by J. C. Owens
Table of Contents
Cover
Table of Contents
Acclaim for J. C. Owens
Look for these titles from J. C. Owens
Title Page
Copyright Warning
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by J. C. Owens
More M/M Romance from Etopia Press
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Praise for Taken
“Taken was my surprise hit of the year. ...[A] rollercoaster ride of awesome. Landon and Kirith are like molten hot lava thrown on your skin. Yes people, it burns so good.”
—Darien Moya for Pants Off Reviews
Look for these titles from J. C. Owens
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Taken
Wings 2: Dominion of the Eth
Wishes
Out of the Darkness
The Ice Prince
Betrayal
Tarsus
The Falling
Also as J. C. McGuire (M/F)
The Ascension (Book One)
The Gloaming (Book Two)
The Conquered (Book Three)
The Triumph (Book Four)
In Print
Taken
Wings 2: Dominion of the Eth
Wishes
Out of the Darkness
The Falling
J. C. Owens
Etopia Press
Copyright Warning
EBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared, or given away. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is a crime punishable by law. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded to or downloaded from file sharing sites, or distributed in any other way via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000 (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/).
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Published By
Etopia Press
1643 Warwick Ave., #124
Warwick, RI 02889
http://www.etopiapress.com
The Falling
Copyright © 2015 by J. C. Owens
ISBN: 978-1-944138-20-2
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Etopia Press electronic publication: November 2015
CHAPTER ONE
Brenaith ran, his lungs burning, each ragged exhalation hanging in the cold air. He gave a whimpering cry as he tripped, and his weary body hit the forest floor hard, a sharp rock slicing deeply into his left palm. The pain barely entered his dazed consciousness as the many aches of his abused body melded into one.
When he tried to get up his body failed him, and he lay there sobbing for breath, shaking with cold and fear.
His terrified mind screamed at him to get up, and he managed to roll over, pushing himself into a half-sitting position, his back against the trunk of a great tree. He let his pounding head fall against the rough bark and closed his eyes for a precious second.
Apart from his panicked breathing, the forest seemed soundless, barren, but he knew that had to be false comfort.
Somewhere close, he would be tracking him, enjoying every moment of the chase. There could be only one ending. His only hope was to find a way to end his life. He searched for a cliff, water, anything that would bring swift oblivion. He had so little time…
He cradled his injured hand against his chest. He was so cold the blood was barely flowing. If he just had more time, he could simply lie there and freeze to death, peaceful, beautiful.
A tear ran down his cheek, freezing as it went. A surge of anger drove him to heave himself to his feet and stumble forward. What use had tears ever been?
Sweet death. He wished he still believed in the gods, but such a comfort had long since been stripped from him. There was no one who cared enough to aid him even if he prayed. Certainly he had done so for five long years, and never had there been the least mercy. Whatever designs the gods had, Brenaith was not worthy of their concern.
He staggered along, searching the unfamiliar countryside for the smallest sign of a river, a cliff side…
The howl of a dog rose in the crisp air.
His breath caught, terror surging through him. They had found his trail.
No. Please, no.
There—ahead—an anomaly in the landscape, a hill, rocky and broken. Perhaps it would have a drop-off.
He forced his body onward, panicking as the earlier howl was joined by another, and then another.
“Please,” he sobbed as he reached the base of the hill, his body on the edge of collapse. Just a little further, he coaxed himself. Just a little more…
He cast a terrified look over his shoulder as the first black hellhound burst from the edge of the trees, reddened eyes fixed upon him.
He scrambled up the steep slope, blood on the rocks under his hands, uncaring now of anything, gibbering fear driving him unmercifully.
The sound of swift hooves on the frozen ground joined the baying of the hounds and drove Brenaith to a frenzy. He would not be taken again. He would not…
An odd, whistling noise gave him only a moment’s notice and his body was too slow, too…
The weighted ropes caught his legs, and he came down hard, his head striking the ground with a force that left him dazed. Blood ran down his forehead.
Then the hellhounds were upon him.
He screamed at the first bite on his leg, throwing arms over his head to protect the back of his neck as a second hound tore at his shoulder.
A harsh voice broke through the tumult, and the hounds immediately released their prey, going to their bellies in instant submission.
Brenaith collapsed utterly, cowering, crying now in great, gulping sobs, his eyes squeezed tightly closed as though he could shut out the presence of his tormenter.
He had failed.
The enormity of what this meant overwhelmed him utterly. There would be no mercy from Lord Stratlin, as there had not been for the last five years. Brenaith’s miserable existence would continue unabated.
