Asil’s Second Date Must Love Cats Aftermath #4
The Marrok opened the door quietly and entered without fanfare. Unlike Asil, he was totally unremarkable in appearance, someone easily overlooked in a crowd. Or in one of the cars parked out in the lot.
“Behold,” Asil said, with a sweep of his hand toward the collared tiger. “I bring you a gift. Merry Christmas.”
“I did not expect a Christmas present from you, Asil.” Bran Cornick, his Alpha and the Marrok who ruled the werewolves, gave him a pained smile. “I thought the uncomfortable gifts all belonged to you this year.”
“I live to complicate your life,” Asil said. “I promised the tiger that we would take all of this one’s secrets. That we would find all of the people who took the tiger and others and see that they do it no more.”
Bran’s eyebrows rose.
Asil smiled. “You would have done it anyway. He brought his games to our territory.” Then he sobered. “There is more to this than a single tiger shifter trying to live forever. You should find out why he has two of Mariposa’s collars.”
Mariposa was dead. That made the items that the witch had created all the more valuable. Too valuable to have been purchased for money.
“And why he brought them here, of all places,” Bran agreed, eyeing the collar sourly. “Powers are moving,” he said, glancing at the lioness before he looked back at the bespelled tiger.
He thumped his chest lightly. “More than one. Do you feel it, Asil?”
Bran was old, older than Asil, who had been born well before the year Charlemagne was crowned emperor. He was also witchborn.
Asil nodded gravely. “I think that we are in for a most interesting Christmas season.”
Bran pinched his nose as if to stave off a headache. “I had hoped that you would disagree. Ah well. Safe travels, my friend.” To the tiger he said simply, “Come.”
The tiger didn’t move.
Asil sighed. “The spell is keyed to the word ‘butterfly.’ ”
Bran gave him a sharp look but didn’t comment. “Butterfly,” he said, “come.”
Asil waited until the sound of Bran’s SUV died away before he opened the lioness’s cage—which had not been locked.
She walked out of the cage with a regal grace only a little marred by a slight limp.
There was no sign of the wound now, but she hadn’t come out unscathed from the fight any more than the rest of them had.
“Dona, are you certain the zoo suits you?” he asked. “I can take you wherever you want to go.” He had already offered her his home or accommodation with his pack.
She butted him gently with her magnificent head.
This was to be my dying gift, she said. To find the people taking our young. I expected to find a coven of witches or even one such as I was in my youth. This… She gave a chuff that sounded like a disapproving grandmother. This was banal and stupid.
In his head, her voice was very faint, reflecting the flame of magic that burned low, like long-banked coals.
“There were no goddesses here,” he agreed. “Save only yourself.”
Amusement touched him. Flattery, she told him. Were I a goddess, do you think I would have been caught by that thread of witchcraft wrapped around my neck?
He was pretty sure that she’d been worshipped as a deity. He was usually right about such things—and she had not said she was not a goddess. She had asked him a question, which was not the same thing at all.
“I wouldn’t have expected the collar to work on you,” he said. It was not an answer to her question, nor was it—quite—a question of his own.
She answered it anyway.
Too old. Her voice was a breeze in his mind, carrying the scent of rich earth and growing things, with a touch of sorrow. He knew then that he had been right about what she was, and that she was ancient even by his standards.
“You were not too old tonight,” Asil said, because she had gotten her wound when the male tiger made his presence known by landing on Asil’s shoulders. “For which I thank you, Dona.”
He had already thanked her—and reproved her—for healing him. She had not looked this bad until she’d spent her magic helping his along.
You are too old to turn your back to your enemy, she chided.
“Yes,” he said, rather than argue about the difficulty of facing in all directions at the same time. “But today was not my day to die. Tomorrow? Tomorrow is another day.”
The lioness’s sweet laughter raced through his body, and he wondered if she could hear his thoughts as easily as she heard his voice.
Death is coming for us all, old wolf. For some sooner than others.
I think I will enjoy the zoo for a while, a place where I am cared for and no one expects anything more than death from an old lioness.
“Cheerful,” he commented.
She chuffed, then shook herself.
The broken collar that had originally controlled the tigress fell from her and landed on the floor with a soft sound.
Like the other collar, it was a pretty thing to carry such ugly magic.
The witch’s spell had been broken when he’d ripped it from the tiger’s neck, but its remnants clung to Asil’s fingertips with a familiarity that burned into his spine and tightened the skin around his eyes with useless tears he did not allow to fall. Mariposa.
Though he wanted nothing more than to fling the cursed thing away, he tucked it into his slacks. Even broken it was too dangerous to leave lying around.
The lioness bumped him.
Mariposa was dead. He—and the lioness—lived. And he thought that might be an interesting thing to do for a little while yet.
“Seattle,” he told her, “is a very long drive. We should begin.”
We could listen to another story about lions, she told him.
He laughed. “I will see what I can find.”