Many thanks to BeaconHill, GlassGirlCeci, and dwood15 for betareading.

Radiant 13.1

The wind whispered around me as I crept along the balcony. The only light in the deserted street below streamed from the windows of the ground floor. A muffled clinking of glasses and nervous laughter could be heard within.

Carefully I slid open one of the second-story windows, and slipped inside a hallway, closing the entrance behind me. "I'm in," I murmured into my radio.

"On my way," came Sophia's voice. "We're sure this is the place?"

"Absolutely," confirmed Dragon. "Hookwolf's dogfighting ring is in the cellar."

"I can't believe they didn't call it off," I said. "Kaiser's feeling a bit cocky, isn't he?"

"I'm not sure Kaiser was involved," Dragon said. "The crowd tonight is mostly Hookwolf's inner group, not the usual blend from across the Empire's organization. I have a feeling this is happening in spite of Kaiser's concerns."

"Never thought I'd be jumping at the chance to prove Kaiser right," Sophia growled.

"He'll get his turn," I promised, padding silently down the hallway towards the elevators and the stairwell. "Aegis, is your team in position?"

"Yep," Aegis reported. "Vista's in position to deliver us right to their front door whenever you give the word."

"Great." I said as I quietly opened the door to the stairway and slipped inside. "Dragon, how are things with the Protectorate?" The sound of my voice, even at a whisper, echoed painfully inside the concrete walls.

"Armsmaster is currently chasing down an Empire smuggler, and Assault and Battery just captured a couple of thugs harassing a black family in the old Merchant territory," Dragon reported. "The rest of the Protectorate is on active patrol. It's going to be a long night."

"It's going to be longer for the Empire," I promised, gripping the stairway's metal railing. "Okay. Shadow Stalker, where are you now?"

"By the cellar window in the alley," Sophia said. "It's barred and shuttered, but I don't see any sign of an electrical current. I should be good to breach."

"Okay. Wait for the signal."

"You never told me the signal."

I smiled. "You'll know."

I swung my legs over the railing and leapt down. The two-story drop whispered by, and my boots touched down with an echoing clack as I hit the bottom. Through the frosted glass pane in the door to the cellar, I could see indistinct figures moving. Laughter and jeering echoed from inside, alongside the yelps of angry and wounded hounds.

I stood up, stretched, and crossed to the door. With a single, brutal kick, I splintered the wood around the latch. The door swung wide open, slamming against the adjacent wall. Silence instantly fell in the room beyond, and I was greeted by the sight of—I took a moment to count—two dozen assorted skinheads, men and women alike, staring at me with wide eyes.

There were cages in the middle of the room, and the floor beneath them was slick with blood. Dogs which had been rattling furiously at the bars, snarling and baying, now stared silently at me. Above them, overlooking them like a throne, was a great seat of metal and wire, and on it sat a thickset man painted with tattoos, a mask on his face in the shape of a snarling wolf.

"Hello, ladies and gentlemen," I said, drawing Sunrise, lighting the room with a pale orange glow. "I'm afraid the party's over."

Guns emerged from belts, holsters, and bags, but I was already moving. I dove forward, driving the hilt of Sunrise into the belly of one ganger. I felt something give—hopefully not his spine—and he was thrown backwards with a scream, bowling over several of his compatriots. Bullets sailed past me, but I was already moving again.

Sunrise was a whirlwind of shimmering black and silver as I wove among them. Bullets pinged harmlessly off of the alloy, or glanced off of my armor. I struck no one with my blade; I dealt no lethal blows. That did not mean I was gentle. Bones broke in my grip, joints snapped under blows from the flat or the hilt of my sword, blood flowed from beneath my fists.

And then Sophia was at my back, tranquilizer bolts spreading from her in a fan. Darkness cloaked her, smoke shadow pouring over my shoulders as she phased, neither fully material nor entirely shadow.

"Some signal," she growled, barely audible over the staccato of gunfire and the orchestra of screaming Nazis.

"I told you you'd know," I said, turning my head back to give her a wink.

She narrowed her eyes at me. Then they widened. "Move!"

I already was, and she quickly dissolved into mist. Not a moment too soon, as the metal barbs that comprised Hookwolf's body sailed through the space we'd been in. He howled, a sound neither human nor animal, the sharp points of his limbs sending sparks up as he turned on a dime. His eyes practically glowed as he glared at me.

I cracked my neck. The gunfire had mostly stopped by now—those gangers who could move were running up the stairs, and those who could not lay curled and groaning, cradling whatever part of their bodies I had mangled. "I did warn you," I told Hookwolf, rotating Sunrise idly in my grip.

He bared his teeth—blades that were as long as shortswords. The sound that emerged was halfway between a wolf's snarl and a man's furious bellow.

I could show him what a real werewolf is capable of. The thought bubbled up from some deep place in my heart. Sunrise grew cold under my fingers. My tongue snaked out, unbidden, to lick my lips. After all, it wouldn't even be wrong. He's a beast. He's vile. He deserves it. He's been lashing out at man and beast alike for years. Let him taste his own poison.

Then Sophia was beside me, Amauril in her hands. The sword lit the room, and Sunrise warmed again in my hand. "Why don't we take this outside, big boy?" she taunted, a sneer on her lips.

Hookwolf screeched and dove for us. We separated, darting around him and dashing for the stairs. I heard the scraping as he spun around. Sophia phased through the broken door, swinging loose on its hinges. I pulled it aside a moment later, just in time to see the trail of shadow she left behind her as she sailed upwards. She solidified on the landing one floor up, reaching down, her hand open. "Come on!" she shouted.

