“Ready?” asked Anissa and tightened her muscles.

  “No surprises?” Elzada crified.

  “None whatsoever!” Anissa grinned and tensed her muscles to the limit.

  They were always like that. The first to sm their milk fangs down each other’s throats is. The first to steal a boy’s kiss. Pouting, arguing, fighting, sulking, and always making pead cheering at the end. Where the other cubs talked their minds out, Elzada and Anissa preferred a more direct solution. Oh, they chatted. Who doesn’t like to share the test gossip when you’re lying on an overheated rock, the stars shining in the clear night sky, and you think this time will never end and you’ll live forever…

  But words were cheap. Whether it be a stolen toy or a tasty ioid drone, a fault is a fault, and blood is the best currency to show siy. After Mom’s lesson, Anissa dragged the “ag” wolf hag Elzada into a remote, cramped partment in the crawler's rear. The stant grinding of the tracks made the pce vibrate slightly, sileng any potential screams that might leave the pact space, and Anissa apologized for breaking Elzi’s wrist and making an implied threat about her little boy. It was necessary, but…

  Elzada’s biological leg fshed, aoes, fed into unyielding hooks by the agony of shattering and healing, stabbed Anissa in the sor plexus. She prided herself on growing strohan her rival, even winning their st sparring match with a single arm. Clearly, her friend worked on a strategy to equalize the strength difference, and by fog her atta a vulnerable area, she’d bypassed the yer of toughened outer skin and subdermal hardeissue that had calcified into a rudimentary exoskeleton, a faint precursor to a true shell she would have in a few years.

  The wolf hag rexed her muscles; this attack caught her off-guard, and Elzada stepped on Anissa’s poor midse. The artificial limb exploded against the side of the wolf hag’s skull, flinging her off her feet and headfirst into a wall.

  “Cheating!” Anissa piaking Elzada’s helping paw. “You tenderized me!”

  “Hey, you’re the one who gave me a free kick with my new leg. Not my fault you didn’t specify that I couldn’t use my beforehand.” Elzada jumped on her biological feet and raised her prosthetic high enough to kiss it. “Spirits, five this bsphemer, but I think this is the beginning of a beautiful coexistence.”

  “As long as we’re even,” Anissa grumbled and spat on the floor. She took a rag, wiped the blood from her mouth, nose, and ears, and swallowed the rest. They didn’t hold ba apologizing for ass-kig, as they called their method of bonding. You have to release all the bad energy, or the Spirit e will get you. “Did you find out what your boy was wasting tokens on? Was it extortion?”

  “Nope, a gift. It’s firl, but not for the reason I thought,” Elzada giggled, refusing to eborate. She put a paw on her friend’s shoulder and helped Anissa to her feet. “And you? Who among the Oathtakers are Janine and Martyshkina writiers to?”

  “No idea.” Anissa shook her head and groaned from a fresh surge of pain. She accepted a hastily offered fsk and drank water, p some on her scalp to banish the stars dang in her eyes. “They guard that secret like a wyrm guards his credit card.”

  “I bet it’s a male. A secret lover, even,” Elzada teased. “They probably hooked up with Lord Steward during their impriso and will soon run off to him.”

  “And he probably uses majestic Wolfkin bodies to…” Anissa ged at the vivid image and ed an arm around Elzada’s neck, joining her in ughter. “Eh, who am I kidding? They do better than that.”

  Dad. The words brought back painful memories. Colt wasn’t an absent or timid father like many males iribe. The old maered their lives, chastising girls and boys alike, regardless of their social standing. Even Impatient One respected his antics when he vihe entire family to join him for di a Normie’s motel and ter led them to show glowing crystals in a cave. Colt even gave them ice cream i from Mom and Impatient One. He was an awesome dad.

  “My bad,” Elzada apologized, guessing gued Anissa’s mood. This wound was still too fresh. “You’re stalling, by the way.”

  “True,” Anissa admitted, usioo taste swollen lips. Elzi’s kick packed even more impact. “It’s just… it’s scary, okay? To have a mae ling in your socket, its wires entering the brain, transmitting a lifeless, unnatural video feed to the lobes. Impnts alone are freaky; this damn thing could well be a mind troller.”

  “Then you have nothing to worry about!” Elzada smiled. “You never had any brains for it to take over.”

  “Jerk!” Anissa joined Elzada’s ughter. “And…”

  They stopped, startled by an ued scream. Thoughts raced through Anissa’s mind as she rushed to the door. Scream? In here? The tracks’ noise would’ve silenced anything, so the source had to be nearby. The voice beloo a Normie; she could bet her life on it. Could this be another instance of a forceful sexual intrusion or a shady deal gone wrong? Lethal stabbings or physical viotions among Normies were rare, but they did happen. The Iigation Bureau retly broke up a small smuggling ring after its members switched from sneaking is and drinks t their hand at selling drugs.

