by Chris Sharp
Auberon looked past the frame of rosebushes and vines, where the green hills rolled down to a stretched plain of tall grass that had been stained by a thousand battles over the millennia. Beyond, the mountain range, which had once seemed so vast, now appeared as only one dominant peak at the far fringe of the shrinking land.
He’d sent Muninn back there to observe the events that unfolded, allowing the bird to wallow in his ancient grudges, while his brother, Huginn, had again flown far off across the skies between the worlds. Despite the distance, Huginn had returned on time, as always, and delivered all the thoughts he’d collected that night.
Huginn had always been the more thoughtful of the brothers, dependable and ready with a keen observation about all he saw in his travels. He was Auberon’s window to the future, while Muninn was his key to the past. Muninn, the more capricious of the birds, remembered everything he’d seen for thousands of years as if he were still there in the moment. He was often lost within himself, late, and distractible. But Auberon was beginning to grow impatient with the lessons of history.
He turned from the window, letting his eyes move across the giant sword that adorned his wall and the monstrous four-clawed hand displayed in the jar below it. The hand was withered and gray, but the black blade was as sharp as the day it had been forged in the deep caverns of the fire giants at the dawn of a forgotten age. It was almost time for that famed blade to come down from its display.
Huginn croaked at his right ear with a familiar welcoming, and the King extended his arm just as the sound of flapping approached from behind. Muninn swooped in through the window and wrapped his black feet around the King’s wrist. The bird croaked a response to his brother as he hopped to his place at Auberon’s left shoulder.
Immediately, the string of all that Muninn remembered seeing from that morning flowed into Auberon’s mind: fallen trees and blood in the snow; wolves howling as the mightiest of the goblin clans was torn apart from within; the doom chant of a lost tongue while a hulking monster that should not have been walked with a trembling of the earth beneath his feet. A bad wind had blown across the mountain, and the name Slud was carried with it, driving, even now, down the slopes toward the lowland clans.
Auberon opened his cold blue eyes and smiled. So, a troll had lived through the culling on the mountain. This was unexpected.
Acknowledgments
As always with these things, there are many people who played a role in bringing this tale of despicably lovable antiheroes to life. I thank my early readers: Jamie Falik, Macon Blair, Peter Sharp, Ben Sharp, Marilyn Sharp, and above all, Lorna Campbell, who read it again and again with notes and encouragement every time. I thank Alex Sharp for playing goblin with me a couple Halloweens back, and being the impetus for the characters of Fixelcrick and Hairy Herald. I thank the brutal New England winter of 2014 for keeping me inside and angry; my agent, Allison Cohen, for not giving up; and the “always right” Jennifer Gunnels for seeing the wicked beauty of this warped tale and forging a home, and title, for it with the publisher of my dreams.
But the story of this book’s climb to the light is unfortunately tinged with morbid serendipity that I fear deserves acknowledgment, as well. After much rejection from the publishing world, I had the fortune of getting to sit down with the late, great David G. Hartwell at a writers’ conference in the summer of 2014. For forty-five minutes, he dispensed wisdom from his hallowed career in the business, and offered his willingness to read what I, and others in attendance, sent him. Months later, I heard of his untimely death. I thought that was the end of Slud’s chance for a wider audience, but it was his associate editor, Jennifer Gunnels, who discovered the book while cleaning out his desk—not her cup of tea, but somehow these characters got to her.
For this, I would like to dedicate this book to David G. Hartwell and Jennifer Gunnels.
And I would also like to dedicate it to the Macensky family: Ben, Alex, Margaret, and Sam. It was at your house that the hero of this story was first summoned up by the roll of dice almost thirty years ago. You offered me the space and time to fully immerse myself in the fantastical. You introduced me to D&D, Lovecraft, Paladium, Warhammer, Python, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd, to name only a few. I owe much of this story, and all the books I might ever write, to you, that house, and that era. Thank you.
Which brings me, finally, to the characters themselves. I have lived with some of them for a long time, and they’ve long since begun to take on a life of their own. It would not be wise for me leave them out of my most sincere, groveling thank you. To Slud, Agnes, Neither-Nor, and the whole twisted gang—I am but your humble servant. . . .
About the Author
Photo © Susannah Bothe Photography 2016
CHRIS SHARP grew up in the suburban wonderland of Alexandria, Virginia, where he cut his nerd teeth playing role-playing games and making gore movies with his friends. He studied English literature and anthropology at Brown University, and Mayan archaeology at the Harvard Field School in Honduras. He then spent sixteen years in Brooklyn, New York, where he worked in film and commercial production by day and was yet another wannabe novelist by night. His first novel, The Elementalists, is the first in a dark YA series and was called one of the “Overlooked Books of 2014” by Slate. Chris now lives in Concord, Massachusetts, with his wife, his daughter, and an insufferable cat named Goblin.
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Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Begin Reading
ONE: Witch of the Iron Wood
TWO: The Beast and the Flame
THREE: Crossing Over
FOUR: Neither-Nor
FIVE: The Unforgotten
SIX: Fox Hunt
SEVEN: Black Cloud Rising
EIGHT: Witch Way the Wind Blows
NINE: Call to Arms
TEN: Walk with Thunder
ELEVEN: Watchers on High
TWELVE: Drink Before the War
THIRTEEN: Elements of Surprise
FOURTEEN: Blood Pressure
FIFTEEN: Chop, Chop
SIXTEEN: Boom, Boom
SEVENTEEN: Hack ’n’ Slash
EIGHTEEN: Butchering Heroes
NINETEEN: Cloak and Shovel
TWENTY: Night Moves
TWENTY-ONE: All Keyed Up
TWENTY-TWO: Death March
TWENTY-THREE: Door Jam
TWENTY-FOUR: King of the Mountain
EPILOGUE
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright Page
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
COLD COUNSEL
Copyright © 2017 by Chris Sharp
Cover art by David Palumbo
Cover design by Christine Foltzer
Edited by Jennifer Gunnels
All rights reserved.
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ISBN 978-0-7653-9328-9 (ebook)
ISBN 978-0-7653-9329-6 (trade paperback)
First Edition: February
2017
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