A PAIR OF men dragged a girl not more than seven years of age from a burning hut. She kept slipping from their grasps as she struggled to escape them. She bared her teeth and bit one man, making him howl in pain.

A sorcerer dressed in deep black robes approached and scowled at the two. “Can none of you handle a mere child?” he asked coldly. His backhand ripped her from her captors’ hands and flung her against a sharp rock protruding from the ground. He grabbed her ebony hair, dragging her to her feet. “Incompetents,” he muttered as he stalked towards the wagons bearing numerous cages with other humanoid creatures. “Get the wagons ready or I will have your skin flayed and ensure you live to see your pulsing insides spill out.”

“Yes, Master Alimar!” The two scrambled towards the wagons. They and the other men began securing wooden walls to the iron bars, concealing the cages.

As Alimar passed one of the wagons, a clawed hand lashed out at him as a young, demonic-looking boy attacked, his youthful wings fanned wide and horns gleaming in the sunlight. “I will kill you!” he shrieked defiantly.

Alimar sneered. “You are nothing, gromek, but what I allow you to be.” When the green-skinned boy lashed out in defiance and tore his robe sleeve, Alimar spoke sharp words of magic, making a tearing gesture from the gromek to a hound standing nearby. The boy screamed in pain as his wings and horns vanished from his body, sprouting from the head and back of the dog. His despairing, shame-filled howl echoed through the jungle.

Forgotten in the sorcerer’s grasp, the green-eyed girl suddenly twisted and pulled free. But instead of trying to flee, she turned around and bit the sorcerer’s hand, her teeth sinking in deep. He swore, yanked the gromek’s cage opened and flung her against the far wall. He stalked to the elegant coach awaiting him, the now-winged hound following. The workers dared not look at him nor make a sound. Even the noise of the wooden walls covering the cage’s iron bars was muted.

The noise of heavy wagons disrupted the abnormal stillness of the shadowy jungle as men wielding machetes hacked with fervent desperation. Workers flinched when the man standing atop the elegant coach heading the train of cages cracked his whip. “Faster! Master Alimar wanted to make the coast before nightfall!” The light glinted off the workers and foreman’s wrist and neck shackles.

Alimar’s long-fingered, slender hand moved aside the curtain concealing the coach’s occupants. The pale sorcerer’s dark eyes glinted menacingly as he looked up towards the foreman. “Overseer Belim, what is the delay? I expected to be on our way home by now.”

Belim swallowed as he looked over the side but avoided meeting his eyes. “Forgive me, Master Alimar. It is these infernal Southern Wildlands. All their terrains have been treacherous. These trees and vines begin growing back the moment they are cut. We have lost five men to this damned jungle alone!”

Alimar’s eyes glinted threateningly. “If conserving slave lives concerned me, I would have instructed you thus. I ordered you to get us to the coast. I wish to get my new pets home to Griffin Isle. You know well death will not absolve you nor protect you from my wrath if you fail.” His voice darkened with increasing threat. “Are my wishes clear now, Belim?”

The overseer nodded, pale with terror. “Very clear, Master. Forgive me.” He turned back to the men who hacked at the forest with even greater desperation. He cracked the whip again, calling orders unnecessarily.

Inside the coach, a young man glanced nervously at the sorcerer abruptly possessed of an unnatural serenity. Alimar stroked the head of the dog bearing the immature gromek’s horns and wings. “Master, I understand that removing the attributes that are a source of pride to the gromek’s kind punishes him for daring to attack you. But, the girl had suffered considerable damage during her acquisition. I do not understand why you risked losing her by putting her in the same cage as that animal after you—”

“Are you questioning me, Gilhadnar?” Alimar’s voice possessed more ice than the highest, glacier-bound peaks. He pinned a mirthless glare on the other man. “Perhaps I am going dull so you think a mere apprentice such as you has the will and strength to overcome me?”

Gilhadnar held up both hands in submission, shaking his head wildly. “No, no, no, Master! I want nothing but to learn from your brilliance. But is it not risky putting her in the pen with that gromek? They are as close to demons as anything gets without in fact coming from one of the hells. A mindless animal. If it kills her, you will not be able to find a replacement since you eliminated the rest of her kind to increase her rarity for your collection.”

“Then you had better hope she does not die, hadn’t you?” Alimar asked coldly.

Swallowing tightly, the apprentice nodded. “Yes, Master Alimar.”