Page 4 of Fate Promised

“You fool,” a man’s voice hissed. “You requested a meeting and then walked down from the east entrance? Anyone could have seen you.”

“I know what I’m doing,” answered another man, his voice nasal.

The tunnel Juri and Kyril followed joined with two others, forming a larger junction like a small room, which spilled out down a slight slope to the beach exit of the sewer. This was how the waste and runoff had been removed in older days. After the magicwielders took over the city, they managed every element with magic instead. As the vulk drew closer, they crouched, and Juri eased forward to see around the bend into the open space.

Shadows flickered over two men in black cloaks. Past them, the exit showed a slash of the beach, silvery in the moonlight. One man had the hood of his cloak pulled up over his face, keeping it hidden, but along his robe on the left side of his chest was a vivid red handprint, as if someone had clutched at the man’s heart. It shone slick and shiny—perhaps it was attached by magic rather than embroidered.

The other wore his hood pushed back, and his cloak had no embellishments. He stood with one shoulder an inch or two higher than the other, making him appear to lean on a stick, but he held none; there was only a pack at the floor at his feet, the top flap open. A slivery scar slashed downward from his brow, bisecting one eye, before disappearing into the man’s full beard. A scar left from powerful magic.

Hoyt. The magicwielder he’d tracked over the past month.

Calling him a magicwielder was a stretch. Hoyt was a necromancer. Outcasts with little magic, necromancers clung to each other, setting up nests in hidden places like the sewers. The dregs of magical society.

This was the first time he’d actually laid eyes on Hoyt. All he knew about Hoyt’s appearance was he had a thin, goat-like beard centered on his chin, and he’d almost lost his life in a magic attack. However, now his beard filled his entire lower face. Perhaps to hide the recent scar that proved the man standing in the sewer was the one they sought. It wasn’t working.

“What are we waiting for?” Kyril whispered, speaking in Vulk. Kyril always spoke Vulk unless forced to use the common tongue. “It’s him. Let’s tear his head off and get out of here.”

Juri’s hackles rose. Something wasn’t quite … right. Over the past month, he’d tracked Hoyt from the kingdom of Rohant, in central Ulterra, through the Divoky Forest, then narrowed in on him here, in Coromesto, the largest city in Ulterra, perched like a jewel along the coast of Trulo kingdom. He didn’t care much for cities, and Coromesto was the worst. It reminded him of a grand dame, a matriarch with an iron fist, sitting on a throne with all her jewels on display, but underneath she was cold. Cruel.

Jewels from a distance, anyway. The city sparkled. Since it was the seat of the magicwielders, their magic whisked along roads and through houses, supplying never-ending light on the lamp posts and horseless carriages driving along white, perfectly paved roads. However, beyond the superficial glitz, it was a divided city with humans on one side and magicwielders on the other, all circling around Herskala Academy, the magic school.

“Why did he stop here? Why now?” Juri whispered. The necromancer had evaded him for a month. Not an easy feat since Juri was a tracker—the only vulk in the pack with extra heightened senses. Someone who’d avoided a vulk for the past month would know better than to enter a tunnel with limited ways to get away.

He wasn’t worried about magic—magic bounced off all vulk—but something still seemed off.

The necromancer shouldn’t have known the vulk chased him, so he shouldn’t have worked his way through Ulterra in hiding. After attacking their Alpha a year ago, the vulk thought the necromancer dead until a couple weeks ago. Yet Hoyt acted like one on the run.

Except for tonight. He lingered in the sewers tonight, and now he’d stopped for a chat?

“Who cares?” Kyril muttered. “Winter’s coming, and I don’t feel like trudging in snow to get back to the pack. Let’s take care of this and go.”

“Hans wants Hoyt alive to question him. We’ll be slow getting back regardless because we’ll be dragging the necromancer with us.” Their Alpha, Hans, had questions about the attack on Hans that involved Hoyt last year. Hans would have joined them to track Hoyt himself if his mate Briony hadn’t recently given birth to twins.

Kyril cursed. Even though they both spoke so quietly it wasn’t even a whisper, somehow Kyril’s salty language made it seem like he raged loudly. Juri bit back a smile.

Kyril should have known Hans would take care of Hoyt himself. When Hoyt attacked Hans and kidnapped his mate Briony for a spell he was casting, the necromancer’s days were numbered.

The hooded man sneered. “You have five minutes of my time before I leave.” The hood twitched as if the man tilted his head. “How did you get that scar? I thought Morana’s followers were invincible? Dabbling with magic far beyond anything the rest of us could imagine.” His laughter was cold and brittle. “Word got round you brought her back from the underworld.” He waved his hand. “Where is she? Why hasn’t she taken over Ulterra and granted you unlimited power?”

Hoyt steepled his fingers. “You know, she told me you asked to join our number, but she refused you.”

The other man drew back. “Lies. The Dark Lady always lied.”

“Perhaps. She had her secrets.” The two men lapsed into silence, Hoyt glaring. Finally, Hoyt shifted. “I no longer follow the Dark Lady.”

Next to Juri, Kyril snorted. “He left out the part where she left him for dead and gave him that nice scar.” Morana was an evil sorcerer the vulk defeated in battle last year. When Hoyt helped raise her from the underworld, she’d blasted him across a cave, a blow that should have killed him.

The hooded man crossed his arms, and a ring caught the light, winking on the middle finger of his right hand. Emblazoned with family crests, magicwielders used large, gold signet rings to stamp the wax on their letters. The man was too far away for Juri to make out the ring’s design. “You said you had magic information to share. You have two minutes left.”

Hoyt reached down into his knapsack and withdrew a large pewter bowl. He placed its base on the sewer floor and retrieved a small flask filled with liquid. He poured it into the bowl.

The hooded man scoffed. “A scrying bowl? Really? You think to impress me with this?”

Hoyt ignored him. He waved his hand, and a plume of green smoke drifted from the bowl’s surface. The water swirled, and an image appeared of a room with a wide window revealing desolate mountains and windswept, reddish hills. Juri squinted, studying it. He’d traveled most of Ulterra, and this wasn’t familiar, but from his vantage point, it was tough to make out the details.

“Touch it.”

The hooded man reached for the bowl, the ring glistening in the lantern light. His fingers dipped into the water.

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