A great, mailed hand reached down and lifted him up with terrifying ease, dangling him, half choking him with his own clothing. He refused to look up, refused to meet those cruel, red eyes in the dark pit behind the visor of his captor’s helm that would glitter with triumph and the thrill of the hunt.
Without speaking, his captor held him firmly, and Brenaith could feel those eyes burning upon him, their will suffocating his own.
Then he was carried ignominiously back to where the huge horse waited. His captor mounted with Brenaith still in his grasp, and set him on his lap.
Brenaith huddled into himself and started to shake as a mailed finger came beneath his chin and lifted his face.
“Look at me, Brenaith.” The command was
soft, yet with iron beneath the velvet tone.
Brenaith opened his eyes at last, his will weak compared to the one who held him. He blinked away tears, his trembling becoming uncontrollable as he stared into the depths of those dark, red eyes.
“My dear boy. I am hurt that you flee from my care. Have you not been my favorite from the beginning?”
Brenaith made no answer, only swallowed with difficulty, waiting for doom to descend upon him.
“I know you are grief stricken, but you must think, not just act. Now look what you have done to yourself.” Brenaith’s torn hand was turned palm upward and drawn to that smiling mouth, which opened to reveal sharp fangs.
A long tongue flicked over the wound, then probed, making Brenaith whimper with pain.
“Ah, your blood, my sweet one—never has there been another who tastes as you do. It is such a shame that your usefulness has come to an end. Still, gifting you to the sole remaining shadow knight will bring me favor and good will. To replace you, I will bring in more of your people to slake my hunger, more of those you and your little prince could not save. I cannot wait to see the despair when I announce your prince’s death. Who will they pray to now for rescue, hmm?”
Brenaith managed to shake his head. “Please,” he whispered.
The dark head bowed closer. “Please? For whom? Yourself? Or your people?”
Brenaith could not answer.
“I am saddened by your actions, my Brenaith. After you fled our bed…”
“It was not your bed,” Brenaith found strength from somewhere deep within. “You took me on my prince’s bed, beside his dead body, not yet cold!”
“Shh, my sweet one. It was to ease your grief, nothing more. But then you escaped the fortress, something you had sworn never to do.”
“My prince is dead. My fellow companions are all dead. There is nothing left for you to use against me. I care not for my word, I care not for my very life. Just let me die—please. If there is the faintest mercy in your soul, let me die.” Brenaith’s brief passion faded into numb despair as he saw the answer in that cold, hard face.
A smile slowly curved those cruel lips. “Oh no, my beautiful human. Your life is still worth much to me. The regard of a shadow knight is something I have long sought, and you shall be my key. I think you a worthy choice for him, the last of your royal companions, outliving even your prince. Such strength of will. You will do well with him. He admires strength, even as he destroys it.” He tilted his head, watching every nuance of Brenaith’s expression with eyes that glowed with anticipation.
“My sweet Brenaith. You think me cruel; you despise the very ground I tread, but when I gift you to the shadow knight, you will remember me with longing. I am nothing in comparison to him. I, myself, fear him.”
Brenaith caught his breath in ragged inhalation, his tear filled gaze caught and held by the truth in his tormenter’s tone.
“You shall learn the meaning of true fear, my boy. He will gorge himself on you even as I have, but he will take your very soul, possess you to the depths of your being. You have not yet begun to know terror.”
The smile widened. “Now, for your punishment. You should not have tried to escape.”
The claws extending through the tips of the gauntlets traced over Brenaith’s tear streaked jaw and then traveled down his body to tear at his pants.
Brenaith did not struggle as he was stripped, did not try to avoid what was to come. He remained pliant as his master turned him, forcing him to straddle those huge thighs, facing him. His eyes were blank, dull, and he stared into the distance even as he was pierced.
Only the faintest of gasps betrayed his pain.
Those hard hands held him like iron, as his master moaned with pleasure, shifting his hips so he pressed further within Brenaith’s body.
“It will be a long ride back to the fortress, Brenaith. A long, hard ride. Consider your folly as we go.”
Brenaith closed his eyes, bitterness rising to flood his being. Once he had been a royal companion to the prince himself. Once he had been noble, strong. A warrior. Once he had been free.
Now he was nothing but a demon’s whore.
CHAPTER TWO
Lord Stratlin’s threat to give him away did not come to pass with any speed. Several weeks had gone by, and still Brenaith waited, each moment seeming like forever, yet a blessing of sorts. With typical cruelty, the demon lord had imprisoned him in his prince’s room, where Tynan had died in Brenaith’s arms.
