The first sip burns, bitter, acrid, the unmistakable taste of Embercrack tea crawling up my tongue and down my throat, setting every nerve alight. It’s not just caffeine, it’s a punch to the bloodstream, an electric surge that seizes my spine and snaps my tail to attention. My hands twitch on the porcelain, claws scraping lightly, the world suddenly humming and spinning with a sharp, broken-edged intensity. Every heartbeat is a drum, every flicker of movement in the smoky Kipma is a shout in the dark.

  My ears flatten, then perk, then flatten again, unable to decide whether to brace for attack or melt into the velvet. My eyes dart from face to face, catching every glimmer of light on gold, every nervous tremor in a patron’s hand, every whispered deal struck behind a trembling palm. The Bond pulses faster, hot and frenetic, my awareness of Master’s presence ratcheted up to a fever pitch, his breath, his pulse, the sly satisfaction curled in his thoughts.

  I can’t sit still. My foot taps a wild rhythm under the table. My tail lashes, curls, then whips at the air, so quick it’s a blue-and-silver blur. My jaw aches from the tension, chewing at nothing, working through the residual urge to pounce, to kill, to laugh until they all realise how close to death they are with me in the room.

  The flavours are overwhelming. Scent of smoke, sweat, the iron tang of coins and desperation, every sound a spike in my skull, the clink of glass, the low moan of a dying harp, the rustle of silk over hungry bone. My mind runs in circles, manic and sharp, catching a hundred stories in every glance, piecing together a thousand betrayals before the first kettle has finished boiling.

  Master is still, the only thing in the world that isn’t vibrating, his thoughts crisp and clear, Good. Keep her alert. The room will notice. That’s what I want. If anything stirs, she’ll see it before I do.

  I giggle, can’t help it, the noise cuts through the quiet, bright and strange, a knife of joy and violence. For a moment, I want to leap onto the table and snarl, to let the whole den know who owns the floor, who owns the Master, who’s willing to draw blood at the slightest provocation. Instead, I dig my claws into the velvet arm of the chair, shuddering, trembling, eyes wild, grin wide and cruel.

  The Bond tightens, a sudden, blinding pulse, scent. Not just the memory of it, but the full force, raw and immediate, projected through me with no warning. Master’s essence, his sweat, his skin, the musk of his clothes, that iron tang beneath the surface, all of it floods me in a single, overwhelming wave. It drowns out the tea, the noise, the velvet rot. All I know is him.

  I snap, all willpower torn away in an instant by that command, by the need, the world vanishes, nothing but the ache in my gut and the animal desperation tearing through my veins. I’m moving before I think, crawling across the table with twitching limbs, the fine porcelain rattling, my tail coiling up around his thigh as I climb into his lap, knees digging into the expensive velvet. My claws snag on his cloak, my nose buries itself in the hollow of his neck, then his collarbone, then his wrist, anywhere skin meets air, anywhere the scent is strongest. I inhale, long, ragged, gasping, filling myself with him, every breath a shudder of relief and frantic need.

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  I don’t care who sees, let the ruined nobles and broken gamblers watch. Let them see what ownership means, let them taste my hunger in the air. I press my face into his chest, mouth half open, tongue flicking against his skin, greedy and lost, purring like thunder, growling at anything that would dare come close. The world is reduced to heat and need, every sense on fire, manic with caffeine and obsession. I can’t get enough. His pulse hammers in my ears, the scent is dizzying, intoxicating. He’s mine.

  MINE, MINE

  I rub against him, cheek, nose, jaw, marking him with my scent, taking his into myself until there’s nothing left but the Bond and the echo of his thoughts. The Bond sings with satisfaction, pride, wicked glee at my madness, at my humiliation, at my loyalty, and I don’t care, I want him to see, to know, to feel what it means to be the centre of my world. Every inch I can reach, I press to, nuzzle, lick, bite, my world, my Master, my everything.

  My tail wraps tighter, my body trembling, every breath a prayer to his scent, every movement a declaration of war on any rival foolish enough to breathe the same air. This is what he does to me. This is what I am, reduced, perfected, consumed.

  His words snap through the haze, cold and sharp, “As much as I appreciate it, CAT, I meant hone in on anything that smells like production.” The Bond flares, shaming heat burning through my nerves, tail whipping once in humiliation and reflexive possessiveness. For a heartbeat I linger, nuzzling his chest, nose buried in his collar, greedily drawing in one last lungful, letting his scent flood every instinct, every twisted little need.

  Then the command sinks in, production, not ownership, not pleasure. My ears flick forward, eyes flashing wide, caffeine and craving blending into a feverish clarity. The Bond thrums with purpose now, the world narrowing to the question he’s pushed into my mind. My body tenses, senses forced to pivot, to drag my focus away from Master and back to the den, to the mess of humanity around us.

  I blink, reluctantly pulling away, tail still curled tight around his thigh, claws lingering on his sleeve. My head lifts, nostrils flaring, drawing in the sour, perfumed fog of the Kipma, filtering through the layers of rot and smoke for something else,something sharp, acrid, metallic, the kind of scent that doesn’t belong to living things, but to work, to making, to building. My heart races with every whiff, eyes darting over the room, nose twitching as I scan for anything that reeks of chemicals, dyes, blood, solvents, anything that doesn’t fit the velvet and despair.

  It’s everywhere and nowhere. Gritty, industrial notes woven through the sweet poisons, the rich tobacco, the reek of sweat and crushed dreams. I catch a thread of burnt alkali from a table of goblins, the stink of old copper near a human with ink-stained fingers, a sharper bite of solvents in the air above a pair of cloaked dwarfs hunched over a case beneath their table. There, something else, too. Faint, but real. A whisper of something chemical, almost alchemical, too sharp and clean to belong to food or drink. My ears swivel, honing in, muscles twitching with the urge to pounce.

  My mind feeds it all back through the Bond, each trace, each detail, every flicker of scent that tastes of production and industry, not just decay and indulgence. I let Master feel it, taste it, the pulse of possibility in the crowded, ruined grandeur of the Kipma.

  But even as I hunt for his answers, I can’t help myself, I press my knee to his leg, tail curling possessively, making sure that even in service, even as his instrument, I remain a living threat to anyone else’s claim.

  I do as I’m told. But he’s still mine.