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  “You think I’ll just...go along with this, and not betray you?” Phoenix asked, unable to believe that Sammael genuinely thought his plan would work.

  Unless he had a plan within a plan. Since he hadn’t lost a family that had never existed, maybe he thought he could use the situation to aid the assassin in—

  “Yes,” he said, mercifully interrupting her thoughts. “And you won’t lead them back here, because you’ll know the whole time that young Patterson’s life is at stake. I give you the choice, Lark. Choose to let me have my revenge, or let Patterson’s son die.”

  With a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, Phoenix realized that what she did now could determine the fate of everyone in the Fringe. In the city itself. She hadn’t yet found a way to question Sammael about rumors of an assassin, let alone search the Hold for proof of his affiliation with other Opiri spies in the city.

  Understanding hit her so hard and fast that she almost doubled over. Sammael wasn’t only asking her to gain access to files that might not even exist, but expecting her to hold the Enforcers off for a full week. Maybe that had always been his intention. If he was actively helping the assassin, the killer would probably act during that very week.

  But she still might have a chance of surprising Sammael, disable him somehow and turn him over to Aegis for questioning. She would have to fulfill Sammael’s demands very quickly if she was to have any hope of helping prevent the assassination attempt.

  And Matthew could easily die during such an operation. What would the death of a senator’s son, popular in his own right, do to the city?

  “Don’t do this, Sammael,” she said, making no attempt to conceal her anguish. “No revenge is worth the kind of risk you’re talking about. Send Matthew back. Leave him in some neutral area far from the Hold and let them come get him.”

  “And allow him to report all the questions I asked, the things I told him?”

  “They’ll kill you the second they have Matthew.”

  “Do you think I’m that stupid, Lark? I’ll take plenty of precautions, and you’ll stay out of the way.”

  Phoenix recognized the futility and danger of arguing with Sammael again. “All right,” she said. “Assuming I can get these files and can get back to you, the Enforcers back off and these politicians agree, what will you do when Matthew is safe? No matter what happens to Patterson, do you think they won’t send every Enforcer and Aegis agent back to look for you as soon as the week is up?”

  He strode to the chair and stood over her, his breath coming in short puffs as if he’d just run a marathon. “I’ll have arranged to move the Hold by then, warn the Bosses I consider worth saving and prepare for the next full sweep. You’ll tell your superiors that I and my crew will run continuous patrols to make sure the Enforcers haven’t broken the deal you make with them. We spot one Enforcer or operative, and Matthew dies.”

  “And the people you’ve helped?” she asked. “The Scrappers and desperate Cits who’ve come here because they have nowhere else to go? You’ll risk letting them be swept up, too, when the Enforcers come back in to hunt for you?”

  “I’ll personally see to it that everyone who wants to leave has a chance to get out of the city first.”

  “In one week? That’s insane.”

  “The southern Wall will be left unguarded.”

  “What about those too afraid to evacuate?” she asked.

  “I’m not likely to change their minds.”

  Phoenix rose, turning away before he could see her wildly conflicting emotions. But Sammael came up behind her and took her by the shoulders.

  “If the Bureau or Aegis had the means to take everyone in the Fringe,” he said, “they’d have done so long ago. I told you there were reasons they wouldn’t. But I’ll do whatever I can for those who want help.” He released her. “You and I have preparations to make before you go.”

  “When do you want me to leave?”

  “Tomorrow night.” Suddenly he seized her, kissing her hard. She began to return the kiss, broke free and backed away.

  “You’re more my enemy now than you ever were,” she whispered.

  “Yes,” he said, his voice growing hoarse. “And when this is ov—”

  He collapsed before he could finish.

  * * *

  Drakon woke to the feeling of cool moisture on his hands, face and chest, a soothing relief from the pain that had tormented him since he’d found Lark at the building during the attack.

  Lark had made it almost easy for him to pretend he wasn’t badly injured. She’d been so caught up in the drama of Matthew Patterson’s interrogation, the stories they had told each other and his plans for his prisoner that he’d managed to keep his face and body from betraying his agony.

  But now he found Lark looking down at him, her hazel eyes filled with mixed emotions he couldn’t read. His shirt was off, and so were the rest of his clothes. A sheet was lightly draped over him, but he knew she had seen the burns. It was fortunate for him that the sunlight had barely penetrated his clothing on his shoulders, upper arms, hands and face.

  “You’ve been asleep for a long time,” Lark said quietly. “How are you feeling?”

  Her simple question calmed him when he should have been most ready to act, to...

  Silence her? Kill her?

  But she did nothing, said nothing. She held him down gently when he tried to sit up, pressing on his stomach to avoid his injured skin.

  “There’s no point in struggling,” she said. “There wasn’t much I could do for your burns, so you might as well let your body heal itself.” She sighed. “All that time with Matthew, and afterward with me, you were trying to hide this. Trying to stay on your feet, fooling everyone. But you only made it worse.”

  “Has anyone else seen me?” he asked.

  His tone must have betrayed his concern, for Lark leaned back, her expression less worried now than wary.