  Anissa opehe door and gnced out, cealing herself in the room, while Elzada quietly released her cws, falling in lihick, almost oily darkness greeted them, swirling in the corridor, dimming the mps. Two people stood in the middle of the hallway. Anissa reized one of them. Keon of the auxiliary forces, a ret recruit who’s been training to join the engineering crews. o him stood the Iternian, a pale-skinned bastard who had begged his way orip to Houstad to film a story.

  She had thought that the vile fn scum had used some advaeology to ambush the boy, but it was Keon who stood before the Iternian, his hands outstretched as if shielding him from something. Her eyes caught a movement in the darkness, and Warlord Onyxia’s head appeared briefly on the ceiling. She swam around the frightened couple, moving in bursts of speed and softly grabbing mps and rails to maintain the bance. Even Anissa’s eyes had trouble keeping up with the warlord’s movements; to the Normies, it must have looked like teleportation.

  “Jacob…” Onyxia spoke in a bnd, uional tone, but some words came out screeg. “Makarevich. I overheard your date of birth. It checks out. You are the son of ia Makarevich.”

  “You knew my mother?” Jacob inquired, oblivious to the threat.

  Onyxia wasn’t the oo bully Normies. She pulled a rank on those who disrespected her, f them into the most humiliating tasks at ued times, and when they often failed, the warlord would then drag them and their entire unit through soul-crushing field training. Tired and angry, the soldiers squeezed an apology from the unfortunate idiot. But stalking down the hallway and dang around an allied Normie, instilling a sense of helplessness while staring at wide-open arteries as if he was a raider…

  It never happened.

  “Warlord!” Anissa leapt to the Normies and Elzada joined her. Together, they pressed the males together, shielding them with their backs. “Cease this act!” She bared her throat. “Not the tribe’s member! They ’t endure a bit! Whatever the insult the reporter has itted, take it on me…”

  “Why would I kill you?” Onyxia, blindingly fast, appeared over Anissa. “Yes, Jacob, I heard of the bitch who spawned you. Your words imply she is no longer in this world…” The warlord’s voice ged. She roared in pure rage, shaking the walls harder than moving tracks. “Twice fate has handed you to me on a silver ptter. Do the Spirits really ask for the settlement of the old blood debt?” Onyxia hissed, baring her fangs, areated, merging with the darkness c the wall. Anissa saw the dark shape spttering against a solid metal, and then she leapt like an ioid, reag the ceiling and soundlessly disappearing.

  “Dammit, Keon, what did you do? What is this moron asking the warlord about?” Elzada asked through stuttering fangs.

  “I don’t know!” the man replied, nearly g from horror. “I was assigo show Jacob the lower decks, so he wouldn’t get lost! He kept asking questions…”

  “Interviewing,” Jacob corrected him.

  “Whatever! He pestered everyo until we stumbled upon the warlord, and then all hell broke loose! We’ve dohing to warrant such aggression!”

  “Iterna knows preciously little about the Wolf Tribe,” Jacob said. “Uanding is the first step in building bridges between people. Iterna hides nothing, and sinander Ravager refused an interview, I tried to find the sed-best person to help my try uand…”

  “Haven’t you uood us enough?” Onyxia asked from above the group. She hung, grasping the protective shell of the mp, somehow not crumpling it or tearing it with her weight. “Bridging people? How dare you? How dare you?!” Her eg voices merged into one.

  A dark paw with seeping bck streaks approached the reporter’s head, and Anissa grabbed it, trying to push it aside. It mattered not, warlord, respect, or anything else; the Blessed teags about proteg the weak meant everything to her. But try as she might, Onyxia easily prevailed, slowly preparing to grab Jacob’s head.

  “Desist.” Warlord Predaig emerged from the darkness, bedecked in the full pte aside, carrying her on in her paws. “Desist sister. We deny fate, staying true to our principles.”

  The paw stopped over the reporter’s head, and Onyxia hissed again—a noise rarely heard in the Wolf Tribe. She let go of the mp, nded nimbly beside the group, and darted away from Predaig, disappearing ihinning veil of darkness. Light returo the corridor, illuminating it brightly, and Anissa couldn’t eve a faint st of Onyxia. The shadow warlord was gone.

  “Phew!” Elzada exhaled. “Did the warlord really attack a Normie?”

  “Of course not,” Predaig said as she hoisted her on onto her shoulder.

  “Thank you for your aid, warlord,” Jacob thanked Predaig. Anissa wale the bastard after seeing how calm he was. He almost died! “May I inquire as to the reason for such hostility? My mother never served in the military; she rofessor at Rednds Uy, teag anthropology. To my knowledge, she never left Iterna’s borders and chose to age normally…”

  “It’s not what she taught; it’s who she taught and what she did. I suggest you do some rep and dig deeper into your family history,” Predaig growled. She whirled and faced Anissa.

  “Expnation, warlord,” the wolf hag demanded. “Bite me, dominate me, but I o know if Warlord Onyxia is on the verge on…”

  “She is not,” Predaig interrupted. She opened her jaws, closed them, and examined Anissa. “Why are you bleeding, Anissa?”

  “I bit my lip!”

