Marked by the Last Moon

Mara Voss had three rules for collecting debts. Never raise your voice. Never show fear. Never leave without the money. She had followed them for seven years, through drunks with knives, nobles with expensive lawyers, and one warlock with a truly terrible temper. She had never lost a debt, and she did not plan to start tonight. At ten minutes to eleven, she stood at the foot of Draven Tower and looked up at forty floors of black glass. The leather ledger under her arm felt heavier than usual. “Nobody would blame you for going home,” she told herself. That was the problem. Nobody would. Her employer, old Mr. Pike, had been very polite about it when he slid the file across his desk. Two million in unpaid contracts. Eleven notices ignored. The Ashfang pack did not answer letters, and the last collector who had visited in person came back with a cracked rib and a new career in accounting. “Nobody else will go near it,” Pike had said. “Nobody sane.” Mara had taken the file anyway. Sanity was expensive, and her rent was due. She pushed through the revolving doors. The lobby was all marble and silence, with a security desk guarded by a man the size of a vending machine. He lifted his head as she approached, and his nostrils flared. Wolf, she thought. They always sniffed first and asked questions later. “Mara Voss, Pike and Associates,” she said, setting a card on the desk. “I’m here for Mr. Draven.” “He isn’t expecting anyone.” “Then he’s about to be pleasantly surprised.” The guard stared at her for a long moment. Then, to her surprise, he picked up the phone, muttered three words, and listened. His eyebrows rose. “Top floor,” he said. “He says to let you up.” That was not how it usually went. Mara had expected locked doors and a polite escort back to the street. Being invited in felt like walking into a trap with the door held open. She took the elevator anyway. Rule four, which she had never written down: when the trap is already open, walk in like you own it. The top floor was a single enormous office. One wall was pure glass, and the whole city glittered beneath it like spilled coins. A long ironwood desk stood in the middle of the room, and behind it sat Kael Draven. She had seen his photograph in the file. It had not prepared her for him. He was tall even sitting down, with black hair, sharp cheekbones, and a charcoal suit that probably cost more than her apartment building. He did not stand. He did not smile. He watched her cross the floor the way a cat watches a bird that has wandered into the wrong room. “Miss Voss,” he said. His voice was low and even. “You are either very brave or very poorly informed.” “Both, according to my landlord.” She stopped in front of the desk and opened her ledger. “Ashfang Holdings owes Pike and Associates two million, one hundred and forty thousand. The invoices are eleven months overdue. You have had eleven notices.” “I read them.” “Then you know why I’m here.” “I know you came alone,” Kael said. “Into my territory. Into my tower. At night.” He tilted his head slightly. “Do you know what my people would do if I told them to?” Somewhere in the hallway, a wolf laughed, low and rough. Mara did not look toward the sound. She did not look away from Kael, either. Seven years had taught her that the first person to look away lost. “I’d guess they would try,” she said evenly. “And then you would have a messy lobby, a missing debt collector, and a very curious guild inspector asking why your pack settles paperwork with violence. Bad for business.” She tapped the ledger. “I’m only here for the money, Mr. Draven. I don’t care who you are.” “That,” Kael said slowly, “is the first interesting thing anyone has said to me in months.” “You have until midnight.” “And then?” “Then I start taking things that matter.” She glanced around the room. “That painting looks expensive. So does that sword.” For the first time, something moved at the corner of his mouth. It was not quite a smile. “The sword belonged to my grandfather.” “Then it’s probably worth a lot.” “Miss Voss.” He leaned back in his chair. “I do not have the money in cash. My accounts were frozen by someone in this city who wants my pack ruined. I have spent weeks trying to fix it. The debt is not a refusal. It is a problem.” Mara hesitated. It was the first time all night she did not have an answer ready. She had walked in expecting arrogance. She had not expected honesty, and she distrusted it more. “Then show me the frozen accounts,” she said at last. “I’ll take proof, a payment plan, and a signature.” “You