The smoke came before the screams. Six-year-old Draxin Alistair pressed his back against the alley wall between two wooden homes and held his breath. His mother had shoved him here a minute ago. She told him not to move until she came back. He could still feel where her hands had gripped his shoulders. The village he had known his whole life was burning. Weathered planks split under boot heels. Doors he had run past every morning hung broken on their hinges. Men in long coats moved through the narrow lanes, calm, unhurried. A broken circle was stitched onto the back of each coat. Draxin did not know what the mark meant. He only knew none of them belonged here. He peeked around the corner. His mother stood in front of their doorway with her arms spread wide. Her red curls caught the firelight. She was still smiling, the way she smiled when she wanted him to feel safe. Two of the coated men were dragging something out of the house behind her, a long shape wrapped in gray cloth. She stepped in front of them. One of the men lifted his hand. Draxin did not see the blow itself. He only saw his mother fall. Her body hit the sand without a sound he could hear over the fire. A moment later his father stumbled out after her, one arm reaching for the wrapped bundle, and fell the same way. Draxin bit down on his own wrist to keep from screaming. His sharp teeth cut skin. The taste of blood was the only thing that kept him still. One of the coated men turned toward the alley. His face was hidden by dirty bandages wound tight across his mouth and nose. Bandaged hands rested on a knife at his hip. He walked closer. Draxin saw the man's eyes narrow above the wrappings, searching. A desert bandit, or something wearing a bandit's clothes. Draxin shrank behind a stack of empty water jars. The wooden slippers on his feet trembled against the ground. He held his breath until his chest burned. The bandaged man paused at the mouth of the alley. He looked straight at the jars. Then a voice called from the street, sharp and short. The man turned and went back to help carry the wrapped bundle away. Draxin waited until the boots faded. He crawled out. His parents lay where they had fallen. He touched his mother's hand. It was still warm. Her smile was still there. He did not cry. Not yet. He looked at the empty doorway where the wrapped thing had been kept, then at the tracks the coats had left in the sand. Whatever they took, they took it from his family. Whatever the broken circle meant, he would learn it. He pulled his mother's scarf loose and tied it around his wrist. Then he started walking after the tracks.

Ten years later, Draxin Alistair tore down a dusty lane between crooked wooden homes, a stolen red fruit clenched in his teeth and a merchant bellowing behind him. His bare torso caught the sun. A long diagonal scar cut across his chest. Yellow hair faded to red at the tips, bouncing as he ran. His wide orange eyes with white star pupils were fixed straight ahead, and he was grinning around the fruit like the chase was the best part. A small mushroom person clung to his shoulder for dear life. Its green cap, speckled with purple dots, wobbled with every stride. Stubby hands gripped a fistful of Draxin's hair. Its eyes were squeezed shut in a permanent, contented smile. This is Draxin Alistair. And this is his trusty old pal, Zag. They kept running. "Thief! Get back here, you yellow-haired rat!" The merchant was a broad man in a stained apron, waving a wooden ladle like it was a sword. His slippers slapped the sand behind them. "That's my last crate!" Draxin took the fruit out of his mouth long enough to shout back. "You had ten! I counted!" "That's why it's my last one!" Zag squeaked. Draxin laughed, cut hard around a rain barrel, and nearly bowled over a woman carrying laundry. He ducked under a hanging line of drying fish. The village of Grants Lake was waking up around them. Chickens that were not quite chickens, all beak and no feathers, scattered underfoot with angry chirps. A tall six-legged pack beast tied to a post brayed as Draxin skidded past its hooves. "Alley," Zag whispered, pointing a stubby hand. Draxin saw it and turned. He slid between two houses, back flat against the wood, and clamped a hand over Zag's mouth. The merchant thundered past the gap without looking. His shouting faded down the lane. Draxin waited three breaths. Then he slid down the wall and sat in the sand, laughing so hard his shoulders shook. He tore the fruit in half and gave the bigger piece to Zag. "See? Told you I'd get one." Zag chewed with both cheeks full. "He knows your face now." "He knew it yesterday." "He'll tell the others." Draxin's grin thinned a little. He looked down the alley toward the main square. His mother's scarf, faded now, was still tied around his wrist. He touched it without thinking. "Then we eat fast and move on," he said. He bit into the fruit. Juice ran down his chin. "We were leaving anyway." He stood, brushed sand off his baggy pants, and hoisted Zag back onto his shoulder. At the end of the alley, past the last row of houses, the desert opened flat and pale toward the horizon. Somewhere out there, ten years of tracks had gone cold. He meant to find them warm again. He took the first step out of Grants Lake before the merchant could round the block.

The desert swallowed Grants Lake behind them within an hour. Draxin walked with one hand shading his eyes and Zag tucked into the crook of his neck. He kept scanning the sand for the ten-year-old tracks he had promised himself he would find. There was nothing. The wind had been working these dunes since before he was born. Whatever trail the men in long coats had left was gone. "We've been walking in a circle," Zag said. "We haven't." "That rock. I've seen it twice." Draxin looked at the rock. He didn't answer. He turned east instead, toward a smudge of color on the horizon. As they got closer the smudge became trees, curling up out of the sand with leaves in orange and red and green. A whole small forest, alive in the middle of nothing. He was halfway to the tree line when he saw her. A girl sat on a low root, still as a lizard, a white and blue cat mask covering her face. Black ponytail. Gray tank top. Ripped brown pants. She did not look at him as he passed. He did not stop. "Weird," Zag whispered. "Everyone out here is weird." Draxin pushed between two twisted trunks. The shade was cool. He was thinking about water when the ground shook. He froze. It shook again. Then a low, wet snort came from behind the trees on his left. The thing that stepped out was the size of a wagon. Muscled like a bear. Black stripes cut across fur that was half green, half red. Its face was pulled back in a tiger's snarl, and two thick horns curved forward from its skull. It saw him. It lowered its head. Draxin ran. He crashed back the way he came, Zag clinging on and shrieking. The beast tore after him. Roots snapped under its hooves. He burst out of the trees and saw the masked girl already on her feet. "Run!" he shouted. "Big thing, run — " She moved before he finished. She caught his outstretched wrist, pivoted under his arm, and flipped him. His back hit the sand hard. The air left him. She stood over him with one boot near his throat. "Not me," he wheezed. He pointed past her. She turned. The beast was already through the trees. She pulled him up. They ran. Twenty steps in, Draxin stopped, spun, and charged the bull. He drove his shoulder into its neck. It hooked him with a horn and threw him. He hit the sand again, rolled, got up, hit it with his fist. It swung its head and caught him in the ribs. He went down hard and couldn't get his arm under him. The beast lowered its horns over him. The girl's boot slammed into the side of its skull. To be continued…

