After leaving Lowe’s flat, Hel didn’t change pace as she moved back onto the corner of Devastation and Contemplation, keeping her steps even, her posture relaxed. The tail was good. Not exceptional. But good. They hadn’t done anything as stupid as staring directly at her or mirroring her movements, and they were keeping just the right amount of distance - blending into the morning foot traffic and sticking to the kind of casual, forgettable pace that made them difficult to pick out of the crowd.

  She might not have even clocked them if the habit of checking hadn’t been beaten into her decades before. She was certain there hadn’t been anyone there when Latham and she had made their way to Lowe’s apartment. So her sudden shadow meant someone had put professionals on Lowe.

  Which meant Lowe was exactly as deep in the shit as he suspected.

  Without breaking stride, she took Latham’s hand as they strolled past a street vendor hawking fried dough and squeezed his fingers three times. Their code. It had started as a joke—something she’d taught him after a run-in with a particularly nasty pickpocket gang a few weeks back. One squeeze: Something’s off. Two squeezes: Eyes on me. Three squeezes: We have a problem.

  Latham squeezed back. A question. We fucking?

  She assumed he meant We fucking shit up? but it was sometimes hard to tell with him.

  Hel stopped, turned him towards her, and pulled him into a kiss, slow and deep, tilting her head just enough to whisper against his lips.

  “No,” she murmured. “I got this. You head back to work. Can’t have keep the gods waiting”

  Latham didn’t argue. He kissed her back, all heat and promise, but there was no hesitation in the way he stepped away. No lingering glance. No unnecessary bravado. That was what she liked about him. No posturing, no puffed-up are you sure, babe? nonsense. No insistence on taking the lead when she’d indicated she had things in hand.

  Most of her past lovers had been, at least in theory, into the idea of a strong, independent woman. But in practice? The moment they saw exactly what that meant—when they saw her duck a blade, snap a man’s wrist, or pick a mark out of a crowd—they balked.

  Latham didn’t.

  He had self-confidence to spare, and apparently, not a single worry in the world about his lady handling her own business. He shot her a wink and peeled off toward the Celestial Temple, leaving her to it.

  Hel cracked her neck, rolled her shoulders, and took a sharp right into an alley and had just enough time to register the man moving before he was on her. Apparently, it wasn’t just following her that was on today’s dance card.

  There was no hesitation. No circling. No attempt at conversation or gauging her skill. Just a knife in his hand and a sharp, downward arc aimed straight at her ribs.

  Ballsy.

  Also thick as pig shit.

  Hel twisted aside, one foot sliding back as the blade skimmed past her jacket, and sent three Wind Blades flying before she even had chance to properly think about it.

  Too fast. Too many.

  The first caught him at the shoulder, the second at the thigh. The third sliced clean across his neck.

  Hel landed lightly, watching as the man’s momentum carried him forward another two steps before his body caught up to the fact that it had just been bisected. He collapsed to the cobbles in two pieces, a widening pool of blood seeping into the street.

  Yeah, that had been too much. She hadn’t meant to liquefy the poor bastard, but she still wasn’t quite used to the power surge that had come with passing Level 50. Sloppy. Interrogation 101. Dead mean didn’t tell you who sent them

  Then a slight chill ran up the back of her neck.

  Not from looking at the body.

  Not from all the blood.

  She wasn’t alone.

  Once more, Hel was reacting before her conscious mind got involved - ducking, pivoting, twisting - just in time for some sort of insanely OP energy bolt to graze the spot where her throat had been a second earlier. The sonic boom briefly disoriented her, so she barely got a look at the second attacker before she was there, pressing her advantage.

  She was blonde - tall and athletic - and fought with the kind of fluidity Hel had only ever seen in really high-level killers. Every attack was delivered without any wasted movement, and every block was instinctive as if she was running through an ingrained, well-grooved sequence.

  Hel grinned.

  This one was going to be fun.

  ***

  Arebella had been only half-listening to Karolen and Ortel as they walked back to the Tower of Law, her mind still turning over the tangled mess of legal, political, and practical impossibilities Lowe had announced back in his flat.

  Her heart went out to him. Not only was the Black Knight apparently back, but the whole situation stank. It was just like it was before. Too many conflicting interests. Too many people playing their own games with Lowe as a pawn. It was a wonder he wasn’t already buried in a shallow grave somewhere.

