Katrina's Destiny, page 4
Thank god Katrina and Thorn were away at Black Ridge, or this could have been so much worse. Bain padded over to Marcus, who was examining a spot on the ground. The familiar stench of dark magic became stronger the closer Bain got. What the hell?
Marcus turned to look at Bain. “This was intentional. Someone targeted Katrina’s house.” His anger matched the barely suppressed rage pouring off Marcus.
Jensgar and Ceva came over to join them. The stench from the black magic made the white witch rear back as her fangs lengthened. Without comment, she turned and charged at Net. “What have you done?”
Marcus and Bain looked at each other before following behind her. Fenrir blocked her path to Net, stopping Ceva short.
“I didn’t…mean,” Net tried to explain as she stumbled backward. “I’ll fix this.” Then Net vanished, followed closely by Fenrir.
“What the hell is going on?” Marcus asked, speaking for Bain as well. He couldn’t shift back without his wheelchair since he couldn’t walk in human form.
“Ceva, what do you know?” Jensgar asked.
She turned to face them as Lily reached for Jensgar’s hand. In his wolf form, Bain reached the waist of a full-grown man. He didn’t have to navigate around people to see the dread on Ceva’s face.
“Net appears to have set a Reaper on Katrina.”
“What the fuck?” Marcus yelled. “How do you know?”
“I caught part of Net’s thoughts when she lowered her guard at seeing the devastation,” Ceva explained. “I must go to protect Katrina.” Then poof. Ceva was gone.
Bain howled his anger to the treetops. What the hell were they supposed to do now? If anything happened to Katrina and Thorn, he’d hunt down Net and make her pay, even if it took the rest of his life.
***
Katrina lounged back in her patio chair, taking her first real break in days. Thorn was off playing with Cassandra, Alpha Aldric’s teenaged sister, and wouldn’t likely be back until suppertime. In the chair beside her, Helena sat with her son Orion on her lap fast asleep. The toddler had worn himself out chasing after the older kids that morning.
“It’s so peaceful,” Katrina commented.
“You mean a lot less stressful.”
“Tomato…tomata. Either way, I’m enjoying myself.” Katrina refused to dwell on the wreck that was her life.
“You know you can stay as long as you want, you’re welcome here. But everything will still be waiting for you in Evergreen when you return,” Helena advised. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Katrina wasn’t surprised by her friend’s offer. Helena had always had the most giving heart. Katrina remembered back to the first time she’d met the princess the day of the ogre attack that had claimed Ewald’s life. Ewald’s and Katrina’s parents had been killed when the ogres attacked on their pack lands. Helena had taken Katrina under her wing and welcomed the widow as if she was family.
“I don’t think anyone can help with this,” Katrina admitted. “It’s pretty much over.”
“It can’t be over.”
“Neither of them will talk to me. They’re avoiding me as if I had the plague, and I’m tired of making excuses for them to Thorn.”
“But I’ve seen how much Marcus loves you with my own eyes. I may not have met Bain, but from what I’ve been told he behaves much the same.” Katrina pulled a light blanket up over a still-sleeping Orion.
“Yeah, well, Marcus has always avoided commitment when it came to me. I thought over time it would change as his feelings had changed, and he’d reconsider, but his recent behavior has proved otherwise.” Katrina’s joy with the day was fading. “And Bain has basically disappeared since he found out about his past with the Goddess Net.”
“I thought Fenrir had erased Bain’s memories when he was reborn?” Helena asked.
“So did I.” Katrina sat up straight in her chair and looked over at Helena. “You know what really hurts? That Thorn and I had hope. I’d come to terms with Marcus believing he and I wouldn’t ever have a relationship other than friends, and then Bain came along. Suddenly, I went from no suitors to two of them wanting to create a family together. I love them both. And when they’re not being assholes or absent, they are truly amazing men. And I know they loved us. Then they pulled back, and we were left even more alone than before. I don’t know if I could forgive them for doing that to Thorn.”
