In a dark and dimly lit room, a light flickered to show a young man cuffed in front of a table. His dark hair dangled over his closed eyes, and his chest moved as he labored to breathe. The old ceiling light buzzed over his head, and it showed a bare room with a tiled floor and gray walls that formed into a sharp, unnerving box. There was a chair on the other side of the table, but that too was empty.

  A pair of footsteps came to a stop on the other side of the room. The metal door creaked open, cold light spewing from the corridor.

  “Terrence McNeil?” asked a short man with a flat voice. The chair on the other side of the table grated against the floor. “We should wake him up.”

  The tall, uniformed police officer grabbed a steel bucket and emptied the water with a splash on the sleeping young man.

  Terry woke up abruptly, gasping for air, puffing drops of water that trickled down his lips. His eyes shot wide and he searched wildly around the room. His chin trembled from the cold.

  “Where am I?” he asked, inadvertently struggling against whatever was holding him shackled on the chair. He turned around and tried to pull, “Why am I cuffed?” his voice sounded strained through his quick, shallow breaths.

  “Terrence McNeil,” the man repeated, ignoring his question.

  Terry steadied his eyes from the familiar officer placing down the empty bucket beside the door, to the unknown man sitting on the chair opposite him. He froze for a moment as realization dawned on him. “I’ve done,” he swallowed, cold water running down the side of his face, “nothing wrong.”

  The man wore a white suit with a black shirt underneath. He craned his neck upwards to look down at Terry, black hair slicked back, thin hard eyes piercing deep into Terry’s. “We account murder as an unforgivable crime, to claim it as ‘nothing wrong’ is a touch insincere, young man.”

  Terry’s face flushed indignantly. He opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by the man who apathetically raised his hand.

  “Sergeant Stone, if you truly care for the truth, you might leave us for a moment to speak in private,” he said casually, unbothered to turn and face the officer standing behind him.

  Terry suppressed a snicker.

  The Sergeant standing behind him was annoying and barely tolerable, and Terry and him had shared an equal distaste for one another from the moment they met, but if nothing else, the man was honest, and as much as it has inconvenienced Terry in the past, he knew he wholeheartedly believed in duty and justice. He would never follow such a dubious command, even if that would cost him his position in the force. Hudson Stone was a cop to the bone.

  Hudson Stone, the Stalwart Buffoon, turned on his heels, walked out the door without quarrel, and asked in his thick and throaty voice, “How long do you need?”

  “For as long as you may and are willing to,” the man said back.

  Terry’s jaw dropped, and he felt he was sucker slapped by a person he’d expected a hug from. An uneasy tingle ran down his spine. He’d known the sergeant, known that he’d never leave him in such a questionable state. But he’d also known, deep down the irrational crevices of his mind, why he’d done so.

  The door closed behind him, the white slim and faint beneath the door. The light buzzed overhead, and the man’s features became sharper, a cold contrast of the shadows cast by his cheeks.

  He stared with troubled eyes as the sergeant abandoned him, the hair on his nape standing on end, the tingling sensation turning to a sharp prickle. “Why am I here?”

  “To be tried, of course.” He leaned closer, his elbows firmly atop the cold desk, his fingers laced and his chin propped on the back of his hands. He waited for a moment, his eyes locked with Terry’s. “Here’s how this’ll go: I inquire; you respond truthfully. Matter of fact, you can save us both the time, if you are guilty of the murder of innocents, just confess.”

  Terry felt something faint brush against his mind, the impression of a falling feather, cold talons probing to draw out an admission from his lips. His instincts flared and his response was that of alarm and danger. He was about to do something rash and stupid, but a gruff voice in his head calmed him down. “You aren’t police,” he said gravely.

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  “That’s an interesting twist.” The man grinned subtly, clapped his hands and stood up. He walked behind Terry and pinched the handcuffs between his thumb and index.

  A deep crunch resonated from his fingers, grinding up the cool steel and turning it rough; the smooth surface turned jagged, brittle rocks formed on the surface and the metal squeaked and shattered in shards and pieces on the floor.

  Terry rubbed some heat to his wrists as the man returned to his seat. “Why would you do that?”

  “The Sergeant has the key, and I prefer to speak on more equal terms.”

