Prologue
TALAKAI
The cutter burned through the last bit of metal, and my collar fell free.
It clanged when it hit the floor. A piece of me falling away, welcome, and yet I found myself struggling to hold on to what was left.
My enraged beast surged through—wings bursting from my shoulders, bones shifting beneath my skin.
“Talakai! No, we don’t have time for this!” Haki hove into view, his handsome face contorted with the angst I also sensed in his energy.
“Or the room,” Kala stated, shoving the laser cutter into her pack. She reached out to touch me, but I flinched away. I didn’t have any more control over my reactions than I did the change. Having anyone—even a friend—that close was almost intolerable, and I didn’t trust myself, either.
I didn’t need a knife to be lethal.
But Kala was right about the space. Our transitory refuge barely had enough ceiling clearance for my nearly seven feet of human. My wings crashed into it, and bits of plaster drifted down around us.
“Talakai.” Kala ceased trying to grab me and instead cemented her gaze to mine. “Breathe with me. In, and out. Deep breaths, that’s it. Call on your training. You are better than this. You cannot let her win.”
Her.Xumi, my captor. The underlord who’d put chains on my soul.
Haki leaned close. “Focus, Talakai.” His voice had overtones of command, just like the instructors that had drilled us, day in and day out, for most of our lives.
I took another deep breath, and with it came an iota of control.
Iwasbetter than this. Kala’s tawny gaze calmed me, while Haki gave me the anchor I so desperately needed to regain the tiniest bit of who I used to be.
Haki saw it. “We’ve got to go,” he urged.
“He can’t go out like this.” Kala kept her voice smooth, but the steel beneath it silenced Haki. There was little doubt as to who was the leader in their relationship. It was Haki’s urgency, however, that enabled me to grab hold of my fragile sanity and force it to obey.
He was never tense without a reason.
Never.
So I rose to it, forcing my wings back into my shoulders, and my body to human. My beast clawed and screamed every inch of the way, fighting for control. But I finally managed to subdue it.
Kala nodded. “Good. We need to leave.”
“And go where?” I didn’t recognize my own voice, or the desperation within it. “The Guild can find me long before Xumi will.”
“The Guild no longer owns you.” Kala’s eyes gleamed. “I’ve bought your freedom.”
I gaped at her in astonishment. She’d already purchased Haki’s freedom only a short time ago. Such things did not come cheap.
Her gaze slid from mine. “I tried to buy you free from Xumi, but she just laughed at me.” Her mouth pulled straight. “Now that we’ve taken you, she will be enraged. I’m sorry, Talakai. It’s all we can do.”
“Shards, Kala,” I whispered, awed that she’d do this. “You’ve done enough. Without the Guild on my tail, I stand a chance.”
“Only if you follow orders,” she said briskly. “Which brings us to our next goal...” Kala raised a knife, and an eyebrow. “The Guild has deactivated your tracker, but we need to remove it. If Xumi gets the activation code, she can find you.”
I grimaced, and glanced down at my arm. The chip was deep in the bicep.
Cutting it out wouldn’t be fun, but nothing could compare to what I’d been through over the last few weeks. My biggest issue was my body’s reaction to the pain. Emphasis on big. I ground my teeth together and kept my other forearm firmly over my groin.
Finally, Kala uttered a grunt of triumph and held up the blood-soaked, inch-long tracker before tossing it across the room. Then she pulled one of the heavy cloaks off the bed and threw it to me.
“Think you need this.”
