For Vyranthas to be reborn, it requires something as…twisted as it is. A product of the hell it breeds. Not to mention someone who truly cares.

  As soon as Veldar was out of sight of his team, he waited, dwelling in the shadows of a bakery just outside of the Suncrest Quarter. After a minute, he doubled back to tail Veera.

  To avoid the crowds he decided to scale a nearby shop. From there, Veera’s bulk was easy to track. He stayed nearly parallel to her, finding her slow pace distasteful. His frown was hidden in the shadows of his hood as she stopped.

  Right. She was just getting food and ale.

  Veldar moved on—her process wasn’t worth watching, and she was perhaps the most dependable of his team. Which wasn’t saying much.

  He quickly made his way across the roofs of shops, then warehouses. The large wall enclosing the Warrens was hardly an obstacle. Massive warehouses sat too close to certain sections, allowing him to vault through the air, catch the top of the wall, and stand up on the foot wide perch.

  From there, he leapt. He sailed through the air with unnatural grace, covering more distance than any normal man could. He landed on the roof of yet another warehouse, skidding against the sloped gray tiles.

  It only took a minute to catch up to Sel, who scurried through the dismal Warrens like a rat. He trailed her through a web of alleys and tenements, then across rooftops—though he had to fall back so he wouldn’t alert her Starborn.

  He watched her settle into a ruined building. After some guards interacted with the Crow’s thugs below, she grew visibly distracted. Eventually she climbed down to the street and set off again in a nonsensical pattern. He decided to let her go—he had his own work to do.

  A quick glance at the several corvid masked thugs stationed around the crossroads told him their commander wasn’t among them. He would be last on his list, then.

  “You haven’t even asked anything yet!” Rene howled, struggling against Veldar’s grip. He was Desil’s cousin, and a popular enforcer around the Lanes.

  Veldar didn’t respond. He had Rene held against the ground, legs twisted around him, letting him use them for leverage as he pulled on his left arm. The man was muscled and an experienced fighter, but that didn’t matter against Veldar.

  He gently gripped Rene’s index finger, bending it slowly. He tuned out the man’s pleas, as did the rest of the Lanes outside of this dirty alley. He bent it a bit further, then snapped it with a jerk.

  Soundless screaming and struggling came from Rene.

  He started on the middle finger. Moments later it too gave a loud crack as he broke it in a way that maximized the pain. Only now did he pause, Rene’s thumb gripped tight.

  “I know you’ve been smuggling things for the Darkin. Tell me where their base in the Ash Lanes are,” Veldar intoned, no hint of emotion in his voice.

  “I swear on my ma’s grave, or, or Aureon! I don’t—”

  He broke Rene’s thumb, momentarily tuning out his shrill screams. Once the struggling stopped, he gripped his arm, twisting to the point just before breaking the wrist.

  “Their base, movements—anything would save your life right now. Think hard.”

  “No! Fuck the stars man, I…they just meet me in the older parts of the tunnels under the district! Connected to the sewers!” Rene cried out.

  Veldar broke his wrist, then gave him a full minute to simmer down. Once the screams subsided, he said, “Not quite what I was looking for. Is that all you can provide?”

  “Yes! Yes I don’t know anything else!” Rene said, devolving into a whimpering mess.

  He considered the man’s words. Best not to waste too much time with this human debris.

  A slim dagger appeared in Veldar’s right hand. Without a word he slammed it cleanly into the back of Rene’s skull.

  He picked himself up, taking a moment to clean the ash and dirt clinging to his cloak. Veldar barely glanced at the twitching corpse as he retrieved his dagger, then moved off into the night.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  After a quick, deadly set of conversations with a handful of thugs, thieves, spies posing as beggars and other lowlifes, he finally came across the person he’d been searching for. Most of his other talks hadn’t resulted in much—besides some brief amusement at two men professing their devotion to The Dark Star before meeting their end.

  A lieutenant of The Murder hovered in the alley below Veldar, talking quietly with one of his men. He couldn’t make out their words from his perch, but it was clear the taller man on the left was the leader here. Both wore the same exact gear: stiff black long coats buttoned up the middle with bone shards, black trousers of the same material, shiny black boots, steel corvid skull masks, and claws on their hands with three long, hooked blades. Several minutes passed before the underling hurried off.

  Veldar dropped down, hurtling toward the lieutenant feet first. The four stories of the tenement he’d been on blurred by, wind whistling in his ears and blowing his cloak out behind him.

  The enforcer cocked his head, twisted, and looked up. He managed to raise an arm to block Veldar’s powerful kick—the man didn’t even flinch. Streams of deep black smoke started trailing from the shadowed depths of the corvid skull covering his face.

