Sentinels: Kodiak Chained

Mariska fought a shock of envy at the way he received Katie’s touch, accepting both it and the sentiment she offered. He set Katie gently on her feet, relinquishing her to Maks.

Katie held tightly to Maks’ hand. “Just like before,” she said, her gaze still a little distant. “This foreseeing has always been about more than Maks’ presence here… that was just part of it. The first part. But… there’s a foreboding… there’s terrible grief, there’s—” She stopped and shook her head. “Can I try to show you, please? My seeings have never translated well to words.”

“Can you do that?” one of Ian’s assistants asked. Mariska hadn’t seen them at the meeting, hadn’t ridden with them in the tidy little BMW SUV, and now, with some resignation, simply thought of them as Heckle and Jeckle.

“I can try,” Katie told him. “But I need hands.” She extended hers, and Maks put his over it. Ruger, too, and that left Mariska and Ian and Sandy, exchanging glances with a mutual reluctance but finally adding their hands to the physical nexus along with Heckle and Jeckle.

“Ready?” Katie murmured. “Here it comes…”

But Mariska wasn’t ready.

The wild, yipping howl of a bereft wild dog, the wash of a vile stench, tasting foul in her throat. A hollow huffing sound, followed by a clacking, the surge of fear… a tremendous explosion. And then an entire chorus of grief, animal skins fluttering to the ground like sodden laundry. Wolf and bear, panther and boar, wildcat and stoat and deer. Crumpled up and discarded, and a nation of grief splashing in to wash it all away—

Ian swore under his breath, jerking his hand from beneath Mariska’s and sending her tumbling back to reality. Tumbling back in reality, as she struggled to reorient and found herself steadied by a pair of familiar hands—familiar and big, and a touch her body knew instantly.

Not until she’d blinked and recovered her equilibrium did he step away, leaving an ache where his warmth had been.

“You see,” Maks said, glancing at Katie. “You see why it matters.”

“Yes,” Ian said, and his words sounded a little strangled. “Whatever that was, it sure as hell matters.”

“That sound,” said Heckle—short, bandy-muscled, and not strong enough of Sentinel blood to take the change. He cupped his hands over his mouth to imitate what words couldn’t quite convey. A hollow huffing sound, a clacking…

“What was that?” Jeckle asked, but not as if he expected to get an answer. Like Heckle, he likely saw little of fieldwork, but he was a solid sort, old enough to have a wealth of experience behind him.

Mariska exchanged a glance with Ruger, looking for and finding the wince of awareness that told her he’d recognized it, too. “Bear,” she said finally. “Frightened black bear, with teeth and breath.”

Heckle gave her a skeptical look. “What frightens a bear?”

Ruger said flatly, “Not much,” and Mariska realized she was chafing her upper arms, chilled to the bone in the rising warmth of the late-summer day.

“Great,” Ian said. “Now the bears are spooked.”

“Good,” Katie said, her tone unexpectedly practical. “You should be.”

Ruger made a rumbling noise; Mariska thought it might have been dark humor. Katie shot him a look. “And maybe you’ll all be careful.” She shivered, giving the woods a wary look.

“The boundaries are up,” Maks told her. “I’ll know if anyone approaches while we’re gone.” He sent a look Ruger’s way that Mariska interpreted as a warning. And once I take you in, you’re on your own.

Chapter 4

The ATVs moved along in eerie silence, and the old logging road unrolled in uneven waves until it slipped along the side of a more significant ridge. By then they’d hit their first Core-imposed obstacle, the thick layers of determent workings that filled Mariska first with the impulse to turn aside and then a rising anxiety.

But Maks led them steadily forward, and the effect faded. Eventually, Maks took them off the trail to a little hollow, and they huddled the machines together and cut the engines. By the time Mariska dismounted and grabbed her gear bag, Maks had already snagged the waiting camo net and flipped it over the ATVs.

Heckle and Jeckle were the last to get out of his way, fumbling their heavily padded amulet storage bags. Maks gave the net a final flip and it settled into place. Rather than heading down the road, he circled aside to move slantwise along the slope of the mild ridge they’d just passed by, his limp more pronounced with the marginal footing—a cautious approach.

