Kora slid over to the worktable and picked up a wooden round-shield, the planks now black with age. An iron shield boss sat in the center of the shield. “This is Fenyir craftsmanship, but the covering has been removed. Is this…”
Fioni joined her, laying her sword down while she took the shield from Kora, turning it over to examine it. “Where are the marsh-tick plates?”
“Gone. Burned—along with the map that Serl inscribed on them. Now only I know where Serina’s heart lies.”
“Kill him,” Danika pleaded.
Fioni glared at him. “Damn you, old man.” She lifted the ancient wooden shield above her head and smashed it down upon the worktable, shattering it and sending wood shards flying. The rusted metal boss came loose and rolled along the floor until it came to a stop near Kora’s feet.
Kalishni’coor laughed again, a long, evil cackle. Spittle ran down his weak chin. “She’ll have no choice when I have her heart. She’ll have to turn me, and I’ll live forever.”
Fioni picked up her sword and advanced on Kalishni’coor. “You’ve lived too long as it is.”
The blanket across his lap fell away as Kalishni’coor climbed to unsteady feet, shaking but still somehow standing upright. His robes slipped open, revealing the intricate blue tattoos that covered his skin, extending all the way down to his withered genitals, which hung like raisins. His eyes glared with malice as he raised his skeletal arms and began to chant, using his own voice once again. The chamber became impossibly dark, and the flames of their torches dimmed. The air felt oily with a foul presence that seeped into their pores, somehow feeling as if it could stain their very souls. Danika screamed. Owen slid away from her, took half a step toward the old man, and then froze. Everyone froze in place, including Danika. Only their eyes moved, darting about in helpless horror, the veins in their necks throbbing.
And then, hidden beneath her cloak, Sight-Bringer throbbed, sending a wave of heat coursing up her arm. Her fingers tingled.
“Hurry,” Kalishni’coor said to his great-grandson, still sprawled out on the floor. The old man’s arms and legs trembled. “I don’t have the strength to hold them for long. Kill them.”
The young man scrambled forward, gripped one of the warriors, and pulled him to the floor. He pried the man’s sword from his hand and, kneeling over him, ran the sword across his throat, sawing through it. The warrior’s legs twitched, and he gasped once before dying.
“Hurry! There’s a trapdoor beneath that table over in the corner. We can hide until the others sail away.”
Kory’ander Dey dragged himself to the next warrior—Kora—and gripped her leg, preparing to drag her down to the ground as well.
An ocean of fire washed up Danika’s arm, coursing through her. Her muscles quivered, and on trembling legs, she stepped forward, brandishing Sight-Bringer before her. Kory’ander Dey shrieked, dropped his sword, and scurried away from her. Kalishni’coor stared in confusion and then focused all his evil on her. His withered, clawlike fingers trembled in spasms as he began to chant again. The air around her became heavy with malice, but Sight-Bringer throbbed again, sending power through her body. She stood before him.
His black eyes grew wide with fear. “No…how…”
“For Vory,” she said as she rammed the jagged blade through his heart.
“And for me,” she whispered.
Kalishni’coor’s body collapsed, followed a moment later by the white-haired boy. Suddenly freed, the others rushed forward, and Owen gently pried the bloody sword from her hands.
“The other one’s gone,” said Kora, standing beside an open trapdoor. A long smear of blood led to it, like a snail’s trail. “He can’t get far on that leg.”
“Leave him,” said Fioni. “I’ve had enough of this damned place.”
Epilogue
Owen stood on the deck of Fen Wolf as it sailed away from the city of Daenipor. The sky, although it was still early morning, was dark with cloud cover, as was his mood. Lady Danika lay nearby, covered by a blanket, fast asleep. Gali sat beside her, her face expressionless, her hand resting atop Lady Danika’s brow. He watched Lady Danika’s face, nearly empty of color. Her chest rose and fell, slowly perhaps, but steady.
He looked away, back toward the pink Rose Palace still visible on the horizon. The shield of Serl Raven-Eye was gone, destroyed—and with it the map showing the location of Torin Island and Serina’s heart. Their mission had failed.
At least I can take her home. We can still warn the kingdom of Serina.
