The Elvren Assassin, page 1
THE ELVREN ASSASSIN
LEAGUE OF SUPERNATURAL ASSASSINS
By
J.E. Taylor
The Elven Assassin © 2024 J.E. Taylor
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This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Cover Art by SLM Creations
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
The Elvren Assassin
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
EPILOGUE
THE ELVREN ASSASSIN
Mya is missing. And the Director wants her back. Or worse, dead.
Avery’s mission was to find Mya, the lost assassin, who stepped through the portal to Eleka and disappeared. If Avery finds her, she must bring her home, or if Mya is unwilling to return, Avery must kill her.
But Mya was the only assassin at the complex who saw Avery as a person. She even gave her the name Avery instead of only the numbers issued to each assassin by the Director.
This is not a job she wants. But she’s one of a handful of assassins with fae blood, and she has no choice but to follow the Director’s orders. If she fails, her handler will pay the price.
And he has angel blood like she does, which makes him the closest thing to kin that she has.
Her only hope is to find Mya and convince her to come home. Or Avery will witness her handler’s death before her own.
CHAPTER ONE
AVERY
THE DIRECTOR OF THE League of Supernatural Assassins paced in front of twenty of us, rattling on about our mission, but my mind was stuck on Mya. Mya, the best and most dedicated assassin in the league, was missing.
I refocused on the Director as he ran his hand through his white hair, stretching the ends until he looked like a mad scientist.
I smirked because he was a scientist, and we all thought he was madder than the crazy Ilyium who hunt us. Or so I’d been told.
I’d never left Icarus before. My training to fight and kill had been extensive, but it was something I had yet to put into practice. I fidgeted in my seat at the thought of an actual mission. My stomach flipped, and I glanced around at the other trainees being sent into the field.
The experienced assassins lined the front row, and the rest of us filled the seats behind. I recognized a few faces but not all of them, so I wondered what dorms they were from.
“You are here because we have found that the portal to Eleka reacts much more favorably to those with fae blood. You are to find Mya and bring her back.” His gaze landed on the front row. “Those with more training will bring me back royal DNA.”
“What if Mya is dead?” the assassin in the front asked.
“Then bring me her body. We found this in Eleka’s portal room.” He held up a chip. One that everyone in the room recognized. It looked like the chips the Director placed in each of our bodies to track us or to disable us if he so desired. “Her body wasn’t there, so that tells me Eleka is not dead like we thought.” He handed the chip to one of the assassins. “Be sure to send a message to the royal family.”
He got a nod in return.
“If Mya is not being kept against her will, then she is your enemy. Understand?” He pointed at a girl in the front row. “I don’t care if you shared a room at one time or not. She is the enemy if she is there willingly. Bring her back by force if you have to, or kill her and bring me her body.”
He looked over the small crowd. “Understand?”
“Yes, sir!” we all said in unison.
He stared us down, and I tried not to shift in my seat when his gaze settled on me. “If you fail, you and your handlers will pay the price.” That settled over the room like a wet blanket. “Be ready to go in twenty minutes.”
His curt nod was our cue to leave, and the twenty assassins in the room made their way through the exit near the back.
I hurried to my room to change and gather my weapons. As I turned the corner, I drew up short at the sight of Ren, my handler.
Ren was at least a foot taller than I was, with black hair that fell in soft curls to beyond his shoulders, and he was all muscle. Believe me, I had a difficult time knocking him to the mat, no matter how hard he drilled me in training sessions.
He leaned against the wall next to my door with a scowl on his supple lips. It intensified upon seeing me.
“What’s up?” I asked as I swiped my fingers across the door pad to my dorm.
The door swished open, and Ren remained silent. I paused in the doorway and met his sharp gaze.
“You missed your morning training.” His crossed arms flexed under his shirt as if he were a breath away from striking something. Even his white wings rattled with tension.
“The Director called a bunch of us in to get ready for a mission.” It surprised me he didn’t know this already, but from the way his eyebrows shot up, this was probably breaking news to him.
His arms dropped, and his steel-blue eyes narrowed as if itching to call bullshit.
“If you don’t believe me, go ask the Director yourself. I have to get ready to go.”
Normally, I did not argue with him or cut him off or walk away like I was about to do. That usually ended with me on the ground and Ren lecturing me about appropriate behavior.
“Where are you going?”
“Eleka.” I didn’t have time to expand on the rest. If he needed to know the details, he’d have to talk to the Director.
