Take My Heart...: Dark Ages - Fantasy (Dark Gods & Tainted Souls Book 3)

by Schenk, Julius

  The man whipped his face and stood, he glowered at Goldie and lunged forward with a series of cuts and slashes that sent him back blocking and dodging fast. The man’s dagger sunk deep into his arm and he dropped the left dagger with a cry. He staggered back as the blood flowed, the man stepped back smiling.

  The priest cried stop.

  “One mark against Master Jenson, that move was much too bloody, you know the rules no permanent injury, two more like that and you’re out, same for you Goldie, no more head butts.”

  The man looked at him and thrust and in a series of cuts. Goldie managed to block but the man’s face got close to him and he heard him whispering to him.

  “You’re dead you fuck. I came here for one reason and one reason only.” The man jumped back and slashed again the mark scoring hard across Goldie’s chest, the blood flowing. The priest yelled again.

  “Another one for you Jenson, one more mark and you’re out. Calm down.”

  The man backed up whispering again. “The king says hello, you piece of shit.”

  Goldie knew this was serious now. It wasn’t a game now but an actual fight. He dug deep into the skills of the brigand and brought up the calm. He’d placed his life on the line every time he fought for money and he’d won, Goldie embraced it.

  The man lunged again and slashed at Goldie. He then kicked him in the leg. Goldie toppled over him and the man ran in. Goldie got his blade pointing upwards expecting the man to be on top of him but looked back at him and saw he’d slipped in his own blood and getting to his feet again.

  Goldie took the time to stand. The man thrust hard at his chest, straight at his heart as he stood, everyone saw it and gasped. Goldie grabbed the blade in his weaponless hand. The gauntlet taking the sharpness. He swung wide with the dagger but too slow, Goldie’s rough mailed fist with the dagger hilt in it and smashed him hard in the already broken nose.

  The man staggered back, as his feet hit his own blood his feet slipped out from him again. He fell forward with a thump and groan. The crowd looked in stunned silence.

  “Clearly we have our winner” the priest cried. “This rabble would have been out anyway. You ok son?” he asked.

  The priest rolled the man over, his own dagger was deep in his chest and a look of surprise on his face. The crowd gasped again.

  “Fucking hell, why does this always happen around you. Once again anyone know this man?” cried the priest.

  “Check his pockets” a voice cried.

  “See who the lady wants dead,” cried the boy to laughter.

  The priest pulled a piece of paper and a few coins from the man’s pocket, he opened the paper read it looking shocked, then looking at all the people read it a aloud.

  “Kill the one known as Goldie, we’ll be there sunset on Ladies day, have the gates open”

  Goldie smiled to himself, now they would believe.

  Chapter Thirty Six

  Grimm almost laughed to himself as sat cross-legged in the sand staring out into the desert. His whole life had been a simple one, if hard, but easy enough to map and plan. He’d been a fisherman in the north, a sailor, and smuggler in Pelloss and now he was fighting in an epic battle against forces that wanted to destroy pretty much everything.

  He’d always been a man to believe in things. Growing up back home, people believed in the old stories and one of the highest positions someone could have was being a wise woman. They had two in his little town. One lived in the township, she helped with childbirths and injuries, sick people went to her for remedies of local plants and teas. The other was more of a seer. She lived away from the town but was not shunned, the people would bring her food every week and seek her for advice on their lives. Now he was having visions like that and had taken so much power. He didn’t feel it in him like a force wanting more, he was simply happy he was equal to the task ahead of him.

  He had helped the desert people and then said his goodbyes to White Eyes. She embraced him as he left. He knew that they couldn’t have killed that man. He was strong in the service of fear. Grimm could feel it radiating from him. He was like a sickness that was ready to set out across the desert and infect the people there. White eyes was traveling on with her dozen or so survivors to the main desert camps. She had asked him to come but he knew it wasn’t his battle. Some instinct was telling him he needed to be somewhere else now.

  He needed guidance, from a source he trusted.

  Grimm stood up and snapped a small branch off a nearby tree. He drew a small circle in the sand and stood within it. He began to think of the Wolvern, last time he’d called it, he’d gotten it wrong but this time, he had the memories of a hundred summonings at his command. He had the power to pull Seth back now if he wanted to. He thought of the creature and thought he wanted, not to call it forth but simply see it and talk to it. As he chanted the words in his mind a white fog bank appeared. It slowly faded away and showed him the Wolvern.

  It stood in a huge glass plain and it was fighting. He watched as it tore into one of those black dog creatures he’d seen in that room with Seth so long ago. It ripped the dog creature’s throat out and flung its body to the side, but seemed injured, it was covered with blood and some of it looked like it was its own. Next to the Wolvern stood the most incredible creature he’d ever seen. It was like a woman or rather a goddess. She was barely covered in clothes and carried a huge black sword, she moved like a flash of white and her hair which was silver-like. A well-polished sword flew behind her. She grinned as she killed one of the beasts. His heart beat faster on seeing her, he’d never felt such lust and want in his life.

  Once they had killed the creatures the Wolvern looked up. Grimm had no idea what they would be seeing. It walked so its head was near him.

