Claimed By The Exiled Tiger King

The first thing Abigail registered was the smoke.

It clawed at her throat, a dry, rasping burn that forced a cough from her lungs. The cough was violent, shaking her entire body, but it only dragged more ash and heat inside. Her vision was a blurry smear of orange and gray.

Where am I?

The last thing she remembered was the heat of a different fire. The kitchen of Étoile, her three-Michelin-star restaurant in Paris. The gleaming copper pots. The scent of thyme and butter. The reporter from Le Monde waiting in the dining room with his notebook ready.

And then—the explosion.

A faulty gas line. That's what they would later say. She had been standing right next to the stove, adjusting the flame on a demi-glace she had been perfecting for six months. There was a sound like a dragon inhaling. Then nothing. Just white light. Just silence.

She was supposed to be accepting an award tonight. Instead, she was here. Wherever here was.

Her vision swam, dark spots dancing before slowly solidifying into shapes. She tried to lift a hand to cover her mouth, to shield herself from the smoke, but her arms wouldn't move. A rough, fibrous pressure bit into her wrists. She twisted, and the feeling of coarse bark scraping against her skin told her she was tied to something. A post. A thick, unforgiving wooden post.

A wave of intense heat washed over her legs, so close it felt like standing in front of an open oven. She looked down.

Dry branches and kindling were piled high around her feet. Flames, bright and hungry, were already licking at the edges, crawling rapidly toward her.

They're burning me alive, she realized, the abstract fear in her mind congealing into a cold, solid knot in her stomach.

Her head snapped up, her eyes frantically scanning the surroundings. She wasn't in a hospital. There were no fire trucks, no emergency crews. Instead, a wall of strange, hostile faces surrounded her. People dressed in animal skins, their faces painted with crude symbols, some with features that were unnervingly bestial—sharp teeth, pointed ears, cat-like pupils.

A guttural roar erupted from the crowd. They were shouting, chanting in a language that was alien yet somehow, impossibly, being parsed into meaning inside her head. Her stellar-universal translator implant—standard issue for all interstellar travelers—was working, but the realization offered absolutely zero comfort.

"Burn the outsider!"

"The curse must be purged!"

This is a beast world, she realized, her culinary-trained mind somehow still sharp despite the terror. I've transmigrated. Into a primitive society of beast-kin.

In her previous life, she had been Chef Abigail Chen. Twenty years in the finest kitchens in the world. Three Michelin stars. James Beard Award. Author of The Art of Extraction, a cookbook about drawing maximum flavor from minimal ingredients. She had cooked for presidents and royalty. She could taste a dish and name every spice, every technique, every mistake.

But none of that mattered here. Here, she was just meat tied to a stake.

A young woman pushed through the crowd and stepped forward. She was adorned with elaborate feathers and what looked like a priestess's ceremonial robes. Her face was beautiful, but her eyes were filled with a venomous, personal hatred.

Chelsea lifted a burning torch.

"She is a curse sent by the dark spirits!" Chelsea's voice was high and sharp. "She frightened away the sacred hunt! The Silverfox Clan will starve this winter because of her!"

She locked eyes with Abigail, a cruel smile twisting her lips, and tossed the torch onto the pyre.

The flames exploded.

A searing pain shot up Abigail's leg as the hem of her simple tunic caught fire. A scream tore from her throat, raw and agonizing.

Chelsea turned back to the crowd, arms raised. "She is a demon! Her screams are a lie to gain your pity!"

The crowd began to pick up stones, hurling them at the pyre. One grazed Abigail's forehead, sending a trickle of warm blood down her temple. Another hit her shoulder, the impact a dull, sickening thud.

The pain, the smoke, the terror—it was a vortex threatening to swallow her consciousness. But beneath it all, a different instinct kicked in. An instinct forged from twenty years of working in kitchens where one mistake meant ruin. An instinct that had nothing to do with screaming and everything to do with finding a solution with whatever ingredients were available.

I've cooked in worse conditions, she thought grimly. This is just another high-pressure service.

She took a deep, ragged breath, the smoke searing her lungs, and roared.

