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“I’ll meet ye there.” Broderickwasgoing to travel with the caravan, but after Amice’s delicate reprimands about Davina, he wanted to distance himself. “I’ll speak to Nicabar before I leave an’ have someone help ye and Veronique with the tent. The journey should only take ye three days.”

Amice frowned but nodded. She returned to sorting her herbs. “Do whatever you think is best.”

Damn her. He shoved aside his guilty conscience and gave her a quick peck on the cheek. “Travel safe. I’ll see ye and Veronique in a few days.”

Before she could respond, he turned and strode away, his cloak billowing slightly in the wintry night breeze as he directed his path toward the city of Aberdeen.

Broderick moved silently through the narrow lanes, the scent of damp stone and burning hearths lingering in the air. He lifted his head and inhaled—there. The stench of unwashed flesh, sour wine, and something fouler still. The man in the red shirtlurking around the Romani camp in the shadows.

The scent guided him deeper into the city’s underbelly—a knotwork of alleys slick with grime and greed. He passed a broken crate, a sleeping drunk, a crumbling wall smeared with soot.

Then…voices. Slurred, careless.

“…easy pickin’s, I tell ye. No guards, no real fighters among ’em, just a bunch o’ dancers and tinkers. We wait ’til they’re far enough north, then we strike.”

Broderick froze, senses honing, rage igniting in his chest.

Another voice answered, low and rough. “Ye sure about this, Ralston? If we’re wrong, it could be our necks.”

The first man—Ralston—gave a mocking laugh. “Ye think I’m daft? I heard it straight from the man ’imself, clear as day. They’re headin’ north tae Stewart Glen. Tha’ road’s perfect for an ambush. We take everythin’—wares, gold, whatever they’ve got—then have our fill o’ the women. Burn the wagons. Leave no one alive tae talk about it.” A pause. Then, with venom, “We’ll be doin’ th’ world a service by killin’ them vermin.”

The second man laughed, low and mean. “Aye, that does sound like easy pickin’s.”

Broderick’s blood boiled. His fangs itched to descend, the Hunger simmering just below the surface. He advanced, silent and swift, a blur in the dark.

As he rounded the corner, the men came into view—Ralston slouched against the wall, a half-empty bottle in hand, while his companion crouched beside him, whetting a blade against a stone.

Broderick needed no further confirmation.

He stepped into the alley, boots striking cobblestone with pending doom.

Both men jerked upright, the air snapping with sudden awareness.

“Who the ’ell are you?” Ralston barked, slurring the words.

Broderick said nothing. He let the silence swell. In the window over their heads on the building behind them, Broderick saw his eyes glint silver, the mark of the Hunger flaring to life. His incisors extended and his tongue caressed the tip of one sharp fang.

The second man staggered back against the wall, blade slipping from his fingers.

“Leave us be,” Ralston growled, trying to square his shoulders. “We’ve no quarrel with ye.”

Broderick’s smile was pure ice. “Oh, but I’ve a quarrel withyou.”

He struck.

In a flash, he had Ralston by the shirtfront, lifting him clean off the ground and slamming him against the alley wall. The bottle crashed to the ground in a spray of glass and stinking spirits.

The second man spun to flee—

“Stay,” Broderick said.

Not loud. Not forceful. But the command hit like iron wrapped in velvet.

The man froze, rooted by the sheer weight of the word, by Broderick’s immortal ability to compel with his voice. He turned, wide-eyed, limbs trembling.

Broderick turned his focus to Ralston, growling, “Ye were plannin’ to ambush the Romani.”

Ralston gaped, eyes rolling in panic.