  Angry one is that you? words sounded in his mind but they were faint, a bare whisper.

  Grimm resigned himself and thinking on the Wolvern hard and the woman, ripped open the veil, soon they stood in the desert with him the circle.

  She pointed her sword at him looking around.

  “What power is this? Where the hell are we?” she said in a refined voice that spoke a strange old version of Northern.

  Grimm knelt before them and putting his head up.

  “I need your guidance,” he said simply, trying not to stare at her.

  “You know him?” the silver woman asked the Wolvern. It paced back and forth and looked on the vast plain. It was not contained and could have run if had wanted to.

  You’ve built you circle the wrong way? It said.

  “Last time I called the wrong thing. I don’t wish to trap you, just talk,” he said.

  The Wolvern laughed in his mind, Guidance, you need no guidance. I feel the power from you like a pounding heat, you’ve done something, even Seth didn’t have this power of the calling.

  Grimm just nodded. “I may have taken some of the Guild and Gatherer secrets but now I’m lost. I know we’re in a war but I have no idea where I best I need to be. They say I should go to the desert and help bring their people back to the fold but I don’t know.”

  The Wolvern paced and thought, Grimm could see it communing with the woman and the creature looked at itself and its damaged leg.

  “Are you friends with Seth, Northman,” she asked.

  He looked at her again and couldn’t help but smile, she was incredible. “I am. I need to help him that is all and seek the best way to do it.”

  The Wolvern communed with him again the desert people are fine, they still call to their dead and follow the old ways, they are not so confused as some might think, but help is needed, did you just see that?”

  “The black dogs seem to be giving you some trouble,” he said simply.

  She laughed for the first time. “Just a little bit, my arms are getting sore from how many of them I need to kill, we journey to find their source,” she said.

  “What should I do?” he asked simply to the Wolvern.

  I would say help us, you are strong and we coul
d use you, but you might not be able to return it said.

  Grimm thought of it. He wanted to be near this woman and help Seth and he knew this was a battle he could help in. Besides he was becoming too much for this world, his power and skills were exceeding any of any living person. He thought he might be able to come back. He smiled. slightly to himself imagining the men chasing him finding he was simply gone.

  Grimm stood and smiled.

  “I’ll come,” he said and stepped from the circle.

  He walked to the lady and held out his hand, taking her wrist like a warrior, he didn’t want to admit how much of his decision was her.

  “I’m Grimm,” he said.

  “Grimm, I’m Silver and stop staring at me. I know what you’re thinking,” she said with a laugh and led him through the void in the sunshine of the land of the dead.

  ***

  She whipped the blood from her face with the back of her hand and looked at her fallen, once friend, Angelina. The woman lay dead, ripped-out throat and blood still pumped from the wound onto the floor. She felt so much better, it had been an age since she’d feed and felt the life infuse her body. She was going to have to do something about this. Clearly this wasn’t something she could keep doing.

  Minsetta looked around the room. There was a small tray of tools on a nearby counter. She looked over them and took up a small dagger with a very sharp edge, clearly for taking the skin off people. She didn’t feel guilty about the women, she’d have surely killed her, yet she was just lost and weak. So many of the women here had been manipulated but were so far gone now she would have no choice. She heard the sounds of yelling and feet coming down the wooden stairs. Angelina had been less than quiet and had screamed her last bit of life away. The whole house would be awake by now.

  She ran from the room, barefoot and bareback. She snuck through a side door and made her way to the nearest exit. There was a small reading room and she crept into it closing the door. She heard the sounds of yelling and pounding booted feet pass. She needed to get the hell out of here. There was a large opening in the stone, which was blocked by a wooden shutter. She opened it easily and let the night air in. Her senses were so heightened and she heard them trying the door. Minsetta dove through the archway. She hit the hard ground, a few feet below, and rolled. She came up running, her long dress flowing behind her. She needed to start dressing more appropriately.

  She raced across the grass of the compound and made her way to the wall. Lucky it was unmanned, just another side of the compound which looked out onto the sparse landscape beyond. She ran at the stone wall and jumping with her foot hitting it she grabbed the top, barely. She pulled herself over the wall with a slight grunt and lowered herself down onto the other side. She gave herself a moment with her back against the wall and then pushed on.

  She had to find her way back to Josette and the Bastards. She felt more than ever they needed to take these women down. They had become so much more dangerous than they were before. When she had come to them as a broken and scared thing, on the run and terrified. They had a different home then, hadn't taken this one yet, she knew not what they had done with the actual sisters of the divine child.

  They had been good at first. They feed her and trained her. They were about women begin strong and protecting themselves but now they were building an army. She had never had much time for cults and worship. Every time she’d come across people who believed in something it always meant death for someone else, she remembered well the mission that had made her never come back to them and seek out the Dark Guild who could, at least, be trusted to just care for their own goals and greed.

  She’d been with them for a few years, never doing many missions but, this time, she’d been given a name. She was meant to kill an evil man, who had hurt many women. There was no justice to be had other than a knife.