  She turned to ask Ortel a question, when something in the corner of her vision glowed gold. It was only a flicker. But that was all it needed to be.

  Arebella’s steps slowed, one of her Skills kicking in hard, honing in on an inconsistency in what she was looking at. A lie. And a big one. But where?

  Her head turned, eyes narrowing on the side alley they were just about to pass. There was a pile of discarded crates lying near the entrance. Next to them was a slumped figure in a cloak. Ordinary. Forgettable. But the glow coiled around the space, clinging to the edges of the crates and the fallen person like light catching the sheen of an oil slick.

  That wasn’t right.

  She stopped, grabbing hold of Karolen’s arm. “Wait!”

  “What?” Karolen said.

  Arebella didn’t answer. She took a half-step back, pulling the Auditor with her. Something about this felt extremely wrong. Her Skill more usually worked when it was people telling lies. But she supposed it could happen if things weren’t quite as they seemed . . .

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  And then the trap snapped shut. The crates exploded outward, shattering as figures burst from cover. Moving very fast. And they were armed.

  Fortunately, Karolen didn’t hesitate. Her Balanceblade formed in her hand, and her weight shifted so that she could cover the other two. For a moment, she thought it might have been an elaborate mugging - maybe an ill-advised attempt at XP gathering? - but once the first attacker she tried to bisect blinked through her attack and kicked her in the back, she re-evaluated. These weren’t street thugs, they were professionals.

  Arebella, for her part, dodged to the side as something whipped toward her—a binding hex, one of them had thrown out—her feet barely cleared the arc of it before it could lock around her limbs. Sigh. Another one of Lowe’s advisories that wanted to take her captive. This shit was getting old. However, with absolutely no offensive skills, her best weapon was going to be avoidance.

  Karolen, on the other hand, didn’t have that problem.

  There was a reason even someone as gnarly as Grackle Naroon hadn’t want to tangle with an Auditor.

  Her Forensic Dissection Skill activated the moment she engaged, the world sharpening as combat data flooded into her mind. Five assailants. Levels 30, which wasn’t ideal, but she’d faced much worst. They were all armed with standard-issue mono-filament daggers and whatever Class they had, which was hidden from her, had minimal defensive Skills. Better than hired goons, but not much.

  Her Balanceblade lashed out, the first slash disrupting the nearest attacker’s mana flow, crippling their movement speed. A quick side step, and she drove the sword into a weak spot, severing all sorts of tendons.

  One very down.

  Then she was already pivoting, redirecting a second attack. And a third. There were too many of them and they were coming too fast. More than she could reasonably handle alone. A fist collided with her ribs, the impact jarring even through her Auditor armor, she headbutted the attacker and drove a knee into his midsection. In the corner of her eye she saw Arebella duck another Skill-based binding attempt, falling out of reach of the woman reaching for her, but trying to track all of what was happening at once was too much.

  Karolen might be holding her own, but not for much longer.

  And where the fuck was Ortel?

  Arebella risked a quick look behind her.

  Despite everything going on around them, the Druid was stood utterly still, his one hand raised, fingers moving through intricate gestures. His other arm pressed against his chest, his breathing slow. Then, with sudden, effortless violence, the ground beneath them changed.

  A totem flared to life at Ortel’s feet—not one, but three—overlapping sigils of Earthen Strength, Natural Force, and something Karolen couldn’t identify.

  And the world around them reacted.

  The cobblestones shifted, turning to grasping roots, thick vines snapping upward, ensnaring the attackers before they could react. Those they caught were dragged down to the floor. At the same time, the air thickened, pressing in on those the roots missed, slowing their movements further and turning their every action into something more sluggish and strained.

  Then came the final touch.

  Lightning crashed down from clear skies. A single, shuddering bolt slammed directly into the last standing enemy, sending them convulsing to the ground in a heap of crackling, smoking flesh.

  Silence.

  For a long moment, no one moved.

  Karolen moved her Balanceblade back into her inventory and turned to Ortel, raising her eyebrows at the unexpected destruction.

  “What can I say, Auditor Mehan? I didn’t always want to be a lawyer.”

  ***

  Rook was surprised anyone was bothering to follow him.

