Page 42 of Night Play (Dark-Hunter 5)
Chapter 9
As the hours ticked by slowly while Bride was confined to her tiny room, she learned one thing.
This wasn't a dream.
She didn't know how it was real, but she had no choice except to come to terms with the fact that this wasn't the asylum episode of Buffy, or a delusion. All of these people were real and they had the worst-tasting food she'd ever tried to eat.
No wonder they were all so damned skinny.
Her tray of barely touched food was set on the nightstand with the books.
Bride paced the room while Listening to the people in the hall debate what they should do to her.
This was getting scarier by the minute.
Suddenly she sensed a movement behind her. Bride spun around to find a man standing there who reminded her of Vane. He had the same multicolored dark hair and green eyes, and his face was eerily similar. Clean shaven, he wore his hair longer than Vane and was dressed in ancient leather and mail armor pieces.
Like Bryani, he had a sword strapped to his back.
He watched her in a manner that was definitely reminiscent of a wild animal examining its prey.
"Who are you?" she asked him.
He didn't speak. Instead, he moved closer so that he could take her hand into his and look at her marked palm. Hatred blazed in his eyes.
Before she could blink, she found herself somehow taken from her room into the center of the hall where the angriest group of people on the planet were found. She felt like the only hot rock in a nest of vipers.
Their loud voices increased tenfold in volume when she appeared.
"Dare!" The shout rang out from the old man. "Why have you brought her here?"
The Vane lookalike cast a malevolent look at Bride. "I call for a timoria against her mate."
Agreement echoed from the crowd.
"Nay," Bryani said as she pushed her way through the crowd to reach them.
"What's the matter, Mother?" Dare asked as he turned toward Bryani. "Have your feelings for the animals who prey upon us changed?"
"You know better."
"Then let us give back to them what they have given to us."
Bryani pulled her sword on her son. "I took a Sentinel's oath to protect"
"A Katagari whore?" Dare asked, interrupting her. He pushed Bride toward Bryani.
"She reeks of their scent. I say we settle this once and for all."
A cheer rang out.
Bride shook with terror.
"Father?" Bryani said to the old man. "Is this the way it's to be?"
The old man took his time scanning the crowd before he faced his daughter.
"You should have consulted me before you brought her here, Bryani. You seek protection for our enemies when there is not a family among us who hasn't been torn apart by the Katagaria. Gods of Olympus, look what they have done to our own family. I have lost your mother's sanity and all my children save you to them. You barely returned from their clutches and then only because you managed to fight them off. Now you beg clemency for one of them? Have they driven you completely mad, too, daughter?"
He passed a less than sympathetic gaze to Bride. "We shall put the timoria to a vote. Who among you says aye?"
The roar was so loud that Bride had to cover her ears.
"Who says nay?"
"I do," Bryani said, but she was a lone voice in the crowd.
The old man gripped his staff and took a deep breath. "It is decided, then. Prepare the human for the timoria."
Bride had a really bad feeling the timoria wasn't a good thing, especially when three women came forward to drag her off.
"What's happening?" she asked the women who grabbed her. "What's a timoria?"
"I'm so sorry, Bride," Bryani said before she was pulled away. "Please forgive me."
Forgive her for what?
"Excuse me?" Bride snapped hysterically as she tried to pry the women's hands off her. It was useless. "Would you please tell me what the hell is going on here?"
The tallest of the women turned on her with a snarl. "For mating with a Katagari, there is only one punishment. You will be given to the unmated men of our clan."
"Given to them how?"
The look on the woman's face said it all. They intended to rape her.
Bride screamed and fought them with everything she had.
Vane took a minute to get his bearings as he arrived in ancient Britain. Time-travel always disoriented him. It took a lot of power to time-jump.
He also had to be careful now. If he sent out probes to locate Bride, they could be intercepted by his mother or her people. Not that he feared them. But he didn't want to go to war without an army.
In this time period, his mother's people ruled. His grandfather was the regis of one of the most powerful wolf clans and it was said that good old Gramps had killed more Katagaria than any other Sentinel in their history.
Vane took a deep breath as he scoped out the village on the other side of the hedge where he was crouched. They would be expecting him.
Sort of.
Vane heard something rustling in the forest behind him. Spinning around, he expected it to be a wild animal or one of his mother's people.
It wasn't.
It was Fury.
Vane couldn't have been more stunned if he'd found his mother right in front of him. At least that would have made sense. Fury's presence made none whatsoever. The wolf flashed instantly to human form and gaped in all his naked horror at Vane, who quickly averted his gaze.
"What the hell are you doing here?" they asked each other simultaneously. "Put some clothes on me," Fury said, snarling the words as he cupped himself with his hands.
Rather than go blind, Vane quickly obliged and dressed the wolf in black jeans and a T-shirt. "Why are you here, Fury?"
He spoke between clenched teeth. "I'm doing what I told you I was doing.