  “Brita dropped in briefly,” she said, watching his face. “She was concerned, but oddly enough, she seemed to trust me to look after you.”

  Feeling an utter fool, Drakon wondered for the first time if Brita had done anything to make Lark suspect that she, too, wasn’t human. But if she’d left him in Lark’s care, she’d believed that Lark hadn’t put two and two together and wouldn’t recognize the nature of Drakon’s burns.

  Drakon hadn’t had the chance to tell Brita that Lark had already guessed he wasn’t human. Did she suspect that Lark, too, was part Opir? If Lark had done anything to make her believe that, she was in more danger than ever before.

  He had to learn what Brita knew. And what she might do with that knowledge.

  “Anyone else come in?” he asked Lark.

  “No one except Repo, who brought the medkit.”

  And Repo, like the rest of the crew, didn’t know his true nature. Lark was an agent of Aegis, and Brita had been wrong to think she wouldn’t figure out the truth.

  “I thought you were a Daysider from almost the moment I met you,” she said, answering his unspoken thoughts.

  He laughed. The joke was entirely on him. “But that isn’t what you think now,” he said.

  Lark leaned over to give him a sip of water from a cracked glass. “You’re a Nightsider. A full Opir.”

  “A bloodsucker,” he said, wincing as he shifted his weight on the mattress.

  “The man who saved my life from The Preacher’s crew, even if I might have taken most of them down with me.” She wet a fresh cloth in a bowl and dabbed at his right shoulder. “Of course I don’t know why, but the fact is that you went out in the sunlight to help me, and I’m grateful.”

  He lifted one hand, wincing at the pull of burned skin. “Grateful,” he said. “You can afford to be. I can hardly hurt you now.”

  “By killing me, or jus
t taking my blood?”

  He licked his lips, realizing he hadn’t accessed his blood stores for three days. Lark’s nearness had aroused an agony worse than the pain of his burns.

  “If I’d ever taken blood from anyone here,” he said, “they’d know what I am. There are enough of them to kill me, if they all turned on me at once.”

  “But you must have your own supply. Where do you get it?”

  “It’s brought to me periodically. I don’t know the source.”

  Phoenix felt slightly ill, though she couldn’t believe that he’d deliberately take blood acquired by violent means. “Stored somewhere on the premises, I presume?” she asked.

  “Somewhere,” he said, closing his eyes.

  “I can understand why you don’t want to tell me,” she said. “But that’s the least of your worries now, isn’t it? I know the only reason you’d be hiding in the Fringe is if you’re a spy for Erebus.”

  “Have you been hunting for Opir agents all along?” he asked wearily.

  “Would you believe me if I said no?”

  Drakon tensed and released the muscles of his left arm, testing the flexibility of his skin. It still hurt mightily, but he was mending.

  Just not quickly enough.

  “Yes,” Lark said at last, sitting back in the chair as if she was relieved that at least some of the playacting was over. “I was hunting for Opir spies. Did you consider that possibility before?”

  “It crossed my mind, after I learned what you were.”

  “Was the story you told me about your family true?”

  “It was,” he said, looking away.

  “Everything? The Enforcers, your wife...your son?”

  No, he thought. Not everything. “I lost them exactly as I told you,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, with that emotion that always seemed so genuine. “I couldn’t believe you before because I assumed you were a Daysider, and Daysiders don’t have human wives and children. But now I know you were once—”

  “Human?” he said, showing his teeth. She stared at his mouth, at the caps that made his incisors seem flush with his others.

  “Yes,” she said. “And the government deported you. For being a dissenter, like your parents.”

  He looked away, knowing he could never tell her the full truth. He could take his revenge on John Patterson if he was lucky, but his mission had to come first. During that week of respite from the Enforcers, he would do what he could to take the mayor down. If Patterson gained leadership of the Enclave after the revelation of his past misdeeds, he would inherit only chaos. Eventually, he would pay in full.

  Like all the innocents who would suffer before the Enclave rebuilt itself...if it did before the Opiri Council came to an agreement and decided to attack.

  He could still help some Fringers escape into the dubious “freedom” of the southern Zone. But not all would leave, and if the city fell those who remained would face lifelong serfdom.

  You can stop, he told himself. You can still back out.

  “Tell me something,” Lark said, breaking into his thoughts. “Why do you look like a Daysider, or a normal human? The caps are obvious, but what about the rest of you? Are you some kind of mutation?”

  In spite of himself, Drakon stiffened. He had felt a freak so long, from the moment Julius had converted him. But now, having lived among humans again for over a year...

  “If I told you,” he said grimly, “I’d have to kill you.”

  Chapter 13

  It was a very bad joke. Drakon knew that both he and Lark were considering the likelihood of this situation ending in the death of one or both of them.

  But then again, they always had.

  “You have a very strange sense of humor,” she said, “considering how many times the subject has come up under equally difficult circumstances.”

  Drakon swallowed the apology hovering on his tongue. “Why don’t you tell me if your story of losing your parents was true?”

