.png)
Sneak Peak!!! Prince of Darkness: Chapter 1
I tilted my chin toward the sun, seeking the warmth of its radiance like a cold-blooded beast, much like the winged serpent that lay mutilated on the dock behind me. With a sigh, I gazed back to my fishing line bobbing through parting ripples of the lake’s surface.
Damn thing shouldn’t have attacked me. Just one puncture from its two-pointed fangs would have collapsed my lungs and had me seizing for several minutes until my final, agonizing breath.
I shuddered. A bite from one of them was probably one of the worst ways to go.
It was a timely convenience as I recognized its shimmering black scales and parting wings among the stagnant surface of the lake, watching as it skated with ambling prowess. Then I waited, knife wielded and ready, never stripping my forest green eyes away from the little beast when it neared. Attracted to life, to the subtle rise in a breath, and the sing-song of a heart pounding against a chest, I stood no chance at not being found. Smelling, hunting on blood, the beasts only lived to feed. When its pointed nose and bared fangs snapped from the rippling waves, I grabbed it by the base of its neck then sliced it clean in two.
I’d come across them more times than I could count, especially here. A dock for basking. Weeds, rushes, and saw grass, perfect for mosquitoes that baited minnows and guppies. The perfect, vulnerable prey for small, amphibious beasts.
Eat or be eaten, right pa?
Stones sunk fast and deep, tightening my throat, shredding across my lungs and into my gut. Even after all this time, it still hurt just as much—even a simple thought. How he brought me here and showed me the best way to throw a line, to strip a fish and gut it clean. What to look for to survive—the berries turning ripe in the bushes that shrouded the lake, which beetles would cause gastrointestinal damage and which would ease a rumbling ache, when it was best to cast my line, and when to run.
Yes. Run.
My gaze drifted into the clear blue skies toward Blood Hill Forest looming over the village like an ominous shadow upon the hill. It was quiet. Too quiet. Especially for a forest full of beasts eager to devour and rip flesh from the bone.
My grip tightened on the rod in my hand, a makeshift of tumble weed for a line, an old hook, and a fallen branch.
I held it more out of boredom than anything as I waited, watched, and prepared for even a shift in the wind or a shattering howl from the void between the tall pines. Anticipation was heavy, a dense fog always at the forefront of my thoughts to put me unceremoniously on edge.
Kicking my feet, I yearned for the sharp chill of the water’s touch luring me in for a swim to ease my strife and cool my skin from the scorching blaze of heat.
Probably not the best idea, though.
It would be irresponsible—stupid—to do so when I was so close to the edge of Blood Hill. Not that it was inundated with beasts with how the hill dropped into a cliff face right at the edge of the lake but still—it was a possibility. The winged serpent was proof enough of that.
A bell sounded in the distance, chiming so loud I felt it with my next breath. My heart jolted, the dock shook, ripples parting beneath my rod.
Please, I begged. Not now. I just got here.
I waited, holding the rod close to my chest. If only my line could pull and yank back the angst lurking there.
It rang again, a warning, loud and resonant, foretelling danger. I jumped from the dock, grabbing my bowstring and arrows resting off to my left with a huffed curse. As the third sound tolled over the village and echoed through the forest, delight and disquiet musings arose.
A beast had entered the village.
It was a chance for meat. Food. Money.
But whose life would it cost? How many had already died? Was my family okay?
Fears unbidden, I sprinted toward the source of the metal echoing in my ears. The planks creaked beneath my boots from the aging dock as I dodged several holes the size of my hand from where the rotten wood had snapped. I knew where to step though, side stepping left to right as if the wood was on fire.
A blistering scream filled the air—then the familiar sound of gunshot echoed with a splintering crack.
“Idiots,” I cursed. Stupid. Stupid idiots.
I gripped the bow tighter and pushed myself to run faster, bolting past the lake and through the dense brush of the forest. Fallen limbs snapped underneath my leather boots while sweat beaded down my brow and my back from the humidity tightening and warming the air. My eyes kept shifting to the skies where hawks circled above me, waiting for easy prey.
Not today, you ugly vermin.
