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to Darius.
    Darius shook his head imperceptibly. “This has to stay between us three.”
    He looked at Amara. Whoever she was, Darius must trust her implicitly. “Tell me everything, Darius.” Her hand tightened around his, telling him she would be there for him, lend him her strength if he needed it. But he didn’t know her.
    Then he didn’t know anything anymore.
     

Chapter Eight – Amara
     
    Amara listened to what Darius told Kane, although she already knew everything, and more.
    When Darius had asked her to go to the boathouse, she had been scared of what he intended. But what he told her was in some ways scarier than anything she could have imagined and she felt the weight of the collar around her neck intensify.
    “Kane, please understand whatever has happened was done to keep you safe.” Darius came closer, keeping his voice low, and looking him straight in the eye, willing him to believe his words.
    Kane shook his head, and she could see him fighting to keep his composure. “What have you done, Darius?”
    “When you were a very small child, and the Prime was in its infancy, it was easy to break the law. We were all finding our feet, trying to work out how we could make a living, how we would survive and feed our families.” Darius shifted his gaze, looking off into the distance as if reliving those times. “We governed ourselves to some extent, each town, each clan, or herd, or … pride, looking to their leader for help to get through it.”
    Amara remembered her parents talking about those times. The war with humans had come to an abrupt end when, over fifty years ago now, the leader of the shifters had inexplicably surrendered. At the time no one knew why, and trouble had flared as a few shifters refused to abide by the terms of the peace treaty. She could see why; having left her home to come here, she understood how hard it must have been. The shifters were fighting for equality; a thing humans were against. Some pure humans argued that it was impossible for them to live as equals when shifters were so unequal .
    Being able to turn into a big cat, or a bear, or a wolf, at will, made pure humans wary of this new species. That was what shifters were called, a new species, and set on the same level as the great apes: intelligent, but not worth the same as a pure human.
    When the treaty was signed, all the shifters were rounded up and sent to the Prime, part of what used to be North America up to the Arctic Circle, shut off from the rest of the world by a border. Anyone who refused to go was taken there by force. The law stated that any shifter who wanted to walk outside of the Prime, in the Otherworld, as it was now called by shifters, had to wear a silver collar, laced with copper, that stopped the signal from the brain which the body needed to turn from human to animal and back again.
    That was what she wore around her neck, visible for everyone to see, much like a brand. Kane’s bracelet and Darius’s ring were made to be disguised as an item of jewellery, but their effects were the same.
    “We were lucky. We had a great leader. Remus, the alpha male of our pride, was a good man. He had been rich in the world before, and had managed to strike deals before the world was split. It meant his businesses grew outside of the Prime; of course, none of it could be in his name. But the people who ran those companies for him had been long-term employees, whom he trusted.” Darius looked at Amara, and she saw the sorrow there as he went on.
    “But success breeds jealousy, and a rival male, Serrif, decided to move in on the action. Not by force—he wanted to trade with Remus, he said it would make both prides stronger. That his people were starving and the lions should stick together.” Darius smiled and shook his head. “Remus always was a good man, always wanting to see the best in everyone.”
    “What happened?” Kane asked, although he already knew the outcome.
    “Remus liked to do his thinking