind,” Walkyr said. “This mist is heavier than it looks. One of us needs to stay here if I’m going to find my way back. Vox would be pissed if we both got lost,” he reasoned.

  The indignant look in Pallu’s eyes faded as the rationale behind his request sank in, then Pallu pulled a small black bag from one of the pouches in his utility belt. Pallu opened the bag and pulled a tiny black disk the size of a small seed from it. He balanced it on the tip of his finger before he carefully tapped his finger to the center of the screen. Once the screen changed, Pallu held the small disk out to him. Walkyr gingerly swept the black dot off of his brother’s finger and looked at it with a frown.

  “What is this?” he asked, looking up at his brother.

  “These are your ticket back, so don’t lose them,” Pallu replied, holding out the bag. “Arrow and I developed them. You need to create a trail of them along the way. The device I gave you is crucial. It is connected to my system. Press it to your neck.”

  Walkyr gave his brother a skeptical look before he pressed the dot to his neck. He hissed when he felt a slight prick to his skin. Pallu grinned at his reaction.

  “You could have warned me that it had a bite,” he dryly commented.

  Pallu shrugged. “We installed micro-hooks to keep it attached to your skin, even if you shift. The device also has biometric enhancements that allow for individual user identification. I added that function. This way it won’t come loose, and you will be less likely to lose it, considering it is so small,” he explained.

  “So, I take the others and scatter them as I go along? How will I know where they are?” he asked.

  “They will emit a vibration. Arrow originally wanted to use heat, but I told him that wouldn’t work. The last thing I wanted was to leave any more of a heat signature than you would normally put out. It would make it too easy to track you. Plus, how would you know if it was the locator or your own body? I also didn’t want anything that made a noise. It wouldn’t be good to have it go off and alert others. Instead, I went for a pulse. The closer you get to one of the markers, the faster it will pulse,” Pallu explained.

  Walkyr nodded, impressed with his brother’s creativity. “How many markers are there?” he asked, opening the bag to peer inside.

  “A few thousand, but you need to make sure you place them no more than five hundred steps apart. Any further and they lose their effectiveness. Oh, and you only have two sunrises to return. Something that size has a limited power source. They will deactivate and dissolve after that to prevent anyone from finding them,” Pallu cautioned before he glanced down at the screen he was holding. “We are about to have company, and it isn’t one of ours. Go—I’ll take care of them.”

  “How do you know someone’s coming?” Walkyr demanded, looking in the direction of the encampment.

  “I added trackers to the liquor this morning. This way we would know if anyone tried to escape,” Pallu chuckled as he slid the small screen into his pocket and pulled out his weapon.

  “It is better to observe than attack. We wouldn’t want them alerting any of the others before the security forces arrive,” Walkyr replied.

  Pallu gave him a disappointed nod before he replaced his pistol and looked up. Walkyr shifted and took to the trees. A second later, Pallu did the same. They watched two of the rebels from the encampment approach. It was obvious both men were extremely nervous.

  “I can’t see my hand in front of my face,” the man in front replied.

  “Zire, it isn’t your hand that you should be looking at. Something disrupted the shield. Pay attention so we can tell the commander this section is clear,” the second man retorted.

  “Clear? No one can see a thing out here. How would we know if it was clear or not? Anyone stupid enough to venture away from the shield deserves what they get. I say we return while we can and tell the commander that we found nothing,” Zire growled.

  Walkyr watched the two men turn. They had only taken a few steps when nearby explosions rocked the ground. The squadron of Vox’s warriors had arrived.

  With a powerful leap, Walkyr landed on top of Zire while Pallu took out the other warrior. He sank his teeth into Zire’s throat, and the weight of his leopard trapped the struggling male under him. He had made sure to avoid the main artery running along Zire’s neck. He wanted the man alive long enough to interrogate him. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Pallu quickly shifting back to human form and leaning to the side to spit.

  “Cat’s balls! Walkyr, watch out! They have poison,” Pallu warned, wiping a hand across his mouth.

  Walkyr jerked his fangs out of the man as the acidic taste hit his taste buds. His cat recoiled from the poison. Shifting, he also spat on the ground. He could still feel a slight numbness on his tongue. Spitting again, he used his foot to turn the man over onto his back.

  “They didn’t even try to resist,” Walkyr growled.

  “Here, put this on your tongue and let it dissolve,” Pallu ordered, holding out a thin blue strip.

  “What is it?” Walkyr muttered, taking the strip and placing it on his tongue.