“I thought this bunker was abandoned,” Mariska said, keeping her voice low as a matter of course with the assumption that someone—anyone—might be in these woods close enough to hear.

Maks looked back at her with some surprise, leading them upward. “This is Core.”

“He means,” Ruger added, “we don’t take anything for granted.”

Mariska gave herself a little kick. Of course not. She simply wasn’t in step with this team yet.

Wouldn’t be, if she didn’t stop second-guessing her own decisions.

Maks took them over the crest of the ridge. “I don’t know if anyone remains,” he told them, a note of apology there. “The scents are strong enough. But I didn’t go in.”

Ian’s voice held some hint of exasperation. “I should hope not. We’ll need to sweep for amulets before we so much as touch the damned door. Tell me you knew that.”

“I knew that,” Maks said, mild in response. Like Nick, Mariska thought—with enough confidence so he had no need to bristle back. But let someone threaten Katie…

She wondered, quite suddenly, what it would be like to have someone at her back so fiercely. Not because she needed it. Just because of what it would feel like.

Maks led them around the jagged stump of a fallen pine and tipped his head at the cut of ground breaking way before them, though there was no structure evident. “There,” he said, and crouched—started to, at least, until the one leg buckled, and he put his knee on the ground with the compensatory grace inherent in all the big cat Sentinels. “The bunker.”

The ground dipped halfway down the ridge and rose even higher on the other side; otherwise, it was unremarkable. Just a rocky little swale covered in stubby, twisted scrub oak and the ancient skeleton of another fallen tree.

But Mariska wasn’t going to be the first one to say there wasn’t anything there. Instead, she moved into position beside Ruger, turning her senses to their surroundings—even if that meant no more than noting the pine siskins fweeting overhead and a singular squirrel rustling around in the pine needles some hundred feet away. The local energies were quiet—no scent of Core amulet corruption, everyone’s personal shields drawn tight. Maks’ was the loudest of those, his shields so much stronger than she ever would have expected, even knowing of his personal strengths.

“Ah,” Ian said suddenly. “I see it now. How the hell did you ever find it?”

“It stinks of Forakkes,” Maks said, and his voice was no longer casual at all. “And others, once close.”

And still Mariska didn’t see it—not until she quit searching the details and instead looked at the little swale as a whole. The slight convex curve of the ground, the occasional hard-edged shadow, immune to the sway of the breeze. This time she couldn’t stop herself. “How—”

How had he buried this structure, and left so little sign of it on the surrounding environment?

“It’s been there a long time,” Ian said, with no trouble following her line of thought.

“The old logging activity would have been a perfect cover for its construction,” Jeckle observed. “The question is, how do we get in?”

“In the rocks across from us,” Maks said. “I didn’t try it.”

“Smart,” Ian said again. He glanced back to Heckle and Jeckle. “Let’s drift on over there, boys. Stay quiet on your feet, and when I say to hang back, then damned well hang back. No one’s asking you to be field Sentinels overnight.”

Maks looked over to Ruger. “Don’t underestimate him,” he said. “Forakkes. He is a man without soul.”

“I know what he did,” Ruger said grimly, and Mariska got the impression that they were alluding to something other than the events in the operation field reports—the details of Forakkes’ amulet workings from the time of Core D’oíche, including those that had caused the ultimate if inadvertent demise of the former local Core prince, the drozhar, of this area. Forakkes had gone on to create the monstrous javelina-creature Maks had battled at so great a price—and he’d nearly succeeded in his intent to kidnap and enslave Katie Maddox.

But this was something else—something grimmer and even more personal. If she hadn’t known it by Maks’ eyes, she would have heard it in Ruger’s voice.

Maks pushed off from the ground—he’d barely faltered before Ruger reached him, one strong arm steadying him the rest of the way up. Maks’ expression was more annoyance than pain, and he said to Ruger, “No matter. Katie will see to it.” Mariska was instantly caught by their easy camaraderie, by Ruger’s instant response to a teammate’s need. By herself, instantly the outsider.

She had only herself to blame for the intensity of that feeling. Jet had been the only one to confront her so directly, but they all knew Ruger had been stunned by her presence on the team—they all knew it was personal.

