Chapter 16
There was no hope. Hope was for idiots. I had zero hope.
Feeling grumpier than ever, I had to wonder at this point how Dace tolerated me. I was a right dick on a good day anymore and I knew it.
That’s probably why she’d recruited beings to help surprise me by getting a hut remodeled for me.
No. That was unkind. What she’d done for me was amazing. I had my own place now, my very own private space, even if I did wallow in it alone most days. Unless Dace could drag my depressed ass out of it.
It didn’t help that something weird was going on with me.
My fingernails were darkening along my nail beds, my gums had started aching constantly.
Had I eaten the wrong thing? Was it, I don’t know, a plant, a parasite?
I don’t know. Despite reassurances from Noyel, who couldn’t explain what was going on with me and urged me to ask another healer but didn’t think it was anything serious, I had my doubts.
He’d never seen anything like this before, he’d admitted.
Considering my hybrid nature, who knew what the hell was causing this!
The weirdest symptom of all to me were the small patches of hair that had sprouted up on my head out of nowhere, some white, some brown, and it was spreading, all over my whole head, beyond what would have been my hairline!
I’d almost rather have remained without any hair at all.
That same patchiness had overtaken my newly grown in eyebrows.
I looked polka dotted! My beanie tugged low enough to cover the mess above my eyes, thicker in some places, wirier in others, but I was still self-conscious about it.
Dace swore it didn’t look bad but I’ve found her staring at the caterpillars sprouting on my face far too many times for that statement to hold any weight.
I felt like a freak!
Kehl finally tried to come around again but I didn’t want him to see me like this, not until I knew what was causing this. What if he thought I was turning into a Krampus too and just ditched me? I’d rather he thought I was playing hard to get than want nothing to do with me at all.
Despite my reticence to answer my door to him, gifts began showing up again.
He once sat out in front of my hut for an entire day before giving up.
Notes found their way under my door.
His English was improving. Some of his notes were downright R rated. He had to be getting help from someone on some of those… I was afraid to ask.
If I didn’t feel reassured Kehl wasn’t going to try and strip me naked and have me right then and there in the middle of the market, exposing my patchy haired body to the village, I wouldn’t be leaving my hut at all.
“I’m not really fit for public consumption,” I grumblingly mumbled as Dace dragged me down the path leading to the market place.
“The fresh air will do you good. You’ll see,” she enthused, though I noted she kept more distance between us than usual.
I did not blame her in the least.
My booted foot kicked at the ground, sending mud flying in front of me as I huffed and puffed my way down the way.
Dace put a little bit more space between us and it clicked then. The mud.
Stopping in my tracks, I looked over at her and smiled sheepishly. “Sorry.”
Dace glanced up from where she was working on a spot of mud on her jacket. “God made dirt and dirt don’t hurt,” she recited in a sing-song.
A small grin pulled at my face. “If you say so.”
Then she added with an impish smirk, “It sure is a pain to try and get out of my favorite coat when it’s that clay-mud getting flung about all willy nilly, though.”
That made me laugh, then she joined in, breaking this odd impasse I felt like we were at.
The market place was pretty impressive. So many baubles, sharp pointy things, shiny things, sharp, pointy, and shiny things combined.
Groups of beasts gathered at certain stalls, haggling over prices, who was willing to offer the best trade for what. It was fascinating.
Which one was Kehl’s?
“Uh oh.”
My gaze followed Dace’s at her emphatic remark to a larger than average looking group of beasts gathered around in a loose circle.
“Looks like a fight’s about to break out,” she muttered. Tugging on my hoodie sleeve, she mumbled, “Maybe we should leave and come back later, after the fight’s over.”
“What would they be fighting over?” I made no move to leave, standing on tiptoe to see if I could get a peek.
I heard it before I saw anything.
“That sounds like one of Daisy’s males, doesn’t it?” Scanning the crowd, I couldn’t be one hundred percent certain but it had sounded like it to me.
The chirping squawks joining in at points furthered my suspicion. Was this her thing? Get her males into fights for her?
“Whuh-oh.” Dace glanced from me to the crowd worriedly.
“What?”
Dace lifted a finger and pointed.
