Suzi stepped into the training room, immediately noting its imposing height and the thick padding lining every surface. The space reminded her of a shrunken-down gymnasium—half the length but just as tall. Straps, chains, and other strange apparatuses dangled from the rafters, but she couldn’t guess their function. In the center of the floor, Bear sat cross-legged, wearing a loose robe. His hands rested on his knees, eyes shut in what looked like deep meditation. A six-foot staff balanced across his wrists—padded tips on each end, like stunted spears.

“Are we fighting?” Suzi asked, pulse quickening. Part of her braced for an ambush, a leftover habit from the last time Darcy had attacked out of nowhere.

“Training,” Darcy corrected, shutting the heavy door behind them with a resounding thud.

Suzi caught the flash of metal as Darcy turned the key in the lock. It made her instincts jolt. “Why are you locking—ugh!”

A foot slammed into her midsection before she could finish the question. Pain exploded through her gut, and her lungs seized as she collapsed to the padded floor. Gasping, she fought to suck in air.

Between ragged breaths, she managed a glance up. Bear was still as a statue, eyes shut, as though he hadn’t even heard the commotion. Bastard’s not helping, she thought, her mind racing.

Darcy’s elbow crashed down between Suzi’s shoulder blades. She had no time to brace; her face smacked the padding, and she groaned, pinned and furious in equal measure.

“She’s shit,” Darcy muttered, rolling away as quickly as she’d attacked.

Suzi tried to quell the surge of panic. “Judas, you gonna help me out here?” she demanded inwardly, her thoughts directed at the warrior spirit bound to her soul.

“You’re not in mortal danger,” Judas answered, voice echoing in her mind.

Suzi gritted her teeth. Of course, Judas would pick now to be aloof. She forced herself up, rolling her neck and shoulders, ignoring how badly they ached. Clenching her fists like a boxer, she braced for Darcy’s next move.

The next four punches barreled in—rapid, methodical. Each blow sent fresh pain ricocheting through her jaw and body. Suzi scrambled to stay upright, but it felt like standing in a hurricane. Finally, Darcy dropped her guard and glowered right in Suzi’s face.

“Maybe you should retire, salope,” Darcy snarled.

Suzi locked eyes with her, adrenaline pounding in her ears. For a heartbeat, she sensed Darcy’s will falter, and the opening was there—like a road sign pointing straight at Darcy’s mind.

Darcy recoiled, looking shaken. “What the hell is in your head?” she hissed.

Suzi exhaled, rubbing the taste of blood off her split lip. Bear remained immovable, apparently content to stay in his meditative pose. She aimed a crimson smile at Darcy, letting the copper tang of blood mix with her contempt.

“You hit like a fucking girl,” she spat in a low voice.

Rage twisted Darcy’s features. Any normal human would be terrified of that look—like a grenade ready to blow. Darcy tore across the mat in a fury, but Suzi sidestepped right, swinging her left arm out. She caught Darcy across the chest, clotheslining her.

In a flash, Darcy twisted and hooked an arm around Suzi’s. Her right leg looped behind Suzi’s back, wrenching her arm upward in a brutal hold. The instinct to counter kicked in, and Suzi dropped her full weight backward, slamming Darcy into the floor. A crack echoed through the room, and Darcy let out a pained whimper.

Suzi rolled aside and leapt to her feet, adrenaline surging so hard her limbs buzzed.

Darcy staggered up, cradling her left wrist. “Nique te mere,” she spat.

“One, nothing,” Suzi said, pointing to herself, then Darcy. Her voice trembled with that jittery mix of triumph and dread.

They locked eyes, both breathing hard. Darcy took a step forward—and vanished.

“Fuck,” Suzi muttered. Her stomach clenched. She remembered how Darcy had blindsided her before.

An arm materialized out of thin air and hammered Suzi in the left jaw with impossible force. She spun, slamming onto the mat so hard her teeth rattled. Dazed, she spat blood.

