Bound Trilogy: Bound: A Supernatural Story (WLW)

Chapter Seven

Bastet Onai stood in an alley a few buildings down from the clinic. Kuba was rumoured to own it. It smelled strongly of peaches in the surrounding areas and that told her everything she needed to know. Her sense of smell had never failed her before. It wouldn't now.

She leaned against one of the alley walls and scanned the crowd around the corner. It was working. This new...thing she could do. She still didn't have a handle on what it was, nor did she know how long she could make it last. However, she only needed a few minutes with this Kuba. Long enough to get her answers.

Until then, until he came out and she could approach him, she would stand her ground. Stay in the shadows. Keep her scent masked if she could figure the damn ability out.

The foxes only mated once. Unless their mates died. Kuba was rumoured to be shacking up with his new mate. If only these foxes around him knew the truth behind the man.

Bastet had half a mind to run through the streets and let everyone know of the loathsome person they let live amongst themselves. She didn't, though. For all she knew, they were all in on it together, or they wouldn't even entertain the idea their Kuba could do a blessed thing wrong. In her experience, keeping up her guard was the intelligent thing. The second you let it down in this world...

She felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand at attention as if on cue and spun around, slinking back further into the alley. A small girl stood before her. She couldn't have been more than fourteen, maybe. Probably younger. She was a wolf.

Okami.

"Who are you and what are you doing on tribal land?" The girl asked, but something in her eyes said she was more upset than she was letting on. The way she peered at Bastet was freezing cold. So cold Bastet shivered. "I asked you a question." The girl stepped forward and Bastet scurried back as far as the alley would let her. The girl stopped and her nostrils flared, then her eyebrows shot up. "What...are you...?"

Bastet had heard enough. Dammit! She thought as she spotted a fire escape ladder attached to one of the buildings beside herself. She leapt for it as she scented more shifters approaching. Two male foxes. They scented the same, but there were two heartbeats. Still, there was no time for more observations.

Bastet would duck into the woods and hide in that cave she found the day before. She would wait there until she could approach Kuba again. Then, she would--

As she climbed up to the ledge of the roof, a pair of hands came down and grabbed her hoodie. She was pulled up the rest of the way and flung a few feet. Predictable. She spun around as she was sent soaring through the air and gracefully landed with a small thump to the rooftop, her backpack smacking against her like a pillow being tossed onto a bed. The foxes she scented before were standing a few feet away and someone was at their back. Human.

Bastet crouched down and hissed at the twins at her front as they helped the little wolf up to join them. The wolf put her hands up and took tentative steps toward her.

"We won't hurt you." She explained, but Bastet moved to the ledge of the building in one leap, settling along its edge. The wolf and her comrades circled around her, none with their defenses raised as they had been before. "Stay calm. We just want to know what you're doing here."

Bastet snarled and moved one foot off of the ledge. They all moved in on her as she began to let herself fall back, but she froze. They followed suit, watching for what she may do next, but her senses were beginning to focus elsewhere.

She blinked a few times, letting her eyes sharpen and spotted her target. Kuba.

She brought her foot back to the edge of the building and glanced over her shoulder to see the others still expectantly waiting to see what she'd do next. The scent of peaches drifted up with the wind as she turned back around and zeroed in on Kuba standing outside his clinic once again. He was gazing right at her, recognition etched along his face.

Bastet straightened, turned and stepped down from the ledge. She looked at all of those encircling her and set down her rucksack. She pushed it forward and nodded at it with a grunt.

"Check it. There aren't any weapons. I came to see Kuba. Let me see him."

"And why would we do that?" One of the twin boys asked as he took a step forward.

Every instinct told Bastet to run, but she ignored the urge and the boy, turning her head toward the clinic once more. Her eyes grew heavy. She needed to do this now before she lost her chance. With quick movements, she leapt toward the ledge, yet was astonished when something grabbed her from behind.

Bastet struggled to break free, but was thrown down to the roof pinned down beneath the two boys. Both of them were giant, which wasn't a surprise, and outweighed her ten to one. She hadn't eaten in days and was never a large shifter. She also hadn't slept in two nights and she hadn't drunk a single drop of water since her supply ran out the night before. Moreso, she hadn't the money to go out and get herself a single thing.

All the stamina, all the fight she held in her moments ago fizzled away and she slowly came to lay still. Bastet heaved as she tried to maintain her wakefulness, but darkness caved in.

"Get off of her, Sera. Gabe! Look at her!" Bastet heard from beside herself, and then the wolf was kneeling beside her. "She's sick! We need to get her somewhere she can rest. We won't get our answers out of her here. Not like this."

"She's an outsider, Yumi. We have laws. She has to go to the sheriff's station if she hasn't been previously vetted." One of the boys said as the weight was lifted from Bastet's back. She was hoisted off of the ground, but couldn't stand. Then, she was in a pair of arms and being carried somewhere that felt farther away than it may have been. She couldn't tell. Her head was just too foggy and the words of those around her became somewhat muddled. "I'll take her. Someone needs to send for Xenia. She's at the ancestral circle."

"I'll get Kuba and send one of the nurses, Gabe. Just get her to the station."

Bastet fought to keep her eyes open, but it was a losing battle. The last thing she heard was, "Let's get her some help, then."