Page 118 of Katya and the Young God

Feketer leans back, looks to Katya. “He should be more careful with the wording on what he makes me say,” he says, smug.

“I caught that too,” Katya responds, but her heart is racing, racing at all the implications of that little interaction.

Feketer gestures at a guard, who opens the door, letting Beatriz in the room.

She must’ve been waiting right outside.

Katya stiffens at the sight. Beatriz is always prim, always proper looking, past middle-aged but not elderly, a perfectly non-descript plump woman. She dresses just nice enough she’s in place in an office, but not so nice that you would notice her passing in the street.

Even her gray-laced brown hair is normal, pulled back into a soft bun.

Katya jerks up, but the handcuff on her chair keeps her down, twisting on her shoulder, and pain spikes up her foot.

“Oh Katya,” Beatriz says, and her voice even sounds grandmotherly. “I wish you had trusted me.”

She sweeps her skirt underneath her, taking a prim seat, keeping a mother of pearl, delicate little revolver in her lap, like one would a purse.

“He’s gonna kill you,” Katya says, the words falling from her mouth without even passing through her brain first. “He’s gonna kill you the moment he sees you.”

Beatriz takes pause at that, like any human should. “If he didn’t kill you, I think he’ll show me more consideration.” She settles back, keeping her hand on the revolver.

And it’s not enough time to plan, it’s not enough time to get out of the cuff, it’s not enough time to do anything but just breathe out her nose, and wait.

And trust. Trust that whatever they’ve cooked up, whatever it is that brought the brothers together after centuries of mistrust and anger, that they’ll get her out.

One of the guards shifts, the one with the old injury. “He’s taller than I remember,” he says, idly. “He always stood so poorly before.”

Katya desperately doesn’t let anything show on her face.

“Maybe love did that,” Feketer says, a sarcastic scoff to his voice. “Maybe him actually getting laid got him to stand up straight.”

The guard’s brow furrows, and he looks sideways at Katya, and she has her best poker face on, desperately clinging onto control. “I don’t...” but he trails off.

“He’s been a defeated man for over a year, some pep in his step now is expected,” Beatriz says, as if idly remarking on the weather. “We should have sent a whore his way earlier, get him on our side.” Even the word whore seems out of place in her mouth, like a grandmother wouldn’t say that. “Could have avoided all this trouble.”

It’d be smart for Katya to retort, to say something about her man not going for that, but the words are frozen within her.

The runes light up, Katya sucks in a breath, panicked, her hands shaking, like everything’s out of control, but…

In the box, stands Pieter, her Pieter, in the same outfit, Selene’s hand firmly in his.

Selene’s face is scared, she’s wearing the pink and purple fluffy jacket and her too big snow boots, and she clutches Pieter’s hand, half hiding behind him. Katya can see the surprise the moment she rests eyes on Katya, and her eyes light up, before she visibly hides the reaction, ducking further behind Pieter.

Pieter’s eyes burn through Katya, with a barely concealed rage, a rage that just wasn’t there with Iakov, and a delighted smile crosses Beatriz’s face.

“I told you he’d bring her,” Beatriz says, and she remains still, hand delicately on the gun, but the guards around relax, dropping their aim and their stances.

Pieter looks to Katya, taking in her cast and her hand and her shoulder and the cut on her face...and several things happen at once.

Iakov teleports behind one of the guards, a hand coming down on the gun, shattering it with an almost detonation of power.

Feketer rockets to his feet, hand on the cane, and Katya sweeps her cast into the cane, pain choking up her throat like bile. He stumbles, as she slides off the chair, her shoulder twisting behind her.

They both tumble to the ground, and the cuffs behind her snap off in some show of Demigod power.

With a release of her bracelet, she grips the garrote, her swollen fingers not bending correctly, but she loops it around Feketer’s neck, throwing her weight backwards, her cast clattering on the cold tile.

He gags on the wire, choking, flailing back with his fists, hitting at any part of her he can reach. His elbow slams into her cast and Katya reels back, black spots crowding her vision.

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