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THE FINAL DUEL TO DECIDE who the next Magic Guild Master would be was held a week before Halloween. A large crowd gathered at the City Square to watch the spectacle of Onvier fighting a fellow elf. Eden’s carriage carried her past the throng, but she wasn’t tempted to stop and watch. A letter had arrived to order her to another job in the Shifter District and it was faster to cut through the square.
Eden saw the Immortal Triumvirate standing on their podium that a skeleton work crew had painstakingly put together. Lord Dallinar could have easily erected it with magic, or maybe he couldn’t anymore, since he spent most of his free time drinking himself into an oblivion. Even the three Assassin Guildmembers had heard about the humiliating spell that had backfired on him. The succubus snickered at the thought of her lord and master being stricken with an erection that had lasted for two full weeks. The fairy had become a laughingstock and he wasn’t taking it well.
A bridge took the carriage to the Shifter District to one of the more affluent areas. Eden passed a few stone hounds that had been formed out of rubble of decrepit houses during her journey. The prank Crowmon was planning hadn’t happened yet. He was apparently biding his time before he would strike.
Her target this time was from a wealthy family. He’d done something to annoy one of their leaders and had doomed himself in the process. Since the mark was a shapeshifter, the succubus assumed Lord Graham had issued the execution order. As always, she’d given the skeleton an address a couple of blocks away from her real destination. She got out to walk the rest of the way when the vehicle pulled over. It wasn’t raining for once, so she hadn’t brought an umbrella with her. The niggling sensation in the back of her head increased slightly in strength as she closed in on her prey.
A shifter dressed in new looking jeans and a t-shirt eyed her in appreciation as he hurried past. He clearly wasn’t one of the thousands of shifters who worked in the factories. Eden ignored him, knowing how attractive she looked in the dark green dress and matching stilettos. As always, she wore her hair up in an elaborate style that showed off her slender neck. She wore emerald and diamond earrings and had a dark green purse slung over her shoulder. A sheathed dagger lay inside, just in case she needed a weapon. The blade was silver, which was deadly to werebeasts.
When she reached the three-story mansion where her mark lived, she circled around the block and approached it from the back. The niggling spell had become an insistent prodding sensation. There were no streetlights to illuminate the area, but shapeshifters could see in the dark. Eden made sure no eyes were watching her from the surrounding homes, then sprinted to the stone wall and vaulted over it. She was a mere blur of movement and made little sound when she landed on the thick grass. It was knee high on her and it hadn’t been cut in months.
Grass swished against her legs as she hurried over to the house. Several people were inside, but she would easily be able to pick which one was her target. Sorcha and Malachi also never had trouble identifying who their victims were. The spells always seeped into their brains once they read their orders to kill.
Her target was on the third floor in a room near the front of the mansion. He was talking to someone in a low voice. Eden crossed the overgrown yard in another flash of movement until she was standing next to the big stone building. Houses didn’t usually have fire escapes, so she was going to have to find another way up. A drainpipe clung to the wall over to the right and she moved over to it. It didn’t rattle when she shook it, so it seemed secure enough.
Eden slipped her shoes off and tucked them into her purse. She grabbed hold of the drainpipe and began to climb. If it had been raining, her task would have been a lot harder. Her grip didn’t slip and she climbed up to the third floor, then stepped onto a windowsill of a bedroom.
Her target had left the room at the front of the house and was heading towards her. The assassin’s succubus magic rose and slithered through the cracks in the window. It sought out her mark and enveloped him. “I need to get something,” he said in a slightly dazed tone to his companion. “I’ll be down in a minute.”
“Our guests will be here soon,” a female replied, then her footsteps continued while the target’s headed unerringly for the succubus.
Eden clung to the drainpipe with one hand and held onto the window frame with the other. The werewolf she’d been ordered to execute strode into the room, then shut the door behind him. He crossed to the window, opened it, then helped her inside. Her magic seeped into him, rendering him utterly helpless. She made him kneel, then pressed her mouth to his and siphoned his life force from his body. As always, her victim was turned into an almost weightless shell within a few short minutes. This time, she didn’t leave a spark of life behind. The spell died along with the shifter and the insistent prodding in her head vanished.
With her task done, the assassin put her shoes on, put the husk over her shoulder and climbed back out onto the windowsill. She slid the window down, then dropped three stories to the ground below. Landing lightly on her feet, she sprinted over to the wall and vaulted over it with one hand. She kept running until she was several blocks away in an uninhabited area.
The buildings in this suburb were mostly ten-stories tall. They were intended to house factory workers and other drones. They’d been abandoned after the undead apocalypse when so many shifters had been slaughtered. Eventually, they would become populated again, but for now, they were an ideal place for the succubus to carry out her job.
Eden chose a building and entered an empty room on the first floor. She dumped the husk on the bare stone floor and held out her hands. Weak flames appeared on her palms as she cast the one and only spell she was allowed to use. Lord Dallinar had figured fire would be the best way to dispose of the evidence, but she could only use the spell while she was on a mission.
The wispy, fragile remains caught alight and burned to ash in seconds, but the clothes took longer to burn. When the items had all been reduced to ash, the succubus headed for the exit. A sense of intense heat approached her and she instinctively went into a crouch when she reached the door. She peered out and caught the flicker of bright orange and red flames as one of the fire elementals zoomed along the street. “Great,” she muttered. “How the hell do those things keep getting out of their confinement?”
Shouts of alarm sounded as the fire elemental set fire to a building. There was nothing Eden could do to put the fire out, so she hurried away from the abandoned area. More shouts and screams came from elsewhere in the Shifter District as more buildings went up in flames. Using the energy she’d gained from her meal, the succubus sprinted towards the City Square rather than waiting for a carriage to pick her up.
When she began to flag, Eden slowed to a brisk walk, then crossed the bridge to the square. Word about the fires in the Shifter District had spread and help was sent to assist them. Fire elementals were unpredictable and hard to control. It was a mystery why the Immortal Triumvirate didn’t have them exterminated.
The duel was long over by now and skeletons were still dismantling the platform where the Triumvirate had resided over the proceedings. They clicked their teeth in surly anger, but they couldn’t disobey a direct order and had to finish their job. Eden felt a strange stab of sympathy for the Night Cursed creatures. Once upon a time, they’d been ordinary humans. They hadn’t asked to be turned into monsters. A curse had turned them into what they were and it had stolen their lives from them. She couldn’t help but compare herself to them as she made her way home.