Tightening my jaw, I bit down on my lower lip, hoping I wouldn’t be too late. I was maybe five minutes out, but timing was everything. It only took a second for a child to be mauled, or for someone to stumble, or for my brother to seek out the beast himself out of his own curiosity.
My breath sharpened, smashing the notion with the nearing crack of the bell. The ground rumbled beneath my feet with each deafening chime, a vexing bellow amplifying over the pound of blood banging in my ears.
“Beasts at McCreery’s! There are beasts at McCreery’s! Stay in your homes!”
My gaze drifted to the source, to the stone structure and copper bell wrapped in vines, as old as the graves from a hundred years past. Between the break of pines in the distance, I made out someone whipping the rope back and forth in panic atop the tower, shouting through the wooden megaphone with their free hand.
From the slight squeal to it and the skinny form, it looked like Mr. Daniels. I rolled my eyes. He’d always been one to run, cower, and panic. Not always in that same order but the spineless man couldn’t even bait a hook to save his life.
Villagers screamed and fled from the local market, as I emerged into the clearing. Women pulled their children to nearby shelters, while men hefted anything nearby to barricade themselves from the alleyway that led toward the McCreery’s. Snatching barrels, tables, crates, and even the wagon cart that sat rotting off to the side of the street for months with a missing wheel and cracked boards.
I turned left and shoved through the commotion. Move! Move!
“Ravyn!” my mother screamed from behind me. Her voice cracked with fear, her eyes no doubt wide and paralyzed.
My gut flopped at the cry of desperation within my ma’s voice. Like I was just seconds away from being torn away from her.
But this was what I did. Surely, she should have been used to it by now…
“Go get em’, Ray!” My brother waved over my mother’s cry. I smiled, looking over my shoulder with a wink. Bright and wide, admiration swam within the mud brown of his eyes, stars erupting and shattering with the incandescent gleam.
Jumping over the makeshift barricade, I left my family safely behind its walls.
Now to find the beast.
I sprinted down the last row of inner village townhomes, my boots squishing in muck and dung from the animals roaming the streets or that were chained or fenced in.
My lungs were on fire, each step having me gasping for my next breath. I might have been a hunter, but it didn’t mean I wouldn’t cough my lungs up during a hard sprint.
Running was for masochists. And despite all the bravado, I was not one to enjoy self-inflected torture.
My balance wobbled, my right foot dipping into a groove from where travelers had pulled their wagons and sunk the soil with the weight. Lips twitching, I could taste the metallic iron of blood on my tongue drifting with the zephyr.
The humidity was so consuming I was sure I was going to pass out turning down the dirt path. Dots impaired my vision. A headache formed just over my brow.
Damn. I panted, feeling my lips flaking and throat turning dry. When was the last time I drank any water?
I edged around the house into the pasture and slowed, assessing the situation and two familiar faces.
And blood.
Lots of it.
It looked like a slaughter.
“By the King’s head! What the hel’ you thinkin’ shooting that off toward the ole’ bat’s house?! Ye coulda killed her!” Thomas was red in the face. Sweat beaded down the hunter’s brows and he was caked in mud from head to toe, blood staining his trousers, gliding down the side of his neck.
“Hey!” I shouted through the tightness of my breaths. I pointed at the shorter of the two men who held the rifle at his side. “If you’re going to shoot that thing then do it right!”
Mark, Missin’ Mark, a nickname much deserved and without much preamble, curled his upper lip in disgust. It was a bloody miracle nobody had died yet from his poor excuse of a hunter.
Turning to Thomas, I asked, “Are you okay?”
“Aye.” He nodded, gritting his teeth and hunching a hand to his leg. “The bloody beasts were right quick. Ate my damn gun and took a bite outta my leg and neck.” Reaching his hand up with a grimace, he pulled down the collar of his shirt where two circular puncture wounds marked his shredded skin, blood staining the cotton.
I looked past the pair of hunters to the gated fence of sheep. A pair of vampire wolves emerged from the forest, shattering the pasture gates. They sank their fangs into the animals’ fur, drenching the ground with the blood of their prey. They ripped apart muscle and tore at the poor creatures like pieces of dead meat, gnawing, tugging, and flinging the sheep around with iron-clad jaws.
Something rocked within me, a small pit burning deep in my gut at the massacre of blood and guts staining the pasture.
