Rain smeared across the windscreen, distorting the neon signs into bleeding streaks of colour as we left the Old Quarter. Selene drove too fast, the tyres hissing on the wet road, forcing me into a silence I didn’t care to break.
The car’s interior was stifling, a metal box saturated with the scent of damp wool and the coppery taste of her magic. It refused to settle, rolling off her in agitated movements that thickened the air, mirroring the drop in pressure before a thunderstorm. Every spike in her power triggered an answering pain in the scar on my chest—a warning that the control I had perfected for decades was finally beginning to fracture.
“What?” she snapped, shifting her grip on the wheel.
“Nothing.”
I studied her profile in the strobing streetlights. Her copper hair was a chaotic spill against the headrest, a visual echo of the static bleeding off her skin. She was a striking woman, tall, with curves that seemed to crowd the confined space of the car, yet the exhaustion etched into her features made her look brittle.
The tension in the car was suffocating. I watched the rigid set of her chin, the white-knuckle grip on the leather. She was eroding.
A few days ago, a surge had torn through the Old Quarter—a detonation of power strong enough to violently rattle my senses. I knew then the source was significant. Sitting beside her now, suffocating in the static of her stress, the truth locked into place: it was her.
“Your magic is loud today,” I said, keeping my voice low to cut through the drumming rain on the roof.
Her head snapped towards me, a fleeting glare. “You said that already.”
“You’re shaking.”
Her gaze dropped to her hands, a hint of surprise crossing her face as she registered the tremor vibrating through her fingers. Anger flashed in her eyes—not at me, but inward.
“Just tired,” she muttered, dismissing the weakness.
“That isn’t fatigue.”
She glared. “I will make you walk.”
“I’m aware.” I turned my attention to the shadowed streets outside, where garish neon bled into the grime. “But throwing me out of the car won’t stop your hands from shaking. You are compromised.”
She fell silent, her grip on the wheel tightening until the leather creaked. The tremor in her hands worsened, mirroring the restless energy of her magic. Her control was slipping, weighed down by guilt and grief.
“You’re thinking about the attack,” I said, observing the way the passing streetlights carved shadows across her face. “About what happened to your partner.”
She flinched. It was subtle—a tightening of the shoulders—but the shift in her emotional field was violent. Sudden sorrow, a spike of guilt, and beneath it all, a fierce, simmering anger. She intended to hunt down whoever created the augmented creature that nearly killed Lennox.
Our goals aligned unexpectedly. I chose not to reveal my own motivations, my own suspicions that predated hers. She would have seen it as a betrayal. Not yet.
The car lurched as she took a sharp turn, tyres squealing softly on the wet asphalt. We plunged deeper into the Lows. The streets narrowed, buildings pressing in to blot out the sky, cloaked in shadows that absorbed what little light escaped from grimy windows. The air grew heavy, saturated with damp earth and the hungry current of stale magic.
She forced the car into a tight space between two derelict buildings. The engine died, leaving only the relentless patter of rain against the roof.
She turned, eyes dark in the gloom. “Stay out of my way.”
“No.” My voice was quiet. “I’ll be where I’m needed.”
She hesitated, conflict warring with exhaustion in her expression. Then she pushed the door open, stepping out into the rain. The splash of her boots was loud in the dead air. As she moved away, the ache in my scar flared—a sudden, intense throb that demanded I follow.
She moved quickly, knowing exactly which gaps in the crowd would open for her. I followed a few paces behind, letting her take the lead through the twisting alleys.
She led us towards the coordinates Hale had provided for the cargo theft. The deeper we went, the more the Lows showed their true face—sputtering neon, dripping tarps, faces half-hidden in hoods. Stall owners tracked her with a mix of wariness and irritation; they recognised the walk of a copper, even out of uniform.
Marcus’s assignment was a thin veil, a convenient fiction about ‘unregistered components,’ but she played the part well enough, scanning the crates and asking the right questions. Yet I saw the tension in her stride. She wasn’t really looking for contraband. She searched with the focus of a predator.
We stopped at a stall where a ramshackle collection ofmismatched items spilled onto a grimy cloth. The vendor, a scrawny Umbrakynn with nervous eyes, shifted weight from foot to foot, uncomfortable under her scrutiny.
“We’re looking for a crate of stolen tech,” Selene said, flashing her badge. “Logistics markings. Seen anything?”
The vendor shook his head, mumbling a denial, but Selene had already stopped listening. Her attention had snagged on something else.