He made his way past the piles of plunder and the still-ecstatic crew to the rear of the longship, where Fioni conversed with Kora. Fioni’s gaze met his, and he saw the same disappointment in her eyes that he himself felt. She had achieved a great victory but had still failed.
No one can stop Serina now.
“Yes, Owen?” she asked.
He leaned back against the hull, watching her with weary eyes. “What now?”
“Now? Now we find somewhere safe to anchor, bandage our wounds, and decide what we’re going to do next.”
“Will you take us home, then, to King’s Hold? We can still—”
“We can’t go back,” Lady Danika said from behind Owen.
He spun about. She must have just woken. Her face was still pale, but there was a fierce determination in her eyes.
“My lady, we don’t have the map.”
She turned to Fioni. “You still have your great-grandfather’s journal?”
“I do. And it is detailed—anchorage locations along the coast, ocean and wave conditions, the sea creatures he saw. All of these clues would normally help us retrace his voyage. Eventually, we’d find Torin Island. The problem, though, is the fog. As soon as we get within the Feral Sea, we’ll be unable to find our way. And if I can’t see the sun, I can’t navigate.”
Kora straightened suddenly. “Fioni—”
“We have to try,” Lady Danika insisted. “We need to find Serina’s heart. It’s the only way to kill her.”
Fioni shook her head. “We’d run out of food and water long before we’d find the island. I can’t ask my crew to throw away—”
Kora gripped Fioni’s forearm. “Will you listen to me, for Wodor’s sake. We can find the sun—even in the fog.”
Owen, Lady Danika, and Fioni turned to stare in confusion at Kora.
“What are you talking about?” Fioni asked. “How?”
“With this,” said Kora as she removed half of a rusted metal sphere from a pouch on her belt. The hollowed-out interior of the sphere contained a handle for gripping. A hole smaller than an arrow shaft had been drilled into the top of the sphere, which was flecked with old paint, giving it the appearance of a giant eye.
Owen stared at it for a moment before he realized what he was looking at. “A shield boss?”
“From Serl’s shield,” Kora answered. “I took it.”
“Why?” asked Danika.
“You know my grandmother sailed with Serl?” Kora asked.
“I do,” Fioni answered. “A master mariner.”
“Not as good as Serl was,” Kora said. “When I was little, my grandmother would sit me on her lap and tell me stories about how Serl could find his way home no matter the time of year—or cloud cover.”
“We’ve all heard those stories,” Fioni said.
“Did you hear that Serl used his raven’s eye to find the sun?”
Fioni’s lips tightened. “That’s just his name-gift, given to him because he was so sharp eyed.”
“No,” said Kora, shaking her head. “My grandmother told me the truth, but I only remembered when I saw you destroy the shield. Serl’s name-gift wasn’t always Raven-Eye. The crew took to calling him that after he had his famous shield built.” Kora handed the boss to Fioni.
Fioni hefted it in her palm, staring at it. “The weight is…wrong.”
“Yes,” said Kora. “Serl painted the raven’s head around the boss, with the boss as—”
“Its eye,” finished Fioni. “The raven’s eye.”
“The handle unscrews,” said Kora.
Fioni turned the boss over and began to twist the metal handle. In moments, it came free, and Fioni peered inside. “There’s something in here, a crystal or a lens of some type attached to the interior.” She then lifted the boss to her eye and peered through it. She gasped, letting her arm fall to her thigh and staring wide eyed at a beaming Kora. “It magnifies the sun,” Fioni said, her voice rising. “I can see it clearly through the cloud cover.”
“You could see it even through the fog of the Feral Sea,” said Kora. “My grandmother claimed it was an Illthori relic, although I don’t know the truth of that.”
“Another Illthori relic?” asked Lady Danika. “That’s not possible.”
Owen stepped closer, his confusion growing. “What does this mean?”
Fioni laughed and gripped Owen’s face with both hands. Pulling him toward her, she kissed him long and hard before stepping back and flashing her white teeth in a beautiful smile. “It means—Sir Owen of Toscovar and Lady Danika Dain of the duchy of Wolfrey—that we sail north for the Feral Sea and Torin Island, after all. We’re going to find Serina’s heart and kill her!”