“And you,” Helena added. Katrina appreciated her friend’s support. “This is about your future.”
“As long as Thorn is happy, I’m happy.” Nothing mattered more than that.
Helena opened her mouth to reply when her canines extended and her royal tattoo began to glow. “Something’s wrong.”
Katrina jumped to her feet as she felt a presence appear behind her. She spun around to find Net standing only a few feet away. “What the hell are you doing here?” She’d left Evergreen to get away from the goddess.
“We don’t have time to discuss this. We need to leave.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Katrina growled, but again she was ignored.
Net crossed the distance with such speed that Katrina didn’t have time to react before Net grabbed hold of her. A flash of bright light blinded Katrina for only a few seconds, but when her vision cleared, she couldn’t believe what she was seeing in front of her.
The grass under her feet was more blue than green, and the sky was golden yellow. There wasn’t a sun in the sky. It seemed to glow all on its own. The forest was thick with evergreen trees and she could hear water gurgling from somewhere close to them. The clearing they were standing in had a small cottage in it, but nothing more.
“Where the hell have you taken me?” Katrina demanded of the goddess before she noticed Net was no longer glowing and her eyes were now blue. “Why do you look like that?”
Net raised her hands as if seeing them for the first time. “I do not know.”
“Where are we?”
“Again, I do not know.”
“You’re the one who attacked me, and I’m supposed to believe you have no idea what’s going on?”
Instead of answering, Net waved her right hand in the air in front of her. When nothing happened, she did it again. Then a third time. “It seems as though my powers have been taken from me.”
“I guess that explains the no-glow and the jeans.” Katrina had only ever seen Net in a glowing, form-fitting dress. “But it doesn’t explain why you took me away from Black Ridge. Have you lost your mind?”
“I assure you that my mind is perfectly fine. For your information, I was attempting to save you from a Reaper.” Net looked at Katrina as if she were the one needing a psychological evaluation.
“A Reaper? Why would a Reaper come after me?” Katrina knew full well she wasn’t exactly a person of power and means. There would be no reason for a Reaper to waste its time and energy on her.
“Because I hired it to kill you.”
“Oh my god, Thorn?”
Chapter Five
It had been hours and still no sign or word from Net. Ceva had explained what she’d found when she’d followed Net to Black Ridge and had brought Thorn back to Evergreen for protection. Bain still couldn’t conceive what Net had been thinking when she’d bought a Reaper contract.
Reapers were a small, secretive race of assassins, trained from birth to hunt with the single-mindedness of a pure predator. Even though no one knew their exact numbers—it wasn’t as if they came out at the mall to be counted and measured—an estimate had them at less than two hundred, and that seemed to be the prevailing belief for a long while now.
The rule was, once the Reaper had a contract, it couldn’t be broken until either its target was dead or the Reaper was.
That the bastards were relentless definitely was a problem. But their natural-born powers were so extraordinary that you had to be off your mind not to be wary of them. They carried no scent, and could move around unseen. Each one was born with varying amounts of dark magic inside them. The higher the level of dark magic, the more someone would have to pay for the Reaper’s services. With a goddess’s wealth and power, Net could have, and probably had, hired the best.
“Where is Fenrir?” Marcus asked Ceva. Which was what Bain wanted to know as well, and would have asked if he weren’t still in his wolf form. For some unknown reason, he’d been unable to shift back into his human form. Given what was going on, that major problem didn’t even register on the list of things he was concerned about.
“He’s silent,” Ceva answered as she folded her black wings closer to her body while she paced the main pack house’s courtyard.
Warriors waited for orders, but none came. There wasn’t the slightest clue telling them where to look. Jensgar, Lily, Thomas, Amalia, Marcus, and Bain waited for Ceva to come up with something because she was the only one powerful enough to sense where Katrina was taken. It wasn’t lost on Bain that if they had mated as planned, both he and Marcus would be able to find her anywhere in this dimension. Not to mention be able to communicate between the three of them, which would have helped now that he was stuck in his wolf form.