Miss McCreery screamed out the window of her cottage, her voice raw, desperate. “Do somethin’!” she exhorted. “My babies!”
“I got it.” Mark moved to raise his gun.
My hand a vice, sure and steady, lowered his barrel back to the ground. “So, you can accidentally shoot one of us?”
“They’re on the other side of the pasture for pity’s sake! You’ll be fine!” He lifted it again and scowled. “I can handle this just fine, woman.”
Woman. I narrowed my gaze, loathing that condescending tone as I debated whether to knock the man against the side of his head with the bow in my hand.
My thoughts burned to ash at the sound of a bullet exiting the chamber, reverberating through my chest. A low whine pierced the air. Flesh shredded. A thump echoed to the damp soil.
“You stupid fool!” I dropped the bow to the ground and grabbed the pistol sheltered in the holster by the side of my hip. “You shot the bloody sheep!”
The wolves were pissed, growling, and snarling their bloodied fangs in my direction. I sucked in a breath. My heart thrashed within my chest. Wraiths upon the breeze charged from across the pin.
Thomas recoiled, raising the jagged tooth knife in his grip. “Shoot damnit! Shoot ‘em!”
Mark hefted the barrel in the wolf’s direction. A moment passed. Then only a low, metallic clink echoed with disheartened alarm. Mark glanced down at the barrel, his eyes wide in panic. “Ah sh–”
Shadows below.
I fired. The kickback shook my hand, recoiling through my ears and into my skull. While the bullet shredded through the wolf’s shoulder, it only charged in faster, its fanged teeth bared and primal.
I clutched the pistol handle. Blood screamed, wailing in my ears.
With heavy paws, it barreled through the pasture fence, growling in a hideous cry to war. Again, I fired. This time between the eyes. With its partner on its heels, I had no time to think—no time for relief.
I pulled the trigger.
Click.
My stomach dropped. Bloody expensive bullets! I looked up just as the wolf’s canines impended above me, bloodied and dripping.
Jumping out of the way, I rolled over my head, pushing my feet underneath me. I reached for my bow just as Mark and Thomas encircled the wolf with their blades. But it wasn’t focused on them. It was focused on me.
My fingers slick and coated in muck, had the arrow slipping between them, refusing to heed. Dread bloomed as the arrow shifted a second. Come on! I grounded my teeth.
“Fire it, lass! Fire!” Thomas roared.
With a steady hand, I shifted back the arrow, then slowed my breaths as the wolf neared. Eyes haunted with a red iris from its taken kills, its black fur glimmered underneath the orange haze painting the falling sky. The wind caressed my skin, my heart pounding against my ribs.
Breathe. With a heavy breath, I narrowed on the single mark within the beast’s eyes. One. Two. Three—
I ceased the tension on the bow.
The air whistled as the cord kissed my cheek. Closer and closer the tip of onyx metal sailed, each millisecond elongating the angst in my lungs.
It struck true.
The wolf’s corpse collapsed with a grumbling thud. One second—a harrowing rise of a breath before its clawed talons would have taken me next.
I blinked at the protruding arrow, my gaze stabilizing on the wolf’s flesh rooted at my boots.
Relief. Trembling, soothing relief. I’d nearly died.
Again.
“Shadows and Spirits above.” Thomas sighed. “Ye nearly gave me a bloody heart attack, lass!”
Pulling myself together, I wiped the muck from my hands onto my trousers. “Well, I killed it.” While my voice sounded dry, emotionless, I was giving thanks to the sun I didn’t end up as its next meal.
“Impressive as always.” He limped toward Miss McCreery’s porch—more of a death trap of rotten wood than an actual porch—patting the spot with scrutinizing inspection before falling to his bum with an agonized cry. “Bloody damn things,” he muttered, pulling back his trousers to a nasty gash along the bone.
I shuddered at the sight.
With a squeal, Miss McCreery rushed out of the house and stared into the bloodbath of her pen. Only two of her sheep had survived. I winced. I didn’t want to count the number of intestines. She sniffled, putting the back of her hand to her mouth probably trying to stop the foul smell of death that lingered in the air. She looked like she might be sick from it all.
Maybe it was because I was so used to the foulness, but I didn’t mind it—even if it tasted like ash upon my tongue and burned my nostrils like poisonous gas.
