seated before one of the raiders, who shoved her from the horse at the feet of the very man who was now their most hated He guessed it was a bonus considering the stories the other Guardians told about their own beasts, but then again he wasn’t sure if any part of their curse was a bonus. It wasn’t the first time she had asked, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. “I can’t just run from this.”

mountain cabin. This is just more pressure, and very strange. I mean, seriously, who ever heard of a psychologists’ conventionWhat happens if you ingest atropa belladonna berries?” she asked, stabbing the cigarette out in her palm. This is for everyone who gave me a chance. I never believed in my wildest dreams I would ever have a career that I loved, but because of readers like you I’m able to write and support my family. So thank you for letting me talk to the imaginary voices in my head while hallucinating wildly. Some would call it mental illness, but I call it creativity with *spice.* Kyra tightened her fists, meeting the gaze of the old woman, her face covered in a lifetime of wrinkles and liver spots. She couldn’t tell her exact age, witches able to live far older than a human lifespan. Your neighbour,” he interrupted. “Eva Morgan, twenty-five from a small town in Kent. Both parents are deceased, a car crash when she was eighteen and she has no siblings. She’s a dancer over at The Dollhouse.” He turned towards the bar. “I wonder if she offers extras? I guess there is one way to find out.”

Food, mostly grey in colour was being sold beside him. Flies buzzed hungrily around the meat, a troll trying to convince anyone the food was edible and that the mould was an added delicacy. He felt the darkness, deep, overwhelming. Crimson. He spun once more, ready to swing with wearied arms, fighting theXander’s attention settled on the only metal allowed in the room, the weapons that were displayed in a carefully protected shield. The bubble around them shimmered, the stall owner the only person able to handle the deadly pieces. Hundreds of wooden stalls had been set up in the high-ceilinged mausoleum, with loud peddlers pushing their wares. Xander hoped the scowl that was his go-to expression was enough to keep the shopkeepers from hassling them to buy their shit. He didn’t need the skull of a siren to help with his love life, or a kidney, freshly harvested according to the sign. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.