Riordan immediately pulled back, sputtering and trying to get the taste of her out of his mouth. Phenalope chased, pressing her advances on him and sticking her tongue down his throat like she was trying to choke him or devour him or something. Riordan had kissed before. It never really did anything for him, never setting off those sparks that people talk about, but this was the first time a kiss had filled him with revulsion.

His arms were pinned between their bodies and his wrists still secured to the wood-burning stove beside them. Phenalope straddled his lap while Riordan leaned away, brain temporarily broken as he fought his initial response and tried to figure out the ideal one. His instinct was to fling her off, break his bonds, and rip her fucking throat out. Maybe that was even the right choice. Taking out their leader would certainly sew chaos.

At the same time, letting her molest him would certainly keep her distracted. Riordan didn’t put much stock in his physical autonomy in situations like this. He hated to be touched usually, but since any touch from Phenalope made his skin crawl and his stomach flip, this sort of violation didn’t feel any worse than getting caressed or beat up, not really. He lacked the sexual taboos of most people the same way he lacked the sexual inclinations they seemed to have too.

But this was a definite violation. Riordan felt sick. She tasted horrible and her soft touch was clingy and possessive. She expected him to be wild. He was more than happy to play that up to avoid this.

Growling, Riordan shoved Phenalope off of him. He didn’t have the best leverage with his arms tied, but he was strong. She tottered and slid to her butt in front of him. He rocked backwards, moving from kneeling to crouching before the wrist bindings brought him up short.

Before she could recover, Riordan rolled forward again. He hit her chest with his shoulder, shoving her further away without doing real damage. He was walking a thin line of amusingly defiant but not actually a threat. With the extra distance, Riordan curled in on himself, bringing his head and hands together despite the bindings and shoving his blindfold up.

It was tied well enough to take two attempts. By the time Riordan could take a look around the room, Phenalope was on her feet and standing out of his reach, looking down at him.

“Well,” she said, “That’s not the usual reaction men have to being kissed by me. Should I feel insulted?”

“You didn’t even ask!” Riordan barked back. It sounded stupid, even to him, considering she had him tied up and all. He barrelled onwards. “You kidnap me, tie me up, and are probably going to kill me. Why should I be happy that you want to force kisses on me?”

A wave of dizziness hit Riordan suddenly. His knees hit the flagstones near the stove hard enough to jar his whole body and he pressed his shoulder to the warm stove to keep from falling further. Warmth flooded through him in the wake of the dizziness, tearing a groan from him. His skin felt sensitive and Riordan began to breathe heavier in response to the increased blood flow.

Bitch had drugged him with that kiss.

With the blindfold removed, Riordan could see the pleased smile spreading across her pouty lips. She flipped her long brown hair over her shoulder and watched him, clearly waiting for the drug to hit full effect. It was no wonder her kiss had tasted so nasty. She probably had some sort of enchantment that protected her. This totally seemed like a tactic she would use regularly.

Riordan closed his eyes briefly, taking internal stock. The effect seemed to be primarily a strong aphrodisiac combined with something that muddled the mind, dulled reaction speed, and caused muscle weakness. Basically, a drug to make her prey weak and aroused, a prime target for her manipulations.

Billy shifted his weight beside Riordan subtly. Riordan shook his head, letting the motion appear like he was trying to clear his mind but hoping Billy would take it as the stand down request it was. He didn’t want Billy to use his limited freedom this early. Riordan could handle this.

Indeed, even as he assessed himself, Riordan could feel his passive shifter healing tackling the foreign drug in his system. The effect was enhanced by the purification spell he’d consumed earlier, leaving his mind clear first before easing the physical effects.

Making the choice to keep playing as if he was fully affected, Riordan opened his eyes and blinked up at Phenalope. “No wonder you didn’t ask,” he muttered, trying to sound like he was having trouble focusing, “Rather use drugs. Consent only matters if you’re a woman, huh?”

Phenalope crouched down in front of him again, reaching out to caress his cheek with fake sweetness. “You are a gift. There’s no shame in gift wrapping you, now is there? And this was the easiest way to ensure your cooperation.”

She took her eyes off him to look at Billy, giving the man an order, “Get him to his feet and take him into the bathroom over there.”

She pointed at one of the two doors off of this main room. With his blindfold gone, Riordan was finally able to take in the layout of the cabin. The front room was a combination of kitchen and living area with the stove located centrally to the building and dividing the space. The kitchen side was pretty basic and had a table with two chairs shoved up under the front window there. The living room had a couch, TV, and some end tables, along with a corner clearly set aside for Duke the dog and a surprising number of guns displayed openly on the wall. A safe in the corner likely held further weapons and ammunition.

The two doors were both open. One led into a bedroom, though Riordan couldn’t see many details in there yet. The other led into a bathroom. That’s where Billy pointed him towards as soon as he untied Riordan’s wrist lead from the stove and pulled him to his feet. Riordan feigned a lack of coordination, leaning on Billy more heavily and dragging his feet.

