HERTA

 

 

Valentina tipped her blade to catch the firelight. She frowned. Not sharp enough. She kept her eyes on the knife so that she wouldn’t look across the fire.

Her brother had brought the clown again. And that made Valentina frown, too.

She much preferred it when John Alec brought his serious-minded, kick-ass warrior wife. Not the wife’s brother. This silly, joke-making fool.

Valentina looked up and took a quick moment to observe the fool in question. His long legs extended out from him, one bent at the knee, as he lay on his back next to the fire and watched the night sky. His shaggy blond hair was inside that strange cap he wore. All black and boxy with a big brim that just extended from the front. His eyes were closed but she knew he wasn’t sleeping. She knew because he was crunching something in his mouth. She would have bet her favorite dagger that it was— yup. She was right. She smirked to herself as he absently tipped his head to the side and spat pistachio shells into the fire.

What an idiot.

It wasn’t that she didn’t like Kain Keto. He just annoyed her. And she happened to think that freeing enslaved shifters from Herta was very serious business. And the way he lazily lay around their campsite put her teeth on edge. The way it always did. Every time she’d seen him for the last year and a half.

He was a good fighter, though. She’d give him that much.

John Alec came around the fire holding that ridiculous glowing earth tool that he seemed to love so much these days. Living on Earth with his wife had changed her brother in a lot of ways. All of them she approved of. Except for his fondness for this iPad thing.

“Stop frowning at me,” John Alec said good-naturedly as he sat down beside her.

“It’s not you I’m frowning at.”

John Alec’s eyes instantly roved across the fire to his brother-in-law crunching pistachios and looking for all the world like he was lying on the beach somewhere. Instead of in a hostile world that was designed in every way to enslave him, body and soul. But that was just the kind of guy that Kain was; his feathers were very hard to ruffle. “He’s not so bad, you know. If you’d bothered to know him at all over the last year and a half.”

“I know him just fine,” Valentina answered with just a touch of that royal aloofness she employed when she felt a little bad. “And it wasn’t him I was frowning at. It was the devil’s play-toy that you love more than life itself.”

John Alec let out a small noise of frustration for his little sister. “You would like the iPad if you would just learn to use it.” He pinched the bridge of his noise. “Never mind. I refuse to have this argument again.”

Across the campsite, Kain spit more pistachio shells into the fire and Valentina shifted in annoyance.

“You know, they help him,” John Alec said in a low voice. One that had just a hint of disappointment in it. Valentina hated it when he used that voice.

“What?”

“The pistachio shells, they help Kain with the Struggles.” He was referring to the bone-deep discomfort of any shifter when they were in the world of Herta. Something about the nature of Herta was like poison in a shifter’s blood. It made a shifter tired, uncomfortable, it willed a shifter to succumb to a master. Especially if they shifted. Which Kain did not do whenever he was in Herta. It was too dangerous to shift. If he did, he might never be able to shift back. He’d be in his bear form for the rest of his life, searching for a master. So whenever any of the Ketos came with John Alec into Herta, it was a constant resistance to the Struggles. A constant management of pain.

Valentina felt a burst of regret for having been so annoyed by him. She knew it must be painful to lie so casually by the fire. He’d been in Herta for three days this time. At that point in a trip, Milla, John Alec’s wife, would be sitting in a tight crouch, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. It hit Valentina then, that all of them dealt with it in a different way. All of the Ketos.

Whenever Ansel, the oldest Keto, came on these missions, he was quiet the entire time. And by the end of the trip, he wasn’t even responding to yes or no questions. Inka, Milla’s semi-loopy twin sister, would jabber on and on about things that Valentina had never even heard of. By the end of a mission, Inka would literally be talking to the squirrels, the owls, the trees.

But he cracked those shells again and Valentina couldn’t help the naturally hot streak of annoyance that burned through her.

“He’s my wife’s family,” John Alec spoke. “Valentina. He’s my family.”