The bull staggered sideways. Its horns swept past Draxin's face and dug sand. It shook its striped head once, snorted, and bolted back through the trees. Branches cracked. Then the forest was quiet again. Draxin pushed onto his elbow. His ribs burned. Zag crawled out from under his collar, cap first, and patted his cheek with a stubby hand. The masked girl stood over him with her boot planted in the sand. She had not moved since the kick. "How did you do that," Draxin said. He sat up and coughed. "That thing was bigger than a wagon. You kicked its head like it was a melon." She looked at him. The cat mask showed nothing. One eye behind the eyehole caught the light for a second, yellow. "Was that a trick? Some village thing?" He wiped blood off his lip. "I hit it with everything I had." She turned and walked back into the trees. Her boots made almost no sound on the roots. Draxin watched her disappear between two red-leaved trunks. He waited. She did not come back. "Hey," he called. Nothing answered. Zag climbed onto his shoulder. "She's gone." "I noticed." "You're bleeding." "I noticed that too." Draxin stood up slow. He pressed a hand against his ribs and felt them shift under his fingers. Not broken. Just angry. He looked once more at the gap in the trees where the girl had gone. Then he turned the other way and started walking. "We should go back to the desert," Zag said. "We should keep looking. The tracks are cold out there. In here there's shade and water and weird girls who can kick." "That's not a good reason." "It's the reason I have." He stepped over a root the size of his leg. The forest smelled wet. Orange and green leaves hung low. Somewhere a bird made a sound like a bell. They walked. Draxin scanned the ground for prints, for anything. Zag hummed on his shoulder. After a while they came to a giant rock leaning against two trees, its face patched with moss. Something floated beside it. Draxin stopped. A small orange orb hung in the air at chest height. It was the size of a plum. Light moved inside it like slow fire. It did not drift. It did not spin. It only hung there. "Don't," Zag whispered. Draxin reached out. His fingertip brushed the surface. The orb quivered. Then it shot forward and struck his open mouth. He gagged. It went down his throat like a swallowed coal. He grabbed at his neck. He tried to cough it up. His eyes watered. He dropped to his knees, hacking, one fist on the rock. Zag stared down from his shoulder with both stubby hands over his mouth. "Draxin?" Draxin could not answer.

Draxin could not breathe. The orb burned in his chest like a swallowed ember. He clawed at the moss on the rock and tried to cough, but nothing came up. Heat pushed behind his eyes. His mouth fell open and orange light spilled out. Zag scrambled off his shoulder and stood in the dirt, both stubby hands raised. "Draxin. Draxin, look at me." The little mushroom creature slapped his knee. "Spit it out. Spit it out!" Draxin tried. His throat locked. Light poured from his eyes now too, wet and hot. The forest around him blurred into orange smears. His arms shook. He felt his own heartbeat in his teeth. The pain was bigger than anything the bull had done to him. Bigger than the day in the alley. He thought, so this is it. His knees gave out. The rock scraped his cheek on the way down. The orange light guttered. The forest went black. He woke to the smell of wood smoke and old blankets. A plank ceiling. A lantern hung from a nail. He was on a narrow bed of rough boards padded with a folded cloth. His mother's scarf was still knotted at his wrist. Someone had wiped the blood from his mouth. His chest ached but the burning was gone. A dull warmth sat behind his ribs now, quiet, like a coal buried in ash. Something small and heavy rested on his stomach. Zag. The mushroom creature was curled up asleep on top of him, green cap rising and falling. Draxin let out a breath and touched Zag's cap with one finger. Alive. Both of them. "Zag," he whispered. "Where are we?" Zag blinked awake. His eyes went wide. "You're awake. You're awake. You died. I thought you died." "I didn't." "You glowed. Your whole face. Then a man carried you." "What man?" The door of the shed banged open. The man who filled the doorway had to duck under the frame. He was tall and built like a stack of bricks, bare chest under a torn vest, a long gray scarf hanging off one shoulder. A purple mark curled across his ribs. A cigar sat in the corner of his mouth, unlit now, chewed. Gray smoke still leaked from his knuckles as if he had just closed a fist around a fire. His eyes found Draxin and narrowed. "You," the man said around the cigar, "swallowed something that wasn't yours." Draxin pushed himself up on his elbows. Zag froze on his stomach. The man stepped inside. The smoke off his hand thinned and drifted toward the lantern. He did not smile. "Kid. You've got about one minute to explain how a boy who isn't dead is walking around with a hiyrel inside him."

Draxin sat up on the plank bed. Zag slid down into his lap and clung to his thumb. The tall man with the cigar stayed in the doorway, arms crossed, smoke curling off his knuckles like it had somewhere to be. "I don't know what a hiyrel is," Draxin said. His voice cracked. He pressed a hand to his chest. The warmth pushed back against his palm. "I found it in the trees. It was floating. I ate it." The man's jaw worked around the cigar. "You ate it." "It flew into my throat." "Orbs don't fly into throats, kid. People swallow them." The man stepped inside and pulled a crate over with his boot. He sat. The crate groaned. "Name's Dante. I run a crew called Burn. We hunt hiyrel. Which means you and me are going to have a real careful talk before I decide what to do with you." Draxin's hand tightened on Zag. "Then tell me what's inside me." Dante pulled the cigar from his mouth. Gray smoke bent around his fingers and gathered in his palm like water. He shaped it into a small ball above his hand. It hung there, spinning. "A hiyrel is a stone," he said. "Rarest thing in Ujaria. Maybe a hundred exist in the whole world. They grow in wild places where nobody goes. Deep forests. Salt flats. Caves under the sea. Each one holds a power. Fire. Water. Smoke. Speed. Whatever the world decides." The smoke ball drifted toward Draxin and dissolved before it touched him. "You don't wear a hiyrel," Dante said. "You swallow it. It settles in your chest. It bonds to your blood. From then on, its power is yours. Mine is smoke. Twelve years I've had it." "Then I have one too," Draxin said. "You have one. That's the problem." Dante leaned forward. His eyes went flat. "One is a gift. Two is a corpse. Every man who's ever tried to hold two hiyrel at once has died screaming inside a day. Their bodies can't take it. So the one in your chest is the only one you will ever have. You understand? For the rest of your life." Draxin looked down at his hand on his ribs. The dull warmth pulsed once, steady. "What's mine?" he asked. "Don't know yet. It'll show when it wants to. Could be a week. Could be a year." Dante stood. The crate creaked with relief. "But that hiyrel you swallowed had an owner. My crew has been tracking it for two months. And now it's in a skinny kid in a shed." Zag made a small sound. Dante put the cigar back between his teeth. "So here's what happens next. You're coming with us until I figure out what's growing in your ribs. Try to run, and the smoke finds you before your feet do." He walked out. The door stayed open behind him.

