Chapter 15 Izan
FIFTEEN
IZAN
The first cultist dies before he finishes reaching for his weapon.
My claws tear through his throat in a spray of arterial red, and I’m already moving to the next target. The ritual site is a converted forge in the lower districts, reeking of blood magic and old iron.
We strike a site that Alerie says has intel that we need. A site that has been activated recently and needs to be cleaned.
Three more cultists. Two by the altar, still chanting over their interrupted ritual. One scrambles for the back exit, knocking over shelves of component materials in his haste.
I don’t let any of them reach it.
The chanting ones die mid-syllable, dragonfire consuming their borrowed authority before they can complete whatever working they’d started. The runner makes it six steps before my claws find the soft tissue between his shoulder blades.
Power builds in my core, and I release it in controlled bursts that strip away their stolen strength. The blood-oath enhancements shatter. The cultists stumble, suddenly human, suddenly vulnerable.
I kill them with efficiency born of centuries of practice.
When it’s done, I stand in the center of the forge, cataloging the evidence. The channels in the floor don’t radiate outward toward the surrounding district—they converge inward, toward a focal point that should contain someone.
Her.
My hands clench before I consciously register the implication.
They were building containment. For a witch. For a specific witch.
The rage that surges through me isn’t strategic.
It’s primal. Volcanic. I tear the altar apart with my bare hands, obsidian claws rending enchanted stone until nothing remains but rubble and ash.
The violence doesn’t satisfy the fury scorching through my ribs.
Nothing will satisfy it except finding every person who participated in this cell and reducing them to cinders.
She’s safe, I remind myself. In the stronghold. Behind wards. Surrounded by guards.
The logic does nothing to calm the dragon screaming beneath my skin.
“Enforcer.” Corveth emerges from the shadows near the entrance, expression carefully neutral. Blood spatters his armor—not his own—and ash grays his dark hair. “The perimeter is secure. No witnesses.”
I wipe blood from my claws against a dead cultist’s robes. “Begin the extraction protocols. I want everything they have—documents, samples, any intelligence we can recover.”
“And the bodies?”
“Burn them. Leave enough to send a message.”
One cultist survives the sweep—a woman in gray robes, half-pinned under fallen shelving. I pull her upright.
“The focal point in the floor. The converging channels.” The questions scrape out rough and hot. “Who ordered it built?”
She stares at me with terror-wide eyes. The dragon’s authority compels truth, whether she wants to offer it or not.
“High Ritualist Threx.” The name tears out of her like a confession. “He sent the specifications himself. Came to our cell personally to oversee the foundation work. Preparing for a priority acquisition, he told us. A witch with Vireth blood.”
Priority acquisition.
They’re hunting her. Specifically. Deliberately. The High Ritualist himself is directing the effort.
“How many sites?”
“I only know about our cell—I swear—”
I release her. She collapses against the wall, clutching her bruised throat. Corveth’s team will extract whatever additional intelligence she possesses. I need air. Need distance. Need to put space between myself and the knowledge that someone is actively building cages for Alerie.