The workshop was a maze of forgotten industry. Cobwebs draped from the ceiling like rotten lace. Every clanking pipe, every creaking beam, every whisper of wind through a broken pane seemed amplified, distorted. The hair on my arms stood on end. There was an echo in the silence—not just an acoustic one, but a magical vibration, stretched thin.
Then I saw him.
The victim lay sprawled on an oil-stained sheet near the back wall, amidst a pile of disused engine parts. Adult male, early thirties, judging by the short dark hair and strong jawline. His eyes stared blankly at the high, grime-streaked ceiling.
He was Calysteri; the faint, residual signature of his innate magic whispered against my senses—or rather, the gaping hole where it should have been.
The emptiness screamed. It was the same mark. The same absolute absence. Talia was the first. Now there was another.
A prickle started on my left shoulder, growing quickly into a scalding weight. My scar. It hammered a raw, insistent cadence beneath my skin.
I forced myself to focus on the victim, pushing down the frantic energy blossoming inside me. His shirt was torn open, revealing a pale chest marred by the struggle, but my eyes were drawn to his arm, flung out against the dirty floor. There, seared onto the right forearm, was the sigil.
It was stark, brutal. The brand formed a crude triangle, its jagged lines charred deep into the muscle, looking like it was inflicted seconds ago. It glowed faintly, a dull ruby ember in the dim light. A tangible, malevolent energy emanated from it, scraping against my awareness. It dragged at me.
“Same as the other one,” Dane stated, voice clipped, an edge ofcontrolled fury in it. He crouched down, not touching the body, eyes locked on the sigil.
The air around us thickened, viscous with a fresh layer of magic—not ancient and layered like the Old Quarter, but recent, raw, and still reverberating. Too recent. Like the perpetrator had just walked out of the room.
My blood jumped. The air was stretched, the vacuum of a massive presence recently removed, leaving a subtle vibration. A resonance. Someone powerful had definitely left this spot minutes ago. My skin crawled.
Dane straightened, his gaze sweeping the room. He inhaled sharply, his Varkyn instincts screaming.
A faint scuffing sound echoed from deeper within the workshop. It didn’t come from the storm outside, but from the darkness inside.
A soft scrape, then silence. It was barely audible, easily dismissed as the building settling, or a rat, or the wind. But my new, hypersensitive ears picked it up.
The hair on the back of my neck rose.
Dane’s head snapped up. His eyes, already intense, hardened. He stared towards the back of the workshop, where a heavy curtain of dust and murk concealed another section.
Our gazes met. He heard it too.
The killer was still here.
Dane didn’t speak.He didn’t need to. He tilted his head slightly to the left—a signal as clear as a shout.
I gave a curt nod. I’ll go right.
We melted into the workshop’s oppressive darkness, moving with a synchronised stealth honed over years of raids in the city’s most unforgiving corners. The gloom didn’t matter. Something in my vision had clicked into place, the darkness receding into grey but into a new kind of sight.
The world resolved into a mosaic of faint light and heat. Rusted metal was a cold, dead blue. Forgotten tools were dull grey ghosts. But one shape blazed—a living flame of warmth and wrongness searing against the chill. It moved towards the back of the workshop, a thread of anxious energy pulling taut.
I followed it, feet making no sound on the grit-strewn floor.
A blur of motion. A spectre detached itself from a stack of crates, impossibly fast. It darted down a narrow rear hallway, a blur of dark clothing and panicked flight.
The hunt was on.
From the darkness to my left, a heavy, sodden slap hit the ground—the unmistakable sound of a leather jacket being discarded. I didn’t need to look.
Then came a sound like a thick root snapping—a wet crack of bone and the violent tearing of sinew. It was over before a human could blink. I had seen it a dozen times, yet the raw, primal violence of it always stole my breath.
I glanced over. The man was gone. In his place crouched a beast of black fur and amber eyes, its massive shoulder reaching nearly to my own. Muscles coiled tight, a low growl tore from him that was pure territorial fury. Then he bolted.
My own body responded before my mind could question it. Magic, hot and insistent, coursed through my veins. The world seemed to slow, my legs pumping with an unnatural strength. I was keeping pace with the wolf. The concrete floor became a grey ribbon beneath my feet.
We flew through the corridor, a blur of teeth, claws, and raw, crackling energy.