Dante walked Draxin out of the shed and up a slope of packed dirt. A wooden building leaned into the hillside, its boards patched and nailed over with more boards. A banner hung above the door with a purple flame stitched on cloth. Men and women moved on the porch, cleaning weapons, sorting packs. They looked up when Dante passed. They did not look long. "Eleven," Dante said. He nudged Draxin forward with two fingers on his shoulder. "That's how many are in Burn. You make twelve if you count the kid we're babysitting. Which I don't." Draxin stopped at the doorway. Zag pressed flat against his neck. "I didn't ask to come here." "Nobody asks." Dante bit down on his cigar. Smoke slid out the side of his mouth and hung against the doorframe. "You swallowed something that belongs to my crew. Until I know what it makes you, you stay under my watch. You eat here. You sleep here. You don't wander." "For how long?" "Until further notice." Draxin's chest pulsed once, warm. He thought of the cold tracks in the desert, the ten years already lost. Every hour here was another hour the broken circle got farther away. Dante crouched. His eyes were level with Draxin's now, and the laid-back frown was gone. "Listen. I've watched a lot of hosts come up. Some last a month. Some last a week. I want to see how far you make it, kid. I mean that." He tapped Draxin's sternum with one knuckle. "So don't waste my time dying." He stood and walked inside. The door swung half shut behind him. Draxin turned away from it. He walked to the edge of the porch and gripped the rail. Below, the yard ran down to a line of scrub trees. He was counting the trees, measuring a run, when someone dropped from the roof beam onto the boards beside him. The cat mask. White with blue stripes. Same ripped brown pants. Same quiet boots that made no sound landing. Draxin's grip locked on the rail. "You." The girl who had kicked the bull off his chest tilted her head. She looked at the shed, at the banner, at the warmth he was holding against his ribs. She did not seem surprised to find him here. "You're with them?" he said. She didn't answer. She reached out and tapped his chest, right where the stone sat, with one finger. Then she held up two fingers and shook her head. One. Only one. "How do you know that?" She stepped back. Behind her mask, the yellow eye holes caught the light. "Mimi." Dante's voice came through the doorway. "Inside." She turned and went in without looking at Draxin again. Draxin stayed on the porch. Zag climbed onto his shoulder. The door was open. The rail was low. But he did not run. Not yet. He needed to know what they are scheming.

Draxin stayed on the porch a long time. Zag shifted on his shoulder, small stubby hands gripping his collar. The mushroom creature's green cap brushed his ear. Through the open door he could hear voices inside the hideout, low and steady, the crew Dante called Burn going about their evening. Draxin's chest still held the dull warmth of the stone he had swallowed. Every minute here was a minute the men who killed his parents kept walking away. A voice cut the yard behind him. "So this is the babysit." Draxin turned. A man had come around the side of the building. Short, shorter than Draxin by half a foot, with a jagged white and purple mohawk and a ripped sleeve hanging off one shoulder. A purple skull was inked there. He wore a spiked choker and a wide grin full of teeth. Draxin knew right away this man belonged to Dante the way a knife belongs to a hand. "Name's Spike," he said. He walked up the porch steps two at a time. "Right hand of the captain. And you're the kid who ate our rock." "I didn't know it was yours." "Cute." Spike circled him once, sniffing like a dog. He stopped in front of Draxin and had to tilt his chin up to meet his eyes. His grin tightened. "Tall for a thief." "I'm sixteen." "I didn't ask." Spike raised one hand. Black liquid welled up from under his fingernails and beaded on his knuckles. It hissed against the porch board where a drop fell. The wood smoked and pitted. "Dante says wait. I say we open you up, take our stone back, save the crew two months of feeding a corpse." Says Spike. Zag squeaked and pressed flat against Draxin's neck. Draxin held still. He had seen men move fast before. He watched Spike's wrist, not his face. Spike's hand shot forward at Draxin's stomach. A larger hand caught Spike's wrist mid-air. Dante stood in the doorway, cigar between his teeth, smoke curling around his knuckles. Draxin had not seen him arrive. "Spike." "Cap. I was gonna be quick." Dante squeezed. Spike's grin flickered. The black ink on his fingers pulled back under the skin like water down a drain. "The kid is mine to open or not open," Dante said. He did not raise his voice. "You touch him before I say, I burn the hand off. Clear?" "Clear." Dante let go. Spike shook his wrist out, laughed once, and stepped back. He pointed two fingers at Draxin like a gun. "Lucky kid." He walked inside. Dante did not follow him yet. He looked at Draxin over the cigar. "You just made an enemy in my crew," he said. "Show me something soon, or I stop standing in his way." He went in. The door swung shut. Draxin gripped the rail. He had bought time. Not much. He had to make the stone answer him soon.

