My knees were shaking so hard I thought my jeans would rip.I stared down at the kitchen floor, my hands glued to the edges of the wooden table. The linoleum was splitting open. A puddle of black water was bubbling up from nowhere, thick and sticky like fresh tar, spreading fast toward my sneakers.This was not a normal leak. Pipes did not bleed black ink."Leo," Chloe said.Her voice was too calm. She sat by the cold radiator, wearing her bright yellow jacket. Her face was pale, like she hadn't seen the sun in weeks, but her eyes were sharp. She always beat me at video games with that exact same look, focused, dangerous, and three steps ahead of me."I see it," I said, my voice cracking. I grabbed my algebra homework and crumpled it into a ball without thinking.We lived in a tiny, falling-apart apartment in Chicago where the rent was always late and the walls always leaked when it rained. But tonight, it wasn't rain coming through the floor.The black puddle stopped bubbling. A hand

The heavy iron wrench tapped against the floor with a steady, annoying beat.I kept my hands flat against my sides, my eyes fixed on the girl standing by the bookshelf. She looked about our age, but her posture screamed danger. Her dark leather jacket was scuffed at the elbows, and the silver ring in her nose caught the dim light of the overhead bulb. She wasn't holding that wrench as a joke."I asked a question," the girl said, taking a slow step forward. "Why are Vane's enforcers sniffing around my doorway? If you brought trouble to my shop, I am going to feed you both to the river-goblins."Barnaby let out a low huff, jumping down from his stack of boxes to land softly on the dusty wood. "Put the tool down, Mara. Unless you want Vane's whole crew knocking on your walls next. These kids didn't just wander in. The girl has the moon-compass."Mara stopped moving. Her eyes shifted from Barnaby to Chloe. The hard look on Mara's face didn't soften, but something else flickered in her gaz

The entire town square went completely still.Every single creature, from the shadowy cloaked figures to the horned merchants running the street stalls, froze in place. Hundreds of glowing eyes snapped away from their stalls and fixed on Chloe.My heart jumped straight up into my throat. I grabbed Mara’s sleeve, pulling her back further into the shadow of the stone pillar."Is she out of her mind?" I hissed, my voice shaking so hard I could barely form the words. "She just told the whole city where we are!""No," Mara said, her eyes wide as she watched Chloe stand alone in the middle of the plaza. A slow, sharp grin spread across Mara’s face. "She didn't just give us away. She gave us an opening."In the center of the square, Chloe stood tall in her bright yellow jacket. Her hands were relaxed at her sides, but the silver light inside her eyes burned brighter than ever. She didn't look like a sick teenager hiding in a cramped Chicago apartment anymore. She looked like a general walkin

The black chains whipped through the air like living snakes.I threw my arms over my head, curling my body around Chloe as she lay flat on the marble floor. Her breathing was shallow, and her face looked as pale as paper. The massive ledger on the stone pedestal was still flipping its pages at a dizzying speed, glowing with a fierce, blinding light that pushed against the dark smoke filling the room.Mara did not wait to see the chains hit. She lunged forward with her iron pry bar, swinging it hard into the path of the oncoming smoke.Clang.The impact sent a shockwave of sparks across the floor. Mara stumbled backward, her boots sliding against the slick white marble, but she managed to deflect the worst of the attack."Get up, Leo!" Mara shouted, her voice tight with strain. "We cannot stay here!""I can't leave her!" I yelled back, dropping to my knees beside my sister.Chloe's eyes fluttered open. The silver light inside them was so bright now it hurt to look directly at her face.

The glowing silver staff in the woman's hand hummed with a sharp, heavy charge that made the air taste like copper.I stayed frozen on the cracked marble floor, my breath hitching in my throat. The armored guard she had blasted through the wall was gone, swallowed by the dark void outside the shrinking room. The woman in the long white coat didn't look like Vane. She didn't have his dark suit or his quiet, terrifying calm. Her eyes were sharp, calculating, and completely ruthless, scanning the crumbling vault as if she were a boss inspecting a messy warehouse."I won't ask twice," the woman said, her voice cutting clean and cold through the noise of the collapsing stone. "Hand over the anchor girl. Vane is a fool who runs this city like a dusty bookstore. I have much bigger plans for what she can do."Mara pushed herself up from the floor, clutching her side where she had hit the stone wall. She grabbed her iron pry bar, her eyes narrowing as she glared at the stranger."Who do you th