A kick smashed into her rib cage, rolling her until she crashed into the wall padding. Her lungs seized again. She gasped for air, arms hugging her ribs in agony.

“Get up!” Judas roared inside her. “Ignore the pain.”

She forced a ragged breath. “Fuck you!” The words tore from her throat as she lurched upright.

A second later, another phantom kick slammed into her chest, pinning her against the wall. She felt a pressure like someone pushing through the fabric of reality itself—then another strike knocked her to the floor. Spots swam in her vision, but she scrambled to her knees, lunging ahead so she wouldn’t be a stationary target.

“If you keep moving,” Judas instructed from within, “she can’t lock onto you.”

Suzi panted, stumbling back upright. “You want to do this?” she rasped.

“Who are you talking to?” Darcy’s voice taunted from behind.

Suzi swung in a blind arc, hitting nothing but air. Her frustration churned alongside the throbbing in her ribs.

“Limbo Skippers need their target to be relatively still to land a blow,” Judas explained. “Keep moving.”

Suzi did just that, darting around the room. Darcy flickered into view in random spots, always a half-second too late. Suzi’s pulse hammered; sweat dripped down her temples as she dodged, waiting for a chance to strike back.

“How did you appear in two places yesterday?” Darcy’s disembodied voice echoed, raw with anger.

“Stop hitting me, and I’ll show you,” Suzi tossed back, still dancing in circles.

That must have intrigued Darcy because she materialized a few steps away—visible, battered, and cautious. “You’ve got another ability besides binding?”

Suzi hesitated, still on edge. “I don’t think so.” She swallowed hard. “I just… I don’t know how I did it. You stuck me in limbo, and I crawled for what felt like eternity until I got to your room. Then I touched you, and suddenly, I was back here—only it was a minute or so before you’d even thrown me in limbo.”

“C’est impossible!” Darcy snapped.

Suzi raised her hand like she was swearing an oath. “I’m telling you the truth.”

“No one can step back in time,” Darcy insisted, her voice wavering in something like disbelief.

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“Time is relative,” came Bear’s rumbling voice from across the room.

Suzi twisted around to see him exactly as before, cross-legged on the floor, eyes closed, staff balanced across his knees.

He continued, “A prophecy speaks of the last celestial, able to walk between worlds and bend the powers of others. One who wields an unseen ability…one who’ll end the war.”

Darcy stared at Suzi with open contempt. “She’s shit. She doesn’t even know how to fight.”

Bear opened his eyes and slowly stood, grasping his staff in one hand. “You both look pretty beat up to me,” he said. “And I’ve watched the footage of her going toe-to-toe with a cop while handcuffed. Seems to me she can hold her own.”

“She couldn’t beat me,” Darcy snarled. “I stopped.”

“She broke your wrist,” Bear pointed out.

Darcy scowled. “She got lucky.”

“She got into your head. She pissed you off and then beat you. You lost your edge.”

Darcy turned a wary gaze on Suzi. “Yeah…what the fuck is in your head? You pushed through my will like I was nothing.” She reached out as if to touch the pink strands of Suzi’s hair.

Suzi flinched back, muscles coiled as she braced for another attack. She half expected Darcy to tear her open then and there.

Bear cut in, tossing his padded staff to Suzi. “Let’s see how she does against me.”

She caught it, noting how unexpectedly heavy it felt. “With Darcy it’s an all-out brawl, but with you, I’m supposed to use a padded stick?” She held the staff aloft, wariness tightening her chest. “Where’s yours?”

Bear answered by shrugging out of his robe. Tattoos spiraled across his shoulders, back, and legs, vibrant blue patterns that shifted when his muscles rolled. “I don’t like chipping my teeth,” he said dryly.

In the time it took his robe to settle on the ground, Bear’s entire form blurred. He whirled around to face Suzi, and suddenly a massive Bengal tiger lunged the ten feet between them.