His prince, his beloved, though Tynan had never known Brenaith’s feelings. They were comrades—Brenaith was a beloved royal companion; that was all.
His beautiful prince—cast to the dogs. Stratlin had been only too pleased to tell him the fate of the corpse. Brenaith had nothing but nightmares about it, waking screaming in the dark, helpless to save Tynan, impotent, as he had been for the five long years they had been imprisoned.
Brenaith could not sleep on the bed, could only curl in a corner, shivering and dozing. That bed represented something he could not yet accept.
His prince could not be gone. His love could not be gone.
Tynan had always been the strong one, the one who kept the others going, who spoke of a time when they would be free again, safe, their country of Artepia repelling the demon invaders. There had been eight of them in the beginning. Strong and defiant. Seven royal companions and Tynan himself, captured at the Battle of Sorel where their country had fallen, where so many of their fellows had died.
Brenaith wished they all had.
But they had not, and in their imprisonment, Lord Stratlin had used them against each other, had made the companions give oaths of obedience to keep their prince safe even as he made Tynan watch their abuse.
It had driven Tynan mad by the end.
One by one, the companions had either died of their abuse or had gone mad and were given to the hellhounds, alive, as Lord Stratlin watched, as he made the survivors watch.
Why had Brenaith alone survived? He could not say. He had been the youngest of the companions, a mere twenty-one when he had been captured. Five long years of torment, yet he still lived, still breathed.
He wished he had caught the illness that had finally taken Tynan. How could his prince have left him? Could he not have at least given him the blessing of the illness before he died? Why could Brenaith not succumb to madness as the others had?
What great sin had he committed that the gods themselves left him to rot here without mercy of death?
Now he waited for more torment, apparently greater than any he’d yet endured, though he could not imagine such a thing. What he had been through seemed the limit of human endurance.
He distracted himself by sitting in the window, staring through the bars at the sunshine outside. Going deep within his mind, he created images, waking dreams of life before the demons, before death and grief and torture.
It had been a good life, before. He had been accepted into Tynan’s Companions, a great honor, something he had dreamed of all his life. And then, upon truly encountering Tynan’s kindness, his strong, humorous nature, he had fallen hopelessly in love.
Now all he had was memories, and he used them to create stories in his mind, beautiful scenarios where he and Tynan had discovered love and fought for it against all odds, always ending up with each other, happy and safe.
He had learned well to escape to the places in his head, where even Lord Stratlin could not follow.
He refused to think of what his master had told him, that the shadow knight would be able to pursue him even there. That was such horror as he could not contemplate. It could not be true.
He thought of his parents and sister. He envisioned their home in the capital city of Monton, saw the bright, cheery whitewashed walls of the houses on their street, the colored shutters and brightly painted doors. The warmth of the people and the ease of life in the rich city. The peace and prosperity they had taken for granted.
He kept the memories safe, blo
cking any thought of what would have happened to his kin, his home, after the invasion. He stubbornly believed that his master had lied to him through the years, that his country still existed, still fought against their oppressors. He had to believe there was hope, somewhere, even if it did not exist for him.
His attention returned to reality as he heard the great iron gates of Stratlin’s fortress grind open. Excited chatter among the demons awakened his curiosity, and he pressed forward against the ornate bars trying to determine what had his enemies aroused to such an extent.
Brenaith gasped and clutched at the stone of the window frame to steady himself.
A shadow knight.
He had only seen one before, during the battle, his great, winged helmet towering above the fighting, its silver wings glinting in the sun like terrifying beacons, the black sword that had slain not just bodies but souls. Here, closer, that black helm made his gorge rise, made his fingers whiten upon stone. Memories flooded him of that battle, of the unstoppable flood of demons that had overrun them like a great tide, a shadow knight and the demon lords at the fore.
He blinked, trying to bring himself back to a reality that seemed almost as fearsome as the past. The shadow knight’s armor was ebony with silver embellishment here and there that caught the sun, a small distraction from the unrelenting black of the rest of him. Even the helm itself was black, only the wings glinting silver. A large, black cloak covered him, sweeping back over the haunches of the stallion he rode.
Brenaith’s gaze dropped to the mount that bore the knight with such ease. Black as his master. A hell horse.
Eyes demon red, long, sharp fangs, taller and more powerful looking than any natural horse, it moved with a precision and delicacy of control that in itself was a warning. This was a rare, deadly creature, its kind bound only to the shadow knights.
His countrymen had learned of them only too well, some of them torn to shreds by the beast before they could even ascertain its presence.