#
Kory’ander Dey woke from a dream of ancient catacombs and dark-red stairs that led down into darkness. As he jerked upright in his bed, pain shot up his injured leg, and he gasped in agony. His face wet with perspiration, he lay still. Just a dream, a nightmare. There’s no stairs, nothing waiting for me at the bottom of them. I’m safe.
Through the windows of his bedchamber, he saw it was night. He let his head fall back on his soft pillows. His bandaged leg continued to throb. He needed more red seed tea, but that fool of a court physician feared it might unhinge his mind.
He snorted.
What had transpired yesterday was more than enough to unhinge his mind. Never before had the Rose Palace fallen to an enemy. Never before had a Moon Lord’s life been threatened. At least the monster that had been his great-grandfather was dead and Kory’ander Dey was finally free of him. Now, he was truly the Moon Lord of Daenipor, beholden to no other master.
Free!
But he did need to urinate.
“Hello,” he called out, trying to see past the open doorway of his bedchamber, to his solarium, where he saw the light from a single candle flickering softly, casting moving shadows. No one answered. Where is that idiot physician? I need the chamber pot. Just for a moment, he thought he heard a soft sighing coming from his solarium. He held his breath, listening, but heard only his heartbeat.
“Who’s there?” he called out. “Guards. Guards!”
Someone must have picked up the candle, because the light began to come toward his bedchamber. Something is wrong. This is—
A woman entered, holding the lit candle with one hand while shielding it with the other. Her long blond hair was tightly braided, with chains and gems hanging from it, like a veil. She wore a flowing dark-green gown with silver and gold chains around her graceful white neck, a white fox-fur cape around her shoulders. When he saw the tattoos on her forehead—the same necromantic symbols of power that had covered his great-grandfather’s skeletal frame—and her all-red eyes, he fouled himself. Behind her stood a young warrior in ring mail, with short dark hair and thick eyebrows. He carried no weapons, but blood glistened from his hands and mouth, running down his chin.
The woman drifted closer, clearly not at all bothered by the sudden stench of fresh feces. She ran her long fingers across his cheek. “Such a pretty one, don’t you think, Dilan?”
The warrior opened his mouth, exposing his fangs.
Blood fiend. Blood Fiend. Blood Fiend.
“Where is Kalishni’coor? He has something I desire.”
“He’s… he’s dead.”
She sighed. “I thought as much. It seems I’m too late. My blood thrall is dead as well, isn’t he?”
His heart pounded, and he could barely breathe. “I…what…you—”
“Never mind,” she said, letting her fingers trail down his exposed chest. “What of the Dain woman?”
“Gone…fled with the Fenyir pirates.”
“The item they came for? This shield of Serl Raven-Eye?”
“Destroyed,” he said, swallowing hard.
Her red eyes tightened.
“Wait,” he urged, his voice breaking. “A map was inscribed on the marsh-tick plates, showing an island in the Feral Sea. My great-grandfather had a copy made. You can have it. I don’t want anything to do with it.”
“A map?” she said with a smile, now exposing her own fangs.
“Please,” he pleaded. “Just take it and go. It’s over there, on the table. Don’t hurt me.”
“Hurt you? Why would I want to hurt such a pretty boy?” She began to unbutton her gown and expose her pale white breasts. Her nipples were rosy and hard. “You’re going to be of great service to me, Moon Lord of Daenipor.”
Kory’ander Dey stared in horror as she cupped a breast with one hand and squeezed it, milking a dribble of pink fluid from the nipple to run down her pale skin.
“Now come. Drink mother’s milk.”
The Mouth of the Gods
Book 3 of the Vampire Queen Saga
Part 1
The Fist of Wodor
Chapter 1
Owen
“The Fist of Wodor, ho!” screamed the lookout at Fen Wolf’s prow, holding tightly to the wooden figurehead of a snarling wolf’s head as the ship climbed through the waves. Other crew members took up his sighting, repeating it down the length of the eighty-foot Fenyir warship, alerting the skipper that their destination lay ahead.