Holy shit. Her reflexes barely caught up—she yanked the staff up just in time for the tiger’s jaws to clamp around it. The impact bowled her over, but she twisted into it, leveraging the momentum to flip the huge cat over her shoulder.

The tiger contorted in midair, landing on all fours with a reverberating thump. Its eyes burned a feral gold, saliva dripping from razor-sharp fangs onto the padded floor.

Suzi’s heart pounded. “Easy, tiger…” She held the staff in front of her and stepped back, measuring her breathing. This was going to be a whole different level of fight.

Bear’s massive tiger paw slapped the padded staff aside. Before Suzi could react, all that orange-striped muscle slammed into her, claws hooking into her upper arms. Weight pressed her to the mats with crushing force. She gritted her teeth, jamming the staff across the tiger’s neck to keep its gnashing jaws off her face.

Every muscle in her body screamed, but she refused to give ground. A spark of grim satisfaction flared at the realization that her new strength wasn’t even close to drained. She held him back, though the claws began biting deeper, slicing into her triceps and shoulders. The pain came in hot waves, but she pressed the tiger away by sheer will.

Then he vanished. Her stomach lurched. In his place, a massive snake filled her vision, jaws parted, fangs bared. There was no time to think—the staff gave her zero leverage against the snake’s thick coils. In a blink, that serpentine body looped around her torso and leg, pinning her arms.

She tried to grip its scales, but the thing’s girth was as wide as her waist. Her fingers slipped along the smooth, banded hide. Panic flared. The snake wound tighter. Each exhale only gave it more room to constrict. Her chest began to hitch with shallow breaths, black spots dancing at the edges of her vision.

“I yield!” she rasped, voice ragged.

The pressure disappeared in an instant. Bear—now a naked man again—spooned behind her on the floor. She lay there, gasping, her ribs on fire and her head swimming from oxygen deprivation. He rolled away, slipped on his robe, and turned back to her, offering a hand.

She noticed the tiger tattoo on his chest had shifted from bright blue to a deep, angry red. The significance flickered in her mind. Some part of his powers, maybe? She pressed trembling fingers to the ragged scratches from the tiger’s claws, still bleeding sluggishly.

“Not bad,” he said, reaching down to help her up.

She clasped his hand, eyes darting around. Darcy was gone, leaving only Bear’s calm presence in this wide training room. “Is that tattoo…part of your power?” Her words came between shallow pants. She couldn’t stop wincing at the throbbing in her arms.

He gave a noncommittal grunt. “Something like that.” Then his gaze sharpened. “Why didn’t you try to overpower my will? You beat Darcy’s will easily.”

A surge of embarrassment knotted her stomach. “I…didn’t even think of it,” she admitted. “You were an animal, and—”

“I’m not just any animal,” he said quietly. “A real animal’s instincts might be fierce, but their wills are usually very mild. Your will is your greatest asset, as a binder. Don’t forget that.” He bent to retrieve the padded staff.

Suddenly, the lights flickered. A split second later, something above them made a sharp crack, and Suzi’s head jerked upward—just in time to glimpse a heavy metal piece, maybe part of the ceiling rig, tear free. It plummeted from the rafters. The lights cut out. An earsplitting crash echoed around them, metal striking the padded floor with enough force to shake her bones.

A massive shape slammed into her side, knocking her flat. Velvety fur pressed against her body in the dark, and she felt rather than saw large paws braced over her. Breath hissed through fangs close to her ear. Her hands tentatively traced along the animal’s flank—until she found a patch of warm, sticky wetness near the haunches.

The creature whimpered and rolled off, leaving her shuddering on her hands and knees. “Bear? Bear!” Panic pressed in. She couldn’t see a damn thing. “Are you hurt? Talk to me!”

Metal groaned overhead. Another cable snapped.

“Move!” Judas’s voice thundered in her head.