Draxin slept on the porch with Zag curled against his neck. He woke to boots on the wood and the smell of cigar smoke. Dante stood over him, cigar burning, arms crossed. Gray light sat behind the trees. Morning had come faster than Draxin wanted. "Up," Dante said. "You wanted to earn your keep. Today you get the chance." Draxin sat up. Zag rubbed his tiny eyes with a stubby hand. Before Draxin could ask, another crew member ran up the porch steps with a small bronze bell in his palm. The bell was still ringing on its own, thin and steady, like a wire pulled tight in the air. Draxin had never seen a bell ring without a hand on it. "Village ring," the crew member said. He was breathing hard. "Grants Lake side. Attack in progress." Dante took the bell and closed his fist around it. The ringing stopped. Smoke leaked between his fingers and curled up to the porch beam. "Follow me," he said to Draxin. He walked Draxin off the porch and out under the banner with the purple flame. In the yard he stopped and pointed at the ground with two fingers, like he was drawing a map on dirt Draxin couldn't see. "Every region in Avator has a crew," Dante said. "One crew, one region. The village rings, the crew answers. That's the deal. Our region runs from the desert edge past Grants Lake to the tree line where I found you. Those people ring, we run. No exceptions." "Why are you telling me?" "Because you eat our food and sleep on our porch." Dante's cigar shifted between his teeth. "You're coming. You wanted to prove the stone answers you. Prove it on someone attacking my villagers." A man in a straw hat was standing at the yard gate, out of breath, hands on his knees. Dirt streaked his shirt. He had run the whole way from the village. He looked up at Dante and his mouth worked before words came. "Men in long coats," the villager said. "Bandages on their faces. They came into the market. They're taking people." Draxin's chest went cold, then hot. The dull warmth of the stone pushed up under his ribs. Long coats. Bandaged faces. The same shape as the men who had killed his mother and father. The same shape he had spent ten years chasing. He stood up straight. Zag's stubby hands tightened on his collar. "I'm going," Draxin said. "I already said you were." Dante turned toward the trees. Smoke trailed off his shoulders. "Keep up. And if you freeze when you see them, I leave you where you drop." Draxin followed him out of the yard. For the first time since the fire in his village, he was moving toward the men in the coats, not away.

They reached the edge of Grants Lake at a hard run. Dante stopped Draxin behind a stack of wooden crates near the first row of houses. Smoke rose over the thatched roofs, thin and black. A woman was screaming somewhere past the market square. Dante pulled a folded cloth from his belt and shoved it at Draxin's chest. "Put it on." It was a torn purple scarf with a yellow flame stitched on it. The banner of his crew. Draxin threw it over his shoulders and tied the ends at his throat. Zag patted the cloth with a stubby green hand and gave a small, worried squeak from under his spotted cap. "Now the villagers know you're with us," Dante said. "And my crew knows not to cut you down by accident. Stay behind me until the stone answers. If it answers." They moved into the square. Four bandaged men in long coats stood over a huddle of villagers on their knees. One held a rope tied to a farmer's wrists. Another turned at the sound of boots. Draxin saw the wrapped face, the dark eyes above the bandage, and his legs stopped. It was the same face. The same coat. The face from the alley where his mother had died. He pressed a hand to his chest. The stone sat there, warm and dull, like a coal under wet ash. He pushed at it. He begged it. Come out. Do something. Burn them. The warmth stayed a warmth. Nothing more. "Move, kid," Dante said, and stepped past him. Dante did not draw a weapon. He took the cigar from his teeth and blew out a long gray line of smoke. The smoke did not drift. It thickened and shot forward like a whip. It wrapped the first bandit's throat and yanked him off his feet. Dante was already gone from where he'd stood. He came out of the smoke behind the second man and drove an elbow into his skull. The bandit dropped without a sound. The third turned to run. A rope of smoke caught his ankle and slammed him flat. The fourth raised a curved knife. Dante flash-stepped through his own exhale and put a fist through the man's ribs. All four were down in the time it took Draxin to breathe twice. Draxin had not moved. The banner hung loose at his neck. His hand was still pressed to a chest that would not answer him. A villager in a straw hat looked up from the dirt, saw the purple flame on Draxin's shoulders, and mouthed a thank you at him. Draxin looked away. Dante walked back through his own smoke, cigar between his teeth again. He looked at Draxin for a long moment. He did not say I told you. He did not have to. "The stone didn't answer," Dante said. "Useless.”

They walked back from Grants Lake in a line. Dante led. Spike walked at the rear, quiet for once. Draxin kept his eyes on the dirt. The purple scarf still hung at his throat, but it felt borrowed now, like a coat that didn't fit. Zag pressed his small green cap against Draxin's neck and said nothing. The mushroom creature knew when to be quiet. At the hideout, Dante stopped at the door under the flame banner. He pulled the cigar from his teeth and pointed it at Draxin. "Wash up. Eat. We talk in the morning." Then he went inside. The door shut. Draxin stood in the yard with his hand still on the warm, useless coal in his chest. "Hey, banner boy." Spike came around the corner of the shed. Short. Mohawk sharp as knives. He was smiling with all his teeth. He had been smiling like that since the market. "Walk with me," Spike said. "Round back. Captain wants the stone counted." It was a lie. Draxin knew it was a lie. He walked anyway. His legs were tired of being afraid. Behind the shed, out of sight of the door, Spike stopped. He held up one hand. A bead of black ink rose out of his palm and hung in the air. It hissed against a fallen leaf and ate a hole through it. "You froze," Spike said. "Four of them. Captain did the work. You stood there like a post." He flicked another drop into the dirt. It smoked. "He won't say it. I will. You're dead weight. And dead weight in my crew? I trim it." Draxin backed against the wall. He shoved at the stone in his chest. Come out. Please. The warmth stayed a warmth. Spike raised his hand. The ink gathered into a fat black drop above his fingers, big as a fist. Zag jumped. The little mushroom leapt from Draxin's shoulder and slapped his spotted cap over Spike's eyes. Spike swore and swatted. The ink drop flew wide and hit the shed wall. The wood hissed and sank in on itself. Draxin ran. Not away. Forward. He drove his shoulder into Spike's stomach and knocked the short man flat. Then he grabbed Zag and bolted for the tree line. "Kid!" Spike shouted after him, laughing now, angry-laughing. "You just made it worse! You hear me? Worse!" Draxin crashed through the brush. His chest burned, not with the stone, with breath. He did not stop until the hideout banner was gone behind the leaves. He crouched by a root and held Zag against his ribs. The stone in his chest was still warm. Still silent. Dante's protection was back at the shed. He had run from it. He was alone in the forest again. And now Spike knew he would run. He tied the scarf tighter and started walking deeper in.