“And if I fail, both of us will pay the price,” I muttered as I stepped into my dormitory room to change into my battle clothing.
The shared closet that the half-dozen assassins who cohabited this room used wasn’t nearly big enough for all our things. My section only had a couple of items. One being exactly what I needed. My battle gear for assignments was the same color as my hair and wings. Purple and blue hues graced the suit, and they shimmered as I pulled it from the hanger.
Ren hadn’t left. He remained leaning against the doorway with his arms crossed in front of him and one ankle hooked over the other. While he looked like he didn’t have a care in the world, his sharp gaze never left me. He reminded me of a hawk scouting the ground for his next meal.
Although on closer inspection, Ren’s eyes held concern. I had seen that look when I lost a training battle and had been reduced to a bloody, broken mess. The same look he wore now was that same concern he had leveled at me as he’d picked me up and carried my battered form to his room to patch me up.
As handlers go, Ren wasn’t bad. He seemed eager to teach me all the techniques that would someday save my ass in the field. But he also wasn’t above beating me to reinforce his point when others were around.
“Eleka’s a death sentence. Why would the Director send you there?” He framed his question in a thoughtful tone, as if his mind kept circling the information I had given him.
This was not his usual demanding bark.
Because the Director did not want to lose his best assassin. That much was clear. He’d rather see her dead than lose her to another realm. But I kept my thoughts to myself as I pulled on my clothing.
Ren chewed on his bottom lip, and his angelic wings spread out when he straightened his back. His soft down appendages always amazed me. He was said to have been bred from the fallen, but his wings hadn’t turned black like all of the other fallen.
Angel blood connected us and made him family. While he shouldn’t ever show preferential treatment, he seemed to have a soft spot for me. The rest of the compound saw him relentlessly pushing me, but no one, especially the Director or his cronies, saw this softer side. If they had, they’d have put him to death ten times over.
The angel blood mixed with my fae heritage made my magic easier to turn on. I could glamour anything with this connection. My only other gift was that the angel blood gave me both strength and speed that surpassed a mortal being. It also boosted my healing abilities beyond what the rest of the assassins were bred with. Even though I had a pair of wings, they were more ornamental than useful.
I shivered at the thought of Mya being alive. Talk about gifts. That assassin could suck the energy from someone to the point they fell into an exhausted slumber. She also could conjure things at will. Her magic was as impressive as her energy tapping, and those didn’t even hold a candle to her deadly fighting skills.
I couldn’t believe she’d been bested by anyone, much less a dead planet. Not with her skills. My heart clenched at the thought of hunting her.
“He wants Mya back,” I said after I sheathed my swords and daggers in their holders.
I ran my hand through my long locks, finger combing the knots out before I swept my hair behind me and squared my shoulders.
Ren’s eyes widened. “You’re hunting, Mya?” His voice cracked with the question.
“That’s the task. Bring her back dead or alive.” My gut twisted. I would likely end up being the one dead, but I had to find her and talk some sense into her.
I was not going with the same “kill her” mentality that I saw in that room. Not with how she had treated me for all these years.
“Just don’t do anything stupid,” Ren said.
“I don’t plan on it.”
He grabbed me before I could slip past him and forced me to look at him. “I mean it. Mya is dangerous, and you don’t have the same level of experience out in the field. So, use your head.” He released me and wiped his face. “I’d rather deal with the whipping post than have you killed on this insane assignment.”
“I will do my best not to get killed. Okay?”
He studied my gaze for longer than normal, as if he wanted to say more, but then he gave me a nod and stepped back.
I wasn’t keen on a death mission, either. I had to at least try to reason with Mya.
Even if it put me in mortal danger.
CHAPTER TWO
AVERY
I STEPPED OUT OF my room, physically ready for my mission.
However, my mental state was not aligned, especially after Ren’s concern. His strange behavior had me doubting my abilities and this mission even more than I was before.
Each step became heavier as I made my way down the sanitized hallway toward the portal room, which would dump us out on the barren surface of Icarus and the gateway to Eleka. It felt as if I would never grace these halls again once I slipped through that portal.
A shiver skittered up my spine, and I arched my back against it.
I slipped into the nearly full portal room and received a sour look from the Director.
“Good of you to join us, sixty-nine. You’ll be paired with one-twenty-two for this mission.” The Director’s sharp gaze pinned on me as if he read my intentions to talk to Mya instead of using violence as we were programmed.
