Rex came in fast and grabbed him under the arm. Soren, Rex’s no-good brother, appeared from nowhere and grabbed Reynard under the other arm. Reynard fought, because Rex and Soren were assholes. He landed a punch on Rex’s stupid fucking face and connected an elbow to Soren’s neck before they got ahold of him again, then he shifted, and clawed and bit at them. Rex grabbed him around the body and slammed him to the ground, and they both fell on him. Reynard shifted to a man again to fight, but Rex sprayed something in his face that choked him. He bent, sputtering, spitting blood and bile out on the ground. Rex and Soren heaved him upward, and then Khain came in fast, his right hand transforming into an oversized paw with three long cruel claws. Khain swiped the paw and the claws dug into Reynard’s chest, splitting it with three jagged lines.
Reynard grit his teeth, holding in his agony. He yanked his arms away from the two traitors and curled them around his marred chest, around the skin and flesh that had been so strong and clean just a moment before.Marked. He was marked. His whole life he’d known this was his fate, and yet the moment still broke him. He backpedaled, his mind twisting.
Rex and Soren lunged for him again. He had no strength left to fight. Khain strutted in front of him, an evil grin on his face, then he circled around behind. Too late, Reynard realized what he was up to. Reynard twisted and pulled and fought for all he was worth, but Khain put a hand on his head, draining what strength he had left with the touch, then he scraped off Reynard’s renqua, skin and all, with one malicious swipe of a dagger-like claw.
Rex and Soren dropped Reynard to the ground in a heap. He shifted, or rather, he tried to shift, but his brain stuttered and cracked, and he could not manage it. Reynard lay there, stunned and despairing, until at last, his mind turned over and he shifted, but not into his fox—into anarctophox. The first shiftinto Khain’s marked beast was hard work. His body strained to manage it. He felt bigger and meaner than normal, and immoral. The shift into the beast felt wrong in a way that his fox never had. Reynard shifted back into a man quickly. The mark on his chest did not heal, it never would. It would be this same open, weeping, dismal, wound until the day he died. He whipped his head around, trying to look over his shoulder at hisrenqua, but of course he could not. He touched his hand to the spot where his proud flagrenquahad been. The skin there was still red and raw and weeping. Despair yanked at Reynard and he beat it back. He would live. He would survive. Every lesson he’d ever been taught about Khain rose in his mind and he threw them all out viciously. He would kill Khain. Somehow. Someday. Someway. He would be the end of Khain.
Khain stood over him, growing and shrinking from giant-sized to man-sized, and back again, clenching and unclenching his fists.
“Foxen,” he said.
Reynard met the demon’s eyes, unable to erase the defiance from his face. Pain speared through him, starting at his mark, reaching up to his head and down to his crotch, seeming to split him right in half. Reynard dropped his eyes and bore it as well as he could. Finally, it stopped.
“Foxen,” the demon said again.
Reynard met his eyes again and again, pain threatened to rip him in half. Reynard did not drop his eyes this time.
Uncle Rhogun spoke to him in quiet, measuredruhi.Drop your eyes. Don’t challenge him.
Never.
Live to fight another day. We have a plan.
That got to Reynard. If there was a chance to fight, he would do what he had to do. He dropped his eyes. The painamped up and continued, then stopped. Reynard stared at the dirt in front of him.
“Foxen.”
Reynard did not look up.
Look at me.
Reynard didn’t.
The pain ripped through him again and Khain laughed long and low.
Look at me,he said again.
Reynard looked. The pain continued, tearing and ripping at him. Reynard dropped his eyes. The pain continued and the demon laughed. Reynard bit his lips until they bled and writhed on the floor, no longer able to comply or deny. The pain stopped abruptly, and Reynard melted into the rock floor, so glad just to be able to breathe.
Khain watched him for a few moments, then turned to Rex. “He’s with team delta.”
Khain abruptly disappeared from sight, with a few wisps of smoke marking where he had been. The males in the room murmured.
Rhogun went to Reynard and covered him with a ratty blanket. “Reynard, I’m sorry to see you here.”
“I’m sorry to be here,” Reynard said, dismayed at how weak his own voice sounded.
Rhogun was a good male and a good uncle, always had been. He was Reynard’s mother’s brother and had disappeared on his way home from work two weeks ago. Reynard had been part of the all-foxensearch team that had found his truck overturned in a ditch. They hadn’t called thevod,only towed the truck to Rhogun’s home. They’d all known what got to Rhogun.
Rhogun was wearing filthy jeans and a ripped T-shirt. His hair was a mess, and his face and beard were dirty and disheveled. He looked like he hadn’t had a shower or changedclothes since he’d been taken. He still had his eyepatch. He’d worn one over his left eye for all of his life, due to being blind in that eye since birth.
Rhogun helped Reynard up and walked him to the far wall, then took him into a crack in it that opened up into a cave beyond. Several males were clustered inside, all males Reynard knew well. They were his own family—all Van Crimsons. The demon had been resting for centuries, but in the last year, he’d stolen 38 Van Crimson males, most of them in the last two weeks—and here several of them were. Someone gave him clothes, and he pulled them on slowly.
Rhogun spoke inruhi,his body curled tight and stiff around his middle as he fought the pain of his mark.Khain is attacking at dawn—a full-on assault on Serenity. We’ve all got instructions about where we’re supposed to be and what we’re supposed to do, but some of us are escaping. We’ll get you out of town.
“I can't,” Reynard said. “I have a Tether.”
“Right but look here on the wall.”