"ENOUGH!"

It wasn't a plea. It was a command. The voice of someone who had run a three-Michelin-star kitchen for a decade, who had shouted down line cooks and sous chefs and deliverymen who showed up with subpar ingredients.

The hail of stones faltered. The chanting died in their throats. For a single, stunned moment, the entire clan just stared at her.

A tall, powerfully built man pushed his way to the front. His face was weathered, his eyes holding a severe, calculating authority. He wore the pelt of a massive silver fox and clutched a heavy bone staff. The Chieftain.

Chelsea rushed to his side. "Chieftain, we must not listen! Do not let the demon speak!"

The Chieftain shook her off, his gaze never leaving Abigail. Abigail's brain, working on pure adrenaline, cataloged him instantly. Not a zealot. A pragmatist. He cares about his people starving.

Good, she thought. A pragmatist I can work with.

"You are to be purified by fire," the Chieftain said, his voice a low rumble. "You have the right to a final word. Speak it."

The fire was now at her knees. The skin on her legs was blistering. She bit down on her lip, tasting blood, and forced herself to meet his cold stare.

"Let me ask you something," she said, her voice raspy but steady. "What did the sacred hunt catch before I 'cursed' it?"

The Chieftain's eyes narrowed. "Three deer. Enough to feed the clan for a moon cycle."

"And now you have nothing."

"Because of you," Chelsea spat.

Abigail ignored her. She kept her eyes locked on the Chieftain. "You're facing starvation because you lost a hunt. Burning me won't fill a single belly. But I can."

A ripple of mocking laughter went through the crowd.

"She's a weak female!" someone yelled.

"She doesn't even know how to skin a rabbit!" another added.

Abigail smiled. It was a small, knowing smile. "You're right. I don't know how to skin a rabbit. But I know something you don't."

She paused, letting the silence stretch.

"I know how to make one rabbit feed ten people."

The crowd murmured, confused.

"I know how to take the parts you throw away—the bones, the organs, the hide—and turn them into a meal that will stick to your ribs for an entire day. I know how to preserve meat so it doesn't spoil for months. I know how to find food in places you've never thought to look."

In my previous life, she didn't add, I built a world-famous career on extracting maximum flavor from minimum ingredients. I made pigeon taste like steak and cabbage taste like silk. You're not starving because you lost a hunt. You're starving because you don't know how to cook.

The Chieftain's expression didn't change, but something flickered in his eyes. Interest. Curiosity.

"You claim you can feed my clan," he said slowly. "With what? The forest is empty. The beasts have fled."

"Give me three days," Abigail said. "Just three days. Let me go into that forest, and I will come back with enough food to replace what you lost. Ten times what you lost."

"Lies!" Chelsea shrieked. "She's buying time!"

The Chieftain raised his hand, silencing her. He studied Abigail for a long moment. The fire crackled. The smoke stung her eyes. She didn't blink.

"Three days," he finally said. "If you return with food, you live. If you return with nothing—or if you try to run—you will be thrown into the Beast Chasm. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

"Cut her down."

Two warriors stepped forward and sawed through the vines binding her wrists. The moment the last strand snapped, Abigail's strength gave out. She collapsed off the pyre, landing hard in the hot ash and embers. Her hands slammed into the searing ground. She choked back a cry, forced herself to her hands and knees, then shakily stood.

Her tunic was singed. Her legs were burned. Her head throbbed where the stone had struck.

But she stood.

The Chieftain's voice was cold. "Three days. Now go."

Abigail didn't waste a word. She turned and walked toward the dark maw of the forest, her legs shaking, every step an exercise in pure willpower.

Behind her, she heard Chelsea's furious whisper: "She won't come back. She'll die out there."

Abigail almost laughed.

Die?

She had survived twenty years in professional kitchens. She had made a soufflé rise perfectly during a Michelin inspection. She had once cooked a seven-course meal for a food critic while suffering from food poisoning herself.

A survival challenge in a forest full of edible plants and animals?

That's not a death sentence, she thought, limping into the trees. That's just mise en place.