Nereya Fout

A talented, cynical investigator of Paden City’s crime-ridden Cloud District, her personal mission to carry out justice comes with dire consequences. Will her zeal change the City for the better?

Nereya Vosiet's life in the Cloud District was defined by crime the moment she left the Nursery Academy. The streets shaped her, but her will remained unbroken. Her zeal led her to execute the crime boss Kalen Dravos and set forth a series of events that could not be stopped. The delicate balance of power in the City's most populous District shifted, and she became a political target. Caught up in a world she never wanted, without the people she trusted most, all she had left was her own determination.

In Artifice Nine, newly promoted City Investigator Nereya Vosiet works to dismantle the Cloud District's crime cartels and locate the missing Oren Thrynn. She secretly reunites with her former partner, Kosrin Fout, who has gone undercover within Jossorin Varik's organization to gather intelligence. Their reunion sparks a romantic confession, and after successfully coordinating a sting operation that captures Varik, the two are married in Paden Tower. Professionally, Nereya finds herself continually frustrated by Varik's calm manipulation, though she manages to secure a vital clue by recognizing his voice from the night Nolan Soleis was blackmailed. When an assassination attempt is made on Varik via poisoned food, Nereya and Kosrin trace the lethal treep poison to Overseer Kessaryn's disgruntled butler, Harmon, and successfully arrest him. Despite this victory, Nereya is forced to watch in horror as Varik masterfully manipulates his own arbitration by producing a secret audio recording that implicates several City officials in a massive conspiracy.

In The Withering, City Inspector Nereya Fout's frustration over being forced to take a matrimonial leave by Councilor Thrynn is cut short when her husband, Kosrin, is brutally attacked and critically injured while attempting to question Jossorin Varik's parents. Vowing to track down his assailants, Nereya takes command of the investigation and forms a team with the legendary veteran Lawkeeper Gavrin Balt and a young Keeper named Heressa Berel. Following Heressa's lead, the trio attempts to gather information from an elderly Gat-Borni defector named Ermino, but their meeting is ambushed by a violent gang of Dravos loyalists. The encounter devolves into a fierce brawl where Ermino is fatally struck from behind, and Nereya finds herself pinned to the wall and choked by the gang's leader. Just as her vision begins to blur, her attackers are suddenly knocked unconscious by a recovering Kosrin, who arrives just in time to rescue his wife.