Enough tears welled in my protesting eyes that I finally studied the darkness between the trees. Glimmers of retreating auras beckoned me, and like a wraith, I stalked between the spindly pines cloaked in fog thanks to my water affinity. Fueled by my hatred for the rebels that got me up each morning, I stretched out my hands as ice crystals formed, leaving a shower of sparkling shards in my wake.
Several figures scattered after the dismemberment of the Berine caravan and the violent upheaval of the earth beneath ourfeet. Tremors continued to rattle the ground as I pursued the trail that I hoped might belong to a wayward rebel.
My mouth watered as the taste of vengeance surged. Duty to Haluma, my home, no matter how bleak and decrepit it had become, pulsed in my veins. Committed protection to my only friend, Delah, anchored me. Once my parents had been burned alive by someone high on Glint, Delah, a fellow orphan, found me. She had immediately become like a little sister, bound by our shared losses.
My commitment to the realm’s innocents, like me and Delah, was the motivation that warmed me on my coldest nights. I was grateful that King Nolan shared my sense of responsibility toward those affected most by Glint’s impact.
Ahead of me, a man in black clutched his hood as he ran, then stumbled. I caught a flash of his face as he hurried to right himself. His profile revealed a sharp nose and the absence of a beard. His aura surged the acid green of turmoil. He wasn’t part of the transport crew.
“Found you.” I pushed myself faster, and my magic harder. The surrounding fog condensed, glazing the forest floor in ice. The stranger slipped and fell, his hands and knees colliding with rocks. “Stay down.”
A sharp whistle pierced the cold air. The man whistled back. Two short bursts echoed through the trees. He was warning his partners.
“Shouldn’t have done that.” I hurled a handful of ice darts at him; one pierced his neck through his woolen cloak.
He shouted in pain, groping at his wounds, and slowly turned to look at me. His aura was muted olive now: resignation.
I smiled bitterly as Kaida, my pet wolvin, emerged from the early-morning gloom. She was a massive creature—her head easily reached my chest—and her fangs glimmered with saliva.
“Is it going to eat me?” the man uttered. Pathetic.
“Only if I tell her to.” Then I slammed my dagger hilt into his temple. He crumpled the rest of the way to the ground, and the woods fell into eerie disquiet.
Kaida took a small step forward, her nose twitching.
“Sorry, not this time.” I rested my hand on her back. “I need you to carry him for me.”
She glared at me.
“Now.”
She huffed a sigh and sulked toward the slumped figure. She gripped his body between her massive jaws. His arm grazed the forest floor as she turned to me.
I rubbed the tension from my temples. Though adrenaline coursed through me in the thrill of the hunt, when it dropped, I’d feel the full effect of my exhaustion.
“To the cells,” I directed Kaida. We strolled out of Rivellan Wood and through the deserted streets of Maripol toward a nondescript building, warded for sound. The rebel would remain there until I returned with the others to extract what information we could in order to annihilate our rebel enemies.
Chapter Two
THE SPY
The gleam in Wes’s eyes disturbed me. Not because they were glowing and his vertical pupils rapidly expanded into black pools. It was the excitement alongside his magic, throbbing, like he was getting off on the thought of torture.
We entered the extraction chamber. The rebel sat secured in the same chair I left him in, though now he was conscious.
I watched warily as Wes’s body contorted, scales emerging from the top of his forehead, clicking, overlapping, cascading downward over his entire body, until he shifted completely into a dreki. The new magic he possessed pushed against my skin, goose bumps erupting. He had recently made the trade and embodied all the power and status of the dreki name.
Even though witnessing a dreki in person unnerved me, I looked forward to my own invitation. Worry started to grow with every day that passed without King Nolan offering me the opportunity.
I knew better than to intervene with Wes’s violence. I attempted it once, revealing a crack in my soldier facade. Empathy was intolerable, a weakness that would disqualify mefrom the revered dreki status. I wouldn’t forget that lesson again.
Feigned boredom settled in place of my discomfort. My mask of indifference became a second skin, especially in the midst of an information extraction. I swallowed. They needed me as their lie detector—auras revealed a lot about a person.
Wes’s clawed hand gripped the man’s hair, yanking his head back. Dag, he called himself, jerked and thrashed beneath the ropes that restrained his wrists and ankles. Belham circled them both, sneering. His fingers itched to release his own magic, but we needed information. Belham shot a quick glance in my direction, a hint of doubt in his gray eyes that I had found the wrong guy.
I knew I had not. My affinity allowed me to see motives and emotions as colorful auras. Dag reeked of secrets. His actions in the woods were meant to redirect the shipment of Berine. He may not have been the lead in this operation, but he was instrumental in its outcome.
Berine was sought after and sabotaged relentlessly, most notably by the rebels and their haughty general. Since my ascension to an elite, the final rank before becoming a dreki, all my missions focused on the protection of our Berine supply and searching for rebels in our realm.