I pressed my lips together against the need to correct him. I had never truly been sixty-nine. Mya had dubbed me Avery early on, and it had stuck. Even Ren referred to me by name as opposed to just a number.
Instead of stewing on the Director’s obvious dis, I looked at my mission partner.
One-twenty-two gave me the creeps. She could become invisible and attack without mercy. Her presence meant I could not reason with Mya. Not without ditching the girl. From what the Director was saying, those of us who had never been on missions before were not to leave the side of our partners. So, dumping this one would be as dangerous as confronting Mya.
I moved closer to one-twenty-two. It was hard to miss her in the room with her spiked neon-green hair and ember-colored eyes that stood out like a beacon on her pale skin. I sure hoped she would blend in where we were going because she stood out even amongst fae blood.
She cut a glare in my direction and faced forward stoically, as if I were beneath her.
My wings fluttered in response, but I kept my mouth closed.
“My guards have programmed the outer portal to take you to Eleka.” The Director’s voice boomed over the room. “Remember your mission. I want her back on Icarus within the next forty-eight hours, or else your handler will pay for your failure. I don’t care if she is alive or dead. Understand?”
“Yes, sir,” all of us responded in unison.
He nodded to the first group of assassins, and the morbid procession began moving through the portal.
“What can I call you?” I whispered to my unwanted partner.
She slashed her gaze to mine, and she scrunched her brow. “One-twenty-two.”
“Your handler doesn’t have a nickname for you?” I had heard my fair share of name substitutions over the years, and sometimes they were decent enough to stick. Thankfully, Mya had taken care of that for me, and Ren seemed to take to it as well.
She pressed her lips together and looked forward, her cheeks reddening. “Lo calls me Em because my hair reminds him of emeralds. That is the name I use on jobs if I have to interact with others.”
“I shall call you Em.”
“Don’t.”
“I can’t call you by a number while we’re trying to blend in on another realm,” I mumbled under my breath. “It would be too strange.”
She rolled her eyes at me, just like Ren always did.
Ren said I had an innocence that shouldn’t have survived this place. We were supposed to be fierce assassins with zero feelings. I think somehow I was defective in that way. I kept my expression neutral around the Director and his guards, and when training in the groups, but when Ren and I were one on one, I smiled and laughed between sparring sessions enough for him to chide me regularly.
“Fine,” she growled as we stepped closer to the portal.
My heart jumped in my chest as the two assassins before us stepped into place in front of the portal. Each of them held out their hands, and one of the Director’s portal guards slashed a blade across their palms.
We were next.
I stared in fascination as the two more senior assassins swiped their blood on the outer shell of the portal, and what looked like an empty space inside churned with black smoke.
The guard gave a curt nod, and they stepped forward, engulfed by the dark fog.
The quick view of inside that foggy space made my wings flutter. I had no idea how I was going to find the nerve to step inside that frightening tube.
I swallowed hard and stepped into place, trying to school my features.
“Palms,” the guard demanded.
Em immediately put her hand out. I was a fraction of a second slower, and she cut me another glare as the guard’s knife bit into my skin. I couldn’t suppress my hiss fast enough.
Em wiped her hand on her side of the portal entry, and I followed suit on mine. That black swirl rolled in the center of the entrance before widening enough for both of us to step through.
My mouth dried, and before I could retreat, I swallowed whatever fear had blossomed in my stomach and entered the portal with Em. Sweat pooled at the base of my back and tingled on my forehead, and I struggled to remember Ren’s lessons on portal jumping.
“Focus on the white dot in the distance. That is your destination.” Ren’s gaze jumped to his window and the night beyond as he explained what the portals were like. “If you let your mind wander, you’ll drift off course and get cut up by the portal. So, remember to concentrate on that expanding dot.”
I blinked and replayed Ren’s lesson in my head along with the mantra that this was just a short jump to the surface outside the complex.
I nearly tumbled onto the rocky outcrop of Icarus’s outer portal plateau.
The chill of the night seeped into my skin, and I shivered, rubbing my arms as I glanced around at our surroundings.
The training towers of Icarus rose high in the distance. And behind me, the main portal shimmered, waiting to swallow us into the unknown.
CHAPTER THREE
REN
I STARED AFTER AVERY with my pulse pounding. She wasn’t ready to go up against Mya.
Hell, I’d successfully buffered her for the past year from any job in the field. Which was probably why the Director didn’t give me any heads-up.
