Crack!

The target jerked backwards, his hands going to a spot high on his shoulder. Dania tried to line up another shot, but the target took off at a run for the shelter of the treeline on the far side of the yard. Dania fired twice more, with no success. The Hellcat that had been watching the front door of the house turned and bolted straight for her.

Deckbearer Jacob Kinley has drawn his deck.

"Fuck," Dania muttered, and used her off hand to draw her own deck as she dismissed the notification with a thought. She came up with Fossil Bloom, Era of the Ice Age, Polar Sanctuary, and her Expedition Charter.

She fired three rounds, but the Hellcat didn't even seem to notice. It let out a roar, and a blast of fire exploded from its mouth. Dania let out a curse and dove forward, rolling to get out of the path of the blazing stream.

"Jake!" Dania yelled as she touched the Fossil Bloom card. "Watch their magic!" A five-pointed, gray and blue stone flower unfurled its petals on a nearby lichen-covered boulder next to where she'd landed. She blinked at it, and then scrambled to get back up on her feet, just in time for the charging Hellcat—stinking of sulphur, musk, and smoke—to hit her square in the chest, driving her back down to the ground and knocking the wind from her lungs.

Panic rose in her chest as she fought and failed to inhale. The Hellcat opened its massive jaws and let out a satisfied rumble as it preened with its teeth poised to tear out her throat.

Somehow, Dania got her gun up and shoved the barrel in through the corner of the Hellcat's mouth. She pulled the trigger and kept pulling, sending all eleven of her remaining rounds into the cat's skull. It slumped, collapsing on her and crushing her into the snow-covered ground for a terrifying instant before dissolving into red and brown light and swirling away.

Dania sucked in a sweet, smoky, icy breath and forced her battered body to move. With shaking, freezing fingers, she reloaded, and then willed herself into rolling over to her hands and knees and climbing to her feet.

She couldn't see anyone.

"Jake!" she screamed, before her common sense reasserted itself.

Dani! Thank all the gods you're alive. Don't scream again. I'm okay. I've got eyes on the deckbearer. Machairi and Hush are fighting the hellcats. Can you get to me? We're over by the garage. By his motorcycle.

The words echoed weirdly in her head, as if she'd just heard Jake saying them out loud… but she hadn't. All she heard was the roar of the fire and the distant sound of gunfire…

Fuck.

Dania lurched forward into a run, ignoring the sharp pain in her ribs. They weren't broken, otherwise she would have felt it sooner. Bruised maybe. Nothing she couldn't handle. As she ran, she cycled her cards.

Megafauna, Tar Pit, Short-Faced Bear, and… yes!

Dania tapped the card for her mantle and felt her speed and agility ratchet upward in response. The pain in her ribs and the stinging cuts on her hands vanished, which she hadn't expected, but didn't have time to think about as she charged through the snow.

She rounded the corner of the garage and came face to face with another Hellcat. She snarled a challenge, but instead of attacking, the Hellcat flattened its ears back, tucked its tail to its legs and crouched.

Then it flopped over on its side and rolled to its back, exposing its vulnerable belly.

Dania blinked and stumbled to a stop in surprise.

Submission! she realized abruptly as her mantle-given feline instincts kicked in. How…OH!

This was the Hellcat she'd killed. With her Fossil Bloom out on the field, she'd assumed control of the creature, which now carried the Extinct subtype.

Again, driven by instinct, Dania met the Extinct Hellcat's gaze and held it, then slowly lowered her eyelids in a long blink. The Extinct Hellcat scrambled up and rubbed its length along Dania's side, and then turned with a rumble of anticipation toward the scene ahead.

About ten yards in front of where they stood, Dania could see Machairi and Hush facing off against three more Hellcats. Jake was nowhere to be seen, but the enemy deckbearer stood with his arms crossed, a confident smile on his face as he watched his creatures work together to savage Jake's companion. This close, Dania could see a red tinge to the man's skin, a tiny ring of black horns marking the crown of his head, and two black feline ears.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Mantled. That's why he's not favoring his shoulder. Fair enough.

Machairi screamed, but didn't dissolve into blue and black light. He backed up, though, holding one hand to a wicked gash on the side of his face. Next to him, Hush winked out of sight, and Dania spared a brief thought to hope that he hadn't been killed.

"Go," Dania whispered to the Extinct Hellcat beside her. "Keep Machairi alive." She had no idea if the thing understood who Machairi was or merely realized her intent, but it charged forward and pounced upon its onetime pride-mate with savage glee.

The enemy deckbearer spun, his eyes lighting up and his face stretching in an unholy grin as he caught sight of her.

"Stole my cat, did you?" he asked. "That a trick of your feline mantle? I could use something like that."