Something lonely and cold slithered its way into Valentina’s chest. John Alec had other family. He had another home. He had a whole other world. Her only family didn’t need her the same way she needed him. And that had her sheathing her sharpened dagger at her hip and leaning toward the iPad. “Show me your plan of attack.”
If there was one thing that fulfilled her in this life, it was her dedication to freeing the enslaved shifters of Herta.

John Alec pulled up the map of the surrounding mountain on his iPad and started drawing lines and arrows, showing her what they would do come morning.

Valentina was intently listening to her brother lay out the plan when Williams, Valentina’s lover, came out of the shadows of the forest. He’d been patrolling, but now he wanted to hear the game plan for tomorrow.

Williams sat next to Valentina, his hand going around her waist. Valentina was listening to her brother speak with such focus that she didn’t even notice that the cold feeling in her chest hadn’t gone away at all.

 

 

***

 

 

Across the fire, Kain Keto kept his eyes half slitted against the stars. He kept them fuzzy because if he focused on them, with all their glittering sharpness, he felt even more pain gather behind his eyes. The third day on Herta was usually the worst. Because on the fourth day, at least he generally knew he was going home.

The last time he’d stepped through the portal and back onto Earth, Kain had shifted so fast he’d torn his favorite pair of jeans to shreds. He hadn’t cared at all. Shifting just felt so damn good after days of not being able to do it.

And the Struggles weren’t exactly a cakewalk either.

He popped some more pistachios and rolled them around in his mouth, concentrating on those instead. Honestly, the pain of existing on Herta wasn’t even what was bothering him the most.

What was really bothering him was the black-haired, muscle-bound grunter across the fire.

Yeah. Kain was not a fan of Williams.

First of all, he thought the ‘s’ at the end of his name was dumb. Second, he thought the fact that he was constantly off patrolling in the woods was dumb. A waste of energy and time. With his heightened shifter senses, Kain didn’t need a security guard. The guy was about as useful as a mall cop. And third, he thought the way Williams treated Valentina was dumb as hell.              

Williams touched Valentina absently, like he’d forgotten she was even there, sitting next to him, looking all cute and big-eyed.

A small smile traced over Kain’s lips when he thought of what Valentina would do if he ever called her cute to her face. Probably stab him somewhere. She knew that Kain was a quick healer, like all the Ketos. Basically anywhere she got him would heal in a matter of minutes. And she’d threatened to do it before.

Kain decided that it would probably be worth the pain to see those big eyes narrow in irritation. He liked the way she looked all the time, with those light brown eyes, just this side of hazel, and her light brown hair to match, always in that complicated plait down her back. He liked her woodsy, tunic-y clothes. And he liked every single one of the dozens of weapons she kept on her person at all times.

But she had a man, as dumb as that man might be. So Kain kept his distance. She was attractive. And Kain liked attractive women. Actually, he liked women of all kinds. And he had the Tinder history to prove it. He wasn’t exactly what one might call picky.

Kain cleared his throat and shifted slightly, avoiding the temptation to jostle his leg up and down in discomfort. He hoped he could get some sleep tonight.

Fat chance. He needed to shift. He needed to get the fuck off of Herta. And he needed a woman. Somebody soft and sweet and willing to help him forget about the world for just a few hours.

Their voices died down across the fire and Kain knew they were done discussing the plan for tomorrow. He heard John Alec shuffle off to his bedroll. Kain knew that he should probably get up and go to his own, but he was so uncomfortable, going out of his skin so hard, that the idea of moving was akin to sticking needles under his toenails.

Kain smirked when he heard Valentina and Williams shuffling around. Though he’d never once seen them cuddle, they always slept next to one another. Kain pictured, for just one bright second, what it would be like to have her body heat next to him right that very second.

He tugged the brim of his baseball hat down over his eyes and blocked the light.

Williams was a bonafide douche. But he was also a very lucky man.

 

 

***

 

It was several hours later when something woke Valentina. A small noise in the night. Williams slept like a log beside her, like he always did. And when she glanced up, she saw that her brother slept as well. Her eyes went next to Kain. But he wasn’t there. He wasn’t on his bedroll or next to the fire.

