“There hasn’t been a new lead in six months. Not since you gutted that Vampyr in Cardin,” Reina whispered.

Thalia turned, peeling her eyes from the carnage. The shadows covering the captain’s dark face did little to hide her revulsion. Her armor glittered in the moonlight, although the muted gold seemed garish against the field of corpses.

“It’s him,” Thalia said. Her gaze roamed over the bodies peppering the land like lumps of coal—bodies that had been ripped apart and propped back together like some sort of macabre chessboard. The crops had been razed to the ground, destroyed as if some feral beast had been set loose upon them.

Reina made a face, scrubbing a hand over her short-­cropped dark hair. “And you’re sure it’s him?”

Him.

It would have been better if it were some feral beast, not the Vampyr she sought.

Thalia clenched her jaw, ignoring the emotions rising hot in her gut. “This death reeks of him.”

Reina studied her a moment longer, brown eyes flashing. “We need to head back to Corithian.”

Thalia wiped the sweat from her brow. Even with night in full swing, the heat of summer worked its way down the back of her spine, itching like a pesky bug. “Why?”

“Your ­ mother sent word.”

“I’m not done here. You’ve seen the fields—these townsfolk won’t last the next few months without their crops. They are as good as dead out here.”

Reina sighed, shifting slightly. “She’s the queen; her word is law even for her daughter. She’s changed her mind about you going off and doing this.”