Dania didn't bother answering. She threw her Tar Pit card out, aiming it between the deckbearer and his motorcycle. If Jake was still over there, hopefully the Tar Pit would at least slow this asshole down before he could get to him. To further keep his attention, she raised her gun again and fired, aiming for center mass.

The deckbearer flinched, and then laughed. "Idiot! Obviously, I'm wearing a mantle! Did you really think your little toy pew-pew would make a difference?"

"It got your attention, didn't it?" Dania asked.

"Oh, you already had that, sweetheart! Do you think I came out here to the frozen middle of nowhere for fun? You've got cards, and I'm going to take 'em!"

"Are you?" Dania asked. "And how are you going to get out of here with them?" She shifted her aim to the deckbearer's left, away from the trees, and fired again. The front tire of his bike let out a snap-hiss, and the bike settled forward, and then leaned hard to the right and crashed to the ground.

"Bitch! That's a fucking Ducati!" the deckbearer spat. "It's worth more than your whole deck put together!"

"I doubt it," Dania said, and played her Short-Faced Bear. The thing rose up behind the Hellcats and raised its massive claws over the two Hellcats not currently being savaged by Machairi and their own Extinct sibling.

But before the Short-Faced Bear could complete its attack, the three Hellcats froze.

Hold! Dania thought at the Bear. It stilled mid-swipe. For just a moment, the entire battle went silent…then one by one, the Hellcats turned with low, rumbling snarls to face their master.

"Wh-what are you doing?" the deckbearer asked, his voice breaking on the first syllable. The Hellcats didn't answer. Instead, they fanned out—including the Extinct one—and began to stalk through the snow.

"How did you—?" The deckbearer turned to Dania, frantically waving his hand to cycle more red and brown cards into place. But he must have reached his limit of cards in play, Dania realized, because no matter how many he touched, he couldn't throw another one down.

And with Jake controlling them, he can't sacrifice the cats to free up a play, Dania thought with satisfaction. How unfortunate for him.

"What's your name?" she called out as the deckbearer began backing toward his bike.

"The fuck do you care?!" he screamed.

"I don't," she said. "I'm just curious. But you don't have to tell me. I'll just find your wallet on your corpse and check your ID." And with that, she nudged her Bear into action. It whirled faster than should have been possible for a creature its size and charged at the deckbearer. He let out a scream and scrambled backwards, catching a foot on one of the stones that surrounded the Tar Pit and falling backwards with a splash. He let out another high, frantic scream as the molten tar coated his body, pouring into his mouth and ears, burning the sensitive membranes there.

The Hellcats and the Bear caught up to him and began attacking his immobilized form. After a second's thought, Dania called back her Extinct Hellcat. She didn't want to lose her Fossil Bloom, which meant she couldn't let that creature die in the sticky, heated tar.

It ended quickly, which was a mercy Dania was certain the deckbearer didn't deserve. Machairi, Hush, and Jake all joined her from the shadow of the trees as the enemy's screams faded and the Hellcats winked out of existence.

Dania reached down and rubbed the cheek of the Extinct Hellcat that stood pressed to her side, and then dismissed her own cards. The Extinct Hellcat, the Short-Faced Bear, and the Tar Pit disappeared, leaving only the burnt, lacerated form of the deckbearer as he drew his last, rattling breath, and then went finally, utterly still.

Congratulations! You have earned one hundred experience points. You have leveled up! You are now level fourteen!

"You okay?" Jake and Dania spoke at the same time, both turning to face each other. Dania let out a laugh and nodded. "Yeah," she said. "I took out the Hellcat that took me down, and my Fossil Bloom brought it back on our side. What happened to you guys? Is Hush dead?"

"No. He retreated when you arrived, rather than be killed. He will return. We fought, as you instructed," Machairi supplied. "Hush and I kept them off of my deckbearer until he could tempt the cats to our side."

"That was brilliant," Dania said, turning to Jake. "Was that one of your new cards?"

"Tempting Dream," Jake said, nodding. His face suddenly de-aged, shedding the shadows that always clung to his mantle. "It worked out, but it was kinda nerve wracking for a minute. I couldn't summon any other creatures, and it took a while for the cats to build up enough temptation to turn. It was good you showed up when you did. That Secret Whisper card was useful, too!"

"I'll always show up for you," Dania said with a smile. She stretched, pleased to find that the pain in her ribs hadn't returned. Her hands, too, lacked the cris-crossing scratches and cuts from the shattered window. Something had healed them, which was interesting. She didn't have any healing abilities, and neither did Jake, so what—

Her eyes fell on the corpse of the deckbearer. A pile of red-and brown cards lay inert on his ruined chest.

With a tight smile, Dania reached out and clapped Jake on the shoulder. "Get the asshole's cards. Let's go see if we can save our cabin."