Book 16: Forgotten(5)
The man from her dreams.
Kate felt like her heart was about to stop. Cold sweat broke out all over her body and suddenly she couldn’t get a deep enough breath to fill her lungs, even though she was gasping for air.
Him—it’s him! He’s coming to get me!
Her hands clenched into trembling fists and she started to see spots dancing in front of her eyes. God, was she going to black out?
No, can’t do that! Have to take control. Have to breathe!
“Kate? What is it? What are you staring at?” Mimi looked to see what had put the expression of horror on her friend’s face. But just as she turned her head, the tall man, who was head and shoulders above anyone else in the food court, somehow melted into the crowd and disappeared.
As soon as he left, Kate’s heart gave a little skip and started beating normally again. Her breathing slowed and her tense muscles began to relax.
“Nothing,” she said in a voice that trembled only a little. “It’s nothing. For a minute I thought I saw—”
“Saw what?” Mimi looked at her with genuine concern on her long face. “Seriously Kate—what? You looked white as a sheet. For a minute I thought you were going to faint or have a panic attack!”
“It was nothing.” Kate waved a hand, trying to dismiss the dark figure. “A figment of my imagination, that’s all.”
“Well…if you’re sure.” Mimi was clearly reluctant to let it go.
“I’m sure,” Kate said briskly. Standing, she grabbed her empty cup and Mimi’s tray. “Come on—break’s over. Time to get back to work. I have expensive watches to sell.”
“But—”
“And if I sell that Yacht-Master, we’ll have our own party!” Kate promised recklessly. “It’ll be amazing.”
“That sounds like fun.” Mimi seemed willing to let herself be distracted, at least for now. Kate breathed a sigh of relief. She dumped their trash in the can and they chatted lightly about possible party themes as they left the food court together. Of the tall, dark-haired man with blue eyes, there was no sign. Kate tried to tell herself he was just a figment of her imagination, brought on by Mimi’s mention of her dreams. But he’d seemed so real standing there, staring at her.
So real and so very, very dangerous.
Chapter Two
Rone watched her from the shadows of a nearby shop as she walked down the long, winding mall hallway. The shop was a purveyor of trendy Earth clothing with dim lighting and loud music blasting from its darkened interior. The harsh noise hurt his ears but Rone barely even noticed it. All of his attention was focused on the petite female with a riot of coppery curls. That was Kate all right—his sensitive Wulven nose confirmed what his heart had already known. His breath caught in his chest—Lalli! Gods, been looking for you for so long! Thought I’d lost you forever!
She’d disappeared right under his nose from the Holy Mountains on Rageron—leaving nothing but the white robe she’d been wearing. He’d searched everywhere, frantic with fear for her safety and had run himself ragged, unable to sleep at night as he imagined horrible things being done to her.
Rone’s mind kept showing him pictures of his beloved mate being tortured or raped and he couldn’t force the images away long enough to get a moment’s rest. What right had he to rest when his mate was missing? Every minute must be spent searching for her but he had searched entirely in vain, until a trip back to the Mother Ship and a meeting with Commander Sylvan had given him a clue of where she might have been taken…
“So she disappeared and left behind only the clothing she was wearing?” the Kindred leader had asked. He was the head of the Kindred Council and a very busy male but he was sympathetic to Rone’s plight, having apparently gone through something like it in the past.
“Yes, there was a strange humming sound and a flicker of light and then…then she was just…gone.” Rone had barely been able to swallow past the lump in his throat. He hadn’t allowed himself to weep after Kate disappeared and he wasn’t about to start now. He had no time for grieving—she was out there somewhere and he had to find her. Only then could he give in to emotion.
“The humming sound…the light flashing…It sounds exactly the way Sophia was taken back before we were joined,” Commander Sylvan had said, frowning.
“Oh?” Rone’s heart had leaped in his chest. “Are you certain? Do you think what happened to your mate might have happened to Kate as well?”