Draxin walked until the trees thinned. He stopped at a gap in the brush where a strange bush grew from the dry ground. Dark red branches twisted up out of the dirt. Small orange flowers glowed on it like the warmth in his chest. He touched one leaf. It was hot. Zag climbed off his shoulder and pressed his green cap against the stem, sniffing. The mushroom's stubby hand pointed back the way they came. Draxin turned. Spike stood between two trees. His white and purple mohawk caught the last light. His jacket was open. The purple skull on his shoulder looked wet. He was smiling with all his teeth. "Told you," Spike said. "Worse." Draxin grabbed Zag and shoved him behind the bush. "Stay." "Cute pet." Spike raised his hands. Black ink bubbled up from his palms and dripped into the dirt. The dirt hissed. "Captain's not here, banner boy. Just us. Just work." Draxin ran at him. It was stupid and he knew it. He swung. Spike leaned back, laughing, and flicked his wrist. A rope of ink whipped across Draxin's forearm. The pain came a second late. Draxin looked down. The skin on his arm was smoking. A strip of it peeled back like wet paper. He screamed and stumbled into the bush. Thorns caught his side. "That's the acid," Spike said. He walked forward slow. "Don't get it in your mouth. Bad day." Draxin punched at him with his good arm. Spike caught the fist and slapped ink across Draxin's other forearm. The skin went black, then red, then wrong. Draxin fell to his knees. His arms hung at his sides, cooked and shaking. "Come on, kid." Spike crouched in front of him. His piercings caught the orange from the flowers. "Use the stone. Do the thing. Give Captain a reason." Draxin shoved at the warmth in his chest. Nothing. He spat at Spike's boot. Spike laughed. He stood up and lifted one hand. Ink pooled in his palm the size of a skull. "Alright," he said. "Neck it is." Draxin closed his eyes. The warmth in his chest tore open. Heat ran down his shoulders into his ruined arms. His eyes snapped wide. He could see the veins in the leaves. He could see the sweat on Spike's throat. Everything had a yellow edge on it, like sun through paper. Spike's smile dropped. "Wait," he said. Draxin looked at his arms. The burned skin was lit from underneath. Small hard scales pushed up through the raw meat, one after another, yellow as the flowers behind him. They clicked as they came in. His fingers curled. They did not hurt anymore. He looked up. His pupils were two white stars in a field of orange fire. Zag peeked out of the bush and made a small, scared sound. Spike took one step back.

Draxin flexed his fingers. The yellow scales clicked along his knuckles. His arms felt heavy and light at the same time, like he was holding them and not holding them. He didn't understand the new weight. He only knew Spike was still standing there, and Spike had burned him. He charged. Spike threw ink. Draxin got an arm up on instinct. The black rope hit his forearm and slid off the scales in a hiss of steam. No pain. Spike's eyes went wide. "Okay," Spike said. "Okay, that's new." Draxin swung. He meant to hit Spike's jaw. His arm went too fast. His fist ripped past Spike's ear and cracked the tree behind him. Bark exploded. Splinters rained down. "Whoa!" Spike ducked and rolled sideways. He came up laughing, but the laugh was thin. "Kid, you don't even know where your hands are." He was right. Draxin's second swing spun him halfway around. He stumbled. His feet couldn't keep up with his arms. He caught himself on the scaled palm and the ground cracked under it. Spike came in low with ink pooling in both hands. Draxin threw his arm out wild. The back of his scaled wrist caught Spike across the chest and lifted him off his feet. Spike hit a tree trunk and slid down it, coughing. Draxin walked at him. His breath came ragged. He raised his fist over Spike's head. He was going to bring it down. He wanted to. He wanted the burn on his arms to be somebody's fault out loud. Spike wiped blood off his lip and grinned up at him. "Do it, banner boy." A hand closed on the back of Draxin's neck. A second hand closed on the back of Spike's. Draxin had one blink to see the gray scarf and the cigar. Dante didn't say anything. He slammed their heads together into the dirt. Draxin's vision went white. The star pupils rolled up. The warmth in his chest snapped shut like a door. He felt the scales still there. He felt Spike's shoulder against his own. Then he didn't feel anything. Dante stood over them. Ash fell from the cigar onto Spike's mohawk. He looked at Draxin's arms, still yellow and glowing faintly at the seams. He grunted. Zag crept out from behind the red bush. The little mushroom stopped at the edge of the clearing, stubby hands pressed to his green cap. "Come on," Dante said, not to Zag, not to anyone. He bent down. He hooked Spike over one shoulder like a sack. He hooked Draxin over the other. The scaled arms hung down Dante's back, knuckles dragging leaves. Dante turned toward the hideout and started walking. Zag scrambled after him, quiet, keeping up.

Draxin woke to the smell of clean wood and old bandages. He knew the ceiling before he opened his eyes all the way. He had been here before. The village infirmary. The same knot in the beam above his head. The same square of light on the floor. He turned his head. Spike lay in the cot beside his. A bandage wrapped around Spike's temple. His mohawk was flattened on one side. He was awake, staring at the ceiling, chewing something. When he felt Draxin look, he grinned without turning. "Morning, banner boy." Draxin sat up. His arms were his arms again. Tan skin. No scales. Faint pink lines ran along his forearms where the ink had burned him. He flexed his fingers. Nothing clicked. The warmth in his chest was quiet. "Don't get cute," Spike said. "Boss says we're square. So we're square." He turned his head. One eye squinted. "For now." Draxin pulled his legs off the cot. His slippers sat by the wall, lined up. Zag was curled on top of them, green cap rising and falling. Draxin picked him up. The little mushroom yawned and settled on his shoulder like nothing had happened. He left without a word. Spike didn't stop him. Outside, the sun was low. The path to the forest was worn smooth by boots. Draxin walked it. He didn't rush. His legs still felt borrowed. He thought about the tree he had cracked with his fist. He thought about Dante's hand on his neck. He didn't know if he was walking toward punishment or a job. The hideout sat in the oasis clearing. Dante stood outside it with his arms crossed, cigar burning. Mimi crouched on a crate near the door, sharpening something on a stone. Her cat mask tilted when Draxin came out of the trees. She didn't wave. She didn't have to. Dante watched him cross the clearing. "You walked," Dante said. "Good." Draxin stopped in front of him. He waited. Dante took the cigar out of his mouth. "You're a hiyrel affiliate now. You survived it. Spike survived you. That means you're useful." He blew smoke sideways. "We're moving." "Moving where?" "North. Tundra. There's a haul out there that's been sitting a long time. Gold, relics, whatever crawled in and died on top of it." He looked down at Draxin. "Not hiyrel. Just money. The crew needs a run that pays." Behind him, Spike came up the path, one hand on his bandage, still chewing. He stopped beside Mimi and spat something into the dirt. "Kid's coming?" Spike said. "Kid's coming." Mimi stood. She slid whatever she'd been sharpening into her belt. Draxin looked at the three of them. The banner. The mask. The cigar. He was in it now. Whatever it was. "When do we leave?" he asked. Dante dropped the cigar and stepped on it. "Now."