“I have tried to follow Net’s trail, but after they left Black Ridge I could no longer sense her or Katrina. It’s as if they have vanished.” Ceva sighed.
“Vanished?” Marcus looked at the white witch as if he might actually pass out, making Bain growl deeply. “As in dead?”
Bain’s growl turned into a whine of pain as he nudged Marcus’s leg. As Bain had hoped, his friend dug his fingers into Bain’s coat. Ceva looked at them and began casting a spell without answering Marcus’s question. Bain felt his fur stand on end as electricity filled the air. Within moments, the feeling faded and Bain looked around the courtyard for answers.
“What the hell was that?”
Marcus pulled away from Bain as if he’d bit him and asked, “Did you say that?”
“Me?”
“Yeah, you.” Marcus looked at everyone else. “Did you hear Bain talking?’
After a round of shaking heads, Ceva said, “I’ve given you two a line of communication. It’s not the same as a mate bond, and it will disappear once Bain is able to shift back. I figured it would make communication during this situation flow a bit easier.”
“Situation. This isn’t a situation. Our mate is missing.”
“I’m positive Ceva understands that,” Marcus replied.
“Well, you’ve known Ceva longer than I have, but why doesn’t she seem to feel panicked, urgent, about Katrina’s disappearance? Where’s the plan? We should be searching. I’m about to lose my mind over here.”
Marcus turned to Ceva. “Bain wants to know why we are just standing around doing nothing.”
“Close enough.”
“It’s not a matter of standing around. It’s obvious neither of them are in this dimension so that makes ‘doing something’ a little tricky,” Ceva explained.
“Dimension?” Marcus asked. “Is that like where the Black Ridge’s unicorns came from?”
“Exactly. But there are an untold number of dimensions. I could teleport from one to another and still never find them before either of your lives ended naturally. I must track down Fenrir and hope he helps us.” Ceva shook her head, almost as if she was as in as much shock as they were.
“Hope? Why hope? Surely, he’d help us.”
“Why wouldn’t Fenrir help us? He’s been around more often lately. I thought that was a good sign?” Marcus asked for both of them.
“Gods are fickle and lose interest quickly.”
“Lose interest?” Jensgar growled. “Katrina was abducted by a goddess who wants her mate back. A mate who doesn’t remember her and is about to mate with the woman she abducted. And in case everyone’s brain is on stun, let’s not forget the whole Reaper contract thing.”
“All true, but when it comes to the gods, it happens all the time. They move on to their next best thing. I’ll search him out and return when I have an answer.” Gone. The white witch didn’t give a damn about niceties. One of the reasons Bain had liked her from the first time they met.
“Now what?” There was no way Bain was simply going to sit around and wait.
“What do we do now?”
“To hell with waiting. I’m calling in a few friends,” Lily replied and began walking quickly toward the pack house. “It can’t hurt to do our own searching.”
“I’m in.”
“We’re in,” Marcus told the group.
In a day that had been too weird to categorize, getting used to talking through his mind to Marcus would be strange, but if it got Katrina back to them any faster, he was all for it.
***
“You’re sure my son is safe.” Katrina was pissed and wanted to claw Net’s eyes out, but Thorn’s safety came first. Losing her shit on Net for trying to have her killed was second on the list of things to do. If Net was telling the truth, Katrina knew in her heart Thorn would have Marcus and Bain to lean on.
“Yes. The contract was for only you,” Net replied in a bored tone.
“Thank god. Well any other god but you, you psycho bitch.” Katrina couldn’t hold back even if she wanted to. “You have no idea where we are, and you have no powers. How the hell are we supposed to get out of here with you all lame-ass now?”
“How do you not understand the situation?” The look of disdain wasn’t a surprise. Katrina figured Net viewed her as a lower species.
“I understand ‘the situation’ perfectly well. I want answers before I kick your ass,” Katrina said as her canines lengthened and claws sprang from her nails.