&
nbsp; “It is a counter-agent for the poison. It is a new technology. The strip analyzes the poison and releases the correct reagent to neutralize the poison. I’m still working on it, but it has successfully counteracted the most common poisons and the one Eldora died from,” Pallu said, looking up as dozens of troop carriers flew overhead. “It looks like Vox sent half the guards.”

  Walkyr looked at his brother with an expression filled with skepticism. “You’re working on it? I can’t tell you how much confidence that gives me,” he sarcastically pronounced. “How did you know to bring a counter agent?”

  Pallu chuckled. “If you had spent an afternoon with Riley and Tina, you would understand. I swear those two had me ready to pack up my entire lab! Have you seen the bag that Riley carries? It is incredible. She has something in it for every situation. Tina was the one who said that they may try to use poison to keep from being caught. Riley said they use that in all the old-time movies. I asked them to make a list of these movies they are always talking about. Trelon Reykill may have some of them,” Pallu mused.

  Walkyr shook his head. His two new sisters were from a world called Earth. Zoran Reykill, King of the Valdier, had crashed on their planet a few years ago. Valdier was home to the dragon-shifting species that the Sarafin had once fought during the Great War.

  The only thing he knew about Earth was that it had somehow managed to survive without imploding, despite Trelon’s mate Cara, as well as Riley, Tina, Pearl St. Claire, and Ruby, Tina’s chicken. That was miraculous considering the chaos that the women tended to leave behind. Having met all of the above, all he could say was he felt sorry for his older brothers and Prince Trelon.

  “It looks like the situation is contained here. I will return. Make sure that my skid is left behind,” Walkyr ordered.

  “Two sun rotations, Walkyr. Don’t forget. I’ll wait here for you,” Pallu reminded him as another explosion rocked the ground.

  Walkyr nodded. “I’ll find the Heart of the Cat and return,” he promised.

  He gripped the small bag in his hand and pulled his blade out. Slicing a tiny hole close to the bottom of the bag, he gripped the top of it between his teeth. In seconds, he shifted into a large black leopard with dark blue spots that formed an intricate pattern throughout his coat.

  Walkyr ignored the battle behind him. His brothers could deal with the traitors who thought they could destroy the royal family. His focus was on finding the Heart of the Cat.

  Small markers fell through the small hole in the bottom of the bag and scattered along the ground as he ran through the thick mist. The lenses Pallu and Arrow had developed allowed him to see just far enough ahead to swerve around the obstacles in his path. His cat warned him when it sensed danger, and he took to the trees, never breaking his stride as he followed that small golden orb beckoning to him.

  Chapter Three

  “How long does Walkyr have?” Vox demanded, pacing back and forth inside the rebel command tent.

  Pallu glanced down at the screen in his hands. “Eighteen hours. He’ll make it,” he said.

  “He’d better. Keep me posted,” Vox ordered.

  Pallu nodded and his older brother pulled open the flap to the tent and stepped outside. Pallu inhaled deeply and released it slowly. It was going to be a long eighteen hours.

  “What’s wrong?” Arrow asked, looking up from the console where he was working.

  Pallu walked over and sat down on a crate next to the computer system Arrow was setting up. He glumly stared down at the screen in his hand before he held it out to Arrow. The Curizan frowned and took the tablet.

  “There’s nothing there. What am I supposed to be looking for?” Arrow asked, looking up at him.

  Pallu took the tablet back and waved it at the other man. “Exactly! There is nothing there, but there should be something there. A whole line of somethings and a moving dot! Walkyr is wearing one of the sensors we created. He left with a bag of markers that should be lighting up the screen. Instead, there is nothing! No markers, no moving sensor, no way to track and find him if he doesn’t make it back in time,” he growled, tossing the tablet onto the crate beside him.

  Arrow shook his head. “That’s impossible. We tested it. There must be something wrong with your tablet,” he insisted.

  Pallu looked at Arrow with a raised eyebrow. “There’s not, but you’re welcome to try yours. The tracker’s identification signal was showing up before I gave it to Walkyr. Even if it malfunctioned, the markers should still register on the map. You try to explain how a thousand of them can all go bad at once,” he retorted.

  Pallu folded his arms across his chest and watched Arrow run the program through his own tablet—again and again. Arrow’s initial disbelief quickly changed to a growl of aggravation, and he glared at Pallu.

  Pallu raised his hands. “I’m just as frustrated as you are. We tested the device extensively, and it didn’t fail a single trial,” he reminded Arrow.