The wagon rolled north for three days. Draxin watched the desert turn to scrub, then to rock, then to snow. He had never seen snow. It stuck to his eyelashes and melted on his tongue. Zag burrowed into the satchel and refused to come out. Dante drove the horses with the reins wrapped once around his wrist, cigar burning against the wind. Mimi slept sitting up. Spike complained about his ears. On the fourth morning they crested a ridge and Draxin saw the village below. Steep metal roofs. Warm yellow windows. Smoke rising straight up in the cold air. One house stood taller than the rest, and a blue banner hung from its front beam. A white fang was painted on the cloth. "Boss," Spike said. He had stopped chewing. "That's a Fang house." "I see it." "You said the haul was buried past the village." "It is." "Then we're going through him." Dante didn't answer. He flicked the reins. They were halfway down the slope when the door under the banner opened. A man stepped out into the snow. He was huge. A white fur coat swallowed his shoulders. His gloves were metal and gears, fingers ending in claws. A blue fang was painted on his bare chest to match the banner. He grinned when he saw the wagon, and every tooth showed. "Dante Cris," he called. His voice carried across the snow like he was greeting a brother. "Seven years. You still smoke those garbage cigars." Dante stopped the wagon. He climbed down slowly. "Gustavo." Draxin slid off the back. His slippers sank into the snow to the ankle. He stayed behind the wagon wheel and watched. Gustavo Frostclaw walked out to meet them. He stopped six paces from Dante. The grin didn't move. "You know the rule. Nobody digs in my tundra without asking. Especially you." "I'm asking." "You're passing through with a crew and a wagon. That's not asking." His eyes slid past Dante and landed on Draxin. The grin widened. "New one. Small." Says Gustavo. "He's mine." Says Dante. "Everything you touch is yours, Cris. That's the problem." Says Gustavo. Mimi's hand moved to her belt. Spike shifted his weight. The snow was very quiet. Gustavo raised one metal glove. The gears clicked. "Villages here answer to me. The people in them eat because I feed them. You want to walk past my door to a hole in the ice, you pay the toll or you fight the man at the door." He tapped his chest, over the blue fang. "Same as always." Dante took the cigar out of his mouth. He looked at it. He looked at Gustavo. "Then we fight," Dante said. Gustavo laughed. It was a warm sound. He flexed the claws on his gloves. "Good," he said. "I was getting bored."

Dante moved first. Smoke poured off his shoulders and he was gone from where he stood, appearing at Gustavo's flank with a fist already swinging. Gustavo ducked without looking. His claws came up and raked across Dante's ribs, and Dante flashed back into smoke before the cut could open him. Draxin crouched behind the wagon wheel. He put a hand on his own chest. The warmth was there. It always was. But warmth was not scales. He tried to call them up the way he had in the forest, when Spike burned his arms and something inside him tore open. Nothing came. His skin stayed skin. Mimi darted along the wagon's blind side and threw two blades at Gustavo's back. He turned his head and roared. The sound hit Draxin like a shove. His knees gave. Mimi's blades dropped short in the snow. Spike went to one knee, cursing, hands over his ears. Gustavo lunged at Mimi. Dante's smoke wrapped his ankle and yanked him off balance for one second, and Mimi rolled clear. "Kid," Spike hissed. He was still on one knee. "Do the thing. Do the scale thing. Now." Draxin squeezed his fists. He pictured his arms yellow and hard. He pictured Spike's ink eating through his skin. He pictured his mother in the alley. Nothing. His hands shook, pink and bare. Gustavo caught Dante across the chest with a claw. Dante hit the snow and slid. The cigar went out. Gustavo laughed and stepped onto Dante's wrist, pinning it. "Seven years and you're still light," Gustavo said. He raised the other glove. Draxin ran. He did not decide to. His slippers came out of the snow and he was running at the huge man's back with nothing in his hands and nothing on his skin. He jumped and grabbed Gustavo's coat and climbed it like a rope. Gustavo turned his head, surprised, then annoyed. He shook once. Draxin held on. He bit down on Gustavo's ear with his sharp teeth. Gustavo bellowed. Not the stun roar. A real one. He tore Draxin off by the hair and threw him. Draxin hit the snow ten feet away and did not get up right. But Dante's wrist was free. Smoke boiled out of him in a black wall. When it cleared he was behind Gustavo again. This time his fist landed clean on the jaw. Gustavo staggered. Gustavo touched his ear. His fingers came away red. His friendly grin was gone. His shoulders began to swell inside the fur coat. White feathers pushed up from his neck. His teeth grew. "Boss," Spike whispered. Dante stood up straight. Blood ran down his stomach. He looked at Draxin in the snow. "Get behind me," he said. "He's turning." Draxin crawled. The warmth in his chest stayed a warmth. Nothing more.

Draxin got his knees under him. The snow burned his palms. Across the clearing, Gustavo's coat split down the back as white feathers pushed through. His face stretched long. Sabertooth fangs slid past his lower lip. Black spikes rose along his spine. What stood up was not a man anymore. It was a beast the size of two wagons, whiskered and hunched, claws sinking into the packed snow. Dante spat blood and stood. He rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck. The cut across his stomach kept bleeding but he didn't look at it. He pulled a fresh cigar from his vest, bit it, and lit it off a curl of his own smoke. "Spike. Mimi. Fall back to the wagon," Dante said. "I'm holding him." "Boss, you're gutted," Spike said. "I said fall back." Smoke boiled off Dante in a black wall. He flashed forward and hit the beast across the snout. The beast didn't move. It swung one claw and Dante flashed out, reappeared behind it, hit it again. This time the beast turned and caught his scarf in its teeth. Dante went to smoke and slipped free, but slower than before. Draxin saw it. Dante was tiring. Draxin pressed his hand to his chest again. Warmth. Only warmth. He begged the scales. He pictured Spike's ink. He pictured his mother. Nothing came up his arms. Mimi crouched beside him. She grabbed his shoulder hard through her glove. "It's not coming," Draxin said. She pointed at Dante, then at the wagon, then at Draxin's satchel. He didn't understand. She shook him once and pointed at the satchel again. He opened it. Inside was his mother's scarf, a knife, and the small dry piece of Veyra thornbush the crew carried for wounds. He looked past that at what Dante had loaded that morning. A cloth-wrapped bundle. A signal charge. Dante had said it was for the tundra crossing, to bring down ice on a pass. One use. Big blast. Draxin looked at the wagon. Then the ridge behind Gustavo, heavy with old snow. "Bury him," Draxin said. Mimi nodded once and went. Draxin ran to Dante's side. "Boss. The charge. Hit the ridge. Bury him." Dante's eyes moved once to the ridge. He didn't argue. "Keep him looking at me." Draxin picked up a rock and threw it at the beast's face. It roared. The sound knocked him flat. Dante flashed in and out, cutting past its eyes, keeping it turned. Mimi climbed the wagon and lit the charge. Spike dragged Draxin back by the collar. The charge arced up and struck the ridge. The mountain cracked. Snow came down in a white wall and swallowed the beast whole. The clearing went quiet. Dante dropped to one knee in the snow, cigar still lit. "Move," he said. "Before he digs out."

