Page 5

Chapter four

Calix

T ucked into the upper boughs of a black-leafed kuraiha tree, Calix watched the sun sink low. His fingers already couched another arrow against the string of his bow.

Down in the valley, he saw movement in the makeshift camp the Kunishi raiders had erected there, just on the cusp of the Drakmor-Kuni border. In the dying light, the flicker of a campfire winked from the very heart of the camp, sending long tongues of wood smoke unfurling against the deepening twilight.

The beasts were getting bolder by the day.

Lighting a fire to mark their position so close to the deep hills of Blackrun was their second mistake, to be sure. But their first?

Thinking they could raid and pillage along the Drakmori border without earning for themselves the supremely unwanted attention of the Crow and his Twelve Sons .

When a burst of movement erupted from just below and to his right, Calix’s eyes snapped that way. He watched as a bird shot from the underbrush and took to the sky.

His own muscles tensed in response.

Calix lifted his bow. He drew its string taut. He sighted down the end of the arrow and tracked the bird up, up, up, up, up…

T here .

His arrow sang through the air and swiftly found its mark.

Calix smirked while watching that potentially traitorous bird fall to the earth. Rumor had it those raiders down in the valley might very well have a Fangtalker with them.

One could never be too careful.

The sound of a whistle on the wind drew Calix back to the moment and away from all thoughts of unnatural Kunishi beast whisperers. He shot a glance over his left shoulder and squinted down through the leaves, back toward his own camp.

To the untrained ear, that whistle might very well have been some sort of songbird calling out to the deepening night.

But Calix recognized the Crow’s call for what it was—a summons.

His latest arrow he reunited with its fellows in his quiver. His bow he slung over his shoulders. And then Calix Fitzjesmaine, bastard son of the Viscount of Jesmaine, shimmied his way through the inky boughs and midnight-hued leaves of the kuraiha tree.

Though rare within the boundaries of Drakmor itself, he knew from their sporadic forays past the border that those trees grew plentifully all throughout Kuni. The Kunishi considered them bad luck, though. Which made it a perfect lookout point.

None of them would be likely to draw near.

When Calix’s feet touched down upon the forest floor, he bit back a groan of pain. His body ached in protest from the hours he had spent tucked in the high branches of that blastedly dark tree.

Next time, he was demanding the youngest Son, Sven, be put on lookout duty.

Another whistle cut through the air—a higher-pitched question from Beck. The Crow’s second-in-command was the worrying sort, always quick to jump to the worst possible conclusions when faced with any manner of adversity.

Stamping his feet to bring some life back into his legs, Calix pursed his lips and loosed a single, low whistle himself.

I’m coming, I’m coming.

He knew they had to move. The sun was down. The moon was new.

Only stars winked in the sky overhead as he crouched low and crept down the hill toward the ridge where he had left the rest of the Sons. The air was chill and damp as it always was this close to the border, leaving Calix feeling as if he were wading through a thick soup as he stalked along.

When he reached the edge of the ridge, he dropped to the ground and rolled off its ledge without a moment’s hesitation. A brief fall and another roll behind a tangle of greenery later saw him lurching back to his feet and coming face to face with a frowning Beck in the mouth of the cave .

“You’re late,” Beck growled by way of greeting.

“Yes, well. Sorry, Mother , but there was a bird,” Calix explained as he dusted himself off.

Talk of a bird earned a concerned hum from young, dumb Sven and a question of, “Did it get away?”

Calix could only scoff. “Of course not.”

He? Let a potential spy get away?

Never .

Not waiting for any further pointless questions, Calix strode deeper into the cave to find their leader.

The Crow of Drakmor cut a strikingly unimpressive figure, especially within the very heart of the gloom. The shortest man Calix had ever met—even smaller than the Kunishi—there was something decidedly disarming about the one-eyed fellow hunched at the back of the cave, sharpening the edge of his glaive.

Something that could easily lead a person to overlook him, to discount him, to underestimate him.

But Calix knew better.

Here was the very reason he had left behind his peaceful life working the Violet District within the capital city of Falwood to join the Twelve Sons.

Not for glory. Not for battle—though that was its own sort of pleasure. Not for any sense of petty revenge against his father, nor his upbringing. No.

It was for him.

For Aldric Hargrave, the true King of Drakmor.