Lupi 04 - Night Season

could bind others to her will. Nathan had stood for her, placing himself between them and her, though he couldn’t have stopped them. They’d all known that.
    But he’d bought a pause, one in which the queen had listened, because she loved him enough to give him that much. In the end, Kai was allowed to live—for now. But not here. Not where people couldn’t protect themselves from her.
    She felt the bitterness coating that thought. She also saw it, strings of greasy gray wrapping the thought as if to mummify it. Oh, she’d seen what happened if you held on to such thoughts, seen people trapped by bitter thoughts too long hoarded, how the grayness strangled all the color out of them. She took a breath and did her best to let the thought and the bitterness go, and was rewarded as they faded away.
    Kai wasn’t exactly a telepath. She wasn’t a non-telepath, either, just as she wasn’t exactly a binder, yet could do some of what binders did. Her Gift baffled everyone, including herself. Maybe herself most of all. She didn’t read minds, but she saw thoughts and the emotions connected to those thoughts. And sometimes, when conditions were just right—or wrong—she changed minds. Literally.
    After a lifetime of suppressing that particular talent, now she had to learn how to master it. Quickly. Before it mastered her.
    She felt the purr before she heard it, a low rumbling in her mind. A moment later a lumpy spot ten feet ahead of them shifted and stretched, becoming eight feet of dappled gray cat. Kai smiled. “Dell’s purely glad about this, anyway.”
    â€œShe understands we’re leaving now?”
    â€œOh, yes.” The bond they’d formed was very new, the intimacy of it sometimes unsettling, and some concepts didn’t travel well between minds so different. But Kai knew Dell understood that her long hunger was nearly over.
    When Dell’s hunger ended, so would Kai’s.
    They’d reached the rendezvous. Kai set one of the sleeping bags down so she could rub behind one tall, tufted ear as the big cat stropped herself against Kai’s legs. Dell had learned that her human was easily unbalanced, so her affection was tempered by care. “She’s eager.”
    Dell would be much better off where they were going, and that gave Kai a happiness to hang on to. If the magic here was somewhat thin for Nathan, it was starvingly low for the chameleon-cat—which was why Kai had begun to tire. The familiar bond ran both ways, and the power the queen had generously offered Dell to sustain her while Kai and Nathan readied themselves for the trip was gone now.
    â€œBest pick up the sleeping bag. It’s time, Kai.”
    â€œWhat?” But she stooped to retrieve it. “I don’t see…is she here?”
    â€œShe doesn’t have to be here. It isn’t a true gate. I explained that.”
    He had, but that wasn’t to say she understood. Somehow Nathan’s queen was reaching him though she wasn’t even in this world, broadening his innate ability to cross between realms so he could take with him things that were his—clothes, gear, and Kai. Who would bring Dell with her.
    â€œFocus on your bond with Dell.” His voice was low. He stared ahead at something she couldn’t see.
    She took a breath and did her best to slip into the state she’d avoided all her life, the condition she called fugue. At first it wouldn’t come. She allowed the frustration to wash through her, focusing only on Dell, the clear, simple colors of her familiar’s thoughts.
    Gradually her breathing eased and her mind slid into that other place, where the colors and shapes of thoughts drew her, their shifting endlessly fascinating…a place where she could lose herself. Had lost herself as a child. A place where her own thoughts could reach out and touch the minds of others, change them. Where the compulsion to do just that could be overwhelming.
    But Dell’s thoughts were clear and true, triggering no urge to meddle. Kai’s heartbeat steadied and she found the bond between them, a smooth, pale tube just tinged with yellow, and she smiled it stronger. Brighter.
    She felt Nathan’s hand on her shoulder. “Now,” he said, his voice the only thing in the world besides the colors, “we walk forward.”
    So she did, trusting him, smiling at how beautiful his colors were, and how intricate, the