Fyordin steps toward Viger, and Tierney can sense his power rearing, ready to loose a cyclone straight at the Death Fae. “You seek to kill, and you won’t align with the East,” Fyordin snarls. “Which makes you a traitor to the natural matrix. And a traitor to Noilaan.” He looks at Tierney, storming ferocity in his gaze. “Careful who you align yourself with, Asrai.”

Tierney’s own power cyclones up, fierce as Fyordin’s.

Fiercer.

That’s it. Gloves off.

“Just because I won’t kiss you,” she says, “doesn’t make me a traitor, Fyordin.”

Fyordin’s nostrils flare, a jealous heat eddying through his power. “Tierney, you concern me. You spend your free time with Deathkin water horses and Death Fae. You were raised by a Gardnerian family and were spotted with them in Voloi wearing Gardnerian clothing. And you have a Gardnerian alias that you refuse to give up. Even though you have an Asrai name.”

Pain slices through Tierney. A name I haven’t used since I was three years old. That makes me think of my mother screaming it every time I hear it. Or even think it.

And there’s the matter of how her newly immigrated Gardnerian family is being treated here in Voloi. Kindly by some, but cruel enough by others that Tierney is prompted to stand in blaring solidarity with them. Finding FILTHY ROACH scrawled over their dwelling’s outdoor wall whipped up Tierney’s defiance so high she threw on Gardnerian blacks and went to town with her adoptive kin.

One foot in the Asrai world, one foot in the Gardnerian.

Fyordin stares Tierney down, his power whipping up almost as tempestuously as hers. “And not only are you friends with Trystan Gardner, but also with his sister, Elloren Gardner. I worry, Tierney, if you’ve become more Gardnerian than Asrai. You look Fae, but are you a Crow deep down?”

Rage blasts through Tierney at the same time that she’s overcome by a heady sense of darkness flashing through her as Viger’s black smoke encircles her, his thrall pulsing to life.

“Careful,” Viger warns Fyordin, calm as Death, as his poisonous snakes bare their fangs and hiss.

Fyordin doesn’t take his eyes off Tierney, his mouth curling down with scorn. “So, you’ll have your Death Fae smite me? Because I speak the truth?”

“He’s not my Death Fae,” Tierney snaps back as Viger’s thrall engulfs her. She turns to glare at Viger.

Sweet gods, what is going on here?

Viger turns his terrifying stare on Tierney, but she’s too incensed to be intimidated by either one of them.

“Get hold of your thrall, Viger,” she seethes. “I fight my own battles.”

Viger has the audacity to bare his teeth at her in response.

“Really?” Tierney marvels, incredulous. “Are you going to bite me, then?”