  “We need to test it again. There has to be some reason for why it’s not showing up,” Arrow grumbled.

  Pallu thought for a moment. He looked up at the doorway and the dense mist beyond, swirling around outside of the encampment.

  The shields had been restored once the camp was overtaken. Unfortunately, the few men who hadn’t fought to the death took poison just like the two he and Walkyr had encountered earlier. Fortunately for Vox, Pallu had been prepared and managed to give one of the traitors an antidote before the poison had a chance to kill the man. Of course, the man was still in critical condition and had to be transported back to the city for additional healing before he could be interrogated.

  “Do you think the mist is causing the interference?” Pallu mused.

  Arrow thought for a moment before he shrugged. “It is possible. After all, none of the scanners have been able to penetrate it. We were working on the assumption that the markers would eliminate all interference by placing a line-of-sight tracking system. Since there were no disruption devices or magnetic fields detected, we assumed that the markers placed at regular intervals would overcome the issue,” Arrow responded.

  “We should test the theory. If it is an issue, we have less than eighteen hours to figure out how to correct it, otherwise, Walkyr could be in serious trouble,” Pallu stated, grabbing the tablet next to him and rising to his feet.

  Arrow nodded and looked out across the thick mist. “If he isn’t already,” Arrow muttered.

  Walkyr jumped over a fallen tree, keeping a steady pace as he followed the glowing orb. His mind drifted as he ran. He replayed the information he knew over and over in his mind in an effort to connect any pieces of the puzzle that he might have missed.

  He broke down the data into three separate categories to make it easier to distinguish the facts from the myths. First, he focused on his own personal experience. He sorted through everything he knew about the Great War, including who and what had been behind the start of the conflict.

  Centuries ago, a secret group of men and women led by Valdier, Curizan, and Sarafin nobles and their followers united to form a secular faction. The group had used their positions to undermine the royal families that ruled over the three worlds.

  The group called themselves The Enlightenment. Their members were made up of rebels from a variety of different species. What concerned Walkyr was that they had recruited members of each royal family as well. Later, it was discovered that trusted warriors of the family had infiltrated and betrayed the people they were sworn to protect.

  The group had used the members’ positions to begin a battle that had led to the Great War—a conflict between the three worlds that had lasted for centuries. It was not until a chance battle between Creon Reykill of the Valdier, Ha’ven Ha’darra of the Curizan, and Walkyr’s older brother, Vox, that the treachery had been uncovered. By then, thousands of warriors from each world had perished.

  Personally, Walkyr questioned the current belief that the Valdier royal, Lord Raffvin, had been the leader of th
e entire operation. He had also been skeptical about the notion that only a few members of The Enlightenment still existed. The information he had discovered since his arrival confirmed his suspicion that the men from the encampment were in just one of several such groups searching for historical and/or mythical items of great importance and power.

  He agreed that the deaths of Raffvin, a Valdier Royal, and Ben’qumain, a member of the Curizan royal family, had been a blow to the faction’s regime. However, the recent attack on his brother, Viper, proved that the group had not abandoned their ambitions.

  Walkyr also didn’t believe that the only Sarafin members of the group were Vox’s two ex-lovers. Each of the females had died—Pursia by suicide and Eldora by poison—before she could tell them much. The other traitor, Bragnar, had been a low-level warrior who had died during the attack on Viper.

  The men back at the rebel camp had been waiting for someone of importance. They suspected the person was the mysterious High Lord—the man whose face they had yet to see—but what if they were mistaken? What concerned him the most was that even without the information from the scroll, whoever had ordered the men to set up camp appeared to be one step ahead of the Sarafin Royal brothers. That meant there had to be a leak somewhere—and the only person that came to mind was the Curizan named Arrow. As much as he hated the idea, he couldn’t help asking himself if it was possible that Ha’ven’s half-brother was a spy for The Enlightenment.

  I think a detailed look into Arrow’s background and any close associates might be necessary, he ruminated.

  He decided to push the idea of Arrow’s possible involvement to the back of his mind for the moment. Instead, he turned his focus on what he remembered of the legends that he had learned about as a child.

  The legends talked about where the Sarafin had come from and how they were given the ability to shape-shift. The legend claimed that what had been freely given to his people could also be taken away.

  It was difficult to believe in such a thing with all of the technology at their disposal, but the possibility that it was true was difficult to ignore. He had seen many strange things in his life, and it was certainly possible that the ‘Goddess’ belonged to a rare species who had far more advanced technology than their own.