Maks started back down the slope, and she quickly smoothed away the little curl of envy that tightened her mouth. Ruger turned to her, his dark expression enough to warn her. “Nothing happening here for a bodyguard, you may have noticed.”

“I’m patient,” she told him.

He snorted. “I doubt the hell out of that.” He bent and scooped up his pack. “If you were patient, you wouldn’t be here. You wouldn’t have talked your way onto this team, when Nick damned well could have used you elsewhere.”

But I wanted to work with you. And I believed in what I told Nick. “I wish we could start over,” she said abruptly, shifting her own pack. “I wish you could look at me and see whatever it was you saw in that park yesterday evening.”

He looked at her for a long moment. “So do I,” he said, and for that moment his voice was devoid of blame and bitterness, holding nothing but honesty—and maybe a touch of sadness. “Dammit, Mariska—so do I.”

Across the swale, up on the high ridge, Ian waved to them; it was enough of an invitation that Mariska tentatively made herself more receptive to sent communication, and she wasn’t surprised when she felt the tickle of his thoughts.

::We can see it,:: he said. ::We’re heading in.::

::We’ll wait,:: Ruger said, not so much as glancing to see if she agreed. ::I’m getting something from inside, though—not human, not well. I’ll try to make sense of it.::

Her resentment flared. Hello, you could have discussed this decision with me. But staying here made too much sense. Besides, if he was heading into some sort of healer mode, she could hardly move out on her own after making such a big fat bear deal about being here.

And if she was going to be honest with herself, she’d have to admit her crankiness came from resentment—from the slowly dawning awareness that she’d just plain screwed up.

::Got us a door,:: Ian said. ::Nicely integrated with the Core amulet equivalent of ice-cold water balancing in a bucket overhead. Gonna be a few minutes.::

::We’ll wait,:: Ruger said again, although this time his attention seemed divided, his gaze distant. His brow drew with concentration—with some subtle effort. “Not unwell,” he muttered, and she wasn’t sure if he spoke to her or if he just spoke. “But not right. I can’t—Hell.” He jerked as if he’d needed to catch his balance against the nonexistent movement of the ground, and Mariska put out an impulsive hand to steady him—but pulled back before he noticed, as he abruptly turned away, one palm pressing against his brow.

She gave him that physical space as he yanked a colorful bandanna from his back pocket, broad shoulders stiff.

“The brief said your healing was still affected,” she said. “It didn’t say how.”

He turned back to her, stuffing the bandanna away. “Does it matter?”

“I don’t know,” she told him. “Does it?”

He glared at her a long moment, then muttered a curse—a capitulation of sorts, if not a happy one. “Affected,” he said, “is a euphemism for can’t.”

It shocked her more than she expected. “At all? But I thought—”

He shook his head, a vicious motion that cut her off short. “Can’t,” he repeated. “I can still feel the wrongness of things—like in there.” He jerked his head at the obscured bunker. “But I can’t heal it. I can’t touch those energies any longer, never mind guide them.”

“But you’re—” They were thoughtless words, and she stopped herself just in time. You’re Ruger. The bear who heals—and who does it better than anyone else in the field. The one who needs backup just because he’s too important to risk, never mind that no one should have to do those two things at once.

She might as well not have bothered. He clearly understood the direction of her thoughts. “Not anymore,” he told her. “I’m here to analyze, that’s all.”

“I don’t understand.” She didn’t, and it troubled her; she didn’t bother to hide it. “Then why would Nick give me the impression you’d take the healer’s role—that you’d need me?”

Ruger snorted; it was a throaty sound. “I don’t have the faintest idea. Because he’s giving you the chance of your career, to be in on this operation? Because he’s pissed at me about something?” But he stopped, and shook his head. “No, that’s not fair. If Nick’s pissed, he comes at you head-on.” He sent her a direct stare, a challenge from pale brown eyes. “I only know one thing for sure—I don’t need this. And we’re spread thin enough. Nick should have put you somewhere else. On someone else.” The challenge didn’t ease in the faintest. “Someone who you haven’t lied to yet.”

“I didn’t—” she said hotly, but stopped. Not just because she pretty much had lied to him, even if it was both simpler and more complicated and that. But because he’d gone still, staring down the hill. Not still as Maks or another big cat would do, the stalking calm—just plain still.

