1 Chapter 1

Only one thing could make me leave my house for the first time in two years-the promise of revenge. The vague message I'd received via email from my best friend had been just a hint, but the opportunity had sounded too sweet to resist.

Bundled against the driving snow in a wool coat and gloves, I marched down the sidewalk in front of my house. The brutal Iceland wind whipped my collar into my chin and spiked frozen needles through the leather on my hands. My loud, crunchy footsteps through the knee-high snowdrifts beat a rhythm at the back of my skull. I was used to dead silence contained within four walls, not this eternal winter bullshit.

Hell Here's neon lights strobed behind the falling snow; I quickened my pace. Despite the harsh weather, the arctic air fanned the vengeful fire that burned in my gut into a raging storm.

I grinned, possibly a little too maniacally, because a couple coming up the sidewalk skirted wide. I eased up the shoveled path toward the thick wooden door of Hell Here and mistakenly made a grab at the handle. Pain stabbed into my hand and flared red across my vision. A cry ripped from my mouth and lost itself in the wind. I backed away, gripping my palm to my middle, while tears iced my cheeks. Thankfully, no one stood around to see that nonsense.

A burly man knocked his way out the door, and I slid by him into the crowded bar. Heat from a large, blazing green fire in the center of the room stung my wind-burned cheeks, and I melted into it while I cleared the long brown hair from my face with a forearm.

Booths lined the walls, and round tables butted up to the steel beams surrounding the large fire. Smaller green flames danced in the middle of every table like little pockets of warmth. People sat everywhere while tipping back drinks, the silver aterns at their wrists winking in the firelight.

A smiley woman with shiny red curls popped up in front of me with a menu. "How many tonight, miss?"

"One," I said, brushing past Smiley toward a deserted corner booth.

I slid into it, facing the front of the bar, and Smiley followed me to place the menu on the table.

"Would you like to hear about our specials?" she asked.

"A bottle of Necromancer's Piss," I said. "And a bowl of fennel seeds."

"A bowl of-"

I pinned her with a look that snapped her mouth shut. "Fennel seeds. Go."

Patience-it was a skill I wasn't working on at the moment.

She scurried off, her smile dropping at the same rate as the degrees outside. The same rate at which my insides plummeted to my feet. Because Hell Here's front door opened once again, and this time the three new patrons hushed the bar into cold silence.

Three Isa fae women stood at the entrance, diamond collars strapped to their necks, their golden stick-straight hair shimmering in the green firelight. Black, smoky wings curled behind their shoulders. The Diamond Dogs, part of the fae government's elite law enforcement and the shit-sniffers around the outskirts of Faction 11. Here, in a witch's bar, an almost literal hole in the wall.

Their silvery blue eyes scanned the crowd. Someone coughed. A brave soul hid his nose inside his coat collar from the faes' bad fish smell. A chair screeched across the wooden floor, which didn't quite smother the sound of a whimper. And then the Diamond Dogs' gazes zeroed in on me. They started across the bar toward my booth like an invading army.

My stomach turned to stone. The approaching wall of stink bowled into me. I folded my hands into my lap, gently so I wouldn't betray the indifference I hoped I had fixed on my face. Did they somehow know why I was here?

"Hadley Hawthorn," the middle one said. "Fancy seeing you...at all."

The three of them looked so alike, but this one had painted her lips blood red. Claudia, I thought her name was. I didn't know the other two. Knowing the Diamond Dogs' reputation, she'd probably kissed a bloodied corpse and then sucked out its eyeballs with a straw for a midnight snack. Hopefully the other two had already eaten. Otherwise, tonight might not end with me passed out under the glow of my laptop like it usually did.

Claudia quirked an eyebrow. "Mind if we sit?"

Actually, yes I did, but I didn't really have a choice. A cold sweat gathered on my upper lip, but I sat back and tipped my chin to the opposite side of the booth. They slid into the seat, Claudia first, the diamond aterns wrapped around their delicate wrists clinking against the table.

The rest of the bar looked on as if our table was center stage. Smiley tiptoed up to us, her face drawn into a grimace, and set the wine and bowl of seeds in front of me with shaky hands.

"Anything for you three?" she asked, avoiding their gazes.

The air around the three of them wobbled, and Claudia, who sat closest to the wall, traded faces with the Diamond Dog in the middle. It happened so quickly, so fluidly, that I might have missed it if not for the subtle tick on their aterns. Must be nice to use magic for such important matters as switching seats.

Claudia propped her elbows on the table and glared at Smiley. "Go away, witch."

She scuttled off, and I wished I could too.