The buried ridge groaned behind them as the crew ran. Dante kept one hand on his gut, the other on Draxin's shoulder for balance. Mimi took point. Spike dragged the wagon by its harness because the mule had bolted. Zag clung to Draxin's collar, shaking. "He'll dig out," Dante said. "Sooner than we want. Move." They reached the cave mouth by dusk. It cut into the base of a black cliff, wide enough to swallow the wagon. Old Burn crew marks were scratched by the entry — a circle with a slash. Dante's mark. The haul was here, buried years ago. "Torches," Dante said. Spike lit two. The light showed blue ice down the walls and a floor slick with frost. Their breath came out white. They went deep. The passage opened into a chamber stacked with crates half-frozen to the ground. Gold spilled from a split lid. Relics wrapped in oiled cloth sat in a pile. Spike whistled low. "Load fast," Dante said. He sat on a crate and pressed the Veyra thornbush against his stomach wound. His face was gray. Then the ice moved. A shape peeled off the wall. It was shaped like a man but built from blue ice, with black hollows for eyes. Two more rose behind it. Their arms ended in jagged points. "Dwellers," Spike said. He spat ink onto his palm. "Been sleeping in here." The first one charged Mimi. She slid under its swing and drove her heel up into its jaw. The head cracked and fell. The body kept coming until Spike hit it with a black spray. The ink ate through the chest and the thing dropped in pieces. Another came for Draxin. He raised his arm to guard. Yellow scales flickered up his wrist and died. He rolled instead. Mimi's boot took the creature's knee out. Draxin grabbed a shard of gold from the floor and drove it through the ice-thing's neck. It shattered. Three more crawled from the ceiling. "Keep loading," Dante growled. Smoke curled off him, thin and weak. He flashed once and dropped two. Spike caught the third with ink. The chamber went still. Draxin's chest heaved. He stared at his own hand. No scales. Just skin. "Load the wagon," Dante said again. He didn't get up. Draxin lifted a crate. As he turned, he heard it — a small clean sound, like glass tapped by a fingernail. It came from deeper in the cave, past the chamber. He stopped. Mimi looked at him through the mask. He shook his head at her. She went back to loading. Draxin set the crate down and stepped past the torches. The sound came again. Closer now. He walked around a bend in the ice. At the end of the passage, low to the ground, something glowed red. He stared.

Draxin stopped at the end of the passage. The red glow came from a blade stuck point-down in the ice. It was crooked and jagged, cut from red stone, with a gold crossguard and a leather-wrapped grip. A single eye was set into the flat of the blade. The eye was open. It was looking at him. The tapping came again. Not from the walls. From inside his head. "Draxin." He took a step back. The voice was low and dry, like a throat that had not spoken in a long time. It said his name again. Only his name. He looked over his shoulder. The torches flickered around the bend. He could hear Spike laughing about something in the main chamber. They had not heard it. He crept closer. Zag pressed flat against his neck and would not look. The eye tracked him. The glow pulsed slow, matching the warmth in his chest. His hiyrel answered it. He felt the pull in his ribs like a hook. "Pick me up." His hand moved before he decided. He gripped the leather. The stone was warm. The moment his skin touched it, the eye blinked once and the voice went quiet, satisfied. The blade came free of the ice with a small clean crack. He held it out from his body. It was lighter than it looked. "Kid." Dante stood at the bend, one hand still pressed to his gut. His cigar was cold. He looked at the blade, then at Draxin's face, then back at the blade. Mimi appeared behind him. Her mask tilted. Spike stopped whistling. "Where'd you get that," Dante said. Not a question. "It was in the ice. It knew my name." Draxin's voice came out thin. "It said it out loud. You didn't hear?" Dante's eyes stayed on the eye in the blade. Smoke curled weakly off his shoulder and died. "No," he said. "None of us did." Spike stepped forward and stopped short, like he had hit glass. "That's Tuktoni stone. That's not tundra work. That shouldn't be up here." "It shouldn't be anywhere," Dante said. He looked at Draxin a long moment. "Wrap it. Cloth, not skin. We leave now." Draxin tried to set the blade down first. His fingers would not open. He pulled, and the grip stayed against his palm like it had been sewn there. The eye blinked at him again. Mimi saw. She pulled the oiled cloth from a relic bundle and wrapped the blade around his hand, hiding the eye. The pull in his chest dulled but did not stop. "It won't let go," Draxin said. Dante turned toward the cave mouth. "Then it comes with us. Move." They ran for the wagon. The warmth in Draxin's chest pulsed twice, in time with something under the cloth, and he understood he was not carrying it. It was carrying him.

