Accidental Surrogate

Sinclair

I growl down at the man before me, who is younger than I thought he would be, for one with

such power. He has thick black hair and a day’s worth of stubble on his thin cheeks. The man

glares up at me with dark, angry eyes and opens his mouth to speak but before he can, I slap him

– hard with an open palm.

–

The man gasps with surprise and pain, his eyes going wide as he stares down at the floor, and I

smirk. I doubt this man has been slapped anytime recently, if ever. He has the smug look of

someone used to being in charge.

But he’s in my house now.

“You’ll speak when we tell you to speak,” I growl, and then I turn to the head of my

–

reconnaissance team, who is standing against the wall, his hands on his knees, panting a little.

Craig isn’t a small man to see him so undone by the efforts suggests that this diminutive priest

is, indeed, powerful in other ways.

“How did you catch him?” I snap. Craig looks up at me and does his best to straighten up.

“We followed the leads, sir,” he replies, looking me in the eyes, “that we gleaned from the

conversation with the other priest, who wished to remain anonymous. They were…fruitful. We

found this one’s lair, for lack of a better word. It was actually in a sewer -in an abandoned

maintenance room. He was living there doing…” Craig hesitates and then shrugs. “Forgive me, Sir,

for the dramatic language, but ‘arcane magics‘ are the only words coming to my mind now. Lizard

skins…and and snail shells, in jars – he had a cauldron –”

“Thank you,” I say, interrupting and nodding towards the head of my investigative team. “You.

will give your details to Alastair, as soon as you can. For now, though I want everyone here for

the interrogation.” I lean forward towards the priest, who watches me with wary eyes and a

clenched jaw.

interrogation,” I continue, lowering my voice and

need

his teeth at me

makes him faulter. And then I step away,

are tensed, ready to rip this man’s head off.

as he looks down at the

And what your people want with my brother’s

at Roger, a too–wide expression that shows all of his

laughter in his voice now. Roger stares at him

behind the priest

against the

flies through the priest’s body, making him shriek and

quickly. The priest goes a little slack in his

the chair to get the

with my

the priest looks up at

matter,” the priest says, shaking his head and holding his gaze.

a smile growing on his face. “You are already…too

laugh, as a crash of glass sounds and

upstairs –

my heart stops as I

Ella

was just sitting here, tense, in my rocking chair by Rafe’s

always is – shushing him quietly

–

at

curiously, expecting a little bird

flooded me when I saw a black–masked face calmly tapping on my window, grinning

gasped, my body turning to ice as I

coming for him.”

–

fast – the man pulled back his arm, and made a fist, and crashed

window

have broken his hand –

into the room through the hole he made with his fist, the rest of

cracking and shattering around him

–

he hit the floor, only half an instant later, my instincts came back to me, and I

basinet behind me and screamed

into the

his feet at the foot of the window. As he stands,

–

–

way up to

unnaturally fast

in the lead is on his feet now, grinning at me, starting to prowl towards