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S tars exploded behind my eyelids but there was no time to assess the damage.

I sat up, fingers flicking as I frantically traced an escape rune into the air, freeing my ankles.

Then I rolled to my feet just as another round of spells smashed into the building next to my head, shattering the brick and sending me spinning away.

I took a narrow alley that ended in a fence and split the wire with a quick spell and the slash of my hand.

My clothes tore on the edges of the chain link, and my forehead throbbed even as blood stung my eyes, but none of that slowed me. Ahead, there was a crowd of people drinking, singing and dancing along the street.

The perfect second diversion.

I dove into the melée, snagged a colorful shawl and used it to swipe the blood from my wound before wrapping it around my shoulders.

Then, I whipped off a quick illusion rune to change the appearance of my hair to a chocolatey brown instead of its usual, almost white blonde.

I forced my feet to dance along with the music, weaving between the other dancers, spinning and turning, trying to see if I was still being followed.

My phone rang and I picked it up.

“Josh?”

“I’ve got two cars on my tail now too, black SUVs like cops or something. I can’t get to our second pickup. What do you want me to do?” There was more than a note of panic in his voice. He didn’t do well under pressure.

Ice slid down my spine. “Keep moving and just try to get there, okay?”

“I hope you’ve got some sort of magic up your sleeve, because this ain’t looking good,” he said over the roar of his bike.

Yeah, so Josh was a Dim. Human. No magic for him.

In fact, he didn’t know witches and wizards existed at all, never mind that I was one.

Dims tended to lose sight of their moral compass when faced with the possibilities of what magic could do for them.

Hell, even us Dwimmers struggled with that temptation . ..

I knew every time I used a bastardized rune instead of just relying on my wits and stealth to do a job, I was taking a risk of being found and punished by the Senate for performing unsanctioned magic.

But I’d gotten so good at shielding it. And, as terrified as I was at the thought of being magically shackled by them, I had mouths to feed.

And I was sick and tired of piecing together small scores just to keep a roof over our heads.

The quickest way to financial security for me and mine was through magic.

A fact I was sorely regretting now. I had to find a way to Josh; from there we would be in the clear.

I tapped my upper lip as I considered my options. “Try to shake them. I’ll keep circling back to the spot if I can. Either way, call me back in ten minutes. And stay safe,” I added. “I want that milkshake later.”

I hung up first, tucking my cell away. This was bad.

They were damned persistent, whoever they were, coming all the way from the States to find me.

And with two cars following Josh and all the men on my tail, there were a lot of them.

Surely more than would be warranted for a few bits and bobs of non-violent, unsanctioned magic?

Most concerning of all, though? I’d spent the thirteen years since I’d left Neverthorn blazing my own way, modifying traditional rune spells into my own shorthand version.

While I did my best to save them for the direst of situations, as far as I knew, the ones I did use had been undetectable. Which begged the question ...

How in Hecate’s name had they found me?

There had to be at least one powerhouse Dwimmer behind this. A witch or wizard strong enough to sense even the tiniest sizzle of magic in the air. Smart enough to realize that there was more than one way to throw a rune.

But who?

Still moving with the crowd, I let the momentum take me all the way down to the market square and waved at strangers, who drunkenly waved back. I swayed and stumbled as I slipped away from the crowd and let myself into the first door that I found unlocked.

I didn’t dare use my magic to change anything else about my appearance. It had been risky enough changing my hair color. Good thing I was prepared.

Pulling off my jacket, revealing a dark tank top underneath, I transferred my loot into the small pocket I had sewn into my bra. Girls love hidden pockets.

I tossed the jacket on the ground. Tearing the shawl into strips, I shimmied out of my pants and wrapped my hips in the bright material.

Knee-high boots, bright skirt, dark tank top. Making my way through the dim room, I found an empty vodka bottle and grabbed hold of it.

I let myself out, walking with a slight wobble, while I scanned the streets.

The first person I saw?

Frigging Brick.

He was not cloaked like the others, and I watched him do a slow turn of the courtyard we were in. “Anything?”

He clicked his walkie-talkie, his eyes skimming past me. “Nothing, boss.”

