A distant howl echoed in the dark plaza. Kael Renard clung to the instructions he had heard when he arrived on this mysterious floor. Sweat poured, cold and oily, down his unfamiliar face. He swallowed hard, and his throat tightened. It felt mechanical and painful, like a giant sheet of rusted iron ripped apart by unseen hands.
Breathe. You've walked into worse rooms than this. Except he hadn't. Not in a body that wasn't his.
Kael stood still, his heart hammering against his chest. Every detective instinct urged him to lower his center of gravity. He needed a steady stance, the one he had mastered in Chicago for tactical breaches. But when he crouched, his knee buckled slightly to one side, throwing his balance sideways. His torso felt weightless. His legs, long and thin, didn't reflect the muscle he'd built over fifteen years. They refused to respond properly. His narrow ankles wobbled the instant he shifted his weight.
This isn't your body. Act like it.
His eyes swept the vast obsidian floor in a slow, calculated circle. Jagged pillars stood against the empty sky like broken teeth. Nothing moved. Yet the weight of a predatory focus pinned him to the spot.
Someone, or something, was watching.
The feeling dug deep: a stakeout gone wrong on the South Side. Ramirez's radio went dead just three seconds before the first shot. He'd learned the hard way what silence like that meant. He wasn't about to make the same mistake twice.
Kael scanned his surroundings, feeling uneasy. He wondered where he was. He didn't dare say it. He reached for his Glock at his waist, but his hand fell short. His arm felt strange and light. He fumbled with the dark robe he hadn't realized he was wearing.
Then the world shifted.
Thick white vapor began to rise from the fissures in the black stone. Within heartbeats, the steam thickened into a wall of heavy, suffocating gray fog. It wrapped tightly around Kael's shins, consuming the broken pillars. He felt alone.
Breath catching in his throat, he shifted away. Stepping back pitched him sideways, like a man on stilts. He struggled to control the stride of a six-foot-two, two-hundred-pound investigator. This borrowed frame gave him no leverage. Dizziness rolled through his spine. Gather yourself. The world outside wouldn't pause for him to find his footing.
Then he heard it: a heavy, uneven grating noise, as though a heavy body dragged itself through the fog.
A few yards away, the mist churned with fierce intensity. A massive limb tore through the gray shroud. A gargoyle-sized paw followed, but the texture was wrong. Smoke and fluid darkness replaced fur and bone.
Kael scrambled back, the sharp clicks of his boots clicking on the stone. A low growl rumbled behind him, sending chills down his spine. His breath came in short, ragged bursts as the creature exhaled. Every step became a fight with his own body; his reflexes lagged behind his instincts.
The creature emerged in full view. Two eyes, like smoldering embers, locked onto him with terrible hunger. A huge wolf made of dark liquid had mismatched legs. Its asymmetry made it look terrifying. Three front limbs pushed it forward in a jarring, tripod-like gait. Two powerful hind legs coiled behind, ready to spring.
It crept closer, its thick, ragged tail lashing like a blur of darkness. It looked starved, ribs jutting like blades beneath its dark skin.
But its head was the greatest horror. The lower jaw swung loose at a sickening angle, as though it had taken a violent blow long ago. Five sharp teeth glistened. They dripped thick black fluid that sizzled on the obsidian.
Kael's fists tightened, nails digging into his palms. His chest heaved as he struggled to breathe. Muscles twitched, ready to move, but he held back. The nervous system he was borrowing didn't understand him yet. It felt like steering a stolen body through a signal that kept breaking apart.
The five-legged predator didn't growl. It raised its head, its broken jaw swaying, and drew a long breath, sniffing the mist.
The air went utterly still. For one suspended second Kael heard nothing but the blood pounding in his ears. Then the creature's ember-eyes narrowed as it caught the sharp scent of his panic. Not here. Not like this. Not in this skin.
It lunged in a terrifying blur. Every nerve in Kael's body screamed at him to move. The massive paw swiped down, aimed for his head.
Move!
He rolled but misjudged his speed. He lost control and crashed to the ground. The creature's paw slammed into the stone arch instead. The ancient stone shattered with a deafening crash.
Kael hit the ground, shoulder skidding over rough stone. Pain flared in his forearm where a flying shard had left a jagged cut. Worse than the pain was how wrong it felt. He braced for impact against a broad shoulder. Instead, a sharp collarbone jabbed into his chest. It was narrow and fragile, surprising him.
He shot up but lost his balance. His long, strange legs gave out. He stumbled back until a cold, rough wall hit him hard in the back. Then the blue swirling sigil on his left palm burst with bright light. The burn had sunk beneath the surface. Fine silver energy lines spread beneath the blue mark, crawling up his wrist like mercury.
A deep, heavy thrum shook the ground, like something enormous had exhaled.
The ground answered with two hard jolts.
The silver mark on Kael's palm flared in answer.
Every beat sent a surge of raw, dormant power flooding into his veins. Adrenaline didn't explain the surge. An unseen force called the hidden power through him. The geometric scars on his arms grew warm, humming with the same frequency. His power was waking up, binding his soul to the tower.
The wolf-like creature paused, then shook off its hesitation. It had seen the silver gleaming in Kael's hand. It crouched low, tensing for another strike.
The voices echoed off the stone, repeating the cold command. No explanation. No mercy. He felt a cold certainty. Whoever kept whispering the cold command didn't care if he knew the rules. It judged him anyway.
This wasn't Chicago. There was no badge, no Glock, no backup. If Kael wanted to survive, he had to move, even dragging this alien body behind him.
He rushed into the thick mist, his stride uneven. One foot landed at an odd angle, forcing him to limp as he pressed forward.
The heavy footfalls of the five-legged predator thudded behind him. It had started the chase right away.
He glanced over his shoulder. His impaired spatial awareness failed him. He crashed into a fallen obsidian wall, the impact sending him sprawling onto the stone floor. Dazed, he lay there as the fog churned white above him until the shapes of the broken pillars swam back into focus.
Then a low, metallic snarl rippled through the fog above him.
The predator erupted from the gray mist, leaping from the ruined barrier. Kael ducked and twisted with a surprising, fluid agility, even disoriented as he was. His lower back, stiff for years from desk work, bent now like a reed. Black claws scraped the stone with a screech, missing his head by mere inches.
His pulse slammed against his ribs; old failures tightened his grip on the daggers. Memories surged: Danny Webb, dead in an alley off Halsted because Kael had been four minutes late to a meet. Ortiz shot, covering him on a warrant that went bad. A dozen cases closed a day too late to matter to the people who'd needed them closed on time. You froze then too. Don't do it again.
Weapon. I need a weapon. His breath quickened, his palms slick as they grasped at empty air. He remembered the times he'd felt helpless before threats he couldn't stop. The fear sharpened with each heartbeat. How had he let himself get caught off guard again?
Yet beneath the terror was a strange split. He felt frantic because he lacked a weapon, even as his hands moved with a will of their own. Muscle memory took over. His fingers found the small of his back and touched cold, etched metal.
It felt wrong. Instinct pushed him forward before he could think.
Kael's sharp mind hesitated even as his lethal instincts surged to the fore. He drew two daggers from his hidden sheaths in a single, swift motion.
The balanced hilts fit into his narrow palms with terrifying familiarity. His fingers tightened on the handles. The blades glowed with a silver light, pulsing in sync with the power surging up his arm.