Valentina narrowed her eyes for a moment but laid her head back down. John Alec’s words rolled back through her mind.

He’s my family.

She rose silently. Valentina cocked an ear to listen for the sound of him again. She didn’t have the super human senses that shifters had, but she’d lived her entire life on high alert, just trying to survive. She depended on her senses to guide her. And sure enough, seconds later, she heard the sound of dripping water.

She didn’t put on her boots or her coat, as she didn’t want to wake the others. She suppressed a small shiver from the chilly early summer air as she stepped through the forest toward the creek.

And that’s where she found him. He crouched over the shallow, bubbling creek and brought water to his mouth in the palm of his hand. She paused when she saw his face. He was grimacing in pain.              

She’d never seen that before.

She’d seen Kain smirk. She’d seen him flirt. Laugh, roll his eyes, whistle in amazement. But never pain. It tugged her forward.

His shifter senses had him looking up at her as she approached and she narrowed her eyes at him as he immediately smoothed away the pain off his face.

“Hey, sunshine. You’re up late.”

She narrowed her eyes even more. First of all, she hated when he called her that. And second of all, she distrusted the way he immediately hid his pain. How normal his voice would have sounded had she not just witnessed his grimace of pain.

She crouched next to him on the bank of the creek. His green eyes were on the water, not on her.

“You’re in pain.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.

He cleared his throat. “Yeah. Herta’s not exactly a vacation spot for shifters.”

She ignored his joke. “How bad is it?”

“Totally manageable.” He glanced her way for half a second.

She didn’t believe him. “You could make a portal, go back through for a few hours.”

He blinked at her. “You really think I would be that selfish? Endanger you like that?”

All of them had tools that could create portals, or gates, between Herta and Earth. Inka’s husband, a scientist, had invented it about two years ago. And it was what made the caravan possible. All they had to do was find where the enslaved shifters were, and then they could immediately create a door, get them through to earth, and close the door to anyone who might be chasing them. Easy as pie. Except they’d soon discovered that every time they used the tool to open a door, it called to hunters on Herta.

These men hunted shifters. They were ruthless murderers and enslavers. And they had a relationship with the portals that no one understood. It hadn’t taken long for them to realize that every time they created a door, a hunter wasn’t far behind them. It meant that they couldn’t cut back and forth as easily as they’d once hoped. And it meant that if Kain were to cut through, get a few hours of relief on Earth tonight, then cut back, he risked bringing hunters straight to their campsite.

Valentina didn’t answer. Instead she leaned forward and took a drink of water with her hand, the same way that Kain had. When she sat back, her palm landed on something between them. His ridiculous cap. He must have tossed it off. She frowned down at it. The night was cool enough to make her shiver, yet the hat was soaked through with sweat.

He wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were on the water and his elbows rested on his bent knees. If she hadn’t seen his face, felt the sweat on his hat, she wouldn’t have known he was in pain.

Valentina rose from beside him and disappeared into the woods. She returned with something clutched in her hand. It had a strong, cool scent. Like mint, but not quite. She went to her knees beside the creek and plunged her hand into the dark water. She searched for something. Her slender fingers came up with a rock and she studied it, tossing it away. She tossed away the next one as well. The third and fourth she kept. They were smooth and flat, like skipping stones.

Kain watched her, mystified, as she turned to him.

“Here,” she murmured. Her tone was both curt and soft at the same time. And then she did the last thing Kain might have ever expected from her.

She pressed the cool stones to the back of Kain’s neck. Her soft, strong fingers swept the stones up one tense muscle and down the other. He made a small sound in the back of his throat and let his head drop forward. Valentina’s fingers paused. But only for a second.

She brusquely pulled the back of his T-shirt up and pressed the stones to the tight muscles in his lower back as well. Kain hissed through his teeth and she wasn’t quite sure if it was pleasure or discomfort.

“Hm,” he shifted a little bit and chuckled. “You gave me the chills. I’ve been sweating my clothes through all night and just like that you give me the chills. How’d you do that?”

He looked back over his shoulder at her but she avoided his eyes. Looked, instead, at that long scar down his cheek. She liked scars. Always had. They told stories. “I’m a healer.”