I couldn’t resist pushing my luck, and bumped him as I stumbled past, and he scowled down at me.

“Get out of here, lady.” He shooed at me with his hands, and his magic pushed me back a few feet. I let the shove of magic hurry me along and smiled.

A kernel of hope blooming in my chest, I made my way to the pickup site, trying to keep my pace slow and easy.

The bus stop across from my meeting point was full of revelers headed home, the bench packed with drooping bodies, the smell of vomit and alcohol covering anything else.

The rumble of a familiar bike engine on the far side of the park called to me, and I started across the street, headed in that direction.

Josh was the best getaway driver I’d known and meeting him had been a tidy bit of luck.

It didn’t hurt that he liked to bring me milkshakes and did whatever I told him to when it came to planning a heist.

I mean, for a Dim, that made him a slam dunk in my book.

I touched my fingers to the side of my bra where the unicorn diamond was tucked into my hidden pocket. “Maybe you are lucky after all.”

Picking up my pace, I broke into a jog, a grin tugging at my lips.

Of course, that grin dropped a split second later as a body slammed into me, taking me to the ground with such force it knocked the wind out of me.

“Get off me,” I growled, then twisted and delivered an open-handed blow to my assailant’s throat, crushing his windpipe.

With a gurgle, he let me go. I was about to take off again, but I was hit with a full body binder from an unseen attacker that wrapped around me within a split second and cut my fury short, stealing my breath.

It felt as though a snake slithered up and around my legs, pinning them together, then around my arms so that I stood like a soldier at attention. There were very few Dwimmers who could cast a spell that powerful, that complex, that fast.

I scanned the area in a panic and caught sight of Josh in my periphery. He was standing beside his bike twenty yards away, motionless, his jaw hanging open.

“Josh!” I screamed his name. But as three more figures advanced on me, I knew it was a lost cause. He must’ve known it too, because his eyes popped wide. Then he shook his head, leapt back on his bike, and gunned it.

Chickenshit.

“Give it up. It’s done.”

There it was again. That damned voice .

He was behind me, and I couldn’t turn to look, my head and neck locked in place.

“Look, you can have the diamond,” I began. “I was just picking it up for a friend but –“

“There is no diamond.” He was close enough that I could smell him now.

Leather and crisp air and dark magic, laced with wood smoke from a crackling fire, warm and tantalizing.

The smell took me back to being sixteen in a blink, and then the person it was attached to stepped into my line of sight, obliterating all else.

He was a massive wall of a man, easily topping 6’5”, with shoulders so broad they blocked out the moon.

He’d filled out since I’d seen him all those years ago.

I managed to zero in on his face and blinked.

Deep-green eyes capped off with dark, slashing brows, the right one bisected by a scar that went from forehead to chin.

I swayed in place, dizzy with shock as the other figures around me, including the guy I’d karate-chopped in the throat, seemed to melt away.

“Typhon Moreno?”

It wasn’t really a question. Despite the added scar, the black hair that was now kissed at the temples with a premature hint of gray, and the face that had matured by more than a decade, Typhon Moreno wasn’t a guy you forgot.

Even now, the rib positioned directly over my heart throbbed with pain of the past.

Don’t fall down that rabbit-hole again, dummy.

His gaze held mine as he tipped his head. “It’s Doyen Moreno now.”

One of my former peers from Neverthorn Academy, Typhon, had been the only student plucked straight from graduation and set onto the path of professorship without ever leaving.

He’d always been chilly and standoffish toward everyone, but once he’d started his training, he’d really cranked it up.

In fact, he’d been instrumental in me leaving when he’d aimed his dislike directly at me, though I was never totally sure why.

Judging by the scowl on his face, nothing had changed.

His eyes drifted over my face. “We’ve been looking for you for quite a while now. I was sent to ... present you with a choice, Ms. Daygon,” he said. A movement on each side of him told me we were being flanked, and Brick came up behind him.

“What kind of choice? I mean, let’s be honest. You have me all bound up in your magic, so my choices are pretty limited at the moment.”

He didn’t so much as move, but I could feel the menace rolling off him, pressing on me. “Harlow Daygon. You can come to Neverthorn of your own accord, or –”