Chapter 1
“Fucking bastards,” I hissed, tracing the tattoo they’d carved into my neck after taking me kicking and screaming from my home. By its shape, it was whichever insignia the Sky Demons used to mark their property.
Peering out through the bars of the small cage I was trapped inside, I listened for anything—voices, steps, or movement at all—but other than the asshole who took guard outside the door, no one else had come through.
The chains around my wrists and ankles clinked and dragged loudly across the metal bottom of the cage as I tried to get into a more comfortable position. This box was far too small for a woman as tall as I was. It’d barely fit a medium-sized street dog, but it was better than no room at all.
I was no stranger to discomfort. After the Fall, most of us lived day by day in a state of organized anarchy. My group, however, made it our personal mission to be more. We planned to fight for a future where these merciless beasts no longer enslaved humankind. My sister, who’d been taken by these very demons, was at the forefront of my vengeance.
“Hey, asshole,” I called out, happy with myself when his feet scuffed the dirt floor. “I doubt even the animals you bastards eat are treated this poorly. Get me a drink, would you?”
My unfortunate guard’s tongue clicked, but I heard him walk off a short sigh later. Satisfied, I pushed my back against the cold metal bars behind me. I hadn’t expected it, but the oversized oaf came clomping back into the room with a small cup of water.
Crouching, his eyes caught the light raining down through a window situated near the ceiling, and it was the first time I’d seen a demon’s eyes that weren’t drawn in the books I’d studied.
His oversized irises had a liquid sheen to them. A reptilian slit bisected his overly large iris instead of the typical human one. His ears were pointed and sticking out from a mess of blonde curls, but I didn’t see anything else. No claws or wings or even the faint outline of scales. He looked like your average brute—not outstandingly beautiful like I’d been warned they tended to be, and this one was covered in enough scars to give me pause.
Interesting. So dragons could bleed. I took mental note of it. The information we had on them was limited to theory because no human had ever killed one. Not one that lived to say so, anyway. No one knew how long they lived. No one knew their secrets, and that was exactly why I was here.
To find out and start trouble.
I’d trained since I was young to fight these flying demons, but this was the first time I’d seen one in person. At least out of their human disguise. In it, we couldn’t tell them apart from the asshole gangs that roamed our sector streets. Unlike dragons, we didn’t have beastly abilities.
As much as I hated to admit it, the guard’s eyes took my breath away for a second before I snatched the cup he offered and drank down its contents. The brute sighed, then got to his feet and left.
His eyes weren’t what surprised me most. It was the fact that he’d given me a drink at all.
Sky Demons weren’t known for their generosity or compassion. They were ruthless and unforgiving. They killed anyone who spoke out against them, and their laws promised unimaginable bloodshed and torture to anyone who attempted to rise up against them. So I couldn’t reconcile this…accommodation.
I hadn’t been beaten. I hadn’t been raped. Despite being dragged from my home, tattooed, and stuffed in a cage that was a tad smaller than I would like, I wasn’t being mistreated. So, what was their deal? Was this the carrot before the stick? A trick meant to convince me I was safe, only to destroy me the second I breathed any amount of relief?
I watched the guard go with skepticism, wondering if he’d spiked the water he gave me with something. I didn’t detect it on my sensitive tongue, but I wasn’t sure what they used to subdue their slaves.
I’d built up some immunity to different poisons over the years, but any poison in a high enough quantity meant I’d die like the rest. I was a Rebel they trained to be a Tribute. A Rebel who was more than a spy inside my own sector. Still, unless they figured me out from the beginning, they didn’t have any reason to get rid of me yet.
I’d been sent for the Choosing.
After the Fall, humankind was on the brink of extinction. The world was in chaos. Wars ravaged the land and left so few of us alive. But soon, we weren’t the only enemies we fought. Suddenly, humankind had an adversary it didn’t have the strength or wit to win against.
Giant beasts emerged from nowhere, capable of abilities the world had never seen before the Fall, and they quickly dominated the skies and land. Most called them dragons, but Rebels like myself out to discover their weaknesses and destroy them from within called them demons.
They easily overpowered and ruled over humans in different parts of the world. And without any way to fight back, we succumbed to their power. With no option but to comply, the remainder of humankind devised a treaty to satisfy each dragon faction’s lust for blood. Every community offered a variety of humans every decade or so to the ruling faction in their area. What they did with them we were never told because whoever was sent was never seen again.
A few in my group had heard whispers that humans were used for everything from labor to breeding, even for sport in some cases. But no single human sent over had ever returned to give their own personal accounting on the matter. Everything was left to theory.
That was about to change.
Several in my group had been taken in this Choosing, and we’d find a way to communicate with each other and the outside world even if it killed us. We’d discover their secrets. Those of us fighting in the shadows wanted to overpower these brutal demons, and we’d die for it without blinking.
I was the first to go straight to the belly of the beast. It took decades, but finally one of us was chosen to be the personal petto one of the ruling three. No matter who we’d sent before, they never went to the leaders.
I wouldn’t squander this opportunity. I’d do whatever it took to destroy them. It was why I’d studied in secret to sharpen my skills. I’d find their weaknesses and exploit them. I’d cause war between the factions. I’d give them a reason to kill each other.
My only goal was to sow violence and communicate any information I could with our group. I’d need to be calculated and learn everything I could about them before I could wreak havoc. Whatever it took, I’d accomplish my goal. I wouldn’t live through this, so I’d die my way.
My platinum-blonde hair washed over my shoulders, just a shade shy of the moon. My sun-kissed skin beamed wherever it was exposed. I’d been taken in the middle of the night, so I was only wearing a tank top and thin pair of shorts.
It was cold in this dirt chamber, but hell if I’d ever show it. I never intended to play prey, not at first. My sector was known for its violence. We were as cruel and feral as the demons who ruled over us.