Tears slipped past Miss McCreery’s wrinkled cheeks. “My babies,” she croaked.
My chest tightened with the agony of the sorrow buckling the woman’s knees.
“Aye just be happy ye alive,” Thomas grumbled. “Coulda’ done a lot worse than that. Ye coulda been one of ‘em.”
“Thank you, my dear, for killing the damn beasts.” Miss McCreery pulled me into a hug, patting each of my shoulders. “Just wish ya could have gotten here earlier.” She pulled away, wiping away the streak of tears staining her face.
I gave a lopsided grin. “Sorry I couldn’t save more of them.”
“You did your best. As you always do. Just ain’t fair you know? That we got nobody to prot ect us and you and ole’ Thomas gotta risk your lives to fight off the dang creatures.” Her nose wrinkled, either from the carnage at her back or from the disgust souring her next string of words. ”Couldn’t the King spare even a dozen of them guards to protect the village from ‘em?”
If only…
It was something I thought about quite a lot. The Kingdom never cared for people like us. They didn’t look past the safety of their city walls to see the villages lying in ruin where the poor fought just to see the sun rise in the morning.
While people like us are left to suffer and die as if we had no right to breathe the same air.
“What are you doing?” I demanded, watching as Mark slunk to the far beast.
“They’ll be good for cleaning and gutting. Good meat.”
“They’re mine.” I approached, wielding my shadow to loom over the deceased beast and Mark’s hazel nut hair. “I killed them. You only nearly got the ha…” I bit down on my tongue, stopping myself before the word ‘hag’ slipped past my lips. “You almost killed Miss McCreery. I earned them fair and square.”
Mark continued to inspect the fur coat of the wolf—the abhorrent thief.
“Aye!” Thomas snapped. “The next time ye want some bloody meat it does ye well to actually kill the suckers in the first place! Now off with ya! Before I put my boot up ye ass for thievin.”
“I wasted bullets on them,” Mark growled. “I got a family to feed just like the rest of you.”
“Then get better at taking your shots,” I snipped, digging my nails into his shoulder until he was forced to rise. “I have a family to feed as well.”
Thrusting my hand off, he gazed upon the pelt with longing. “You’re better off than most of us. You could at least share it; we all worked for it just as much.”
Damn him and his pity card.
I sighed, hitching up my shoulder to better adjust the arrows at my back, nibbling on my lower lip as I looked to the wolves and all they could provide. Bones for broth. Meat for several weeks, if not months. Fur for warm coats in the winter. I could even sell them for coin to get finer weapons, more bullets.
Frowning, I looked down at my pistol. Why’d they have to be so bloody expensive?
Mark’s hazel eyes stared at his empty sack of bullets. He had a wife and three daughters—one plagued by a sickness that had wiped out several of the villagers. She was the same age as me—not yet having turned nineteen. While I didn’t know her well, could I really be so selfish as to deny this man means to care for his family? I knew all too well the hardship of this village.
“You can take the coat. Nothing more.”
“Thank you,” he mumbled, refusing to meet my eyes—perhaps wounding his insufferable pride to ask a woman for aid.
“Thomas, you can take the meat off the one closest to your feet.” I snapped my gaze at Mark just as he opened his insufferable mouth to protest and complain. “Do you want the coats or not?”
“Yes,” he said, rather abrasively before dropping down to his knees and sheathing his blade.
I waited, watching for any indication of deceit as Mark cut across the coat and removed it from the layer of the wolf’s flesh.
“What bone ye use for the arrows?” Thomas queried, nodding toward the other wolf as Mark removed the pointed arrow in its eyes.
“Fiend.”
Thomas whistled, laughing in amusement, his rotted teeth on full display. “Hard to find that is.”
It was hard to find but not impossible. I looked to the skies where dark clouds brewed in the distance. The wind nipped across my bare arms, howling in the distance like an enraged beast.
A storm was coming.
“Better be right quick strippin’ em,” Thomas grumbled, looking up to the sky as the sun dipped lower behind the trees—it too terrified of the dark. “The sun’l be settin’ soon and I’d like to avoid runnin’ into any Shadows.”
Pre-order now!
Comments