Page 5 of Lana Pecherczyk
Blake squinted to focus and gasped, hope stirring in her soul.
People. Lots of them. Not just people, but livestock, fresh produce, trinkets, furniture, and homewares. It was exactly the kind of place she loved hunting in for hidden gems. Surely, someone here would have a charger she could borrow.
Stumbling closer, a cold dread crept up her spine as details sharpened in her vision. The marketplace—familiar in concept yet utterly alien in execution—seemed wrong in ways her mind struggled to compute. The trapped orbs hummed and pulsed like living things.
“This isn’t Perth,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “This isn’t anywhere.”
Chapter
Two
The late afternoon sun baked entrails into River’s leathers and skin as he walked home through the Order campus. Two female mages approached on the same path. As they neared, they pinched their noses and scrunched up their faces. He resisted hugging them to smear his crusty mess over their pristine blue robes. Instead, he gave a jaunty wave, gesturing emphatically so the stink wafted.
“Monster guts smell good, don’t they?”
They scurried away, and he grinned.
The taint-sprung monster he’d fought in Rubrum City left him covered with an unusually pungent type of blood and viscera that clung to his nostrils and itched his skin. The four-eyed rooster had phased into shadow, leaving only whispers of movement before it struck. Needless to say, it had been a handful to dispatch.
Guardians were under strict orders to debrief the preceptors of any new monsters immediately after returning from a mission. If he had to remain in festering clothes, then it was only fair that everyone else suffered too.
He ached. He stank. He was over it.
All he wanted was a scalding hot bath, enough liquor to drown his thoughts, and oblivion for a few blessed hours.
But when he finally reached the Cadre of Twelve’s private training lawn, his steps slowed to a deliberate crawl. Clarke waited on the porch steps, her four-year-old twins clutching her hips like red-haired parasites. More troubling, an ornate pouch swung from her fingers. He searched for escape routes. None.
“River!”
Shit.
“Whatever it is,” he shouted, “the answer’s no.”
He put his head down and charged forward.
Don’t make eye contact.
“River,” she pleaded, her voice softening in a way that burrowed under his skin.
As Prime of the Order of the Well, Clarke now wielded the power to shatter his plans, regardless of how he felt.
He stopped at the base of the steps with a deep sigh. “Fine. Tell Preceptor Barrow I’llconsiderchanging the new monster’s name from Cockadoom. Happy?”
“Um. Sure. Girls,” she said to her children, “let Mommy give Uncle River the pouch.”
“No!” shouted one—maybe Hazel? Or was she Holly?—while the other sucked louder on her thumb. The wet sound grated against his nerves.
“Girls,” Clarke repeated. “I really need to give this to Uncle River.”
He arched his brows. “So this isn’t about the Cockadoom?”
“I have no idea what that is.” Clarke shot him an apologetic look when her twins hindered her again. “They’re too big to be carried, but they won’t let go.”
“Just kick them off.” He sidestepped, but the non-thumb-sucker—definitely Hazel—blew a raspberry. He barked a laughand nearly returned the gesture before she scrambled back up to hip level.
“These arrived today for you and Ash.” Clarke finally extracted two glass coins from the pouch.
Twinkling reflections caught his gaze, sparking a war between dopamine and fury. The coins were Murder’s Call, invitations to the Great Murder, a bi-annual crow-shifter gathering where scores were settled, alliances forged, and secrets traded like currency, where his inability to fly would be impossible to hide. Where they might find the Collector and trade for the cryptex.