And then, before she could ask, he started down the slope. There was something about the angle of his head that caught her attention, spiking concern.

“Ruger,” she said, pitching her voice as a warning.

He didn’t seem to hear, and maybe it was just as well she hadn’t distracted him. For an instant later, when a camouflage-obscured figure behind the fallen tree exploded into motion, Ruger barely startled at all, even when Mariska yelled his name—this time imbuing it with alarm as well as warning, all the dammit, this is what I’m here for she could manage in one word.

At the park, he’d respected that. He’d wordlessly left her the room to do her share of the brawling.

Now he ignored her completely—even though he could easily see that the man had reacted in panic as Ruger’s path downward narrowed his escape route from this swale. And he could damned well see that if he stepped back, he’d create the man room to get past, leaving him completely open to Mariska’s full-bore approach from the side.

A bear in full-speed charge was nothing to trifle with, whether in her human or animal form.

But no, Ruger crouched slightly, weighting himself to earth—taking those few necessary steps to block the man’s way. And then he just was, rooted and unmoving. He ducked one shoulder in a perfectly timed block, and Mariska found herself floundering to shift gears. She cursed, slipping in the layered old pine needles, and righted herself to discover that the fool of a Core minion was fighting back—and doing it in the cowardly way that the Core did best when they couldn’t manage an ambush.

With firearms.

“Gun!” she cried, barely hearing Ian’s mind voice with its bemused ::What the hell is going on over there?:: as she spotted the weapon on its way out of the shoulder holster hidden beneath the forest-patterned camo jacket. “Gun!”

::Idiot,:: Ruger snarled, a personal thought gone public—or at least gone to Mariska—as he yanked the man up and off his feet, gave him a good shake, and dropped him to slap the gun away. “Stay down.”

But by then Mariska was close enough and still running on strong, and she could see the man had no intention of doing any such thing. He fumbled in his jacket pocket even as he crabbed away—a classic amulet grab—and Ruger said, “Ah, hell,” and threw himself down on the minion.

“No, no, no!” Not when there was no way to tell what the amulet would do if it made contact, what it would do even if it didn’t.

The dull snap of bone stopped her short. Ruger rolled away from the man, ending up on his hands and knees and already poised to thrust up and away. A big man, nimble on his feet.

But then, she already knew that.

Amulet corruption shredded the air, far thicker than carrion; the man had time for only a faint gargle of horror, a quick and spastic thrash toward death before he subsided.

After a moment, Ruger climbed to his feet, nothing of haste about it.

::Ruger?:: Ian said, obscured by terrain and structure. ::What the hell?::

::We’re good,:: Ruger said, an absent sending that didn’t distract him from circling in as he brushed himself off. ::Back with you in a moment.::

“Good?” Mariska said, aghast at the shrill note in her voice. “We’re good?” By then she was close enough to reach him—she punched him solidly on the arm. “This is what you call good?” She looked down at the minion—the former minion—and discovered his elbow bent the wrong way, his hand stuck in his pocket as it clutched the amulet… and his body as mummified as any creature left dead and undisturbed in the desert sun. “What were you even thinking?” and she threw another punch into his arm, full of frustration and fury.

Ruger turned with a quickness belying his size, his hand closing around her wrist—closing hard. His eyes, so matter-of-factly amiable—so filled with heat—had gone hard, hard enough to make her gasp. And he said nothing, but she heard the growl rumbling deep in his chest.

She responded without thinking, offering the quiet sound in her throat that meant a bear’s acquiescence—but only for the instant before she managed to cut it short. Then she yanked her wrist free and glared at him. “You should have let him go. I would have had him—that’s why I’m here.” And when he said nothing, she found herself flinging out words, rushing to fill that void, wanting something—anything—from him in response. “Last night in that parking lot, you would have let him past. You would have worked as a team. You should have known—”

“Last night,” Ruger interrupted, “we were a team.”

She blinked back unexpected emotion, and made her voice hard. “We’re still a team. You have your job, and I have mine. Don’t get them mixed up again.”

::Guys?:: Ian said. ::Hate to break up your little whatever-it-is, but have I mentioned I want to know what the hell is going on?::

“We had company,” Ruger said, out loud as much as through his mind’s voice. “Our company accidentally fried himself with his own amulet.”

