Chapter 13
THIRTEEN
Riven
Rain smeared across the windscreen, distorting the neon signs into bleeding streaks of colour as we left the Old Quarter. Selene drove too fast, the tyres hissing on the wet road, forcing me into a silence I didn’t care to break.
The car’s interior was stifling, a metal box saturated with the scent of damp wool and the coppery taste of her magic.
It refused to settle, rolling off her in agitated movements that thickened the air, mirroring the drop in pressure before a thunderstorm.
Every spike in her power triggered an answering pain in the scar on my chest—a warning that the control I had perfected for decades was finally beginning to fracture.
“What?” she snapped, shifting her grip on the wheel.
“Nothing.”
I studied her profile in the strobing streetlights.
Her copper hair was a chaotic spill against the headrest, a visual echo of the static bleeding off her skin.
She was a striking woman, tall, with curves that seemed to crowd the confined space of the car, yet the exhaustion etched into her features made her look brittle.
The tension in the car was suffocating. I watched the rigid set of her chin, the white-knuckle grip on the leather. She was eroding.
A few days ago, a surge had torn through the Old Quarter—a detonation of power strong enough to violently rattle my senses. I knew then the source was significant. Sitting beside her now, suffocating in the static of her stress, the truth locked into place: it was her.
“Your magic is loud today,” I said, keeping my voice low to cut through the drumming rain on the roof.
Her head snapped towards me, a fleeting glare. “You said that already.”
“You’re shaking.”
Her gaze dropped to her hands, a hint of surprise crossing her face as she registered the tremor vibrating through her fingers. Anger flashed in her eyes—not at me, but inward.
“Just tired,” she muttered, dismissing the weakness.
“That isn’t fatigue.”
She glared. “I will make you walk.”
“I’m aware.” I turned my attention to the shadowed streets outside, where garish neon bled into the grime. “But throwing me out of the car won’t stop your hands from shaking. You are compromised.”
She fell silent, her grip on the wheel tightening until the leather creaked. The tremor in her hands worsened, mirroring the restless energy of her magic. Her control was slipping, weighed down by guilt and grief.
“You’re thinking about the attack,” I said, observing the way the passing streetlights carved shadows across her face. “About what happened to your partner.”
She flinched. It was subtle—a tightening of the shoulders—but the shift in her emotional field was violent. Sudden sorrow, a spike of guilt, and beneath it all, a fierce, simmering anger. She intended to hunt down whoever created the augmented creature that nearly killed Lennox.
Our goals aligned unexpectedly. I chose not to reveal my own motivations, my own suspicions that predated hers. She would have seen it as a betrayal. Not yet.
The car lurched as she took a sharp turn, tyres squealing softly on the wet asphalt.
We plunged deeper into the Lows. The streets narrowed, buildings pressing in to blot out the sky, cloaked in shadows that absorbed what little light escaped from grimy windows.
The air grew heavy, saturated with damp earth and the hungry current of stale magic.
She forced the car into a tight space between two derelict buildings. The engine died, leaving only the relentless patter of rain against the roof.
She turned, eyes dark in the gloom. “Stay out of my way.”
“No.” My voice was quiet. “I’ll be where I’m needed.”
She hesitated, conflict warring with exhaustion in her expression. Then she pushed the door open, stepping out into the rain. The splash of her boots was loud in the dead air. As she moved away, the ache in my scar flared—a sudden, intense throb that demanded I follow.
She moved quickly, knowing exactly which gaps in the crowd would open for her. I followed a few paces behind, letting her take the lead through the twisting alleys.
She led us towards the coordinates Hale had provided for the cargo theft.
The deeper we went, the more the Lows showed their true face—sputtering neon, dripping tarps, faces half-hidden in hoods.
Stall owners tracked her with a mix of wariness and irritation; they recognised the walk of a copper, even out of uniform.
Marcus’s assignment was a thin veil, a convenient fiction about ‘unregistered components,’ but she played the part well enough, scanning the crates and asking the right questions.
Yet I saw the tension in her stride. She wasn’t really looking for contraband.
She searched with the focus of a predator.
We stopped at a stall where a ramshackle collection of mismatched items spilled onto a grimy cloth. The vendor, a scrawny Umbrakynn with nervous eyes, shifted weight from foot to foot, uncomfortable under her scrutiny.