The wrapped blade tugged at Draxin's chest with every step back to the main chamber. He kept his hand low so the eye stayed pressed against his thigh. Dante watched him a long moment, then turned to the piles of crates and canvas bundles heaped along the ice wall. "We take everything we can carry," Dante said. "Fill the wagon. Move." Draxin worked one-handed. His right fist stayed closed around the leather grip under the cloth. He hauled sacks of coin to the wagon with his left arm, then boxes of old relics wrapped in oilskin. Zag rode his shoulder and pointed at things worth grabbing. A cracked bronze cup. A bundle of knives. A small carved stone that looked like a fish. Spike whistled while he worked. He kicked open a chest and grinned at the gold inside. "Boss, we're rich again." He dumped the whole chest into the wagon bed. "Short guys need extra shares. That's the rule." "No one made that rule," Dante said. "I did. Just now." Mimi carried two crates stacked to her mask. She set them down without a sound and went back for more. When she passed Draxin, she tapped the cloth on his hand once, checking the wrap. He nodded. The pull in his ribs had settled into a steady hum. He decided he would keep it. He had no way to drop it, and no way to know if it was a piece of his parents' killers or bait pulling him somewhere worse. Either answer was north of here, not behind him. He would carry it until it told him more. They loaded until the wagon axles groaned. Dante slapped the side rail. "That's the cap. Out." Draxin pulled the mule forward. The cave mouth opened into gray light and blowing snow. He blinked against the wind and stopped walking. A man stood in the snow twenty paces from the wagon. White feather coat crusted with ice. One steampunk glove hung split at the knuckles. A long red gash ran from his jaw down into his beard. He was smiling with all his teeth. "Boys," Gustavo Frostclaw said. His voice was hoarse from the cold. "You forgot to check under the snow." Spike stopped whistling. Mimi shifted her weight. Dante stepped past the mule and put himself between Gustavo and the wagon. Smoke curled weak from his shoulder. Gustavo's eyes moved to Draxin's wrapped hand. The smile widened. "And you brought something out with you. I can smell it from here." Under the cloth, the eye blinked. Draxin felt it against his palm. The blade pulsed once, hot, like it was answering a name it knew. His hiyrel answered back. Dante did not turn his head. "Kid. Get in the wagon." Draxin didn't move. His fist tightened on the grip.

Gustavo took a step forward through the snow. His split glove flexed, and the claws under the leather clicked together. Draxin's hand would not open. He tried to shove the wrapped blade at Mimi. His fingers stayed locked on the leather grip like the bones had fused. The eye under the cloth pulsed against his palm. Warm. Awake. Watching Gustavo the way a dog watches a wolf. "Kid," Dante said again. He did not look back. Smoke leaked from his shoulder in thin ribbons. "Move." "I can't." Draxin's voice came out cracked. He pulled at his own wrist with his free hand. Nothing. The blade held him like a hook through the palm. "It won't let go." Gustavo laughed, low and pleased. "It knows me, boy. It won't leave until it's tasted me." He took another step. His shadow reached the mule. Mimi was there in one motion. She caught Draxin under the arm and hauled him off his feet. Her mask brushed his ear. She tapped his wrist twice, then folded his locked fist against his chest and pinned it there with her own hand. Carry it, the tap said. Don't fight it. Just carry it. "Spike," Dante said. "On it, boss." Spike spat black ink into his palm and slung it in a wide arc across the snow between them and Gustavo. The ink hissed. Steam rose in a hot wall. "That'll burn through his boots if he's dumb." Mimi threw Draxin into the wagon bed. He landed on sacks of coin with the blade crushed under his ribs. Zag scrambled up his shoulder and clung to his sideburn. Mimi vaulted in after him and grabbed the mule reins. Gustavo walked into the ink. His boots smoked. He did not slow. "Cute." Dante turned his head at last. "Go." Mimi cracked the reins. The mule bolted. The wagon lurched and the axles screamed. Spike caught the tail rail and swung up beside Draxin, grinning through his own steam. Dante ran three strides behind and stepped into his own smoke. He came out of a second cloud already at the driver's bench. Gustavo roared. The sound hit Draxin in the teeth. The mule stumbled, then found its legs and ran harder. Snow flew from its hooves. Behind them Gustavo was through the ink wall and running, coat flaring, claws out, mouth open too wide. He was gaining. Then the roar broke into a cough. He clutched his ribs where Dante's old blow had opened him. He fell to one knee in the snow. His shout chased them down the slope. "I smell it, boy. I'll follow it." The wagon crested the ridge. The northern village fell away behind them. Draxin lay on the coin sacks with his fist still locked on the grip. The eye under the cloth had gone quiet. His arm ached to the shoulder. He looked at his hand. He could not open it. He was going to carry this thing until it decided otherwise.

The wagon rolled south for two days. Draxin sat with his fist locked on the leather grip the whole way. The blade pulled north. Every mile the mule dragged them away, the pull got worse. It tugged at the bones in his wrist. It kept him from sleeping. When he closed his eyes he saw the eye under the cloth watching him back. By the time they reached the hideout in the forest oasis, his arm was shaking. Dante kicked the door open and waved him inside. Mimi steered him to the long table. Spike dropped onto a crate and lit a cigar stub off Dante's. "Put it down," Dante said. Draxin tried. He pried at his own fingers with his free hand. They did not move. The blade jerked north against the table, dragging his wrist with it. Zag squeaked and hid behind his ear. "Still stuck," Spike said. "Fun." "Unwrap it," Dante said. Mimi cut the cloth with a small knife. The red stone came out. The eye in the middle opened and fixed on Draxin. The warmth in his chest lurched toward it like a fish on a line. "It wants the north," Draxin said. His voice was thin. "It won't stop pulling. I can't think." Dante leaned on the table with both hands. He studied the eye. He did not touch the blade. "Tuktoni answers to something. Not to you. You're just the handle." "Then what's the hand?" Spike said. "North," Dante said. "Whatever's up there is calling it home." Mimi tapped Draxin's wrist twice. Same as before. Carry it. Don't fight it. "I tried that," Draxin said. "It's still screaming in my head." She tapped again. Then she took his locked fist in both of her hands and turned the blade until the point aimed due north through the wall. The pull in his wrist eased at once. The eye slid half shut. The warmth in his chest settled. Draxin breathed out. His shoulders dropped for the first time in two days. "Point it where it wants to go," Dante said. "It stops screaming. Fight it, it doesn't." "So I just hold a compass now," Draxin said. "You hold a leash," Dante said. "On the other end is whatever killed the ice and put that thing in the wall. And Frostclaw is already walking the same road, sniffing after you." Spike whistled. "Cool. Great. Love that." Draxin looked at the blade. Aimed north, it was quiet. Turned any other way, his bones hurt. He could sleep like this. He could think. He could not put it down. "When we go," he said, "we go north." Dante pulled the cigar from his teeth. "We were going to. Now we know why." Mimi wrapped the cloth back over the eye, careful to leave the point aimed at the wall. Draxin rested his locked hand on the table and, for the first time since the cave, closed his eyes.