He winced as Zahra smacked him even harder.

“And after the completion of your…tour?” Zaethan asked.

“She starts raving about dark spirits, moving buckets, puddling. Kakk talking, yeah?” Takoda flapped his hands around. “Somebody’s been using it.”

Zaethan rolled up the map and hit Takoda in the chest with it. “Zullee, my friend. Zahra,” he ordered, pushing off the desk, “I want you with Dmitri tonight. The rest of us are needed out there. We need to arrest Wekesa in the act.”

“We bringing Maji’maia with us?” Kumo swirled a finger around his eye. “Tàkom lai na huwàa?”

“Ano zà. Our brother has become a monster. It’s Darakai’s responsibility to put him down.” Zaethan belted his kopar. The witch’s accusation rang in his ears as if he still laid on the mat of that training room. “Damn the day we step aside and invite Boreal to do it in our place.”

THIRTY-ONE

   The figure ignored a pair of drunkards wrestling ineptly in the street as he scanned the rooftops. Near the edge of Marketown, the stench of the slums overpowered a more pleasing spice in the breeze, floating from the closed stalls of the Drifting Bazaar.

He used his thumb to itch a fingertip on his left hand, hanging onto a drainpipe with the other. He’d shed another fingernail, the raw bed of flaky flesh raking against the interior of his stiff glove. It creased as he stretched out his hand. He knew from experience that the nail would not grow back.

Below, one of the intoxicated men smashed a bottle over the other’s head. Preparing to move along, eager for an alternative bouquet of smell and sound, the figure spun when Amaranth’s cry shot through the night. Gliding across the slats of the rickety building, avoiding a break in the tiles, he ran in the direction of her call. Further down the boardwalk, where the edge of the slum turned into a river of colorful booths, the Pilarese hawk circled overhead.

He leapt over a steep drop and landed on a collection of homes wedged into the tight street, heading for her wings. The figure did not hesitate, vaulting to a crooked terrace and hoisting himself through the window of an abandoned structure. His cloak caught on a splintered sill. Ripping it with his momentum, he sprinted to another window overlooking the alleyway. Amaranth surveyed on the opposite side.

The figure lingered behind a weathered curtain, searching the shadows for her sighting. Huddled, shaded in the back corner of a buoyant stall, a hooded man dumped his burden onto a pile of sack grain. His own cloak concealed his identity, even as he turned to hop off the merchant boat. Moonlight spilled over the addition to the stack of burlap: a pale, lifeless boy.

Preparing to vault, the figure flung himself back into the vacant hovel. At the farthest mouth of the alley, another person appeared, starting to run toward the hooded killer.

“Doru!” a southern voice screamed in pursuit. “Kumo, Alpha Zà! Tricker getting away!”

The figure stooped lower, hidden, as the Darakaian sprinted after, a sharp kopar in hand. From the other end of the alley, a second southerner flew around the crumbling corner of a shop and barreled straight into the killer, slinging them against a crude lamppost. The figure heard a crack as the Darakaian screamed in anguish, rattling the only torchlight in sight.

Attempting to thrust his sickle-sword into the hooded man, his body suddenly spasmed and the kopar rattled on the cobblestones. Gargling blood, the Darakaian tried to mouth something to his assailant. The figure leaned forward to read his lips, but the cape covered the warrior’s face when it whirled. The hooded man bolted into the shadows, leaving the Darakaian slumped against the post in a growing puddle of crimson.

His kinsman arrived at his side, in not nearly enough time as the struggle had happened so quickly—even the figure shook himself to recall his original quest. Without concern for the panicked Darakaians, howling for help, the figure gripped the top of the window frame and swung onto the gable. Under Amaranth’s lead, he dodged a broken chimney and trailed her deeper into Marketown’s busy district.

There—between a trader’s cart and the rear of a loud tavern, he spotted the hooded man weaving through a crowd of hagglers. The figure stalked his path from atop the adjacent building. Speeding up, he lost his footing over a cable. Cursing the misstep, rare as they were anymore, he watched in helpless horror as a slew of tiles scattered over the edge and plummeted into the street. The hooded figure pivoted, still disguised by the swath of rich fabric, and took off into the seedy network of trading trolleys and smoking tents.

In the scarce torchlight, as Marketown’s customers preferred the anonymity of darkness, the figure leapt to the ground. He pulled his cloak close, head low, and plunged into the swarm of bustling patrons. Passing a pipe marrow tent, he breathed shallowly, refusing to allow the substance access to his shriveled lungs. Bobbing in and out of the throng, the figure soon lost track of the man, though Amaranth still hovered above. He ducked around a hanging rug when a woman bumped into him, reaching for a bushel of milled spices, and began to barter with the owner. Through the strips of the plaited fabric, he studied each passerby patiently, trusting the hawk’s guidance.

Vigilant, the figure watched the movement in the street from the trader’s booth for half an hour. Amaranth screeched over the racket, pulling his attention to a smoking tent across the way. The hooded man exited through the slim split at the front and reentered the crowd. Easing away from the stand of goods, the figure slinked along the narrow lane between the street sellers and a row of rowdy establishments.

Maintaining pace at the rear, the figure followed him down a vacant alley. Out of sight, the figure sprung off his heels and dove onto the killer’s back, awakening the monster within.

The cowl of the figure’s cloak flew off as his blistered arms snaked around his prey’s neck and squeezed the throat mercilessly, crushing his knees into the ribcage. Animalistically, the glands behind his canines flooded with the expectation of the kill. Stickiness drooled from his mouth, down his chin.

The figure was driven into the wall and slammed against the old brick repeatedly as his prey tried to break free. His state of mind fractured, the figure thrashed his head and constricted his limbs tighter. Sputtering erratically, his prey’s veins pounded in his ears. Snarling through his nostrils, the figure sank his teeth through the velvet of the killer’s cloak. Sour warmth bathed his parched and abrasive tongue. He heard a grunt of pain, the accompanying scent of fear pleasing and sweet.

Spinning them away from the brick, his prey flailed through the alley. Savagely, the figure’s jaws stayed anchored in his prey as they both tumbled into the open.

The figure heard shrieks in the distance, and his humanity tried to reclaim dominance over his curse. Something smashed into his back, hurling him off his prey and into a casket of spirits. Rolling into a crouch, he growled at the forming circle of frightened faces.