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"There you go. See? That wasn't so bad, was it, lass?"

"Please call me Vivienne," I say through my teeth.

Colorful striped banners flutter in an unseen wind overhead. The market is thronged with beings straight out of myth—stalls overflowing with blown glass, glowing potions in deep purples and blues, and strange artifacts.

"Och, come on," Lachlan says, giving my hand a slight tug. "We've got places to be. If we hurry, we'll have time to visit that bookstore you were begging to go to. Stop dawdling."

His hand gives mine a firm squeeze, and despite my pride, I cling back. The crowd is dense and utterly bizarre. A minotaur clad in a sharp, broad-shouldered suit stands near a flower cart, lifting a newspaper to hide his face the moment he notices me looking.

A prickle of warning shoots up my spine. To my left, a lizard man with slick green scales walks past, his red forked tongue flicking out to lick his own eyeball without a shred of subtlety. Someone bumps my shoulder from behind, but when I spin around, they've already vanished into the throng.

As fantastical as this place is, it feels distinctly unsafe. The animal part of my brain screams that I am way out of my depth.

I swallow hard as Lachlan guides me through the press of bodies, pulling me toward a shop tucked between two crooked stalls just as a heavy brass bell chimes overhead.

"Theo!" he booms, his voice vibrating deep in my sternum.

I let his hand go, because the shop's not nearly as busy as the rest of the street. In fact, it's fairly empty. A few shoppers quietly walk around, glancing here and there at what, at first sight, looks like any other boutique. There's an assortment of clothes hanging from a rack along the walls, a face-out boasting leather jackets in various colors—dark blue, deep red, forest green—each shimmering slightly.

I squint at them, trying to get a better look at the leather, because it's not quite like anything I've ever seen. I startle backwards slightly as what I'm looking at finally clicks in my brain.

It's scaled leather. They're not suede or patent or anything else. Nope. Straight-up scaled. I've definitely never seen anything like it.

The tables that, on first glance, looked to be covered with belts and other small wearable tchotchkes are in fact full of sheaths and various harnesses.

All right, so he took me to the weapons outfitter first, just as he said he would.

I drift closer toward the sound of Lachlan's Scottish accent, listening as he's answered by a man whose voice is just as deep, though laced with an edge of raw frustration.

I've never been one to turn down a chance to eavesdrop. In fact, I consider myself an Olympic-grade eavesdropper. I let my gaze travel casually over the shop's displays, pretending to browse while locking onto their hushed conversation with renewed interest.

"I don't know, Lachlan," the stranger's deep voice says. "I can't help feeling like something is incredibly wrong."

"Look, don't be dramatic," Lachlan answers, clearly annoyed by the man's concern. "Things are looking up. Midnight House has an heir⁠—"

"Midnight House," the man interrupts sharply, "is one of several extinct houses. You think Sanguine is just going to let her go unchecked? Everybody heard what happened at the Council meeting. Everybody knows Sanguine is behind the extinction of the other houses, and nobody on the Council has the balls to stand up to those fucking bloodsuckers."

"Don't be specious," Lachlan says dryly.

"You hate them just as much as I do," the man counters.

"Oh, I hate the leader of Sanguine, that's for damn sure," Lachlan answers.

A jeweled knife glitters on a nearby display table. I pick it up casually, feigning complete, absorbed interest in the opals clustered along its handle.

"Something's changing, Lachlan—and I don't just mean your new charge. Something feels wrong," the man insists. "I don't know... I feel the call of the forest in my blood more than I have in a long time."

I lose track of the rest of their words, suddenly entranced by the interplay of light on the smooth stone set into the dagger's pommel. The blade itself is stunning, etched with what looks like Futhark runes along the razor edge—a script I've never formally studied, but have seen often enough in ancient texts to recognize.

"Fucking hell," Lachlan's voice cuts in from much closer than before. "I told you not to touch anything."

"I didn't touch anything, Lachlan—" I start, still staring down at the blade resting in my hands.

"Looks like she found what she needed," the stranger says, stepping into view as his eyes cut to me. "Nice to meet you," he tells me gruffly, sounding anything but pleased by the introduction. "And I do think holding that dagger means you have, in fact, fucking touched it."

"Oh." I blink, awareness washing over me. A sudden wave of surprise hits because I did, in fact, pick up the goddamned dagger without meaning to, and now it's sitting firmly in my palm—the runes along the blade glowing faint and warm from my own body heat.

"It's bonded with her," the man announces.