He squinted his eyes at her. “I thought you were a warrior.”

“That, too. I’ve worked hard my entire life to be a warrior. But I was born a healer.” She shrugged, as if it were no big deal that with a few simple strokes of her hands she was easing the raging discomfort and low-level pain that had been chasing Kain for days.

When the stones began to warm against the heat of his body, she tossed them back in the river and came to her knees beside him.

She snapped open the leaves she’d picked in the forest and a thin, green juice trickled out, the fragrance tickling at Kain’s nose. She put the juice on her thumb and then firmly drew a line behind one of Kain’s ears and then the other. It instantly cooled him there, the fragrance soothing. Next, she took him by the chin and faced him toward her.

Kain’s calm, green eyes watched her carefully. She drew her thumb over his brow and down the length of his nose, dragging the leaf’s juice along there as well. Kain felt the cool burn soothe across his face. And the scent began to open up something in his head, to relieve the pounding headache that had started paying rent behind his eyes.

And lastly, she studied the leaf left in her hand. She tried crushing it between her fingers but frowned when it didn’t have the desired effect. Popping it into her mouth she gave the leaf two quick chews before pulling it out of her mouth and shoving it, with no ceremony, between Kain’s teeth.

He stared at her, frozen, his eyebrows raised.

Those light brown eyes of hers were fierce, unapologetic. “It’s the only way to fully activate the healing properties of the leaf,” she explained. “Put it in your cheek and keep it there tonight. It’ll help with the pain. Help control your temperature.”

He nodded and quickly looked away. He knew he should say thank you, but his refined shifter senses were currently tasting the flavor of her mouth mixed in with the leaf in his cheek and he thought he probably couldn’t have spelled his own name at that particular second.

A few minutes passed and Valentina rose.

“Thank you,” Kain managed. “You didn’t have to do that.”

Pain had truly left his features though his blond hair was still darkened with sweat. His silvery scar caught the moonlight and his eyes looked disconcertingly honest. Almost like a child’s. Valentina felt a tiny little door crack open in her mind. A lifetime of experiences had her immediately slamming it closed. Viciously. “Well. We can’t have you holding us back tomorrow. Just because of the Struggles.”

He recoiled. He’d never once held back the group. If he had, Kain would have couched his pride and let the more skilled members of his family go on these missions. But he’d been extremely helpful in Herta. Clutch, on more than one occasion. And he really didn’t like her tone when she spoke of the Struggles. ‘Just because’. Right. Well, she’d never experienced them, so she didn’t know.

It was then that Kain scented Williams coming toward them through the woods. Great. The boulder masquerading as a man was coming to check on his woman. Kain’s mood soured even further. He couldn’t bring himself to say that dumb-ass name out loud.

“Someone’s coming,” he grumbled, as Williams came through the brush.

Valentina burst into action with a soldier’s perfectly honed reflexes. Kain’s jaw dropped in complete glee as she lunged backwards, kick-flipped off a tree, and had Williams on his back, knife to his throat in less than three seconds.

Her face went from fierce to furious instantly.

“Damn it, Valentina!” Williams huffed, red in the face.

All those push-ups and sword sparring in the woods and he still couldn’t get the drop on his 5’2” girlfriend. Kain swallowed down a laugh.

Valentina sheathed her dagger and rose off Williams, stalking over to Kain. “You knew! You knew it was Williams. You must have scented him. Yet you let me think he was an intruder!”

Kain found it wise not to say a word. But he couldn’t quite hold the smile back.

She glared at him, her high cheekbones even more prominent as she sucked in those pouty lips in anger. “Everything is a joke to you, Kain Keto. I come to you to help and you—”

She cut off in anger, tossing her hands in the air and striding away into the forest.

Williams righted himself and glared at Kain as well. Kain didn’t bother glaring back. He simply rose and held a hand out to the floored giant.

He may not like the big oaf. But he was fighting alongside him tomorrow. “Sorry man, I wasn’t thinking.”

Williams said nothing as they walked back to the campsite.