Chapter 12

CHAPTER TWELVE

550 YEARS AGO

A ndie ran through darkness in feline form. She could barely see and had no idea where she was going. The veil cat—she had to believe it was still inside her—seemed to tell her the way. It wasn’t a voice in her head but an inherent direction she knew to follow.

The spirit held fast to her fur, and she needed to get it to its final resting place. A distant part of her knew she should be worried about Cee. Consumed by her mission, thoughts of her sister started to fade into the surrounding darkness. There wasn’t room to worry about other veil cats in the space between realms.

It felt like forever that Andie moved through the unknown. This darkness surrounded her and the spirit until she suddenly knew it was time to leave.

She jumped again.

After so much darkness, the world forming around her was a welcome sight. Andie and the spirit exited the void between realms. They plummeted before Andie’s mind could catch up with her current feline form. Andie had the sense to look down, to see what they would hit—not that there was much she could do about it.

A river rushed below them.

The urgent gurgle of the water’s flow told her all she needed to know—the current was strong. She didn’t know how well her cat form could swim, but this would not be pleasant if it were anything like when strays were caught in the rain at home.

Andie held her breath and waited for the cold shock of rushing water to overtake her. She hit it with a splash. A second splash sounded as she burst back above the surface. It couldn’t distract her from the water’s icy temperature.

It wasn’t just cold—this wasn’t a refreshing dip on a hot day to cool off. The river was frigid; the stab of cold was bone deep. Her body, even as a feline, started to panic. She lifted a paw to paddle forward before she lost all sense of direction.

It wasn’t a paw Andie lifted, but a hand. The feline was still inside of her—she could sense it. But she looked down at her body returned to human form, dressed in the tunic and leggings she’d worn in the woods. Her clothes were heavy on her body as she swam for shore. She was shaking from cold, exhaustion, and pure panic.

She’d lost track of the spirit in her progress. Leaving the river without it was not an option. She was its guide on this journey. A splash drew her attention to not only the spirit but her sister, too.

Andie raced for them both.

“Come on, Andie,” Cee said as she left the spirit to fend for itself and swam toward the bank.

Knowing her sister was safe, Andie turned for the spirit. Before she could think better, she reached for it. Without her veil cat form, would she be able to touch it? The pull to shepherd the spirit was so strong. A rightness settled over Andie as her hand closed around the spirit’s solid wrist.

Andie pulled hard, swimming diagonally with the current. She set them for a trajectory of the shoreline. The spirit was another weight to add to her tired swim. Andie’s ability to touch the spirit left her too stunned to notice.

She let out a gasping breath as her arm made the final stretch for the shore. She pulled herself and the spirit forward, her body shaking in earnest now that they were safe. When they finally reached shore, the spirit smiled at Andie. A soft smile she wasn’t quite sure she deserved. She hadn’t stopped her sister’s attempt to steal this spirit’s essence. She hadn’t prevented her sister from following her to this…realm, even though Andie knew Cee wanted to steal more spirits.

Andie rolled over onto her back, appreciating the soft grass of the meadow. Her breaths were still heaving—she couldn’t rein them in.

She picked herself up momentarily to see Cee kneeling beside her. The spirit was gone.

“Are you alright?” Cee asked.

Andie didn’t know how to respond. The wound on her arm must have reopened on her journey. It didn’t hurt, but blood dripped from the gash she’d made to follow the spirit.

“Cee, you can’t take the spirits from here,” she said, her voice, trembling from the exertion, a poor reflection of her certainty.

“We can talk about it later,” Cee said, “Just breathe.” She patted her sister’s hand and pulled her head onto her lap.

“No!” Andie shouted. “The spirits belong here. We can’t take them if they want to stay.”

“What’s this about, Andie?” Cee asked. “You know we need more than your blood magic to save the village.” Her brow furrowed in contemplation. “Oh, do you not want another magic to be able to save us? You want to be the hero?” She tilted her head.

“I don’t want my blood magic to be what saves us, but I refuse to disrupt these spirits’ afterlives without their consent.” The blood continued to drip from Andie’s arm. Each drop hit the ground like a silent promise. She would fight Cee on this. It was bigger than saving their village. This was about preserving whatever came next.