  Her eyes glistened. “It was. But my father wasn’t sent on a suicide mission. He was simply a good operative who was killed in the field. And the Agency did raise me.”

  “Like an estranged aunt?”

  “I was different. But I found my place.”

  Drakon wondered if she truly had. “Why were you looking for The Preacher when you came to the Fringe with your story of being hunted?” he asked. “Were you told he had some connection to Opir agents in the city?”

  “No,” she said. “Not specifically. But I had to start somewhere, and we knew he was one of the most powerful Bosses in the city.”

  “But not that he was also the worst?”

  “I knew I could defend myself, and I could escape if I had to.”

  He laughed, setting off another wave of pain. “If you were sent to expose Opir spies, why didn’t you return to Aegis when you believed I was a Daysider? Did you think you could handle me alone?”

  “I knew the odds of that were very much against me,” she said. “But I thought the risk was worth it.”

  “You might still be able to get out of here,” he said harshly. “Warn the Enforcers.”

  She met his gaze. “And sacrifice Matthew after all?”

  “You can expose me to my crew,” he said, attempting to sit up.

  “And Matthew would still die, at their hands.”

  “So you’ll present the bargain?”

  “My mission is already compromised beyond recovery.”

  “Given what I know of you, Lark, I wouldn’t bet on it.” He eased himself back with a grimace. “Is Lark really your name?”

  “It’s Phoenix,” she said.

  “Lark. Phoenix. One common bird, one mythically powerful.”

  “I guess I couldn’t get away from avians,” she said. “Is your name really Sammael?”

  “An Opir can have many names in his lifetime,” he said. “It’s as good as any.”

  She would know he was evading her question. But he suspected that his true Opir name was already known by Aegis, though only through rumor. Rumor he’d always recognized might extend to suspicion that a killer from Erebus hid within the city.

  Was it possible that suspicion had become certainty? Had Lark—Phoenix—been sent to find a very specific Opir agent? A Dragon to her mythical bird?

  “You need more water,” she said suddenly, retrieving the glass and kneeling beside him again. “And I know you’ll need blood to complete your healing. You’d better tell me where your cache is.”

  He shook his head.

  “Could it be you regret what you’re doing?” she asked, leaning toward him. “Do you want to die?”

  He flinched at the sound of her voice expressing the thoughts he still didn’t want to face.

  “You remember what it’s like to be human,” she said. “Did you return as a spy only because you expected you’d get a chance to take revenge on John Patterson?”

  Now, Drakon thought, she was trying to trap him. He could see her struggling to make the right decision, wondering what questions she dared ask.

  “Come here, Phoenix,” he said.

  She stared at him as if he’d gone mad. “So you can strangle me? Break my neck?”

  “I believe I once told you that I would never touch you against your will,” he said, meaning it with all his heart. “Are you willing now?”

  She got up and sat on the edge of the bed, careful not to jar him. Heedless of the discomfort, Drakon clamped his arms around her waist, pulled her hard against his chest and kissed her. The pain was nothing to the ecstasy of holding her. She melted against him, speared her fingers in his hair and straddled his hips. She was no more gentle with him than he was with her. His cock swelled to its full size almost instantly.


  Phoenix obviously felt the change. She rubbed herself against him, teasing him through the thin barrier of the sheets as he deepened the kiss. He ignored the pain in his arms and shoulders, pulling at her shirt with thick, clumsy fingers, running his palms up the skin of her belly and ribs, finding her breasts bare underneath. She tilted back her head, offering. Offering him everything.

  He moaned with lust, for her body and her blood, and suddenly Phoenix stiffened. She wrenched herself free, and he swallowed a grunt of pain.

  “God,” she said, panic in her eyes. “I’ve hurt you!”

  Drakon burst into a laugh of frustration and disbelief. “Yes,” he said, catching his breath.

  “Don’t!” she ordered. “I could have—”

  He grabbed for the only part of her he could reach, clamping his fingers around her wrist. “That was nothing,” he said. “And I wasn’t groaning in pain.”

  She stared at the one part of him that refused to concede defeat. The sheet might as well not have been there at all. She pulled free of his grip.

  “I can’t believe you were trying to seduce me in your condition,” she said, breathless with emotion she was fighting to control.

  “Seduce you?” he said, nearly as breathless. “You were the one on top of me.”

  “I wasn’t... I didn’t—” Phoenix broke off and clamped her lips together. Those lips Drakon had just kissed, and wanted to keep kissing until...

  “I will give you one more chance,” he said quietly. “You can get out of the Hold before anyone in the crew knows what you’ve done. You might even be able to get Matthew out as well. If you don’t, I will do exactly what I vowed to do. I’ll make sure the Citadel’s mission is carried out.”

  And, in that moment, he wanted her to stop him. To relieve him of his pain, his rage, his all-consuming guilt. Wanted her to end it, so he wouldn’t complete his mission, wouldn’t become what he had once hated so much.

  He would stop hating. Stop caring. Stop remembering.

  “If you don’t do it,” he said, “you’ll always wonder if you could have stopped the Enclave from crashing down around you.”