::Purely by coincidence, I’m sure. Keep sharp, then. We’re just about through here; come on over and we’ll get a look inside.::

::Coming,:: Mariska said—but when she lifted her head, she discovered that Ruger was already on his way.

The brief, acrid stench of stolen Core power burst through the underground workshop, making Ciobaka sneeze. “Wowoww.”

“What are you complaining about now?” Tarras slammed the door of the recently emptied cage nearest to Ciobaka’s.

“No,” Ehwoord said, the snap of annoyance in his voice. “He’s right. Yoske triggered one of his defense amulets.”

Ciobaka tilted his head, studying Tarras as his mouth clamped shut and his body stiffened in anticipation of repercussion. But Ehwoord continued quietly grooming amulets for the next round of impressions, no more prepossessing than he ever was with his slight stature, his belly going round, his hair gray and his skin lined with wrinkles of a strangely stiff nature—as if parts of him had forgotten they were old and the rest of him was ancient. Sometimes Ciobaka thought his mind worked in that same pattern, shifting from coldly efficient to something just a little less sane.

Tarras asked carefully, “You felt it?”

“It’s my amulet,” Ehwoord told him, as if that was explanation enough.

“Then they’ve found the overflow installation.”

“Perhaps. Or Yoske became careless between here and there.” Ehwoord’s mouth tightened. “I needed that network up and running. I need those cameras. After a time, if Yoske doesn’t return, you’ll see to it.”

Tarras cleared his throat. “Of course. I’ll take a team and—”

“No,” Ehwoord snapped, and Ciobaka blinked at his emphatic tone. Interesting, to see Ehwoord ruffled. Interesting, to see that Tarras feared. “We hardly need half a posse tramping around in the woods if the Sentinels have found the installation. You may, however, take Ciobaka. He can warn you of Sentinel presence long before you detect them. They are, at all times, far too cocky about their presence in woods such as these.”

“Wahnnah!” Ciobaka said, and barked an exclamation as his tail quivered in anticipation. “Ouwwtah!”

“Out,” Ehwoord said, flaunting his human tongue and lips. “And yes. Of course, you will wear the collar—and you still bear the obedience amulet within you. If your behavior is less than exemplary, there will be punishment upon return.”

Ciobaka flattened his dingoesque ears, crouching slightly in the submission that Ehwoord wanted to see. But he flexed his newly mobile dewclaw thumb, pondering the buckle to his electric collar—and made sure Ehwoord saw that not at all.

Chapter 5

In truth, Ruger had only meant to stop the Core minion from pulling the amulet from his pocket. If the man hadn’t triggered the thing in hand, he’d still be alive.

He’d been a handsome man—as were many of the Core, in a snake-oil kind of way. Not because of their strikingly swarthy skin—more olive than Mariska’s stunning complexion, not as dark—but from the affectation of their hair, slicked back into a short queue and always black, whether natural or dyed. And the silver jewelry, heavy at wrist and neck and ear.

And their ubiquitous suits. Especially in the highlevel posses—those serving the regional drozhar or even the Septs Prince, leader of them all. High sheen, beautifully cut… always just a little bit I think much of myself.

Not that this man was any of those things any longer. His black hair had gone dry and brittle; his skin taut, dry walnut stretching over bone. His clothes had been woodsy enough, the camo jacket over fatigue pants and a black T. But whatever else he might have had to tell them, they’d lost it when his tongue dried up. All they’d ever know was that this place wasn’t quite as abandoned as they’d thought it to be.

“He’s safe,” Ian said, coming to inspect the man now that he’d cleared the installation’s entrance of security workings. “I’ll leave the rest of it to you.”

Ruger hadn’t expected Mariska to display any squeamishness over the chore, and she didn’t. She leaned over to search the man, displaying her truly fine ass in the process. Ruger watched until he realized the riveted nature of his gaze, and scowled as he moved off across the swale. “I’m going to take a look inside with the AmSpecs. Let us know what you find.”

“Nothing so far,” she said, all business, her voice muffled as she bent to her task—and as he put distance between them. “Whatever he was up to, I don’t think he’s going to give us any clues.”