Page 70 of Empowering the Wolf's Heart

When Gerald and his posse gathered their things to leave the arena, I was more than happy to be slinking around inside of shadows as the people thinned. Then I didn’t have everyone touching me.

Gerald and his guards were taking their normal route to their typical ale house, the Ale’s Maiden. Idiots. Didn’t they know varied routes makes it harder for assassins to track you?

I followed Gerald down, watching above and around the idiots when aneedslammed into me. Then it was gone. It was familiar. The person cravedfreedom.It couldn’t be.

Fenwas Hood. I’d once thought it could’ve been Shen, but I saw Fen. He was the black werewolf with the heart on his haunches.

I blew on my dart and Gerald jerked, causing an arrow sent from two stories above the alley to go wide and crash into a pile of crates. Gerald’s hired mercenaries quickly picked him up and darted down the alleyway.

No more arrows were shot, which was confusing. Why would Hood not try to finish him even if he hit a mercenary? What’s one more soul added to his tally?

A glint of light reflected off a golden eye before it looked away. He was right above me.

Ice flooded my veins as my heart tried to bruise my ribs.

I jumped, scrambling up a trellis which creaked and groaned to reach a window on the second story. Four feet from me was a balcony made of rusting iron. I gathered myself and leapt, barely grabbing the bottom of the balcony. My body jolted as the rusted iron dug into my hands. I pulled myself up and used a rotting wooden ladder to make my way to the roof.

Just in time to see a black-cloaked individual pause on the far side of the roof. Goats were lounging in the corner, chewing their cud as if they saw cloaked assassins on the daily.

The dry grass crunched beneath my feet. The person turned, their cloak snapping in the wind. There was a hint of a golden eye before he jumped. “Stop!” I yelled, racing forward.

I didn’t have time to think about it. I was two stories up and Hood had just jumped across to another roof. He wasn’t getting away this time. I needed another mage stone. I needed to be heir. I needed to avenge my grandpa. I needed to restore my family’s honor.

I had to bring back his pelt.

There was no other choice.

I pushed myself as I ran, my legs burning on the last step. I used the ledge to push myself off and then I was airborne. Weightlessness made it feel like I was flying for a split second, then the ground tugged at me. I flailed my arms and legs, but I knew I wouldn’t make it.

I stretched as far as I could, but my fingers missed the edge by mere inches. I saw my death. Felt my own pricklingneedfor someone to be with me, to help me—the firstneedof my own I had ever felt.

No one would come.

Mom and Dad wouldn’t know what happened to me for a very long time. They may never know, as bodies that turned up in the streets were put in a massive, unmarked graveyard.

Fingers wrapped around my wrist with a bruising grip. I slammed against the wall even as I met glowing golden eyes above me within a face wreathed in shadow.

He pulled me up as if I weighed nothing and deposited me on the roof in a tangle of arms and legs. His movements were jerky and abrupt. He turned to go, making it five steps before I pulled out my blowgun and aimed it.

“Stop!”

He paused.

I slowly stood, my body aching and battered, but nothing broken. I walked around him to stare at the man of my nightmares. He seemed smaller. In my dreams, he was a giant, snarling, untamable beast with red-flecked teeth and glistening red eyes.

But before me now? He was just a man. Not a nightmare. I could beat a man.

“Tonight, you die,” I said.

Was it my imagination, or did his shoulders dip at my words?

I blew on my dart, and he didn’t move. It struck his arm, just above his bracer, and he stumbled. Then he straightened. That dart had enough wolfsbane to kill a smaller werewolf. He should’ve been out.

A yell pulled from my aching chest as I attacked. I punched him in the stomach, and he grunted, exhaling as if pained. Something about that made me pause for a split second—a second he could’ve taken advantage of. I knew better than to give such a killer an opening, but he didn’t grab my throat as I thought he would. No, he stood there, watching me, even as I recovered enough to land a strike against his kidney and then his solar plexus. On those, he didn’t move.

It was as if he were frozen in time, even as I kicked his jaw with enough force to bring him to his knees.

I slapped him. “Fight back!” I screamed into his face. The rage was wearing off. The adrenaline was fading. And behind it was a question.

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