She felt her body jerk aside, as if her limbs weren’t her own—Judas seizing control. A second pendulum of machinery slammed past, narrowly missing them. In the darkness, Judas’s vision flared with a ghostly glow, letting her see Bear’s aura: a faint yellow shimmer, like a half-burnt candle.

He was breathing, but the huge cat form sprawled on the floor looked limp. Darcy’s aura and Everett’s flickered somewhere beyond the walls, paused in alarm. Another presence—a dark red stain in the ether—hovered outside, the same twisted color Suzi had seen during the plant fire.

Judas inched closer, dodging more falling debris, and dragged Bear by his forelegs. Suzi felt the weight in her arms, though she wasn’t the one steering. When they reached the door, it was still locked. No key in sight. Judas pivoted, took a breath, and kicked. The sturdy wood barely shuddered.

A second’s hesitation. Suzi felt confusion tingle through the voices in her head when Judas suddenly turned her back to the door, wailing in a melodramatic tone, “Oh, woe is me! All is for naught, I am helpless!”

“What the fuck?” Suzi hissed from within Guillermo.

“‘Woe is me?’ Seriously?” James echoed in the mental chorus.

Another cable tore loose with an earsplitting snap. A massive hunk of steel slammed into the door from the other side, splintering it clean off its hinges. The momentum died against the wood. Judas waited until the pendulum swung gently away, then stepped through the destroyed frame, hauling Bear along.

In the relic room’s dim light, the shape in her arms was a large, black puma. Its side gaped open with a wound that stretched toward its spine, thick and wet with blood. Panic throbbed in Suzi’s chest as Judas’s shout tore free. “Everett!”

Dr. Everett and Darcy barreled in seconds later.

“What did you do!?” Darcy snapped, eyes blazing.

A harsh breath left Judas’s lungs. “A Chaos Demon is attacking me.” She jerked her head toward the red aura that lingered beyond these walls. Everett guided them into a smaller adjoining space that looked like a makeshift surgery bay. Darcy slipped away, presumably to scout.

Everett pointed to a cold metal table in the center. “How long has he been out?”

“A minute—maybe two,” Judas said, laying the massive cat down.

Everett rummaged in a drawer, pulling out a medical stapler. “If he dies while shapeshifted—” He let the words hang ominously, focusing on the job. “Hold that wound together.”

Judas clamped her hands on the torn flesh. The puma’s chest rose and fell in shallow gasps. Eighteen staples later, Everett cracked a vial under the cat’s nose. Bear came around in a start, thrashing with a strangled roar.

“Hold him!” Everett yelled.

The puma fought, but gradually calmed under the firm grip. In a blink, it shifted back into a large man with a stapled incision from his right side across his hip and down toward his buttock—now sealed but still raw and painful-looking. He gasped for breath, eyes rolling.

“You’re fine, Bear,” Everett said, sounding almost bored.

Suzi watched with uneasy fascination as the puma tattoo on Bear’s chest flickered from blue to red to a weak pink, barely visible against his skin. His eyes fluttered closed again, and he slumped, unconscious.

A lurch in her gut signaled Judas relinquishing control, and suddenly Suzi was back behind her own eyes, keenly aware Bear was completely naked. A flood of embarrassment shot through her cheeks. She snatched a sheet from a shelf and draped it over him.

“Dr. Everett,” she managed, still short of breath, “how exactly does Bear’s Shapeshifting power work?”

Everett glanced up from cleaning his hands. “Likely the same as your ability—”

Before he could elaborate, Darcy stepped out from behind a tall cabinet, appearing from thin air. “He got away,” she said, voice tight, “but it’s clear she’s a target. I saw multiple demons lurking around her aura.”

Suzi tried to catch her breath. “I don’t feel them.”

“They’re out of range,” Darcy explained. “They know your power is only effective at short distance. That Chaos Demon was in a weird vessel. Human, maybe, but something else too. There was a Nightmare Demon, a Forgetfulness Demon, and others I couldn’t get close enough to identify. So…” Her glare pinned Suzi. “Who the fuck did you piss off?”