reason, he’s owned by these vamps, and it hangs heavy in his irises like shadows he can’t dilate enough to see through.
Canes owning other Canes is an ancient and shameful practice...but it’s still technically legal. Just like a shifter being collared under shifter law is still legal. It should have been outlawed decades ago, but it wasn’t.
And although I’m not a shifter, technically, the collar was put on me with my permission, which means Kaazu had every right to do it. What would be illegal is if someone removed an active collar without the owner’s permission. If caught, the person’s life could be forfeit, and Kaazu has every right to kill him.
The plan is to do it all without getting caught.
I nod slightly to the conjurer kid before my eyes move on to focus on Kaazu. My master is busy taking the bets for the upcoming fight that will end our show. The bets are coming in heavier than usual, and the vampires are going for it with full enthusiasm.
I’m making sure of it.
Nearly all of my fellow troupe members are shifters, aside from one vampire. And then there’s me. Master Kaazu picked me because I’m something different.
I’m a stimulant. A somewhat rare breed of Cane. The only way you get a stimulant is when a shifter breeds with a conjurer, but the success rate of creating offspring from that match is very, very low. But when it works...well, there’s a reason Master Kaazu spent so much money to buy me from my family when I was just a kid.
As a stimulant, I’m able to stimulate a particular emotional response in people. My power lies with confidence. It doesn’t matter if it’s an individual or a crowd, I can pull out confidence from a person until they think they’re a king ready to rule.
Master Kaazu knew that I would be a lucrative addition to his troupe for two very specific reasons.
The first is I can tug out confidence from all my troupe members, ensuring that they’re self-assured whenever they’re on stage, which always makes the performance better. Flawless, even. Nerves can ruin just about any routine.
But the real reason I’m so valuable? I can work a crowd.
Master Kaazu makes money when Canes hire us to come perform for them. But that’s not his most lucrative venture. Not by far. The real money is in the bets. Our troupe’s performance always ends with a real, non-choreographed fight. The bets come in—all of them through Kaazu—and he skims a portion off the top. It’s my job to ensure that the crowd is confident enough to place those bets.
I collect the bets myself sometimes, telling Kaazu that the crowd is harder to affect long-distance, so I need one-on-one interactions. It’s usually a lie, of course. I just do that when I’m going to skim a portion of the profits for myself.
I have to be careful, though. Meticulous. I can’t do it too often, or Kaazu will figure it out. But I’ve skimmed as often as I dare, and I’ve saved up every single bill.
Tonight, I’m handing it all over.
Right now, I’m pulling so much confidence from the crowd that it shows visibly in the cocky slants of their postures and arrogant glints in their eyes. Every single one of them is going to make a bet and make certain that Master Kaazu is occupied. I want him so distracted by the rising dollar signs that he won’t notice the surge of magic that’s going to happen on stage.
I feel someone come up beside me, and my eyes track over to the conjurer kid who’s made it over to my side. With brown hair that flops over his head like a mop, blue eyes, and traces of adolescent acne, he can’t be more than fifteen. But he’s a conjurer, and a damn powerful one at that. I’m sure that’s why the vamps keep him.
“You ready?” I murmur, keeping my eyes on the stage.
The young male cracks his knuckles in a nervous gesture as his eyes dart over to the vamps, but no one is paying us any attention. Not while the females are in the crescendo of their performance, all the added effects further hypnotizing everyone. If I wasn’t already immune from years of exposure, I’d be entranced too. It’s not called Troupe Delirium for nothing.
I feel tendrils of worry wafting from the kid. “I don’t know…” he mumbles.
I can tell how nervous he is just by looking at him. I don’t even need