Net backed away with her hands up. “I was out of my mind when I took out the contract.”
“A contract that can’t be broken until I’m dead or the Reaper is. Forgive me for not sympathizing because you were out of your fucking mind.”
“Well, that is the reason I came to get you after your house was burned down.”
“My house burnt down?” Katrina’s voice was garbled as her wolf fought for freedom to attack the enemy. “Your Reaper set my home on fire?”
“It appears that is what occurred,” Net answered while taking a couple more steps back.
“Tell me why I shouldn’t end you for what you’ve done. It wasn’t enough to take Bain from me, but to want to end my life seems a bit excessive even for a nut job like you.” Katrina began moving toward goddess fuck-up, her patience well and truly exhausted.
“Because I don’t have Bain,” Net said quickly, stopping Katrina in her tracks.
A single drop of rain landed on Katrina’s head and then as if a tap had been opened wide, it began to pour. They ran to the cottage at the same time a flash of red lightning lit up the darkening sky.
Thankfully, the door was unlocked, and once inside, Katrina slammed it shut. They were dripping wet, and strangely, there were two towels folded on the sideboard waiting for them. Katrina looked at Net.
“It wasn’t me,” Net answered Katrina’s unasked question.
Katrina knew better than to believe anything Net said, but wet and cold was not a good state of being so Katrina grabbed one of the towels. The fabric was soft, and had the scent of being taken in off the clothesline minutes ago.
Net quickly followed. Katrina removed her wet sandals before venturing into what looked to be an open-concept living area and kitchen. A fireplace on the back wall had roaring flames dancing inside.
“Someone must live here,” Katrina said. “It seems cozy.”
“Where do you think the owners are?” Net asked.
“Or better yet, why did they leave everything unlocked and a fire burning in the hearth?”
“I don’t think we should step in too far, in case they come back.” Net wasn’t so gung-ho to be adventurous without her powers.
“You’re more than welcome to wait outside,” Katrina shot out. “As for me, I’d like to know what I’m facing before anyone else shows up.”
Katrina dried her bare feet on the rug by the front door and cautiously made her way into the living room. A couch and two chairs were arranged in front of the fireplace on what looked to be a woven area rug. The floors were dark hardwood, and the walls were painted cream colored. Almost everything had some sort of wood incorporated into it, which she guessed would be expected for a cottage in the woods.
A purple lake was visible outside the garden doors on either side of the fireplace. A yellow sky, blue-green grass, and a purple lake: where were they? Was she dreaming all this? Was Net messing with her once again?
Katrina could hear Net’s light steps behind her as she walked into the brightly lit kitchen. Out of curiosity, she opened a few cabinet doors to find that they were stocked with food.
“The fridge is full as well,” Net said while staring into the full-size refrigerator. “Someone brought us here and intends to keep us in this place for a while.”
“I’m sure the owners will return. This has to be their food.” Katrina didn’t want to admit that this might be a gilded cage they’d been dropped into. “Once the rain stops, I’ll go for a run and see if I find anyone else. Oh, and even though we were interrupted, believe me when I tell you that I’m still going to kick your ass.”
“I don’t doubt that for a moment,” Net replied dryly.
“Good.” Katrina turned toward the hallway leading from the living room to the back of the house. She hadn’t missed what Net had said outside, that she didn’t have Bain. Did that mean physically, metaphorically, or emotionally? And what relevance did that have to their current situation? That couldn’t be the “I went crazy” excuse for contracting a Reaper to kill her. She couldn’t dwell on that right not. She had other things to deal with. Like not getting herself killed.
The hallway wasn’t long and had three closed doors. She stopped outside the first door and stared at the doorknob as if it was going to bite her. Anything was possible.
“I’ll do it if you haven’t got the nerve,” Net offered with a heavy dose of sarcasm.
“Can’t you go one minute without taking a shot at me?” Katrina asked. Net had the grace to look contrite. A first. “You should be trying to get on my good side. I’m the only one with any defensive capabilities.”