  He'd felt the presence of those that peeled off to go after the others after they'd left Lowe's apartment. He'd wondered if he was supposed to warn them about that? He'd been finding that sort of decision much harder since he'd been . . . what, resurrected? He wasn't sure that was the right word. Prevented from passing? That might be more like it.

  In any event, he couldn't seem to work out whether he should tell everyone that there were little groups following them all home. He didn’t seem to know those sorts of things anymore.

  But then it was too late, and everyone had gone their separate ways.

  He didn't think it had ended up mattering, though. Not if the visions he had of a number of violent deaths were anything to go by. Good on the lawyer. He was surprised the tubby little Druid had it in him.

  Rook didn’t change pace as he stepped into the tree line, his boots crunching through piles of fallen leaves. Soar’s glow was already fading behind him, replaced by the cool hush of the deep woods, shadows pooling between skeletal branches.

  He didn’t need to turn around to know he was being followed.

  Once upon a time, he thought he would have been able to evaluate them. Know what he was dealing with. But he didn’t seem to have that skill any more. These guys probably were. But, then again, he’d been aware of them since he’d left Lowe’s flat. So how good could they really be?

  Mind you, a year of looking at the world through other eyes meant he had a pretty good sense of when something was hunting him.

  So what’s the play here, he wondered. Ambush? No. If they wanted him dead, they’d have just done him in the streets. They would, wouldn’t they? That’s certainly what he would have done. Following a target of unknown strength into the dark woods? That wasn’t a smart play. Or was it? He supposed they’d find out - one way or another.

  The trees thickened as Rook moved deeper, the path narrowing into a ribbon of twisting roots and whispering underbrush. He heard those behind him adjust, closing in just slightly now that he’d led them out of sight of the streets. Two at the back. One to his left, keeping parallel. A fourth somewhere ahead, waiting.

  Oh. He saw what they were doing. They thought they were boxing him in.

  Bless their souls.

  His footsteps slowed and he made out the sound of a branch snapping somewhere behind him. Rook thought it was probably time to cause an end to all this. He stopped walking entirely and loosened his shoulders slightly. “Are you lot going to introduce yourselves, or am I meant to guess?”

  No response.

  “Fine. We’ll do it your way.”

  He shrugged off his coat, he didn’t want that getting dirty, and let it drop to the ground in a pool of dark fabric.

  Then he moved. Clearly faster than any of them could have possibly expected. One moment, he was standing, and the next, he had crossed the distance between himself and the nearest man, his fingers slamming into soft flesh as he drove a hand into the bastard’s gut and out the back.

  A choked gasp, and Rook pulled his arm back, letting the body sink to the floor beneath him.

  The second one came at him immediately, faster reflexes than the first. Good. It would almost be insulting if they weren’t. Knife. Reverse grip. Close-quarters discipline. Classy.

  Rook caught the wrist before the blade could sink in, turning the momentum against him, spinning him sideways and slamming a knee into his chest. The man grunted but didn’t go down, twisting, moving to disengage. Rook simply let him go and crushed his windpipe with the heel of his palm instead.

  Rook’s head snapped towards the third figure. A woman with a crossbow. A good one. Military grade. Already aimed.

  He moved before the trigger was pulled, twisting with unnatural speed, the bolt whipping past his shoulder as he closed the gap in the time it took to exhale. The woman wasn’t fast enough to reload.

  Rook was.

  His fingers caught her by the throat, lifting her off the ground, holding her there just long enough to feel her struggle. Just long enough to let the realisation set in. And then he squeezed.

  Rook turned to the last man.

  The one who had been waiting. The leader. Unlike the others, he hadn’t moved.

  He was watching. Assessing.

  Smart.

  Rook wiped the blood from his knuckles and took a slow step forward.

  The leader didn’t move. He just tilted his head slightly as if reconsidering something. Yeah, that was the wrong time for that.

  Rook smiled, wide and wolfish. “You thought you had me. That’s adorable.” The leader’s shoulders tensed. Rook took another step. “You thought you were hunting me.” Another step. “But I don’t think you understand.”

  And then, suddenly, Rook’s eyes were different. Something dark shifted behind them, something old, something not entirely sane. His voice lowered, something almost gentle in it now. “I’ve already had experience of being hunted.” The leader took an instinctive step back as Rook’s grin widened even further. “And I really didn’t care for it.”