  Veldar kicked off the arm, landing with a flutter of his cloak almost ten feet away. The scarred, aged assassin shrugged back his cloak, revealing his hard, plain face and short gray hair, chiseled arms, a tall and muscled physique, dark clothes and fine leather armor.

  The lieutenant’s head stayed tilted as he stared at the assassin. He probably knew of Veldar to some extent.

  The enforcer moved first, bounding forward with unnatural speed. Veldar was forced to jump back and draw both daggers as the man swiped at him with hooked steel claws. This caught him off guard, but only slightly. His thoughts were detached from the furious exchange of strikes and parries.

  He’d expected the alchemical enhancements, of course. The Crow kept her men addicted to Corvidin, a substance that increased one’s speed, reflexes and sensations—pain included. Veldar hadn’t expected his foe to be so skilled though, and they were locked in a brief stalemate. But men like this relied too heavily on their alchemical mixtures, instead of perfecting their natural skill.

  The alley was a haze of kicked up ash and smog, the only light coming from the sparks their weapons produced. The lieutenant was a flurry of steel claws, the bottom half of his long coat whipping about him. Veldar didn’t even break a sweat, simply meeting each blow while staring him down, face like a carved stone mask.

  There.

  His left dagger finally found an opening, and he drove it into the man’s left arm, twisting it. The arm fell limp and useless as he still tried to strike Veldar with his other hand.

  He shifted, caught the arm, then brought a dagger hilt down hard, breaking it at the elbow with a crunch.

  The screams echoing out from the corvid skull went ignored as his foe stumbled back a few steps. Black smoke poured from the mask now, and started billowing out when Veldar kicked the man’s left leg at just the right angle, sending him crashing down.

  Veldar calmly moved to straddle the panicked man. He sheathed his dagger, then grabbed the other one still in the man’s arm. He twisted once before tearing it free. The struggling ceased after a dozen moments.

  “I know that your master, the Crow, has dealings with the Darkin. Tell me what you know, and where their base in this district is,” Veldar said, grasping the corvid skull’s beak with his free hand.

  “Go take a dive off the spires, bastard,” the thug said hoarsely, through gritted teeth and groans of pain.

  Veldar pulled at the mask—really almost a helmet. The leather straps holding it in place strained. The man beneath him stilled.

  “I can’t! The Crow will—”

  With a grunt of effort, he ripped the mask off. Tubing leading to an odd mechanism grafted onto the man’s nose snapped free. He instantly started to writhe below him, brown eyes wide in terror.

  “Try once more,” Veldar said flatly, holding the mask above the man. Smoke still streamed from it, dissipating into the air.

  “The Shattered Circle! Last block of the Lanes! They’re there, I swear just give me my mask!” His scarred, flat face was crazed, desperate.

  Veldar let the moments pass by, watching him squirm. The man started trembling and hacking up something foul after a minute passed. The withdrawal of the drug was hitting the man in full force.

  Since the man offered nothing else, Veldar sheathed his dagger, then dismantled the mask as best he could, ripping out internal mechanisms, wires, tubes and the reservoir of black sludge. He threw the trash aside.

  The man lay limp, gaze listless. He knew what came next. What happened to addicts of this particular drug once they were deprived of it was truly unpleasant to behold. He’d drown in his own blood within minutes.

  It was time to gather his team.

  It only took an hour to hunt down Ryn and Veera—Sel was a little trickier. But by two in the morning, he had them gathered on top of a collapsing stone and wood tenement. This area held many such buildings, remnants of decades old housing, yet to be rebuilt after the rather recent fire, and the riots brought forth during the plague. The debrief was short and sweet, affirming what Veldar found on his own.

  Their perch was directly outside of the so-called Shattered Circle, just high enough to see over most of the collapsed buildings and rubble. Inside the rough circle of destruction sat three sizable tenements of stone, though two were in poor shape. The five story tall tenement in the center was dark, its broken windows appearing like jagged, gaping maws.

  “We’re ahead of schedule. Judging from everything we’ve found, that’s the base,” Veldar said, gesturing at the ruined circle of tenements.

  “Still…doesn’t look like much,” Sel muttered.

  “That’s what my last partner said, don’t remind me,” Ryn said flatly, messing with his crossbow. Sel stifled an annoying laugh and jabbed the fool.

  “Sel, Veera. Split up and keep watch. Take note of any Darkin activity. Ryn will go inform the High Matron, while I fetch Lightward Cassian and his men. Expect us back within two hours.” Veldar gave them an icy look before nodding to Ryn. In moments the two bounded away across the rooftops.

  Veldar felt a rare pulse of uneasiness, but pushed it down.