Phenalope turned towards her assistant, Sara. The woman was athletic and clearly worked out regularly. She wore slacks and a tailored button-up blouse, both of the materials clearly being a stretchier blend than just cotton and allowing for full range of motion.

“Sara, please fetch the tote from the van, thank you,” Phenalope directed with a wave of one hand, like some imperious queen. “Also the garment bags. I will need to look my best.”

The assistant was quick to obey, striding back out the front door towards their waiting vehicles. Riordan counted a van, two SUVs, and a pickup truck parked around Billy’s SUV near the cabin. The clearing was fairly full in the part he could see, but the driveway had been long and probably had plenty of space for the other arrivals that were expected later.

Phenalope seemed lost in planning, pacing and humming to herself with that glazed look to her eyes of a person staring at something besides their physical surroundings. Her desired ritual ascension, in all its pomp and circumstance, likely flitted before her eyes. Riordan used that time to hurry Billy into the bathroom with him.

“How are you doing?” Riordan asked Billy, voice soft enough to be almost inaudible without shifter enhanced hearing.

“Still cursed,” Billy replied grimly, “It feels like sludge throughout my body, puppeting me. Between getting you here and those stones, my mind feels clearer, but you can’t count on me for much under this.”

“I made a magical screamer beacon. Do you think you could hold onto it or get it somewhere useful?” Riordan dug out the moonstone and passed it over.

“I can feel it. How are those death mages missing this?” Billy asked, even as he slipped the stone into a pocket.

Riordan grimaced. “I excluded females from being able to pick up on it. That means Frankie and Vera aren’t going to notice either, but I’m hoping it pulls in the agents when they get close. Vera and Frankie should be able to track you off the pack bond or something. Frankie’s got a lot of tricks. What did you do with her anyway?”

It was Billy’s turn to grimace, shooting a glance back towards the main room as he closed the toilet lid and settled Riordan on it as a seat. “I stopped the car and pretended something was wrong with it. I got her out of it and then gunned it, basically just abandoning her there. The compulsion required me to be alone, but couldn’t make me fight her. She hesitated to stop me magically and that was enough to get away. I’m sure she’s gotten a ride by now. How drugged are you?”

“I’m basically fine now,” Riordan confessed, even as he faked the weakness and fever of the drug, “Shifter resistances plus that spell I ate.”

Billy snorted softly. “Who eats spells? Seriously.”

Riordan let that critique of his casting pass without comment, mostly because Phenalope drew closer to the bathroom. She leaned against the door frame, staring at Riordan with a mercurial smile on her face. Billy went back to acting as the puppet guard. Riordan appreciated the man’s attempts not to garner further attention. Phenalope could order him to kill himself if Riordan misbehaved and that would put a major cramp on any plans to disrupt their operations ahead of time.

He wasn’t sure what was going through Phenalope’s mind at this point. She remained sharply observant, clearly enjoying his disadvantaged state, but whatever commentary she might have added was forgotten in the wake of Sara’s return. The assistant carried a large plastic tote bin and two garment bags. She set the tote down on the couch in the main room and held out the garment bags for Phenalope.

The death mage squealed happily, abandoning her study of Riordan to go play egotistical dress-up. She snatched the bags and took a few steps towards the bedroom before pausing to order Sara around some more. “Do what you can to clean him up and dress him in something nice. Drug him more if needed. When you are finished, come help me with my hair and makeup.”

“Yes, Prophet,” Sara said, bowing slightly. Phenalope smiled at the woman and then disappeared into the bedroom, shutting the door.

Riordan assessed his options as Sara gathered some supplies from the tote. He’d been at the cabin perhaps another thirty minutes since his arrival, which meant around an hour since he’d left the pack house with Billy. He tried envisioning the map of where their personnel resources had been an hour ago and where they might be now.

Vera had been at the pack house with some number of more civilian pack members. Mark and a larger number of the security team had gone to Empire, with Maudy and Norris either in that area or possibly captured. Frankie had been abandoned on the side of the road between the pack border and Empire, but could have already gotten some form of help by the time Billy got to the pack house. The agents and Lucinda had been at the border, engaged in cleaning up residual death magic.

The mess in Empire was going to take time to sort out and couldn’t be entirely abandoned, but could be scaled back if the situation had shifted to being cover up rather than potential combat. Those forces wouldn’t be anywhere near here yet, being furthest away and most engaged. Vera needed to stay on pack lands to manage the whole thing. She would be sending whatever security members she could spare in this direction, plus she would have gotten in contact with Frankie, Lucinda, and the agents. Those four would be Riordan’s soonest reinforcements, but unless the situation moved into being an emergency or Riordan was able to improve the odds, they wouldn’t move against this number of cultists and death mages until they got their own reinforcements.

That meant it was time for Riordan to try to even the odds or at least buy more time.