Prologue

Twenty years ago my sister, Cora Bloodshade, was beaten and dragged away in the night by inner city guards. The emperor himself signed and sealed her death certificate and had it hand delivered to me by the same guards who killed her. If they weren't protected by the emperor's magic, I would have burned them to ash then and there, but I've been patient, and vengeance is long overdue.

The city of Nebula was a small, almost forgotten place on the very edge of the Drikadean Empire. The Jade Sea caged us in on three sides, not that the city guards would ever allow anyone to escape through the ports. Planning an escape through the Jade Sea was a suicide mission; everyone knew there was only one way out of this wretched place, and you had to be chosen. The Game of Sevens. That's what they called it. Seven groups of seven, challenged to seven days in sector seven, which was where they sent the rogue vampires, witches, and werewolves: the worst of the worst. Calling it a game was the same as calling pigs being sent to the slaughterhouse a game.

The city guards do nothing to control the violence, the terror, stealing, and murdering in the city, so when you're chosen for the games, you'll do almost anything to make it out alive. They have one simple order from the emperor. No one in. No one out. Unless they make it through the game's first, and even then, the emperor has to meet you for judgement day before you're taken in or out of Nebula. If his royal highness finds you favorable, then you're sent to Sanctem, the safe side of the border. If he finds you unfavorable, you'll find yourself stuck in Draden, the city capitol. Most people who end up stuck in Draden are put under heavy surveillance with no private life, or they're taken by the inner-city guards, and never heard from again.

Every day and every night I had hoped to be chosen, so I could get justice for my sister. I would find a way to burn those guards to ash or envelop them in shadows so dark that they would pray for the depths of hell instead, and I would find a way to drag the emperor down with them. And gods above, the shadow-fire goddess heard my prayers, because tonight the inner-city guards showed at my doorstep with a royal decree.

Zeraphina Bloodshade ordered to the Game Of Sevens: effective immediately.