Keeper's Justice
Copyright© 2025 by Charly Young
Chapter 10
Niamh
Niamh Harpe awoke to total darkness with a splitting headache and a terrible thirst. She put a hand up and gently touched the side of her head. Felt around the wound, noting the slickness of drying blood. She had been lucky. Shifters were tough. Her helmet had deflected the bullet just enough to graze instead of kill. A normal human would be dead. She briefly wondered why she was still alive. Then dismissed the thought. Escape was the pressing need—thinking could come later.
She tried to move, but realized that a thin steel cable tightly encircled her neck. She started to shift and stopped just in time. There would be no shifting to escape. Her panther form’s neck was much thicker than her human neck. She would effectively decapitate herself if she shifted.
She checked the environment. Given the symphony of smells: saddle soap, neatsfoot oil, and the sharp tang of liniment, she was locked in a tack room of a stable or barn.
Her keen ears picked up someone outside the room. The door opened, revealing a woman dressed in a shapeless sweatshirt and tan canvas Carhartts.
“Ah, Mistress, you’re finally awake.”
“Yes, after a fashion. Who are you and where am I?”
“We’ve met before, Mistress. My name is Aiyana Chelan. We are in the milking barn in the Chelan compound. You must be thirsty, Mistress.”
She held up a bottle of water for her to drink. After a casual comment on the friendship bracelets Charlie and Kat had made for her, the wolf-kin left, closing the door and plunging the room into darkness once more.
Niamh composed herself in patience. Her chance would come. Meanwhile, she tried to figure out which one of her bosses had betrayed her to the Alpha.
Her day had started well, then went bad. She had come back from an excellent early morning run to find four hungry children looking at her with pleading eyes, begging for some waffles just like Uncle Lan made.
“Okay, I’ll try my best, you little scamps. Are your beds made and rooms cleaned?”
They scampered off to do her bidding. She went into Elisabeth’s kitchen to try her best. It was her turn to cook. She and her sept-sisters had worked out a kitchen schedule. Elisabeth was by far the better cook, but they kept things fair and took turns—with the understanding that there would be no complaining. Teasing was okay; complaining was not.
Wraith was in the kitchen with a towel spread out on the table, sharpening her knives. She had an astonishing number, which she kept concealed on her person. Wraith was an assassin. The blades were the tools of her trade.
“Waffles again?”
“Yes, that damn man spoiled those kids for a healthy breakfast. At this rate, my ass is going to be ten times bigger than it is.”
Between the three of them, Lan was always that damn man.
Wraith laughed and went back to her knives.
Niamh, in the meantime, reached up and adjusted the placement of the crystal kitty. Charlie was fascinated with the thing and kept touching it like it was real. Every time she did, she never put it back where it belonged.
“Thanks for that. That shelf’s been driving me crazy, and I couldn’t tell why.”
Niamh nodded. The deirfiúracha m’fhuil binding that had created their Cyfamod had created some interesting side effects. Their strengths were now partially shared. Both she and Wraith, as well as Katrinka, now had a touch of Elisabeth’s harmonizer magic. Wraith and Elisabeth now had a sense of smell many times more sensitive than ever before. They all shared Wraith’s nature magic. Plants all over the house were joyously growing. The gardenia that Elisabeth despaired of ever flowering was in full bloom now, spreading its perfume all over the house.
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