Free the Darkest Edge Of Dawn (2010) by Kelly Gay Page A

head, and taking out Grigori Tennin's card from my inside jacket pocket. I like what you've done with the place, it said.
    The small card had come with the flowers he'd sent via florist to the hospital just as I was leaving. The flowers were long gone, but the card I'd kept. It was wrinkled and bent now, but it reminded me of my place in this game. Grigori had had a hand in bringing darkness to the city; I just didn't know the part he played. His card reminded me to be vigilant, to always watch my back because he wasn't through with me. And I sure as hell wasn't through with him.
    I stared at the meadow, my gaze not really focusing on any one thing as I flipped the card slowly through my fingers, thinking about the victims in the warehouse. All Elysian. There'd be no one who would benefit more from a war than the jinn tribal boss. The entire tribe would be eager to fight and get back to their warlike ways. And while the jinn and other Charbydons would be battling the rest of us, Grigori would, no doubt, benefit from the distraction. Law enforcement would be completely overwhelmed, leaving Grigori to expand his many illegal endeavors.
    That was worst case scenario. And Pendaran would play right into Grigori's hands, starting a battle with the jinn over Daya.
    A green flash snaked through the darkness above, lighting the meadow for a moment in a soft green glow.
    I tapped the edge of the card against my cheek, opening my mind, letting in all the possibilities, all the paths this case might take, and where they might have originated. My thoughts turned to Llyran, the Adonai serial killer, a Level Ten felon who had escaped Titus Mott's lab around the time I'd brought darkness to the city. Llyran had disappeared. No word. No sightings. He could be back in Elysia by now or right in my backyard, laying low.
    Or--goose bumps sprouted along my arms--he could be killing his own kind. I hugged myself against the sudden chill. An Adonai killing his own kind? His own race? Seemed shocking, but why not? Humans had been killing humans since the dawn of time. The question was: did he have a motive? Or was he simply killing for the love of it, for a reason only understandable to the serial killer mind?
    Pendaran's ultimatum of one week--one week to find Daya's killer before he confronted the jinn--grated on every last nerve. One week to find a serial killer powerful enough to kill not one, but seven of the most powerful beings in the city.
    Hardheaded dragon bastard.
    It was either lock the Druid King up and prevent him from waging war--which was guaranteed to cause serious injury to all parties involved--or find the killer. Or, I thought, biting the inside of my cheek, find something or some way to convince Dragon Boy to back off and let us do our job.
    I slipped the card into my pocket and slouched further down the bench, bracing my boots in the grass.
    A chuckle stuck in my throat as the realization of why I kept coming here, given the circumstances, dawned on me. This was the only place where I could just sit and not be bothered or worry about anyone else. This was the only place where I felt like I belonged, because, really, who else would belong at such a place except me?
    This was the site where the warring genes in my body converged, melded, came together in one cohesive, perfect moment. Did I know that for certain? No. But it had felt like it. Thinking back on it, I was pretty certain Mynogan's ritual was what gave me that sense of oneness. I'd heard the drumbeats in my mind and body. I'd been thrown back to a time so ancient it felt like the beginning of time itself, and in that moment I was whole, not fractured like I'd felt before or after.
    So, yeah, I thought, looking up at the darkness moving slowly overhead, this was my place, my ... creation.
    I was an hour and a half late for dinner, but I came home decompressed and back on track. And after I ate and showered, I planned to log on to the ITF database and pull Llyran's file. My