A very familiar smell hits my nostrils.
I bound out the back door and chase the smell around the woods. I wrap around trees and dig in the snow, disorienting myself to try and get to it. My claws are digging into the frozen tundra, moving my body as fast as it can go.
Then I hear it.
That familiar hissing.
“Toshi,” Vlad growls.
I raise my head into the air and howl so greatly the treetops shake with snow. It comes crashing down to the earth, coating our fur and sending a stumbling Toshi out into the open. He’s still in his Primal form, all black with green eyes, and he’s wounded. Hurt. Stumbling around with wet fur and hissing as more frozen water hits his back.
I rush for him, and he bears his claws until he realizes who I am.
“Sebastian?” Toshi purrs.
“You’re injured,” I growl.
“I’m soaked.”
“We need to get you help.”
“Is Clarissa okay?”
“Don’t worry about her.”
“Is. She. Okay?”
His purring turns to a hissing before he stumbles and falls to the snow. I hear the bounding of footsteps behind me and the ground rumbling underneath my feet. Clarissa skids to a stop beside Toshi, and her tongue dips down to him without a second thought. She licks him so hard it rolls him onto his back, and the two of them snuggle close as Clarissa licks his wounds clean.
Licks his wounds closed.
“I didn’t know Cats could do that,” Vlad says.
“They can’t. But Cats who have synced can,” Theo says.
“Have they retreated?” I say growling.
“All of them, yes. But we don’t know why. There were still plenty to fight,” Theo says.
“I know why,” I say.
My eyes raise to Clarissa’s, and her licking stops. Toshi stands onto his four legs, then fluffs his fur out. He’s walking straighter. Standing taller. Looking better than before. But my eyes are still connected with Clarissa’s.
With the hurt and anger flashing through them.
“They took Kyle?” she growls.
“That’s my theory, yes.”
“Why would they do that? They have me they’re chasing. Why go after him?”
“You’ve slaughtered droves of them,” Vlad says. “They’re probably frightened of trying to take you. Hell, they probably realize they can’t any longer.”
“We have to go after them,” Clarissa says.
“You can’t,” Toshi says.
Our heads turn to look at him as his eyes connect with hers.