“You can understand why I’m eager to be rid of her,” Boden said. “Would twelve energy chips be enough incentive to track her down?”
That a boy, Boden. Aim high.
A chair creaked. Fi pictured Cardigan leaning back his stockybuild, lacing his fingers. “You think she’s worth that much?”
“If it means keeping Verne happy?”
Silence.
“Forgive me,” Boden said. “I assumed we both had similar motivation, in that regard.”
“Do we?” Cardigan spoke slowly. “Sheisa dangerous mistress to disappoint. But also a purveyor of attractive rewards. Perhaps if you’d be interested in sharing those rewards…”
Fi’s pulse skipped higher. Not just at Cardigan taking the bait. She inched down the hall, drawn by a flicker on the air.
A Curtain. Another one inside the house?
It wasn’t alone. A courtyard lay at the villa’s center. Two more Curtains fluttered in the still air, one near a tiered fountain, the other tangled in a trellis of blooming jasmine. This many in such density couldn’t be naturally occurring.
Someone must have cut them.
A hand clamped over Fi’s mouth. She was dismayed tonotfeel claws.
Fi spat a muffled curse as her assailant pinned her to his chest. Before she could draw her sword, cold raked her skin. She fell backward.
Pulled through a Curtain.
They emerged on a different Shard to the one she’d entered through. One of the smallest fragments she’d seen, edges crumbling into the Void on all sides, ground a stagnant mix of bog and gravel. Several sheds sat at the center, and combined with the multiple Curtains cut into Cardigan’s villa?
Fi was lividshe’dnever thought of such an efficient setup for storing contraband.
Add it to her growing list of reasons to loathe Cardigan. He’d conned her into transporting energy capsules when he already had his own Voidwalker on staff?
“Don’t fight,” the man warned in a Spring Plane accent. And stupidly.
Fi elbowed his stomach.
Heat leached from her muscles as she Shaped energy over her arms, enough to zap his hands off her. Fi lurched free then faced her attacker: a slouched and unassuming man, cradling his gut.
Theassistant?
He lunged. Splayed a hand across the damaged silviamesh of her stomach. A pulse of energy sent Fi staggering like a gut punch.
Cardigan’s assistant was a fuckingVoidwalker? And he’d still hired Fi to walk those energy capsules into a building about to explode?
Fi dug into her pockets. Her opponent grabbed one wrist and twisted, forcing her to drop her transport stone. He kicked it over the Shard edge, lost into the Void. Fi gasped her indignation. Transport stones wereexpensive.
But he’d disarmed the wrong hand. A daeyari energy capsule burned hot and cold in her palm. She pressed it to his side.
The current spiked molten up her arm, but at least she prepared for it, Shaping the chaotic energy away from her flesh and into her assailant. A ripple of crimson hit the man’s ribs. He screamed. Released her. They tore apart, his shirt tattered, a horrific energy burn across his chest. Fi’s arm throbbed. Better than some of her practice rounds with daeyari energy, but the black blotches along her fingers weren’t pleasant to look at.
With a frantic swipe, the assistant dove back through a Curtain. Fi barreled after him.
“Intruder!” he bellowed down the hall of Cardigan’s villa. “It’s—”
Fi tackled him. As they hit the ground, she clenched a fist.Though she held no physical hilt, she Shaped silver energy from the heat of her sternum, forming a dagger. The raw magic seared her skin without any buffer. She didn’t have to hold it long.
One plunge drove the blade into the man’s heart.
