Sanaa's heart thundered in her chest as she watched the smile on her mother's face widen. Of course, she laid a trap for them. How had they been so stupid?

Her temper flared, but she did her best to hold it in check. She couldn't afford to be careless until they were safely back in Ronin's home. If they lived through the night.

A man emerged from the shadows behind Niabe. The beams from the floodlights shimmered against his pale skin. His blood-red eyes wandered Sanaa's body without any hint of shame, the way a hungry lion might look at a wounded gazelle. Even Sanaa knew that only blood sorcerers, the most hated of all powyr users, had eyes the color of blood.

"Sanaa, welcome," he said, the accent in his voice barely audible. "Your mother has told me so much about you."

"Really? She hasn't told me a damned thing about you."

A cold smile tugged at the corner of the man's lips. "A tragedy beyond imagining. I am Deckard Channing. Niabe has been in my employ for some years."

Fear and fury mingled in Sanaa's blood. "You mean you're the bastard that destroyed her."

Deckard canted his head to the side. "I don't think that's fair. You should have seen her back then. Tired, grieving, afraid for herself and for you. I gave her purpose. I gave her faith!"

"By stealing her soul?" Ronin asked. He positioned himself between Sanaa and Deckard, his hands open at his sides.

For the first time, Deckard turned his attention to the dragon. Pure contempt filtered into his expression, making him look even more dangerous. "I assure you, I took nothing that Niabe wasn't more than willing to part with."

Sanaa looked at her mother. Niabe was nearly fifty years old, but she had the posture and manner of a woman half her age. She tried to picture her mother as she would have been twenty years in the past, when she first encountered Channing. A good-looking man, with the money to make all her dreams come true. A man who offered her the world when everything and everyone she held dear was lost to her. What woman wouldn't have wanted him? The story hit almost too close to home.

"That was my mother," Sanaa said. "I'm not her."

Deckard shrugged. "Aren't you? Here you are at my door with something I want. Although, I admit, you've also brought things I could do without."

"Careful, blood worker," Ronin spat. "Don't think I can't feel the stink of it on you from here."

If the blood sorcerer took any offense to Ronin's words, he didn't let on. "You wield the powyr your way, dragon, and I will wield it mine."

As if to cement his point, Channing extended a hand out toward Niabe. A cloud of fine red particles formed in the air over her, gathering until a thin sheet of blood hovered over her arm.

"Ultimately, it's only a matter of skill, isn't it?" Channing asked the question with the disinterest a normal person might use to describe the weather. "The powyr and wyrd are in our blood, after all. Does it really matter so much if I prefer to take it from the source?"

His fingers wiggled and danced in the air as he spoke, gathering the blood veil into a ball which he beckoned into his palm. Channing closed his fist, obscuring the ball from view, but Sanaa could swear she saw it leeching into his skin.

"You're a monster," she whispered, though the word didn't feel powerful enough to describe Deckard, the demon with the paper-white skin who’d single-handedly brought her family to ruin.

"That depends on your point of view." Deckard opened his hand again and caressed Niabe's arm with his blood-stained fingers. He smirked with satisfaction at the tremble his touch brought forth. "Your mother might disagree."

Ronin craned his head to exchange a glance with Sanaa, the muscles in his chest tensing and releasing as if to convey his message more thoroughly. She didn't need him to tell her what she already knew, this encounter could only end in bloodshed, but the Dragon wanted to take the lead.

Sanaa blinked to let him know that she understood. Then her eyes moved back to Channing's ashen skin and chilling smirk. "My mother hasn't been in her right mind since she met you."

He scoffed and waved a dismissive hand. "More insults and snide remarks. I expected more from you, Sanaa. But enough pleasantries, my dear. I invited you to hear my offer, not to argue. And so, you understand, this offer will only be made once."

"You can make any offer you want," Sanaa said. "I'm not making any deals with you."

"Not even to spare my granddaughter's life?" Niabe asked.

Sanaa's blood turned to ice in her veins. Something about her mother's voice was wrong. There was too much certainty behind her words. Too much confidence that Sanaa could be brought to heel by mentioning her baby. Every maternal instinct in her body told her to turn and run. Shift into her thunderbird form and race back toward the village. She glanced at the dragon and noted how his balled fists trembled.

