It's not my fear, she reminded herself as her breath puffed into a cloud on her exhale. It's an effect of the monster. We must be close. She flexed her fingers, extending her claws, but held herself motionless as the icy breeze cut through the trees that surrounded them. A glance up at the thin slice of night sky showed heavy, pregnant clouds sweeping over the crescent moon, blocking its light.

  Snow is on the way.

  Her mouth went dry, and she felt her shoulders trying to hunch up around her ears as fear swirled in the bottom of her belly. Once more, she willed it away.

  Not mine. Not real.

  "Be ready," she called lowly, her voice carrying a rumbling burr. "Here it comes!"

  The feline growl that underlaid her words was, like her claws, a product of the Lost World Lioness card mantle she'd donned for this hunting trip. To her right, her nephew Jake stood wrapped in shadows, looking a decade older than his just-turned-seventeen years as Nyx's Mantle settled over him.

  It didn't matter that neither she nor Jake intended to fight. Sometimes, one didn't have a choice. Dania preferred to be prepared.

  "Got eyes on," Amari called out. She, too, was mantled, though Dania couldn't see the small black horns and cat ears she knew hid under Amari's natural Afro hairstyle. Amari's normally honey-brown eyes glowed a dull, smoky red in the forest night, and that gave it away. As did the faint scent of smoke and sulfur that emanated from her general direction.

  On Amari's right, Kendra pushed Joe's wheelchair forward and then stepped out to stand beside the elderly deckbearer. Moonlight glittered off the green scales of Joe's mantle, but Kendra seemed to disappear into the darkness beneath the trees. Even Dania's feline eyes had trouble picking her out. Like Jake's, Kendra's mantle used shadows to protect and hide her.

  The forest floor pulsed in front of them, and Dania had time to draw in a breath before the ground exploded outward, tossing dirty snow, half-rotted leaves, and fragments of twigs into the air as a monster resembling a giant earthworm rose ten above and ahead of the little group.

  "Overwhelming Dread," Dania muttered for Jake's ears. "This'll be a good challenge for them. They should make some levels from it."

  "Watch for the little ones!" Jake called out as the monster heaved. It opened its mouth to spit out six smaller versions of itself, the Dread Burrowers. Each of them was longer than six feet, though only about as big around as Dania's wrist. They were quick, though, and Dania knew from experience that they could be deadly.

  "You've got five minutes until it pukes more out!" Dania called out, though she belatedly remembered that Amari, Joe, and Kendra could read the Overwhelming Dread's card as well as she could. Still, she figured a warning couldn't hurt. "Incapacitate the babies quickly if you can and concentrate your attacks on the big one!"

  Joe touched his center card, and for just a second, Dania thought that the Dread Burrowers had somehow multiplied early. But the scent of green, living things tickled her nostrils, and she realized that Joe had played a card called Creeping Vines. As she watched, thorny green tendrils wrapped around the smaller Burrowers. Four out of the six immediately ripped themselves free, but the vines managed to entangle two of them quickly enough that it effectively took them out of the fight.

  A small, humanoid figure climbed up onto Joe's shoulder from his lap. Dania hadn't seen Audrey, Joe's plant companion, earlier, but that was probably because Audrey didn't really like the cold. She tended to curl inside the warmth of Joe's jacket or under a blanket on his lap until it was time to come out and fight.

  Like now.

  Audrey lifted her leaf-tipped hands and flicked them in the direction of one of the free Burrowers. Immediately, a jet of water shot from her palms and soaked the ground directly under the creature. At first, Dania thought she'd missed her attack, but when the Burrower sank into the moistened soil she realized that Audrey had cleverly trapped it. The temperature was well below freezing, and the mud that enveloped the Burrower quickly solidified into a nasty, icy kind of cement.

  A deep, throaty yowl announced that Amari had played one of her Hellcat creatures. Fire blasted through the night, lighting up the small clearing and casting deep shadows against the snow. The flames hit the Overwhelming Dread directly in its grotesquely yawning mouth, and a rank stench filtered through the cold night air.

  Like someone cooking rotten meat, Dania thought, wrinkling her nose. Gross.

  Another Hellcat joined the first, even though less than thirty seconds had passed. Dania had seen Amari's deck—had killed the deckbearer who owned it before her, in fact—and knew that it was built around several synergies for the infernal creatures within. That was part of the reason they referred to it as the "Cats and Bats" deck, which was something Amari had embraced wholeheartedly.

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  This second Hellcat followed its deckmate into battle and made a fantastic feline leap to dig its claws into the Overwhelming Dread's slimy, thick skin. Like a cat climbing a tree, the Hellcat scaled its way to the top, flames dripping from every claw. The Overwheming Dread let out a deep, piercing bellow, and the smaller Burrowers thrashed in response—the ones who could move, anyway.

  On Joe's other side, Kendra touched a card. Instantly, a pale gold shimmer of light flowed from the card to coalesce as a framed, golden disc hovering over the battlefield. A winged cow cradled the disc between its golden horns. The entire piece radiated light that, when it fell upon the Hellcats and Joe's Creeping Vines, appeared to strengthen the cards and drive them on with more vigor.