I jumped, grabbing her hand as my feet caught the very edge of the landing. She swung me up, over the railing, just as Hookwolf burst through the masonry of the wall behind me. "Go!" I shouted, and we went.

This was the plan. Drive the Empire out into the open, where the rest of the Wards could close around them. Hookwolf was no exception to that plan. In fact, he was its most vital target.

We dove out of the building's front door just as Hookwolf exploded onto the ground floor. The Empire was scattered—I could see several pockets being contained by the other Wards and a few PRT troopers with containment foam. But all that was secondary to what was right in front of us.

"Out of the way," growled the girl atop the massive hound. Bitch wasn't bothering with the mask anymore, probably because she no longer had a team to keep happy. She looked for all the world like an ordinary teenage girl, if a little stocky and ruddy, dressed in ratty jeans and a t-shirt. The lizardlike dog-creature she rode on chuffed at me, its breath staining the air around me with a faint, rank scent.

"What—" Sophia began, but Bitch ignored her, whistling to the dog beneath her. I grabbed Sophia and pulled her aside just in time.

Bitch charged. Hookwolf met her halfway. They met in a cloud of debris and crumbling stonework as he dove through the wall. The two twisted creatures snarled and tore into one another, biting and clawing in a primal ritual of dominance and hate.

But only one was bleeding. Bitch's beast might have been unnaturally powerful and resilient, but Hookwolf was made of metal. There was a reason he was considered one of the most powerful capes in the Bay—he had no obvious weaknesses.

That wasn't going to stop me.

"Hold him down, Bitch!" I shouted, shifting my grip on Sunrise.

"Brutus, hold!" she barked, and the dog obeyed. It sank its teeth into the wiry tangle of Hookwolf's neck and shoved its weight down onto him. Blood sprayed from its mouth as the flesh was pierced, but Hookwolf was forced into stillness, struggling and throwing himself against the hound.

I rushed forward. Sunrise trailed behind me in my double-handed grip. Hookwolf's eyes flickered to me—and there it was. The fear, glittering in his eyes like reflected firelight. I bared my teeth and drank it in. Then I leapt. The sword rose behind me, and I brought my weight down with it as I fell. It sheared deep into the metal—but no blood emerged, and though Hookwolf yelped, it seemed a sound of surprise more than pain.

I pulled the sword out and reached into the gash it had left. My fingers peeled away at the overgrowth of blades—and then I felt it. A surface of smooth crystal, radiating icy cold through the metal. As I touched it, Hookwolf screamed, thrashing in a frenzy, primal terror and pain shocking through him as the Shard's panic reverberated in the very mind of its host.

"Yield," I ordered, my voice hard. "Now!"

Hookwolf's maddened struggles only grew more fierce.

"So be it," I hissed. I reached out into the Unseen. As I had with Noelle, I found the barb where the Child of Ungoliant had anchored itself into the mortal man. I seized it, twisted, and pulled.

Hookwolf wailed in agony. Razorblades and twisted wire scattered from him like rain from the coat of a dog. The crystal under my fingers warmed and morphed, softening into human flesh. Brutus recoiled as the metal under its paws shattered like glass, fragments sprinkling in all directions. In the middle of a circle of blades and points, Hookwolf staggered on all fours, bleeding from a thousand cuts, some shallow, some deeper. He took one step, then two, his hands and knees growing still bloodier as they landed on sharp steel. Then at last he fell, leaving a streak of crimson on the asphalt as his side struck the street. For a moment he struggled, his hands clawing at the air above him. Then they fell to his sides, and he was still, his naked, hairy chest heaving.

I stood up and sheathed Sunrise. The sharp sound as it slid into the scabbard seemed to rouse Bitch from a daze. She looked at me sidelong through narrowed eyes as her hound pawed at its wounded snout. "What did you do?"

"I took his power away," I said, waving at a nearby PRT trooper who was fixing handcuffs onto an Empire ganger. He caught my eye and nodded when I gestured down at Hookwolf. He finished securing the ganger, then started coming our way, pulling out a containment foam canister.

"That's fucked," Bitch said succinctly.

"Only way to disable him without killing him," I said. "At least once he'd successfully transformed."

"Sorry I didn't tranq him earlier," Sophia said, coming up beside me. "I tried, but he was already transforming as soon as you busted in."

I nodded. "I half expected as much."

She glanced at me. "If I'd gone in first…"

"Then he might have been able to keep his power, at the cost of increased risk to you," I said, meeting her eyes. "His power wasn't worth that to me."

She looked away.

"So, what now?" Bitch asked, glaring down at me. "You gonna try and take me in?"

I raised my eyebrow at her. "If you thought I was going to do that, why did you come?"

"Had to make sure." She spat down on Hookwolf's prone form, which was already half-covered with foam. "Asshole needed to be put down."

"And that was worth being captured?"

She just continued glaring at me without answering.

I sighed. "I'm not taking you in just after you helped us. It's not like I can't find you if you commit a major crime. You're safe for tonight."

She nodded, still looking wary. She whistled, and her dog turned, padding down the street.

"Feel free to say hello to Fume while you're here," I called after her. "He should be in that direction."

She didn't respond verbally, though I saw her shoulders tense. As I looked after her, I saw her turn aside in the direction of her former teammate.

"Sure it's a good idea to let her go?" Sophia asked.

"I'm not a fan of punishing people for doing a good deed," I said, turning away. "Come on—let's get going. Some of these gangers will need medical attention."

And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.