Kehl was tall even for Lo denaii standards. I hadn’t been looking for him in the crowd. I’d been staring right past his fuzzy head, in fact.
I was moving through the crowd, ignoring whatever it was Dace was trying to tell me, pushing past beasts with a snarl on my lips until I spilled out in the open middle of this madness.
“What the hell is going on?!” I bellowed as I was spewed out of the gathered crowd and stumbled into a muddied makeshift arena.
Kehl’s lip was busted and one of his eyes appeared to be swollen shut, but it was Daisy’s troublesome twosome who appeared to be the worse for wear.
Something just completely snapped inside of me then and I roared at the group as a whole.
“My Purr-roo?” Kehl popped up from his crouch as they started to circle one another. He looked so happy to see me I could kiss him once I was done slapping some sense into him.
“What the hell is going on here?!” My gaze darted to Daisy’s mates, their personal instigator wringing her hands not far off behind them.
“Say I ‘sult their Daidzee,” Kehl growled out at them. “Kehl say not. Daidzee ‘sult my Purr-roo. ‘Til she ‘pologize my Purr-roo front of Kehl, Kehl no sell her.” Baring his teeth at them, he then snapped them at them. “Kehl means Kehl say.”
Gaze zeroing in on Daisy, I motioned her forward. Daisy’s eyes widened and she pointed to herself, shock clear across her face. Her gaze darted around for help but none was forthcoming.
“Yes, you. Come here.” I motioned her closer. “This is between me and you. You want to start shit with my mate? You’re that petty you want to have your mates beat him up over what?”
“Fabric,” she blurted, then blushed beet red.
Over fabric. “Me and you, this is our fight, you can fight your own battles. Let’s go!”
Handing over the little one in her arms to one of her mates, Red stepped out of the crowd and right next to Daisy.
Daisy gaped, eyes darting around. “It’s only fair,” Red muttered.
I failed to see how but that was just fine with me. Dace rushed up to me then, trying her best to glare at Red but she looked as out of place as Daisy.
Red’s males simply stared on curiously, while Daisy’s males started to loudly protest.
Kehl, somewhere off behind me, was quiet until Red took a step towards me and I did the same.
With a snarl, I bared my teeth at her. That strange pressure in my mouth was at its boiling point.
Strange popping noises and the feeling of something falling from my mouth made me wonder as Red’s eyes widened in shock and she stumbled a step back if my damn teeth had just fallen right out of my head.
The pressure at my nail beds was at its breaking point. A groan of a growl left me as, like my teeth, that pain reached its peak and then, pop.
There was a thud to the ground right as that pressure that never let up behind my eyes crested. I’d swear there was a popping sensation inside my head, and then I felt light as a damn feather.
There was roaring. I heard that as much as I felt it.
Shocked shouts. Dace was saying something. It was all muffled as my eyes rolled up in my head and I flopped to the ground. I think I blacked out. When I opened my eyes everything was jumbled and blurry.
Dace was crying out my name but she sounded farther away than she had been.
“Help her!” Daisy cried out, of all the beings to call for help for me.
I could make out her males rushing over but then the weight at my back lifted and a roar I knew quite well filled the space.
All the crying out and the screeches, the cries for help, the murmurs of confusion and worry, simply ceased.
I knew then exactly what had happened. Forcing myself to sit up, Kehl knelt to catch me before I could once more flop to the muddy ground.
“My sexy, horny hero,” I joked weakly, reaching out to stroke my hand down his face as he scooped me up and stood.
It hadn’t registered, the state I was in, what had really just happened— Kehl had come out to the village, shifted into his Krampus form, for me.
Khel’s rumble was everything to me. It cut in on the murderous snarl he was using to warn others way.
Trusting him fully, I quit fighting the odd, weightless feeling dragging me down and gave in to it.
Kehl barked something, maybe my name, maybe something at someone else. I was too far gone to understand.
I knew one thing for sure— he loved me, enough to shift and out himself to protect me. I was safe with him. He wasn’t about to let anything happen to me.
My last thought before totally giving in, I was pretty sure I muttered out loud as I leaned into him and breathed in his scent was, “MINE.”