would take a payment plan from me?” “I’d take one from the devil if he signed in ink.” Kael opened his mouth to answer. On the wall behind her, the clock began to strike eleven, and every light in the building went out at once. Mara’s hand dropped to the knife in her boot. Rule five: never stand anywhere you can’t get out of. “What did you do?” “Nothing.” His voice had changed. It was lower now, rough at the edges. “That is not me.” Silver light poured through the glass wall. Mara turned and saw the moon rising over the city, huge and pale, a full week before it should have been anywhere near full. The light flooded across the floor, across the desk, across her hands. Then it touched her collarbone, and it burned. She cried out. It was not quite pain. It felt like a hot brand pressed against her skin from the inside, and she clutched at her collar as the heat spread across her chest, settled, and stayed. Across the desk, Kael had stood up so fast that his chair hit the wall. His hands were shaking. His eyes, which had been dark as coal, were burning amber. “No,” he whispered. “No. Not her. Not a human.” “What did you do to me?” Mara hissed. “I did nothing!” His shout made the glass hum. He pressed a hand to his own throat, where his collar had fallen open. There, just beneath the skin, a silver crescent glowed like a drop of moonlight. “Look at it. Look at yours.” She pulled her collar aside. The mark on her skin was an exact copy of his, small and bright and impossible to ignore. The light faded. The emergency lamps flickered on. The room felt different somehow, as though a thread had been pulled tight between the two of them, and she could feel it humming. Mara knew what it meant. Every child in the city did. The Moon chose a mate for every wolf, and she never made mistakes. Nobody refused her. Nobody could. “That’s a mate mark,” she said slowly. “A fated bond. That only happens between wolves.” “Usually,” Kael said through his teeth. “I’m not a wolf.” “I had noticed.” “Then it’s a mistake. Take it off.” “Do you think I would not have done it already?” His eyes flashed. “There is no removing it. There are only old stories of mates who refused, and none of them ended well.” Mara stared at the glowing crescent on his skin and felt her heart pound. It was not fear, she told herself. Rule two. She was not afraid. She was simply furious. “I came here to collect a debt,” she said. “Not a husband.” The doors burst open. A lean man in a dark jacket stumbled in, breathing hard, like someone who had run up forty floors. “Alpha, the moon, it rose early, the whole pack felt it, and—” He stopped. He looked at Kael’s collar. He looked at Mara’s. His face went white. “Dorian,” Kael said quietly. “Close the door.” “Alpha, that’s—” “Close it.” The beta obeyed. When he turned back, his shock had turned into something much closer to fear. “You know what happens if the council hears. A human Luna. They will call the bond cursed. They will say you have been compromised. Silas Thorne has been waiting for a reason to challenge you for months.” “Who is Silas Thorne?” Mara asked. “A rival alpha,” Kael said. “He wants my territory. And I suspect my frozen accounts are his doing.” Mara’s mind clicked into place. “That’s why you couldn’t pay.” “Now you understand.” “And if he finds out about this, he’ll take everything.” She looked at Kael. “Including me.” “If he learns the bond exists, yes.” Kael’s gaze held hers, steady and unreadable. “You are no longer just a debt collector, Miss Voss. You are my weakness. Or, to him, my greatest prize.” The words should have frightened her. Instead, they made her chin lift. Mara Voss had spent seven years being underestimated by powerful men. She did not intend to be anyone’s weakness. “Then we have a problem,” she said. “Because I’m not leaving without my money, and I’m not dying for a moon that never asked me.” Dorian made a strangled noise. Kael, to her great surprise, almost laughed. Then her phone buzzed. Mara pulled it from her pocket. Unknown number. One line of text, glowing in the dim room. Congratulations, Miss Voss. I will be collecting, too. She looked up. Through the glass wall, on the roof of the building across the street, a lone figure stood perfectly still in the moonlight, watching them. Kael’s hand closed around her wrist. It was warm, and it was not gentle. “Rule one,” he said quietly. “Stay away from the windows.” Mara glanced at his hand, then at his face, then at the figure on the roof. “Fine,” she said. “But I want it noted that I’m adding hazard pay.” End Of Episode 1