  “And why is your side swollen?”

  “I bit it really bad!” Anissa panicked. She was never good at lying.

  “Sure…” Predaig g Elzada and shook her head. “Not my problem. As for your question… Uand this. Everything you’ll hear is strictly private. Spill it to anyone and you’ll learn that old people aren’t as afraid of the w as young people.”

  “I swear on my life. If I ever reveal the knowledge you are about to give me, I will rip my heart out,” Anissa vowed.

  “Yeah, the same!” Elzada supported her.

  “Not a talker, but…” Keon gulped, turning almost as pale as the Iternian. “I am curious. You have my word.”

  “Forty-five seds!” Jacob held up a hand, stopping Predaig. The man reached into his pants, into the back of his molded boots, then uhe gloves formed by his armor. He pulled out rec devices, turhem off, and finally pressed something on his helmet. The visor opened and the inside of the helm went dark. “There, everything is offline. Now, expnation, please.”

  “The Culling,” Predaig said, as if it expined everything. She tinued, answering the fused looks. “Iterna’s crimes are not limited solely to the president’s loyalists. When the voys arrived in Rednds, it was the teachers and professors who handed over the students…”

  “They merely obeyed the w; no one expected the bitch to be this crazy,” the repued. “The goverold the people that the kids would be safely resting in five-star hotels until…”

  “Sileernian,” Predaig interrupted Jacob. “Onyxia had a daughter. Not biological; she simply took in a girl whose mother was killed under her leadership. Few know of it today. The girl perished, cut in two by the sand reaper, when Iterna drove out the students. But it wasn’t the end of it. Not every corpse was recovered, but Onyxia and I spent plenty of time interrogating raiders, opening the bellies of the beasts. We even wrote to Iterna’s gover, against Ravager’s wishes.” She closed her eyes wearily. “Sometimes I wish we had dohat. Some secrets are too painful.”

  “I get the gist of the idea,” Anissa said hurriedly. “This ia Makarevich, a teacher, must have given Onyxia’s cub to the police, right? There is o eborate if this is so hard for you.”

  “Oh, please, are we so soft to be broken uhe deaths of our cubs?” Predaig chuckles. “They would’ve kicked our asses in the Great Beyond if this were so. No, Anissa, the betrayal went deeper than that. Iterna, too, searched for bodies, tacted families, did what she could to mend the irreparable. Some bodies were unreizable. And ia, that trust-busting bitch, had performed an autopsy on the poor cub’s body.” Predaig’s grip on the on tightened. “It wasn’t enough to kill her; they had to desecrate the poor baby too. There is a stall, or auditorium, as they call it in Rednds. Students e io learn about the various New Breeds. Onyxia and I received a video about it.”

  Predaig opened her eyes. “The girl exists after a fashion. They turned her into a hologram, who cheerfully greets students and expins well-known facts about the Wolf Tribe. It’s not her; it’s just her faint image. Even the girl’s voice is distorted, too clear, too happy. A phantom on invisible strings, dang for Iterna’s amusement while her bones are on dispy.”

  Anissa slowed her breathing, fighting against an urge to wrest away Jacob’s head. Savages. The Iternians are a little better than savages. No, they’re even worse! At least savages have the dignity of eventually killing you. But these scums abused the trust, murdered the best geion, and then dared to use their souls? When will it be enough for them?

  “I…” Jacob stumbled. His posure vanished, and the man was visibly shocked. “We didn’t know. Mother always bmed herself for what had transpired. She made it her goal to prove to the citizens that abnormals and humans were not so different. To that end, she performed autopsies, linking human evolution to the Glow, and the history holograms are meant to show students that people outside of Iterna are no different from us. That they too have their cultures, lives, and hopes. They are meant to illustrate the true horror of our deed, so we would never agai it!” He desperately met Predaig’s eyes.

  “We wear trophies to boast of our victories,” Predaig said mercilessly. “But... I suppose we also wear boems to remember those who left before us,” she added, a little softer.

  “As soon as I tell everyone bae, they will remove the hologram…” Jacob stopped as Predaig’s bde touched the neck of his suit.

  “No. Onyxia and her poor daughter were humiliated enough. There will be no more dishonor to their names. It is better to let the hologram remain nameless. Let the dead rest and the grieving mourn. Onyxia has found another whom she siders family. There is no oo bme, punish, or five. We just have to learn how to move on. Don’t stir the pot and ruin her life again, Iternian,” Predaig stated. “e, Keon. I’ll assist you in esc uest. And as for you two,” the warlord addressed the Wolfkins. “Don’t bite your lips in strange pces again.”

  “You ’t trust Iternians,” Elzada said as the group left her. Then she hiccupped and turned. “You didn’t think that the warlord thought us…”

  “What… No!” Anissa shouted. “Spirits, no! You have a son! I had males and io have cubs. It… Elzi, it’s all your fault! Your bad influence always gets me into trouble!”

  “My bad influence?! You broke my freaking arm!”

  “Well, I apologized for that!”