  She’d journeyed into the city and sought the man out. He was easy to find, a traveling priest of some desert tribe. She found him sitting in a local tavern. He’d been in the city for a few weeks and had gathered quite a following. The main city of Pelloss had lots of desert people, most slaves. But they were allowed to worship what they wanted. She found him after a service, he sat along drinking a strange drink of fermented milk and something. It smelled terrible. She sat next to the old man in the tavern and smiled prettily at him.

  “I’m not interested,” was the first thing he said to her if he thought she was a whore he was an idiot she looked much too expensive for anyone in that tavern.

  She laughed. “In what?” she asked.

  “Conversation, lies, tricks, you’re here to kill me and I’d rather just go and get on with it,” he said and smiled with a tired grin. He had cracked broken teeth and kind eyes.

  “Am I now?” she said back, surprised. She hardly looked like an assassin. She wore a fine dress and looked like a rich trader’s wife.

  “You are and you’ll be the third this week, you Pellosi don’t like me much, so what’s the story. I see that look in your eyes, anger, what have I done to you,” he said.

  “You’re a rapist. You preach that women should know their place and you’ve left a trail of bodies in every town you’ve visited,” she said.

  He laughed back to her. “Ahhh sister of fury then. Yes, I have left a trail of bodies and many of them women but you try to kill me and I’ll fight back, if it’s a woman it’s a woman, rape not so much given I haven’t had sex in twenty years but enough lies,” he said and stood up. “I’ll meet you out the back of the tavern.”

  She finished her small glass of wine and watched him walk out the back. It was a lot harder given he knew she was coming but a job was a job. The problem was he was hardly what she thought. She believed him and they were taking him out for other reasons, she didn’t care she just didn’t like being a tool in someone else hands.

  Minsetta stood from her small wooden stool, straightened her dress and walked out after him. She looked and saw no one was paying attention to her and she pulled her dagger out from behind her back as she went, maybe she would just talk to him.

  As she stepped through the wooden door that led to the muddy street behind the tavern, she smelled his horrible breath. She spun fast and grabbed his dagger hand as it came down fast at her. He was hiding behind the door. She punched him hard in the face with the hilt of her dagger as she held his hand. She fought against his strength as he pushed the dagger closer and closer to her chest. They were pushed up hard against the wall and her eyes locked with his. She saw he was afraid and not angry.

  His dagger came closer and closer but she spun hers in her other hand and brought it into his stomach again and again. She felt the sharp blade plunge into him and felt the hot blood on her hands. His eyes closed and he slumped dead to the muddy street. She wiped the dagger on her dress and calmed her ragged breathing. She looked at the fallen man and felt nothing. Certainly no sense of right or justice. She was done with them. That night she’d gone back, stolen a few of their books and made her way to the Dark Guild who she’d heard of from her first lover. He was happy to have her back and to buy his way higher into the ranks of the Guild with her knowledge as his bargaining tools.

  “Where were you?” said a voice that startled her.

  Minsetta looked up from the wall where she was still resting and looked at the girl in front of her, Josette.

  She had no idea how long she’d be standing there.

  “You ok? I thought I’d have to rescue you” Josette said, and they hugged.

  Minsetta pushed herself free and started to walk with her away from the Keep. “I’m fine, nothing my new body couldn’t handle,” she said.

  “You have blood on your face, you should fix that before we get back”

  “You with the Bastards?” she asked.

  “Half of them,” Josette said back.

  “What happened to the rest?” she asked.

  “It’s a long story and we have a few miles to go so let’s get going”

&nbs
p; Chapter Thirty Seven.

  She smiled at him. He stood alone with the woman who was the Lucky Lady alone on the ship deck and she looked just like a normal person now. She spoke words and not thoughts at him and was actually smiling. He looked at her smiling face and smiled. himself.

  “What cheers you lady?” he asked.

  “You Northmen cheer me, you are so manly and useful. I really think I’ll have to get some temples in the North when this is over and if we win, and it’s seeming like we might now, it’ll all be down to you three,” she said.

  “Us three?” he asked.

  “You of course and your friends Grimm and lovely Goldie, all three of you are so good you just feel the path and run to it. I’ve never seen a people so willing to be guided by their instincts, you’re not about rules and history you just do what feels right and it most often is.”

  Seth felt a pang of homesickness when she mentioned Grimm and Goldie. It had been so long since he’d seen them and had left them on that battlefield. It seemed like a lifetime ago and the duke seemed like a nice foe compared to this new one.

  She laughed, reading his thoughts. “Let’s go eat,” she said.

  “You can eat?” he said.

  “I can pretend, it makes you comfortable if I do.”

  She took his hand in hers and it was cold as ice. They walked through the narrow wooden corridors till they reached the Captains quarters, which he knew well. They walked through the ornate door and he saw there was a feast laid out.

  “You’ll need your strength,” she said.

  Seth looked at the food and felt a hunger like he hadn’t in ages. He hadn’t eaten in days he realized, but hadn’t needed to until now. He ripped a piece of chicken from a full cooked one and bit into it like a savage. She laughed as he devoured it, as the food hit his suffering stomach his thoughts came back to his friends.

  “You know where they are? Grimm and Goldie?” he asked.

  “Of course, would you like to see them?” she said.