Farther back, his vision blocked by the large mast and its full, flapping square sail, Owen Toscovar balanced precariously upon the gunwale, one hand lightly gripping the rigging as he leaned out over the freezing water of the northern Promiscuous Sea. Although he looked much like the other men aboard the longship with his blond hair and newly grown beard, Owen was no ruddy-faced Fenyir clansman but a Kingdom of Conarck man-at-arms, sworn in service to the noble Dain family. Despite his mainlander origins, he had taken to seaborne life as if born to it, finding in himself an unexpected love for the sea. Ignoring the rushing waters below and the cold spray in his face, Owen watched the ship’s prow rise above the waves, revealing the towering rock pillar rising out of the ocean—the Fist of Wodor.
The Fist sat upon a towering rock formation the others had called a stalk, a pillar of weathered cliff at least a hundred feet high. Ages ago, the stalk had clearly been the far tip of the headland that extended out from the Hishtari coastline on their right-hand side—or steering-board side—but the never-ending onslaught of the waves had battered it free of the cliffs, so that it now stood as a tower of rock surrounded by the ocean. The summit of the tower flared wider, like the head of a war mace—No, Owen corrected himself, like a closed fist sitting atop an arm thrust into the air. The rocks at the bulbous summit even had the appearance of tightly clenched fingers. Owen swung back onto the ship, dropping lightly upon its wooden deck. No one back home in Wolfredsuntown would ever believe me if I told them of this place.
Fen Wolf rocked slightly as the longship’s prow swung to port, angling away from the Fist and the headland to maneuver around it. As the sun dropped below the cliffs of the headland and the shadows grew over the waves, he knew they’d need to find a place to beach the ship soon, or risk spending a night at sea. And, after weeks of sailing with the Fenyir, he well understood their unease with such a practice; what you couldn’t see in the dark could easily tear your hull out.
Lady Danika Dain, the last of her family and Owen’s new liege-lord, sat farther forward on a rowing bench near the ship’s mast, a thick wool blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Gali, the young Hishtari woman who had saved their lives in Daenipor, sat beside her, idly chatting away in her stilted trade common. The two women, equally out of place aboard the ship, had found comf
ort in each other’s company. Their discomfort wasn’t because of their sex—slightly less than half of Fen Wolf’s eighty-some crew members were women—rather, it was their mainlander heritage, which couldn’t have been more different. Lady Danika’s family was nobility and had ruled the northern Duchy of Wolfrey in the Kingdom of Conarck for generations, whereas Gali was a Hishtari pickpocket who had grown up on the rough docks of Daenipor, stealing to stay alive.
Watching them together, Owen was glad for whatever comfort Lady Danika could find. The brave noblewoman had lost everything—her father, her younger brother, and all her servants but Owen. Months ago, she and her brother had mounted an armed expedition to Greywynne Island in an attempt to recover a priceless heirloom, the magical sword Sight-Bringer, buried in the catacombs beneath the ruins of an ancient fortress. Instead, they had inadvertently set free a monster—Serina Greywynne, the Blood Queen of legend who had almost destroyed the kingdom a half century earlier. In the bloodbath that followed her escape, Owen and Lady Danika—the only survivors of the ill-fated expedition—had fled for their lives, pursued by Serina’s servants, the traitorous Greywynne Islanders. They had stolen a small fishing boat and headed out to sea with the shattered remains of Sight-Bringer, now only a white-stone hilt and a half foot of jagged steel. Fioni Ice-Bound, Fen Wolf’s beautiful but volatile redheaded skipper, had saved them. Serina had been pursuing them ever since.
He watched Fioni now, standing on the steering platform at the rear of the longship, her hand lightly resting atop the tiller, her short red hair flapping in the breeze. Fioni Ice-Bound—the dreaded “Red Wolf,” scourge of the shipping lanes that ran along the Fenyir island chain between the Kingdom of Conarck and the Empire of Hishtar. At her feet, as always, lay her massive wolfhound bitch, Ekkie, her long tail slowly flopping against the deck in a measured, happy cadence. Fioni was near Owen’s age, still in her early twenties. But where Owen was a simple soldier, the younger son of a horse-breeder, Fioni was like royalty among the barbarian Fenyir clans, the great-granddaughter of the legendary Fenyir chieftain Serl Raven-Eye and the daughter of the Waveborn clan’s murdered yarl, Taios Oak-Heart.
The Vampire Queen Saga: Books 1-3: (The Vampire Queen Saga Boxset) Page 56