“We’re looking for a crate of stolen tech,” Selene said, flashing her badge. “Logistics markings. Seen anything?”
The vendor shook his head, mumbling a denial, but Selene had already stopped listening. Her attention had snagged on something else.
The items on display were a catalogue of desperation: vials of diluted elemental residue glowing with weak light, illegal summoning wards etched into bent scrap metal, and a row of small, gleaming cylinders.
Lycan Surge.
A black-market booster. Unstable, dangerous. It was a crude, forced amplification rather than true augmentation of the Varkyn’s natural gift. It pushed their bodies beyond natural limits, often with irreversible consequences.
Selene picked one up. Her fingers went still. Her internal tempo faltered, skipping a beat. For an instant, the composure around her eyes cracked.
She swallowed, the sound audible in the sudden quiet. The cylinder clinked against the concrete stall as she set it down.
“That substance isn’t safe,” I observed.
“I know. But it’s old news.” She pushed the memory aside and leaned over the table, pinning the man with a hard stare. The pretence of the cargo theft vanished completely. “I’m hearing rumours of a new supplier. Someone selling a compound that transplants magic rather than boosting it.”
The vendor blinked. “Transplants? Like… mimicry?”
“Transfer,” Selene corrected, her voice low and dangerous. “I’m looking for tools that allow a user to channel power they weren’t born with. A theft, not a surge.”
The vendor shook his head rapidly, backing away. “Haven’t seen that. That’s… that sounds suicidal.”
“If you see it, you call me.” She slammed a card onto the table.
We moved on, questioning two more vendors. Her questions were surgical. She drilled down into specifics: containment failures, non-magicals showing signs of elemental burnout, and new suppliers operating outside the usual syndicates. Her tone took on an edge, a tremor of controlled impatience.
“You take the front stalls,” she said abruptly, her voice clipped. “I’ll check the back paths.”
Ignoring me completely, she turned and strode towards a narrow, dark alley—a black slash between two half-collapsed buildings.
She intended to lose me. I considered letting her go, allowing her to pursue this phantom alone. But the scar across my ribs—a souvenir from a life I’d left behind—gave a distinct, warning throb. It had laid dormant for decades; now, around her, it woke up.
I allowed her a lead, then melted into the deepening shadows to pursue. The shadow-walk came easily, a familiar cloak that rendered me invisible to anyone who wasn’t explicitly looking for a ghost.
She moved with deceptive fluidity, slipping between hidden entrances and bypassing main thoroughfares.
Vendors watched her, whispering, but she maintained a relentless pace.
Finally, she halted at a concealed doorway half-covered by a sagging neon sign marking The Pit, its lurid green light painting her in stark relief.
She paused for a heartbeat, then slipped inside.
I followed.
Stairs descended into the earth. The atmosphere curdled, growing warmer, heavier. A muffled roar grew louder—a primal sound of bloodlust. Music thumped, a driving beat accompanied by shouting and the metallic clang of a cage.
The smell hit me: too many bodies. Human, Varkyn, Umbrakynn—the pungent mix of sweat, magic, and fresh blood.
An underground fight ring. She had intended to come here all along.
I stayed close to the wall, mapping the exits as my vision adjusted. Across the packed room, Selene slipped past a pair of bruisers and vanished into a guarded booth at the rear. The mood around the pit was volatile. Hungry.
Crude betting tables occupied the outer ring, coins passing quickly between hands. But the strongest pull came from the pit itself.
A Varkyn stood on the verge of a shift, muscles bulging, claws already bared. He should have dominated the fight by sheer mass. His opponent was an Umbrakynn—gaunt and bleeding heavily. He moved with a broken rhythm, limbs snapping too fast, then too slow. His irises were blown wide, unfocused.
He shouldn’t have been standing. Yet he was winning.
His fist connected with the Varkyn’s chest, and the shockwave rippled through the crowd. The Varkyn stumbled, hacking blood.
A wrongness tightened in the air—a magic signature that didn’t belong to either species. Forced. Inserted. Knotted beneath the skin.
The Umbrakynn lunged again. As he moved, his tangled hair flopped to one side, revealing the skin at the side of his neck.
A crude, uneven triangle throbbed there, glowing dimly beneath the flesh—a sigil.