“The circumstances are similar but I don’t see how,” Sylvan said. “Sophia was taken by the Scourge using a molecular transfer beam they perfected.” His eyes had widened and he had snapped his fingers. “A beam I would wager is still aboard their FatherShip!”
“It still exists?” Rone asked. “But why wasn’t it destroyed after the Kindred finally defeated the AllFather?”
“It was not ours to destroy,” Sylvan had said gravely. “There is an heir—Xairn, the son of the AllFather, though he does not claim his race and has renounced his parentage. He wanted nothing to do with the Fathership but it was thought best to give him time to grieve and think before making any final decisions about it. So the Council ordered it to be towed out into deep orbit, which we did. It has been abandoned ever since. Its weapon systems were disabled, of course, but the equipment was left alone. It never occurred to me—to any of us—that someone might infiltrate it and try to use some of its resources. But maybe that is what happened to your mate.”
“Yes—yes!” Rone had clutched at the hope desperately. “Maybe someone stole Kate using this beam you were talking about—maybe she’s being held there, even now, waiting for me to rescue her!”
Sylvan had frowned again. “Gently, my friend—I do not wish to get your hopes up too high. And are you certain that Kate is waiting for you? Forgive me but didn’t you say that she seemed to have forgotten you somehow just before she disappeared?”
Rone had shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
“The blossoms she inhaled were Dream Blooms which cause a kind of temporary amnesia. But it will have worn off by now.”
“Very well. We will send a squadron of warriors with you this very day to the Fathership,” Sylvan had decided.
“We don’t have time to get a squad—we need to go now!” Rone had insisted. “Kate may be hurt…she might have been…been tortured or…” He shook his head, unable to go on.
Sympathy flashed in Sylvan’s pale blue eyes.
“My Brother, I know so very well the doubt and fear you are going through now. I too, have walked through that shadow and I would not wish it on anyone. But if someone is on the Fathership, using its abandoned equipment for nefarious purposes, it might not be safe to go alone. Come, I’ll call a squad right now and they can meet us at the Docking Bay. We will be there before you know it.”
So they had gathered a full squadron of heavily armed warriors and gone to the Fathership…only to find it abandoned.
“There is nothing here,” Sylvan said, when they had made a thorough search of the ship and ended back in the control area. “I am so sorry, my Brother.”
“Don’t be.” As they walked further into the navigation room, which was filled with delicate looking equipment, his Wulven senses had detected a familiar scent. Warm and fresh and incredibly faint yet he could smell it, still lingering like a ghost in the air. “Kate isn’t here,” he’d told Sylvan. “But she was. And look!”
Lying on the dirty metal floor was something blue—a tiny flower so crushed and withered Rone almost mistook it for a piece of discarded trash—something left behind by the now almost completely extinct Scourge. But there was another familiar scent coming from it—the sickly, sweet stench of the Dream Blooms—the ones Kate had been smelling just before she’d disappeared.
Stooping, he picked it up carefully.
“What is it? A flower?” Sylvan had bent forward to sniff the withered blossom but Rone yanked it out of reach.
“Careful! This is what stole Kate’s memory—it’s not safe to breathe its fragrance—not even in this state.”
“Then you’re right—your mate was here!” Sylvan exclaimed. “But where did she go from here? And who took her?”
“We believe it was Two, the Dark Kindred who wanted Emily dead,” Rone said in a low voice. “The trap Kate fell into was set for her in the first place—the priestess who was complicit in setting it up admitted as much, though she didn’t know who she was dealing with, only that he offered her vengeance.”
“So Kate sprang it by accident,” Sylvan remarked. “And was instantly transported here via the molecular transport beam.”
“Yes, but where is she now? And what’s being done to her?” Rone ground his teeth in frustration. “Gods, I’m going to go crazy if I can’t find her!”
“You’ll find her, my friend.” Sylvan had looked thoughtful. “I believe she may be even closer than you think. Come, let’s look at the coordinates the beam is set to.”