  "Watch the babies on Kendra's side!" Jake called out, and next to him, his companion Machairi shifted in the snow. Amari's first Hellcat charged over to intercept the three remaining Dread Burrowers that were converging on Kendra. Her Disk of Isis was a powerful persistent that had solid benefits to any allied creatures or equipment on the field… but it left Kendra vulnerable without a creature of her own to defend her.

  Wouldn't have been a problem if she had her companion, Dania growled in the silence of her mind. Like Jake, Kendra had been gifted her deck on Drop Night three years ago. Unfortunately, her asshole ex had been part of a card trafficking ring, and he decided he needed those cards. So he'd beaten Kendra almost to death until she gave them up to protect her toddler son and unborn daughter. When Dania had killed him in the process of taking down the trafficking ring and returned the deck to Kendra, it had contained the requisite ten cards, so she hadn't thought anything of it. It was only once things had settled down that Kendra informed her that her ex had apparently swapped out her powerful companion card for something else. Kendra hadn't known why… but Dania had a pretty good idea.

  Because that crazy asshole Hiro Landaine was all about collecting sets of cards, Dania thought, even while her eyes tracked the action in front of her. And Kendra said her companion was part of a set. She acts like it's no big deal, but I know she has to miss it. I want that companion back for her, and it pisses me off to know that some of Landaine's flunkies escaped with some high-powered cards!

  She'd known this for three years, of course. The police raid that had helped take Landaine down had been a sudden thing, and they'd accounted for quite a few of Landaine's associates… but not all of them.

  And that, as far as Dania was concerned, was unsat. It may have been Landaine's organization, Landaine's plan, but his underlings were far from innocent. They'd come after her family, and regardless of how long it took, Dania would track them down and ensure that they could never hurt Jake, or Joe or Amari, or Kendra and her kids…or anyone else, for that matter. Not ever again.

  To that end, Dania kept in contact with some of her old friends in the ER. She'd also forged a relationship with several card brokers and quietly watched to see if anything that seemed like it might fit came available… but so far, no luck.

  That will change though, she told herself. Some day, those assholes who escaped the raid, or who were out doing shit when it went down… some day they'll slip up. And I'll be there, waiting—

  "Nice, Joe!" Jake yelled, pulling Dania back to the here and now. She blinked and focused on the battle in front of her and realized that Joe had played his Fertile Ground card, which effectively doubled the performance of his vines. Two of the three Dread Burrowers threatening Kendra squirmed helplessly against the slowly tightening, renewed net of virulent plant tendrils he'd called forth. And as Dania watched, Amari's Hellcat dispatched the third one.

  That left only the Overwhelming Dread itself.

  The second Hellcat let out a yowl of pain and dissolved into red light as the monster's flailing tongue struck it like a whip. Amari never missed a beat. She touched another card and a third Hellcat entered the fray, leaping forward to scale the Overwheming Dread as its deckmate had done previously. The other Hellcat still on the field turned and let out a deep, throaty roar and shot a stream of fire from its mouth, arcing to splash right into the Overwhelming Dread's face.

  Audrey, Joe's plant companion, remained on his shoulder, bent over something in her hands that Dania couldn't see. As Dania watched, she straightened and handed the object to Joe, who took it and inserted it into the magazine well of his favorite 1911 pistol.

  What was she doing with his ammunition? Dania wondered for a split second as Joe lifted the weapon and fired at the base of the Overwhelming Dread's lashing tongue. The monster screeched again, but Joe kept firing, unloading the entire magazine.

  The Overwhelming Dread began to thrash about, twisting in the dirt and snow, its mouth hanging open wide enough that Dania could see the slick green toxin that spread over the thick, cylindrical base of its tongue. The tongue itself heaved, and then sort of flopped slowly to the ground, as if paralyzed.

  Audrey must have poisoned the rounds, Dania realized with a grin. I knew she produced that necrotic toxin from her thorns. Trust Joe to come up with a practical ranged delivery system!

  Kendra, who had stepped back behind to Joe's chair in order to avoid the Dread Burrowers, touched another card. This time, the glowing black light resolved into the shadowy shape of a scorpion, which scuttled forward and began attacking the Overwhelming Dread's far side.

  Dania looked over at Jake with a small smile. It would take a few more rounds to finish the Overwhelming Dread off, but at this point it was just a matter of time. Without the Dread Burrowers to pull attention away, Amari, Joe, and Kendra had more than enough power between the three of them to take the Overwhelming Dread out before it could vomit up another batch of minions.

  "Good little fight," she said softly to Jake. "They're coming along nice—"

  "Deckbearrrrerrrer…"

  Dania spun, her eyes searching the shadows under the trees. "Hush?" Joy and hope filled her voice. She hadn't seen her strange monster friend in a few weeks. He often went off on business of his own, and she didn't question it. But she'd missed him.

  "Deckbearrerrr. Bewarrre. Something comessss. Quiiicklllly."

  ooks 1 and 2 are now available in KU, and Please check it out and tell him I sent you!

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