48

I could feel his presence now, pressing in on my mind. It was like having a sinus headache while listening to the buzzing whine of a swarm of mosquitoes. He was pushing against the ward, trying to find a weakness, but it had been too well crafted. Perhaps if he'd had ten times the power he had available to himself right then things might have been different, but the magic held fast.

"I need more power," Matt grunted, the strain as evident on his face as the rivulets of sweat that were soaking his shirt. "I will break you, and you will be mine."

He reached out and gestured and I watched as the twins, who had been silently standing off to the side, collapsed into each other's arms and began to shake. I couldn't be sure in the weak light available to my eyes, but the two sisters really looked even more slender and gaunt than when I had first met them. Then I felt the flow of power from them to Matt. He was using the collars as a siphon to plunder their energy in order to break my protective magic.

Matt pushed, pried, and beat at the ward, with his power and the power stolen from others. Eventually I felt the thrumming pulse from the stones dramatically decrease and when it did, he backed off and collapsed to his knees, completely out of breath.

"That is just not possible," Matt groaned in exhaustion. "It can't be that strong. Nothing can."

"But it is, Matt," I called out to him. "And for all you have tried, and the hurt and death you have caused, you still lose. You cannot and will not take my will from me."

"Fuck you," he spat at me as he got to his feet. "Your will? Your freedom? It's not yours to give or withhold. It's mine to take, by right. Mine!"

If it was possible, Matt was even angrier now, and he removed the magical bindings from Jasmine right before he unceremoniously kicked her lifeless body off of the now blood soaked altar. He took a short time to set things up again, and then went over and released Jess from the rod that she was hanging on and dragged her barely conscious form back to the large stone. It took him only a minute or so to have her fastened down just like Jasmine had been, and then he came over to me.

"So here's how it's going to go," he hissed inches from my face. "Your dear friend Jessica is now the next to generously give me of her life force's power, which I will use to further weaken the magic protecting you. If that does not work, I can take some time to bring a few more volunteers from the party earlier and keep going until you crack."

"It won't crack," I replied with a confidence that I was feeling less and less of. "And the deadline will pass and the Neko in me will be lost forever. You still won't win."

"No! No, no, no, no," he exclaimed in fury, slapping me over and over again. "Not this time! You don't get to make that choice this time. The power is mine by right!"

"What do you mean yours," I cried. "You can't be a Neko, you are male. It's not possible."

And then he laughed, a soulless laughter that would have given goosebumps to a skeleton.

"They haven't told you yet have they," Matt asked me, and the gleam that had appeared in his eyes scared the hell out of me. "Those sanctimonious cunts that call themselves the Circle still make you "figure out" the meaning of the Neko to soul mate bond."

He was pacing now, and wringing his hands with what looked like glee. This boy was seriously crazy, and I continued to try and get free so I could stop this night of horrors.

"Well, I will make it easier on you two," he giggled as he pointed to both Kelli and I. "When you bond with each other the Neko puts on a collar and the soul mate gains complete and utter control of her new pet kitten. How exciting, no!"

I felt confusion from Kelli about what we were hearing, but she was attentive, and still not saying anything.

"This collar, and it can be either real or figurative, is just like the ones on my little pets over there, and the one on you. Except my collars are designed to force a shift in the bond from a soul mate to me. Unfortunately they don't survive the process, but as long as I get what is my due, I don't give a shit."

"You keep saying you want your due," I continued for him, realizing that I was on the verge of some important information. "But if I can keep my power from your hands by giving it up, I would make that choice a million times."

"It's not your power," he screamed at me, slapping me yet again. "It's my power! That's why the bond gives me control, should have given me control. But Anya decided to give up a power that wasn't hers to give up. It was mine!"

And suddenly I knew Matt better than anyone else but Kelli, because in a sick and twisted way he was Kelli. He was, or had been, the bond mate of a Neko. A Neko who apparently had chosen not to bond with him. The changes her choice made in him, and the path he walked because of it, had me thinking that the Neko, Anya, had made the right choice if the bond would have given him total control of her.

"It doesn't matter now, though," he mumbled. "She's long gone and it's an ocean under the bridge by now."

Matt gently patted my cheek, and now, more than any other time that night, his touch made me feel disgustingly dirty.

"So, now I will take the bond from Kelli that should have been mine in the first place, and then I will wait as long as it takes until the next Neko arrives, and the next, and the next. And then all of the power that Anya denied me will be mine and mine alone."

The feral grin that was on Matt's face as he turned from me made me even more afraid than I had been up to that point, but it also fanned that spark of towering anger that I had deep down inside of me. I could feel its power trying to come up from the depths of my soul, and that gave me yet another reason to fear. I knew that when it came down to it, I wouldn't be able to control that anger, but I was out of options, out of pieces, and out of moves. So I reached deep inside to find that burning power inside myself.

I closed my eyes, and all that I could hear was the beginnings of Matt's spell work, which would end as he killed Jessica, just like he did Jasmine. I was way short on time, but I followed my instincts and pushed my mind to look the center of my very self. Of everything that made me, me. It was a strange feeling, and I was amazed that I could look at myself in this way and actually see something.

Whatever the circumstances, I was standing before two glowing orbs that were bound in darkness somewhere in my mind, and my instincts told me that these balls of light were my Neko powers, or at least the visual of how my mind pictured them. I reached out and touched first one and then the other. The one on the right was glowing a deep red, and I felt that incredible anger as I made contact, but I was also nearly flooded by other feelings as well. The anger was only a part of what I was, and the sheer vastness of its depths was startling. The other ball of light had a soft golden glow to it, but it shied away from my touch and I could not get a handle on what I needed to do to free them both.

Outside of myself I heard Matt finish his spell chant, and I opened my eyes in time to see him slam that damned silver knife into Jess, and as his hand descended I silently apologized to Jess for not being able to save her either. The sickening thud that I had expected never came, though. Instead there was the sharp ping of breaking metal and I watched the blade of the knife spin off into the darkened forest. Hanging just above Jess' skin was a barrier of mist that looked like silvery moonlight, and I noticed that the design the woman at the street fair had drawn on her was back. This time, however, the design ran from her face down the length of her body and to her ankle. She had protection