My strike wasn’t hard. I had no stomach for hurting this spindly, strange-looking fae who cowered against the wall. This clearly wasn’t the first time he’d been beaten. The male trembled like a leaf and tried to protect himself with his long thin upper arms.
With my wolf’s strength to draw on, I could break him into pieces without thinking twice, but that wasn’t my goal. My eyes narrowed on the tiny barbs my weapon had left in his skin. The spiked metal glinted in the dull light of the twin fae moons before they burrowed further into his turquoise skin.
I sighed and stood to my full height. Placing my hands on my hips, I stared down at him. This fae was just doing what his master had ordered. Like many of the lower castes in the Summer Kingdom, he had no power and was repeatedly beaten into submission. I could see the old bruises on his arms and neck. Whatever bastard owned this blue-skinned, yellow-eyed servant did not treat him well.
I narrowed my eyes on him. “Who’s your master?”
He peered up at me. His throat bobbed. “I-I can’t tell you, Yellow. He’ll kill me and sell my family to the traders.”
I flicked my dyed-blonde hair off my shoulder. Normally I plaited it so it was out of my way, but I didn’t bother today. My lead on Walker, the fae who betrayed my family and me, had come to nothing again. I curled my fists and took a deep breath. The disappointment meant mundane things like my hair were easily forgotten. My target watched me with wide eyes as I quickly braided the stuff out of my way. I had to agree, it did seem like a weird thing to do when I was supposed to be threatening him. I shrugged. My work involved a lot of fighting, and these days we often had to run from the fae authorities. It would just get in the way. I suppose I could cut it off, but Connor, the guy I grew up with and the only person whose opinion mattered to me, had loved it, so I wanted to keep it even if I did have to disguise its normally bright red colour.
“Fine. Get lost. But if I catch you sniffing around this place again, your boss won’t get a chance to end you. I’ll do it myself.” I infused my voice with enough venom to make the threat believable. I hated the hierarchical system in Faerie. It was like going back to the middle ages on Earth.
“Whoa, Yell, you can’t just let him go. He knows where our stash is, and if he knows, so does his master.” Blue, who was my friend, and the most awesome, bad-assed bitch I could have as my partner, looked at me like I was crazy.
I yanked the tall, ridiculously thin fae up from the ground. He swayed a bit, a sickly sheen covering his skin as I straightened his clothes. I made a show of smoothing down his silk waistcoat. He obviously worked for one of the disgustingly rich high fae families.
“What’s your name?” I asked, knowing full well he wouldn’t give it to me. Names held too much power in this land. But Blue was right; we couldn’t afford for him to go spreading word of where we hid our stash of digitalis. The petals, leaves and roots of the plant we knew as Foxglove were worth a fortune here in Faerie. Blue and I dealt in the sale and distribution of the plant. It was deadly to humans, but to the fae, it had opiate-like effects that they paid for handsomely.
We’d been dealing here for four years now, but rather than the authorities managing to catch us and shut us down, we just got more creative and always evaded them. It was a dangerous career choice, but definitely worth the risk to our lives. Though it was more than the riches, which I never really spent, that made me continue with this unlawful existence—it was the challenge and the fact I got to search for Walker. I loved evading the cunning and powerful fae royal families. We’d been dealing within the borders of the summer realm for about a year now. Rumour had it that it wasn’t just the Summer King who was out for our blood but the High King of Faerie: the Winter King.
Fortunately, the threat of capture didn’t matter to me. I had nothing beyond this