  Terry swallowed. With an admission like that, the man in front of him was either overconfident, or things didn’t bode well for him if the situation turned to worse.

  “I am here on Otherside business, young man,” he paused to let the words settle. “You see, rogue Awakened tend to be quite the volatile individuals.”

  Terry’s voice was quiet when he spoke, “You are a representative of the Veilguard? But you’re violating the Laws.”

  “I am?”

  “You can’t … you can’t force someone’s mind like that.”

  “Under normal circumstances, you’d be correct. But this is an incident in progress, and I’ve been appointed Eyre,” he paused when he recognized the look of confusion on Terry’s face, “sometimes I forget how oblivious the unaffiliated can be. Forget the title. My name’s Hugo Rook, and for my own safety and the integrity of this investigation, I’m allowed certain exceptions.”

  Terry felt a certain annoyance find perch in his voice. “And what,” Terry said. “Can I do to satisfy you, Your Honor?”

  “Not many things. Though gibes surely won’t do you any favors.” Hugo was sitting with his legs crossed, his hands clasped gently atop his knee. “Who could’ve thought that a place like this would’ve been so tumultuous. Simple misconducts? Sure, you’ll find those anywhere. Breaking and entering? Occasionally. But abductions? Murders? Those aren’t that common for a town this size. And for some reason, there is a single point of reference that ties them all together. Tell me why that is.”

  Terry understood where he was going with it, and he gave Hugo the answer he wanted to hear. “I’m sitting right here,” Terry said while the man kept quiet. “It’s not really hard to guess why. You think I am guilty. Is that it?”

  Hugo shook his head. “Not that simple, though not quite far from fact either. A case must be made against you. I have no inclination towards it, but it is there, and the accusations are grave enough that others wouldn’t think twice to convict you based on suspicion alone,” he popped his index, “understand that it is too convenient: the young Awakened, always near, present on every scene, on every crime—” He moved to his ring finger.

  “Almost,” he corrected and finished with his pinky. “Luckily for you, I’m not others.”

  “You can’t blame me for all that! There were killers in town. I—we stopped them!”

  “And we’ve been notified of them, and the way they were dealt with; your role in it all. But it is not easy to discern broken individuals from those who aren’t. The worst monsters are those hiding in plain sight. They might be people close to you, people you trust,” Hugo furrowed his brows, “the operative in Volpora learned that the ugly way. I’m not looking to make the same mistake.”

  Terry got a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach. It wasn’t fair to pin it on him. He wanted to say something to his defense, but when he faced the cool and steady eyes of the man opposite him, he found himself at a loss for words. This wasn’t the time for whining, this was the time to shut his mouth, and think. There were too many things going on around him, not least of all being the unknown killer present in town.

  A killer who was strong enough to—

  Another thought entered his mind now that his hands were free and his head had started to clear from the dizziness. But it was rash and stupid, and he shooed it away, branding it fatally bad for his continued breathing. The shadowy figure veiled in black feathers and heavy talons that loomed over the man opposite him had made sure of that.

  “This is a great opportunity for you. Don’t waste it.”

  Sweat ran down his face, and Terry took a deep breath before coming to a decision on the life-ending situation he found himself in. Again. “What do you need from me?”

  “I need you to tell me everything,” the man’s voice was humorless and demanding.

  Terry thought back to the long year he’d been through. “It would take too long, I don’t have the time. Believe me, I am innocent.”

  The man scowled and the downcast shadows turned his complexion deathly pale. “If that is your final statement, I should mention that I take no pleasure in the act of killing. Regrettably, for the both of us, the situation demands nothing less from me. In the end, it is too convenient to simply pass by and do nothing. I warn you, this will be your final chance to prevent your death,” he said, the last words spoken with an otherworldly chill behind them. “I urge you. Take it.”

  The gravity of the situation became all too clear to Terry, a low-pitched buzzing accompanying a resurfacing headache. Even though he was tired and hurt and trapped in a dark room, his execution had not been an eventuality in his mind. At least until then, until the moment the air turned stale and the eyes of the man gleamed yellow.

  He had no more hope for a swift escape from this room, no hope but for the quiet prayer he silently gave for everyone to be alive and safe when he made it out. He resigned himself and recalled as best he could that warm day that felt so long ago to him.

  “From the start,” he said.

  “From the very beginning,” the man said back.