Author:
M.J. Swenson has been writing stories since elementary school and earned a B.A. in Creative Writing from the University of St. Thomas, Minnesota. Besides writing and reading, M.J. also enjoys playing music and video games.

I woke up feeling that something had changed.

I blinked twice, waiting for my eyes to adjust, and glanced at the clock beside my bed. It read 6:38, as it did every morning. I slid out of bed and moved to my dresser, where I opened the third drawer and pulled out a dark blue V-necked shirt with short sleeves and a dark blue pair of pants. I changed in front of the mirror and examined myself. I looked just as I had the last time I’d looked in the mirror: long, straight, dark brown hair; blue eyes; an absurdly straight and narrow nose; the slight scar at the edge of my eyebrow. The scar whose origin I still couldn’t remember.

Familiar Assassins

I woke up in my cell again. My cheek pressed against the stone floor, my back felt damp, and I could barely see. I was dizzy and achy, like I hadn't eaten anything in several hours. Or days. Or weeks. Who even knew anymore?


I tried to sit up, but waves of pain rippled across my back, and I slumped back down onto the stone floor. At which point I noticed that I was lying in a half-dried pool of my own blood.


"Triad," I murmured, squeezing my eyes shut.


"Don't even think you're going back to sleep," a voice said outside my door. The door unlocked, and two guards came in to haul me to my feet. "We're taking you back in for questioning. You got off easy last time."


"No," I murmured, kicking feebly at them, trying to get them to put me down. My legs would hardly move. "No no no."


"Don't want to go?" one guard asked. "Maybe you should have given them the information last time."


Chapter 41