The last time Vanessa saw Warren, it was as he drove her to the airport in his beat-up Honda Accord. The mission had gone well; they had retrieved the magical item of the week and returned it to the Knights of the Dawn. It was funny—because if Vanessa failed a mission, that was fine because really, that helped the Society. But if she succeeded, that was also fine, because it built her a reputation within the Knights. So, the only reason she really ever cared about succeeding was because Warren was so goddamn dedicated and she really, really liked him.

He tapped his steering wheel to the beat of some pop song and sent her a glance. "Do you know what your next mission is?"

"No." Vanessa bit her tongue as she spotted an opportunity to switch lanes and go faster. Back-seat driving remained a bad habit of hers due to the fact she knew she was always going to be the best driver in the car. But a sucky thing about one-way flights was that Vanessa couldn't drive herself there.

Warren hummed. "I have a solo mission."

Vanessa looked at him in shock. No. Without her? "For how long?"

He smiled at her and she swallowed her words. Right. They couldn't share that kind of information.

Vanessa grimaced. If Warren was going to be on a solo mission, whatever she was assigned would be with someone else. Or also solo. Please, please be alone if it wasn't Warren. She couldn't stomach conversations with most of the other Knights.

Dread seeped in. She was going to miss Warren terribly. Whatever they had, it continued to grow and Vanessa shuddered at withdrawal.

"If you're lucky, you might get Dougan as a partner," Warren said. He grinned at her lack of enthusiasm—it stroked his ego.

Vanessa looked out the window. "I haven't worked with him before."

"He's pretty great. We've done a few missions together. Very handsome. You'd love him."

She knitted her eyebrows. That flippant detail ignited previously unknown jealousy. "Did you two—?"

"No, I've only ever caved to unprofessional urges for you, honey pie." Warren winked. Ever since he picked up on the fact that pet names caused Vanessa to wrinkle her nose, he began utilizing a seemingly unending list of sickeningly sweet sobriquets.

"I'm sure you tell that to everyone."

Warren lost the playful face and lowered his eyebrows. "No, I meant that. It's just you."

Hope exploded in Vanessa's heart and she dug her nails into her palm. She avoided his gaze and steadied her breaths. How would she survive a few weeks without him?

Warren tapped on the steering wheel, the song shifting to another top 40 tune. "Have you—?"

"No."

Maybe lustful, easy targets. But never other knights. Never.

—

During one regular possession session, Vanessa's entire framework shattered.

Her hairy legs and beating heart belonged to the Society member, Manchester, that had saved her all those years ago, which was good, because if it had been her body that had walked into the meeting room, she would have collapsed.

Four other Society members sat at a table. That was normal. Vanessa had seen them before in passing. But, there was a single smile that pulled her gut straight down to hell.

Clara laughed at the face on Vanessa's vessel. The familiar trill stole Vanessa's breath. "You look like you've seen a ghost, Manchester."

Vanessa forced Manchester's facial muscles into a sheepish grin and mechanically walked to the open seat. "Sorry. Early morning today."

Manchester's mannerisms functioned as second nature to Vanessa, who had spent her early days working with him. She let herself run on autopilot as shock worked its way through her stiff muscles.

Every time Clara laughed, Vanessa fought against the black that encroached her vision. She fought against glimpses of another time. Highway overpasses, cardboard boxes, bloody feet, and terror. Terror as pure and cold as a rushing arctic river.

Vanessa sat dumbly through the meeting as everyone discussed recent missions. Even Clara. Even Clara.

Clara was one of them. A Society member. She leaned back, laughed, traded jokes, and talked of her own missions.

Was Clara even a unicorn? Vanessa knew the Society's handbook well. The threat didn't have to be real; it just had to feel real. Did Clara just use some random stolen horn to sell the image?

Vanessa knew the Society had unicorn horns. She had even stolen a couple for the Society before. Those were some of her favorite missions—when she felt she got to exact revenge against Clara and all the other blixhunters. Now, she felt sick to her stomach. What if they had used them to lure in other blixes?

Sick coated Vanessa's throat. The Society used ruses to build complete trust, complete loyalty. But, Vanessa, at seventeen, would have already placed everything she had in them if they had just rescued her from the hell she had already been living in. They had unnecessarily created a new one—a hell that followed Vanessa year to year, night to night, day to day, and nightmare to nightmare. A hell she could never escape.

Later, when Vanessa severed her connection to Manchester, her bedsheets felt cold and thin. She shivered. Why did they lie to her? Why did they lie?

Those days of torture had been—what? Unneeded? Frivolous? Why had they put her through that?

Why had her family done this to her?

—

The next year included intense soul-searching and constant crying and feeling like she was seventeen again. So, generally horrible.

During the day, she remained Vanessa Santoro—master strategist that single-handedly propelled missions to success. But at night, her progress over the past ten years vanished. Every night, she battled Clara. Every night.

Vanessa still stayed strong with the Society. After all, they were the only group working to free blixes and other dark creatures from the chains of humans and the light brigade. But, betrayal seeped into her bones of which loyalty poured the foundation.

Eventually, Warren's assertion that Vanessa would get Dougan as a mission partner came true. On a whim, she even slept with him. The memory chilled her neck.

It wasn't like Warren and Vanessa were anything—they weren't even exclusive. But Vanessa still hated herself that night and had stared at the ceiling with a longing, guilt-ridden heart, spending hours convincing herself that she had only slept with Dougan to bite him and further infiltrate the Knights.

But, that wasn't the truth. It was far less logical and cold than that.

Vanessa hadn't seen Warren in a year. They weren't assigned to missions together anymore. Dougan wouldn't tell her why.

And she missed him.

No one else held her like he did after sex. Everyone else treated it like just a hook up, which it always was, but it was more than that. It was Vanessa's drug, the one she took to dull the loneliness. And Warren's absence hit her like withdrawal.

Instead of drowning in emotions, Vanessa dived to further depths in her work. She couldn't allow such inner, trivial turmoil to stagnate her progress on her true goals. Her performance on Society missions even improved. They became more exact, more successful, more everything.

On the outside, she wore the pride well.

On the inside, she felt like she was young again, coming back to her mom days later after she had been kicked out again for some perceived slight. Coming back like a beaten puppy begging to be better. That maybe if she was really good, the Society wouldn't hurt her again like they had used Clara to do when she was seventeen. The self-aware sensation of her pathetic motives felt like ants crawling all over her.

But, that was no matter.

For Vanessa's next accomplishment, she would go beyond all other Society members. Everyone would pale in comparison. She would be irreplaceable, highly sought-after, and needed. Her new goal shined like a beacon in the distance.

Vanessa would figure out the identity of the leader of the Knights of Dawn.