"What do you want?" Sanaa whispered.

"Send your daughter to join Niabe in my household. Now, before you interrupt," Channing said of her stunned expression. "Know that I have considerable resources. She will be well looked after and receive the finest education. The entire world will be at her disposal. Here she will be treasured. You can—”

Channing’s eyes widened. He extended a hand, barely deflecting Ronin’s raging ball of fire before it smashed into his face.

“The answer is no,” Ronin spat as he circled away from Sanaa.

The blood worker crouched into a low squat. “My offer wasn’t meant for you, Dragon. You won’t live to see that child grow even one day older.”

Ronin turned his head toward Sanaa, though his eyes remained locked on the blood worker. “Shayla. Her name is Shayla.”

Channing hopped down to the ground, tossing his coat to the side. The two men circled one another, shimmering tendrils of powyr gathering in their hands.

“You should have taken his offer, sweetheart. You would have lived longer,” Niabe said.

“A life as a slave isn’t the one I want Shayla to have.”

“It wasn’t her life you were bargaining for, Sanaa. I wish you knew when to leave well enough alone.” Pain flashed in Niabe’s eyes. As the last words left her lips, Niabe extended her arms.

Sanaa took a step back as her mother’s body morphed, muscles and bones popping and giving way as she shifted into a hideous mass of writhing fury with the scales of a lizard, fangs of a snake, and claws of a tiger.

A chimera.

The fearsome beast that had been Niabe tilted its nostril slits into the air and released a piercing shriek.

Sanaa crouched into a defensive stance and reached for her thunderbird.

"No!" Ronin screamed. "Don't shift!"

"You're joking, right?" Ronin may have had magic, but without her animal form, Sanaa was an ordinary woman. No match for legendary beasts or sorcerers who used blood as their catalyst.

A legion of tiny cries joined the chimera's cries, growing louder as an army of guppy demons swarmed into the courtyard. They circled the wizards, writhing at their feet before deciding they wanted no part of that battle and making a beeline for their mistress.

Sanaa ran back toward the gate, the chimera and its guppy horde right at her heels. Her mind flailed for a way to fight back without changing form. There were no branches on the ground large enough to do damage. She had no lighter, no gun, and no knife. No weapon of any kind except her nails, a paltry substitute for her talons.

A swirling stream of blood-red light streaked through the air and smashed into the gate. Sanaa skidded to a halt just as the glowing metal rose in the air, righting itself against the brick wall. She whirled around, barely catching a glimpse of Channing’s outstretched hand before he dodged a stream of fire from Ronin’s hand.

Guppy demons rushed down the driveway slashing the air with their claws and gnashing their poisonous fangs. The Chimera sauntered among them, its blood-red eyes locked on hers.

"Sanaa, no!"

Ronin's shout of warning faded in the shriek of pain that erupted from Sanaa's throat as her thunderbird form emerged.

The Chimera growled instructions to its demon army. The creatures shrieked and rushed at Sanaa. She flapped her wings, sending the vile creatures tumbling in a gust of wind as she took to the air.

Niabe howled in rage and swiped at Sanaa, but without wings, it was no match for a massive bird of myth and legend.

Sanaa shrieked again, this time with all the power and force she could muster. The glass in the compound shattered, raining shards onto the sorcerers. The guppy demons clamped their hands over the heads, screeching in pain and horror as the sound waves shook their powyr in their bodies apart. Even the Chimera slumped toward the ground.

Sanaa hovered over the drive way, staring in shock at the carnage, one chilling thought running through her mind: this shouldn't have been so easy.

Ronin ran down the driveway toward Sanaa, launching a final stream of fire at the Blood Sorcerer over his shoulder. “Sanaa, fly. Fly!”

Channing laughed and clapped. "I heard stories of your power, Sanaa, but it truly is a sight to behold!"

Sanaa flapped her wings soaring into the air and over the gate. The roar of a dragon and rush of wings behind her told her that Ronin followed.