A thrum through her veins drew her gaze to the ground. As her blood dripped into the meadow, the land seemed to suck each drop beneath the soil. It differed from how the land on the continent reacted to her offering. This felt like land accepting a promise she didn’t realize she’d been making.

“Afterlife?” Cee considered. “Is that where we are?”

They were the last words she heard from her sister before magic—not unlike blood magic—flooded Andie’s veins, and darkness overtook her.

Andie blinked as she took in her surroundings. The ground was no longer hard and covered in grass. It was plush—soft. Her skin was warm, bundled in a pile of heavy blankets. She was inside. She searched the room to understand where she was, what had happened, and where Cee was.

“You’re awake.” A voice spoke into her mind. Andie pushed the blankets aside and propped up on her elbows to evaluate the speaker. No one was there.

“ We’re down here, ” the voice said. It was then Andie noticed the echo to it, like the voice was a chorus of many. She looked down. A host of veil cats lay by the bed. One of the cats sat up as if sensing her gaze. Its yellow-green eyes didn’t blink as it stared at Andie.

“ Where is my sister?” Andie asked aloud. She inherently knew the cats could hear and understand her.

“ She is safe, ” the cat said to her. “ She’s in the room next door. ”

“And do veil cats sit at the foot of her bed?” Andie asked.

The feline’s whisker twitched. Andie would call it an attempt at a smile if she didn’t know better. “ How do you know what we are? ” it asked.

Andie didn’t know. She said as much. She’d felt the name when she shifted into one. It felt right—she hadn’t questioned it.

“ We figured as much, ” the veil cat said.

“Do you speak for all of them?” Andie asked.

“Sometimes,” he said. “My name is Orion, and this is your pack.”

“My pack?” she said, affronted. “I’m not a veil cat.” She didn’t like this cat telling her they knew things about her.

“We beg to differ, but we’ll give you time to sort that out.” Orion started licking his paw and swiping the wetted fur over his ear.

“Am I a prisoner here?” Andie asked.

The veil cat stopped its cleaning. “What makes you think that? You’re in a well-appointed room; we cared for you the best we could. This should be royal treatment for a human…” The cat had sounded sure of itself initially, but Andie could feel its doubt by the end.

She decided to ignore the nagging feeling in the back of her mind that told her to question why this cat wanted to give her royal treatment. A different question popped into her head. “We didn’t die, right?”

“Neither of you are dead,” the cat replied, “though we cannot guarantee your sister’s safety if she tries to take a spirit from its resting place.” Orion’s voice was still smooth—elegant—but didn’t hide the hint of malice.

The cat paused before proceeding. “You feel the same…do you not?”

How could he know that?

“We are bound to the land…just as you now are,” Orion spoke quietly but surely. Was that true? Andie believed the cats were bound to the land. The longing she felt when she’d transformed—the desire to return herself and the spirit she shepherded to this place—wasn’t a feeling that could be mistaken.

But was she now bound as one of them?

“I’m human,” she said, running her fingers through her long white blonde hair as confirmation of the form she held.

“You are, and you are not,” the veil cat said, tilting its head and resuming licking its paws.

“What does that mean?”

“You perform magic even on the continent, do you not?”

“How could you know that?”

“The vow you made to the land had the ring of authority. It was a presence we’ve been waiting a long time for.”

Authority? Not from Andie. Cee was the one who led. Cee devised plans and could get people to agree to enact them. People were too unpredictable to Andie. She was never able to read them. It’s what had drawn her to magic in the first place. The expectations of magical contracts were much more straightforward.

Andie rose and placed the bed between her and the host of cats. Another veil cat sat up. Andie could see it from where she leaned over the mattress. Its golden eyes blinked. She stumbled from nerves as she took a step backward. Andie’s fingers caught on the wooden bedside table. “Ouch. ”

She lifted it to her lips reflexively. She could see a splinter in the pad of her finger. Blood welled at the insertion point. Instead of sucking the finger into her mouth, she didn’t know what overtook her. Some desire to prove she didn’t belong to the land here—that this was all a big misunderstanding. The blood fell from her finger and hit the floor.

Fur coated her body, and she was on all fours before she could blink. A growl ripped through her throat at the change. Without conscious thought, she’d transformed back into a veil cat.

“Well,” the cat said lazily. “Hope that answers that question for you.”